All These Beautiful Strangers

by Elizabeth Klehfoth

  “It was the one reckless thing my father ever did,” I said. “Marrying my mother.”

  “How’d they even meet?” Greyson asked, and it was a fair question.

  “They met in the ballroom of the Carlyle Hotel,” I said. I’d been told this story a hundred times. “At some benefit my grandparents were hosting. My father was working at the Calloway Group. My mother was twenty-two.”

  “So Grace was what—like, a cocktail waitress at the party?”

  “No,” I said, glaring at him.

  “What?” Greyson said. “There’s nothing wrong with being a cocktail waitress.”

  I glanced back at the portrait of my mother on the wall—how elegant she looked there, how happy. It had never occurred to me as a child to ask what my mother had been doing in the ballroom of the Carlyle Hotel. In my mind, she appeared in a ball gown and my father danced with her, swept her off her feet. But now, I had to admit her presence there seemed strange.

  “Your father always kind of scared me,” Greyson said, staring up at the picture. “I mean, he’s kind of an intimidating guy.”

  I didn’t say anything. I remembered the night after my mother left. My father had gone to the police station to file a report. Grandma Fairchild came over to stay with us. She fell asleep in the upstairs guest bedroom. Late in the night, Seraphina climbed into my bed crying, and I didn’t want to wake our grandma. I was seven, and I was the big sister, and I wanted to help.

  “Don’t cry,” I told Seraphina. “We’ll build a fort and we’ll crawl into it, away from it all.”

  We stripped the sheets and pillows from our beds, pulled the cushions from the couches in the downstairs living room. We raided the linen closet, collected fluffy bath towels and thick down comforters and kitchen tablecloths. We draped them over chairs and lamps and tables, Scotch-taped their ends to the walls, and secured them in the edges of doorways—through the living room, the dining room, the upstairs hall. With a flashlight, we crawled through the labyrinth of passageways we had created, naming the rooms and their purposes, and we fell asleep tucked into the space between the coffee table and the couch in the downstairs study.

  Sometime in the night, our father came home. I heard the creak of the front door opening, and I saw, through the thin curtain of the sheet draped overhead, a light turn on. I heard my father’s expletives from the front hall, heard him call our names, heard the ripping of tape from the walls, the sharp edges of chairs biting into the hardwood floor as they were overturned.

  “Go,” I whispered to my sister. “Go, go, go.”

  Go where, I didn’t know. But we crawled, one after another, through the living room, as the soft ceilings of our fortress fell around us. The wood floor was hard and unforgiving under the bare knobs of our knees, the heels of our hands. I led the way into the dining room, took refuge under the big oak table.

  He found Seraphina first. Pulled her from underneath the dining room table by her ankle—I saw it all. He sat down not four feet from me, pulled her onto his lap, tugged her pajama bottoms down to her thighs. I heard the sharp slap of his hand against her bare bottom. Once, twice, a third time. My sister was staring right at me, her face red and puckered, her eyes dripping and wet. She wailed, but she didn’t call out my name, didn’t give me away.

  I scooted back farther under the depths of the dining room table. I covered my mouth with both hands, tucked my fingers into my lips so that he couldn’t hear me breathe, couldn’t hear my dry gasps for air.

  Now I looked up at the portrait of my father, tall and smiling, his arm around my mother.

  “I guess he wasn’t around that much, right?” Greyson said.

  “He was around,” I said.

  “Huh,” Greyson said. “I just don’t remember seeing him that much, is all.”

  “Well, it’s not like you were here all the time,” I said.

  “Sure, I guess,” Greyson said.

  When we reached the second-floor landing, I didn’t turn right and go to my old bedroom. I knew what I would find there; I could navigate it with my eyes closed even after all these years: the giant bay window looking out onto the lake, the pale pink walls, the twin canopied beds where Seraphina and I slept, my old dollhouse in the corner. Instead, I turned left and headed to my parents’ room on the other end of the house. The door was closed but not locked. It was dark inside, the dying light of the day filtering in through the cracks in the curtains. I threw the curtains open and coughed at the waves of dust that unfurled themselves from the window dressings.

  My mother’s vanity was draped in sheets, but I brushed them off and sat in her chair, just as I had when I was a little girl and I would play with her makeup. I opened her jewelry box and started going through the velvet cases. There were so many—all gifts from my father, I presumed. A pearl necklace for her birthday, diamond earrings for an anniversary, a sapphire ring on the day of my birth, a platinum tennis bracelet for Valentine’s Day.

  I wondered why my mother hadn’t taken any of her jewelry with her. When she left, her SUV was still parked in the front driveway; her purse with her keys, wallet, and phone was sitting on her bedroom bureau. It took days before anybody noticed her luggage was missing—two paisley-print suitcases that she normally used to cart her belongings back and forth between the city and the lake house. Some of her things were missing too—her toothbrush, her comb, her favorite summer dresses, a pair of sandals. It bothered me at first, trying to figure out the importance of what she had left behind and what she had chosen to take with her. And then the investigator found the bank tapes and it all made sense: my mother hadn’t wanted to take anything that would be missed, anything remotely traceable. She didn’t want to be found.

  I remembered there was a rip in the inner lining of one of the suitcases. Seraphina and I had found it once while packing, and we thought it was special, like a secret compartment. We used to keep little things in there when we were traveling, our most prized possessions. That summer, Seraphina had stored one of her horse figurines in there, and I had stowed away the bracelet my father had gotten me on a business trip to Barcelona. As a little girl, I would sometimes lie in bed awake at night and imagine my mother, wherever she was, unpacking her things and discovering the treasures that Seraphina and I had hidden there. A part of me liked knowing that my mother carried a piece of us with her. I wondered if they brought her some small comfort.

  In the bottom drawer of the jewelry box, I came across a worn drawstring pouch. Inside I found a cheap gold necklace with a crab pendant. The body of the crab was a fake ruby and the claws were clutching artificial diamonds. I remembered my mother wearing this necklace often. It had been one of her favorites; she wore it almost every day. I had always assumed my father had given it to her, but under closer inspection, I realized how inexpensive it was, the gold chain faded, the fake ruby cloudy and plastic. This definitely was not a gift from my father. I wondered why she had worn it so often, and why she kept it in her jewelry box with all her good jewelry. I didn’t know why, but something made me take it. I slipped the pouch into my pocket.

  “Hey, what are you doing in here?”

  I turned around on the vanity seat and saw a man in coveralls standing in the doorway, a flashlight in his hand. Greyson froze where he was in my parents’ walk-in closet.

  “This is my house,” I said. “What are you doing in here?”

  “I’m calling the police,” the man said as he took a phone out of his pocket and started dialing. He pointed a finger at me. “I saw you take something from that jewelry box. You better put it back.”

  “Hey, man, this is Charlotte Calloway, all right?” Greyson said as he stepped out of the closet and came to stand by my side. “Her dad owns this place. He’s the one who pays your bills. It’s probably best not to piss him off by calling the police on his daughter.”

  The man hesitated. “You’re Mr. Calloway’s daughter?”

  “Yes,” I said. “And I can prove it.”

  I fish
ed my driver’s license out of my purse and held it out to him. He came toward me and picked it up, squinting at the name and the picture and then back at me.

  “Your turn,” I said when he handed my license back. “Who are you?”

  “Frankie Martin,” he said, running a hand along the back of his neck. “I’ve been keeping up the grounds here for half a decade. The first time I’ve ever actually been inside, though. No one told me anyone was coming up to the house today.”

  He was still squinting at me like he wasn’t sure I should be there.

  “Look, you or I can give my father a call if you really want,” I said, and I reached into my purse and held up my phone for emphasis. “But he’s in Aruba on business and I can tell you he’s not going to be very happy to be bothered.” I pulled up my father in my contacts and hovered my thumb over the “call” button.

  My father wasn’t in Aruba. It was Sunday and he was either at home in the city or on the golf course with my grandfather. But I really didn’t want to explain to him why I was at the lake house.

  “No, no, that’s all right,” the man said, scratching the back of his neck again. “Just be sure you lock up when you leave. It will be my ass on the line if you leave a door unlocked and someone gets in here.”

  “Will do,” Greyson said.

  After Mr. Martin left, Greyson and I combed the house methodically, room by room, but it was impossible to search every nook and cranny. When it started to get dark out, we agreed it was time to leave.

  “I’ll drop you off on my way out of town,” I said.

  “Thanks,” Greyson said.

  I paused. I had never gotten to have that conversation with Claire.

  “Actually, I’m kind of hungry,” I said. I glanced sidelong at him. “Do you think Claire would mind if I stayed for dinner?”

  “The more the merrier,” Greyson said, leaning forward to adjust the air-conditioning. “And lucky you, Sunday night is sloppy joe night.”

  “Oh boy,” I said.

  At dinner, Nolan, the youngest, recounted jumping off the high board at the community pool, and Ryder grunted one-word answers any time he was asked a question. When we were done eating, I stayed to help Claire with the dishes as Greyson took Nolan upstairs for his bath and Ryder ambled away to play video games in his room.

  “So, what were you and Greyson up to today?” Claire asked as she filled the sink with hot water. Steam peeled off the edges of the sink. “Please tell me he didn’t hold you captive in the den watching football all day.”

  “No,” I said. “We were out, mostly. He took me to Mandy’s Ice Cream Parlor on Third. We took a little walk around the park.”

  Shit. Was Mandy’s still there? I hadn’t been there since I was . . . like, seven. I peeked a glance at Claire to see if my lie had landed. She was nodding and reaching for the soap.

  “Thanks,” Claire said. “For getting Greyson out of the house for a bit, getting his mind off things. He really needed that.”

  Getting Greyson out of the house? Getting his mind off things? What, did Greyson not have friends or something? I mean, I guess it wasn’t that surprising. He was kind of obnoxious even if he was sort of cute.

  “Um, yeah, sure,” I said.

  “And I wanted to thank you for coming to your grandparents’ party for your mom the other night,” Claire said. “I know it meant a lot to them to have you there.”

  “Yeah,” I said. “It was . . . nice . . . to be there. To be a part of it.”

  “Hand me that plate, will you?” Claire asked, and I handed her the first dirty plate off the stack on the counter.

  “Claire, speaking of my mother,” I said.

  “Yeah?”

  “Well, I was wondering . . .” I hesitated. “I don’t know, it’s just that, from everything you told me the other night about my mother, she seemed like a free spirit. Do you think maybe she got tired of being tied down? Maybe she wanted to make a clean break, you know? It’s not impossible, right? Do you think that’s why she left?”

  Claire was quiet for a moment as she scrubbed the plate with soapy water. Then she set it down in the sink and turned off the running faucet. She turned to face me, her hands still red and wet from the hot water.

  “Your mother didn’t leave you and Seraphina, Charlotte,” she said. “I knew your mother better than anyone and she would never have done something like that.”

  “So she never mentioned leaving?” I asked. “Like even hypothetically? She never wanted something different?”

  Claire chewed on her bottom lip as if she were having some internal debate.

  “Claire,” I said. “Please.”

  She sighed and looked at me. “Your mother always tried to keep this from you and Seraphina, but she and your father used to fight.”

  “I know,” I said. “I saw them.”

  “This was different, Charlotte,” Claire said. “Not just arguments. It got physical.”

  “Are you saying . . . are you saying my father used to hit her?” I asked. My stomach clenched and I felt dizzy. No. No. I shouldn’t have been asking these questions. I didn’t want to know this.

  “I believe he did, yes,” Claire said.

  “You believe he did, or you know he did?”

  “Your mother was very protective of your father and their relationship,” Claire said. She reached for a towel and dried her hands. “She didn’t want people to know that they weren’t happy. There was this one fight, a few days before she disappeared, that got worse than the others. Grace showed up at my place one night with bruises up and down the left side of her body and a gaping cut a few inches wide on her shoulder. I bandaged her up myself.”

  “My father did that to her?”

  When I reached for the counter to steady myself, I realized my hands were shaking.

  “Grace told me her version of events,” Claire said. “There was a disagreement. Things got heated. She said she fell.”

  “So it was an accident,” I said. People fight. People lose their tempers. Accidents happen.

  It didn’t make sense. None of this made sense. Claire had gotten the story wrong, somehow. If something like that had happened, I would have known.

  “He would never do something like that,” I said again. “He wouldn’t.”

  “Grace—she was an outsider,” Claire said. “She didn’t come from their world. She wasn’t one of them. They always treated her like she didn’t belong. They were cold—his whole family was cold to her.”

  “That’s not true,” I said, because it wasn’t. I would have known. “My father loved her.”

  “Maybe so,” Claire said. “I know he used to, in the beginning anyway.”

  It had been stupid of me to start this line of questioning, because what did Claire know about my parents’ relationship? She hadn’t really been there; she hadn’t really seen anything. Not the way my mother would perch on her tiptoes so she could reach to straighten my father’s tie before he left for work. Not the way my father slid his hands into the back pockets of my mother’s blue jeans as she grilled the potatoes on the back patio, the way she leaned into him. If Claire had seen the things I saw, she wouldn’t ever be able to believe my father would raise a hand against my mother. He loved her. He loved her. And it ruined him.

  “So, even though you believe all of that—that my mother was unloved, mistreated, and physically beaten—you still think she didn’t leave us?” I asked.

  “When I found out about the safety-deposit boxes, I wasn’t shocked,” Claire said. “If you ask me, she withdrew all that money with the intention of leaving your father, but she was going to take you and Seraphina with her, start a new life.”

  “So then why didn’t she?” I asked.

  “Because Alistair Calloway isn’t a man you just leave,” Claire said. “Especially when you’re a working-class girl from Hillsborough. I think he found out what she was planning. He found out and—well, he punished her for it. He made it so she could never leave.” />
  Her words turned me to ice. She was no better than Uncle Hank with her crazy theories. No, she was worse than Uncle Hank, because she said it out of jealousy. She hated my father. She was jealous of the way my mother had loved him.

  “They may not have found Grace’s body when they searched the woods or dragged the lake,” Claire said. “No, Alistair is too smart for that. But somewhere, your mother’s still out there, waiting to be found. And when we find her, he won’t be able to hide what he did anymore. The whole world will know what he is.”

  “You’re a liar,” I said. “You’re lying. Why don’t you just tell the truth? I saw you. I saw you that night with my mother by the lake.”

  I had never told anyone that. Not the police when they did their initial investigation, or my father, or even Uncle Hank. I had told them everything but that.

  There had been a storm the night my mother disappeared, I remembered. The whole day, the sky had been gray and dull, the clouds heavy. My parents had a fight late in the afternoon; my father left. Around seven thirty, my mother put Seraphina and me to bed in the room we shared on the second floor, and then she went out back to take her nightly swim in the lake, a towel tossed over her shoulder, a rubber cap concealing her hair. I fell asleep but woke to rain slicking the windowpanes. I had the distinct memory in my dream of my mother calling out to me. I got up and went to the window. And I saw them, down in the water, my mother, and her—Claire.

  Claire was facing my mother, so her back was to me, but I recognized her familiar blond hair, tied up in a knot at the back of her head. I didn’t think it was strange that she was there. She and my mother were constantly together and it was not unusual for the two of them to sit out back on the screened-in porch on an evening like that, and drink a glass of wine. But there was something in the way they were holding each other—how desperately they clung to one another in the water—that made me look away, embarrassed. I felt something twist in my gut.