I think you’re right, Jenny . . . Yes, now that I think about it I think that was when I got you Goldy . . . Now, how did I manage to forget that?
Good question.
Something was happening here.
Another thing that should’ve made it into my comic—stuff reversing itself the way things do on the planet Bizarro. No longer Mr. Greer and Mrs. Charnow and Lars sniffing something foul and starting to dig around to see where the odor was coming from.
I was doing the sniffing this time.
I’d always known when it was starting. Sometimes the funny faces wouldn’t register on my radar, but the funny questions would. Innocent sounding at first, if you were willing to ignore they were coming out of left field. Mrs. Charnow suddenly bringing up my first Halloween costume even though it wasn’t close to Halloween—Remember what you dressed up as? Mr. Greer staring at the floor and plucking a memory out of thin air—the first time he’d taken me fishing on Lake Winowee. Remember how many fish you caught, honey? I didn’t remember how many fish I’d caught, it was so long ago, I was barely five, and they’d say of course, don’t worry about it. But that’s exactly what I’d start doing, worrying—because I knew more questions were coming, and more after that, insistent-sounding questions, with Mrs. Charnow and Mr. Greer and Lars becoming more and more insistent that I answer them.
I didn’t know when Jenny had gotten Goldy.
I didn’t.
Odds were good it wasn’t after that pony ride.
I’d made it up. About me crying. About me asking for a real pony. About everything.
My third birthday party was at Chuck E. Cheese. According to Ben’s memorial page it was. I’d invented Dad playing endless games of Skee-Ball there.
Remember the day stupid Ben . . .
I was thinking about that time . . .
I’ll never forget the time Mrs. Colletti sent me home with . . .
Maybe she’s confused. Maybe she’s just not remembering correctly. Maybe she has her head up her ass. Maybe she is remembering correctly, but she doesn’t want me to know that I’m not.
Maybe she didn’t really lie to Becky.
On the way to D’Agostino’s to shop for groceries, I told her I’d been thinking about the summer we all went to Montauk to go digging for clams.
That was on Ben’s page too. The family going to Montauk and digging for clams. And playing miniature golf. And going whale watching. All right there on Ben’s page.
And all taking place after Jenny was kidnapped.
A stupid-as-shit effort to keep their minds off it—those were Ben’s words—stupid-as-shit, picking a place Jenny had never been to, instead of heading up to the lake, which is what the Kristals usually did in the summer, back when they were still the Kristals. Not wanting to be where Jenny and her brother played Indians, fished for minnows, and roasted marshmallows because the idea was to stop thinking about her and not be reminded of their missing daughter every minute of their entire fucking vacation.
So they went to Montauk and went clam digging.
A whole year after Jenny disappeared. Ben already licking the wounds on his burned hand. Jenny already on her way to the cold case file.
Laurie said: We’re five minutes away.
Remind me to pick up pears for Dad.
Do you like Dolly Madison ice cream?
Dad showed us all how to shuck the clams there, I told her. In Montauk. You made spaghetti and clam sauce with them. Isn’t it amazing I can remember that?
Her hands blanched white around the steering wheel. The blood had run right out of them.
Yes, Jenny, she said. Yes . . . it sure is.
* * *
—
She knows.
TWENTY-FOUR
They were playacting.
Why were they playacting?
It didn’t matter if they were playacting.
This is what I’d wanted. This.
Mommy, Daddy, and Big Brother. A house with a front walk instead of locked gates. Want to go shopping with me, Jenny? Want to help me cook dinner, Jenny? What’s the Knicks score, Dad? Ben’s being an asshole, Dad.
They want their daughter back. That’s all.
Even if she’s not their daughter.
They want her back so badly it doesn’t matter if she’s not their daughter.
It totally makes sense.
It makes no sense.
It was senseless.
Okay, sure—almost forgot. There was one member of the family who didn’t want his sister back.
I once saw this show called Ghost Hunters where this guy visited haunted houses looking for cold spots. The rest of the house might be ninety fucking degrees, but behind a certain door, upstairs in the attic, it felt like the middle of January.
You could actually see this guy’s breath coiling upward like one of those spirits he was supposedly hunting for, as he’d stare straight into the camera and solemnly proclaim: This house is haunted.
So was this one.
Haunted by someone who’d walked out the front door one day and never came back. One morning I’d caught Laurie staring at a picture of Jenny on the kitchen wall. When she heard me behind her, she’d quickly turned away, like she’d been caught cheating.
There were two Jennys in the house.
And it had its very own cold spot.
Ben.
* * *
—
I was looking for something to read.
Let’s be clear about that.
When I say something, I mean anything. A People magazine, a trashy romance novel, a grocery list.
Anything.
The goal being to get my mind off this merry-go-round it was on—spinning round and round and always ending back at the same place: Why?
It was making me dizzy. I wanted off.
Dad had left.
See you tonight, Jenny Penny.
Sure, Dad . . .
Laurie had left.
Have a great day, Jen.
You too, Mom . . .
Ben had left.
Bye, Ben . . .
Door slam.
The merry-go-round was beckoning. I already had the ticket in my hand. Cue the calliope.
TV wasn’t an option. There was only so much of Kim, Kourtney, Khloé, Kylie, and Kendall I could take before it all became white noise.
The downstairs bookcase contained actual books. The bookcase in Father’s house had contained superhero comics and places to stash drugs.
The Norton Anthology of English Literature. Leviathan by Thomas Hobbes. Of Suicide by David Hume. These particular books looking as if they hadn’t been opened in decades and had been possibly used as doorstops.
A bunch of Alex Cross novels took up most of one shelf, with Morgan Freeman’s face peeking out on one of them.
Stuck behind the Alex Cross novels, a thick manila envelope.
Let me be clear again. Just for the record.
I was just looking for something to read, and since that manila envelope was addressed to Laurie and Jake Kristal and the return address scrawled in the top left-hand corner said J. Pennebaker, Bakersfield, Georgia, I wanted/needed/desired to read more.
Pennebaker. I knew that name.
I carried the manila envelope to the couch and sat there staring at it.
Pennebaker.
The guy who’d called the house just before I’d decided to take a walk and run into Becky.
Tell Mrs. Kristal I won’t be calling again.
Someone calling to say they wouldn’t be calling.
Pennebaker. Joe.
Only it seemed to me that even then the name had sounded kind of familiar—just like Maple Street had, and Forest Avenue, and this house.
When I opened the envelope and lo
oked inside, when I took the stapled-together sheaf of papers out and began perusing them—no, really reading them, the way I’d once read Ben’s Facebook entries, as if my life depended on them, my new life, because, well, it had—I remembered why.
TWENTY-FIVE
Interview. Mr. and Mrs. Kelly. July 12th, 2007. 10:24 a.m.
L: I’m Detective Looper of the Nassau Police Department. I’d like to ask you a few questions about Jenny Kristal if that’s okay.
* * *
—
Detective Looper.
July 12, 2007.
Mrs. and Mrs. Kelly.
They were like clues on that game show—the one where you get to see the consonants but you have to buy the vowels if you’re going to put it all together. Like staring at half a thought. Or half a poster on a telephone pole by Fredo’s Famous Pizzeria, where you only get the G from MISSING.
Detective Looper. The detective in charge of investigating Jenny’s disappearance. In all those articles I’d read and reread, when a policeman was quoted on the case, it was always him. Looper.
July 12, 2007. Two days after Jenny went missing.
But who were Mr. and Mrs. Kelly . . . ?
L: Let’s start with two days ago. Mrs. Kristal sent Jenny on her way here to play with your daughter, Toni, is that right? She called and set up a playdate?
Of course. Toni Kelly’s parents. Back when Toni didn’t have three rolls of fat under her T-shirt.
This was the transcript of Detective Looper’s investigation into Jenny’s case. J. Pennebaker of Bakersfield, Georgia, had sent it to Laurie and Jake. Jenny had been on her way to see Toni Kelly that morning, so that’s where Looper had started.
MRS. KELLY: Yes. Well . . . she didn’t specify a time or anything.
L: What did she specify?
MRS. KELLY: She asked if Toni was home and I said sure and then she asked if she could send Jenny over sometime to play.
L: And you said okay?
MRS. KELLY: Yes.
L: But Mrs. Kristal didn’t say when?
MRS. KELLY: She said sometime in the morning. I mean, I was home all day, so I said sure, whenever.
L: Is that the way it usually works?
MRS. KELLY: Usually . . . I don’t . . .
L: When she sends Jenny over to play? Mrs. Kristal usually doesn’t specify an exact time? Just says it’ll be sometime in the morning or afternoon?
MRS. KELLY: I don’t know . . . I guess . . . I mean Toni. . . . my daughter, Toni, and Jenny . . . they don’t play together all that much.
L: They aren’t friends?
MRS. KELLY: Sure. Well . . . more neighborhood friends, you know . . .
L: So this wasn’t a usual occurrence? Jenny coming over to play?
MRS. KELLY: It wasn’t unusual. I mean, it used to happen a lot more . . . when the kids were younger. I think Ben . . . her brother, Ben, he has a broken arm and Jenny was maybe getting on his nerves, you know the way kids fight, so I think Laurie wanted to get Jenny out of the house. She asked if it would be okay.
L: And you said fine.
MRS. KELLY: Yes.
L: But Jenny never came.
MRS. KELLY: No.
L: So did you call Mrs. Kristal? Ask where Jenny was?
MRS. KELLY: No.
L: Why?
MRS. KELLY: I just figured . . . I don’t know . . . that she’d changed her mind. Like I said, it wasn’t an exact time or anything. It was kind of indefinite. I just assumed plans had changed.
L: Okay. So when did you realize they hadn’t changed?
MRS. KELLY: When Laurie called.
L: When was that?
MRS. KELLY: Around three.
L: And what did she say?
MRS. KELLY: She wanted to talk to Jenny.
L: Were you surprised?
MRS. KELLY: Of course. Because I hadn’t seen her. I thought she . . . that Laurie hadn’t sent her over.
L: And what did Mrs. Kristal say when you told her Jenny wasn’t there? I assume you immediately let her know that was the case?
MRS. KELLY: Yes, of course. She got, well . . . kind of hysterical. She said she’d let Jenny out of the house at ten thirty in the morning.
L: To come over to your house?
MRS. KELLY: Yes.
L: Let me ask you something. Mrs. Kristal said she opened the door and watched Jenny walk to the sidewalk. Then she went back inside.
MRS. KELLY: Uh-huh . . .
L: Does that surprise you at all?
MRS. KELLY: Surprise me? Not sure I understand.
L: Parents don’t walk their kids over to someone’s house around here? For a playdate? I mean, is it normal to just let them walk there by themselves?
MRS. KELLY: It’s a pretty safe neighborhood. We’re just two houses away.
L: So Jenny always walks here by herself?
MRS. KELLY: Always? There isn’t an always. I told you . . . my daughter and Jenny . . . they don’t really play together very often anymore.
L: Okay. But when they do play together?
MRS. KELLY: I’m not sure . . . it’s not like I keep track. Jenny’s older now. I’m sure I’ve let my daughter run down the block to her friend Mandy. I’m sure I have. Like I said, this is a pretty safe neighborhood. Or was.
L: Okay. Let’s go back to the phone call. Mrs. Kristal asked to speak to Jenny and you said she hadn’t shown up.
MRS. KELLY: Yes. I said maybe Toni had let her in and I just hadn’t noticed. I mean, it’s possible, right? I jumped off the phone and ran upstairs to take a look.
L: That’s where your daughter was?
MRS. KELLY: Yes. But Jenny wasn’t there. Toni was watching cartoons. She hadn’t seen Jenny all day.
L: Okay. What happened then?
MRS. KELLY: I got back on the phone and told Laurie. And by now, I was, you know, scared to death, I mean I was almost starting to cry too, I probably was, because I knew . . . well, I knew that it wasn’t good. That something really horrible may have happened.
L: And how was Mrs. Kristal?
MRS. KELLY: How do you think? She was screaming. “We have to find her! We have to go look for her!”
L: So what did you do?
MRS. KELLY: Ran over there, of course. To Laurie’s. I took Toni with me naturally . . . no way I’m leaving her alone now. And Laurie was calling the police and then, well . . . that was it. The start of everything. I mean, you guys came, two patrolmen I mean, is that what you call them? And then all the parents, me and Cindy Mooney and Nancy Klein and Amy Shapiro, we all went searching the neighborhood. Jake came back from work, and I called Brian, and he came back too.
MR. KELLY: Yeah, my wife kind of lost it. The Kristals too, of course. We were all half out of our minds.
The questioning went on for a while. Some questions directly for Mr. Kelly, like where he’d been when he’d gotten his wife’s call. At work, he said. Morgan Stanley. And questions for the both of them—like did they know anyone who might’ve wanted to hurt Jenny, which seemed kind of ridiculous, since if Toni Kelly’s parents knew someone who wanted to hurt a six-year-old, wouldn’t they have told someone about it?
No, both Kellys confirmed.
The Kellys’ house had been thoroughly searched that day—I knew all that from the online articles. Maybe Jenny had let herself in, the police thought, and got trapped in a closet or a crawlspace or behind a radiator? They’d looked underneath the backyard deck, inside the attic, underneath the brick barbecue. Nothing.
L: What can you tell me about Jenny? Anything at all that might be helpful.
MRS. KELLY: I’m not sure . . . what do you want to know exactly?
L: Like I said, anything at all. What’s she like?
MR
S. KELLY: Jenny . . . what’s she like?
L: Yes.
MRS. KELLY: Normal. Just a sweet, adorable, six-year-old little girl.
Looper asked them if he could speak with Toni, but Mrs. Kelly said Toni wasn’t there—they’d dropped her at her grandmother’s while they helped man Jenny Central—the command center Jake and Laurie had set up on Maple Street. A place to take calls and hold hands.
Interview. Mr. and Mrs. Klein. July 12th, 2007. 1:34 p.m.
Looper asked them about the day Jenny disappeared.
MRS. KLEIN: It was horrible. I mean, just all-around hysteria, I’d say.
L: When did you first hear about it? About Jenny being missing?
MRS. KLEIN: Sandy called me.
L: Mrs. Kelly?
MRS. KLEIN: Yes.
L: Remember what time that was?
MRS. KLEIN: About three fifteen, I think. Something like that.
L: What did she say?
MRS. KLEIN: That Jenny was missing. That Laurie . . . her mom, Laurie, had sent Jenny over to play with Toni, but she never got there.
L: Were you surprised?
MRS. KLEIN: I was devastated. I mean, you never think something like that’s going to happen to someone you actually know. It’s awful. Kind of surreal, really.
L: Were you surprised Mrs. Kristal hadn’t taken Jenny over there herself?
MRS. KLEIN: I don’t know. I wasn’t thinking about that. I was thinking about Jenny.
L: I’m sorry, according to Mrs. Kelly, you said, wait a minute, let me check my notes . . . you said you didn’t understand how Jenny couldn’t have gotten there? You asked if someone had snatched her away from Laurie on the way over?
MRS. KLEIN: Maybe I did. I don’t remember. I was confused . . . about how it happened.
L: So you were surprised Mrs. Kristal hadn’t walked Jenny over to the playdate?
MRS. KLEIN: I didn’t say that. Look, every mother’s different . . .
L: But it’s something you personally wouldn’t do?
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