24

EXACTLY 7:09 AT NIGHT,
TUESDAY, OCTOBER 19TH

It is dark outside. I see lights coming toward the house. Tires on the driveway. A car door shuts and someone comes up the steps.

I move fast into the living room.

Then Crystal with a C opens the door and walks right in. “Hey, Ginny,” she says. She walks right past me into the kitchen and puts two plastic bags down on the counter. “How did it go today? Everything at work was fine. No one even mentioned the whole Amber Alert thing, except some new contractor in the break room.” I hear her open the refrigerator. “Whoa.”

I am still in the living room next to the screen door.

“Ginny, the eggs are still here, but where’s the rest of the food?”

So I say, “I ate it.”

“You ate it?”

I nod my head yes.

Crystal with a C walks into the living room. “Ginny, did you really eat all the food in the refrigerator? Except the eggs?”

I nod my head yes again even though I hid the bread and the milk in a closet. She walks to the garbage can and looks inside it. She picks up the empty ketchup bottle and the little papers that went around the butter. And the empty cheese wrapper. “You seriously ate all this?”

“Yes.”

“Did you cook something?”

“No.”

She looks through the garbage some more. She picks out the empty brownie box. “This, too?”

I nod my head yes. It is good in milk.

“Without baking it? Did you get sick? Did you throw up, I mean?”

But that was three questions in a row.

Crystal with a C makes a breathing sound. “I don’t know if I should get you a laxative or worry about diarrhea. Look, tomorrow you have to eat what I tell you. I’ll even write it down. You can’t eat everything that’s in the refrigerator or you’ll make your tummy really upset. You could get constipated. Do you understand?”

I don’t know what constipated means so I say, “No.”

“Just eat what I put on the list, okay?”

“I like lists,” I say.

“Good. Now, why don’t you put these new groceries away for me while I get dressed? Then we’ll make supper together. I’ll show you how to make scrambled eggs.”

She drops the brownie box back in the garbage can.

“Wait,” I say.

She looks at me.

“What town do Gloria and my Baby Doll live in?” I say.

“They’re still in Harrington Falls. Now go get those groceries put away. I need to get changed out of these clothes.”