At the same time, I say, “Busy day for fishing,” taking in the surplus of boats on the lake, though finding it impossible to believe the world still exists, that life still goes on, that people are able to do ordinary things like go boating and fish.
Elliott steps closer, looking past me and out the window. “They’re not fishing, Court.”
I look again and this time see it for myself. The boats aren’t out there slowing to troll for fish as I first imagined. Instead, they’re trying to get a glimpse of Emily and Nolan’s cottage from the lake, searching through binoculars or taking picturesof it on their phones and on cameras with telephoto lenses to share online with horrible little hashtags like #crimescene or #murderhouse, reducing our family’s nightmare to a social media post.
Rage builds inside of me. “What do you think they can even see from the lake?” I ask, trying to keep my voice calm, level, but as I do I remember how Emily used to relish her undisrupted view of the lake from the cottage’s deck. While the rest of her family slept, she spent her mornings there, drinking coffee and taking it in: the reflection of the sky and the shadows of the trees on the still blue-green water.
“I don’t know. Probably not much,” Elliott says to indulge me. But I know he’s wrong. They can see practically everything.
“Why don’t the police make them leave?”
“I don’t think they can. It’s public property and it’s not like they can rope off a lake.” Elliott turns me around and again he asks, “Why don’t you stay here today? Let the police look for Reese. If she’s there, they’ll find her. They’ll bring her home.”
I shake my head. “I have to go, Elliott. She’s my niece. Emily would do this for me.” He nods, pensive, and I can tell he wants to say more. “What?” I ask, feeling frustration build that I even have to explain to him why I would want to go.
“It’s just...” His eyes stray. He won’t look at me as he says, “I keep thinking about what she said to Emily the other night. She was just so angry. I’ve never seen her like that before.”
I hate you. I wish you’d die.
I take a breath. “What are you saying? That she killed them and ran off?” The words are hard to get out. They’re harder to imagine. Elliott is quiet; he can’t bring himself to say yes, that that’s exactly what he thinks. “She didn’t do this,” I say. “You know her. You know she would never do this.” But even as I say it, I wonder: Did either of us know Reese that well? Once upon a time, when she was young, we did. Reese was exuberantthen. She had the best smile, the best laugh, and she was always very liberal with her hugs. Before Cass came along, Elliott and I adored being the fun aunt and uncle, without all the duties of parenting. We’d have Reese over to our house from time to time and spend the day watching movies and playing games, sending her home before the drudgery of bedtime. When she was young, Elliott taught her how to play hide-n-seek. Reese was a quick learner. I remember finding her at the back of my closet and not just standing there, but fully dressed in a shirt and skirt of mine and in my shoes. At least twice I looked right past without ever noticing she was there. Hidden in plain sight. Elliott was impressed; he said she was like some child prodigy of hide-n-seek, which she thought was hilarious, though she had no idea whatprodigymeant.
But this new Reese, this defiant seventeen-year-old Reese, is almost a stranger to me. That girl that we knew as a child isn’t her. It’s someone else. “She was just mad. She said things she didn’t mean. We’ve all done that.”
“No, you’re right,” he says. “Of course she didn’t. Like you said, she was just mad.” The change of heart is too quick; I can see in his eyes that he doesn’t believe it.
My head throbs. When I looked at my face in the mirror before, it was swollen from crying and there were tiny marks, like broken blood vessels, on my cheeks and around my eyes from vomiting. The kids, all three of them, sit on the unmade sofa bed in their makeshift pajamas like deer in headlights, their eyes glazed over and stunned. Mae’s face is puffy from crying half the night. As I watch, she sniffles and then wipes her nose with a sleeve. Beside her, Cass stares down at her own hands before getting up and moving to the loft to be alone.
“You’ll take care of the kids?” I ask, worrying about them, feeling conflicted by the need to find Reese but also my desire to stay here and be with Cass and Mae, to comfort them.
“Of course I will.” I press the heels of my hands to my eyes. “Are you sure you can do this?” Elliott asks.
“Yes,” I say. “I’ll be fine.”
“Okay,” he says, reaching out for me and pulling me close, “if you’re sure. Just be careful. Stay alert. Stay with people and don’t ever let yourself be alone.”
“I won’t.”
The police officer steps out of his car when I go outside. Up close, he’s maybe fifty years old, tall, lanky and balding. “Everything alright, ma’am?” he asks.
“Yes,” I say, moving down the steps, veering away from him and in the direction of my own car.
“Going somewhere?”
I stop and turn back, feeling my breath quicken, that flight-or-fight reaction kicking in. “Am I not allowed to leave?” I ask, defensive.
He waits too long to answer. When he does, he asks, “How can I keep you safe when I don’t know where you are?”
I tell him, “I’m going to help the search party look for my niece.” I don’t ask if that’s allowed, or if I’m just supposed to stay in the cottage all day like a prisoner.
As I jog the rest of the way to the car, my neck stiffens with that sense of being watched.
I open the door and get in. I slam the door closed and lock it.
From the front seat of the car, I search the woods, wondering if that sense of being watched is just my imagination or if it isn’t my subconscious, picking up on something my eyes cannot see.
Reese
My horoscope this morning said to take risks, to reap the benefits of not playing it safe. I’m not usually a risk-taker. My idea of taking risks is watching horror movies, riding roller coasters and things like that, things that scare the shit out of you but are safe, that can’t really hurt you.
