The Seventh Mother

by Sherri Wood Emmons

  As I let myself drift to sleep, I prayed for the hundredth time that day: Dear God, please take care of us. Please help us do what we need to do. And please protect us from . . . from anything bad.

  43

  Jenny

  I squeezed my eyes shut against the sunlight. I was so tired I just wanted to sleep a few more minutes. I must have forgotten to close the curtains the night before.

  Then I heard it, someone else breathing in my room.

  I opened my eyes and sat up, staring around me at the huge, unfamiliar room. Where was I?

  The clock beside the bed said it was a quarter till seven.

  I turned toward the breathing sound and saw Emma asleep in the bed next to mine. She was still wearing her clothes. I looked down. So was I.

  Images of the day before came flooding back—sitting on the bed in Lashaundra’s room, cutting open the boxes in the attic, showing Emma the lockets and the driver’s licenses. I wasn’t at home, in my own room. I was in a room on the third floor of a convent. Emma and I were hiding from Daddy.

  I sat up and closed my eyes. When I opened them, I would be at home. The whole thing would just be a nightmare. Please, God, let it be a nightmare.

  But of course, it wasn’t just a nightmare. It was real. I had ruined everything.

  I stared at Emma while she slept. I felt tears sting my eyes. Emma was the closest thing to a mother I’d ever remembered having. She was pregnant with my little sister. I loved her. I had done what I had to do to protect her.

  I had to pee.

  I rose quietly and tiptoed to the door, pulling it open, praying it wouldn’t squeak. Then I stepped into the hallway and padded barefoot toward the bathroom and relief.

  I was washing my hands when the woman with the short blond hair walked in.

  “Good morning!” she said, smiling.

  “Hey,” I mumbled.

  “I hope you slept well?”

  “Yeah, I slept okay.”

  “Did we keep you up last night?”

  “Um, no. We went to bed early.”

  “Oh, good,” she said, splashing water on her face. “We got a little tipsy and I was worried we were too loud.”

  “It’s all good.” I walked toward the door.

  “Is your mom up?”

  I stopped. My mom? She meant Emma, of course.

  “She was still asleep when I got up.”

  “Well, breakfast is at seven,” she said. “So if you guys want to eat, she should get up.”

  “Okay, thanks.”

  I walked back to our bedroom wondering if I should wake Emma or not. She was pregnant. She needed to eat. But she needed to sleep, too. And as long as she was asleep, she didn’t have to remember why we were here.

  “Good morning,” she said when I opened the door.

  “Hey,” I said.

  “Did you sleep okay?”

  “Yeah. Did you?”

  “Actually, yeah. I slept well. I’m kind of surprised I did. I was just so tired.”

  She was sitting up in bed, stretching.

  “The lady we saw last night, the one with the blond hair who’s not a nun, she said breakfast is ready at seven.”

  Emma looked at the clock. “Well, we’re just in time then. Wait for me, okay? I have to go to the bathroom.”

  After she left, I made up the bed I’d slept in. Then I made the bed she’d slept in, too. When she got back, we both changed our clothes. Then we walked out into the hall, and there was the blond woman again.

  “Good morning!” she chirped. “Are you-all going to breakfast?”

  “I guess so,” Emma said.

  “Good. We can go together.”

  She led the way down the stairs, talking the whole time about Loretto, its history, the nuns. She talked fast and she walked fast. Emma and I had to hurry to keep up.

  “I’ve been coming for almost twelve years,” she said as we reached the first floor. “Honestly, I don’t know what I’d do without this place. It’s my spiritual home, and I’m not even Catholic. I mean, when my marriage ended, I was here more than I was home. And the sisters just let me be however I needed to be.”

  “When did your marriage end?” Emma asked. We were walking down yet another long hallway.

  “Five years ago,” the woman said. “I’m Lorelei, by the way. I don’t remember if I told you that last night.”

  “I’m Emma, and this is Jenny.”

  “Are you-all from around here?”

  Emma looked at me and I looked back at her.

  “No,” she said. “We’re just passing through.”

  “So how did you hear about it?”

  “Um . . . a friend of mine stayed here once. It was a long time ago.”

  Lorelei opened a door into a large, empty room. We followed her to another door on the other side. I was glad we weren’t trying to find our way around on our own.

  “So, when are you due?” she asked, glancing at Emma’s stomach.

  “September,” Emma said.

  “That’s so exciting. I always wanted a baby but . . . well, maybe next time, right?”

  She pushed open yet another door to another hallway. It really was like a maze.

  “We were trying to get pregnant,” she continued. “But it didn’t happen. And then . . . well, then he decided to try with someone else.”

  “I’m sorry,” Emma said softly.

  “Oh, well.” Lorelei just kept walking. “I’m glad I found out before I got pregnant, anyway.”

  I looked at Emma and wondered what she must be thinking.

  “Here we are.” Lorelei opened yet another door and we were standing in a huge dining room filled with women, mostly old women. Some of them even wore the hats I thought all nuns were supposed to wear.

  “There’s cereal and juice,” she said, “and sometimes boiled eggs. The biggest meal is at lunch. Don’t miss that. Then for dinner, it’s usually soup and leftovers from lunch. It’s not exactly gourmet cuisine, but hey, it’s here and it’s ready and you don’t have to cook it.”

  We went through the line cafeteria-style. I got some Cheerios and a carton of milk and a roll. Emma filled a plate with fruit, a boiled egg, and a biscuit. Then we followed Lorelei to a table and sat down. She never stopped talking the entire time.

  “This is Sarah,” she said, nodding to another woman at the table. “She’s from Louisville. And Pat’s from Columbus.” She nodded to another woman.

  “This is Emma and Jenny,” she said, pointing to us now.

  “Hello,” each of them said, smiling at us.

  Lorelei chattered nonstop while we ate. When she paused to take a breath, Emma asked, “Is there any place close by where we can get Internet access?”

  “Sure,” Lorelei said. “There’s a room just off of this one where you can get it. I’ll show you after breakfast.”

  I ate my cereal and tried hard to block out the chatter around me. I wondered what Daddy was doing right now. Was he eating breakfast, too? Was he worrying about where we were? Had he discovered that things were missing from his boxes in the attic?

  Finally, Emma stood up. “Where should we take our trays?” she asked.

  “I’ll show you.” Lorelei rose and picked up her tray, then led us to the back of the room.

  “Now, let me show you the Internet room.”

  She led us to a smaller room that looked like it had been a kitchen once.

  “You can get on the Internet in here. They keep saying they’re going to get it at the main house, but that hasn’t happened yet. And you know what? I’m kind of glad. It’s nice to be completely disconnected from the world, you know?”

  She led us back to the building where our room was and sprinted up the stairs ahead of us.

  Emma looked at me, winked, and smiled as we climbed the stairs.

  “So, do you want me to take you back to the Internet room? Or do you think you can find it on your own?”

  “I think we’ll be fine,” Emma said. “But t
hank you for showing us the way.”

  “No problem.”

  Lorelei stood a moment, just smiling at us.

  “I know it’s confusing at first, but you’ll get the hang of it,” she said. “This really is the best place in the world.”

  Then she turned and walked quickly down the hall to her room. “She talks a lot,” I said to Emma once we were inside our own room.

  “Yes, she does.”

  We sat down on our beds for a minute, just relishing the quiet. Then Emma rose.

  “So,” she said. “Get your laptop and let’s go see what we can see.”

  We got lost only once on our way back toward the dining room, ending up in a large chapel with wooden pews. But a nice older lady pointed us in the right direction, and we finally found the little room where Lorelei had said we could get on the Internet.

  Two other women were already there, each in front of a laptop. Both of them smiled when we entered.

  “Here,” I said, sitting at an empty table.

  I turned the computer on and waited, then connected it and us to the Internet.

  “Can I check my e-mail first?”

  Emma nodded.

  There was only one message, and it was from Lashaundra.

  Hey, where are you? it read. Your dad was here last night asking if we knew where you and Emma were. He was really mad. And, I hope you won’t be too mad at me, but after he left I told Mama and Daddy about the driver’s licenses and what we found online. They kind of freaked out, and I know they are worried about you. So e-mail me and let me know you’re okay.

  I showed the e-mail to Emma. Her brow furrowed as she read it.

  “Damn,” she said softly. “I didn’t want to get them involved.”

  “It’s okay,” I said. “They won’t tell Daddy anything. Not now that they know what . . . what we found.”

  She still looked worried.

  “Can I e-mail her back?” I asked. I hated to think of Lashaundra worrying about me. And Mr. and Mrs. Johnson, too.

  “I don’t know,” Emma said.

  “It’ll be okay,” I said. “I’ll just tell them that we’re safe. That’s all. Please, Emma?”

  “Okay,” she said, finally. “But don’t say anything about where we are or where we’re going.”

  I clicked reply and typed: Hi Lashaundra. Don’t worry. Emma and I are fine. We are safe. I miss you.

  “Is that okay?”

  Emma read what I’d written and nodded. I pushed send and breathed deeply. At least they would know we were okay.

  Then I pulled the stack of driver’s licenses from my pocket, went to Google, typed in Cara’s name and city, and scrolled through the missing people till we came to her spot. Emma read it, her face pale.

  I typed in Briana’s name and pulled up the newspaper article. Emma read that, too. She looked like she might throw up.

  “Are you okay?” I whispered.

  She nodded, but didn’t say anything.

  I found Ami’s license and typed, Ami Gordon, Fort Worth, Texas.

  Several items popped up, and I clicked on the first one.

  LOCAL WOMAN’S DISAPPEARANCE A MYSTERY FIVE YEARS LATER

  FORT WORTH—When seventeen-year-old Ami Gordon left her parents’ house in Haltom City on April 2, 2008, after an argument with her father, her mother thought she’d be home within the week.

  “She only took her backpack,” says Tammy Gordon. “Not enough clothes to stay away for long. She didn’t have a credit card, and she couldn’t have had more than twenty dollars with her. We figured she was staying with a friend and would cool off and come home.”

  But Ami Gordon never came home, leaving her parents and younger brother to wonder what had became of her. They are still wondering.

  Emma was reading the story over my shoulder. I felt her hand shaking on my arm.

  “Look,” I said, pointing to the bottom of the screen. “There’s a reward for any information.”

  “Look at her mother.” Emma’s voice was shaking, too.

  I stared at a picture of an older woman sitting on a couch holding a photo of Ami. A man sat next to her on the couch, his arm around her.

  “I can’t even imagine what they are going through,” Emma said. She had one arm wrapped across her stomach, like she was shielding the baby from the computer screen.

  I said nothing, just clicked the back button and scanned through more entries on Ami’s disappearance. She’d left home the spring before Daddy and I came to Texas. She’d lived with us a few months there and stayed with us when we moved to Tennessee. After she left, Cara had moved in with us.

  “What about this one?” Emma held out a driver’s license and I took it from her.

  Laura Parker, Cincinnati, Ohio, I typed into the search engine. I clicked on the first entry that came on the screen, a newspaper article from the Cincinnati Enquirer.

  “Missing Woman’s Remains Found in Florida,” the headline read.

  I read quickly. The article was a lot like the one about Briana. Human remains in Florida had been identified as Laura Parker, missing for three years from Cincinnati. The article was dated 2007.

  I stared at the picture on the screen, trying hard to remember the face. But no memory surfaced. I’d been so little then, and it was right after my mother died.

  My mother . . .

  I typed furiously in the Google search bar: Hailey Bohner, Greenfield, Indiana.

  Nothing.

  Hailey Bohner, Indianapolis, Indiana.

  Still nothing.

  Hailey Bohner, Cincinnati, Ohio.

  I stared at nothing on the screen.

  “What was her maiden name?” Emma whispered, her hands on my shoulders.

  Hailey Wright, Indianapolis, Indiana.

  Finally, a hit. I clicked on the link.

  LOCAL WOMAN STILL SEARCHING FOR DAUGHTER

  INDIANAPOLIS—Imogene Wright last heard from her daughter, Hailey, in January 2006. Hailey, then living in Cincinnati, wrote that she was afraid of her husband, Brannon Bohner. Wright wrote back, but never received a reply to her letter.

  “I just know something went bad,” Wright says. “We didn’t always get along, but Hailey always let me know where she was and that she was okay. When I got the last letter, I wrote back to her and told her to come home and bring her baby.”

  Bohner gave birth to a daughter in 2003.

  “I never got another letter,” Wright says. “I drove down to Cincinnati a couple months later to the trailer park where her letter had been addressed from, but the man in the office said Hailey and Brannon and the baby had left a few weeks before. He didn’t know where they’d gone.”

  Wright contacted Cincinnati police, but because Hailey Bohner had not been listed as missing by her husband, they had little to go on. Hailey and Brannon Bohner and their daughter, Jenny, were gone. Wright has not heard from her daughter since.

  I was shaking so violently now I had to clench my hands together in my lap. I swallowed hard and stared at the picture of a woman standing under a sign for the Compton Hills Mobile Home Park. I squinted and stared again. That was my grandmother, the one I never even knew I had until I’d gotten into Daddy’s boxes.

  Another picture showed a smiling young woman with blond hair cut in a sleek bob—my mother. Hailey Wright . . . she had a last name now, and even a mother. And the last time anyone saw her she wasn’t in Greenfield, Indiana, where Daddy told me she had died of the flu. No, it was at a trailer park in Cincinnati, Ohio.

  I felt Emma’s arms around me; her head rested on mine.

  “Are you okay?” she asked, her voice very small.

  I shook my head, but no words came.

  Across the table, another woman sat in front of her open laptop, her eyes on us. She tilted her head slightly.

  “Are you all right?” she asked, looking from Emma’s face to mine.

  “Oh,” Emma said. I don’t think she’d even been aware of the other people in the room. “Yes, we’re
fine. Just doing a little family history project.”

  I snapped the laptop shut, unplugged it from the wall, and carried it against my chest, walking quickly out of the kitchen-like room and into the maze of hallways.

  “Jenny, wait.”

  Emma ran to catch up, wrapping her arm around me.

  “He lied to me.” I felt a catch in my throat. “He told me my mother died in Indiana, in Greenfield. But she was in Cincinnati before she died. And that last woman, Laura, is from Cincinnati. Maybe she moved in with us there, after my mom . . .”

  I stopped to stare at Emma, and I knew my face was as pale as hers was.

  “What happened to my mother? Do you think . . . did he kill her?”

  Emma pulled me into a tight hug.

  “I don’t know,” she whispered. “I don’t know.”

  “Are you guys all right?”

  Lorelei stood watching us, her eyes wide.

  “We’re okay,” Emma said, trying to smile. “We’ve just gotten some . . . sad news.”

  “Anything I can do?”

  “No, thank you.” Emma took my hand and we walked back toward the main wing of the building that housed our room, then up the steep stairs. Her face was so white she looked sick.

  “Are you okay?” I asked as we reached the landing of the second floor.

  She nodded and stopped, holding onto the banister.

  “I just need to catch my breath.”

  An instant later, before I could even put my hand out to her, she collapsed in a heap on the floor.

  “Emma!”

  I heard footsteps in the hallway, running toward us. More footsteps on the stairs below.

  “Goodness!” Sister Frances knelt down beside Emma. “What happened?”

  “She just . . .” I stopped, unsure how to go on. What had happened?

  “Oh, my.” I heard Lorelei’s voice behind me. She stood on the stairs, gaping. “Is she okay?”

  Sister Frances was patting Emma’s cheek, calling softly. After a long minute, Emma’s eyes fluttered open and she stared around her, as if trying to figure out where she was.

  “You fainted, dear.” Sister Frances patted her cheek more gently. “Can you stand?”