The Silent Sister(78)

“Ingrid,” she said. “I’m sorry to do this so quickly, but I have to go home.”

“Home?” Ingrid stopped her work and looked at her in absolute shock. “You mean, to your family in Maryland?” Jade hadn’t so much as mentioned that nonexistent family in years.

Jade nodded. “My father somehow found out I’m going to State and he got a message to me that my mother’s really sick.”

Ingrid didn’t say a word. She stared at her, and Jade had to fill the silence.

“And honestly,” she said, “I’ve been missing them. I just have to go. So my rent’s paid up till the end of the month … is that okay? Do I need to give you more? I could—”

“No, Jade.” Ingrid held the hoe upright at her side. “That’s fine. I’m sorry about your mother.” She laid down the hoe and walked over to her, putting her hands on Jade’s shoulders. “You’ve been the best tenant I could ask for, but I’ve always felt you should go home,” she said. “Be with your family. What about school, though?”

“I’ll have to transfer. It’s okay. Family’s more important.” She choked up a little at that. She wished she could go home.

“Are you driving all the way to Maryland?” Ingrid lowered her arms, a worried look on her face. “That will take you days.”

“I know. That’s why I’m going right away. I don’t want to leave my car here.” Was she making any sense or digging herself in deeper? “Thanks so much for everything,” she said.

“Let me get you some food to take with you.” Ingrid took a step toward the house, but Jade grabbed her arm.

“That’s all right, thanks,” she said, afraid that with every second that passed, Arthur Jones was getting closer to her. “I’ll be fine.”

* * *

She had one more stop to make before leaving Ocean Beach: the bank. She still had nearly two thousand dollars in her account. She took the money in cash, stuffing it into her purse, and hoped that she hadn’t set off some kind of alarm in the teller’s head. She was sure she looked like the frightened, guilty woman she was.

* * *

She made it all the way to a rest stop near a town called Redding in northern California before she absolutely had to sleep. Even so, she only managed to doze for about an hour, cramped in the backseat of her car, before fear woke her up. Maybe she should have called Celia before heading to Portland, but she was afraid of what Celia might say. What if she told her not to come? Everything was going wrong for her all of a sudden, and if things went wrong with Celia, too, she couldn’t take it. She didn’t know how she’d explain showing up at her apartment out of the blue, though. Suddenly she felt like she didn’t know Celia well at all. Charlie’d said to go to her, though, and he knew her best.

* * *

She was numb from worry and the road by the time she reached Celia’s apartment the next afternoon. Celia wasn’t there, and Jade sat on the landing outside her door. She had to pee and she was starving as she went over and over in her mind what she planned to say to her. She had it worked out, a long and elaborate string of lies. But when Celia walked up the steps, her face registering surprise at seeing her there, Jade burst into tears.

And then she told Celia everything. Everything. Even the things Daddy had no idea about.

Even the things he couldn’t possibly guess.





PART THREE





40.

Riley

Once I pulled myself together after leaving the message for Suzanne, I drove the rest of the way home with a thrill of excitement running through my body. Lisa was alive! Unless she’d met with some terrible illness or accident—but how likely was that? She was only forty years old. I would find her, and nothing would stop me. I knew, though, that I’d have to be cautious. That meant not telling Danny what I knew, for starters. I’d look for Lisa in a way that put her in no danger, remembering what Tom had said: If Lisa wanted to see you, she could have found you. She had to be afraid of being found. Did she know Daddy was dead? Did she know about our mother, for that matter? Would she care if she did?

* * *

When I walked in the house, Christine grabbed my hand. “Where’ve you been?” she asked. “We hit the mother lode in the attic!” She dragged me into the dining room where she had completely covered the table with knickknacks and stacks of old books and other odds and ends I’d never seen before. I yanked my hand away from her, not at all in the mood to deal with details of the estate sale.

Jeannie walked into the room, her arms overflowing with old sewing patterns.

“Look at these!” she said. “Deb must have saved these from when we were teens just learning to sew. Check out the styles on the packages!”

I looked around my mother’s warm, cozy dining room, now turned into a junk store. I saw the gleam in Christine’s eyes and the dress patterns spilling out of Jeannie’s arms onto the floor. The two of them were now more familiar with the house of my childhood than I was, treating it like their own. I wanted them gone.

“I can’t take this anymore!” I shouted, my voice so loud even I was surprised.

Jeannie stopped walking toward the table, a few more of the patterns falling from her arms. Christine held a small ceramic horse frozen in midair.