After Seth left that morning, she cleaned her condo top to bottom, as if she could scour him—and her own bad decision—out of the house. She cleaned the toilets, scrubbed the kitchen sink, and mopped the floors with all the force she had in her, using the exertion to push away the pesky memories of the night before: Seth as he smiled at her in that knowing way; Seth’s face over hers, their breaths mingling; Seth as he showered after. As if by showering he could wash away what they’d done. She’d said as much before he left, and they fought about it. He called her crazy, a favorite word of his.
“If you regret sleeping with me so much, why do you keep doing it?” he’d asked. She could hear the hurt in his voice. “You initiated last night, not me.”
She’d shrugged, doing her best to appear nonchalant. “I have needs, too, you know.”
“You don’t always have to come to me with your needs,” he’d said. The hurt had turned to anger, tracing the outline of his words.
The problem was, she couldn’t imagine doing anything but going to Seth. For a time, he’d been the love of her life, even though the marriage had failed. They’d called time of death over a year ago, and yet these interludes continued, no matter how many times she promised herself she’d put a stop to it. Back when they were still trying to be married, their therapist had said they were both afraid of transparency, of vulnerability, of exposure. So they fought instead of talked, joked instead of being honest, left instead of staying. And then, foolishly, went back for more.
“I don’t want to sleep with a stranger,” she’d retorted, intentionally keeping her tone light, breezy. In lieu of a response, Seth had walked out the door. At least he hadn’t slammed it.
She wished she had to work today, wished something big would happen so she’d get called in even though it was her day off. But that was the thing about being the Public Information Officer for the sleepy town of Wynotte’s police department; there wasn’t much to inform the public about. No one really needed to know that Myra Stockton had called the ambulance last night for the thirteenth time this year. The truth was, whatever the public needed to know in this town didn’t require Anissa’s input. The gossip mill worked faster and more efficiently, if a person wasn’t fussy about facts.
She was grateful her job involved other responsibilities—victim advocacy, liaising with the mayor’s office, and public relations for the department, putting on a good face for the press whenever possible. Anissa was happy to do whatever needed doing; she was one of those weirdos who truly loved her job. Once she’d told Seth it was her calling, and he’d teased her about it for days. But she’d meant it.
She went looking for the TV remote, moved out of her way in her cleaning frenzy, only to spy her phone where the remote usually sat. The screen said she had three missed calls from Pete Lancaster, the sheriff. She smiled as all thoughts of Seth retreated from her mind as surely as if she’d swept them out with the broom. If Pete was calling her on her day off it meant something had happened. Inside her a small voice said, Finally.
She called Pete back and waited for him to answer with that familiar “This is Pete,” in a slightly exasperated tone, like she’d just pulled him from something far more important. Right now the thing that was more important, she knew, was his newborn son.
Pete didn’t answer, so she hung up and sank into the couch to wait for him to see her missed call. If she left a message, he wouldn’t listen to it anyway. She got up and went to the window, scanned the minuscule patch of grass the condominium complex counted as a yard for a sign of the cat that had been hanging around lately, a skinny, skittish Siamese. It always darted away before she could try to help it.
Her phone’s ring pulled her away from the window. She snatched it up and answered, her “Hello?” coming out far less poised and professional than she’d intended. Rein it in, she cautioned herself.
“Niss?” The female voice on the other end was not what she expected. Her sister Marissa chuckled. “You’re awfully happy to hear from me.”
Anissa rolled her eyes. “I thought you were Pete.”
“Pete?” Marissa exclaimed. “A guy named Pete is calling you? This is news!” Marissa was clearly thrilled at the mention of a guy other than Seth.
“Pete Lancaster,” Anissa said dully. “The sheriff.”
“Oh.” Marissa’s voice went flat. “I didn’t know his first name was Pete.”
“Are you calling for a reason?” Anissa asked, barely concealing her impatience. She wanted to talk to Pete about whatever he’d been calling about, not get grilled about her love life by her nosy sister.
“Actually, I was probably calling about the same thing as Pete,” Marissa said. A smug eagerness filled her voice.
“What?” Anissa breathed, her impatience with her sister quickly replaced by intrigue.
“They found that kid’s jacket,” Marissa said. She paused before adding, “Well, that’s what they think it is, at least.”
Anissa didn’t have to ask what kid Marissa meant. She knew. Everyone in Wynotte knew. Or at least, everyone who’d been around for any time at all. Davy Malcor was a legend in this town, a cautionary tale, a ghost story whispered on the darkest nights.
Almost twenty-one years after eleven-year-old Davy Malcor had gone missing from a cornfield while playing games with his friends in the dark, everyone had theories on what had happened to him. His was the town’s most famous case, one that still cropped up every so often—when some crackpot in prison confessed to abducting him, when supposed new evidence emerged, or when the press decided to run an anniversary story, reminding everyone about the cold case, lest Davy be forgotten. But of course, he was never forgotten. Davy Malcor was out of sight but never out of Wynotte’s collective conscience.
Marissa continued. “I knew you especially would want to know. I mean—”
“Where’d you hear this?” Anissa cut her off. Her question was based on her graduate training and subsequent experience in managing public information: don’t believe what you hear unless it’s been verified by a reliable source. Her sister was not what the police department would deem a reliable source. And yet, Pete had called her three times while she was cleaning. He was probably pissed that she wasn’t available when he needed her, day off or not.
Anissa began to change from her sweats into something more presentable as Marissa explained what she’d heard. The gossip was that the guy who’d bought the Oxendine land had found the jacket while walking the property—and not just a scrap of fabric but a whole, intact jacket, a very distinct jacket that anyone with access to media had seen at one point or another.
Anissa could picture the jacket, but not from the photos in the news. She’d seen it with her own eyes. Davy himself had shown it to her—on a warm autumn night, far too hot to be wearing a jacket, but Davy had showed it off even as sweat formed on his brow and dripped into his large brown eyes.
“My neighbor Sarah—you remember her?” Marissa continued, unaware that Anissa had all but stopped listening, lost in her own thoughts, her own private memories.
“Yeah,” Anissa lied, tugging on jeans fresh from the dryer, glad she’d done laundry.
“Well, her husband works for the commercial real estate agency that sold the guy that property. He drove out there and said it’s all taped off and cops are there.” Marissa paused. “I’m stunned you haven’t heard.”
Her phone signaled an incoming call. “I gotta go! That’s Pete on the other line.” She hung up on Marissa in time to catch the call.
“Hello?” she asked, breathless and anxious.
“I assume you’ve heard the news.” Pete wasted no time.
“Yep, already misinformation to start managing,” she said. “The story’s making its way through town.”
“That’s why I need you to get to the Malcor home,” Pete said. “Be with them as much as they’ll allow. Help them ward off the press as we figure out what’s happening. I don’t want them divulging anything until we’re ready to make an official statement. See if you can help them understand the importance of that.”
“I can do that,” Anissa said, willing herself to sound confident. It seemed she had waited her whole life for this moment, but she wasn’t sure she was ready now that it had come. She thought of the games they played as kids. “Ready or not, here I come,” they’d called.
“Good girl,” Pete said. It should bother her that he’d called her a girl, but she was too thrilled by his praise to correct him.
“One more thing,” Pete added, his voice dropping an octave as he spoke again. “And this isn’t for public knowledge. But I think we’re really close this time.”
“Really?” Anissa breathed, incredulous. In the two decades since Davy disappeared, there’d been supposed sightings, false confessions, and continued efforts on the part of the family to keep the investigation open—all things that brought the press to town, sniffing around at the possibility of the case finally being solved. Anissa wanted to say she’d always believed it would happen one day. But was that really true? Had she lost hope along the way? She didn’t want to think that way, even for a second.
“We’re as close as we’ve ever been,” the sheriff said.
“Wow,” Anissa said. The word sounded inane and inadequate, but she couldn’t take it back.
A moment of silence passed between them before Pete said, “Ok, well, you best get over there before the press starts camping out on their lawn. I’ll send some uniforms over to help with that. Do you need the address? This case has been quiet for a few years. I’m not sure you’ve had cause to go over there since you started this job.”
“No,” Anissa said. “I know. Where they live.” The sheriff didn’t need to know why. She’d prefer he never did.
October 12, 1985
5:15 p.m.
From outside the bathroom doorway, eleven-year-old Davy does his best to stay hidden as he observes his mother. She is applying makeup, unaware that she’s being watched. She always opens her mouth as she lifts the mascara wand to her lashes. He’s about to blow his cover to ask her why, but she spots him before he can.
“Davy Malcor, are you spying on me?” she asks and lifts one corner of her mouth without turning from the mirror. He grins and their eyes meet, two reflections smiling at each other.
“It’s not spying,” he says. “It’s reconnaissance.” He likes that word. He learned it from The A-Team. Or maybe it was Magnum, P.I. It was definitely not Simon & Simon. He isn’t allowed to watch that one. It comes on too late. His parents make him go to bed too early. He’s going to talk to them about that, and soon.
His mother screws the mascara cap back on and drops the tube into her cavernous makeup bag with a jumble of products Davy doesn’t understand and is a little afraid of.
“Reconnaissance, huh?” she asks.
He nods in answer, but she isn’t looking at him anymore. She is pulling other things from her bag, lining up products on the counter, lost in thought. She isn’t thinking about him or his older brother or his little sister. She is thinking about going to a party with other grown-ups. He heard her talking about it on the phone with Mrs. Swain from next door. The Swains are going to the party too. They’re all riding together. Which means the grown-ups next door will also be gone tonight.
Davy feels a little shiver of fear go up his spine. He doesn’t like when his parents go out, doesn’t like being home alone with only his older brother there for protection.
He watches his mother swipe red lipstick across her lips, then study herself in the mirror before grimacing and wiping it off with a tissue. Bored with the scene, he turns to go and plows into his older brother, TJ, who promptly shoves him as if he did it on purpose.
“Watch where you’re going, twerp,” TJ says. TJ rarely calls Davy by his actual name. He has a wide variety of not-so-nice nicknames he uses instead. His mother says they are terms of endearment, but Davy doesn’t believe that.
Not one to take things lying down, Davy retorts, “You watch where you’re going, you big jerk.”
Their mother steps out of the bathroom hollering, “Boys! Don’t start!” She is still wearing her robe. Once she has a full face of makeup, she will put a scarf over her head and then shimmy her dress on over the slip she is no doubt wearing under the robe. Then she’ll pull the scarf off and presto! She’ll be ready to go. Davy tries not to feel sad at the thought.
“Mom, I need to talk to you,” TJ says.
Their mother holds up a hand and shakes her head. “I’m getting ready to go out. Go talk to your father. He’s already ready.”
“Ready ready,” Davy says and laughs.
TJ smirks at him. “You’re so lame.”
“Am not,” Davy says.
“Are too.”
Their mother points at her bedroom door. “Boys, out,” she commands. Then she begins mumbling to herself but still loud enough for Davy to hear what she’s saying.
“Can’t I have a few moments to myself? Is that too much to ask?”
“Mom, seriously,” TJ continues, ignoring her command. “I need to talk to you. It’s, like, urgent.”
Ever since he saw Fast Times at Ridgemont High, TJ has been inserting the word like into his sentences here, there, and everywhere. He sounds stupid if you ask Davy. But of course, TJ doesn’t ask Davy for his opinion about, well, anything.
“Danny!” their mother hollers down to their father. “A little help up here!”
From somewhere in the house a deep voice answers, the words unintelligible.
“What?” she yells. When there is no reply, she sighs deeply and returns to the bathroom. TJ follows her. Davy sits on his parents’ bed, curious what TJ’s important question is.
Their father enters the room carrying four-year-old Kristy, who is holding a fish stick in each hand, her face smeared with ketchup.
“Tabby,” their father says. He is nearly out of breath from carrying Kristy up the stairs. “You told me to feed her, so I’m feeding her. Then you call me up here. So which is it?”
“TJ has some important question he has to ask,” their mother says. “I’d like him to ask you, for once, and let me get ready in peace. Why is this so hard to understand?”
Kristy waves at her mother with a fish stick, then crams half of it in her mouth, smacking loudly as she begins to chew.
Their mother wrinkles her nose at the sight. “You need your face wiped,” she tells her daughter. Kristy laughs and tries to reach for her mother, who ducks out of the way with a look of genuine fear.
“Everyone out!” Tabby says to the whole lot of them, making shooing motions with her hands. “You’re going to make us late.”
“Oh, Tabby, we won’t be late,” his father says, shifting Kristy to his other side.
In response Kristy runs her ketchup-laden hands down her father’s shirt as Tabby looks on in horror.
“Well, I thought you were already dressed, but I’m glad you weren’t,” she says.
Unruffled, Davy’s father winks at Davy’s mother. “You say that like I’m a rookie at this.” He turns to apprise the messy child he holds, now biting into the second half of her fish stick. “Let’s go clean you up, kiddo,” he says and leaves the room. Davy follows him out.
Tabby turns back to the mirror, picks up a compact, and pulls an applicator from it. She is about to apply eyeshadow when TJ speaks up.
“Mom, I really need to talk to you,” he says again. Tabby, not realizing he is still standing there, jumps at the sound of his voice, causing her to drop the applicator, leaving a smear of smoky-blue eyeshadow on the counter. Tabby curses under her breath as she reaches for a tissue to wipe away the mess.
“I told you to talk to your father,” she says to her oldest child. She uses her most patient voice, though she feels anything but patient.
“He can’t, Mom. He’s taking care of Kristy. You’re the only one not doing anything.”
“Not doing anything? Not doing anything?” Tabby exhales loudly, lifting the eyeshadow wand in the air as proof that she is, in fact, doing something. Or does it not count in her family’s eyes if the thing she is doing is solely for herself? She closes her eyes, inhales and exhales, centering herself. Soon she will be at a party with other adults, talking about things adults talk about, a cold glass of crisp white wine in her hand. She just has to get there first.
“What do you need?” she asks.
TJ has come to the bathroom doorway, standing in the same spot where Davy stood moments ago. Tabby has no idea where Davy has gotten off to, but he is worried about tonight. She can tell. He’s afraid to be left at home with TJ in charge. She knows this, knows what he’d been thinking as he watched her.
But she hadn’t said anything, hadn’t wanted to open that can of worms. Because to do so would possibly throw off their plans for the night. And just for one night, she doesn’t want to know her son’s fears, doesn’t want to ponder the depths of his psyche. Ignorance, Tabby knows, can be bliss. Complete and utter bliss.
TJ pauses before answering, which means he is working up to something. “So Phillip and some other kids want to go play night games and—”
“What are night games?” The term sounds nefarious to her.
TJ huffs and Tabby knows he is thinking that his mother is slow, that she requires his patience. “It’s just kids playing normal games—like freeze tag or capture the flag. But, like, at night.”
Tabby raises her eyebrows at him. “Where are these night games going to happen?”
TJ brightens at the question. The fact that she is asking means there is hope of gaining the permission he seeks. He points in a vague southeast direction.
“Those fields over by the fork in the road. You know, where that old farm was?”
“Is,” Tabby corrects. “The old farm is. It’s still a farm.”
“Well, there aren’t any crops anymore,” TJ argues. Around the time he entered his teens, TJ became an excellent arguer. Neither she nor Danny saw it coming, this transformation from child to miniature lawyer, always pleading some case. At fifteen, he is a master at it. They both find it exhausting. Exhibit A: Danny has opted to clean a ketchup-stained child over hearing TJ out.
“Still,” she says. “I don’t think you kids should be traipsing around on property you don’t own.”
“Phillip says people do it all the time and nothing ever happens. He says they’re gonna sell that place anyway and build another neighborhood.”
“Uh-huh,” Tabby says, turning back to the mirror and applying the eyeshadow. “And how is Phillip so knowledgeable about local construction plans?”
“His uncle told him,” TJ says.
Tabby sighs into the mirror, her breath fogging it. “I don’t like that uncle of his. He seems . . . I don’t know”—she casts about for the right words—“Out of it.”
“Aw, Mom,” TJ says. “It’s just because he’s an uncle and not a real parent.”
Tabby rolls her eyes. “That’s comforting, TJ.”
“No,” TJ persists, “I mean he didn’t, like, choose to be Phillip’s dad. He just, you know, had to. Because his parents died. Or whatever.”
“Well, that is certainly sad for all concerned,” Tabby says, thinking she really should take time to learn more about TJ’s friends. If only there weren’t so many distractions. She puts down the eyeshadow wand and steers the conversation back to where they’d started.
“I’d love to say yes, but I need you here.” She turns the faucet on, then off again. “We’re going out tonight. Remember?”
“I know, I know. But I had an idea,” TJ says, holding up a finger. TJ’s ideas are legendary. He is uncannily good at figuring out an angle that will benefit him best yet still placate others. She and Danny often muse over whether this means their oldest child will be a success or a swindler.
“He could just be a politician,” Danny likes to say. “Then he’d be both.”
“What’s your idea?” Tabby sighs, beaten. She squints at her makeup job in the mirror. She isn’t very good at applying eyeshadow. As a stay-at-home mom of three, she doesn’t have much reason to perfect the skill.
“Davy can stay here with Kristy and watch a movie. I’ll just be, like, down the street and Larkin will be right next door if there’s an emergency. I’ll stay for one hour, then I’ll come right home.” He holds up the Scout’s honor sign, even though he’d quit Cub Scouts at age eight after only three months of meetings, claiming earning the badges had been “too stressful.”
Tabby’s head is already shaking, even as he holds out his arm and points at his watch to imply he can be trusted to use it.
“Come on, Mom. One hour. That’s all,” he pleads. But even as he does, she recalls Davy watching her in the mirror from the same spot where TJ now stands, the barely contained anxiety welling behind her younger son’s eyes.
“Davy’s not ready for that yet,” she says. “I’m sorry.” She can feel the situation devolving, can feel Davy’s unspoken fear, TJ’s mounting anger, and Kristy’s small sticky hands reaching, reaching, reaching. All she wants to do is go to one party. Why, she thinks, is this too much to ask?
“That’s not fair,” TJ wails, sounding like the child he still is, even as his body morphs into something that increasingly resembles a man.
Tabby opens her mouth to speak, but before she can offer her normal retort, TJ rolls his eyes. “I know what you’re gonna say. Life’s not fair. Well, it really isn’t in this house!” he exclaims, then storms out of the room.
Tabby stands motionless, alone for the first time all evening, and grips the edge of the bathroom counter. She studies the mirror and wonders briefly if she recognizes the reflection.
Danny’s face appears beside her own. This time he is not carrying Kristy, but he is still wearing the ketchup-smeared shirt.
“Do I even want to know?” he asks, already sounding worn out even though the night is young.
“He wants to go play so-called night games down the street with some friends,” she says. “Wants us to leave Davy and Kristy alone here for an hour so he can go. Says he’ll watch the time and Larkin will be right next door if the kids need anything.”
Danny, always the more lenient parent, shrugs. “It’s not a terrible plan.”
“If Davy weren’t so nervous about being here alone, then TJ’s plan would be fine.”
“Well, maybe we force Davy to toughen up, face his fears. I mean, Larkin is right next door.”
Tabby is shaking her head again, disagreeing before he can finish speaking. “I get the feeling he might really be afraid of something.”
Danny raises his eyebrows. “Maybe we should talk to him about it.”
Tabby closes her eyes and shakes her head, this time more emphatically. “I am not getting into that tonight. We can talk to him later.” She waves her hand in the air. “Tomorrow. Or something.” She turns to Danny, puts her hands on his shoulders, and kisses him full on the mouth.
He smiles and pulls her closer. “To what do I owe this honor?” he asks, his grin going from playful to lascivious in a second.
“To a night out. Just us. As grown-ups. Not as Mom and Dad but as Tabby and Danny, the people we were before the kids came. The people I hope we still are, if we could just get the chance for a couple of hours.”
Danny pulls back and studies her for a moment. “You really need this, huh?”
She nods and buries her head in his shoulder. “You have no idea,” she says into his stained T-shirt.
She wants him to change out of that shirt. She wants to see him in the golf shirt he’d laid out earlier, the new jeans she picked up at the mall for him. She wants to see him out of the house, away from the kids, shed of the personas they wear within these walls. She wants him to wink at her from across the room like he used to when they went to parties in college, back before they knew what the other was thinking with just a look.
He claps his hands together. “I think I’ve got a solution. TJ!” he bellows.
“What are you up to?” she asks, feeling hope bubble up. The situation can be fixed. The night can be saved. They can all get what they want.
TJ appears in the doorway, looking mournful. “What?” he asks.
“Let’s make a compromise,” Danny says, rubbing his hands together.
At the word compromise, TJ’s mouth droops even more. “Just forget it.” He starts to walk away, but Danny reaches out and catches him.
“You haven’t even heard my offer.”
TJ stares at the ground. “What is it?”
Danny looks over at Tabby. “You sure Larkin is home?”
Tabby nods. “Marie said she was going to be.”
“Well, we can ask Larkin over to babysit Kristy for a couple of hours so you can go play your games.”
At this TJ lifts his head and looks at his father. “Really?”
Danny is usually of the mind that there is no reason to pay a babysitter when you have one who will work for free already in the house. He is making a magnanimous decision in the name of keeping both his wife and his son happy. This is worth the fifteen bucks it will cost him.
“But”—Danny says, and TJ’s shoulders drop; he is a balloon deflated with a single prick—“We let Davy choose whether he stays here with the girls or goes with you.”
“That’s not—”
“Don’t say fair,” Tabby interjects. “If you say fair, we’ll cancel this whole offer and you’ll stay home as planned.”
TJ’s eyes move from his mother to his father and back again, gauging the strength of their union. Deciding it is stronger than he is, he sighs deeply.
“Ok,” he says quietly.
Danny claps his son on the back. “Good man.” He says this often, even though TJ is far from a man.
Not yet, a little voice inside Tabby says. Not just yet.
“So I can tell Phillip I’ll be there?” TJ asks. Tabby hears the excitement creeping back into his voice.
“You can,” Danny says, “after we talk to Davy and find out what he wants to do.” TJ’s face falters, but he recovers quickly, not wanting to lose his parents’ goodwill.
“I’ll go get him,” he says and races off in search of his little brother.
Danny turns back to Tabby and kisses her again. “See? Everybody wins.” He waggles his eyebrows in a way that suggests he expects to be the big winner later that night.
And Tabby laughs because she believes it is just that easy.