Since She Went Away(9)

Jared saw the opening. He decided to jump.

“Is that what your parents are like?” he asked, feeling very much like a man sliding along potentially thin ice. “Your dad, I guess . . . or your mom when she was living with you?”

Tabitha’s eyes focused again. Jared worried that he’d pushed too hard, that she’d be angry again. He knew if she stormed off this time he wouldn’t be able to convince her to stay. And if she walked out the door of their house angry, he might never get this close to her again.

But he took the chance. He wanted to know. Wanted to know her.

As his mom always said, “You have to live with whatever consequences you create.” He understood that all too well.

But Tabitha didn’t storm off. Her features softened, and she slid her hand along the inside of his thigh, creeping ever closer to the bulge growing against the fabric of his jeans.

“My parents,” she said. She shook her head and leaned in close, kissing him once and then twice. “Shit. It’s so complicated. . . .”

“Your mom? Is something—?”

“Shhhh,” she said.

And then they were kissing more, her hand on top of the bulge. And Jared had no trouble forgetting everything except her.





CHAPTER FIVE


The sun was slipping away as Jenna drove home. They lived at the eastern edge of the central time zone, which meant it started to get dark by four thirty. Jared usually remembered to flip the porch light on for her, but it was out when Jenna pulled into the driveway. Was the bulb dead or was he not home? He was supposed to be home.

Jenna’s hand shook as she reached out. The front doorknob turned and opened without her key, and she stepped into the darkened living room. The door shouldn’t be unlocked, even if he was home.

No answer. Unlocked door.

“Jared?”

Jenna tried not to smother him, tried not to let Celia’s disappearance color the way she treated her son, but she couldn’t help it. She worried about him more. The day after Celia disappeared, Jenna called a locksmith—every door received a dead bolt and a chain. Everybody in town probably did the same thing. A wave of suspicion swept through Hawks Mill once Celia was kidnapped. There was a palpable edge, a tension that seemed to grow between everyone, pushing them back, making them scared. No one felt the same about the town or the people in it.

On the day after Celia disappeared, Jenna found an old baseball bat in the garage, one that Jared used in grade school, and she’d slept with it next to her bed ever since. She carried pepper spray on her key chain and kept one in the drawer of her bedside table. She checked in with him more, texted him more.

But she hadn’t heard from him after school. He never responded to the text she sent from the barn. She took deep breaths, told herself to be cool.

All was quiet inside the house. No music, no TV. She turned on a lamp, which cast a faint halo of yellow light on the space. The house looked neat and orderly, just the way she liked it. The place wasn’t much, about fifteen hundred square feet, and it still needed work. But it was hers, slowly being paid for by her job as a nurse. Didn’t this make her an adult: a job, a house, a kid? It wasn’t bad for a single working mom, right?

How did having a missing and possibly murdered friend fit into the picture?

She went down the hallway to his bedroom, stepping lightly, the floorboards creaking under her feet. He could have fallen asleep. She remembered her own teenage years, the endless naps, the sleeping in on weekends. Was that one of the worst things time took away? The ability to sleep long, lazy hours?

Faint light seeped through the bottom of his bedroom door. She knocked lightly.

Did something rustle? Did she hear a voice?

“Jared?”

She pushed the door open. A quick scrambling, two bodies moving away from each other like repelled magnets. It took Jenna a moment. Jared was on the bed, his hands fumbling with his belt. And was that . . . ? A girl? Was there really a girl in Jared’s room?

“Jesus, Mom. Don’t you knock anymore?”

Jenna was paralyzed by both shock and embarrassment. Embarrassment for herself more than for the kids. After all, they were just being kids. She’d done the same things when she was fifteen. But as the bumbling adult walking in on them, she felt more the fool. Could she not have imagined Jared might have a girl in their house after school?

“Oh, shit, honey,” she said, her words rushed. “I didn’t know.”

The girl—the beautiful girl—was straightening her shirt, smoothing it back down over her jeans. Jenna did the only thing she could do—she stepped back, pulling the door shut behind her.

Jenna wandered out to the kitchen in something of a daze. A girlfriend? How did she not know? She turned on the light above the sink. The darkened window gave back her own reflection. She’d never given him rules about having girls in the house. She’d never given him many rules about anything, so she had no reason to be angry. Not about that. She was a little pissed he hadn’t returned her text or locked the front door, but she knew her worries were her own problem, letting the dog and pony show at the barn get inside her head. Jared was fifteen. He didn’t have to stay in constant contact with his frazzled mother.

Jenna opened the refrigerator and pulled out a bottle of beer, which seemed essential after the day she’d had. She popped the cap and took a long drink, feeling the pleasant burn as it ran down her throat.