by Abbi Cook
I stood in the doorway practically begging her to reconsider coming out that afternoon, but she wouldn't budge. Just a few months later, she was gone.
Tears well in my eyes at the reality that my sixteen-year-old sister didn’t come to me or Claire or even Tess instead of disappearing. Did she think we wouldn’t be there for her, no matter what she was dealing with? What could have been so awful, so terrible that it meant she had to cut all of us out of her life?
None of us have asked that question out loud since that day. I've thought it, but I haven't said it even to Claire. Asking that of my mother would only anger her more, and I wouldn't bother asking Tess. I doubt it would ever occur to her to think of Lauren’s leaving as anything worth considering. For as much as Lauren's disappearance has sent Claire into a tailspin of depression, it seems to have done nothing to my other sister. She performed her part with familial and perfunctory obligation for a few days after hearing the news, but since then I’ve heard nothing about her trying to comfort my mother or Claire. Since we barely talk, I never expected her to make any effort for me.
I initially thought she had been overwhelmed with sadness since Tess and Lauren were much closer than I am to her. But that proved to be wrong. She simply didn't want to be bothered, and neither Claire nor I have heard from her since.
As the favorite daughter, she can do no wrong. I'm sure my mother is perfectly happy with Tess's decision to sweep the entire situation under the carpet and move on.
The thought of forgetting Lauren makes my chest ache, so I take a deep breath, filling my lungs completely as I silently apologize to her for not seeing whatever it was that hurt so much she didn't think she could turn to any of us. It's little comfort, but it's all I can offer.
Wiping the tears from my eyes, I look around the room that used to be mine. I recognize its pale pink walls and wood trim and feel at home here, but as I try to remember anything that happened in this room, I draw a blank.
I have to be able to recall something that occurred here. A Christmas Eve when I waited for Santa Claus to bring presents. A thunderstorm that scared me so much I hid under the bed. A bout with the flu that kept me in bed for days.
But no matter how hard I try, I can find no memory of anything happening to me in this room. Nothing. How is this possible? I spent every night of my life here until I left this house. I've literally only slept in two bedrooms in my entire existence, except for the handful of hotel rooms I've slept in on vacations and on my honeymoon. Something must have happened to me here.
I close my eyes and struggle to concentrate, willing my brain to give up even the tiniest shred of a memory. I refuse to believe I can't remember anything about all the years I spent in this room.
Am I losing my mind? I'm beginning to wonder if that's the problem. One hit on the head and a short time of being unconscious, and now months later I'm blacking out over nothing, seeing things that aren't there, and forgetting significant parts of my life.
Then, as if a door opens in a long forgotten corner of my mind, a tiny piece of something begins to make its way to the front of my brain. A hiding place I had in this room. But where? I scan the room for any sign of it but see nothing.
Jumping up from the bed, I hurry over to the closet and fling the door open. I see nothing but a dozen wire hangers on the rod. One swings like some makeshift pendulum, but other than that, the closet is empty. My mother must have taken all of Lauren's clothes away. I run my palm over the wall on the left side of the closet but feel nothing indicating it's anything but a wall. I do the same on the back wall and the other side.
Nothing.
My brain must have been tricking me, but it felt so real when I finally had a hint of something I remembered in this room. I close the closet door and hang my head in defeat.
I am losing my mind.
Slowly, I begin to walk toward the door to leave. I'm going to have to go back to the doctor's and tell him what's happening. He's going to think I'm crazy. So will Adam.
My shoe catches on the area rug in the middle of the room, making me tumble forward. I fall to the floor with a hard crash. To push myself up, I press my hands against the floor and feel something uneven under them. Pulling the rug back, I see what I instantly recognize as my hiding place. A single floorboard a lighter color than the other boards around it makes the memory rush back as clear as ever.
As relief that I'm not going out of my mind washes over me, I press on the end of the board to make it pop up like it always did. Now it's as if I'd never forgotten this place under the floor. I lift it away to reveal my secret hiding spot. Inside, a single book I don't recognize sits along with a pen, so I pick them up and sit back on the floor to see what I left all those years ago.
Chapter Ten
Natalie
My fingers run over the deep blue cover of the tiny book, and when I open it, I see it isn't a book to read. It's a diary. I don't remember keeping a diary, but since I can't seem to remember much of anything lately, I dismiss that thought and flip to the first page.
I read the first few words handwritten so they slant to the left and know this wasn't my diary. This was Lauren's. Slamming the cover closed, I put the book back beneath the floor and her school ID falls out from the back pages.
Lifting it up, I look at the picture of her and smile. Even though we weren't sisters by birth, she looked so much like my mother and me. In her big blue eyes, I see all the hope she had for the future. God, what happened to her? Where is she now?
Guilt presses on me at the very thought of reading her diary. She intended for it to be private. She wouldn't have hidden it if she wanted others to read it, so violating that now, even with her gone, feels wrong. Closing my eyes, I try to forget that book. It was never meant for me to read.
Then it occurs to me. If I can find any answers about why she left, I have to.
Lifting it out of the hiding spot, I carefully open it again and turn to the first page. My eyes scan the page for a date, but she didn't include one. She didn't write Dear Diary either. The words just begin on the first line.
I won't do what she wants. I'm not going to let it happen to me. Everyone else may be powerless to stop her, but not me. She thinks I'm her pawn, a piece on her chessboard to move around as she sees fit, but she'll find out how hard this pawn fights if she tries to force me to do what she wants.
Her anger practically radiates off the page, and knowing Lauren, she was angrier in person. That passion of hers for so many things in life meant she’s always felt everything so acutely.
I can guess who the she refers to is. My mother. Not a day went by when the two of them didn't have at least one argument over something. I couldn't be sure what this particular fight was about, but I could guess.
Lauren had fought tooth and nail for the chance to go to college after taking the SAT in eighth grade and scoring in the top five percent in the country. My mother has never seen much use in a college degree. She doesn't have one, and she doesn't think they're necessary for females. After she took me out of school following sixth grade and brought me home to be educated by a private tutor, all of us were taught at the house, and according to her, we received all the education we could possibly need.
I have to admit I don't know if I disagree with her. At first when I moved out after Adam and I married, I worried I'd end up in social situations with people who were far better educated than me because they would have attended college, but I found the opposite to be true. Whether they were wives or husbands in our social circle, no one had read the classics like my sisters and I, and very few people knew much more than the basics of history, even American history.
So maybe my mother was right when she told Lauren that college would be a waste of time, especially at her young age. My sister disagreed, though, and from the moment her private tutor mentioned how she should attend college early because of those test scores, she began making plans to go to school at a local university.
At first, my mother sim
ply refused to allow it, but that didn't stop Lauren. She snuck out over and over to visit area schools. When she found out, my mother decided she couldn't leave the house unless she was with her or escorted by one of us.
Still, that didn't stop my sister from her plans.
It became a weekly problem of Lauren sneaking out until my mother finally gave in and said she'd allow her to go to school if my sister agreed to live by her rules. Lauren relented, and I thought she'd been happy. They still fought more than any of us ever had with our mother, but I just assumed that's what their relationship was. Then that day my mother called to tell me she found Lauren’s note in her room and I couldn't help but doubt everything I'd thought about them.
Had my mother begun pressuring her to quit school? Lauren talked about being a pawn and being forced to do something she didn't want to do. Being forced to leave school would make her write with the rage I heard in that diary entry.
I turn the page and see a second entry. This one is sweeter, more like the sister I knew.
This course is helping me understand so much of what I already knew. If I ever spoke up in class and told them what I've seen, they'd freak. Maybe it would give me a chance to talk to that blond guy in the back row. He'd probably just think I was weird because I know so much about it. I'm not weird, though, and if he gave me a chance, he'd see that. I'm not like these people. I'm not and I won't let myself be.
Maybe it was something to do with a boy that made her run away? I want to believe that. Maybe that’s where she is. If I could find out this boy’s name, then maybe I could find her.
I read through the next few entries that deal with disagreements with someone like the first entry and a handful that talk about school and some boy in her classes. None of it gives me any definitive answers about why she disappeared, and my emotions fluctuate between sadness that this is all I have left of her and guilt for what feels like prying into her private thoughts.
By a quarter of the way into the diary, I find an entry that sounds more despondent than any I've encountered so far. I cringe at the idea of her feeling so lost that she couldn't share her thoughts with anyone but this book.
There's a party tonight, but I'm not going. I'm expected to, but I can't. I just can't. This whole thing is so wrong. I should be able to make my own choices. I'm old enough to drive and smart enough to attend college classes, but in my personal life, I'm still treated like a child. I'm not, though. I know too much to be a child.
J. stopped me after class and asked me if what I shared is real. He had no idea. I told them next to nothing and still they sat there shocked with their mouths hanging open. If they only knew.
What was she referring to? What party? It couldn't have been a party here at the house. My mother hasn't had any in years. And who is J? She refers to him as he. Is he the boy from the back of the class she mentioned earlier?
I let out a heavy sigh. Reading Lauren's diary is like looking at her life through a microscope with a dirty lens. I can see it up close, but it's hazy and I don't understand what’s in front of me.
None of what happened makes sense to me. None of what's happening now to me with my memory loss makes sense either.
My shoulders sag from exhaustion. I don't want to think about my sister like this anymore. I just want to go back to thinking of her as a beautiful girl whose big blue eyes showed the world how intensely she felt her emotions. Now unless she returns, she'll forever be the one who ran away from all of us instead of that lovely soul who had such a promising future.
I think back to when she was younger and can't remember anything but the day she came to us. She was so tiny. I didn't know what to feel about her even as my mother beamed with joy at her arrival. My sisters had come into my world so quickly with Claire and Tess arriving two years before. I became the big sister of two younger sisters in a matter of weeks and then of three later. I didn't know why our family grew so quickly, and I didn't dare to ask my mother, who grew happier and happier with every new little girl she adopted. All I knew was what she said every time I got close to them.
"Remember, Natalie, you have to be gentle with your sisters. You're bigger than they are. You don't want to hurt them."
As her words ring in my ears, I realize that's a memory from when I was a child. I don't know how it came to me, but it did. I'm not losing my mind!
I'm not. It's just been a difficult few months. That's all. Emotional trauma can mess with anyone's head. I read that somewhere or heard it on some news show, didn't I?
If only I had someone I could share with about what I'm going through. Claire is in no shape to hear about anything I'm going through, so I haven't burdened her. My mother would simply dismiss my concerns and instruct me to talk to my husband. I don't know how Adam would react. He might call me silly, or worse yet, he might think I have psychological problems. Both those possibilities make telling him anything about this my last resort.
A noise outside the door startles me from my thoughts, and I stuff Lauren's diary and ID into my purse before I hastily replace the floorboard and pull the rug back over the area. Jumping to my feet, I hurry over to the door in case my mother is standing on the other side. I open it a crack but see no one, so I leave my sister's room and walk downstairs to say goodbye to my mother.
I find her in the same place I left her in the garden. Her expression is placid as she enjoys one of her great passions in life.
"Mom, I just wanted to say goodbye. I'm going to get going now."
She stops pruning her roses and looks at me with confusion in her eyes. "I thought you left a while ago. Where did you go?"
I hesitate for a moment while I consider whether or not I should lie to her, but I don't want to, so I answer, "I was up in my old room."
My cowardice makes me cringe. I don't call the room by its rightful name because there's no point in upsetting her once again. It's a lame excuse, but it's the best I have.
She doesn't ask why I would be spending time in a room I moved out of years ago, and we both know that room wasn't mine anymore. Still, I'm not surprised when she doesn't ask anything and simply moves on with our conversation.
"Well, be careful driving home. I think it's supposed to storm this afternoon, so I'm trying to get as much done out here as I can before the rain comes."
For a moment, I consider asking her if she knows about this J person Lauren refers to in her diary, but I chicken out. "Okay. I'll call you later this week. Call me if you want to talk."
A quick flash of anger rushes over her expression, but then after a moment, it's gone and she smiles once more. "Tell Adam I said hello."
Her mention of him brings me back to my original purpose in coming to see her, so I ask, "Do you remember that dress I wore the night I met Adam?"
She stops trimming a branch and nods. "I do. Why do you ask? What's with this trip down memory lane today?"
Unable to tell her the truth, I scramble to think of a plausible lie. "Oh, I was just thinking about it the other day and how much I liked the dress I wore that night."
As she cuts a single yellow rose, she smiles. "That was a beautiful dress. It looked perfect on you. I'm not surprised he fell in love with you that night."
The way she and Adam refer to that moment in time as if all it took was one glance at me in my white dress makes me feel like I'm playing a part in some fairy tale. They mean no harm, but it all feels so foreign to me now.
"Well, I'm going to get going. Bye, Mom."
"Would you like to take that dress home, Natalie? I think it's hanging in my closet. I can get it for you. I'm sure Adam would love to see you in it again. Maybe you could wear it for a romantic dinner for two tonight."
Forcing a smile at her not-so-subtle suggestion for a night of romance, I nod, curious now to see this legendary dress both of them have talked about in such glowing terms. "Sure."
"Follow me in and I'll run up to my room to get it. I won't be more than a few moments," she says as she rushes past me into the
house.
By the time I reach the bottom of the stairs, I see her walking toward me with a dress slung over her arm, but she must be mistaken. It's not white.
"Mom, I don't think this is the dress. It's the wrong color."
Irritated by my comment, she looks down at the black silk dress and then back up at me. "Don't be silly. I remember this was the dress you wore that night. Ask your husband. He'll tell you the same thing. Here, take it home and wear it tonight. He'll love it."
I open my mouth to explain to her that he said the dress was white but press my lips together to stop the words from coming out. How could I argue with either one of them? I don't remember what color dress I wore that night.
But why don't they?
Chapter Eleven
Alexei
I should be back at the office by now, but my encounter with Natalie Anchoff left me feeling restless. I’m not your usual businessman, so I don’t have to sit behind a desk and slave away on a computer from nine-to-five, but I should be doing something more than simply browsing some roadside antique store.
She acted different than I expected. I like that and I don’t. I’d expected some mindless Stepford wife by the way that asshole husband of hers talked about her. Actually, since he described her as little more than a pretty face with a uterus that doesn’t work like he wishes it would, I didn’t think she could be more than a Stepford wife. Yes, he said she was educated, but I’d dismissed that.
Now I know I shouldn’t have.
Natalie Anchoff impressed me, and not just because she’s more beautiful in person than in her photo. The problem is I can’t exactly say why. Our conversation didn’t venture into anything that brought out wit or sharpness in her, but something about the way she caught on to my bullshit line about chivalry shows she’s not just her looks.
On the other hand, getting out of her car and following a strange man to the side of the road just yards away from a wooded area tells me she’s far too trusting for her own good. But then again, of course she is. She’s married to a man who’s paying to have her killed, and nothing about her demeanor told me she has even a hint that’s going on.