The Good Neighbor Page 9

  To me, it was like they didn’t trust me.

  Even though my mom claimed to know a lot about what was wrong with the internet, it was kind of funny that she didn’t think things through as much as she should have. Probably because she underestimated me. She thought I was the same little girl who believed every word she said. The same little girl who did whatever she told me to. The same little girl who wanted to sleep in a pink and white princess bed.

  Most days during school hours we did some kind of internet research for either history or science. She would sit in the chair in front of the computer, enter the password, and search for the information. Then we switched places and I would read what she’d found. Every so often, she let me do the searches, but she always had to enter the screen-lock password first.

  When you sit beside someone every day and watch her type, it doesn’t take that long to figure out what keys her strong, slender fingers are hitting, no matter how fast she taps the keys. The password was babyg1rl. Easy. And lame.

  The other thing about my parents was that they loved their sleep. My dad went into such a deep sleep he snored like a mountain lion. I would wake at eleven thirty or twelve, and he would be so sound asleep he didn’t even move his head or shift his legs if I walked into their room. Around twelve thirty in the morning, he started snoring, and then I knew he was in really deep. My mom, for reasons that I didn’t really understand for a long time, took a pill to help her sleep every night. Nothing woke her once that pill got its grip.

  It’s not that I was being sneaky, I was curious. Even so, I tested their sleep first.

  One night I went into their room at one fifteen. I stood near the foot of the bed for a few minutes and watched them. The only sound was that rumble and snort coming from my dad. My mom slept like she was dead, her body completely motionless as her breath drifted in and out.

  I went to the kitchen and filled a glass with water. I drank it. I put the glass in the dishwasher. I returned to their room. They hadn’t moved.

  I’d watched a lot of movies and TV shows with my mom. I knew how to be cautious when you didn’t want others to know what you were up to. I went into the small study and turned on the desk lamp. I sat at the computer desk. I tapped the keys for a few seconds. After returning to their room to check they hadn’t moved, I went back to the computer and entered the password.

  I used my dad’s headphones to listen to a few YouTube videos. I kept myself angled in the chair so I could see the doorway, although if they caught me, it would be too late. I visited Twitter and Facebook and read some stuff there. I didn’t know anyone on Twitter, so I got tired of that quickly. Since I didn’t have a Facebook account, I couldn’t see much, but I looked up my friends, and they had their settings so I could see their profile pictures and a few pictures of their pets and scenery from vacations.

  By two thirty I was starting to yawn.

  I searched how to make sure my parents couldn’t find out what sites I’d visited and then followed the instructions to erase the history. I opened a few folders on the desktop, but I got bored. I was yawning like mad, and all I found were copies of their wills and some scanned letters from my mom’s mother.

  I yawned again. I didn’t want to go to bed even though my eyelids felt thick and heavy. I opened the photo app. I’d never looked at our photographs on the computer. My mom always printed out the best photographs and put them in albums. I liked going through the albums, remembering the fun stuff we did as a family, and looking at pictures from the camping trips we’d taken with the other homeschool families.

  Soon I was totally falling asleep, but I couldn’t stop looking at the pictures. I hadn’t seen a lot of those pictures. There were thousands of them.

  Something kind of bothered me about all those photographs, too many photographs, almost, but I couldn’t figure out what it was. Finally I decided I was just grumpy and tired. My mom always said that not getting enough sleep can make your mind play tricks. Being too tired makes you confused and short-tempered and creates all kinds of havoc in your body. I closed the app, locked the screen saver, turned out the light, and went to bed.

  The next time I’d look up how to set up a Facebook account. All my friends had them. Their parents supervised what they did on Facebook, but they weren’t shut out completely.

  17

  Taylor

  The temperature hit one hundred three degrees Sunday afternoon. For some reason, and I sort of wanted to take credit for this, all of our neighbors had decided the coolest spot available was the island of greenery in the middle of our cul-de-sac. I took credit because before I set up the Facebook page, before I provided nourishment after we all pulled together searching for Brittany, people rarely came out of their houses in the evening. As far as I could recall, we’d never congregated in the center island park. I’d broken the ice with the things I’d done to support the Cushings.

  This evening, everyone drifted outside after dinner. Even our backyards were too confining to allow much of a breeze to pass through. That island garden seemed to be the only space where air was moving. We were standing around drinking bottled water and iced tea, talking about the heat.

  They were unaware of it, but I desperately needed their supportive presence. All the sightings reported on the Find Brittany page were dead ends. Now I had yet another lunatic to face, this one claiming she was Brittany’s mother. Talking to other people helped me get out of my head, helped me stop thinking about what I was going to do.

  After we’d run the subject of the weather into the ground, everyone wanted to know how the Facebook page was working out. They wanted to know if there were any leads. What they really wondered but didn’t say was Is there any hope?

  I told them about my disappointment over the sightings, some bogus and some impossible to verify.

  “But I think it gives us a lot of hope,” I said. “People are paying attention.”

  “I agree,” Sofia said. “I just know that girl is out there counting on us to find her.” Carlos put his hand on her shoulder and massaged it lightly. Sofia glanced at the Cushings’ house. They were the only ones who hadn’t come out for some relief from the stifling air. I understood. I’d considered texting Moira or knocking on their door, but Duncan said I should leave them alone. He’d insisted they would feel conspicuous, and it wouldn’t be relaxing for them or us.

  My phone pinged. I didn’t have to look to know who it was. Mrs. Green. It sounded like a fake name to me. One of the ninety-nine percent crazy that Officer Carter insisted were out there. There was no way Brittany could be this woman’s daughter. I’d scrutinized her profile picture. It showed a blond woman, but she was wearing sunglasses, so I hadn’t been able to tell anything. She’d been messaging me nonstop. Pretty soon she was going to make good on her threat to post a public message. I couldn’t hold her off with platitudes much longer. I gulped water and tried not to feel the constant vibration against my hip bone.

  We talked about the search of the open space, the police officers, and the apparent hopelessness of finding a lead.

  Freya pushed her sunglasses up on the top of her head. A few strands of dark brown hair slipped through and dangled over the bridge of her nose. “How can a girl just vanish? I know it happens every day, but I’ve never experienced it before, and I just feel so helpless. I can’t imagine how it is for them.” She glanced at their closed courtyard door. The rest of us had left our doors standing open, and seeing theirs shut tight made us unable to look away.

  Keith and Kelly were sitting on the park bench. They weren’t saying much, just staring at that door. It was as if it was shut tight in order to hold unbearable grief inside that house. We couldn’t stop ourselves from staring at it, just as we couldn’t stop thinking of Brittany.

  “Maybe even more people will report seeing her,” Freya said.

  “That’s what we’re hoping,” I said.

  She pulled her glasses back over her eyes, even though the sun was below the tree line. “I wi
sh we could do more.”

  I nodded. “I do too.”

  Duncan moved away from me. He took a seat on the bench and began talking to Keith. I had the sense they weren’t even discussing Brittany or the investigation. Officer Carter called it an investigation, but what were they investigating, really? They’d talked to no one outside our neighborhood unless they were already known to the police, and I wasn’t sure how much they’d really dug into each household on our street. They sure hadn’t asked us many questions. While I didn’t want to think that way, it popped up in my mind every few hours. They had no suspects, no idea what to do next.

  “It’s so frustrating,” Josh said. “Maybe we should do something ourselves.”

  Freya leaned her head on his shoulder. “Like what?”

  He moved away, wiping his hand across his forehead to remove the sweat.

  I turned away from Moira and Alan’s house. Nicole was looking at me. They were all looking at me. I suppose part of what comes with taking the lead in drawing a community closer to each other is that now they were all looking to me as if I had answers. Suggestions. I was more frustrated than any of them.

  “We need to share the Facebook page more,” I said. “It’s the only thing we have.” They all nodded and said they had. “We should ask our friends to share it too,” I said.

  “Good idea,” Freya said.

  I glanced at Duncan. He and Keith were still talking. Duncan’s arm was stretched along the back of the bench. Kelly was on the opposite side of Keith. She’d leaned her head in, and they spoke in low voices. My phone buzzed again. Thinking about what Mrs. Green might be saying in her messages made me want to cry.

  I raised my voice slightly, hoping to draw their attention back to what mattered, and asked Nicole, “Where’s Luke?”

  “In the house. Why?”

  “He should be out here. He’s close to Brittany’s age, closer than we are. He knows things about kids her age that we don’t. He should be helping. He should be sharing the Facebook page with everyone he knows, and helping us search. Why didn’t he help with the search?”

  “He had plans.” Nicole’s voice was tight.

  “I think this is a situation that overrides plans to hang out or whatever.”

  Nicole put her left hand in her pocket. She took a sip from her water bottle, then walked toward the bench. No one said anything more. Shortly after that, Kelly and Keith stood. They said goodbye and began walking back to their house. Freya and Josh did the same. They closed their doors as they entered the courtyards, leaving nothing but more silence.

  As Nicole started across the street, I hurried after her. “Why don’t you come over for a glass of wine?”

  She continued walking. “No thanks.”

  “We need to put our heads together.”

  “No, we don’t.”

  “Are you upset with me?”

  She stopped. “I don’t appreciate you accusing Luke of whatever it was you were trying to say.”

  “I didn’t accuse him of anything. Remember? You said you were worried he needs more direction. Purpose. I thought getting involved with this effort would be good for him.”

  “It’s not your job to decide what’s good for him.” She moved away and walked quickly to her house.

  A moment later, Duncan and I stood alone in the middle of the street.

  “I’ll take that glass of wine,” he said. “I’ll pass on conjuring up ways to help.” He laughed.

  “This isn’t a joke.”

  “Just trying to lighten things up.” He put his arm around my waist. “I’m worried about you. I hate seeing you so upset, so frustrated. There’s really not a lot we can do.”

  We went inside and closed and locked the courtyard door. The house was more stifling than when we’d left. The heat burned into my skin. Our house was designed perfectly for warm weather, but not heat like this. The ceiling fans were doing nothing to stop me feeling like I was in a furnace. Although it really was too hot for wine, I wanted something. I considered a vodka tonic.

  Duncan picked up an apple from the bowl on the counter and took a bite. “We could get naked to cool down. And make up for the other night.”

  I laughed. “It’s way too hot for that.”

  “I miss you.”

  I gave him a light kiss on the knuckles of his hand holding the apple. “I think it was good that everyone supported each other just now, don’t you?”

  “Did we?”

  “We’ve never hung out like that.”

  “Tragedy stirs people’s juices.”

  “It’s more than that.”

  He took another bite of the apple, avoiding my gaze.

  “I wish you weren’t so disinterested, or whatever it is you are. I don’t get it.”

  “I’m not disinterested.” He bit the apple and chewed slowly before he spoke. “I have a life to live. I’m not a police officer, and I’m not a close friend of the Cushings. I’m not a friend at all. If they need a neighborly hand for something, I’m here. But I’m not capable of finding their child. And I’m not going to shove myself down their throats.”

  “That’s not what I’m doing.”

  “I don’t want to see you so upset. All this so-called community bonding is just the natural anxiety over the realization we’re not as safe as we believed. That’s all.”

  I went to the cabinet and got the vodka. Duncan declined my offer to make him a refreshing drink, waving the apple at me. He went out to the back patio and sat on the lounge chair, munching his apple. I made a drink and went into my office to check my work email and see what Mrs. Green had to say to me through the Find Brittany page.

  I wasn’t sure what to do. No one else could see the messages. It was easy enough to delete them, but they were creeping me out. I tried to think what I could say to make her go away. It was almost like she was threatening me. I stared at the string of new messages.

  No one could recognize a child they hadn’t seen for ten years. Kids change too much in that amount of time. They’re entirely different people. This was just a woman whose mind had slipped off center after years of grieving for her lost daughter. She probably thought every blonde girl she saw on a missing-child page was her daughter. My eyes filled with tears.

  I put my fingers on the keys, but I had no idea what to say. It should be something sympathetic, realizing she’d been frantic to find her child for so long. I moved my hands away from the keyboard. Another message appeared.

  I recoiled each time I saw her anger in blunt type. She might be dangerous. She might be completely unbalanced. She might not have lost her child at all. Or she might be so sick with unabated loss it had permanently damaged her mind. I couldn’t sit there thinking and doing nothing. I’d receive more angry messages. I needed to calm her down, but I had no idea how.

  I logged out of Facebook. I wanted to cry. I wanted to tell someone, but there was no one I could talk to. Not a single person on the entire planet. Nicole apparently no longer wanted to be my friend. My work friends were only casually interested whenever I mentioned Brittany and her parents. Duncan was out. It was just me, wanting to do the right thing, to help people when their lives were falling apart.

  18

  Moira

  I woke up Monday morning, if you could call it waking up, since my sleep was a disturbing half-dream-half-terrified state where I felt I was always awake. When I actually did become conscious, I realized I’d been asleep after all, though it hadn’t felt that way. The doxepin wasn’t helping. I’d considered taking two capsules, but as much as I hated not sleeping, I was terrified of missing a call from the police. Even more important, it wasn’t impossible that Brittany might manage to get her hands on the creep’s phone and call me. So maybe the surreal dreams and the jittering of my eyeballs was worth it.

  Without Brittany, I felt as if someone had carved a hole in my body, not unlike gutting a fish. I couldn’t read; I couldn’t watch TV. Alan and I had nothing to say to each other. When I tried t
o complain about the offensive questions the police officer had asked, he said she was just doing her job, and that since he didn’t take it personally, neither should I. The logic of that advice escaped me.

  I took it very personally. It was fine for the police to believe they were obligated to ask those ugly questions when they suspected a family had issues, but that was not our family. Anyone could tell by looking at me, looking at Alan, looking at how I kept our home, most of all, looking at our well-adjusted daughter, what kind of people we were. Pawing through Brittany’s things should have shown them clearly what an exceptional child she was and how beautifully we were raising her.

  After a cup of coffee and a slice of buttered toast that I couldn’t finish, I found myself looking at my phone, hoping Taylor might text me. At least she wanted to talk about Brittany. At least she felt worried about her, even if she was doing all the wrong things to show her concern.

  By ten thirty I was so wound up I felt like ants were creeping down my spine and the backs of my legs. I scratched and brushed at my skin, but the persistent, delicate sensation of tiny feet continued. It got so bad I went into the bathroom and lifted up my shirt, twisting to get a view of my back in the mirror. All I saw was smooth, pale skin. There were no black insects running about, looking for food, contemplating feasting on my flesh.

  I sent a text message to Taylor and asked if she wanted to come over for a cup of tea. I certainly didn’t need coffee. Herbal tea, chamomile, although I’d never experienced the calming it was purported to offer. Still, the process of making and sipping it would soothe me without sending a jolt of caffeine to my amped-up nervous system.

  Taylor and I sat on the back patio, the heat already creeping across the yard.

  “Over a hundred again today,” Taylor said. “That’s the forecast.”