Hannahwhere

by John McIlveen

  “My God, are you trying to scare us to death?” asked Debbie. “What on earth were you doing in there?”

  Hannah returned the hug for a moment and then pulled herself free. She looked at Debbie and saw the truth in her eyes. Hannah’s smile faded and she backed away from Debbie. Breathing heavily and nearing hyperventilation, she looked from Essie to Doctor Farren and back to Debbie, shaking her head in denial.

  “Sweetie, wait!” pleaded Debbie.

  “Hannah. It’ll be all right,” Doctor Farren assured her, though he had little clue as to why she was acting this way or of what he was assuring her.

  Hannah faced him, eyes glaring and body shaking with fear and rage. “No it won’t!” she screamed, and then she disappeared from sight.

  “Jesus Christ!” Doctor Farren bellowed. He leapt backwards as if the bathroom had just burst into flames. “Where’d she go?”

  Debbie and Essie looked at each other, unsure of what to do. Frustrated, Debbie looked at Doctor Farren with an imploring expression that seemed to say Please understand, and then Debbie, too, disappeared.

  Nearly frantic, Doctor Farren looked at Essie and asked, “What the fuck is going on here?”

  Essie wished she could disappear, too.

  Chapter 34

  Debbie’s decision to follow Hannah was purely impulse. She had had a couple of precious seconds to consider the consequences but Hannah had already spilled the beans, so the decision was made for her. She had no idea which direction Hannah had gone, but the choices were few since Hannah knew of so few places—the hospital, the dumpster, Debbie’s house, Riverside Park, and Elm Creek. Strike the hospital and she’d most assuredly not be at the dumpster. That left Debbie’s house, Riverside Park, and Elm Creek. She made a hasty decision and figured that her house was where Hannah most wanted to be. A two-minute search around her house made it clear that it was the wrong decision. She didn’t think Hannah would go to Riverside due to the number of people who would be wandering around, and its proximity to the hospital. This left Elm Creek.

  Debbie was soon standing in Hannah and Anna’s bedroom within the house on North Easy Street. Nothing had notably changed since they had last been here. She opened the closet door and looked inside. It appeared the same inside, but this time when she pushed at the back wall with the toe of her shoe, the magnets briefly resisted, but then the door swung smoothly inward.

  “Hannah. If you’re in there, honey, I need to talk with you,” Debbie called, peering down into the dark chamber. She received only silence in response.

  Debbie turned from the closet and was soon enthralled by the level of detail in Elizabeth Amiel’s painting, the alien strangeness of the leaves and fruit that Elizabeth had created using metallic paint, the odd stars that seemed aflame, and the flower petals with their near coloring book simplicity. Hannah and Anna had taken Elizabeth’s imagination and replicated all of this in bold 3-D grandeur, and then somehow shared it with Debbie. Another uncanny aspect of the mural was how Elizabeth had painted a precise timeline that started with her meeting Kyle Janssen, to the appearance of Debbie. It was disquietingly accurate, even after Elizabeth’s death.

  Debbie moved closer to the picture to inspect Elizabeth’s rendition of her. Elizabeth got Debbie’s characteristics spot on, from her long red hair and pale, freckled flesh, to her body, which seemed far more flattering from Elizabeth’s perspective than Debbie’s. She couldn’t remember ever looking that good in the mirror, but then, no one saw Debbie in the same light that she saw herself. It was astounding that Elizabeth and Debbie—or Ms. Coppertop—had never met.

  From the immediacy of her new vantage point, Debbie noticed something she hadn’t the first time she’d been there. The frilled lacy edges of her dress were script, a string of words written along the wrists and beltline in delicate print. Though it was still daylight, Debbie had to get within inches of the wall to read the exquisite handwriting.

  “Memory is the mother of all wisdom” – Aeschylus.

  Similar script was present throughout the mural. There were hundreds of words—maybe thousands—that had not been noticeable when she was standing away from the wall. The most visible script ran along the border where the walls met. It was written, “Yeah we all shine on, like the moon, and the stars, and the sun.” — John Lennon.

  Written along the inner perimeter of the heart that hovered above and in front of the painted Debbie, it read, “The ears of men are lesser agents of belief than their eyes.” – Herodotus. Debbie pondered the words for a couple of seconds. It was the ancient Greek philosopher’s way of saying “seeing is believing”. Debbie understood the truth in this… especially after the last week. Seeing is also remembering, amended Debbie.

  She moved to the image of a pregnant Elizabeth Amiel. Along the outline of her swollen belly were the words, “And it came to pass in the time of her travail, that, behold, twins were in her womb” – Genesis 38:27.

  The words were compelling and Debbie wanted to read more, but she forced herself to step away from the wall to look around the house.

  Someone had cleaned up the small pile of debris that had been in the far corner of the living room, to the right of which lay the large expanse of wall where the sofa had most likely been. She envisioned Elizabeth Amiel fighting off the drug-crazed Travis Ulrich while Anna watched, probably standing where Debbie now stood. How devastating for a child to see her own mother butchered. Debbie tried to shake the vision from her mind.

  The kitchen window she had busted out was boarded over with plywood; otherwise, it looked the same in there. Moving further into the room, she glimpsed motion through the window near where the table had once been. Outside, all looked still in the yard. The swing set stood at an awkward angle like a hobbled recluse, looking forlorn beyond the abandoned, weed-choked garden, then something on the roof of the dilapidated shed caught her eye. There was a flash of red as the cardinal spread its wings and flapped once.

  “Well, hello, Mr. Janssen,” Debbie said.

  The bird bobbed its head with staccato jerks and centered its gaze on her. Chirby-chirby.

  Soon nothing will shock me, Debbie thought. She headed for the front door, turned the knob and pulled, but the door had been boarded over from the outside. She hated the thought of breaking another window, then remembered and laughed at her foolishness. Within a blink, Debbie was beside the shed upon which the cardinal was perched. He looked down at her expectantly.

  “Not even a flinch?” Debbie asked. “Aren’t birds supposed to be timid?”

  Djou-chirby-chirby, said the bird.

  “Why don’t you make this easy on both of us and start talking English?” said Debbie. “Disney’s birds do it all the time.”

  The bird said nothing, only stared at her.

  “I figured as much. But that’s okay, it would surely earn me a course in basket weaving. Are you friendly at least?” She raised her hand towards him. The bird calmly regarded her hand as if contemplating a taste sampling, then suddenly took flight and swooped across the street to alight upon a telephone pole.

  “Oh, I see how it is,” Debbie said, dismissing the peculiar cardinal.

  She turned her attention to the house and noted that the access to the crawlspace was again boarded over with plywood. Posted on the face of it was a new white paperboard sign with bold red lettering, PRIVATE PROPERTY - TRESPASSERS WILL BE PROSECUTED TO THE FULL EXTENT OF THE LAW. Another one was stapled to the plywood covering the rear door. Debbie couldn’t remember any postings on the house during her last visit and wondered why it mattered now and not before.

  Djou-djou-chirby-chirby-chirby.

  “You still here?” Debbie asked her chatty companion.

  Djou! The bird swooped to the right and landed atop the next phone pole. It faced Debbie, ruffled its feathers, and released another djou-djou!

  “You want me to follow you?” Debbie said to the cardinal, feeling as if the eyes of the neighborhood were on her. No one was within eyeshot
on the streets as far as she could tell, but if anyone were watching from behind their windows, they’d surely think she’d skipped a cog on her mental sprocket. The bird did nothing.

  Debbie walked to the end of the driveway and said, “Okay, Lassie, where next?”

  Sure enough, he took flight. This time he headed south, stopping to perch four poles away—about the length of a football field. An early-model Ford pickup truck approached, bouncing and clattering and sounding more like an approaching train. Debbie worried that her being a stranger would make her conspicuous and raise some suspicions… not that a pale redheaded woman was very intimidating. Fortunately, her presence only inspired the driver to lean out of his window to daftly gawk at her. He looked as if doubling his IQ still wouldn’t scrape one hundred, and his “hey honey” greeting only reinforced that notion. Debbie did her best to ignore him, but she couldn’t help feeling as if she had “USDA Choice” stamped on her ass in blurred blue ink.

  As Debbie walked toward the pole on which the bird rested, a street sign became visible. West Boyd Ave.

  “Okay, Cardinal Kyle. Where next?” she asked. He promptly took off eastward on West Boyd Avenue.

  They continued in this fashion for about half a mile until they came upon a large structure of red brick and beige cement. Behind a four-foot chain-link fence, half-a-dozen children reveled in a playground while their parents looked on from a small field, smiling amiably at Debbie as she passed. The cardinal landed atop a basketball backboard in the courtyard behind Elm Creek Elementary School. Debbie walked onto the schoolyard, concerned that local eyes might be on her. If they were, no one complained. The bird flew again and landing on a windowsill. Debbie moved beside it and it stayed facing the glass.

  “Now what?” Debbie asked.

  The bird ruffled its feathers again but remained silent. Debbie looked into the classroom through cupped hands. It was clearly abandoned for the summer. She walked to the school door and tried to open it, but it was locked as expected. Returning to the window near Cardinal Kyle, Debbie studied the classroom arrangement. She then walked around the south end of the school where she came upon a white modular unit not unlike Hannah’s home, presumably used as offices or maybe an extra classroom or two. Debbie moved between the school and the mod unit, again praying that no one was within eyeshot. She closed her eyes, envisioned the classroom, and was soon standing among the empty desks, looking out at Cardinal Kyle. Debbie opened the window enough to allow the bird entry, but it merely looked at Debbie and cocked its head as if to say “I got you this far, so the rest is up to you”.

  Debbie understood the gesture. Birds were known for not handling indoor spaces very well, especially ones with windows. She watched as the bird took wing and disappeared over the school’s roof.

  For the better part of an hour, Debbie silently combed the school for Hannah. She searched the cafeteria, the gymnasium, the girls’ and boys’ locker rooms, the bathrooms, and the principal’s office. She cursed the cardinal and her own foolishness for believing he was anything more than a bird… a peculiar bird maybe, but just a bird. She left the principal’s office and stopped outside the nurse’s office.

  She approached the door but hesitated before opening it, knowing if Hannah was in there and the door were to suddenly open, she’d spook like a fawn and be gone in a second. She also suspected the nurse’s office would be locked. Standing inches from the door, Debbie willed herself ahead by two feet, figuring it unlikely that anything was directly behind the door. She reappeared on the other side of the door, in a suite of two rooms and a large closet. It was larger than she had expected. The first room housed a desk, three horizontal file cabinets, and a bank of oak cabinets—four upper and four lower—topped with dark blue Corian countertops for work surfaces. The top cabinets had lockable glass-front doors displaying a wide array of first-aid items. Debbie moved to the doorway of the second room, which appeared to be a small sickbay with three cots. On the nearest cot, Hannah lay with her back to Debbie.

  “How’d you know I was here?” Hannah asked, startling Debbie. She hadn’t moved at all.

  “A little bird told me. How’d you know I was here?” Debbie echoed the question.

  “You popped the air when you came. It’s loud,” Hannah said.

  Debbie recalled the sound of air displacement Hannah had made when she arrived in the hospital bathroom. Why would it be any different for me? she wondered. And why is there no sound when we leave? She figured it should be the opposite.

  Debbie sat on a folding chair set against the wall across from the cot on which Hannah lay. A small stainless-steel cart, empty but for a box of tissues, was set to Debbie’s left. She rested her arm on it.

  “Can we talk about what’s going on?” asked Debbie.

  “I’m not going to anyone else’s place. I’d rather stay here,” Hannah said stubbornly.

  “You’re telling me you’d rather spend all of your time alone, hiding from everyone, with no friends, no nice bed to sleep in, and no nice warm meals?” asked Debbie. “That doesn’t sound like a nice life to me.”

  “I did it before. I know how to take care of myself,” Hannah said defiantly.

  “I have no doubt. I’m pretty convinced you can do just about anything, but can do and want to do are two very different things,” Debbie said. She decided to go the nonchalant route. “You’re nine years old, which means you’d only have to hide for another, oh, let’s say nine or so years until you can legally be on your own. Of course, you wouldn’t have any schooling, so you wouldn’t be able to drive a car and you wouldn’t be able to get a job unless you like cleaning stinky toilet bowls or trash barrels and picking up animal poop. If that’s the case, then I guess you’re all set.”

  Debbie fidgeted with the box of tissues and waited for Hannah to respond. When she didn’t, Debbie continued. “If anyone blabs about that nifty disappearing act you pulled in front of all those people back at the hospital, they’ll definitely want to know how you did it. If people find out that the little girl who appeared out of nowhere is missing again, they’ll be searching even harder to find you. Maybe you can hide well enough so no one sees you for the next nine years.”

  Debbie hoped Hannah wouldn’t study her logic too closely, since it was about as solid as quicksand. Hannah continued giving Debbie the silent treatment, so she dropped the blasé tone.

  “Nothing says that in time I can’t be your foster mother or even your mother. Believe me… I’ll keep working at it if you stick around. You of all people should know that incredible things could happen. In a little over a week you’ve changed my views on so many things.” She chuckled and continued, “If I hadn’t seen these things with my own eyes, I wouldn’t be here right now… in Elm Creek for crying out loud!”

  Debbie looked around the small room and the enormity of the situation hit her.

  “God, we’re in Nebraska! We freakin’ teleported here!” Debbie gushed. “It’s hard to believe, but here we are. Seeing is believing. Your mother even wrote it on your bedroom mural… seeing is believing.”

  Hannah rolled slightly on the cot, her attention piqued. “She did? I don’t remember that. Where?”

  “Well, it actually says something like the ears of men are less likely to believe than their eyes. I know I tortured it, but it’s a quote by some Greek philosopher whose name I can’t remember. It means people are more likely to believe something if they see it than if they hear about it. Like with ghosts or God… or you.”

  “Oh, I saw that one, but I didn’t understand it,” Hannah confessed.

  Debbie retreated into thought for a few moments and then said, “You know what? That quote gives me an idea. It’s a shot in the dark, but I think it just might work if we’re lucky.” She got up from the chair and moved beside Hannah. “I know I can’t make you come with me if you don’t want to, but I would love it if you did. I’m not giving up on this. Will you come with me?”

  Debbie waited what seemed like forever f
or a response but it never came. She leaned over, kissed Hannah on the head, and said, “Think about it. I’ll be at my house waiting for you… if you want.”

  As difficult as it was leaving, Debbie traveled home.

  She got a glass of water from the kitchen and went into her bedroom where The Doobie Brothers rocked on about “China Grove”. She sat on her bed and mulled over her options, pulled her iPhone from her pocket and called Essie.

  “Where in the hell are you?” she whispered sharply on the third ring.

  “And a big hello to you, too,” said Debbie.

  “I mean it! What were you thinking? Do you have any idea what kind of shit storm you left brewing here? Fortunately, only Doctor Farren and I saw it. He’s so amped he’s about to fall into convulsions.”

  “I can imagine. Don’t you want to know if I found Hannah?”

  ”You know I do!” Essie sputtered. “I’m just so goddamned infuriated and concerned. How do we get out of this one? Can you turn down the radio? By the way, how is Hannah?”

  “Hey, what happened to your ontological shock theory?” asked Debbie, adding a touch of smart-ass. She pushed the volume slide on her radio down, but not off… never off.

  “Let’s hope and pray I’m right! Again, how is Hannah?”

  “She’s in Elm Creek, but she’s fine,” Debbie explained. “I think she’ll come back soon.”

  “You think? You didn’t bring her back?” Essie asked, sounding aghast.

  “Don’t worry, she’ll be back,” Debbie said. “How, pray tell, would I bring her back, anyway? It’d be like catching smoke with a butterfly net.”