Cemetery Girl

Our backyard sloped down to the houses behind us. Some kids a little older than me lived back there. Our mothers knew each other, and from time to time they’d let us all run around together under their watchful eyes. On this particular spring day I’m remembering, I was out with those other kids, a boy and girl named Amy and Kevin. The weather was newly warm, the trees and flowers were starting to bud and bloom, and the parents were probably glad to be able to let us all out of the house to burn off energy.

But at some point that day, the skies darkened.

Enormous clouds, thick and purple and looming, grew above us. The wind picked up, making branches and leaves fall to the ground around us. It buffeted our small bodies until we swayed and struggled to stay on our feet.

There’s a gap in my memory. It’s possible the parents of the other children called them in, or perhaps the other kids decided to run home in the face of the threatening storm. I just know that I ended up in our backyard alone as the storm continued to blow. And it seemed as though the entire world had been set in motion. The trees bucked and bent, the fence that bordered the yard shuddered, and everything that wasn’t anchored down-every leaf, every scrap of paper, every grass clipping-took to the air and swirled around me until I felt as though I were standing in one of those Christmas snow globes, the kind that when shaken produce the kinetic spinning of a blizzard.

I turned toward the house, moving my little legs a half step at a time. The wind pushed against me, holding me upright as though I were being restrained by invisible wires. Something flew into my eye, a quick stabbing pain. I pressed my hand against the eyelid and kept walking forward as best I could.

By the time I reached the side of our house and came around into the front yard, rain had started to fall. Thick, pelting drops splattered against my face and into my hair. My breath came in jerking huffs. My one open eye blurred and burned from the tears. And I finally reached a point, standing on the side of the house, where I decided I just couldn’t go on anymore. I let the wind push me back, let my body go slack and loose, and I sat down in the grass, my hand still pressed against my eye. I remember thinking, very clearly, that I was going to die right there, that my life was going to end in the storm, in the side yard of our house.

I don’t know how long I sat there. It couldn’t have been very long, because I don’t remember getting very wet. But at some point I looked up and there he was. My father, standing over me, his face creased with concern. I thought he was angry with me for being out in the rain, but he didn’t say or do anything to indicate anger. Instead, he bent down and gathered me in his arms and squeezed me tight against his chest. I went limp in his grip and buried my head against the side of his neck. I breathed in his familiar scent, and in that moment I knew what it meant to be home. To be protected. To be safe. And long after my father died and this became the only solid memory of him I carried with me, I used this moment as a measuring stick, a guide to remind me of what a father was supposed to be.

Chapter Eighteen

The business card with Susan Goff’s name sat on the kitchen table amid the crumbs and the morning paper.

I had picked up the phone twice and put it down twice, changing my mind, before I finally placed the call.

I was alone in the house. Really alone. Abby had been gone three weeks. Whenever I called Ryan for updates, he offered nothing new and told me to be patient. Liann e-mailed me a few times, just checking in, as she put it, but the lack of developments didn’t give us much to talk about. And my occasional trips to campus only reminded me of how little interest I had in writing a book about Nathaniel Hawthorne.

Susan Goff answered her phone with a bright, energetic voice that made it tough for me to estimate her age. She could have been in her twenties, or she could have been pushing sixty. But her enthusiastic greeting did have one effect-it disarmed me and made me more at ease than I’d expected to be.

“I was referred to you by a friend,” I said.

“Wonderful,” she said. “What can I help you with?”

“I don’t know. Do we set up an appointment or something?”

“Yes, of course. But just a casual chat. I hate the word ‘appointment.’ It sounds so businesslike. Don’t you agree?”

“Yeah, I guess so. Okay. Well, just so you know, my name is Tom Stuart, and I’m calling because of my daughter.” I started to tell her the details of Caitlin’s disappearance, thinking she would want to know them up front, but she gently interrupted me.

“Oh. Oh, yes. Oh, I know who you are. Yes, yes.”

“You’ve heard about it on the news.”

“Yes.” She paused. “From the news. And Tracy told me she’d be giving you my card. This is so very sad. I’m so very sorry for this.”

“Thank you,” I said. “It was Tracy who referred me to you.”