I hung up. I decided to head out toward the mall, to Williamstown Road, where they’d found Caitlin walking just that morning. It seemed like the next logical step. I backtracked through our neighborhood to get to Williamstown Road, but I avoided our street, figuring that if there was news, someone would call. And if there wasn’t, I didn’t want to get sidetracked. I took a longer way around and ended up abreast of the cemetery. I hit the turn signal and pulled in through the gate, heading toward the back to Caitlin’s headstone. I wasn’t supposed to be there. It closed at dark, but they didn’t always shut the entry gates. This was one such night.
The road through the cemetery was narrow and closely lined by trees. My headlights illuminated the gnarled trunks and bounced off the headstones, showing the names and dates in brief flashes. I took a fork in the road, one that bent to the left, and I knew I was getting close to the headstone.
Then I saw the girl.
First she was a white blur in the headlights, held in relief against the darkness. I hit a bump in the road, and the headlights jostled up and down. I lost sight of her for a moment, then picked her up again. She stood in front of Caitlin’s headstone, her hands resting on the top, as though she needed it for support. It was the same girl from the park that day, the one who ran off into the trees when I approached her.
Caitlin?
I hit the brakes, skidding to a stop. I pushed open the door.
“Hey!”
The girl turned and ran off, dashing into the darkness like a frightened animal. I went after her, dodging around the tombstones. But there was next to no light. As I ran, I saw the girl ahead of me, her light clothes showing up in the darkness, but in a short while she faded from my view, swallowed up by the night.
“Hey!”
I stopped running, my breath coming in short, huffing bursts. She was gone. I listened but didn’t hear the sound of twigs snapping or grass being trampled. If she was still out there, she was being stealthy and quiet, moving in the night like a guerrilla.
Beyond the edge of the cemetery were tracts of new and fairly expensive subdivisions. She could easily be from one of those homes, I reasoned, a kid who wandered out of her yard to play.
But what did she want from me? What did she have to do with Caitlin?
When my wind came back, I turned for the car. The headlights were angled toward Caitlin’s headstone and held it in a cone of light that carved through the darkness.
A fresh bouquet lay at the base of the stone, below Caitlin’s name and dates. It looked like the kind from the grocery store, fresh-cut flowers wrapped in cheap and crinkly cellophane.
I hadn’t been back to the cemetery since the first day I saw the girl, a few weeks earlier. I didn’t know if Abby was visiting the plot. I imagined she would—Abby on her knees at the headstone, her hand reaching out to brush away a stray leaf or spiderweb, then bowing her head in prayer or reflection. She might even bring Pastor Chris with her, a spiritual companion to share her journey of grief. I shook my head, allowed myself a little moment of I-told-you-so triumph. I’d been right. Caitlin was still alive. She’d come back. No need to turn the page or move on.
There was a piece of scrap paper affixed to the cellophane with a paper clip, a note written in pen, a scrawled, scratchy handwriting. Not a child’s writing, and not a woman’s either. I could read the note without bending over.
Good-bye, it said. Don’t come back.
My knees felt jittery, like they were full of sand.
I grabbed the bouquet and brought it with me to the car.
I returned home just before nine o’clock. Ryan and Abby were in the kitchen. They sat at the table, sipping coffee. I carried the bouquet.
“I found these,” I said. “At the cemetery.”
They didn’t say anything, but I could tell they didn’t get it.
“At Caitlin’s headstone,” I said. “There’s a note. Somebody left a note for her.”
Ryan came out of his chair.
“Put it down,” he said. “Put it down.”
I laid it on the counter.
“Did you touch the note?” he asked.
“No. It’s still there.”
He put his glasses on and read the note. “Do you know the handwriting?” he asked.
“No.”
“Abby,” Ryan said, “will you get me a ziplock bag, one of the large ones for the freezer?”
Ryan carefully picked the note up by its corners, his fat, sau-sagey fingers looking almost delicate, and dropped it into the bag Abby was holding open. He sealed it with a quick motion of his thumb. “It’s unlikely there will be any prints, but we can try.”
“Who is that note for?” Abby asked “Is it for her? Or us?”
“It might be a joke,” Ryan said. “Some sort of hoax.”
“I don’t think so,” I said. “Earlier, when Caitlin was asleep, I looked in on her. She was saying something in her sleep. She said, ‘Don’t send me back. Don’t send me back.’ At first I thought she was talking about us, that she thought we were going to send her back to wherever she came from. But the way she said it . . . I don’t know.”
“Let’s not jump to any conclusions,” Ryan said. “I’m going to take this with me. And I’ll call as soon as I hear anything. Just hang in there.”
“I guess we know all about that,” Abby said.
“Ryan,” I said. “My brother, Buster.”
“Abby mentioned—”
“He was here, right before. I think . . .”
I didn’t know what I thought. Not really.
“We’re looking into everything,” he said. “But no promises, no guarantees.”
And that’s the way he left us, waiting for our daughter again.