JANE
The Watson family home is your classic Cape with antique gray siding and red trim in the middle of a quiet cul-de-sac adorably named Periwinkle Circle. It’s in immaculate condition. The grass is a healthy green and the de rigueur blue and pink hydrangeas are generously mulched in cedar bark. I press the bell and hold my breath, waiting for the door to open. On the bike ride over, I practiced my opening lines repeatedly, trying to sound natural.
Hello, my name’s Jane Ellison, the sister of Kit Ellison who I think might have been a friend of your late daughter’s. And I am so, so sorry about Ettie’s death. I, too, have been dealing with grief. My mother died after my sister went missing over ten years ago, which is why I’m here. Can we talk inside? I’m hoping you might have some memories of Kit you can share.
Once we get comfortable, my goal is to ask if any of the Pease men was hitting on Ettie when she worked as Chet’s assistant, if she felt scared and intimidated like Kit had. I hope the Watsons don’t immediately order me off the premises.
I ring the bell again. When there’s no answer, I trot to the garage and peek inside. Only one car. It doesn’t seem like the Watsons are around this afternoon, though they might be back soon, since I don’t get the sense they rent the house. The furniture inside is upholstered and there’s wall-to-wall carpeting along with tons of family photos on a table I can make out through the front plate-glass window—all hallmarks of a permanent residence. Going around to the back, I try the sliding door. Almost by accident, my hand slips to the handle. I give it a tug and it slides open with ease, presenting me with a gap of six inches and a huge moral dilemma.
If I follow my urges and step inside, I will officially be committing an act of criminal trespassing, a misdemeanor in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, and if I’m caught, I can kiss goodbye any chance of working for the Department of Homeland Security ever again. On the other hand, if I close the door and bike home, I can kiss goodbye ever discovering what secret about the Pease men Ettie might have been hiding.
It’s a no-brainer. After stashing my bike in the woods behind the house, I head inside, sandals off, door closed. Homeland Security would never put me on the payroll again, anyway.
The Watsons’ home is as nice inside as it is outside. Neat as a pin. The interior has obviously been recently redone. Solid, polished wide-pine flooring runs throughout the kitchen, which has more granite than a Roman cemetery. The cupboards are custom made in a creamy beige that meshes well with the slightly darker walls and paler coffered ceiling. Sub-Zero fridge, Wolf stove, and huge windows looking out to the garden.
I tiptoe across the living room toward the center stairway that leads upstairs. If this house follows typical Cape style, the main bedroom will be on the ground floor and the other bedrooms upstairs. At the mantel over the brick fireplace, I take a detour to study the framed photos flanking an antique nautical clock. I scan past Mr. and Mrs. Watson’s wedding photo and baby pictures of Ettie to a larger one of her all grown up.
It’s a college commencement photo in which she’s between her mother and father, who are beaming with pride at their daughter proudly wearing a kente cloth stole in black, yellow, maroon, and green. Her robe is bright red, the color of Boston University. The image of happy Ettie with her parents brings a lump to my throat. All that bright potential snuffed out by the hubris of Chet Pease who insisted on flying in thick fog like it was simply an annoying inconvenience. That his foolishness was his ending, too, is no consolation. I just hope the Watsons were compensated financially for their loss, even though money would provide little comfort in the wake of such grief.
As I predicted, upstairs there is a bedroom at either end joined by a common bathroom and a linen closet. The open door to the left reveals a pair of twin beds in matching seashell coverlets in what I bet is a guest room. The door to the other is closed.
Well aware I am committing an unforgivable violation of not only the Watsons’ personal space but also Ettie’s sacred memory, I turn the knob and step back in time. The Watsons haven’t changed a thing. It looks like the room of a daughter who’s simply away at college and might be home for Thanksgiving.
Stuffed animals are tucked in alongside the pillows of her double bed. Athletic ribbons hang from the wall—soccer and spring track—along with a framed Honors Society certificate. Ettie’s earrings are arranged in an orderly fashion with hanging necklaces and bracelets on a jewelry tree. On the top of her wooden dresser is a digital watch, undone as if it had been slipped off her wrist moments before. The room even smells faintly of a teenage girl’s cologne—Abercrombie.
My mother kept Kit’s room the same way after she went missing. Of course, we never knew when she might roll in the front door with some excuse or another. This is different, yet there remains the same sense of disbelief. I know exactly what the Watsons are thinking—she can’t be gone, not their baby, not their sweet sunshine. I say a short prayer asking for forgiveness and begin my hunt.
There is no laptop on her desk, which has been dusted clean, though the drawers are stuffed with junk: spiral-bound notebooks, old math tests, English papers, and homework sheets. I flip through a diary, but Ettie gave that only a half-hearted effort. Nothing about the Peases jumps out. I do find a couple of foil-covered condoms, so there’s that.
No computer under the bed, on the bedside table, or in one of the zippered cases in the closet, either. I even check the bookshelf, where I find Octavia Butler, Sarah Dessen, Sharon G. Flake, Jenny Han, and Rainbow Rowell, some of my favorite authors. I have a feeling Ettie and I could have been friends.
Finally, I try the bedside table drawer. This is cringeworthy personal, right up there with rifling through a dead woman’s underwear, but as it turns out, worthwhile. For underneath a box of tampons and a half-eaten lollipop are two Polaroid photos stuck together by the sugar of the melted candy.
It’s so rare to come across Polaroids these days that I figure they’re super old. And they are, sort of. As I carefully peel the photos apart, my heartbeat quickens. The background is dark, night, and in one corner it’s possible to make out sand. The flash washes out the fire from the pit, but not the six bare legs of three girls captured sitting on logs. There are beer bottles in hands and cigarettes between fingers and when at last I have the photos separated, staring back at me are two ghosts.
Her hair in twisty braids, wearing a white tank top, Ettie Watson is putting up a hand in mock protest as she buries her face in the shoulder of the girl next to her.
I quit breathing.
From underneath her brunette bangs, Bella Valencia stares straight at the camera while leaning playfully against a blond girl in a Serendipity Seafood T-shirt that, days later, would be found washed up in the marsh flotsam and jetsam, stained dark red with blood.
Kit.
This photo must be from the farewell party on the cove, the last night she was seen alive. This right here could be proof that Bella and Kit knew each other well enough to hang out at a party. That they were not only acquaintances but possibly friends.
My chest tightens as I take the Polaroid to the window where the light is better. Kit looks good, I’m pleased to see. She looks actually really happy and, most of all, sober. Oh, how I wish Ettie were alive so I could ask her all the questions racing through my mind at this moment.
Did Bob interview her about Kit? How well did she know Bella? Were the three of them friends, or had they just met at the party? Who took the photo? What happened to each of them after it was taken? How did Kit go from looking so healthy to crawling across the beach on her belly, sick from drugs, a few hours later?
I’m so lost in thought I don’t register the crunch of a car pulling up until I hear a door slam. Peeking through a slit in the Venetian blinds, I can make out the same Chevy that picked me up this morning. It’s parked at the curb and the same plainclothes cops are walking up the Watsons’ driveway.
Shit!
With such a pristine place, the Watsons must have one of those hidden security cameras to guard it. Why didn’t I think of that? Stuffing the photos in my bra, I consider my options. Not hiding under the bed, that’s too easy. Can’t go into the hall. The window faces the driveway and, besides, I’m on the second story of the house.
If I’m caught—when I’m caught—the Watsons will be horrified, and rightly so. Bob will be livid and have to arrest me for trespassing, as well as burglary for stealing the photos. That’s a felony.
If I’m lucky, I’ll be sent back to the psych ward.
If I’m unlucky, I’ll be sent back to the psych ward.
With no other choice, I slip into the closet, shut the louvered doors and secrete myself behind stored, bagged winter clothes. The doorbell rings. Once. Twice. My heart is thumping so hard, I can’t hear my own thoughts. Then I remember I left my sandals inside the sliding doors.
Double shit!
I brace myself for the inevitable tread of footsteps, for Raleigh and Gillette to call out, for them to inspect each room until they get to Ettie’s. I am crouched in this position for so long, my back pressed into a corner, hemmed in by the zip-locked plastic bags whose mothball fumes are making me dizzy, that my toes go numb.
And, yet, nothing. Only the tick, tick, tick of the mantel clock one floor below.
Finally, after what feels like an eternity, I open the doors an inch and cock my ear. Not a peep except for that clock. Then I emerge entirely and tiptoe, crouching, to check the window.
The unmarked car is gone.
That’s impossible. Did I . . . dream it?
Closing the closet door, I dash into the hallway and fly down the stairs, snatching my sandals and exiting through the back door, unable to believe my good fortune. All I can figure is police aren’t allowed to enter a house without a warrant. Chances are, those two cops are at the corner of the cul-de-sac, waiting to bust me as I pass by.
Fortunately, I don’t have to take the streets back to the cottage. Brushing the clippings from the greasy gear, I hop on my bike and head through the serpentine trails so familiar from my childhood until the stunted oaks give way to houses. Zigzagging through residential neighborhoods, I cut through backyards that connect to shortcuts only the locals know. Ettie’s photos are safe in the pocket of my white jeans.
When I finally reach our cottage, panting, I nearly collapse from relief that I made it back before Dave, Sheila, and Erik did. The house is dark and as tight as a drum. The car Erik and I rented sits in the driveway, dusted with dead, brown pine needles that also blanket the front step. Mission accomplished.
Parking my bike in its usual spot, I go around the rear deck and enter that way. I need a shower and a change of clothes so I can be sitting on the couch when they return, looking a little weaker, but much better since this morning. I remove the photos from my jeans and take another look.
Ettie and Kit are both dead and their one connection is Bella. I try that concept on for size.
Buzzzzzz.
The couch cushion is vibrating and I remember I left my phone under the pillow. When I pull it out, I find the screen exploding with texts.
PICK UP PICK UP PICK UP.
CALL ME AS SOON AS YOU WAKE UP.
GODDAMMIT JANE - I NEED YOUR HELP, PLEASE!
And then the last one that catches my breath . . .
MABEL IS MISSING!!