The Night She Disappeared

by Kevin O'Brien

  —Excerpt: Session 3, audio recording

  with Dr. G. Tolman, July 23

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  Tuesday, July 14—11:02 A.M.

  Anna stood at the number 47 bus stop at Bellevue Avenue and Bellevue Place on Capitol Hill. She was near a little cluster of storefronts—a hip-hop bar called The Lookout, a jiujitsu studio, and the only spot among them open at this hour, a small mom-and-pop grocery store. The rest of the block was made up of apartment buildings. Nobody else was at the bus stop, which had a shelter—barely large enough for two strangers to keep a comfortable distance.

  Right now, the shelter wasn’t necessary. Anna could feel the sun on her face, and the thermometer was supposed to hit the mideighties today. She wore sunglasses—with a pretty, white summer blouse and khaki slacks. It was the kind of outfit she’d wear for one of her news reports—nice, but not flashy. She wanted to look the way she did on TV.

  She was supposed to meet someone here at eleven o’-clock, someone who knew her only from her appearances on KIXI-TV News.

  Anna had been anxious about the meeting and arrived ten minutes ago. She’d been a bit unclear if this woman was getting off the bus when it arrived or just meeting her at the stop. But there was no bus and no one else around, so Anna had been waiting.

  With her phone in her hand, she reread Russ’s text from last night:

  Don’t know who Gil is. I’m ashamed to admit I never read Courtney’s book acknowledgments very closely. If I don’t recognize a name, I just assume they’re someone with the publisher. I watched Sally Justice last night. Sorry she was so rough on you. It’s because of Courtney & me that you’re going through all this misery. You deserve better. Forgive me. Love you.

  It had been only two days since she’d last talked with Russ on Sunday, but it seemed like forever. Maybe that was because everything they’d said was so final. For the past couple of days, Anna kept having these little crying jags that sort of snuck up on her. She felt one coming on now and tried not to succumb to it.

  She still hadn’t heard from George and didn’t really expect to.

  George wasn’t the only person she’d disappointed—far from it. Anna had made the mistake of opening her work mail this morning: 493 e-mails—practically all of them negative. She had Bible-thumpers claiming she was going to hell, loyal fans who were let down and disillusioned, and everyone in between. She hadn’t read all of the e-mails yet and wasn’t responding to any of the critics, most of whom just seemed to be venting. There was no point in engaging with them. She sent thank-you notes to the handful of people who had e-mailed their support and said they hoped to see her back on TV soon. In her brief replies, she didn’t mention that she was pretty certain her television career was over. Instead, Anna kept things upbeat.

  Last night, she’d Googled the names of the women in Courtney’s writers’ group. The only one with a working phone number from the online white pages had been Becky Arnett. She’d answered after three rings.

  Anna had explained who she was—and that she had some questions about Courtney Knoll. She wanted to make sure she was the same Becky Arnett who had been in a writers’ group with Courtney.

  “Yeah, that’s me,” Becky had answered. “And I can see from the caller ID that you’re Anna Malone. But I’m having a hard time believing you’re the Anna Malone from TV. I’d have to meet you first before I start spilling my guts about Courtney. How about if we meet someplace late tomorrow morning—say at eleven o’clock? There’s a bus stop by a bar called The Lookout . . .”

  Anna now checked her wristwatch: 11:09. She looked up and spotted a thirtysomething brunette on the sidewalk, wandering toward her. The woman was totally focused on her phone. She stopped by the shelter, gave Anna the briefest of glances, and went back to her phone.

  “Excuse me,” Anna said. “You’re not Becky, are you?”

  Barely looking up, the brunette frowned, shook her head, and turned away.

  “Thanks,” Anna said to the woman’s back. Sometimes she hated what cell phones had done to polite society.

  With a sigh, she decided to go back to her own phone and catch up on all those e-mails—and all the people who thought she was sinful, selfish, and immoral. Anna cringed as she read the subject headings to some of the latest incoming messages. You’re Disgusting got right to the point; So Disappointed in You felt like a well-deserved kick in the stomach; and A Pig by Any Other Name was immediately deleted.

  Near the top of the current e-mails listed was one from Taylor H. with the subject header: Tonight’s Sally Justice Show.

  Anna opened it:

  Dear Anna,

  On tonight’s show, my mother is talking mostly about you and Dr. Knoll and your backgrounds. I couldn’t get any details, but she’s going into your family history. She’s determined to make you look bad. She’s interviewing someone you worked with at the TV station. Unfortunately, I don’t have a name or any other information about who it is, just someone work-related.

  Since I refused to appear on last night’s show by running out on her, my mother’s not sharing much with me. One thing I know, she’s zeroing in on your claim that you don’t remember anything from the night Courtney disappeared. She thinks it’s a big cover-up, and it’s where she’s going to keep jabbing away at you on her show.

  Anna, if you could remember, and go public with that, Sally wouldn’t have much to use against you. I think it might help Dr. Knoll, too. Right now, remembering exactly what happened Thursday night and Friday morning seems like your best defense. I know a hypnotherapist who might be able to help. She’s had amazing success with people who have had blackouts or repressed memories and things like that. If you’re interested, let me know.

  If I’m overstepping here, please tell me and I’ll back off.

  I hope this is some help. I’ll text you if I can get the name of that coworker my mother will interview on tonight’s show.

  Take Care.

  Taylor

  Anna wondered if Sally Justice had gotten to George. But she couldn’t imagine that George would betray her—no matter how angry he was at her right now. She’d been on good terms with nearly everyone in the newsroom. So she wondered who else Sally had booked on her show tonight.

  She dreaded what Sally would broadcast about her dead parents. But there was nothing she could do about that. She told herself she shouldn’t care, sticks and stones and all that. But she had a career in TV, and it mattered what people thought of her.

  She fired off a reply to Taylor:

  Dear Taylor,

  Thank you so much for your note and all your help.

  If you can find out who your mother is interviewing tonight, maybe I can reach out to them ahead of time. I’m not certain what kind of negative stories any of my work associates might have about me. But if you can find out anything more I’d appreciate it.

  Thanks also for the advice about jarring my memory of Thursday night. You’re not overstepping at all. This is very helpful. Maybe we can discuss it later.

  The truth was, a part of her didn’t want to remember.

  Had it all happened just as Russ had described? Or had he lied to protect himself? Knowing Russ, he could have been lying to protect her.

  But Anna knew she couldn’t have murdered Courtney. It didn’t matter how drunk or angry she’d been, she couldn’t have killed her—at least, not deliberately. Why was she still haunted by the lie that creep had whispered to her on the phone Saturday afternoon?

  She heard a rumbling down the street and saw the number 47 bus turn a corner and pull up toward the stop.

  She quickly typed: Thanks again! All my best, Anna. Then she pressed send and put her phone away.

  The bus rolled up to the stop, and the doors opened with a hiss.

  Removing her sunglasses, Anna watched an older woman step down to the sidewalk. The gray-haired lady didn’t look at her. She was followed by a man on his phone and a woman on her phone. The bus driver—a stout woman of fif
ty with short-cropped curly gray hair—stepped down to the bus door. “We leave in five minutes,” she announced—for Anna and the woman still staring at her phone. “You’re welcome to board and pay now, or wait out here. We leave promptly at eleven-twenty.” She smiled at Anna. “Well, if it isn’t Anna Malone, the genuine article. I’m Becky.”

  Before Anna could answer, Becky turned to the woman on her phone. “Hey!” she barked. “I was talking to you a second ago. Are you getting on the bus or waiting out here or what?”

  The woman looked startled. “Um, I—I can wait.”

  Becky ducked back into the bus, and then reemerged with a satchel. She looked at Anna and nodded toward the small grocery store. “C’mon, let’s talk over here.”

  Anna followed her, and they stopped in front of the store window. “Thanks for agreeing to talk to me,” Anna said. “You said to meet you at the bus stop, but I didn’t expect you to be driving the bus.”

  Becky dug into her purse. “I’ve published three books—all small press, but legitimate. I’d be homeless and starving to death if I wasn’t driving this bus around the city thirty hours a week. That’s the life of a struggling author—in a nutshell.” She fished out a pack of Virginia Slims. “Mind if I light up?”

  Anna shook her head.

  “I was ninety-nine percent sure you were the real Anna Malone, but I wanted to meet you in person. Before I let you go, I want your autograph.”

  Anna smiled. “I’d be happy to give you one, but really, I’m just a local TV reporter. I’m not a celebrity.”

  Becky lit her cigarette and turned her head so that she didn’t blow the smoke in Anna’s face. “Are you kidding me? I watch trashy TV. I saw The Sally Justice Show last night. You’re getting more and more famous every day. I have to confess: I may have gotten you here under false pretenses. I’m not sure what I can tell you about Courtney. I haven’t seen her in about three years. That’s when she left our writers’ group. Actually, we voted her out.”

  “I got the impression from Dr. Knoll that there were some hard feelings.”

  “That’s putting it nicely. When Courtney sold that first book, The Defective Squad, we were all so excited for her. We thought we’d already read most of the book as a group. But no, Courtney went in an entirely different direction from the first draft we’d seen. And half of her ideas she stole from us. For example, I was writing a memoir four years ago, and I shared it with the group. My father was a security officer, an ex-cop, and an alcoholic. He used to beat me—and my mother, who, by the way, was half-Tlingit. Mom got the worst of it. One night, when I was eleven, Dad handcuffed me to the stove and beat my mother to death with his nightstick. Then he shot himself. I watched the whole thing. Sound familiar?”

  Anna stared at her in wonder. “That’s what happened to the mute girl in The Defective Squad,” she murmured. It was Courtney’s dramatic explanation for how the girl had become mute. The girl had screamed throughout the whole ordeal, and then didn’t utter another word after that. The mute girl in the book had a Native American mother, too.

  “She never asked me if she could use that story,” Becky said. “She took my personal pain and exploited it. She stole from all of us.”

  “I understand from Dr. Knoll that the whole idea for The Defective Squad came from someone else in the group.”

  Puffing on her cigarette, Becky nodded. “Crazy Sandy, she’s the one who first wrote about the team of disabled teenage superheroes. She got about four chapters into it and then gave up. That was typical of Sandy. She’d get a plot idea brewing, start a book, and abandon it after a couple of months. But Courtney never asked Sandy if she could use the idea. She totally ripped her off. After Courtney’s book came out, Sandy went nuts and told Courtney that she was going to sue. Courtney claimed that Sandy had given her permission to use the idea—which was a bald-faced lie. She also claimed that Sandy would have never gotten the idea in the first place if it weren’t for Courtney being in the writers’ group and being deaf—which is maybe half-true, I guess. But it was still a raw deal for Sandy. She was all bent on hiring a lawyer and going after Courtney. But the group talked her out of it. Sandy was always kind of nuts, hence the nickname Crazy Sandy. Of course, no one called her that to her face. Anyway, all a judge or jury would need is fifteen minutes of listening to Sandy rant and rave, and they’d throw the case out of court. We all figured what’s the use? and moved on. But Sandy never got over it. I mean, she hated Courtney with a passion.”

  Becky dropped her cigarette on the sidewalk and stepped on it. “In fact, when you announced on the news Sunday night that Courtney was missing, and Sally Justice said she might even be dead, I thought, Well, maybe at last, Crazy Sandy got her revenge.”

  Dumbfounded, Anna stared at her.

  Becky glanced toward the bus, and Anna followed her gaze. A man was at the bus door, but he hesitated and looked at Becky expectantly.

  “We leave in a minute!” she called. “Go ahead and board. Pay me when we’re ready to take off!”

  “Are you going to Nordstrom Rack?” he called.

  “We stop right by it!” she called back. Then she turned to Anna again.

  “Do you know how I can get ahold of this Sandy?” Anna asked.

  Becky shrugged. “I have an e-mail address. I’m not sure if it’s still good. The group broke up about two years ago. The rest of us have kept in touch. But Sandy kind of fell off the grid.” She reached into her purse again and took out a spiral notebook and pen. “Sandy’s phone number and e-mail are in my laptop at home. If you give me your e-mail—along with your autograph—I can send you Crazy Sandy’s contact info, if it’s still good.” She handed the pen and notebook to Anna. “And for the autograph, Becky is with a y.”

  Anna scribbled down her e-mail and phone number. Then she wrote: To Becky—Thanks for everything! All my best, Anna Malone. She handed the notebook back to Becky. “By the way, there’s someone named Gil in the acknowledgments of all three of Courtney’s books. You don’t happen to know who that is, do you?”

  Shoving the notebook in her satchel, Becky laughed. “That’s an inside joke. For a while, the girls in the group all lived vicariously through Courtney, because she was having more sex than the rest of us combined—most of it behind her husband’s back, too. She used to complain about Russ never being around, so she had to go out and get her fun elsewhere. She was a regular love-’em-and-leave-’em girl. She once joked to me that when she wrote her acknowledgments, she’d have to thank all the guys she’d laid because they kept her from going insane while writing her book. Gil is code for ‘Guys I’ve Laid.’”

  Anna let out a surprised little laugh, “Seriously?”

  Becky nodded. “Seriously.”

  “Do you know if any of her boyfriends resented being loved and left? Did any of them have wives who might have held a grudge?”

  Becky gave her a shrewd half grin. “Are you looking for suspects?” She shook her head. “What a dumb question. Of course you are. Sally Justice is trying to pin Courtney’s disappearance on you and your boyfriend.”

  With a sigh, Anna nodded glumly.

  “Well, what Sally doesn’t know is that Courtney must have a whole bunch of people who wouldn’t mind seeing her dead. But the guys she was seeing three years ago? That’s a long time for a guy to hold a grudge. Besides, I can’t even begin to remember any of their names. She always referred to them as the Gym Guy or the Tennis Player or Mr. Light Rail. If you’re looking for suspects, I still think you’re better off tracking down Crazy Sandy. Now, she’s the type who will hold on to a grudge until the Rapture.”

  Wide-eyed, Anna nodded. “Okay, thanks.”

  “Well, I’ve got passengers tapping their feet.” Becky started to back away—toward the bus, where four people were now waiting to board. “I’ll e-mail you Sandy’s contact info.”

  “Thanks again!” Anna called.

  She watched Becky Arnett board the bus, and then the passengers followed her in.


  “Hey, Anna!” she heard Becky yell.

  She came to the door of the bus.

  Sitting at the wheel, Becky smiled at her. “I wanted to say, I really enjoyed meeting you. You’re a nice person. And I think Sally Justice is full of shit.”

  “I needed to hear that,” Anna said. “Thank you.”

  Becky nodded and reached for the door lever. The bus doors closed with a hiss.

  Anna waved, and then she watched the number 47 bus pull away from the curb and head down the street.

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  Tuesday, July 14—6:11 P.M.

  The TV news kept showing that same footage of police searching the lake around Russ and Courtney’s dock. They also showed—over and over—the same author photo of Courtney, looking intelligent and beautiful.

  Early this morning, some teenagers had discovered Courtney’s suitcase, the one Russ said she must have packed and taken with her when she’d disappeared. The case had been floating in the water by a neighboring dock north of Russ and Courtney’s house. Inside the carry-on were two bloody bath towels and a hand towel—all monogrammed with Courtney’s initials. Several more items were stashed in the suitcase, including Courtney’s phone, her purse, and other articles Russ had noted as missing. Courtney’s glass quill award wasn’t among the items found.