by David Bell
“Sure,” she said. “Did you talk to her?”
“The house was dark, and no one answered. The neighbor told me he hadn’t seen them, but that maybe her dad got in an argument with some guy in a suit earlier. Bizarre, isn’t it?”
His mom stood with the bottle of wine still in her hand. “What’s her dad like? You’ve met him, haven’t you?”
“Briefly. I guess.”
She put the cork back in the wine. “You guess?”
“I mean I’ve seen him. I don’t really know him.”
“And nothing about her mom?”
“She doesn’t talk about her. Never. And I don’t push. I figure someday I’ll get the story.”
His mom closed the refrigerator again and came back to the table with her wine. She seemed more focused on him, whatever fog she’d been swimming in when he first came home having lifted.
“This is all strange. I think maybe you need to stay away from that house for now,” she said. “You don’t know what’s going on. And if she asked for space, you need to give it to her. You don’t want to come across like a weird, desperate guy.”
Her words stung. A weird, desperate guy.
“Jesus, Mom. Thanks.”
“I’m not trying to put you down,” she said. “You’re young. It’s your first love. It’s easy to let your emotions get the best of you.”
Her words sank in while he chewed another piece. She seemed to be speaking from hard-won experience. And he knew on some level she was right. He’d been dating Tabitha for what? Three weeks or so? And what did he think was going to happen? They would stay together and get married? Have kids and grow old? But it wasn’t just about the relationship. He sensed something wrong, not with Tabitha but with her life. And she might be in danger or distress. Could he just stand by while who knew what happened to her?
“I think there’s something I need to tell you.” He swallowed. “I ran into Ursula in the park tonight. That’s why it was kind of weird that her dad was here when I got back.”
“What about running into Ursula?” she asked.
“Her friends started mouthing off about you. How you were the cause of what happened to Celia.”
“Have they done that before?” she asked.
“It happens from time to time. Just stuff they say in the halls at school when I pass by.”
“Are you serious? Do you want me to call the school and ask them to stop it?”
“Mom, easy. I can handle it.”
“It sounds like bullying to me.”
“Not everything is bullying, Mom. Well, I guess when Ursula tried to pummel that girl back in November, that was kind of bullying.”
“Her mother had just disappeared.”
“Sure, Mom, I get it. Well, here’s the thing, and you’re not going to like it,” Jared said. “They started mouthing off, and I got mad. So I told them the truth. I told them that I was the one who made you late that night. And why.”
For a moment, his mom remained calm, and Jared thought—hoped—it would be one of the many times she took bad news in stride, let it roll off her back like nothing. He hoped the wine would make a difference as well. Maybe the wine combined with the end of a long week would keep her mellow.
But her eyes opened wide.
“Tell me you didn’t,” she said.
“I lost my cool. It just came out. I don’t want people to think the worst of you. I deserve a share of the blame.”
A flush rose in her cheeks, and it wasn’t from the wine. She was pissed. She slammed the wineglass down on the table, making the liquid slosh up the side like waves on a storm-tossed ocean. Jared was surprised it hadn’t broken. “Dammit, Jared. I asked you never to say anything about that. To anybody. I lied to the police. Do you understand that? I told the police a different story to keep you out of it. I said I was just a dumb-ass who was running late because I couldn’t find my keys and my phone. I could get in a lot of trouble for that. And then once that starts to spread and everybody knows . . .”
“It was just Ursula and a few of her asshole friends.”
She gave him a withering look. “‘Just Ursula’? The biggest pain in the ass in town.”
“I thought you liked her. You felt sympathy for her.”
“I do. And I liked her more when she was a sweet kid. Not a nasty teenager. And those other kids . . . They could tell their parents or anybody else—”
“Okay. I get it. I’m sorry.” He held his hands out like a televangelist beseeching the crowd. “You know, most parents would like it if their kid stood up for them. And most parents would like it if their kid decided not to tell a lie.”
His mom studied him for a moment, her cheeks even redder. “I’m done with you for the night.”
She grabbed her wineglass and left the kitchen.
CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR
Jenna and Jared circled each other warily that weekend. Neither one mentioned the tension between them, and neither one apologized. They both did their own thing and passed by each other like roommates, answering each other’s questions with grunts, politely informing the other person where they would be.
Jenna spent most of her Saturday with Sally. In the afternoon they went shopping at the small mall in Hawks Mill. Sally needed to buy a dress for a wedding she was attending, and she wanted to bring Jenna along as an extra set of eyes.
“You’re younger than me,” Sally said. “You can keep me from looking like the bride’s grandmother.”
That evening, they met up with some friends from their book club at a Mexican restaurant. They all ordered giant margaritas and fried ice cream, and Jenna made a point of not saying anything about Ian or Celia or Reena Huffman. To their great credit, her friends didn’t bring it up either.
While they drank and talked and laughed, Jenna was also aware of where Jared was. He told her that morning that he and Syd and Mike were going to a movie—some horror movie they’d all been hearing about for weeks—and then they were heading back to Mike’s house to play video games and hang out. Jenna knew Mike’s parents and had been to their house on numerous occasions to pick Jared up or drop him off. They were attentive parents, and even though Mike was already developing into a bit of a smarmy smart-ass, she trusted them to keep an eye on the boys while she went out.
She told Jared, as she always did, to text her if he went anywhere else.
Jenna returned home around eight thirty and started reading a book. Her reading habits had changed as soon as Celia disappeared. She used to read mysteries and thrillers, books about serial killers and disappearances, but she quickly found she couldn’t stand to experience those kinds of stories anymore. She’d taken to reading historical romance novels, dramas that ended with the man and the woman riding off into the sunset together, all their troubles behind them. Just a few months earlier she would have laughed if someone suggested she read something like The Stranger Carried Me Away or The Knave Who Stole My Heart. That night, waiting for Jared to come home, she read the last fifty pages of one of them and ended up getting a little teary-eyed when the hero and heroine finally got together.
“God,” she said out loud, “what’s become of me?”
Jared returned home just after nine. He told her that Mike’s dad had given him a ride, and then he started for his room as if he couldn’t wait to get away from her.
“Do you want to watch a movie or something?” Jenna asked.
“I already watched one today,” he said, and kept on going.
His words had some bite to them, but Jenna shrugged them off. She knew she couldn’t take a teenager’s mouthing off personally, and she remembered the awful things she’d said to her parents while she was growing up. What goes around comes around, her mother always told her. Someday you’ll have kids of your own.
Indeed.
She went to bed early.
She spent Sunday cleaning while Jared studied in his room. He emerged from his sanctuary from time to time, helping with the laundry and carrying the garbage out to the curb, but otherwise they remained in their mutually imposed détente.
Jenna knew she shouldn’t have lied to the police. And she shouldn’t have asked Jared to keep a secret. She never wanted either one of them, especially Jared, to get into the habit of lying, even about the most inconsequential thing. But she made her decision early on and felt she had to live with it. She wanted to protect Jared from the kind of scrutiny she had endured in the wake of Celia’s disappearance. Maybe he’d thank her for it later.
On Sunday night, after the laundry and the cleaning were done, Jenna didn’t feel like reading. She’d finished her latest romantic adventure and wasn’t quite ready to start a new one. She faced another week of work and liked the idea of giving her brain even more of a rest than a romance novel could provide. So she turned on the TV, making a conscious choice to avoid any channel that carried anything resembling news. She didn’t want to come across some weekend host offering their half-baked opinions on Celia’s affairs or Jenna’s lies about them.
She settled on a nature show, something about hippos wallowing in the middle of Africa. But just like with the romance novels, she found herself tearing up when they showed a mother hippo with one of her calves. What’s wrong with me?
And then Jared came into the room, throwing himself into a chair. He propped his feet up on an overstuffed ottoman and stared at the screen.
She saw his presence as a peace offering, a gesture of reconciliation.
“What’s this?” he asked.
“Hippos.”
“Cool.”
“Do you want to change it? I’m not really paying attention.”
He held out his hand and she tossed him the remote.
“But no news,” she said. “I don’t want to see my face or hear my name.”
“Neither do I,” Jared said. And then he laughed. “I mean on the TV.”
“Nice.”
He flipped around carefully, skipping the channels that might show news or crime stories. Jenna watched him and tried to sound casual.
“I Googled Tabitha yesterday,” she said. “Just curious.”
“There’s nothing there, right?”
“No. But that’s not so unusual. She’s young.”
“Did you Google me?” he asked.
“Yes. For comparison. And Syd and Mike.”
“And?” he asked.
“You all came up for something. But not Tabitha.”
“Weird, huh?”
“Yeah. A little. I tried her dad as well. Also nothing, but there are a lot of Edward Burkes. Do you know her mom’s name?”
“I don’t. I never asked.”
“But they’re separated, is that it?”
“It seems that way.”
“And her mom still lives in Florida? Is that where you said she was from?”
“Mom, do you know that my answers to these questions aren’t going to change? I said I don’t know anything about her mom.”
“I hear you.”
Jared didn’t seem to want to say more, and she felt relieved. He surfed some more and then settled on a show about the life of JFK.
“Is this okay?” he asked.
“Sure. Just don’t expect a happy ending.”
“I know what happens,” he said.
Together they watched, and Jenna felt somewhat normal again.
CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE
During lunch, Sally came into the break room and informed Jenna she had a phone call.
“Here?” Jenna asked. “Did they say who it was?”
“No, but it’s a guy. He sounds kind of formal. Maybe it’s Manuel, the waiter from Saturday night. I could tell he liked you.”
“He was what, seventeen? And gay?”
“He had to be twenty-one. He served us margaritas. Line three for your mystery call.”
Jenna stepped into the records room. Jared would have called on the cell or texted if he had a problem. So would the school. She picked up and pushed the flashing light. “Hello?”
“Hi, Jenna. It’s Ian.”
She would have recognized the voice even without his identification. It took her a moment to answer. “Oh, hi. Is something wrong?”
She assumed there had been a break in Celia’s case, something Ian needed to let her know about.
“No, nothing’s wrong. And I would have called your cell or something, but I don’t have it. I just knew where you worked and figured you’d be there on a Monday afternoon.”
“I’m here. I’m pretty much always here.”
“And I don’t want to take up a lot of your time. I just wanted to tell you I’m glad we talked on Friday. You were right at lunch that day when you said I should have spoken to you sooner and given you a chance to say whatever you needed to say.”
“Okay. Thanks.” Jenna kept her voice low. Even though she’d pulled the door to the records room closed behind her, coworkers and patients passed by talking and laughing. “I wasn’t up nights worrying about that. In the big picture, how I feel or what we talk about isn’t the most important thing.”
“But maybe it is in a way. It helped me, talking to you. Sure, Ursula and I have a bond and a relationship to Celia. But it’s nice to talk to another adult who knows her as well as you do.”
Jenna remembered the feel of his hand against hers, both in the restaurant and then in her kitchen. Had he really been caressing her skin with his thumb that night? Or had she imagined it, like a foolish schoolgirl? Either way, the memory of the touch made every nerve end in her body tingle. And as soon as she realized that, she told herself to make it stop.
“I wish we could talk about the good things,” Ian said. “All we’ve talked about is this awful stuff. This stuff that has blindsided us. When Celia disappeared, it felt like I’d been hit by a truck. And now this news of the affair . . . it feels like I got hit by another truck.”
“Or kicked in the balls?”
Jenna cringed. Had she said too much?
Ian laughed a little. “Right.”
Ian never seemed like the kind of person who needed sympathy, but what else could she say to him? “I’m sorry.”
“No, it’s good. Let’s just make sure the next time we talk, we focus on something else. Maybe we can involve Ursula like we talked about. She’s at an age when she’s going to want to know what her mom was like as a teenager. Who better to tell her, right?”
“You know, Ian, I haven’t stopped thinking Celia can tell Ursula herself. I—”
But she stopped herself. She wasn’t sure if she believed the words coming out of her own mouth. And she didn’t want to sound completely fake.
“It’s okay, Jenna,” Ian said. “We all know where we stand.”
A silence settled over the call, so Jenna broke it by giving him her cell number. “Call me or text me if you want to share those good memories with Ursula. Or anybody else. I think you’re right. It would be a good thing.”
“Sure.” He paused. Jenna heard someone talking in the hallway. Then Ian said, “It’s been good reconnecting with you, Jenna. It’s, well, it’s a part of the past that had been shut off for a while.”
“You’re right,” she said. When she hung up the phone, her hand was shaking.
• • •
She walked out with Sally at the end of the day, both of them moving slowly, tired from a busy Monday.
“So, who was your mysterious caller today?” Sally asked.
“Oh.” Mention of the call made her feel guilty, even though she wasn’t sure why. She’d spent the day thinking about Ian a lot. The two times their hands touched, the desire to reconnect and share old memories. Wasn’t that a perfectly normal thing to do when so
meone . . . “Just a friend.”
“‘Just a friend’? Just a man friend? Why so defensive? Do you say that about me? ‘Oh, that’s Sally, she’s just a friend.’”
They stopped by Sally’s car, a black Jetta. Sally leaned back against the trunk as if she had all the time in the world.
“It’s Ian.” Sally didn’t react. “Celia’s husband.”
“Oh, I get it.” A knowing look spread across Sally’s face. “You’re worried what it looks like if you two start buddying up.”
“We’re not buddying up. We’re old friends too.”
“I thought he was such a stick-in-the-mud. Didn’t you always refer to him as Mr. Uptight or something like that?”
“He is like that now, but he wasn’t always. In high school he could be funny. He partied like anyone else at times. He has a warmer side.”
“So did Celia, apparently. I saw that stuff on the news over the weekend.” Sally studied Jenna, waiting to see if she wanted to talk. When she didn’t say anything, Sally said, “I’m sorry you got dragged through the mud again.”
“It’s fine. I just didn’t know my best friend as well as I thought I did.”
“Hey, who knows anyone as well as they think they do? Derrick, my oldest, he called me over the weekend. His whole family is converting to Catholicism. The whole family.”
Jenna was only half paying attention. She saw her conversation and contact with Ian through Sally’s eyes, through the eyes of anyone else in town. No, it might not look right, even if they were old friends. Even when things with Marty were at their worst, their most unfulfilling, she never cheated. Not that she had a lot of choices as the stay-at-home mother of a four-year-old boy. But how far she’d come, how much more confidence she possessed about her own place in the world.
“Do you have time for a drink?” Sally asked.
Jenna came back to the conversation. “A drink? No, I should get home. Jared and I had a rough patch over the weekend. I feel like I should be there. And his girlfriend dumped him.”
“No way. That little bitch. And after she mounted him that way? Got him all stirred up?” Sally offered a sympathetic smile. “Those poor boys. They never talk about their feelings, but when they get hurt, look out. There’s a well of emotion just waiting to come out.”