A Warm Heart in Winter(46)

Soon enough, she found a stride, and it felt good to breathe in the cold, dry air. She proceeded down her street, and when she got to the end, she was hot, so she took off her wool hat and crammed it into the pocket of her parka.

The main road had been plowed, and she stayed to the shoulder, making really good time on the inch of powder that had sloughed back down the banks created after the city trucks had barged the majority of accumulation out of the way. There were few cars out and about, mostly high-clearance SUVs with the drivers looking smug, as if they felt that their automotive choices were being totally validated.

She knew exactly how far she went. Six point four miles.

She’d run the route so many times. In fact, all of that back-and-forthing had been the reason she’d made varsity cross-country.

Terrie, on the other hand, was a couch potato. The joke in the family had been that Elle and Dad were birds of a feather and Mom and Terrie were loungers without measure.

Not that anyone was making those comparisons anymore, even if Terrie was still playing on her iPad most of the time.

Elle knew she was getting close when the stores and the bus stops began appearing. More traffic congested the road, so she moved up onto the sidewalk—or where one would have been without the snow dump—and then soon enough, she cut across the narrow lawn of a CVS. After that, it was a diagonal on the Rossignols through the unplowed parking lot of a strip mall, and on the far side, the apartment blocks started, the buildings grouped by exterior paint jobs.

Gray and white. Dark brown all over. Cream and white. Dark green and tan.

The names were fancier than the facilities. Greystone Village. Elmsworth Court. Willowwalk Homes.

As she shhhhsht-shhhhsht-shhhhsht’d along, she figured whoever owned the places had chosen the names deliberately. It wasn’t that the units were nasty. But they sure weren’t old Brownsboro Place–worthy.

Her mother’s enclave was second to the last on the street, and Elle skied into the parking lot to find that everything had been plowed—so that all the sedans and minivans parked under the open-area carports were totally blocked in. Not that anybody was making a move to go anywhere. It was a Saturday, after all, and hello, the snow.

Plus who could have gotten any sleep in the whole city with all that wind? It was like Caldwell was gonna get blown off the map of upstate New York.

Her mom’s apartment building was two-story and split in half, the double-decker sporting an open-air stairway to feed the upper quartets. Her mom’s flat was on the second floor over on the left, and Elle didn’t bother to check and see if the Audi station wagon was parked in its spot. It was never not there. And it couldn’t have left this morning, anyhow.

Shucking the skis, she gathered them together, and it was messy work getting up the stairs with the poles, too. Fortunately, her mom’s door was the first one she came to. She knocked.

No answer.

Elle’s heart pounded as she got out the set of keys she had been given. Well, “set” was the wrong word. The keys she had to her father’s house were a set. There was his front door key, the key to her locker at school, the key to her bike lock. For her mom’s apartment, there was only the ring and one single, notched dangler.

Unlocking things, she cracked the door an inch. “Mom?”

When there was no answer, she threw open the door. “Mom!”

That was when she heard the shower running. And then a muffled answer through the bathroom’s closed door.

“Thank God,” Elle whispered. Louder, she said, “I’ll just wait, Mom.”

Leaving the skis outside, she hoped they wouldn’t get stolen as she closed herself in. And then she wasn’t worrying about her equipment for the trip home anymore. The interior of the apartment was so dark, she couldn’t see, and she stayed right where she was for that reason—and others. After an eternity, she realized she hadn’t kicked the snow off her shoes, but before she could step out and stamp on the welcome mat, the bathroom door opened and light spilled into the central room.

“I’ll be right there,” her mom said as she went into her bedroom.

The other door closed, but with the light still streaming out of the loo, Elle’s eyes were able to get to work. The sofa and two armchairs were from the old family house, and they had fit into the living room there. Here, with so much less space, they were crammed in too tight, no room for a coffee table between them, their cushions too big, their backs and arms too tall. At least all the walls were cream so the dark red didn’t exactly clash, but neither did it really fit. The color was way too vivid, the tan carpeting making it look like raspberries on oatmeal.

Everything was neat—which was a relief—nothing out on the tiny three-top table in the galley kitchen, no dishes around the sink, no cereal boxes on top of the fridge or debris on the countertop. As always, Elle told herself that that meant everything was okay. She’d seen Intervention and Hoarders.

Tidy meant it was okay.

Right?

“Not even close,” she mumbled to herself as she rubbed her nose.

The smell was stale and dusty, and that, coupled with all the closed blinds, made her feel like she was in a damp cave.

Figuring she better do something about tracking in snow, she took her cross-country’ing shoes off and set them on the rubber mat just inside the door. Then, in her three pairs of socks, she padded over to the kitchen table and sat down. As she waited, it was hard not to notice how barren the front of the refrigerator was: No school calendar. No pictures of her and Terrie. No coupons, or birthday cards, or notes.