CHAPTER FOURTEEN
CAYLEE
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I’m too happy, giventhe situation.My cheeks are glowing—even I can see that—and I’m almost dancing as I walk down the hall to take my lunch break.
“Louisa still hasn’t been found,” Amy reminds me, bringing me back to earth.Turns out it’s possible to be stupidly happyandsad at the same time, apparently.
“It’s horrible.”I sigh.
“She was just here.Then gone.How?”Amy bites into her sandwich, looking miserable.
Brad walks over with his salad and eats standing.He does that most days.
“It’s what young kids do.She might’ve been waiting for her braces to come off so she could run away with the boyfriend.”He munches down on the crunchy lettuce.
That doesn’t feel like something Louisa would do.She seemed to genuinely like her mom.When you know someone, even in our situation, over eighteen months, you get a sense of these things.
Louisa would race out to tell her mom things after the appointment.I’d watch them quietly chat in the waiting room.She’d show her things on her phone, and they’d giggle.
That wasn’t a kid who was in a hurry to run away.
“She comes from a good home.”I say, disagreeing with him.
Brad shrugs.“You don’t know what goes on behind closed doors.”
He might be right.I never saw her with her dad, and he did come across as that firm corporate type when he showed up the other day.Then again, his daughter was missing.
“I’m sure the cops are doing all they can.”I feel my happiness subside further and wish I could go back to my post-multiple-orgasm bliss.
“So many kids go missing; it’s terrible.”Amy sighs.“And that other girl who went missing six months ago...wasn’t she a patient of ours too?”
What?
My eyes widen.
“Who?”Brad barks, lowering his salad, appearing angry rather than concerned.
Then it’s gone in a flash.
“Mary Beth.Remember, she was the little ballerina—"
“Yes!Mary Beth.”Brad stabs the air with his fork, his expression almost detached.“She was the head ballerina in their school production of Swan Lake.You remember her, Caylee.”
Oh god, not Mary Beth!
I glance at Brad, shocked, and wonder if he knew.
“My god.Are you sure it’s her?”
Amy nods, finishes her sandwich and wipes her hands on a napkin.
