Come Find Me(23)

But that was the thing about Abby. Everything shook her. It was just in her expression. Like she was always a step behind, surprised by where she found herself. The last time I’d seen it, she was in the car with me—the moment she realized what she was doing. Like I’d been the one to start it, instead of the other way around.

“Yes, I think this is her doing,” I say, but my words have less force, less conviction. And I no longer feel I can leave the house; I feel like there’s something holding me, against my will. I go upstairs to my room, leaving the agent to whatever he’s doing downstairs. The answers aren’t going to come like this, this simply. With a picture of my brother in an anonymous email, after all this time. Not to Abby.

    No.

The truth was sent to me. Something has been trying to reach me, and now it’s finally pushing through.



* * *



—

I never told my father the other part of the fever dream. The words I could just barely make out, Liam’s lips moving too fast to make out the rest. Help us. Please.

I bought this equipment the very next morning.





The first thing I notice when I upload the new data is that the signal is no longer there. I mean, it was, but eventually the signal went dead, around the time Lydia mentioned the power going out. It’s not there after the reboot. I change views, change parameters, hit a thousand different random numbers searching for something more. But all that remains is the expected background noise of the vastness of space, exactly where it’s supposed to be—a whole lot of nothing, in an endless expanse of nothingness.

“No,” I mumble, something twisting inside. It was right here. I stare at the screen, scrolling through the data over and over.

“Kennedy? Can you come out here?” Joe calls, finally back from campus, but I’m not done checking, I keep hoping I’m wrong. It could be showing up somewhere I don’t understand, some part of the program I don’t know about—

“Hey, did you hear me?” Joe peeks his head into the room, catching me off guard. “What’s that?” he asks as I turn the monitor of the computer black.

    “Physics,” I say, and Joe nods. Like, of course it’s physics. Not: I think I’m receiving a signal from outer space, but I think it’s a warning, and it’s coming to my house, which, by the way, I swing by at night sometimes while you’re sleeping.

“Can you take a break for a sec?” He asks this though I’ve already obviously shut it down. But we’re like this with each other, asking, always, before we step.

“Okay.” I follow Joe out to the living room, where he sits in the center of the sofa, his arms braced against his legs, leaning forward.

Oh God, we’re about to have a talk. This is the demeanor he exhibited when: we went over the ground rules; we discussed our living arrangement; he sat across from me in the hospital, trying to find the words. The police had taken me there, in the ambulance they had no use for otherwise, because they didn’t know what else to do with me. I sat there, alone, in a white-walled room, with white sheets, a white curtain, everything shadowed beyond the bed. I have no idea how long I was there, only that, by the time I left with Joe, it was daylight.

He’s gotten better at the words. Not so much the demeanor, though.

I perch on the edge of a flannel recliner chair that I’m fairly certain he found at the side of the road somewhere on trash day. And I balance myself carefully on the ledge, leaning forward, so I can take off at any moment, depending on the direction of the conversation.

It’s then I see he has a few sheets of papers beside him, folded into thirds. He spreads them open in front of him, his fingers trembling, like he’s prepared to give me some speech. “The district attorney’s office,” he begins, and I’m already standing.

    Here I thought he was out having fun with friends. But he was probably just working his way up to this.

He puts the papers aside. “Kennedy, sit down. We’re supposed to do this. I promised them.”

“Joe, come on.”

“The trial starts next week, Kennedy.”

“It’s not my trial.”

I see the muscle in his jaw clenching, but he must’ve taken up yoga or something, because he takes this deep breath and the muscle finally relaxes. So much different than the early days, when he’d slam a door, grab at his hair, look up at the ceiling, his eyes bone-dry but looking as if he’d been crying. He takes a deep breath. “I told him we’d go over the questions. Just you and me. None of that.” He shakes his head, as if the problem were the office, the wooden table, the man, and not the crack running through everything.

“Joe, I know. I know. And we will, I promise. But I can’t tonight.” I scramble for any excuse, completely desperate. “Lydia asked if I could sleep over. I forgot to check with you, but I told her I’d be there after dinner.” I look at my phone. It’s definitely after dinner, whether we’ve eaten or not.

“It’s a school night,” he says, but his objection is halfhearted already.

“Right. But Lydia goes to my school. We’re studying. We were studying, earlier, but then I had to leave.” I stare directly at him, my eyes watering from not blinking. I’ve never lied to him so directly. I hold my breath.