WEST McCRAY:
Why are you back now, if you knew Mattie was dead and you knew Sadie was by herself?
WEST McCRAY [STUDIO]: Claire surprises me, then. She starts to cry, and it seems to take every last ounce of her willpower to stay where she is. She looks like she wants to run. She doesn’t. But it’s a long time before she’s able to speak.
CLAIRE SOUTHERN:
Why do you think I got clean? You said it yourself—Mattie was dead. I knew Sadie was here alone. I wanted to be with her.
WEST McCRAY:
Do you love your daughter?
CLAIRE SOUTHERN:
[PAUSE] Sadie deserves to hear the answer to that question more than you do and you got no right to ask me it.
WEST McCRAY:
Her car—
CLAIRE SOUTHERN:
She got herself a car?
WEST McCRAY: Just before Sadie left Cold Creek, she did. That was in June. A month later, it was discovered abandoned in Farfield with all her belongings in it. Sadie hasn’t been found.
Does Farfield mean anything to you?
CLAIRE SOUTHERN:
No.
WEST McCRAY:
We’re trying to figure out its significance. May Beth reached out to me for help. I’ve been trying to find your daughter.
CLAIRE SOUTHERN:
Why?
WEST McCRAY:
Why what?
CLAIRE SOUTHERN:
Why are you looking for her?
[DOOR OPENING]
MAY BETH FOSTER:
Good Lord, Claire.
CLAIRE SOUTHERN:
I knew you wouldn’t be able to keep yourself out of this. [TO WEST] What I mean is, why are you looking for her?
WEST MC McCRAY CRAY [STUDIO]: Before I can answer, May Beth puts herself in front of Claire. She’s waving the postcard Claire sent from L.A. in her hand.
MAY BETH FOSTER:
Why even send this, if you were never going to come back, huh? Why?
WEST McCRAY [STUDIO]: Claire takes the postcard and squints at it in the dark. After a long moment, her face just seems to cave in. She begins to cry again.
MAY BETH FOSTER:
You know what Mattie was like after you left? She cried for you— CLAIR SOUTHERN:
No, no, no, you had your time to talk and this is mine— MAY BETH FOSTER:
She cried for you. She cried for you every damn day and night. She wouldn’t eat, she couldn’t sleep—she had nightmares … when she got that postcard, it was like a light—it was like a light went on. She had something to live for. But still, she wanted you. They think Mattie got into a truck with a killer because she wanted to make her way to you.
CLAIRE SOUTHERN [TO WEST]: Get. Her. Back. Inside. Now.
WEST McCRAY [STUDIO]: It takes quite a lot of persuading to get May Beth to go back inside. Claire is agitated and refuses to talk until she burns through two cigarettes, tears silently streaming down her face.
CLAIRE SOUTHERN:
You know what everyone likes to forget about me?
I was a kid. I was a kid when I got into all that shit. I was a kid addict. I was a kid when I had Sadie. And my mother—my mother dying. I was a kid for that too. I was an orphan. I’m not making excuses but I don’t understand why Sadie was too young for everything I put her through, but I … I was just somehow old enough for the shit that got thrown at me. Soon as she was born, May Beth ripped Sadie out of my arms and started turning her against me. It broke my heart. And I let it happen because I was just a kid and I was fucked up and I didn’t know how else to be. My mom was dead. There was no one. Sadie hated me, and all I could do was let her. And then Mattie came and—Mattie, she loved me.
WEST McCRAY:
Claire, do you know a Darren M—?
CLAIRE SOUTHERN:
What?
WEST McCRAY:
I’ve retraced a lot of Sadie’s steps from Cold Creek to Farfield—I’m not done yet, but I’m getting there—and so far, it seems she was looking for a man she claims is her father. She’s been telling people his name is Darren. He exists, but I haven’t managed to track him down either.
CLAIRE SOUTHERN:
Then what good are you exactly?
WEST McCRAY:
If it’s not Darren, who is Sadie’s father?
CLAIRE SOUTHERN:
I don’t know.
[PAUSE]
I think that’s all I can take tonight.
WEST McCRAY [STUDIO]: Claire excuses herself for a final time, holing herself up in May Beth’s spare bedroom. I won’t get any more information out of her for the time being. May Beth joins me outside a few moments later. She’s been crying and she’s doing her best to pretend she hasn’t been.
WEST McCRAY:
What was Sadie like after Mattie disappeared?
MAY BETH FOSTER:
What?… How you’d expect. Frantic.
WEST McCRAY:
I mean after. After they found Mattie’s body.
MAY BETH FOSTER:
She wouldn’t come back to her trailer until she knew. And half the time she stayed at mine, I’d find her outside, right where we’re standing now and I don’t … I don’t think she ever slept. She was out looking for Mattie when the police came around to tell us the news and I can’t even describe watching her walk up … walk up to them. Two officers, just waiting. And when they told her, she just … I’m sorry.
WEST McCRAY:
It’s okay.
MAY BETH FOSTER:
She just collapsed. It sounds so dramatic, but it wasn’t like that. She wasn’t screaming or wailing or anything, it was like her body couldn’t stay standing under the weight of it. It was almost like watching a person getting pulled under water, just being taken. And then she stayed at her place and she wouldn’t leave and I was a coward about it. I let her alone for … days, because I didn’t want to see it on her face. I didn’t know if I could handle it.
When I finally braved it, she was on the couch and I fed her and I cleaned her face and I brushed her hair and I put her to bed. And when she woke up, she was just … there. But something inside her was gone. I couldn’t reach her. Every day, since that one, I couldn’t reach her.
WEST McCRAY [STUDIO]: You can hear it, the devastation in her recollection. But now I want you to imagine it said to the universe, to the millions of silent stars above us.
MAY BETH FOSTER:
I hate Claire. I know it’s not Christian of me, but I do.
WEST McCRAY:
I’m going to have to ask you to keep her around. There’s more I need to talk to her about, when she’s willing. And call me, if there’s anything. Can you do that for me?
MAY BETH FOSTER:
I guess I can, but God help us both.
Where are you headed next?
WEST McCRAY:
Place called Langford.
MAY BETH FOSTER:
What do you think you’ll find there?
sadie
Weak light filters through the blinds. The room comes into slow focus.
Waking up in the backseat night after night never feels this strange, this lonely. At least I know what I have to do when I get up: climb into the front seat. Drive. Find Keith. But this, the soft pillow under my head, the springy, but semi-comfortable mattress under my body, the assuring weight of blankets on top of it, reminds me of being back home and all the things I’m not doing—will ever do—again. Tiptoeing into Mattie’s room, shaking her gently awake. Ripping the blankets off her none-too-gently ten minutes later if she hadn’t managed to get her ass out of bed before then. She always made it to the table by the time her scrambled eggs had cooled into rubber and she always bitched about it, but after a while I realized she was just a freak who liked them that way …
Those were my mornings.
He took them from me.