Girls in Trouble: A Novel

by Caroline Leavitt

  It felt like forever since she had been here. There were the same houses she remembered, the pastel-painted Cape Cod, the ranch hidden by bushes. The kids’ toys flung carelessly, a red and white jump rope, like a snake coiled on the grass.

  There. Sara saw the house. Pale blue. Danny’s house. She stopped pedaling, planting her feet on the sidewalk, her heart racing.

  Danny’s front door slapped open and a woman stepped out. Sara stared. The woman was tall and thin and shockingly lovely, with a curly cap of black hair and pale skin. She was holding a black down jacket closed about her, and when she bent to pick up the newspaper, tossed on the porch, a gold cross glinted at the base of her throat. She looked up and saw Sara. Her hand reached up to touch the cross.

  Danny’s mother, Sara thought. It had to be. Sara had never once met her, and here she was in the flesh, and she seemed nothing like how Sara had imagined her, nothing like the photograph she had seen.

  “Are you lost?” Danny’s mother said. Her voice was low and deep, but there was a sticky quality to it, like dried honey on a counter.

  Sara shook her head. She wanted to, but she couldn’t move. Danny’s mother studied her, considering. “Do I know you?” she asked finally.

  “I’m Sara.”

  Danny’s mother came down the walk and over to Sara. She stuck out her hand to shake Sara’s. Her nails were bitten and unpainted. “Frances,” she said.

  “I need to find Danny. It’s really important. I’m his girlfriend.”

  Frances cocked her head, considering.

  “I left him a note. Do you know if he got it?”

  “I don’t know anything. Anyway, he’s not here right now.”

  “Please. You have to tell me where he is. Please.”

  “Why would I want to do that?” Frances said and then she peered closer at Sara. “Are you all right?”

  Sara nodded.

  “Well, that’s good, then.” Frances looked at the house. “I need to go now.”

  Frances started to turn, another silent person who wouldn’t talk to her, and Sara couldn’t help it. The words flew from her mouth. “Did you know we had a baby?” she blurted. “Did Danny tell you?”

  Frances narrowed her eyes. “I knew all right,” she said shortly.

  “Do you want to see her?”

  Frances started. “Like in person?” she said.

  “She’s living with another family. Not officially adopted. But I have a picture.”

  Frances stayed silent while Sara dug in her purse. She found the photo of Anne she loved, the one she always carried, the baby in a tiny yellow dress. Sara’s hands shook.

  “Isn’t she beautiful?” Sara said. Frances studied the picture, and just for a moment, her mouth tightened, and then she handed the picture back to Sara.

  “All babies are beautiful,” Frances said flatly. “And if you think I can’t imagine how you feel, you’re wrong.”

  “Excuse me?”

  “Look at you, young, pretty girl with all the doors in the world ready to open for you, and there you are wanting to slam them shut and put on the dead bolts.”

  “No, no, it’s not that way. You don’t understand.”

  “Oh, yes I do. Better than you think.” Frances squinted at Sara. “There’s nothing more terrible for a mother than losing her child. Doesn’t matter how old they are or how it happens. Sometimes, you do things you might never have figured yourself doing. Impossible things. It’s just what love does to you.”

  “Do you know where he is?” Sara blurted. She heard the begging in her voice. “I have to talk to him. Before it’s too late.”

  “It’s already too late, isn’t it?”

  “Please. Tell him I came by. Please.”

  “I’m doing you a favor, not telling you anything, and you don’t even know it,” Frances said. “You probably shouldn’t come back here again,” she said. And then she turned, tucking the paper under her arm, and walked back inside. Sara balanced on her bike, just for a moment, and then she bent her head, and began to ride as fast as she could.

  As soon as she got to Eva’s, before she even parked her bike, she heard the baby crying. Not the usual cat cries Anne made, but real wails, loud and ragged. Alarmed, Sara let her bike fall on the soft grass, and bounded up the steps.

  Eva would be furious that she had come over, but she couldn’t think about that now, not with the baby crying like that. Was something wrong? Maybe she would just come inside for a minute, make sure everything was okay and then leave. Maybe Eva would be in a better mood now, maybe she’d want Sara to come in and help, the way she used to. They should figure this out, the same way she would figure out a calculus problem. “Unsolvable,” people would say, and Sara would go right ahead and solve it.

  She didn’t have the key anymore, so she knocked on the door, and when no one answered, she knocked again. “Eva?” she called.

  She went around to the back of the house, where she saw the small window, half open, easy enough to shimmy up into.

  As soon as she was inside the house, the baby’s cries went up two decibels. My God, she thought. Where was Eva? Had something happened? She didn’t care if Eva was mad she was here, she just wanted Eva to be okay, she wanted the baby to be okay. “Eva?” she called, and the baby cried louder. She rushed through the kitchen, past the hanging calendar. Every day had something written on it and she peered at it. “Lunch with Christine.”

  “Meeting at school.”

  “Mommy and Me Class.” Every day was filled and not one day had space for her on it. She passed by the living room, automatically looking for the photograph of herself, big and pregnant, but it was gone from the mantel, removed, and when she saw the blank spot Sara felt as if she had been punched in the chest.

  She stopped, and she could hear Eva downstairs, the noisy rattle of the dryer, the radio blaring, Eva singing the way people do when they’re alone, belting out “Blue Bayou.” Jesus, Sara thought. My God. Didn’t she hear Anne?

  The phone rang and Sara froze. The radio clicked off but instead of hearing Anne wailing, Eva picked up the phone. Sara stood there, amazed. “Oh, let me call you later,” Eva said. “I can hardly hear myself think down here.” And then in that moment of quiet, when Eva could have heard Anne, when she could have raced upstairs to tend her, when she could have seen Sara standing there in the kitchen where Sara wasn’t supposed to be, Eva turned the radio back on, and then all the fear and tension Sara was feeling catapulted right into rage. Was Eva that oblivious?

  Sara knew what to do now. She strode into the baby’s room, and as soon as Anne saw her, Sara swore the baby’s cries got lower. Anne gulped and sobbed and glued her eyes onto Sara and Sara ached with emotion. Sara picked Anne up, and hugged her close, and the baby’s cries slowed to whimpers. Sara loved her. This was her baby and no one could take that away from her, no matter how they tried to separate the two of them, no matter how they tried to make her invisible. Especially someone who would stay downstairs singing and chatting on the phone while a baby cried.

  I changed my mind, she thought. You’re my baby no matter what anyone says.

  She thought of Danny’s mother, with her bitten nails, standing on the front lawn, telling Sara how she had lost her son. Love can make you do impossible things, Frances had said. Sara held Anne tighter. / won’t lose you, she thought. I’ll never lose you.

  She held the baby in one arm and, with the other, grabbed the diaper bag and stuffed it with diapers and clothes. She was acutely aware now of Eva’s singing, of the noisy banging of the dryer. She had to rush. She was sweating now, and her throat felt stapled shut, and she raced into the kitchen, jamming Similac and baby food into the bag, warm winter clothes. Then she bundled Anne into a hooded, fuzzy coat and carefully fit her into her baby carrier. “Shloo,” said Anne and Sara said, “Shhh.” The baby studied her, newly interested.

  The dryer suddenly stopped and a pebble of panic formed in Sara’s belly. Grabbing up the carrier, she rushed to
the front door and flung it open, didn’t even stop to close it, but strode out across the front lawn. She’d stop at the bank. Grab what money she had there. It wasn’t much, but it would be enough to get them started. Her bike, well, it would just be another thing she was leaving behind, another thing she’d have to regret.

  * * *

  Eva came upstairs balancing two loads of clean wash. She was feeling so good, so impossibly good. Downstairs, while sorting wash, she had daydreamed she and George were snorkeling in Hawaii. Maybe that’s what they all needed. A little vacation. Someplace warm and lazy where all they had to do was bake on a beach and not think about anything more pressing than what suntan lotion to buy. Winter blues. That’s all it was. She went to get the baby. Tomorrow was day care again, but today she thought she’d take Anne out; maybe she’d take her to see Christine, after all. Just talking to Christine that little bit on the phone had made her want to talk to her even more. Every day she had something new planned. She was getting out, feeling better. The whole world seemed to be opening up again. “Anna banana,” she called, “Did you finish your nap?” One of the things everyone was telling her was so great was the way the baby slept, so deeply you could shoot off fireworks next door and she wouldn’t rouse. It was good, Eva supposed, though sometimes, standing by the crib, watching her daughter in her still, long sleeps, Eva wondered why Anne wasn’t more anxious to be awake, to get lively.

  “Let’s see if we can get you up,” she called, and then she walked into the baby’s room and saw the empty crib.

  She felt confused and then scared, and then, almost like relief, she caught that damn scent, that musk, and then she felt anger. Of course. Oh goddammit. Of course. Sara. This was just the kind of thing that girl would do. Eva didn’t have any idea how Sara had gotten in here, but she could just imagine. Maybe she made up an extra key knowing full well Eva would ask for it back. Maybe she came in through the window. That did it. “Sara!” Eva called, her voice rising.

  She looked through the house. The kitchen, the den, the rooms in the back. “Sara!” And then Eva saw the carrier was gone. She’d kill her. She’d absolutely kill her. Sara probably took Anne to the park or out for a walk. How dare she!

  Eva grabbed her keys and her coat and headed out the door and then she spotted Sara’s bike. “Sara!” she shouted, but the neighborhood was empty. She got in her car and drove, around and around the neighborhood, to all Sara’s old haunts. The schoolyard where there was a small swing set and a blacktop, the same blacktop where George had taught Sara to drive. The Star Market where Sara might have gone to get supplies. She couldn’t find her, couldn’t see the baby, and she began to feel angrier and angrier.

  Eva drove back to the house. She was too furious to go back inside, so instead, she waited on the front porch for Sara to show up with some excuse. She simmered with rage, waiting, imagining Sara’s explanation, the thin soft voice. The baby had needed air. The baby had needed diapers so she took her for a walk. She was doing Eva a favor. She was helping out. A million excuses. Eva stared at her watch. Six already. This was it. The final straw. She was boiling over now. She stood up and looked down the street, so empty not even a dog was lolling down it, and then her fury began to fade into fear, and by the time she went back inside to call George, she was panicking.

  “It’s all my fault!” she cried.

  “How is it your fault? Is it against the law to do the laundry? To leave a window unlocked in your own house? Eva. Stay calm,” he said. “I’m coming home.”

  But Eva’s calm had dissolved. Where had Sara gone for so long? She stepped outside and knocked on Nora’s door and asked if she had seen Sara that afternoon. She even called Abby’s office, but Abby bristled when Eva told her Sara had taken the baby.

  “Taken the baby! What are you talking about?” Abby said.

  “She broke into the house!”

  “The ‘one big happy family’ house?” Abby said. “What proof do you have that she would do such a thing! You’re negligent, and you blame my daughter?” Abby hung up. Negligent, Eva thought, her fear growing. She was negligent and even Abby knew it.

  She picked up the phone and called the police, and the moment they arrived at the scene, George pulled up in the drive.

  There were two cops. One was stocky and older and the way he kept staring at Eva unnerved her. The other cop looked barely older than sixteen, which startled Eva. His face was dusted with freckles, his hair was boyishly cut, and his nails, she noticed, were chewed. “Start from the beginning,” the sixteen-year-old-looking cop said, opening up a notebook, and Eva shook her head, as if she could just shake everything free.

  “I see,” said the cop, but Eva saw how he exchanged glances with the other cop.

  “What?” she said.

  He wrote something else down. “Nothing.” He looked at her impassively. “Can you describe the girl?”

  “There’s a picture.” George reached into his pocket and pulled out a shot of all of them, laughing up into the lens.

  “You keep a picture in your pocket?” the cop asked, and Eva took George’s hand.

  “The baby had two different-colored socks on,” Eva cried.

  The cop raised one eyebrow at her.

  “On purpose!” Eva cried. “She loves colors!”

  “She just came in?” the cop said.

  She turned to George. She clutched his arm. “I should have watched her better. I should have locked the windows.” She swiped her hands across her eyes.

  “Don’t. You don’t have to do this.”

  “I don’t?” she asked. “Why don’t I?”

  Eva couldn’t look at the cop. “Can I use your phone?” he said. “Do you have her parents’ number?”

  Eva nodded, dumbly. George went to get the number, to lead the cop to the phone.

  All she could think of was that she had been doing laundry and the baby was gone.

  It didn’t take long for George and the cops to come back into the room. George shook his head. “I got the mother at work,” the cop said. “She says Sara often goes off on her own, that Sara often left things over here.” He frowned and scratched at his head. “Are you sure she took the baby?”

  Eva gripped George’s hand. It was too terrifying to think otherwise. “Yes,” she said.

  “Do you know where she might go?”

  Eva shook her head. “She had a boyfriend, but he’s gone.”

  The cop shut the notebook. “Well, she’s a kid. How far can she get?” he said. Both cops got back into the car. Eva heard the skittery whine of their radio, the smooth way the car started up. She saw Nora peeking out from her front door, looking over. And then they were gone.

  That night, George and Eva just lay in bed. Neither one of them could sleep. Eva crawled as close to George as she could and then, suddenly, he bolted up, frowning.

  “What is it?” Eva asked.

  “The cop never gave me the picture back,” George said. “I forgot to ask.”

  “We’ll call the station, get it back.”

  “He folded it in two.”

  Eva rubbed George’s shoulders, at the tiny knots, and then suddenly she felt chilled.

  “You don’t think it’s someone else who took Anne? You think it’s Sara?” She couldn’t help worrying it in her mind. She remembered a few years ago, when she was teaching, reading about this terrible thing. A single father and his best friend and their two young boys were at a Waltham ice-cream shop. A bright sunny day. A car had pulled up out of nowhere, a door had opened and a man had leaped out and had snatched one of the boys, had sped off in the car before anyone could move. The whole neighborhood went crazy. There were search parties. News reports. The father went on TV to plead and ended up sobbing so hard, the newscaster had had to take over. The boy was found two weeks later, in a mall, two cities away. He was dressed differently, in new, brightly colored clothes. His hair was dyed blond, and he wouldn’t say who had taken him or why. “Well,” the newscaster had said. “Wh
at matters is the boy is home safe.”

  It had bothered Eva, that story, that not knowing what had really happened. It bothered her so much that she and Christine had put together a Don’t Talk to Strangers Program at the school. They had made the kids learn the song about remembering your name and address and going up to the kind policeman. They had playacted what to do if a stranger approached. “Bite strangers! Kick them!” Eva had shouted. “It’s the one time you’re allowed!” Christine had finally abandoned the program because it was making everyone more scared. Too many kids were flinching when relatives they hadn’t seen tried to hug them, too many kids were screaming at their parents’ friends, “You’re not my mommy and daddy! Help!”

  She wrapped George’s arm about her. She asked again, “Do you think it’s Sara?”

  George rested his head against her shoulder. She could feel his breath tickling her skin. “Yes,” he said heavily. “Yes, I do. It was her bike here, wasn’t it?”

  “Do you think Anne’s all right?”

  “She wouldn’t hurt her own baby—” George said. He said it as if he were trying to reassure himself, but Eva bolted up in bed again.

  “My baby!” Eva cried. “My baby!”

  It was four in the morning and Sara and Anne were on a Greyhound bus. She hadn’t slept at all, hadn’t had a thing to eat, either. The seats were uncomfortable, bright red and crackling, and there was a jagged rip on the edge, as if someone had taken a bite of it. By then she had stopped thinking about Danny, about Eva or George or her parents. With every mile, another memory receded. She glanced at her watch. Another few hours and she’d feel even safer.

  She had bought a ticket to Cleveland because it was the first bus that was leaving. Ten minutes later, she might have been on her way to Phoenix or Dallas. Santa Fe, she thought. She had paid for it with cash. The man didn’t even blink when she asked for a ticket, and thank God he didn’t make her pay for the baby. “She’ll sit on my lap,” Sara had said, but he had shrugged. “The bus is half-empty, anyway,” he told her.