May 9, 2017
Sara Donoghue sits in the interview room. It is hard to tell what sort of building it might belong to. The walls are cinder block, painted a dingy white. An empty metal bookshelf stands against one wall; the table in the center is a cheap folding picnic table.
Dr. Andrew Ashford enters the room and settles into the chair opposite Sara Donoghue once again. Ashford is black, dark skinned, hair silver. A dark web of scars puckers the skin on the back of one hand. He carries a briefcase, which he sets beside him on the floor. Sara Donoghue, in contrast, is a slight girl with medium-brown hair. She wears black jeans, a black tank top, and a black sweater that has slipped down one shoulder, baring a freckled shoulder. She seems tucked in on herself and tense with nervous energy.
ASHFORD: I’m sorry about that. Our equipment is usually reliable, but we occasionally encounter technical difficulties around these sorts of events.
Sara looks to the side, as if uninterested.
ASHFORD: Tell me about your sister.
SARA: Becca?
ASHFORD: Do you have another sister?
SARA: No, it’s just—what do you want to know? There’s a lot in the reports. Official records.
ASHFORD: I want to know about your sister from your perspective. Before her disappearance. What was she like? Did she have a lot of friends?
Sara hesitates. She speaks carefully, as if worried Ashford will get the wrong impression.
SARA: She had us. The five of us.
ASHFORD: The “Wildcats”?
SARA: Yeah. But by the time she disappeared, we weren’t really hanging out together anymore. We hit high school, and Anthony and Trina got involved with sports. Mel started spending all her time with the theater kids, and Becca . . . I don’t really know what happened with Becca.
ASHFORD: Did she have other friends?
SARA: She was friendly with almost everyone. But she didn’t have close friends, other than us.
ASHFORD: She didn’t meet anyone new she clicked with?
SARA: You mean her boyfriend? I guess. But she was never serious about him.
ASHFORD: What makes you say that?
SARA: She liked him because he listened to her. But they didn’t belong together.
Sara chews on her thumbnail.
SARA: You always got the sense she didn’t belong here at all.
ASHFORD: Did that have anything to do with the fact that she was adopted?
SARA: What? No. I mean, it wasn’t always easy for her, I guess. Briar Glen’s about as white as you can get, and people can be pretty racist even if they don’t mean to be, but at least at home, that was never a problem. It wasn’t about not belonging, I guess. More like she deserved to belong somewhere . . . bigger. Better.
ASHFORD: Like where?
SARA: New York. LA. Paris. Someplace where her art could really take off.
ASHFORD: I’ve seen some of her photographs.
Ashford opens a folder on the table and spreads out several glossy photos. The top photo shows six preteens. A printed label has been affixed to the front, identifying each of the children. Becca and Sara stand at the center, arms around each other, Becca’s outline slightly blurred as if she’s barely managed to dash back into the frame. Despite their different ethnicities—Sara white, Becca Asian—there is something about their stances that marks them as obviously related. Anthony Beck and Nick Dessen, both white, stand to the left of the sisters, Anthony with his chin tilted up in a too-cool pose he hasn’t grown into and Nick, a skinny kid in an oversize windbreaker, mimicking him. On the right, Trina Jeffries breaks the mood with a smile, her hand lifted to tuck her hair behind her ear, and Melanie Whittaker, a black girl in a denim jacket covered in iron-on patches, curls the corner of her mouth like she can’t quite take herself seriously.
Ashford slides this photograph to the side, baring another. Sara frowns, a faint line of confusion between her brows. He taps the new photo, an image of a young man with his face in blank shadow. The light is odd at his shoulders, as if his outline is fracturing.
ASHFORD: What do you know about this photograph?
SARA: I haven’t seen that one before.
ASHFORD: What can you tell me about Nick Dessen?
SARA: Aren’t you going to ask about the other photo?
ASHFORD: Which one? This one?
He moves aside the photo of Nick Dessen and places another on the center of the table. It shows Sara, her hair damp and hanging limply around her face, standing next to a young woman wearing a white dress with a slash of blue ribbon across her waist. The girl has extended her hand; Sara has begun to lift her own, as if to take it.
ASHFORD: You find this photo remarkable?
SARA: Don’t you?
ASHFORD: Not particularly. Two girls. About to hold hands.
SARA: But she’s . . .
ASHFORD: She’s Lucy Callow? She does bear a resemblance to the photos we have, but existing photos of Lucy Callow aren’t high quality. This could be anyone. [Pause] But it isn’t, is it? It is Lucy. You found her.
Sara meets Ashford’s eyes. She’s silent for a moment. Then she lets out a quick, choked-off laugh.
SARA: No. We didn’t find Lucy.
ASHFORD: Then—
SARA: She found us.