by Darcey Bell
Charlotte thinks she’s going mad. Her daughter is missing, and this woman is telling her Bible stories. But she can’t explain why she has no time to chat, why this is so urgent. A kidnapped daughter is an emergency. Wanting to return a misplaced cell phone is not.
Charlotte is lying to Ruth’s mother. Ruth’s a liar, and now she’s turned Charlotte into one too.
The woman says, “Wait. Is everything okay? Has something happened to Naomi?” She must have heard an off note in Charlotte’s voice.
“No, not at all.” Charlotte’s proud of how quickly she’s thinking. “She’s fine. She said she was going to her grandparents’ house in Hoboken, and I’m going to be passing right near there today. I could just swing by and drop off her phone. We live in Montclair, which isn’t far away.”
Her knowledge of New Jersey must be coming from God. Charlotte has no idea if Hoboken is anywhere near Montclair. “I know how inconvenient it is, trying to function without your phone. Ruth—I mean, Naomi—must be having a hard time—”
The silence lasts so long that Charlotte says, “Hello? Are you there?”
“Are you sure you’re friends with her? How good a friend?”
“Pretty good?” Why does that sound like a question?
“Because the truth is: Naomi’s grandparents have been dead for ten years. She told you they were alive? How typical.”
Charlotte’s hand is shaking as she types: Grandparents dead 10 yrs.
Rocco’s grown alarmingly pale, but Charlotte needs to focus.
“Let me guess. I’ll bet she’s told you that her grandparents are angels who treated her like the princess she is. I bet she told you that they’re totally responsible for her health and happiness. Her sanity. That they saved her from her cruel witch of a mother who abandoned her. Am I right?”
Charlotte has a bad feeling about where this is heading, but she has to tell the truth. Or whatever version of the truth she knows.
“She speaks about her grandparents so lovingly—”
“My parents were monsters from hell, both of them. One summer, I made the mistake of leaving Naomi with them because I was having some personal problems. And when I returned to collect my daughter in the fall, I learned that every time she’d talked back or annoyed them in any way, every time they caught her in a tiny white lie, they’d lock her in the basement, which—or so Naomi told me—was crawling with enormous wolf spiders.
“By then I’d learned not to believe her, but my parents said she was telling the truth. About the spiders, anyway. My parents weren’t even the tiniest bit embarrassed. They said they’d been trying to teach her a lesson, to make her behave like a lady. A little lady, they said. Sometimes they starved her for days until she begged for food and water. My father drowned her cat, and I’m pretty certain he made her watch the cat die. And my God, the way my parents died—”
“I’m so sorry. I don’t mean to pry, but how—”
“It’s no secret. It was in all the papers. My father dragged my mother down into the basement and locked them in. He shot her and then he shot himself. He died instantly, but it took her longer.”
“That’s terrible,” says Charlotte. “I’m so sorry.”
“Then you must be sorrier than I am. The terrible part was that it made it damn hard to sell the house. At least Naomi got some of the money when they finally closed. Some payback for what she went through.”
“I must have misunderstood,” says Charlotte. “She always talks about going to their house. She says she still goes there all the time—”
“Oh, no,” says the woman. “I hope not. Not again.”
“Not what again?”
“My parents’ house sat on the market for a very long time. Given how hot that neighborhood suddenly was, it should have sold in a flash. Or so the real estate agents kept telling me. That neighborhood being ‘hot’ was beyond my imagination. But anyway, a murder-suicide house is a tough sell.”
Charlotte’s daughter is missing, and this woman has shifted from Bible stories to real estate.
“During the time the place sat empty, Naomi was picked up by the cops for loitering near the house. The real estate agents had to change the locks. Supposedly she harassed—or threatened or something—some people renovating one of the brownstones down the block. The neighbors got nervous. Naomi called me from the police station. That’s what it took to make her get in touch with me. I think she blamed me for her grandparents’ deaths, just like she blamed me for everything. But of course I had nothing to do with it.”
It crosses Charlotte’s mind that maybe the woman isn’t telling the truth about any of this, that maybe Ruth learned to lie from her mother. But somehow Charlotte believes her.
“The police let Naomi go, with a slap on the wrist, and without even a restraining order. The grief-stricken granddaughter, et cetera. Even in New Jersey, people have a heart.”
Charlotte says, “Do you know the address? The house where your parents’ lived?”
She’s actively praying now. Please make this work.
“You’re asking me if I know my own parents’ address? How could I forget something like that? It’s 129 South High Street, Hoboken.”
“Thanks for your help,” Charlotte says. “I’ll give . . . Naomi your regards.”
“Giving her the phone will be enough. And do please tell her to call me. But . . . maybe it would probably be better if you don’t let her know I told you any of this. She tends to lash out when she feels threatened.”
Charlotte had thought she couldn’t feel more terrified than she already was. But now she does. She’s shaking so hard she nearly drops the phone when she hands it back to Rocco.
When the line goes dead, Rocco says, “Can we keep calling her Ruth?”
“I think we have to,” says Charlotte. “Ruth is the person we know.”
“We didn’t even know her fucking name,” Rocco says. “She pretends to go out to Hoboken. She pretends to visit the dead. Can you believe that?”
“I do,” says Charlotte. “I actually do.”
“Call Eli one more time,” Rocco says. “I’ll go get the van. Let’s drive out to Hoboken. I have a feeling that her grandparents’ house is the first place we should look.”
“They don’t live there anymore,” Charlotte says. “They don’t live anywhere anymore.”
“Please,” Rocco says. “I got us into this mess, and I’ll get us out.”
It’s a cliché, but Charlotte clings to it, like a drowning person clings to a hunk of driftwood.
“It’s worth a try, I guess.” Not for one moment does she think it will work, that they’ll find Daisy at the house where Ruth’s grandparents died horribly, a decade ago.
“I’ll make it right,” promises Rocco.
More than anything in the world, Charlotte wants to believe her brother. For just an instant, the terror subsides, and then it rolls back in again, like an icy wave with a murderous undertow.
26
Ruth
First stop is the candy store in Union Square, the place where Daisy’s mom is least likely to take her, where we’re least likely to run into Charlotte. Candy is sold by the pound, and the fun part is letting the candy out of giant funnels, sort of like lab equipment, from which the Technicolor sugary bits pour and rattle into paper bags. It’s all you can eat, more than you can eat, more candy than a child with the biggest sweet tooth can imagine. It’s a cosmos of candy, created for children, a world that grown-ups can only observe from the sidelines.
Daisy runs from funnel to funnel. At first I help her, but she quickly gets the knack of operating the stops that release and shut off the floods of candy.
“Is there some kind of candy you want, Auntie Ruth?” Daisy pauses to ask, though only after she has almost filled her bag.
“No,” I say. “Have a little more. Make sure we have plenty for later. And we’ll have to eat it all, because you know what your mom will say if we bring all this candy home, or even if we tell
her how much we ate.”
“All of it?” says Daisy. “We have to eat it all?”
“Every piece,” I say.
Daisy nods solemnly. A pact has been made: Whatever happens this afternoon will be kept secret from her mother. What happens in the candy store stays in the candy store.
“What’s so funny?” asks Daisy.
“Nothing,” I say. “Just thinking.”
“Are you sure that this is okay with my mom?”
“Sure I’m sure. I mean, I’m probably sure.”
“You said ‘sure’ three times,” says Daisy.
I’m a little surprised by how quickly Daisy agrees to lie (though we won’t call it that) to her mother. But when candy and kids are involved, the normal rules don’t apply, and the truth is endlessly elastic.
Daisy scrupulously avoids sampling the merchandise, unlike the other children stuffing their mouths, all over the store. The sugar will come in handy for the energy we’ll need to get through the day and bring Daisy home—and face the music.
The young woman (blue hair, nose ring) at the checkout counter weighs the candy—two outrageous sugary pounds!—and asks Daisy if she plans to eat it all herself. The question throws Daisy into a panic. What grown-up will allow that? But she has no one to share the loot with, no siblings, no cousins, and, as far as I can tell, no friends. Except me. Daisy looks down and grabs my hand.
What would Charlotte do in this situation? Charlotte would never be in this situation. Charlotte would never let her daughter buy two pounds of candy.
That’s the good thing about dropping in and out of Daisy’s life. Everyday reality is not an issue. This might be my last day with Daisy. It almost surely is. Two pounds of candy, thank you very much.
To rescue Daisy from the overfriendly checkout person, and put a stop to my own gloomy fears about possibly going to jail for kidnapping and certainly never seeing Daisy again, I say, a little too brightly, “We’re bringing it to share with her great-grandparents in New Jersey.”
I have the checkout girl at great-grandparents. She doesn’t stop to wonder: Who brings an elderly couple two pounds of obscenely bright, sweet candy?
“Great-grandparents!” She crosses herself—a strange thing for a punked-out girl to do. “God bless them.”
“Totally.” I pay in cash—I’ve borrowed a little from Rocco—and we sail out into the crowded Union Square afternoon.
The bag is so heavy that Daisy can’t carry it and eat at the same time, so she hands it to me, and we walk west on 14th Street, sharing sweets. Until then I’d never believed that sugar was a rush. I’d thought it was the fantasy of parents worried about dental bills. But it’s definitely a high. It turns up the volume, the color, the speed. No wonder children crave it.
All around us are moms and kids, dads and kids, nannies and kids, kids being walked home from school. It’s a city—a world—full of children. For the first time, maybe ever, I don’t feel sick with envy. For the first time I have a child of my own.
Daisy and I are happier than these strangers could possibly be. This is our once-in-a-lifetime special day. We appreciate it more, and we have enough sweets to sustain us, however long our adventure lasts.
ON THE PATH, it’s rush hour 24/7, so the crowd is no surprise. But it’s surprising that a child works like a magic charm to protect you from the wolves and monsters underground. Or that’s how it seems today. The wolves and monsters get up to give us seats on the train.
Daisy’s looking around, delighted. She’s fallen down the rabbit hole into a wonderland beneath the city. It’s as if she’s a feral child who’s wandered into civilization, an outer space alien landed on Earth, or a mermaid washed up on land. All this is new to her, or almost new, and the thrill of newness is contagious. Everyone in the train catches her excitement. They must think we’re from out of town.
“Do you take the train much, Daisy?”
It’s an unfair question. I already know the answer.
“Some. Not much. Mostly taxis.”
“The train’s a lot more fun,” I say.
“Really fun,” says Daisy.
27
Vanessa
Vanessa should be at work, but she longs—the way she might long for a lover—to go to Hoboken and check on the renovation. The house is like a lover. It was love at first sight. She fell in love the moment she saw it. It’s the place where she and Brian were destined to raise the kids.
They were shocked that they could afford it, but the real estate agent was honest about the reason for the bargain price. She had to be, by law. A crime had been committed here, a decade ago. A very old couple had lived and died here: a murder-suicide in the basement. It was awful, but Vanessa thinks it’s the only serious crime she can sort of understand. She and Brian are going to grow old together, and if one of them was in horrible pain, or end-stage dementia, and didn’t want to live . . . she can imagine. You pray it never happens. But it does.
The house sat on the market for ages. The old couple’s granddaughter tried to buy it, but they hadn’t left a will, and by the time things were sorted out, the granddaughter got a chunk of cash from the estate but not enough to buy the house. Or she couldn’t get a mortgage. Or something.
Someone—an investor—bought it and never lived here, never intended to. The developer lost interest or went out of business—the real estate agent wasn’t sure—and the house fell into disrepair. All that time, it was waiting for Vanessa and Brian and their kids, for buyers with the courage and energy to show the house the love it needs.
The house is the first thing Vanessa thinks about when she wakes up in the morning and the last thing before she falls asleep at night. It is like a love affair. She can’t wait to move in, to furnish it, to have a kitchen and a dining room and—
She reminds herself to be patient. But still, she can’t help going to the house, more often than she probably should, just to see what’s happening, how things are coming along.
Of course, it’s never going as fast as she hopes. Everyone says: Renovations take twice as long and cost three times as much as you expect. But every tiny sign of progress fills Vanessa with joy.
Today she arrives to find more cracked paint removed from the staircase, exposing the beautiful wood underneath. An incremental improvement, but a step in the right direction. The house smells awful. It’s full of toxic fumes from the industrial-strength paint remover.
But the woodwork is beautiful. And she loves it.
Vanessa tells herself she’ll only stay a little while and then go back to work. Brian will feed the kids and put them to bed if he has to. He’ll understand. He knows how much she loves the house.
She walks from room to room, then sits on the bottom step of the staircase that leads from the front hall. It’s not the most comfortable place, but it’s the only spot there is to sit.
That’s when she hears the doorbell ring—amazing!
She didn’t know the bell worked.
She looks up to see a woman and a very pretty little girl in a bright purple jacket.
They’re standing on the top step.
Staring at her, through the window.
28
Ruth
Granny Edith and Grandpa Frank’s neighbors never liked me. They still eye me with suspicion. No matter how often they see me with my grandparents, they act as if I’m a stranger come to steal their money. So Daisy and I are careful to walk on the other side of the street.
I can see my grandparents’ brownstone from the corner the way you might notice a cool guy at a party. Not necessarily the handsomest guy, but the one you want to see.
At last we’re across from the house. Does Daisy sense my happiness? She can’t help it.
My feet know the front steps, their height and depth. I could climb them blindfolded, but climbing stairs with your eyes shut isn’t something I want to teach Daisy. Plus I would miss seeing the banisters and the stone urns in which Granny plants pansies and nasturtiums ever
y spring.
The front door has a decorative pattern of cast iron over glass, so you could say there are bars on the door, like Rocco’s mom has in Mexico. But these never seem like bars. They’re more like a maze through which I can always find my way.
I’ve forgotten my key, which is strange. I never do. I need it for when I come in late at night. When my grandparents are watching TV, they don’t always hear me ring the bell. And they’ve finally begun to listen to me about keeping the door locked, for safety.
But today it’s early, so they’ll be closer to the front of the house, though Granny Edith may have the vacuum running, which she does so often that it’s a wonder the house ever gets dirty enough to clean.
I ring the bell. It’s hard to see through the windows, which are always dusty, no matter how much I tell Granny Edith to hire someone who can get to the places she can’t reach.
If I move to the edge of the steps and lean over as far as I can, I can just see inside. There’s a ladder and tarps on the floor and all the way up the stairs. Could my grandparents have started renovating without me? A shiver of . . . something . . . icy cold travels from one shoulder blade to another.
At last a young woman answers. She’s wearing jeans and a sweater, the kind of sporty clothes that have that infuriating way of signaling that her outfit may look casual but really it’s expensive. It’s a look I aim for and can pull off pretty well, but never as well as this woman does. I aim for the look of the weekend guest heading out to Montauk, but women like her own the Montauk house. They’re the hostesses who invited me—but only for the weekend! Come Sunday night, I crawl right back into the hole I crawled out of.
The woman looks like Charlotte. That is, she has Charlotte’s vibe. The loving, confident mother. Today’s hip, stylish young mom. The lady of the manor. The woman whom everyone is supposed to envy. And I do. Oh, I do. Envy breaks out in a light film of sweat on my forehead. I hate this woman already, though none of this is her fault. She’s just being who she is. She’s probably snagged the sort of rich husband who would never even buy me a drink if I hit on him in a bar.