Diego and Shay have this whole shared language that I’m not part of, a shorthand I remember from my relationship with my mom. All Mom had to do was say, “I’ll take a Pooka-sized slice,” and I’d know that she meant an extra-big piece of cake. Our old dog, Pooka, was about the size of a handbag, but she could eat twice her weight in one sitting.
In other words, a family has shorthand. When you lose your family, you lose that. You just can’t walk into another family and pick it up, either. Shay bent over backward to include me. If she and Diego said something I didn’t get, she’d tell this anecdote about how it came about, and I’d listen politely, but the whole explanation is so lame, because the thing about family shorthand is, you had to be there. I wasn’t there with Shay and Diego. And the person I was there with once, through a million memories, isn’t with me anymore. So I don’t have a shorthand I can ever say out loud, ever again. You would think when you lose your family, you just lose love, but guess what? You lose a whole vocabulary.
In other words, Diego and Shay are close. So I’m surprised when Diego doesn’t tell Shay what happened at the Carbonels. I can tell because there’s nothing in the air between us, no more than usual, anyway.
Shay makes pasta with broccoli that night. She puts the bowl on the table and leans over to smell it. Then she takes a piece of broccoli in her fingers and eats it. I don’t know why she can’t wait until she puts it on a plate.
“Geesh,” she says. “It’s a good thing we’re not having visitors tonight. I might have overdone the garlic.”
Just then, the doorbell rings. Shay and Diego laugh.
“Just don’t exhale,” Diego says.
It’s Detective Fusilli. He tries to keep this cordial expression on his face, especially when he sees that we’re eating, but it is obvious that he is steamed, and I think I know the particular object of his rage. Still, he gives an appreciative glance at the pasta and grilled bread with olive oil and garlic, the green salad gleaming with dressing. Suddenly, he looks hungry as well as tired and angry.
Shay pushes away her glass of wine nervously, as if Joe Fusilli was doing a spot check for Mothers Who Drink and Cook. “Can I help you, Detective?” she asks.
Detective Fusilli tears his gaze away from the pasta. I exchange a glance with Diego. It’s the first time we’ve found something funny at the same moment. I wonder if Joe Fusilli is just dying to take off his jacket, hang up his gun (I can’t see it, but I know it’s there), and sit down for a bowl of linguine.
“I need to talk to you and your daughter,” he says.
“I’m her niece,” I correct quickly, before Shay has a chance to.
“My sister died a year and a half ago,” Shay explains.
“I’m sorry.” For a moment, Detective Fusilli looks human. But then something else kicks in behind his eyes, and he gives me a quick glance. It’s only a flicker, but I’m beginning to read Joe Fusilli like Green Eggs and Ham. He’s thinking, motherless girl, orphan, possible emotional problems, stirring up trouble for attention.
Shay covers the bowl with a plate, and we all troop out to the living room. Everyone sits except for Diego, who lurks in the doorway. It’s still light out, the long light of a Northwest summer. The sun shines right in my face, and I consider changing my seat, but I wonder if that would make me look guilty.
“Are you aware that your niece went to the Carbonel house this afternoon and told them she had a vision about their daughter?” Detective Fusilli asks Shay.
Surprised, Shay looks at me.
“I drove her over,” Diego says. “I thought it might help.”
Shay looks at Diego now. She turns back to Detective Fusilli and doesn’t say anything.
He leans forward. “She told them Emily was still alive. Can you imagine how much damage she did to those people?”
“By giving them hope?” Shay asks.
He leans back again, but he keeps his eyes on Shay. “What if it’s false hope?”
“What difference does it make?” Shay asks, surprising me.
That takes Joe Fusilli aback. I can see it. He turns the question over in his mind.
“Well, let me start with this,” he says. “Your niece here—”
“Her name is Gracie,” Shay interrupts tartly. Her skin is flushed.
“—told them that she saw a waterfall. Mrs. Carbonel wants us to check out every single waterfall in Washington State because your niece—Gracie here, saw one in a vision. Don’t you think that might be an incredible waste of resources? And don’t you think, if we don’t do what Mrs. Carbonel wants, she’s going to think that no matter what we do, it isn’t enough?”
“Hey,” Diego says, “what if Gracie’s vision is true?”
The detective sighs. He runs a hand through his hair. There is a bottle of antacids in his car, and he wishes it was in his pocket.
“Too much TV,” he says tiredly. “Too many movies. People think that psychics help cops out. They think psychics can find people. It just doesn’t happen that way.”
“Cops do use psychics,” I say. “I read about it.”
They all look at me, as if they’re startled I can speak.
Joe Fusilli’s gaze is especially intent. It’s like he’s a tracking device, and now he’s totally focused on me. His voice is soft. “So you read about it, Gracie?” he asks, and I realize that I’ve made a big mistake. So that’s where you got the idea to make things up? I can’t read his mind, but I know what he’s thinking.
I feel my face flush, and I hate myself for showing him he’s caught me off guard. “It happens,” I say. “It has happened. I’ve read the cases.”
“So you thought you could help us with Emily,” Joe Fusilli says. “Let me go over what you told Mrs. Carbonel.” He reaches into his breast pocket and takes out a small pad. He starts to read. “Grade was transported over water on a boat.”
I realize this is a show he’s putting on. He’s deliberately trying to embarrass me. We live on an island. Lots of people have boats. There is a bridge about fifty miles north of us, but the ferry gets more traffic, because it’s the quickest way to Seattle. There is a better than fifty-fifty chance that Emily left by boat.
“Was it the ferry?” he asks me.
I shake my head. “It was some kind of powerboat. It was going very fast.”
“Ah, a new detail.” He makes a show of writing this down. “And you say Emily was with someone she trusts. How do you know that?”
“She was laughing.”
“You saw that in your vision?”
I nod.
“Why was she laughing?”
“Because the boat was going fast, and she was having fun.” That was very clear to me. Emily had felt free.
“Did you see her by the waterfall?”
“No. I just saw a waterfall. But it was weird.” I’m trying to remember now. I know the detective isn’t really interested in this. But I know something wasn’t right about that waterfall. I just can’t figure out what.
“Weird?”
“No sound,” I say. “But it wasn’t just that. I don’t know,” I say finally, unable to put it into words.
“All right, then, Gracie. I have copied down everything you remember. Is that all you remember?”
“Yes,” I say, because there is no way I’m telling him any more than I have already. He’s going to walk out the door, tear out the page he’s written on, ball it up, and throw it on the floor of his car, along with what I’m sure are crumpled fast-food wrappers, a sweaty T-shirt, and crumpled cans of diet Sprite.
And because I want to get back at him, I say, “I’m sorry about your mother.”
He goes still. “My mother.”
“She has Alzheimer’s. You’re always able to help people. And now you can’t. When it’s most important.”
Everybody kind of freezes for a minute. Detective Fusilli’s face doesn’t reveal what he’s thinking, but he’s furious and not happy to find himself just a little confused. He takes a breath and casually puts his pad back into his pocket.
“I was the chairman of the annual Alzheimer’s fundraiser. It was in the paper last month.”
“I don’t read the paper.”
He dismisses this. He had been off his stride for a moment, but now he’s figured out an explanation, so he can dismiss what I say. He leans forward, resting his elbows on his knees. “Tell me something, Gracie. You say that Emily was with someone she trusts. You know this because of your vision.”
I wait.
“Is that the only reason you know it, Gracie?” Joe Fusilli asks. His voice is very soft now.
“Yes,” I say. “I told you that already.”
“Are you sure?”
“Do you want to hear it three times?”
“Because if there’s something you have to tell me, now would be a good time. A very good time.” There is something threatening in his voice now. He’s leaning on me, hard.
Shay suddenly bounds to her feet. “That’s enough,” she says. “You are harassing my niece.”
“I just want the truth,” Detective Fusilli says, his eyes still on me. “There’s a young girl out there we’re trying to find.”
“Gracie’s a minor, I’m her guardian,” Shay says, not giving an inch. “So get out.”
Joe Fusilli gives Shay a cool look, as though her anger doesn’t affect him in the least. “I was just leaving,” he says, standing up. “You might want to have a talk with your niece, Ms. Kenzie. If she knows more than she’s telling—”
“She told you she doesn’t!” Shay snaps, her eyes blazing.
“Let’s keep our focus here,” Joe Fusilli says. “Our focus is Emily.”
Now Shay really gets angry. Her hands actually curl into fists, and for a moment I’m afraid she’ll haul off and land one on the detective.
Instead she whirls around and heads for the front door. She opens it with such force it bangs against the wall. “I haven’t forgotten about Emily for one second since this happened,” she spits out. “Her parents are close friends of mine. I’ve known her since she was born. We are all living with this, Detective. We are all in our separate hells about it.” Suddenly, it’s like Shay’s throat closes over the words. “Now get out of my house.”
He looks at Shay for a moment, then walks out the door. Shay closes the door very gently. She composes herself, still facing the door, before she turns back to us.
There is a long pause. Then Diego speaks.
“Detective Pasta sure knows how to push your buttons,” he says.
We hear Detective Pasta start his car and take off.
He thinks I know something more than I’m telling. And I do. I’m just not sure what it is, and he is not the person I can tell it to. Nobody is. I’m alone. This is not in any way news to me.
But now being alone in the world has a new weight. Somebody has to find Emily Carbonel.
That someone, I now realize, is me.