Good Girl Bad (3)

Back at home, Rebecca dumps her handbag on the kitchen island with a loud thump.

She can hear chatter coming from the living room, the faint hum of the television, and she feels like storming up there and shutting it down, all of it. The television, the happy family time. Tabby has made her look stupid in front of her teacher, in front of Nate, but she’s just glibly fooling around on a school night in front of the television without a care in the world.

“Tabby!” she shouts down the hallway, and there’s a moment’s silence, the voices quieting. Then the living room door opens and Leroy and Tabby both emerge, padding down the long hallway toward her. They look so easy, so relaxed, and she feels resentful that she has to be the one to bring things back to order, to interrupt their fun, to remind them of the real world.

But somebody has to do it.

But just as she opens her mouth to say something cross, something biting, Leroy jumps clownishly down the five steps into the kitchen and grabs her in a dance pose, swinging her around, one arm firmly around her waist. He grins at her impishly.

“Look out, Tabby, Becci looks a bit peeved! What is it? An F? An expulsion? You’ve learned that Tabby’s quit math to do embroidery instead, and your dream of retiring on the back of your daughter’s orthodontic practice has gone up in flames?”

He spins her around once more and then pushes her against the wall, kissing her right on the lips in front of Tabby, his eyes laughing.

They’ll have sex tonight, she can tell from his kiss, the way he holds her against the wall.

Her tummy flutters.

“Slipping grades,” she squeaks, as she tries to wriggle out of his grasp, but the tension has gone out of her.

Leroy gives her a final smooch, then releases her. As he turns to go back to the living room, to give her space to chat with Tabby, no doubt, she thinks she catches a small smile toward her daughter, and a wink, and her stomach does less of a flutter and more of a churn.





3





Monday

Rebecca shakes Genevieve roughly.

“Gen. Gen!” Genevieve groans, and tries to burrow back under her doona, but Rebecca is tugging it down harder and faster than she can pull it back up.

“Mom!” Gen protests, the cold creeping in from the hallway, from outside. From the situation in the kitchen.

“Where’s your sister?” Rebecca’s voice is urgent.

“Wha-at?” Genevieve rubs her bleary eyes. “How should I know?”

It’s now nearly 9 a.m. Two hours have passed since Rebecca found the front door open, and impatience and irritation have finally given way to something more urgent.

“Get up,” Rebecca instructs her youngest daughter, rifling in her cupboard and throwing a tee shirt and some leggings at her. Genevieve holds them up in confusion. They’re not appropriate for a Melbourne spring morning, no matter that it’s nearly summer. And they’re certainly not appropriate for a school day.

“They’re gone,” Rebecca continues, looking through Genevieve’s wardrobe like she might find some clue in there. “Leroy. Tabby. Leroy’s car. But something’s not right. I can feel it.”

Hustling Genevieve through the house, shivering in the thin tee shirt Rebecca had handed her, she points to the mobile phones and wallets triumphantly. “See? Tabby would never go anywhere without her phone. And. Charlie.” Here she glances at the little form underneath the sweater she had hastily thrown over him while she made phone calls, trying to find her daughter and husband.

Her eyes linger there, uneasily.

In her state of agitation, she completely forgets how one ought to break such news to anyone, especially to her teenage daughter.

Genevieve is still half asleep, and is struggling to make sense of her mother’s words, which are being thrown at her, staccato-like. Bam. Bam. Bam. Bam. But when her eyes—following Rebecca’s—fall on the shape under the sweater, she falls silently to her knees. She glances up at Rebecca, a question in her eyes, but she doesn’t need a response, and her mouth gapes slightly, tears welling in her eyes, and she doubles over, a silent scream emanating from her open mouth.

She doesn’t touch the sweater, just keens silently beside the little body on the floor.

Something about her daughter’s grief shakes Rebecca out of her quest for an explanation. Genevieve is a thoughtful, sensitive, quiet teen, and Rebecca is surprised by the force of her pain.

No, that’s not right. She’s not surprised by the force of it—she’s surprised that Genevieve is showing it. To her mother.

Rebecca has her own pain about the dog, but it’s been swallowed up by more important things, like where her husband and other daughter are, and why they left in such a hurry that they didn’t even shut the front door.

She kneels beside Gen, putting her arms around her shuddering, small frame. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” she whispers, mortified by her insensitivity. She holds Gen tight, keeping her close until her shaking slows and stills.

“What happened to him?” Gen hiccups, her voice painfully small.

“I don’t know, sweetheart. But something’s wrong. I’m going to call the police. I’ve already called everyone who I can think of who might know where they are.”

She’d been methodical—Tabby’s friends. Trent Witherall’s parents. Nate. The school.