What She Left Behind (22 page)

NEED YOUR CAR NOW. BACK DOOR BY CHOIR RM. URGENT.

“Sara, you know that cell phones aren’t allowed in class. Hand it over.”

Somehow Robertson is standing next to my desk, but I don’t think he saw my message to Zach before I sent it. He holds out his hand.

“It’s my mom. She wants me to call her. I told her I’m in class and I’ll call her at lunch. I’ll put it away.”

“Sorry, you know the rules. Hand it over.”

I shove the phone in my pocket. There’s no way I’m going to hand over the one way my mom can contact me.

“I can’t.” I say simply.

“Sara, I’ll have to write you a referral if you don’t turn it in. You can get the phone back at the end of the day.”

“I understand,” I say. “I’ll save you the bother. I’ll just go to Mr. Altman’s office myself.”
Had I actually said that?
Robertson looks startled.

I stand up, grab my backpack, and move quickly to the door. On my way, I crush the Ritz Bits that Alex and I dropped. I hope that Zach got my message.

“Sara, get back here!”

I speed up and start to run down the hall.
Please let Zach be there. Please, God.
I don’t often talk to God—I guess you can say I’m holding a grudge about Matt—but I really hope he’s listening.

I fly past the science rooms, the library, and the gym. When I get to the back door, Zach is there. He hands me his keys.

“Thanks,” I say. “Gotta go. I think Robertson might send Altman after me.” I push open the door and keep running. When I get to the parking lot, I pause to look for Zach’s car.

Zach grabs my hand. “It’s this way,” he says. “I’m coming with you.”

“No, I’ll be okay,” I say. “You’ve already missed enough school because of me.”

“Doesn’t matter,” he says.

I don’t have time for arguing. With each second that passes, I imagine Altman hurrying to the back door, getting closer and closer to catching me.

“You drive, then,” I say, tossing him the keys.

Zach jumps in the car and starts the engine. He backs up while still pulling on his seat belt.

“Turn right out of the parking lot and don’t speed,” I say. “The last thing we need is to get stopped.”

“Where are we going?”

“Carter Mini Storage. The numbers in my dad’s office must be the combination for a unit there. My dad probably just has some old junk from the hardware store there, but …”

“Probably. But there’s no harm in checking. Where is this place?”

“Outside of Brookton, somewhere off of Ridge Highway.” I look up the address on my phone. “I remember going past it when Dad took Matt out to practice driving and I got stuck going along.”

“I’m sure your dad was a very patient instructor,” Zach says sarcastically.

“Yeah, right.” I roll my eyes. Since my dad’s truck is a stick shift and Matt wasn’t used to it, he had jerked us forward every time he hit the gas. Dad made Matt stop and start a lot because we were on dirt roads with barely any traffic. Instead of getting better, Matt seemed to get worse every time. And so did Dad’s yelling.

Zach and I pull up to a stop sign. I look down at the directions on my phone. “Turn right. It’s over there,” I say, pointing. Nestled between two cornfields, Carter Mini Storage consists of a farmhouse with a bunch of metal buildings behind it. Zach pulls in and
turns off the engine. I wipe the sweat from my hands on my jeans. “So what do you think? We just go to the front door?”

“Sounds good to me.”

When we knock, I can hear a TV blaring on the other side.

“It’s open!”

The door sticks so I have to push kind of hard on it. A middle-aged woman sits barefoot on a couch.
Judge Judy
is on TV.

The woman’s eyes remain focused on the TV. I clear my throat. “Excuse me, ma’am. My dad sent me over here to get something out of our storage unit, but I forgot what unit number he told me it is.” My cheeks flush and I have to wipe the sweat off my hands once again. I expect her to say that she’s going to have to call my dad to confirm, or that she’s sorry, but she can’t give out that sort of information. Instead she just sighs.

“Name?” The gravelly tone to her voice makes sense considering the cigarette in her hand.

“Ray Peters.”

Without turning her head, she reaches behind her and grabs a Rolodex from the end table. She flips through it with one hand, then inhales deeply from her cigarette and blows out the smoke. She crushes the stub into a glass ashtray. “Number eleven,” she says.

I nearly hyperventilate. “Okay, great, thanks a lot for your help.”

The woman has already turned back to the TV.

Outside, Zach and I walk down the path between the storage units, and I feel like I’m trapped inside a movie. I see things but don’t feel like I’m really there. Grass with weeds, dandelions. A toad hopping in front of us, going just fast enough that we don’t
step on him, but never veering off to the side and out of our way. Zach takes my hand. It feels cool and confident; mine is warm and clammy. We reach unit eleven and I give him the sticky note with the combination.

“You do it, please.”

He twirls the lock, and it snaps open with a sharp, metallic
click
. Then he rolls the door up. Silver.

I hear a whimper and realize that it’s coming from me. I grab on to Zach’s shirt and bury my face in his side.

“This can’t be right. It just can’t be.” My mother’s car. I feel like I’m suffocating. Still holding on to Zach, I turn my face and look at the car again. Something about the look of it bothers me.

The car sparkles as if it’s just been cleaned at the carwash. Which doesn’t make sense because my mom is afraid of the car wash, just like me. She’s afraid of putting the wheel in the wrong spot, of having the car in the wrong gear, of getting trapped inside and no one noticing. Matt always did it for her. It was one of his chores—to either wash the car at home with the hose or take it to the car wash in Brookton. He usually took it to the car wash, partly because he was lazy and partly because he wanted to get out of the house, I suppose. After he died, I took over the car washing. And this isn’t how I’d left it. Usually I wash the car on weekends, but I’d never gotten around to it last weekend. The car had been so dirty I had been afraid my dad would yell at me about it.

I put my face to the window and peer into the front seat. It looks the same as always, only cleaner. I reach for the handle.

“We probably shouldn’t touch anything,” says Zach. He takes
the end of his shirt and opens the driver’s-side door. On the floor of the passenger seat is my mother’s phone.

Zach opens the trunk as I look in the backseat. “There’s a suitcase here,” he says. I walk to the back of the car. It’s the same suitcase that my mom had packed for our escape.

This time I don’t try to dream up any explanations, any hopeful stories to explain all of this away. My mom is dead. My dad killed her.

All I want to do is go home. To my mom. Who isn’t there and never will be.

Zach pulls out his cell phone. “I’m calling the police.”

I shake my head. My mind is full of voices. Mom’s. Dad’s. Matt’s, even. “Did you—did you see any—did you see any blood here?”

“No, but that doesn’t mean …”

“When Dad talks to Jack—” His wolf eyes glint in my mind.

“I know. He might try to convince the police that your mom left on her own.”

“Take me home, Zach. I need to get some things.”

“Sara—”

“Please, Zach. Just please take me home.”

W
hat if your dad’s home?” Zach asks, unbuckling his seat belt.

“He’s not. It’s only twelve thirty. He doesn’t believe in leaving work early, even when he’s sick.” Just to be sure, once we’re out of the car, I peer into the garage. No truck. Safe, for the moment.

Zach takes my hand and we go inside. “I just want to get a few things,” I say.
Mainly my mom’s necklace. And Sam—as stupid and messed up as that is.
“Come with me?” I ask, gripping his hand a little tighter.

“Of course,” says Zach. We cross through the living room, where something smells fruity. An orange. “Do you smell that?” I ask Zach.

He nods.

I look around. It isn’t like my dad to leave out a plate or a peel after a snack. Nothing. Then I freeze.

Dad is sitting at the dining room table, eating orange slices. My heart beats furiously. No one goes into the dining room. It’s off-limits because of Matt. We all know that. We all respect the unspoken rule. Yet there he is, sitting and eating as if nothing has changed.

Every instinct tells me to run. Instead I approach the dining room, but I don’t go in. Zach stands next to me.

“Your school called. Said you had skipped out. Again,” Dad says nonchalantly.

“We found Mom’s car,” I say accusingly.

My dad pushes his chair back and stands up, walking toward me with measured steps.

Zach makes a fist.

A glint of silver in Dad’s hand. Just seeing it starts my whole body trembling. A gun.

The gun Matt used to kill himself.

Zach hesitates. My dad does not. He smacks the gun against Zach’s head, and Zach crumples to the floor.

I swing my backpack at Dad. He blocks it, grabbing my wrist and forcing me to my knees next to Zach.

Zach’s body is still, his face expressionless, his skin smooth and flawless. He looks how I wished my brother would have looked when he died. Serene. Peaceful. Beautiful.

I kiss the tops of his eyelids, like I had wanted to do to Matt.
Please, God, let him still be alive.
I press my face against his and feel his soft, cool cheek. His warm breath tickles my ear.
Thank you, God.

Dad yanks me to my feet. My head hits the wall and a picture frame falls to the floor and cracks. “Go pack his bag,” he says. “Now that Matt doesn’t have play rehearsal anymore we can finally go on vacation.” He gestures toward Matt’s room.

“We need to call an ambulance.” I can barely hear my own voice over the roaring in my ears.

“He’ll be fine.”

Dad waves me along with the gun and follows me into Matt’s room.

This can’t be happening.
This is my dad, the same dad who gave me Sam. Who used to call me “angel,” who took me biking, fishing, train-watching, horseback riding, and to see the Statue of Liberty.

“Pack.”

Why hadn’t I left the day my mom didn’t show up at the Dairy Dream? I kept believing she was alive long after it made any sense.
I’m sorry, Zach. Sorry for getting you into this mess.

Dad sits on Matt’s bed, patiently watching me.
Who is this person?

I open Matt’s dresser drawers. They’re all neatly organized—too organized. I want to cry, but instead I choose the same kind of stuff I’d packed for myself last Monday night: underwear, socks, jeans, a few T-shirts, and a sweatshirt for good measure. Only one, because
wherever we’re going, whatever we’re doing, it can’t last for very long.

Then I go into my bathroom, the one Matt and I used to share, and I find a new toothbrush. There’s one in the drawer that Mom had bought before Matt died. It’s red. Matt’s color.

I take Matt’s duffel into the living room and set it down.

“Go ahead, pack yours, too,” my dad says encouragingly. He seems to be in a great mood, despite the gun in his hand. He follows me into my room.

I’d already repacked most of my duffel in preparation for Mom’s return. I slide it out from under the bed and toss in the rest on autopilot. Including Sam. Dad doesn’t seem to remember that Sam is supposed to be in a Dumpster. I reach for a pen on my desk.

“Nope. This is a no-homework vacation.”

“Great. Then I’ll take a pen for crossword puzzles. What else should I bring? Where are we going?”

Dad laughs and shakes his head, as if I’ve just told him the world’s best joke.

“You hate crosswords.” Then his face loses its color and he stops laughing. Matt was the one who liked crosswords.

“I can bring it along for—”

“I said no!”

“Then I’ll just bring something to read.”

My dad nods, jaw clenched, as I tear out a page from
Soap Opera Digest
and slip it into Alex’s Stephen King book.

Dad escorts me to the living room and nods for me to pick up Matt’s—Zach’s—bag too. “Ladies first.”

With a bag over each arm and the Stephen King book in one hand, I cross through the kitchen. I sway to the left, pretending my balance is off, and drop one of the bags. I lurch toward the phone, knocking a chair over on the way. Then I grab the receiver and hit talk. My dad doesn’t try to stop me.

No dial tone.

Dad looks at me like when I was five and I’d say, “Can I have another cookie, please?” And he’d say, “There aren’t any more.” I’d check anyhow. He’d let me, and he wouldn’t get mad. His eyes would just say,
See? I told you,
when I saw the cookie jar was empty.