But now she was afraid. She was just as afraid as I was.
“Let’s go,” she said, opening her door. I did the same, slamming it shut before walking toward the front of the car and staring at our wraparound porch, at the rocking chairs creaking in the breeze, at my favorite magnolia tree casting shade across the hammock my dad had tied to its trunk years ago. We walked inside, the door groaning as we pushed it open. My mother nudged me toward the staircase, and I started toward my bedroom before a voice stopped me mid-step.
“Where have you two been?”
I froze in place, turning my neck to see my father sitting on the living room couch, staring in our direction. He was holding a beer, his fingers ripping at the damp label, a little pile of paper scraps collecting on the television tray. Sunflower seeds scattered across the wood. He was clean, showered, his hair combed back and his face freshly shaven. He seemed put together, dressed in khakis and a button-down, shirt tucked in. But he also seemed tired. Exhausted, even. His skin seemed saggy and his eyes sunken in, like he hadn’t slept in days.
“We got lunch,” my mother said. “Girls trip.”
“That sounds nice.”
“But Chloe isn’t feeling well,” she said, looking at me. “I think she might be coming down with something.”
“Sorry to hear that, honey. Come here.”
I glanced at my mom and she nodded slightly. I walked back down the steps and into the living room, my heart hammering in my chest as I approached my father. He looked at me, curiosity in his eyes as I stood before him. Suddenly, I wondered if he had realized his box was missing. I wondered if he was going to ask me about it. He reached his hand toward my forehead and pressed.
“You’re hot,” he said. “Sweetheart, you’re sweating. You’re shaking.”
“Yeah,” I said, my eyes to the floor. “I think I just need to lie down.”
“Here.” He grabbed his beer and pushed it against my neck, and I flinched, the cold glass numbing my skin, its sweat dripping down my chest and dampening my shirt. I felt my pulse, hard against the bottle, a cool beating. “Does that help?”
I nodded, forcing myself to smile.
“I think you’re right,” he said. “You should lie down. Take a nap.”
“Where’s Coop?” I asked, suddenly aware of his absence.
“He’s in his room.”
I nodded. His room was on the left side of the stairs; mine, the right. I wondered if I could sneak in there without my parents noticing, curl into his bed, and pull the covers over my eyes. I didn’t want to be alone.
“Go ahead,” he said. “Go lie down. I’ll come get you in a few hours, take your temperature.”
I turned on my heel and started walking back toward the stairs, the bottle still pressed to my neck. My mother followed me, her closeness comforting, until we hit the hallway.
“Mona,” my dad called out. “Hang on a second.”
I felt her turn around, face his direction. She was silent, so my father spoke again.
“Is there something you need to tell me?”
* * *
Aaron’s eyes are drilling into my skull as I gaze out toward the river. I turn to him, unsure if I heard him correctly, or if my memories are flooding my subconscious again, clouding my judgment, confusing my brain.
“Well?” he asks again. “Is there?”
“Yeah,” I say, slowly. “That’s why I called you here. This morning, I got a call from Detective Thomas—”
“No, before we get to that. Something else. You lied to me.”
I look back toward the river and lift a coffee to my lips; we’re sitting on a bench by the water, the bridge in the distance looking even more industrial and bleak with the settling fog.
“About what?”
“About this.”
He holds his phone in front of me, and I grab it with my free hand; I’m looking at a picture of myself, wandering amidst a crowd of people. Immediately, I know where this was taken. My gray T-shirt and topknotted hair, the mangled trees dripping in Spanish moss, the yellow police tape blurry in the distance. This picture was taken one week ago in Cypress Cemetery.
“Where did you find this?”
“There’s an article online,” he says. “I was looking in the local paper, trying to identify some people to talk to, when I came across images from the search party. Imagine my surprise when I saw that you were there.”
I sigh, silently berating myself for not paying closer attention to those journalists I had seen walking around with cameras slung from their necks. I hope Daniel doesn’t see this article—or worse, Officer Doyle.