Which was why I couldn’t go straight to Marcus’s tower to see Keith, like I’d planned. I needed a break first. Talking to Keith wasn’t going to go well. I knew it. He hated me as much as one person could hate another, and I was so afraid of his anger. Not that he’d hit me or anything, but that he’d yell and find a way to hurt me with words. I was most afraid to see the physical damage I’d done to him. I wasn’t sure I could take seeing him like that, knowing I was responsible. The bottom line was, like Reverend Bill had implied, apologizing to Keith would be for me. To help me. Like I’d be using him to clear my own conscience.
Or was that just a cop-out?
Whatever. I wasn’t going to go to the tower without a break.
I drove home, and as I was pulling into the driveway, I saw a yellow kayak docked near the end of our pier. Did Andy get his kayak? Then I spotted a woman—Jen?—running up the pier toward the boat.
I put my car in Park and jumped out.
“Jen!” I called, walking across our side yard toward the pier. It was Jen. That shimmery dark hair and skinny body were unmistakable. “Jen!” I shouted, louder this time.
She stopped and turned around. Waved. Then started walking back up the pier toward me. I felt joy at seeing her. All that stuff about her not coming to pick me up when I was stranded and her splashing me in the ocean was instantly forgotten.
“Hi!” I said as we met in the side yard near the pier. “Did you get a kayak?”
She glanced back at the boat where it rocked gently next to the pier. “A rental. I just felt like trying it out.”
“Cool,” I said.
“I stopped by to make sure you were okay,” she said. “I felt bad about the other night. Not coming to get you.”
“That’s all right,” I said. “I got towed.”
“Excellent.” She shook her head with a roll of her eyes. “It was stupid. I had a guy there. I always hate it when girls shaft their female friends because of a guy. Sorry I did that to you.”
I practically loved her for saying that.
“I get it,” I said. “How’d it go with him?”
She shook her head. “It was okay.” She glanced back at her kayak again. “I’ve got to get going. I just wanted to be sure you were all right.”
“Come in for a while,” I said. I didn’t want her to leave. I wanted so much to get back to the pedicure-and-movie feel our friendship had in the beginning.
She shook her head and started moving backward toward the pier. “Can’t,” she said. “Not today. But I’ll call you and we can get together, okay?”
“Okay.” I watched as she turned and ran up the pier toward her boat again, wondering where she had to run off to in such a hurry.
I walked into the house through the unlocked porch door and instantly smelled it: citrus. Oranges or lemons or whatever it was, and I knew that Jen had been inside the house. Just to see if I was there, I told myself. Probably poked her head inside the door from the porch and called my name. But even as I made up reasons for why she might have come inside, I stood in the middle of the room, breathing in her scent, feeling strangely chilled to the bone.
Chapter Sixty-Six
Sara
Here and Now
April 2008
AMAZING! I’VE CAUGHT UP TO THE PRESENT IN THESE NOTEBOOKS! It shocks me to realize how much I’ve written, how many notebooks I’ve filled in the past six months, and—yes—how much better I feel. Maybe it’s simply the passage of time that’s helped, but I think it’s the writing. Self-indulgent, I know. Especially all I wrote about Jamie. Remembering him. Wallowing in those ancient memories. Oh, he was so imperfect! Just like everyone else. But writing about him made me remember all that I loved about him. The joy I felt back then was intense. The grief, equally so, but I don’t regret a minute. If I’d never had Jamie in my life, I wouldn’t have my son.
We just passed the one-year anniversary of the fire. Physically, Keith is doing much better. He still wears the compression bandages, but they’ll come off sometime during the summer. From an emotional perspective, though, I’m afraid his anger and bitterness are boundless. I forced him to go to a therapist a couple of times, but he won’t go back, and there isn’t much I can do to make him. His anger comes out in all sorts of ways and while it’s often aimed at me, I know its true target is Maggie. All the Lockwoods, actually.
During my weeklong bout with the flu back in October, Laurel took time off from work to drive Keith back and forth to physical therapy in Jacksonville every day, in spite of the fact that he refused to say a word to her. For a while, I let her be my personal slave. She bought our groceries and picked up Keith’s prescriptions and paid for repairs on my car, and I felt justified in letting her do all of it. After a while, though, it no longer felt right. I think my anger was starting to fade. I didn’t want to be her friend again—I doubt that will ever happen—but I also didn’t want to abuse her, and that’s what I felt like I was doing. She was no more responsible for Maggie’s actions than I was for Keith’s smoking marijuana or skipping school. So I apologized to her, and although she said she sincerely wanted to help, I stopped calling her. We haven’t spoken in a couple of months, although I see her here and there. It always feels strained. We’re cordial to one another, nothing more.
Here is what I worry about now: In September, only five short months away, Maggie will get out of prison. It’s one thing to bump into Laurel from time to time; it will be another to bump into Maggie. It will be unbearable for Keith to see her flitting around the island, free as a bird. I try to remind myself that she’s Jamie’s daughter, and I know that, deep down, a part of me still loves a part of her. Yet Keith is first in my heart and always will be, and I worry that seeing Maggie free is going to tear him apart.
For a while, I seriously considered moving. So seriously, in fact, that I did some job hunting, using the computer in the waiting area at the PT clinic while Keith was in with Gunnar. I needed a job that would pay better than waitressing, and it had to be in a location near good medical facilities for Keith. There were several opportunities in Charlotte—training positions in banks and that sort of thing. I applied for one of them at Western Carolina Bank under my maiden name, deciding that if we moved, I’d make it a truly fresh start. I got so excited about the possibility that I looked at apartments online as well. I stumbled across a gorgeous apartment complex with two-and three-bedroom units, plus both indoor and outdoor pools I was sure Keith would love. I filled out the application online, but I knew I was dreaming. The bank salary might cover the rent, but little else.
I thought about the necklace Jamie gave me so long ago, the one I intended to wear on our wedding day. I pay thirty dollars a year for the safe-deposit box it’s in, and I haven’t once looked at it since I put it in there. I fantasized about selling it so that we could live in one of those apartments. The way Jamie talked about the necklace, I think it might be worth five or even ten thousand dollars, although I’ve heard you can never sell jewelry at its true value. I found this high-end auction house online where you can sell jewelry at a good price and keep seventy percent of what they get for it. Seventy percent of, say, ten thousand dollars, along with the salary from the bank, would have made one of the two-bedrooms manageable, at least for a while. But even though I never wear the necklace, I like knowing it’s there. Jamie gave it to me, not to Laurel. I doubt I’ll ever be able to part with it.
As I waited to hear from the bank and the apartment complex, I lay awake every night imagining our new life in Charlotte. The more I thought about it, though, the less appealing the fantasy. I didn’t want to do it. This is my island, too, not just Maggie’s or the Lockwoods’. I may not own property all over it, but it’s mine in my heart, and it felt so unfair that I should have to give it up. So by the time the bank called to say they had a trainee position for me, I’d changed my mind about leaving.
That means that in late August, as long as Keith continues to do well physically, he’ll return to
school. He’ll be a year behind his friends—his former friends, since most of his old friends seem to have disappeared. Kids can be so damn fickle. I’m worried they’ll also be cruel. I guess what I’m really worried about is that I made a mistake turning down that job. Was I being selfish?
A calendar hangs on the wall above my dresser, and I keep lifting the pages to see how quickly September is creeping up on us. I picture Maggie checking her own calendar, looking at the same date with happy anticipation that is the flip side of my dread.
Oh, God.
Was I being selfish?
Chapter Sixty-Seven
Keith
I WAS WORKING OUT ON THE ELLIPTICAL TRAINER IN MARCUS’S bedroom, watching this dude jog on the beach with his Jack Russell terrier, when the doorbell rang. I kept pumping away on the elliptical. I was going over to Jen’s later, so I knew it wasn’t her at the door, and anybody else would be for Marcus. But the bell kept ringing and I started thinking maybe Marcus locked himself out, or maybe it was Flip Cates with news about my mother. So after about five minutes of listening to the bell ring, I got off the elliptical, slung a towel around my neck and went downstairs. I pulled open the front door and was really sorry I bothered: Maggie.
Without even thinking about it, I turned my head to the left to hide the scars. “What do you want?” I asked. I could’ve happily gone the rest of my life without seeing her.
“To talk to you,” she said.
I’d seen her those couple of times on the news since she got sprung, but I hadn’t realized how skinny and pale she’d gotten.
“No, you don’t,” I said. “’Cause if you start talking to me, I’ll start talking back, and you won’t want to hear what I have to say.”
“It’s okay,” she said. “I mean, I do. I want to hear what you have to say.”
“Go away.” I started to close the door, but she put out both hands to stop it.
“Please, Keith,” she said. “I know you don’t owe me anything but—”
“Damn straight.”
“I know that, but please. Let me in.”
I couldn’t say why I caved, but I turned away from the door and let her walk into the house behind me. I flopped down on the sofa and folded my arms across my chest. I wished I wasn’t wearing a T-shirt. I felt like one big walking scar.
“So, go ahead,” I said.
She leaned against one of the chairs and stared out the window toward the beach, and I realized that the last time she saw me, I was in the hospital, covered in bandages. This was her first real glimpse of her handiwork. First time was always a shock. She pulled it together finally, though, and looked right at me.
“I’m really sorry, Keith,” she said. “For the fire. For your injuries. They’re all my fault. I’d give anything to be able to change what happened.”
“You’re not the only one.” Man, I hated that girl. She sort of slid from leaning against the chair to sitting in it, like she was inching her way closer to actually being in the room with me.
“How are you doing?” she asked. “Uncle Marcus says your PT’s going pretty well, but you dropped out of school.”
“That’s my business.”
“I know,” she said.
She was just trying to start up a conversation, and I felt kind of sorry for her. The weird thing was, she had the same eyes as me. I’d never noticed it before, but they were exactly like mine. The shape of them—kind of abnormally round. The brown color that was practically black. The fat eyelashes that looked good on a girl but were too fem for a guy. So, maybe it was because she had my eyes that I felt like I could see behind them. I could see she was scared, being there with me. I didn’t want to feel any sympathy toward her, but when someone has your eyes and you can see right through them, you can’t help but feel some of what they’re feeling. I was glad when my phone rang and I could pull it from my pocket to look at the display instead of her eyes.
It was Marcus.
“Hey,” I said.
“Hey, Keith.” The way he said it, I knew something was wrong.
I sat up. “What is it?” I asked.
“Your mom’s car’s been found.”
“Is she…Is she with it?”
“Your mother?” Maggie leaned forward in the chair.
“I’m sorry, Keith,” Marcus said. “She…It looks like she had an accident. She ran off Route 74 outside of Charlotte, and her car was deep in the woods. It probably happened that first day she went missing. They think she was probably killed instantly. I’m at the police station. They need you here. Do you want me to come get you?”
I couldn’t speak right away. I couldn’t get enough breath in my lungs to say a word.
“Keith? Let me come get you.”
“No,” I said. I’d known it from the start, didn’t I? That she was dead? “I’ll be there in a few minutes.”
I got up, turning off my phone. I ignored Maggie as I headed to the kitchen for my car keys.
“They found your mother?” Maggie watched me grab my keys off the counter, then followed me to the door. “Keith? Did they—”
“Yes, they found her.” I spun around to stare her down, smacking my fist against the wall. “She’s dead!”
“Oh my God!” She covered her mouth with her hand, tears already in her eyes. “I’m so sorry.”
“So what’s the score now, huh, Maggie?” I asked as I yanked open the door. “Five for Maggie Lockwood? Congratulations! You have another victim.”
She followed me out the door, practically tripping over me, she was so close.
“Are you going to the police station?” she asked. “Let me drive you.”
My car. Her car. Both of them a blur in front of the tower. Why was it getting to me like this, when I’d known all along she was dead? My chest muscles squeezed tight around my windpipe.
I pounded the hood of my car. Once. Twice. “Fuck!”
Maggie took my arm and led me to her car. I let her. It was like I had no fight in me. I let her open the car door. My legs shook, from the elliptical or from freaking out or both. I fell into the seat.
Maggie got in behind the wheel and turned the key.
“Damn it!” I said when we pulled into the street. “Why Charlotte? Why without me? Why didn’t she fucking tell me?”
“I don’t know,” Maggie answered, like I’d actually been talking to her and not myself. “Could she have been going to a job interview, maybe? Uncle Marcus told us about the apartment and the bank and—”
“Your uncle should keep his trap shut.”
“We’re family, Keith.”
“Cut me a break,” I snapped. “You and I might have some of the same blood in our veins, but that’s where it ends. I don’t want you for a sister. Get it? I don’t want shit to do with the Lockwoods.”
That shut her up. She sniffled and wiped her eyes with her hands, but we didn’t talk for the rest of the way to the station. When we got there, she walked right into Flip Cates’s office with me, like I’d invited her to tag along. Marcus was there, too, and if either of them was surprised to see Maggie and me together, they didn’t say anything.
Flip stood up from behind his desk. “I’m sorry, Keith,” he said. “This wasn’t the news we were hoping for.”
Marcus walked over to hug me, but I wasn’t having any of it. “Where’s my mother?” I kept my arms at my sides. “What did they do with her?”
“She’s at the medical examiner’s office in Charlotte,” Flip said.
“Why? What does a medical examiner do?” It was one of those things I probably should have known, but I needed an answer and didn’t feel like faking it.
Marcus leaned back against Flip’s desk. “They’ll figure out how long ago she died and the probable cause of death,” he said.
I didn’t want to think about what my mother looked like when they found her. Decomposed and everything. I didn’t want that to be the last image I had of her in my mind.
“They’ll probably want to do
an autopsy,” Flip said.
“Why?” Crap. Now they wanted to cut her up.
“To try to figure out if there was a medical condition or…possibly alcohol or another substance in her system that might have led to her losing control of the car.”
“She didn’t take any drugs,” I said. “And she hardly ever drank. I already told you that.”
“Maybe a deer ran out in front of her car,” Maggie said.
“Very possible, Mags.” Marcus nodded.
“There were boxes and some other things in the car with her.” Flip looked at a notepad lying on his desk. “The police will turn them over to you. When you’re ready, you’ll have to go up to Charlotte to get them.”
“I can do that for you if you want, Keith,” Marcus said. “Or at least go with you.”
“Or I could,” Maggie said.
“They can just throw it all away,” I said. “I don’t want it.”
“Well, I think you need to get it in case there’s something important.” Marcus folded his arms. “The police said there were a lot of papers. Bank statements. That sort of thing. Then some books. Some clothing. A suitcase. Probably the one you thought might be missing.”
“I never said I thought one was missing,” I said. How many times had I told them I didn’t even think she had a suitcase?
“One of the boxes had a pan on it, like Andy Lockwood said he saw her carrying,” Flip said. “But it was an old box and just had toiletries in it.”
“Like she was moving,” I said.
“We don’t know that.”
“Without me.”
“Her car was totaled,” Marcus said, “but you should be able to get insurance money for it.”
“Whoop-de-do,” I said. “That should keep me going for another month or two.” The walls of Flip’s office were closing in on me, getting dark around the edges. My legs started shaking again and I sat down on one of the chairs by the desk. Flip and Marcus and Maggie were all staring at me, and I felt so alone. All those weeks my mother’d been missing, with me knowing deep inside she must be dead, and I’d never felt that horrible, scary, suffocating aloneness until that moment.
Secrets She Left Behind Page 36
