by Gian Sardar
His phone rings, the station’s number on the screen. The first thought: it’s happened. A third victim. But then Aidan remembers it’s just early evening and every incident occurred at that moment when night hooks into early morning. The witching hour, he’s heard it called. “One minute,” he says to Abby, and heads to the pay phones near the restrooms, as if this is the only appropriate place to talk on the phone. Still he sees the curve of her waist.
“It gets worse,” Harris says. “Sarah Breining’s mother attempted suicide.”
“Fuck,” Aidan says, realizing too late he spoke too loud. A mother and son pass by the men’s room and the boy’s eyes go bright. Aidan mouths an apology, then turns to the wall.
“She thinks it’s her fault,” Harris continues. “If she hadn’t left Sarah’s dad, this wouldn’t have happened. He’d have busted in, saved the day.”
“I remember him, he wasn’t saving anything. Before I forget, the Marshall women, the pictures I saw of them were DMV. People look different for those. I want to see what they really looked like.”
“Sure. Listen, the mother’s attempt got people talking, and now we’ve got a reporter who’s not so interested in the integrity of the case.”
“When?”
“Tomorrow. Gonna go from bad to worse. Article gets graphic. Lips, tongue. All the details. Be warned. Nothing’s gonna be the same.”
Back at the table, their soup bowls are waiting and Abby’s got the green box open, holding up what looks like a bank ledger. “They were paying money. Or she was. This account’s in my grandmother’s name. Must’ve been after my grandfather left.”
“To who?”
“It’s blank. Just dates and amounts. The whole thing. Every couple of months, for years. The same amount each time.” She flips to the back, pages and pages filled. “It kept going. No wonder her money went.” She looks up for a second, then quickly back down. “That guy creeps me out.”
Aidan turns to see River Man, standing and unfolding his wallet. He selects one bill, lifts the corner of his empty plate, and wedges it beneath. Then he turns to the coat hooks on the far wall.
“I saw him once before,” Abby says. “At Applebee’s.”
“He’s okay,” Aidan says, watching River Man slowly put on a dark green jacket. “I see him at the river.”
“Oh. Well, if the river vouches for him.” She smiles.
Through the window now River Man stops beneath the awning to light a cigarette. The ember burns as he leans against the wall. Aidan searches the lot. Which car is his?
“Look at this. My grandmother sold a house in 1996. Where’s Morrow Lake?”
“You didn’t know about the house?”
“Not a thing.” She angles the paper toward him. Warranty Deed, written at the top in tall, ornate letters.
“Morrow Lake’s north,” he says. “Look at the sale price.”
A wrinkle forms between her eyes, and she flips the page over as if an explanation could be on the back. “A dollar. She sold it for a dollar. This was years before she died. No dementia, not then. What the hell.”
“The question is who she sold it to, and why. Who’s Eleanor Hadley? Why does she get a house for a dollar?”
“Wait, I saw a letter,” Abby says, and starts sifting through the pile. “Hold on. From Eleanor Hadley. Here. Same address. Morrow Lake.” She scans the page. “‘I’m sorry for what you’ve gone through. Some days are hard. I mourn Claire’s loss as well.’ She knew Claire.”
“We should see if she’s still around.” He’s about to say more—to see why she got a cabin for a dollar—but an old obituary, cut from a newspaper, has fallen out of an envelope and its photograph places a stillness within him. Pale hair that looks ivory in black and white. A young face, yet knowing. The page is cut from the newspaper and is missing the date.
Claire Ballantine, of 435 Lake of the Isles, has been declared death in absentia, having been missing since 1948. A victim of foul play from a robbery at the Ballantine estate, Mrs. Ballantine leaves behind no children. Her husband, William S. Ballantine, predeceased her legal death.
“Claire,” he says. He hands Abby the obit, watching as she reads the words. The next envelope is blank, empty, and he’s about to move on when he realizes there’s actually something inside. A little note, jotted in penmanship he recognizes as Edith’s, post-event, but even messier, as if she’d not had a firm grip on the pen.
“‘Claire,’” he says again, reading the letter aloud. “‘How I wish you were still with us. I stay on the left side of my house so I don’t see yours. But still I see the basement, and still I remember. Out of sight is not out of mind, I can tell you that. Every day I fear the police will come. I can’t live here. I can’t live at all.’ No address on the envelope. Written after Claire disappeared. More like a confessional.”
“The basement,” she says, processing something. “I’ve always—” She stops, pushing past whatever was in her mind. “My grandmother was paranoid. Always thinking someone was at the door, there to get her. There was a reason. I didn’t know. Was Claire killed in her own basement? Could my grandmother have seen it?”
As she twists noodles from her soup around her spoon, Aidan holds back his smile. “We don’t know what she’s talking about, if what happened in the basement had to do with Claire’s disappearance. Though the dates of the letters, the difference in her writing, all that coincides with her disappearance. I can look for the owner. Claire’s house. Get a number. You could go inside. A lot has changed on our end, but I can also look for her file. Or his. And this Eleanor Hadley—if she got the cabin in ’96 she might still be there.”
Across the table, Abby sets her spoon down. “You would do that?”
He nods. “When I get a chance to do it, it’ll only take minutes. I might have to say Claire’s your relative.” He motions to the obituary Abby still holds in her hand. “What happened to the husband, do you know? It said he died. He must’ve been young.”
Abby traces the type with her fingertip. “My mom said he hung himself in the basement. He never got over Claire. Could that be what my grandmother meant? What happened in the basement? Him?”
Suddenly the rain picks up, as if the sky’s been angered. He has to admit this is interesting. A house basically gifted to someone Abby’s never heard of, a woman gone missing, a robbery. Never will they find the answers—the past is too layered, too thick and unreachable—but perhaps that’s the lure. No one’s life hangs in the balance; people don’t need to lock their doors to ward off whatever happened all those years ago. “I’ll go with you to Claire’s house. If I can.”
For a moment she just looks at him steadily, and he knows she’s thinking of the boyfriend, if this is wise or fair. If she says no, that will be it. They might exchange emails. See you at the next reunion. Give me a call if you’re in town for Christmas. “I used to live near there,” he adds, as if this offering tips it to an innocent slant.
Finally she says, “I’d like that.”
“Okay. Haven’t had a full day off in two weeks. They’ve got to start staggering time off—not much, but our overtime cap’s been gouged. That and the only thing keeping guys awake is foul coffee and driving with the windows down.” He smiles. “So I can probably swing it.”
Then he remembers River Man and turns back to the window, but all that’s left is the rain.
12
Then
I KNOW WHO THIS IS. Sunday, hot even during the early shift, was achingly slow. Every time Eva stepped outside, the air grabbed and tightened and clung. The farmers aren’t happy and the litanies of complaints are endless—soybeans wilted, corn starting to curl, wheat crops maturing too quickly. All of Luven accepts it with guilt, as if the heat’s been conjured just for them, the hot breath of God’s anger.
Make it to Wednesday, that’s it, she told herself throughout the day. Till then
she knew William was inaccessible, captive with a wife who may or may not have discovered their affair. Hard to think of anything else until Gerry walked back inside, wiping the sweat from his face with a handkerchief he stuffed in his back pocket.
“I got news,” he said. “Eddie Parks. They found him.”
Eva’s breath wedged, stuck somewhere by her heart. Eddie Parks, missing three years, found. Only then did she realize she’d still been holding out hope he was alive. The weight of what he once meant to her pressed deep. “His mother, she knows?”
“Sure, where do you think I heard it from? Are you crying?” He reached for the crumpled handkerchief, but Eva quickly shook her head and wiped the tears with her thumb. “Well,” Gerry had continued, turning back to the kitchen, “I suspect he’ll come in here as soon as he’s back. That boy loved his chicken-fried steak.”
Alive. Eddie Parks was alive.
At home now, Eva tries to distract herself with thoughts of Eddie. On the floor by her dresser is a decoupage box filled with class photos, notes from friends no longer, funeral cards, some in Flemish, others English. The repository of things hurt. She opens it and finds a photo of Eddie and his little sister on the day of her First Communion. The last Eva saw of him, right before he left. In the background is the grove of elm trees, and within a second she’s found the one she used to climb. Would she still be able to? With age comes knowledge; with knowledge comes fear. Too much could go wrong.
But these thoughts are of no use. It’s William who lives within her now, a sharp radiance that can’t be ignored. Besides, it’s been years since she’s seen Eddie, and she’s witnessed enough soldiers’ return to know that he might come back in name only.
Just make it to Wednesday.
—
Sometimes she’s convinced she feels it—a fight between him and Claire. She’ll be working—scouring syrup from a plate, jotting an order that changes with every breath, or standing there, waiting for her food to be ready, always standing—when suddenly there it is, a shift in energy, a distant threat, a clamping on her throat. Of course there would be a fight. Every hour is a new possibility: him leaving his wife, his wife leaving him, him choosing Eva, him choosing his wife. Anything or nothing.
But by Wednesday it’s changed. The feeling has lifted to desperate, everything edged with panic, each minute spring-loaded. Today is the day. And though all she has wanted is for him to leave his wife, now she just wants things to return to the way they were. In the face of nothing, she’ll take something. Monopoly in the moonlight, hot, humid nights, dinners on the back porch. Bubbles and fogged mirrors. It was perfect, really, just subtract those days he’s gone. Nothing matters but him.
The bus ride to Rochester takes longer than usual. Scenery creeps, reluctant to let her pass. It’s getting dark by the time she unlocks the door to the little house and takes a seat in the living room. She’ll see him the second he pulls in, be waiting when his key turns the lock. In one move she’ll wrap her arms around his neck and her legs around his waist, throwing him off balance. Whoa, he’ll say, and laugh and dump whatever briefcase or keys or newspapers he has in his hands. Then he’ll swoop her up in his arms and kick the door closed. Never will seeing someone be such a relief.
She looks back at the clock. He should’ve been home by now. The yard has gone from dark brown to black, the driveway leading to nothing more than a faint trace of street. He’s never gotten home this late. Something is wrong. Now she knows it. Feels it in every inch of her body, as if she’s fluttering about inside herself. She won’t make it through the night. So many hours—dark, unforgiving hours.
The stairs creak in the silence of the house, somehow louder, as if aware that only one person is home, as if able to concentrate their sound for one set of ears. From the threshold of the room she stares at the bed, sliced diagonally by a shaft of moonlight. Fully clothed, she lies down and curls on her side, arm stretched to where William used to be.
13
Now
DREAMLESS. FOR ONCE. A sleep that carried her from end to end, a solid raft in black waters.
“What’d you do different?” Robert asks. Monday morning, soft light in leaves, the distant hum of a plane. “Why last night?”
“I don’t know. Maybe just lucky.” Abby stretches on the couch, luxurious with rest, then curls and faces the wall, the window above brightening in dust motes like a sprinkling of mica—fairy wishes, Aunt Emilia used to say. Beautiful. Everything. Amazing what a real night of sleep can do. Though maybe it wasn’t just the sleep, a thought tugging on her. “But I read some letters.” I spent the evening with a man who wasn’t you. “I have a game plan.” To see him again. She hears Aidan: You look beautiful like that. The way her heart slammed against her chest, it seemed impossible that others weren’t hearing it. “When’s your meeting at Warners?”
He tells her Wednesday, though they’re not meeting on the lot, but at a restaurant, and gives her the name of two producers, neither of which mean anything to her. “Look them up,” he says. “They’ve done some great stuff.” There’s a pause. “Abby, I saw it on the news this morning.”
For a moment she’s confused—the producers were on the news?
Robert continues. “Have you read what they’re saying? What he did?”
“Oh. No. I haven’t looked.”
“Well you might want to. They’re even talking about it here.”
But she doesn’t want to. She wants to stay in her pajamas, stare at a blank wall, and replay yesterday. Which she does. Over and over again. It’s strange, right alongside the heart-leaping feeling—that top-of-the-roller-coaster lift and flurry—there’s also something calming about Aidan, as if for years her view had been uncertain but just now it’s shifted to familiar. You know this place. She’s fallen right through the rabbit hole and once more is consumed with him—though differently, not just a crush, not fraught with teenage lust and a need for vindication, but rather a whole body-and-mind craving, like someone compelled to eat a certain food, not consciously aware of the reason for the demand but wanting it all the same.
Reason, however, has wrapped yellow caution tape around him, but deemed that thoughts are fine. She can relish in thoughts, bathe in thoughts, sink her feet deep into them. We all want the house down the block; we all wish we were ten pounds lighter. It is human to want. The problem is that in her mind she has already kissed him. He has already unbuttoned her blouse and she’s felt the warmth of his hand. They’ve gone grocery shopping and folded into each other watching marathons on Netflix, popcorn falling on the floor. Lust and life, all of it. And because her mind has taken her there, there is a part of her that understands she has already cheated.
And it makes her nervous, because this want is nothing like she’s known.
To think of something else, she goes to her mother’s computer and looks up the producers. A man with thick eyebrows and a woman, young, with sharp chin-length blond hair and pale skin, eyes lined in black. Sophia. A fitting name. Another picture is taken at an event, and a split in her dress reveals some of the longest legs Abby’s ever seen. She clicks on Filmography and takes in the names of two of Robert’s favorite movies. Stop. She closes the window and there, behind it, is an article her mother must’ve been reading just this morning. Abby sits back hard. The details, not just of the cases here, but also of the ones in Marshall—lips sewn, tongue cut out—are burned into her mind, and as she closes her eyes dark blood pools around twine, skin pulled taut. A knife sawing into a tongue. It’s only when the room begins to splinter that she realizes she’s not taken a breath.
Her phone rings, startling her. A Minnesota number. She recognizes it, though she hasn’t yet programmed it into her phone. As if he had sensed her panic, there he is. A lifeline. Everything surges within her as she swivels in the chair and hits Answer.
“So I have a large pizza. Pepperoni,” Aidan says. “Which is not ho
w I start many conversations.”
She smiles, still feeling the dark details behind her. “Sounds like you’re really hungry.”
“I’ve got about forty minutes. Working, but I’m close. We can go to the park. I have napkins.”
“I just read the article.”
There’s a pause. “I know, it’s graphic. I’m around the corner.”
Within minutes the gray sedan turns onto her street, windshield catching a stray bit of light. When he pulls into her driveway, he smiles through the window. This moment, so simple, disarms her, and in an instant the world and everything bad within it is gone. She tucks herself against the wall, where he can’t see, just to catch her breath.
Inside the car, she clicks her seat belt into place.
“Hi,” he says.
“Hi.”
She smiles to the window. Never has such a small word been so loaded.
He’s just reversed and hit the street when Brittany appears in her driveway, a garbage bin wobbling behind her. For once her face is without makeup and is remarkable in its unremarkableness. When she sees them, she angles her face into the light and shoots them a smile that’s in no way an indication of happiness. “Shouldn’t you be working?” she says to Aidan.
“I am. Late lunch.”
He’s wearing cologne, a scent that takes Abby to a forest, the end of a long day camping, sun and pine and smoke. For a moment, a cruel moment, she wants to ask what it is so she can buy it for Robert. A many-tendriled guilt spreads within her.