Since She Went Away (5 page)

“So, what’s the problem?”

“Jesus, it’s so stupid.” He remembered the night well, felt his cheeks burn with embarrassment just thinking of it. “You know my friend Mike. He’s a little wild. He’s a jerk sometimes, to be honest. He got ahold of this bottle of whiskey. I think he stole it from his dad. He wanted us to drink it that coming weekend, me and him and our other friend Syd. But Mike couldn’t keep it in his house, so he gave it to me to hide.”

“And your mom found it?”

“She came in to say good night and the damn bottle was sitting out. I’d taken it out of my bag for just a minute, and I forgot to hide it. She saw it sitting there and started asking me a bunch of questions. You see, she can be cool about stuff like that. She trusts me. I told her the truth. I said it was Mike’s. She believed me, but we still had to have this
talk about alcohol and responsibility. She wanted to cancel her plans with Celia, you know? She said she didn’t feel right running off with this hanging over us. But I told her to go, even though she was late.”

Tabitha nodded, her gaze still locked on his. “You were holding something for your friend. It’s not a big deal.”

“I know, but I think . . . I think about it. She beats herself up over Celia, and it was me who caused it.”

Some of the burning in his gut eased. A little of the pressure lifted. Tabitha’s understanding washed over him like a cool rain.

“Have you talked to her about it?” Tabitha asked.

“I should, but I’m always afraid to bring up the whole thing. I don’t know if she wants to talk about it, or if she wants to pretend the whole thing isn’t happening. Even though it is.”

“It’s sweet that you worry about her like that,” she said. “It really is. But I’m sure she understands.”

“Do you know she never told the police about it? Nobody knows but her and me. I lied to Mike about it. I told him I got caught, but not that night.”

“And now I know.” She looked pleased.

“And now you. She figured it didn’t matter
why
she was late that night. Just that she was late. She protected me from having everyone know. She was afraid that the whole town would hear about Mike and me having the alcohol, and they’d judge us and they’d judge her. People talk a lot in a town like this. They lay into people for every little mistake. Mom figured none of us needed that hassle. She made me dump the booze out, and she told Mike’s parents. He was pretty pissed for a while.” Jared ran his hands through his hair, running against his scalp. “I wonder if I’ll ever be able to forget that. Or forgive myself.”

Tabitha looked lost in thought. Her eyes grew duller, and she raised her hand to her mouth and started nibbling on the nail on her
index finger. He thought she was checked out, but she said, “Parents can be pretty sensitive sometimes. They go through a lot of stuff. We have to remember that.”

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

T
he 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.

She stared at the bottle. A couple of beers or glasses of wine became the norm after Celia disappeared. Sometimes more than a couple. She needed them. Every night she needed them.

That’s when she heard Jared’s door open followed by footsteps coming down the hallway.

“Mom? I’m walking Tabitha home.”

Jenna turned and saw Jared’s head peeking into the kitchen. She recognized the look on his face. He wanted to rush out of the house, make a break before she could say or do anything else. No
way, she thought. She wasn’t going to let everybody go their separate ways on that crazy note of embarrassment.

“Come on in here,” Jenna said, making a waving gesture with her hand.

“Mom,” Jared said, teeth gritted.

“I want to meet . . . did you say Tabitha? Come on.”

“Are you kidding?” Jared asked.

“Tabitha?” Jenna called. “Can you come here for a minute?”

Jared looked as if someone had just dropped a ton of bricks on his shoulders. He possessed the teenager’s ability to overexaggerate even the slightest indignity.

Jenna walked to the hallway and saw the girl making her way toward her. Jenna’s quick first impression in the bedroom had been correct—the girl
was
beautiful. Bright green eyes and a long neck. She’d pulled on a winter coat, a little too big and two seasons out of style even to Jenna’s eyes, but it wasn’t zipped yet, and Jenna saw the slender, shapely figure that almost every teenage girl seemed to be blessed with. Once upon a time, Jenna had that body too, and she cursed herself daily for not appreciating hers when it was in full bloom.

Jenna held out her hand. “I’m Jenna Barton. Jared’s mom.”

“Hi.” The girl took her hand in a limp shake. Her skin was warm, a little sweaty.

“I’m sorry I walked in that way,” Jenna said. “I had a long day, and I wasn’t thinking. You’re welcome here anytime.”

The girl smiled, but the look seemed forced, as though she didn’t want to show her teeth. Jenna couldn’t tell if she was shy or embarrassed or both. Up close, Jenna saw that the girl’s haircut looked unprofessional, as if someone just trimmed the edges straight across every once in a while. Maybe she even cut it herself. And her clothes weren’t anything special either. Knockoff jeans and a fading top, the sneakers, once white, scuffed and dirty. A kid without a lot of money, which made her beauty
all the more impressive. It wasn’t enhanced by the clothes or the haircut or orthodontry. She was the real deal, a stunner.

“What did you say your last name was?” Jenna asked.

“Tabitha Burke.”

The girl didn’t look up and meet Jenna’s eye. But there was something about her face, and not just its youthful beauty. Something about the shape, the set of the eyes looked familiar.

“Burke,” Jenna said, leaning against the hallway wall. “Are you related to Tommy Burke? He manages that electrical supply company out on the bypass.”

Tabitha shook her head. “No.”

“Mom, Tabitha doesn’t have relatives here. She’s new to town. Don’t start asking her about everyone you went to high school with.”

“I was just asking about the Burkes I know.”

“We have to get going, okay? I’m walking Tabitha home.”

“Do you want me to drive you? It’s dark and cold.”

“I’ve got this, Mom. Okay?”

“Are you sure? I mean—” Jenna stopped herself. Life had to go on. They couldn’t hide inside all the time.

“Mom.”

And Jenna knew he was right. She needed to back off and let him walk the girl home if that was what he wanted to do. It was early, and there’d be a lot of cars and people out despite the darkness. She sighed, letting go. She tried very hard to let go.

“Okay,” Jenna said. The girl, Tabitha, still looked sullen and stiff, her eyes fixed on the floor as though Jenna’s shoes were fascinating. But Jenna couldn’t shake the sense she’d seen the girl before. And recently. Maybe she’d been a patient at Family Medicine. Jenna couldn’t ask about that, couldn’t run the risk of violating the girl’s privacy. Walking in on her dry-humping her son was enough humiliation for one night. And if the girl had the guts to come back, to stick around after that
inauspicious beginning, then Jenna would admire her. “Well, I’m sure your mom appreciates the fact that you have someone to walk you home in the dark.”

Jared’s eyes rolled to the ceiling and back, as if Jenna had just offered the queen or the pope a hit from a joint.

Tabitha raised her head a little, her cold green eyes meeting Jenna’s. “My mother . . . ,” she said, her voice flat.

“You mother? Is something . . . ?” Jenna lifted her hand to her mouth. “Oh, honey, I’m sorry. Did she pass away?”

If there’d been a hole to crawl in, Jenna would have jumped in with both feet. And pulled the top shut behind her. First catching them in the bedroom and then that comment. It made cursing at Becky seem like a minor miscue. She’d made the ridiculous mistake of assuming that everyone else’s life was better than hers, that she could be a single mom but Tabitha’s family was perfectly intact.

“Not that,” the girl said. She held Jenna’s gaze. “It’s kind of an unusual situation, I guess. I live with my dad. Here. My mom . . . moved away. She’s—she’s had some problems.”

Jenna waited. The girl seemed on the brink of adding something else, but she stopped herself. Jenna decided not to prod. She’d already trodden uncomfortable ground. She didn’t need to pry into her parents’ marital troubles.

“I see,” Jenna said, trying to sound neutral.

“We’re going, Mom.” Jared reached out and gently guided Tabitha toward the door. “Tabitha’s late.”

The two of them walked side by side, but Tabitha turned back and looked at Jenna again. “I’m sorry about your friend,” she said, her voice still flat and cool. “It’s messed up when these things happen. When people just disappear.”