cell phones. Rain thought about that a lot now. If they’d had phones, how would that day have been different? Would she have called her mom? Would their mothers have been tracking them the way people did now? Maybe her phone would have rung just then: I told you to stay away from the woods! Come home this instant!
But there were no phones to ring. Just two girls, twelve going on thirteen. Neither one of them especially cool. Smart, A-students, but naive, sheltered. Tess had braces and enormous glasses, wore her mousy blond hair in braids; Rain, in braces, too, her black hair was wild, untamable. She couldn’t shimmy the rope in gym class to save her own life. Rain already knew she was a writer, like her father. Tess, an accomplished horseback rider, as at ease in a saddle as she was on a bicycle, was certain she was going to become a veterinarian. And Hank, who they were on their way to meet at his house because he had a pool, well, he was just a comic-book, video-game nerd. All he wanted to be when he grew up was a superhero. They were merely waiting for him to get bitten by a spider, or fall into a vat of toxic sludge, and emerge with his powers.
“What’s wrong with the woods, anyway?” asked Tess. She was rail-thin, coltish, prone to tripping. “Since when can’t we walk through?”
Rain looked at her jagged cuticles. She wasn’t clear on her mother’s reasoning. “My mom just said.”
They almost didn’t see him; the big man sat as still as a boulder by the side of the creek. They might have walked right over the bridge and passed him without noticing—if not for the dog.
“Rain?”
She practically jumped out of her skin, adrenaline rocketing through her. Lily whimpered, shifted crankily in her sleep at the sudden movement. Greg stood over her, a hand on her shoulder.
“Did you fall asleep?” he whispered. He lifted Lily from her arms, kissed the baby’s head softly and placed her in the crib. He stood watching their little girl.
Rain came to stand beside him, and he turned to her.
“I’m sorry,” he said. “I shouldn’t have said that. It was a low blow.”
He put his arms around her again and they stood swaying, turtles from the nightlight dancing on the walls.
You were right, she wanted to say but didn’t. It is about what happened. Everything Rain had done since that day was about what happened. How could it not be?
She let the comfort of the room, her husband’s arms, the present moment wash over her. She pushed that day, and everything that happened after, back down into the box where she kept it, and locked it up tight. She envisioned herself throwing the key down a deep well.
Don’t let this slow you down, kid. Her father had issued this directive right after, and at critical moments since. If you let it get its claws into your haunches, it’s over. Remember that.
She’d been running. Fast as she could. Why did she always find herself back there?
“Whatever you want to do,” Greg whispered. “Whatever you need, I support it.”
“Thank you,” she said, holding on to him tight.
But wasn’t there a part of her that wished he’d stop her? That he’d tell her no, that Lily came first, and they’d agreed someone should be home full-time. Wasn’t there a part of her that wished he’d keep her from following that trail into the woods? Again.
They stood there awhile, holding each other, watching Lily, the big, sweet-faced moon hanging from the ceiling watching them. Her eyes drifted outside to the street, where she saw the headlights of a sedan switch on across the street. The car sat idle for a moment, then pulled away slowly. Her heart thumped.
It’s nothing. It’s no one, she told herself. Even though a part of her knew it was a lie.
Do you see me? Do you know it’s me?
He loves you. That’s obvious as I watch you hold on to him, sway in the dim light of the nursery. I shift in my seat, stare at the monitor in my hand, its glow shining blue on the dash, on the door. I’m happy for you, believe it or not. I didn’t think you two would actually get married, let alone stay married. Of course, it’s early days. Still, you seem to get each other. It’s not perfect—I’ve heard the two of you fight, and fuck, make up, argue again. But it’s healthy. It’s real. When he kisses you, I turn the monitor off.
I start the engine and drive away.
You know what I remember about that day, Lara? Everything. Every detail.
I woke shivering because my parents kept that house as cold as a fucking icebox, didn’t even bother turning it up when they left for work. They were both gone, as usual, when I got up.
Remember that feeling? That summer feeling. You open your eyes and there’s absolutely nothing to do. The day stretches ahead, leisurely and beautiful. No school, no responsibilities, no chores in my case—hey, there was a cleaning service for all that—just the blissful freedom of the unsupervised adolescent.
I knew you guys were coming, that we’d swim. There’d be pizza and video games, and some stupid movie. I figured we’d ride our bikes back to your place. Your mom always made dinner; my parents might not come home until eight, carrying fast-food burgers or fried chicken in greasy white sacks—they loved their junk food, didn’t they? Remember how we’d eat that later, too? Eat at your place, eat again at mine. Your dad would come for you, so you wouldn’t ride home alone in the night. Sometimes you’d just leave your bike and get it the next day.
I had a stack of new comics that my dad brought the night before from his favorite shop in the city. I read one—Batman—as I ate a huge bowl of Cocoa Puffs, then drank the chocolate milk that was left behind. The way we ate. Remember how we’d ride to the general store and buy bags of junk—gum and candy bars, those peanut butter cookies, and cheesy puffs, potato chips in cans. We’d just sit on the sidewalk and eat it all. I look at those old pictures and we were all so skinny. I guess that’s the magic of being a kid, right. Eat whatever you want. No consequences. Until much later.
I remember the sunlight glittering on the pool. The birds singing in the backyard. The hum of a lawn mower from across the street. There was a note from my mom: Get out and do something today. Don’t just lie around in front of the television. Love you!
Later, she blamed herself. She should have been home. If she had been—The way I see it, there’s plenty of blame to go around.
The last time I wrote, you told me that you didn’t remember much of anything. You told me that you didn’t want to remember. That’s when you asked me to stay away, to stay out of your life. If you could go back and relive that day, change things, you would. But you can’t, you said, so you had no choice but to move on. You politely suggested that I do the same. Move on.
It’s so easy for you.
Not so easy for me, of course.
What if I hadn’t gone out looking for you and Tess? What if I had, instead, called
