I'll Be You(42)

It had been so long since I felt beloved, I realized, and my heart swelled with affection for the sticky little girl whose sleeping head swung and bobbed with each bump in the asphalt.

Charlotte was still asleep when I pulled up in front of the next address on my sister’s list, a home on a street just two blocks inland in the seaside village of Laguna Beach. The houses in this neighborhood were built close together—real estate here was too valuable to waste on lawns—with socially oriented front patios festooned with American flags and planter boxes full of impatiens. A clapboard beach cottage stood at 72 Buena Vista; it had been enlarged and expanded at some point in recent years, and now boasted a two-story addition and a rooftop deck that had views out to the ocean.

It was another expensive-looking house, I noted; perhaps the common thread for these people on my sister’s list was their income? My suspicion that these were former customers—that this whole thing was a pointless wild-goose chase—grew stronger.

I didn’t have to ring the doorbell at this house. The owners—a well-groomed elderly couple—were already sitting on their front patio, just beyond a low wall covered with Fourth of July bunting. They were drinking iced tea and playing cards. I circled the block, looking for parking, but there was none to be had, and Charlotte was starting to stir in the back, rustling every time the car drifted to a stop. I couldn’t imagine what I would do if she woke up again. If I took her out of her car seat, would I ever get her back in again? So finally I gave up and double-parked in front of the house. I left the motor running and climbed out of the front seat to stand just outside of the car.

“Hi,” I called, softly, over the hood of the car. “Can you help me?”

The couple turned to stare in unison, startled from their game. They were silver-haired, the woman in a striped cotton pantsuit and the man in a polo shirt the color of strawberry sherbet. Their skin was sun-weathered, preserved like dried apricots.

The man patted his wife’s hand and half stood to squint at me over the wall. “Why are you whispering?” he asked.

I pointed at the car. “Sleeping baby,” I said.

His wife stood up now, craning to see through the window. “You lost?” she asked.

“No, that’s not it. I’m just wondering…I’m trying to track down my sister, and this address was in her things. I know this is a long shot, but do you happen to know her? Elli Logan, goes by Eleanor sometimes. Or even Eleanor Hart.”

“Elli Logan?” Something lit up in the woman’s face, her dried-fruit skin crinkling as she smiled with surprised delight. She approached the dividing wall, grasped it as if she might leap right over, and peered closer at me. “And you must be Sam, right? Oh my goodness.”

“You know my sister, then?” The relief made me wobbly. Finally. Answers.

“Well, yes!” She blinked, almost shyly. “I was such a fan of To the Maxx. Watched every episode! So I feel like I watched you grow up! And then my daughter, she just loved that show of yours on Nickelodeon, what was it called?”

“On the Double,” I said, as something inside me deflated. “Wait. Do you know my sister, as in know her personally? Or do you just know of her?”

She laughed, lightly touched her hand to her silver hair as if to check that it was still properly coiffed. “Well, I would certainly be shocked if she knew of me.” She smiled. “You said something about this address? She had it? You’re looking for her here?” Her lips pursed together now, and her eyes grew wide. “Wait, is something wrong? Did I miss a story in the tabloids?”

I realized that I’d made a terrible mistake. I imagined this woman calling her friends, the story leaking out through the social networks of the Southland, the calls from the local gossip press. “Forgotten Child Star Elli Logan Goes Missing.” It had been well over a decade since I last showed up in the pages of a gossip magazine—a wild night that had resulted in a paparazzi shot of me passed out in the passenger seat of a rap star’s car. My sister had been absent from the news even longer. Would we still merit a story?

If my sister has joined a cult, absolutely, I realized. There is no expiration date when it comes to scandal.

“No! No. My sister is fine.” I straightened, flashed a look from my old playbook: an On the Double smile, one part girl next door, one part charming rogue. “I think you misheard me. I’m just trying to locate an old friend for her. Maybe I got the address wrong.”

“Oh.” The woman’s face fell. “Well, we’ve lived here only a few months. Are you looking for the family who used to live here? The Millers? We bought the house from them.”

“Yes,” I said, grasping. “You know them?”

“Oh, no. You never get to meet the people you buy from these days. We get their mail sometimes, though. Tom and Carrie. They’re your sister’s friends?”

“Yes,” I lied. “Elli and Carrie were very close. She’ll be so disappointed. Did they leave a forwarding address?”

The woman frowned. “No…I think they moved their family out to the East Coast, though? New Jersey? Connecticut? I can’t remember, sorry. Do you want me to call my real estate agent and see if she can track them down for you?”

Through the window, I could see Charlotte stirring. A solitary Puff clung to her lower lip, which quivered tremulously; her nostrils flared with a sudden intake of breath. Shit. I felt a sudden lurch of desperation. Get in the car. Get her home. There’s no information for you here.