It was coming from inside the closet.
“Sara,” he said, standing on shaking legs, blood pounding through his head, making a roaring sound in his ears. The room seemed to shift around him, growing longer. The distance between himself and Sara felt impossibly far. The moonlight hit the closet door. He could see it move slightly, the knob slowly turning.
“Move away from there!” he cried.
But his wife sat still, eyes fixed on the door.
“It’s our Gertie,” she said calmly. “She’s come back to us.”
Ruthie
The heater in Buzz’s truck was set to full blast, but they still shivered as they navigated the Connecticut suburbs. The floor of the truck was littered with McDonald’s bags, coffee cups, and empty bottles of Mountain Dew, Buzz’s drink of choice when beer wasn’t an option. Fawn sat between them; though her fever was broken, she was still weak and pale. They’d stuffed her into her down parka, then wrapped her up in a wool blanket before leaving home four hours ago.
“Are you sure you’re up for a road trip, Little Deer?” Ruthie had asked.
Fawn had nodded eagerly, and so Ruthie said okay, even though she was pretty sure that taking Fawn out in the bitter cold when she was sick was not something Mom would approve of.
It was only day two without Mom, but already Ruthie was starting to realize the million and one things her mother did each day to keep the household running smoothly—cooking, cleaning, laundry, feeding the cat, plowing and shoveling the driveway, bringing in firewood and splitting kindling, taking care of the chickens, giving Fawn medicine and juice. Ruthie didn’t get how her mother managed it all and made it seem so effortless. Maybe her mom wasn’t as much of a disorganized flake as Ruthie had always thought.
Buzz had borrowed his dad’s GPS, and they were using it to find their way to 231 Kendall Lane, Woodhaven, Connecticut, the address on Thomas O’Rourke’s driver’s license.
Buzz had tried to talk her out of driving down to Connecticut, said they should at least do a little research first.
“It’s been a million years, Ruthie,” he said. “What are the chances they’re even at the same address? I’ve got my laptop—give me five minutes somewhere with Wi-Fi and I can check it out before we go all the way down there for nothing.”
Ruthie was adamant. She insisted they just get in the truck and go.
“It’s been fifteen years. Maybe they’ve moved, maybe they haven’t. There might be neighbors or relatives who can tell us something.”
“It’s a hell of a drive for a dead end,” Buzz said.
“Look, the wallets have to mean something, my mom saving them all this time, hiding them like that, right? That driver’s license is my only clue, and it leads to Woodhaven, Connecticut. I need to go. I’m going.”
And so they were on their way, Ruthie silent and deep in thought for most of the ride. She knew Buzz thought she was being ridiculous, but she couldn’t shake the feeling that going to Woodhaven was the right thing to do, and she didn’t want to waste any more time.
“So what’s the plan if we find them?” Buzz asked as he navigated the streets of Woodhaven.
“I’ll ask them if they know my mom and dad. Depending on how that goes, I’ll show them their wallets and ask if they know why my mom might have them.”
“How’s that gonna help us find Mom?” Fawn asked.
“I don’t know,” Ruthie admitted, fiddling with the broken latch on the glove compartment. “But it beats sitting around waiting.”
Ruthie was sure she had never been to Connecticut; in fact, she had rarely left Vermont. She was studying the landscape—billboards, chain restaurants and big-box stores, rows of identical houses and condos—with a strange unsettled awe. Her jaw ached from grinding her teeth, a terrible nervous habit she had had since before she could remember.
The streets they’d turned onto now were set up in a neat grid. All the houses were small capes and ranches with barely any yards and sad little hedges marking property lines. The snow lay in filthy clumps along the edges of the streets. She tried to imagine growing up in a place like this—your neighbors so close that you could see into their windows. Maybe her parents were right to keep them removed from the world on their little homestead in Vermont.