What Remains of Her

by Eric Rickstad

  Jonah stood, rippling with rage. “No,” he said. “I don’t know how you can even think that.”

  Except Jonah did know how Maurice could think it, because it had been the very thought that had wormed in Jonah’s brain over the past days and as recently as that morning when he’d startled awake in Sally’s room; a thought he had shoved away, repressed, for being too macabre to entertain. The same thought Maurice had voiced aloud.

  Rebecca harmed herself and Sally.

  Because you pushed her to it.

  No, a voice said. They’re out there. You must believe that. You must find them. You will see them again. One way or another.

  Wishing

  Lucinda sat on the edge of her bed and rocked, eyes squeezed shut. Wishing wishing wishing. Wishing school wasn’t canceled, because it would mean Sally was home. But school was still canceled, to allow every grown-up and older student to look for Sally.

  Lucinda was so stupid.

  She had been so sure Sally wasn’t missing and that all the grown-ups were being silly, worrying so much. Lucinda had been wrong, and now she couldn’t even think the word missing without emptying her heart. Each second Sally was gone, Lucinda felt more scared, and lonely. And guilty. She hadn’t told her dad about the man in the woods and wondered if she should have.

  She shivered thinking about it.

  But . . . A secret was a secret.

  And if she told her dad, she’d have to tell him she’d been in the woods where she was never ever supposed to go. He’d be so super mad. And if Sally came back, Sally would be super mad that Lucinda had given up their secrets and ruined their hideout.

  Lucinda held the shard of soapstone from Sally’s bedroom in her palm as she gazed out her window, shut her eyes to feel the warmth of the sun through the glass. Her dad was out there somewhere, leading a search.

  Lucinda opened her eyes at a noise.

  Her mom stood in her doorway. She was having trouble putting her coat on after coming home to take a long nap and make a zillion sandwiches she’d had Lucinda pack in a cardboard box earlier, for the searchers. She tugged a hat over her ears, her coat crooked. She’d buttoned it wrong. She looked dazed, a sleepwalker. She did not seem like herself or look like herself. None of the grown-ups looked like themselves anymore. They looked like sick twins of themselves, their eyes red and lost, faces pale, hair a mess. Maybe it was good. Maybe it meant the grown-ups were working so hard to find Sally that they did not have time for sleeping or eating. Her dad sure didn’t have time.

  “You buttoned your coat wrong,” Lucinda said.

  Lucinda’s mom stared at Lucinda as if she didn’t know who she was. “What?” she said. Even her voice wasn’t her own voice. It was all scratchy and raw.

  “Your coat,” Lucinda said. “It’s buttoned wrong.” She tried to put a sunny sound in her voice. But it didn’t work. It sounded flat and fake and stupid. She was just as fake as everyone else.

  Her mom glanced down at her crooked coat and shrugged.

  A knock came on the foyer door downstairs, and she disappeared from the doorway.

  Lucinda slipped the soapstone in her pocket and sneaked to the top of the stairs to see her mom greet a woman who’d come to watch Lucinda while Lucinda’s mom went back out to search.

  Lucinda did not want to be home alone with a stranger. She did not want her mom to go. She did not want any of this. She wanted things back the way they were before, when everyone was who they really were. Including herself.

  The woman, cheeks reddened from the cold, plucked off her silly furry earmuffs, her cat-eye glasses fogging up. She sniffled and wiped her leaking nose onto the arm of her parka, took off the parka, and slung it on the peg by the door. It took Lucinda a second to see that the woman was a friend of her mom’s who worked at the post office. Her hair was collected in a ponytail and she didn’t have on her usual purple eye makeup. On her slight frame her rumpled sweatpants and sweatshirt sagged. Even from the top of the stairs, Lucinda could smell the woman, a weird sour smell like that of a load of wet clothes left too long in the washer.

  Lucinda’s mom picked up the box of sandwiches and slipped past the woman and out the door, saying, “I don’t know when I’ll be back.”

  Then she was gone.

  The woman sat at the card table in the living room and sorted puzzle pieces Lucinda’s mom had dumped out but never started to organize or assemble.

  “Want to help?” the woman said. “Puzzles keep our minds busy.” She peered up. When she smiled, it looked as if her face might shatter to bits.

  Lucinda didn’t feel like doing a silly puzzle. She scuffed off to her room and sat on the edge of her bed and looked out the backyard window again.

  In the yard, the tire swing at the edge of the woods twisted from its tree branch in the breeze. Lucinda’s dad had put up the swing two summers ago, after Lucinda’s adoption was final. The swing looked as sad and lonesome as Lucinda felt.

  Lucinda and Sally had played on the swing every day that summer, spinning on it until they thought they’d throw up. It was the best thing ever.

  They never played on it anymore. Sally had said they were too big for it, even though Lucinda had still wanted to play on it. Now, Lucinda felt sorry for the swing. Even though it was dumb to feel bad for a hunk of rubber that couldn’t feel anything. But she felt sorry for not playing on it just to prove she was big, even though her dad always said, Don’t be in a hurry to be big. You spend the rest of your life wishing you were little again.

  She did not know what he meant. Who would ever want to be little? She and Sally had worlds to discover, treasures to unearth. Yet she did not feel so big now. Did not want to be big. She wanted to crawl into bed between her parents and snuggle in, safe and warm. Except both of them were out in the cold, searching for her friend as if she were lost treasure herself.

  Out the window, past the woods, rose a hill where Sally and Lucinda liked to sled. The hill was super steep, and Lucinda and Sally weren’t supposed to sled there. Their parents said a boy had been killed years ago when he hit a tree. Lucinda and Sally agreed the story was made up, like the story of the bottomless talcum mine shafts in the Big Woods.

  Dark shapes crawled like bugs over the hill. The searchers. They inched across the hill in a line. What if Sally wasn’t found? What was Lucinda supposed to do then? She’d never make another friend like Sally, could never sit next to Sally’s desk without Sally at it beside her. What would the school do with Sally’s desk and chair? Would they just let some other kid sit there? They couldn’t do that. It was Sally’s desk. Would they leave it empty? Would they take the chair away to leave a big hole like the one in Lucinda’s belly? Lucinda couldn’t stand the thought of it. Just couldn’t. She had to do something. She had to find her friend.

  For the zillionth time, she wondered if she should tell her dad about the pit and the man in the woods. Maybe Sally was in the woods. In the pit. Hiding. Maybe she’d gone there to hide. Or . . . maybe . . . she’d been taken to the pit. Lucinda didn’t know if Mrs. B. was with Sally or not, but maybe it was worth checking the pit.

  Tell your dad, a voice said.

  No. She couldn’t. Not yet. She’d go and check the pit herself. Somehow. If she found anything, she’d tell her dad. Right away. If she didn’t, she would keep her secret, as Sally would want.

  We could slip out your window now, the voice said. Drop onto the garage roof and onto the back porch. Sneak through the woods, make our way along the creek, to the covered bridge, then up into the woods.

  But how would she get back in the house without being seen by the woman downstairs? Even if she tiptoed in through the back sliding door she’d get caught. And what if her mom or dad found out she was gone? She didn’t want to worry them. Not now. She wanted to be good; yet she wanted to find Sally more.

  Maybe, the voice said, we could sneak out at night.

  She knew the way. She had a good flashlight. She could do it and not ever get caught, and maybe
help. Maybe find Sally.

  Tonight, the voice said, we’ll go tonight.

  Home Free

  Lucinda lay awake beneath her bedcovers. The wind wailed at her window. Tree branches scraped against the glass like ragged fingernails. It was almost too scary to go into the woods. Almost.

  Under her sheets, she shined her flashlight on the map of the woods she’d drawn with crayons in a sketch pad. She was a good map drawer. She and Sally drew tons of maps in their notebooks. Maps and diagrams of their dig sites, of the pits and the woods. She ripped the page out and folded it up and sneaked it into the pocket of her bib overalls she’d put on after her mother had tucked her in.

  She peered out from under her covers. Her alarm clock said 12:32. It was the latest she’d ever been awake, yet she was alert, all shaky with excitement. And fear. She thought of Sally and drove the fear from her head.

  She eased the sheets off and placed her feet super quiet on the floor.

  The ancient floorboards sighed.

  She listened for the sound of footfalls announcing her parents coming to check on her.

  She heard nothing but the screech of the branch on her window.

  She turned slowly to look at the window.

  A hand tapped at the pane.

  She jumped back.

  No, just a branch.

  She eased closer to the window to sneak a look outside. Her warped reflection gaped back at her. She cupped her hands around her eyes and pressed her nose to the window. The glass was cold. The night was black, no moon, no stars. Only the white snow gave off any light, a ghostly glow.

  She glimpsed movement, a person hunched over at the edge of the yard, by the woods. She pressed her face tighter to the window.

  The tire swing rocked in the wind.

  She’d been certain it was a person. It wasn’t. She was giving herself the willies. She needed to stop it. She needed to be brave, to think of Sally, pretend Sally was right there with her. So she could do this, find her friend.

  She slipped her coat on and zipped it slowly, the sound loud in the silence. She just knew it was going to wake her mom and dad. If they were even asleep. It seemed no one slept anymore. She put the flashlight in her coat pocket.

  Knowing that opening her bedroom door slowly made the hinges squeak, she flung it open fast, poked her head into the hallway. No light came from under her parents’ bedroom door.

  She slipped down the hall toward the stairs, past the photos of herself on the tire swing and of her and her parents during holidays.

  The top stair tread was loose, creaky and dangerous. She’d tripped on it more than once. She stepped over it and tiptoed down the stairs.

  At the bottom, she headed for the kitchen, where her boots sat lined up near the door to the outside.

  In the kitchen, she stopped.

  The cellar door stood cracked open and light seeped from the basement. Lucinda stared at the light, looked at her snow boots squatting in the foyer. All she had to do was go ten more steps and put the boots on, sneak out the door, and she was home free.

  A sound rose from the cellar. A voice.

  Lucinda crept to the cellar door and stole a look.

  At the bottom of the stairs, Lucinda’s father sat on a stool at his workbench, his favorite place when he needed to think about his sheriff work. He built and painted birdhouses down there too. Or tried. The houses always came out odd and lopsided. Lucinda didn’t mind, she liked them that way. Because they were her dad’s. The birds seemed to like them too; they built their nests in the houses her dad put in the yard every spring.

  Her dad wasn’t working on birdhouses now. He sat slumped on the stool as he spun the handle on the bench vise and shook his head, muttering as if trying to rid his mind of horrible thoughts.

  He was worried about Mrs. B. and Sally, and Mr. B., but he tried not to show it to Lucinda. To anyone. The day before, Sally had overheard her mom telling her dad, “You have to do something to help him.”

  “I’m trying. This is a nightmare,” Lucinda’s father had said and hugged her mom who shook from sobbing.

  Lucinda needed to get to the pit; yet her dad seemed so alone.

  She wanted to go down there and give him a big hug.

  If she did, he’d put her back to bed and she might not get another chance to sneak out. She was torn between her friend and her family. Both needed her.

  Her friend needed her more.

  She crept over to her boots by the door and tugged them onto her feet.

  Her hand was on the doorknob when she heard a lone sob rise from the cellar.

  Lucinda stole back to the cellar door.

  Her dad was down there, pinching the brow of his nose.

  She’d give him a hug then head to the pit, somehow, later.

  She shed her coat and started down the stairs.

  Normally, her dad would have heard her first step on the top stair. Not tonight.

  At the bottom step, she said, “Daddy?”

  Her dad whirled around on the stool, startled. Then he smiled, though the smile didn’t match his sad eyes. “Sweetie. What are you doing? It’s late.”

  “I had to pee,” she fibbed.

  He cocked his head the way he did when he knew she was fibbing but he didn’t care that she was. “What is it, sweetie?” he said.

  “Sally,” she whispered. She suddenly wanted to tell her dad the truth. “I know what happened.”

  Her dad’s eyes got big, as if he might get sick, like when he’d eaten bad fried clams in Maine. He stood and took her shoulders in his hands. “Know what, sweetie? Tell me.”

  “It’s my fault.”

  “No. Don’t ever say that.”

  “I should have told you.”

  He swept her up in his arms and hugged her. She hadn’t let him pick her up in a long time. She was too big for that. But she was glad he picked her up now. Glad he still wanted to pick her up. He wiped dirt from her boots, the cellar’s dirt floor muddy from the rainwater that had leaked in before the rain had turned to snow. “What are you doing dressed, and with boots on?” he said.

  She’d forgotten the boots, shrugged.

  “You can’t be down here,” her dad said. “It’s filthy. Your allergies.” He was right. Her nose and eyes were already crazy itchy.

  “It’s my fault,” she sobbed.

  “Shhh. No. What happened has nothing to do with you. Nothing.”

  “I should have told you about the man in the woods.”

  Her dad’s body stiffened. He held her out away from him, looked her in the eye. He looked scared. “What man?” he said.

  “The man in the woods, watching me and Sally.”

  “In what woods when? What are you talking about, sweetie, a man, what man? Did you recognize him? Did he approach you? Did he hurt you?”

  Lucinda believed if she undid her fib maybe she’d somehow get her friend back.

  “He didn’t hurt us. He never came close.”

  “What’d he look like?”

  “We never saw his face. Just movement in the woods. Green pants and a green shirt. I only saw him once, but Sally told me about him. He was her secret. She’d seen him a bunch. She made me promise to never tell. But . . .”

  “You’re not supposed to be in those woods,” her dad said. “If you fell into one of those old mines—”

  He hugged her so tight she couldn’t breathe.

  “Daddy,” she said, “you’re hurting me.”

  He relaxed, looked at her, his eyes sharp. “If you tried real, real hard, do you think you could remember anything about his face?”

  She shook her head. “I never saw it.” She sucked strands of her hair into her mouth. “Am I in trouble?”

  “No. No. Of course not, sweetie. No. Never. This. It could help. You could help.”

  “But I fibbed. I didn’t tell you, and Mom says leaving something out is the same as lying. And maybe if I had said something right away, Sally wouldn’t—”

  “D
on’t think that. You told me now. Maybe we can find this man.”

  She nodded, but still felt like she had eels swimming in her stomach. “Do you think he did it?” Lucinda asked. She didn’t know what “it” meant, but for the first time thought maybe something really bad had happened to Sally, and she wasn’t just lost. “Is Sally dead?”

  “I—” Her dad seemed about to cry. He looked away toward the corner of the cellar to hide his face from her. He cleared his throat and looked back at her. “Some people. They do bad things. That make no sense to other people, who would never do them. And they make things up in their head that make those bad things seem okay. But they’re not okay. I want you to think. This is important. It could help.” He looked super serious now. “Did you get even a glimpse of the man’s face or anything else that might help?”

  “Nuh-uh.”

  “You sure it was a man? Could it have been a boy? From school, maybe spying on you?”

  Lucinda had not thought of that. Sally had called the person a man so Lucinda had thought it was a man. “Maybe. I saw boots. Like men’s work boots, but they could have been boys’ boots. Boys wear the kind men wear at the Grain & Feed, but they never lace them. They wear the tongues hanging out because they think they look cool. But it just looks really stupid.”

  Her dad smiled. A real smile.

  “These boots were laced. But. Girls wear them too. A couple older girls in school. Eye Shadow Girls.”

  “Who?”

  “Mean older girls.”

  “Are you sure it wasn’t just your imagination? It’s okay if it was.”

  Lucinda thought how she’d believed for certain she’d seen someone outside Sally’s bedroom a few nights ago and had screamed, and her dad and Mr. B. had come running. But afterward she’d thought maybe she hadn’t seen anyone at all. And just earlier tonight she’d thought she’d seen someone out her own window but it had just been the stupid tire swing. Hadn’t it?