The Girl in the Headlines

by Hannah Jayne

  I stepped back, terrified, the receiver hanging down like in some old-school horror movie.

  Dave and Rita were trying to hold me prisoner.

  No.

  I sucked in a deep breath. The Midnight Inn probably didn’t pay much, and no one had a landline anymore. It could be perfectly innocent, because everyone had a cell phone and a computer.

  A computer! I felt my spine straighten, a thousand-pound weight lightening just slightly but enough to feel a tiny bit of freedom. I stared out the front windows, cocking my head, listening hard for the sound of gravel on tires, an engine rumbling in the distance, but there was nothing. And I thought again about where I could be, how far out Rita and I had traveled last night, but my head was buzzing, a hornet’s nest of emotions pinging off my skull. Was Dave going to kill me? Was Rita even involved? Did Nate call the police? Is this all some horribly timed coincidence and Jerry was laughing all the way to the bank?

  “Focus!” I said out loud, shaking my head. “Where would she keep her computer?” There wasn’t any other furniture in the living room-kitchen area save the round dining room table, the couch, an easy chair, and that little coffee table, but I scanned anyway, looking under the couch and in all the crevices where someone might deposit their laptop. My mom was notorious for leaving hers under the couch when she worked late at night.

  My stomach tightened. My mom was my mom. Rita was my birth mom. There was an absolute difference that I didn’t think could ever change.

  I padded my way down the hall, studying everything as though there might be a massive clue, a beckoning cell phone or an iPad queued up to FaceTime. At the end of the hall was Rita’s closed door, and I glanced over my shoulder to make sure they were still gone, then clicked the knob, feeling like I was violating this tiny shred of trust we had been developing.

  She gave you a place to stay and a bologna sandwich, I scolded myself. It’s not like she saved you.

  I stepped into the bedroom, where I was surprised the bed was made, the comforter pulled over the pillows just like at the Midnight Inn. I almost expected to find a chocolate on the pillow, and my stomach fluttered, remembering the one I had gobbled down. I didn’t dare turn on the lights, even though the curtains were drawn and the room sat in a quiet dimness; I would look for a cell phone or laptop and then take off. I rummaged through the matching nightstands, but there was nothing except a half dozen lighters, a few empty packs of cigarettes, and a few ballpoint pens with the Midnight Inn logo emblazoned on the side. I stuck one into my jeans pocket, then checked under the bed and in the top drawer of the dresser. There was nothing obviously wrong about the room, but something still nagged at me.

  It was the clock.

  A garish, ugly diner clock with a thick black face, white numbers, and the words Time’s Up! painted in an arch across the top.

  Tim Esup.

  Dave and Rita. They kidnapped me. They dumped me in a horrible motel. They had Josh. They did this.

  A slow, hot panic spread through my entire body.

  I have to get out of here.

  I opened the closet door and rifled through a couple of discarded purses, a stack of sweaters, and then a duffel bag. I stopped when my hand ran across something hard and cold. I lost my breath and smiled like an idiot.

  “Cell phone!”

  But my hand didn’t close around the smooth length of a phone. I peered into the bag and pulled my arm out, my mouth dropping open.

  I was holding a gun.

  Forty-Four

  I had never even seen a gun, and now I was holding one in my shaking hand. It was cold steel and heavier than I thought it would be, with a black rubber grip and a short barrel I knew enough to point away from me. There were bullets in the duffel too, bright little blue and yellow boxes, and I thought they should be much more serious considering what they were used for: skull and crossbones or DANGER: DEATH! all over. My heart was still thudding in my chest, and I could feel my throat start to close up, my breath ripping from my lungs.

  “Breathe, breathe, relax.” But the attack was coming even as my mind was reeling, a thousand thoughts crashing into one another: Was this the gun used to murder my father? Was it just a normal gun, because people were allowed to own guns? Was this the gun they were going to use to kill me?

  No.

  I couldn’t put Rita in that scenario. She was a mom, and I was her kid, in blood if nothing else. But Dave was my dad…

  And a felon. Checking in with his parole officer. Peeing in a cup. And felons weren’t allowed to own guns.

  I laid the gun down gently in the duffel, suddenly sure it would explode or shoot if I touched it anymore, certain that it was loaded with bullets just waiting to be lodged in my head.

  I sucked two puffs of my inhaler and tried not to look at the gun in front of me that sped up my heartbeat once again.

  I have to get rid of it.

  Dave couldn’t kill me if he didn’t know where the gun was, right?

  But is this the only one in the house?

  I doubted he could go to court or the police station or wherever with a gun in his pocket, and in that same instant, every piece of clothing and luggage stuffed into Rita’s closet seemed menacing, seemed like it was the housing for everything from crossbows to cannons.

  My racing thoughts were cut by the low hum of an engine, gravel being spit out by tires. I gingerly but quickly picked my way across the hall and stashed the duffel as far under my bed as I dared. I briefly thought about what would happen when Dave figured out that his gun was missing but just as briefly prayed that it would never get to that and if it did, it would be an issue between him and the police.

  I ran into the living room and peered out the window. I could see the maroon van coming up the gravel drive and making its way to me.

  Weapon. I needed my own weapon.

  I rifled through the kitchen drawers, hoping for a pair of scissors, a knife that was suitable for cutting more than just butter. For being a professional housekeeper, Rita was a terrible one at home; every drawer was filled with crap: papers and matchbooks, stubby pencils and rubber bands. I grabbed a handful of pages and paused, a series of numbers catching my eye.

  Five hundred. 500, 500, 500. Dates. The letters DRM.

  “Dave and Rita Mondale,” I whispered. “My parents were paying Dave and Rita.” I wanted to crumple, to throw up, to stop and pore through every document, but the car was coming closer. Instead, I snatched the statements and ran into my bedroom, panicked, looking for somewhere to hide them. I heard the car tires come to a halt, muffled voices as Rita and Dave slammed their car doors. I tried my best to scan the pages, hoping they proved something significant. Why were my parents paying Dave and Rita off?

  “To keep us from getting to you.” Dave’s voice echoed in my head, and the words swirled in front of me. Were the McNultys really trying to keep me away from my birth parents? Why would they do that if they weren’t even willing to adopt me? Dave had said he and Rita weren’t willing to give up their parental rights. A niggle of rage went through me. Because they truly wanted me back, or because they couldn’t be bothered to sign the paperwork? Did my parents even ask? Did the McNultys really want me?

  I thought of my parents, my sweet parents who still came in and kissed my forehead at night, my mom who still made me lunches and wrote notes on my bananas, my dad who came to every field hockey game and ballet performance, screaming like an excited banshee whether the performance called for it or not. I rubbed my temples and pinched my eyes shut. There was way too much information to sift through, too many things to look at, scrutinize, understand. I thought of all those years with my parents, my normal life, and birthday parties—and birthday parties.

  I thought of that party where Rita and Dave showed up. They didn’t say anything to me, didn’t even wave or make eye contact, except for Dave while I cowered under the tab
le. I remembered my dad jogging over to them, his arms gesticulating as he talked to Rita, my mother hanging off to the side. But she went over too. She went over to Rita, I remembered that. Rita handed over the gift, and my mother handed her something back. A check? That was when Dave pulled back the tablecloth and spoke to me. And then they walked away.

  But…there was a physical ache in my head, and pictures flashed in front of my eyes. Balloons. Pink balloons at my ninth birthday party. Too-bright sunlight. Lynelle and…multicolored balloons. A vase of roses on table. My mom and dad. Josh. I sat down hard.

  I was remembering.

  It was hazy when I came in the front door, and it was oddly quiet in the house. There was no one in the kitchen even though the table was set with my parents’ wedding china. My mom used if for any occasion deemed even remotely special. There were balloons tied to my chair. A vase full of hot-pink roses and white baby’s breath at the center of the table. A construction paper sign with the words you look like a monkey and you smell like one too crayoned across it. There were no presents, because I had gotten my phone the week earlier, and Josh had dumped his gift on me when he woke me up in bed. I smiled at that, remembering the oddly wrapped gift—more tape than wrapping paper—and Josh screaming, “I picked it out myself.” It was the hoodie that I was wearing.

  I tried to go back into the memory, into the house. I opened the door again, looked at the celebratory setup in the kitchen, and this time, I remembered… Soft voices. Unfamiliar.

  In my mind, I held onto the gauzy memory with delicate fingers. I told myself to walk, to follow the voices, and my memory obliged. They were in the formal living room, the room we sat in on Christmas or when fancy people from the university or mom’s colleagues came over. But the people Mom and Dad were talking to weren’t fancy. A skinny woman with long, dark hair shot through with silver. She was wearing a short dress that showed off her knobby knees and sitting across from a big, gruff man. My eyes flew open.

  Rita and Dave!

  Rita and Dave were at my house on my birthday, talking to my parents, and I saw them. I remember the breath piercing my chest. I remember the shock and disbelief and fear that started bone deep. I saw myself stumble backward, Mom jumping to her feet and steadying me while Rita sat there and blinked. I remembered her smell, heady with the garlic from the manicotti she was cooking, and I could almost feel the weight of her hands on my arms. My mom’s voice was at my ear, warm breath on my cheek. “It’s going to be okay, hon. If you don’t want to see or talk to them, we’ll get rid of them and have your party.” I know my mother smiled conspiratorially, but I don’t remember if I smiled back or said thank you or talked to Rita and Dave. But I did remember thinking how odd the four of them looked, Rita and Dave lounging in their chairs as if they were at home, my parents sitting across from them on the white couch, backs ramrod straight as if they were going to flee at any minute. No one looked happy. No one spoke while I was there, and I remembered wanting to shout at Rita, to ask her why she was there, but I thought of those other birthdays, and the same fear roiled through me. I didn’t like the man with Rita. I didn’t like Rita; she still frightened me but it was in a childish way, like when the movie that terrified you as a child still scared you as an adult. You knew better, but it was still there. The man touched something primal in me, and I took a step back. I remembered that my dad’s lips were set in a hard, thin line.

  “Go upstairs and keep Joshy company, would you, Andi?” he said.

  I must have nodded, must have obliged.

  “We could go to the bank right now.” Dave’s voice.

  “We’re not going to do that.” My dad.

  I was standing in the stairwell.

  “What’s going on? Who are they?” Joshy on the top step, his teeth blacked out by chocolate, a final bite of Snickers in his hand.

  “Disappear, kid.”

  I could hear him groan, could hear him stomp down the back stairs. The door to the garage opened and closed. That was where he hid his stash of Halloween candy.

  Dave again. “We’re going to get what we came here for, one way or another.”

  I saw my sneaker on the carpeted stair, moving back down.

  And then what? And then what?

  Blood on my hands. On my chest.

  I snapped back to the here and now when I heard the door open, Rita and Dave still in midconversation before she shouted, “Hey, Andi, we’re back.”

  My stomach burned. I hated the way my name sounded on her lips.

  Forty-Five

  Terror spread through me. It infected every cell, every fiber of my being. My tongue went heavy in my mouth, my saliva sour. I knew it, but I didn’t want to.

  These people killed my father. They tried to kill my mother.

  I thought of Dave, his giant mitt of a hand fisted and pounding on our front door. Did my dad answer it? Was he frightened? Did Dave just walk in and…and… I couldn’t bear the thought, but the idea hung there like a nagging itch I was desperate to scratch. What happened in those moments before the attack? Did they blame me? Did they hate me? Did they regret ever bringing me into their lives?

  I was down on my knees, my stomach turning in on itself, too horrified, too broken to cry. I had done this. I hadn’t pulled the trigger or brought the whole plan together, but this all happened because of me. If I had stayed with Rita or been left at some orphanage, this never would have happened, and Josh could have had a normal life, and my parents—I mean, the McNultys—would be having pizza night and telling Josh that ice cream was actually dessert and not just a bridge to cake.

  I started to dry heave. I started to dry heave and gag, curling my hands into my sweatshirt because there was blood on them.

  “Mom and Dad…” My words were small, pitiful, and a voice hissed inside that the McNultys weren’t my mom and dad. My mom and dad were Rita and Dave Mondale, and they were ruthless criminals who just wanted me back—because they thought I came with money.

  A little flicker of anger lit in my gut, slowly taking hold.

  They didn’t care about me. They didn’t care whether I was happy or miserable or alive or dead. They cared about the money.

  I was gasping now, tiny pants to get my heartbeat back down to normal. Dave and Rita didn’t do this because of me. They did it to me—and they did it to Josh.

  “Andi?”

  Rita poked her head into the bedroom, and the world must have aligned, because I didn’t have an asthma attack or burst out crying or try to shred her apart with my bare hands. All I did was smile kindly and say in a voice that wasn’t mine, “Did everything go okay?”

  “Yeah. Super quick, in and out. We brought back some doughnuts. Why don’t you come into the kitchen?”

  It went super quick because the parole officer never asked if Dave had attempted a double homicide during his time off. The parole officer never asked if he kidnapped two children, dumping one at a cheap motel and one at… A sob lodged in my chest, but I did my best to squelch it down, to pretend to clear my throat.

  “Sure.”

  Rita went down the hall, and I pulled my shoes on, completely unsure how I was supposed to sit across a table from these people and eat a doughnut. How does one dine with a pair of murderers?

  It seemed like that hall was a million miles long as my mind continued to spin. Should I run? Accuse them? Did I really believe Nate was in on it? Could I call him? Would he rescue me? Could I call the police now?

  I was shaking by the time I stepped into the living room, my blood thundering through my veins. I couldn’t look at Rita or Dave, so I focused on stupid things around the room. The phone that didn’t work. The calendar pinned to the wall next to the door. The dish rag thrown over the sink.

  And then it hit me: there were no pictures. For a set of parents who wanted so desperately to get me back, there were no pictures of me except the three stash
ed in the drawer. That diminishing piece of me that still wanted to believe Dave and Rita couldn’t be in this together (she had to have been coerced; maybe she left before Dave fired the gun?) wanted to think it was because memories of the daughter she couldn’t get back were too painful, and any reminder of me needed to be relegated to a dark drawer, only viewed when she was emotionally strong. But the side of me that was coming to hard realizations, that still felt the weight of the gun in my palm, knew it was because other than the days they deposited those $500 checks, they never thought about me at all.

  I sat down in one of the chairs and mechanically selected a sprinkled doughnut, put it on the paper towel in front of me.

  If my parents were paying Dave and Rita, why would they try to kill them? Why would they extinguish the family that gave them free money?

  I heard Dave’s voice again, that growl: “Seventy or eighty thousand…”

  I cleared my throat, willed the pounding in my head to go away. Dave and Rita both looked at me as though I was supposed to say something.

  “Uh, good doughnut.”

  Dave smiled and Rita nodded.

  “So.” I dragged my tongue across my bottom lip, tasting the super sweet sprinkles and frosting left after my first bite. “Are you two married?”

  Dave and Rita exchanged a glance that should have been loving but fell flat. “Yes. We’ve been married a long time.”

  They both smiled, and I wondered why there weren’t more of Dave’s things around. There was bubble bath and lavender soap in the bathroom, and the closet was stuffed with Rita’s things—except of course for the duffel.

  I nodded and stared at my doughnut.

  “So I think—I mean… I should probably get on.”

  Rita nibbled daintily around her doughnut, dragged a finger through the chocolate frosting. “You can stay here as long as you need, darling.”

  “Nobody here is going to tell on you.” Dave’s smile still triggered something in me, and I flashed back to my birthday night, the way both of them sat in the formal living room. I wanted to scream at him. I wanted to scream at him that there was nothing to tell, that I knew he was there and I knew it was he who attacked my parents. But he terrified me.