“Quit it,” Nell says.
“Swear to God.” I look over at Mags. “See? Right now, she’s thinking how much she wants to go to Gaudreau’s and get me a butterscotch sundae with whipped cream and lots of jimmies just the way I liiike it. . . .” Mags shakes her head. “Then give me your keys and I’ll go.” She laughs. “Whatever. Wait till this fall. I’ll get my license.”
“Yeah, you and that three-legged dog hangs around the dump,” Mags says.
Nell’s smiling again, which means we’ve done our job. I sit back, feeling the grit of the shingles against my elbows and palms. Below, voices rise. Libby: “You going to play blind with your own daughter? Everybody knows, Sarah. Everybody sees.” I run my fingertips over the grit, grinding it into my skin. “How long are you gonna let it go on? Till she winds up like that Foss girl?”
“All right, stop it.”
“It could happen. She’s asking for it. Every time she walks out that door in those skimpy little shorts with her shirt cut way down to here, she’s asking for it. It scares me knowing that my baby’s out there with her sometimes, running with God knows who. It’s not the same world it was when you and Tommy used to go out raising hell, you know. You better get your house in order and fast, or—”
“Stop telling me my business.” Mom’s voice is ferocious, making all of us jump. Nothing but shocked silence from the kitchen. “I don’t need you telling me my business.”
We sit, staring at each other, waiting. The next sound is the screen door banging as Libby walks out.
They found Rhiannon’s car.
When I come downstairs the next morning, our daily American is already lying on the kitchen table. That’s the front-page story: Missing Sasanoa Teen’s Car Found in Woods. There’s a photo of a silver Honda Fit being towed out of the trees. It’s funny; I expect it to be rusty or covered in mud or something, but it just looks like a car, and it’s only been missing a year, anyway. I look for the sticker in the back window, some manga creature from one of those graphic novels she loved, and find it, sure enough.
Mom walks in and sees me standing at the table. We don’t speak as she reads over my shoulder. Smelling the simple powder scent of her, I remember how she shut Libby down last night. Over me. It doesn’t seem quite right to say thanks, and it sure as hell would be the wrong thing to tell her that we were listening in, so I stay quiet. She grazes my shoulder with her hand as she moves to the bread box. “You eaten yet?”
“No.” I watch as she pops two extra slices into the toaster.
Mags comes downstairs. She stops when I show her the article. “Somebody called in an anonymous tip.” I lay the paper facedown so I won’t have to look at the Fit anymore. “Paper says her car looks like it’s only been in the woods for a few weeks.”
“Makes sense.” Mom pushes the toaster lever down. “Hate to think that the search party missed a whole car.”
“It’s creepy. Where’s it been all this time?” I push the paper away. “Why’d somebody want it found now?” My skin prickles at the thought of it: Rhiannon’s little silver car moving through the night while Sasanoa slept. Tires rolling down into pine needles and dead leaves. A door shutting. Footsteps fading away.
It reminds me of the headlights I saw in the darkness from my bedroom window, but that was days ago, not weeks. “I don’t even get what this means. Did a migrant do it or not?” I try to put a familiar face on the night driver in my imagination, but the features swim and blur.
“Could be.” Mom brings her breakfast to the table and sits, reaching for her Kools and the ashtray. “If he came back to rake for the Wardwells again this year, he could’ve moved the car from wherever he hid it last summer.” She exhales through her nose. “Wanted to scare everybody all over again.”
“Nell’s gonna freak.” Mags puts on her sneakers. “That’s the part of the woods her group searched.”
Nell really wanted to help find Rhiannon, like she owed her or something. They weren’t friends, and I’m pretty sure that Rhiannon thought she was weird, even if she never said so. Rhiannon was a Gemini through and through; you never knew what kind of mood you’d find her in, but you lived for her good days, because she was bubbly and so much fun when she wanted to be. Whenever Rhiannon came over to our house, Nell would hang out, too, as usual. One time, when Nell was in the bathroom, Rhiannon whispered to me, “Isn’t she in special ed?”
I said yes. Rhiannon didn’t bring it up again. After a while, we started spending more and more time at her house without ever talking about why. But in the back of my mind, I knew. And I hate that I never called her out. I hate that I wanted her friendship more than I wanted to stand up for Nell.
Now Nell comes to the door, opening it a couple inches and peering at Mom like she’s nitro in a bottle. I guarantee she’s been listening to her mom gripe about her aunt Sarah all morning. “Hi,” Mom says without looking up, and Nell’s shoulders relax. She isn’t wearing the necklace anymore. Thank God.
As we head out the door, I glance at the trailer. No Libby walking over this morning with her mug in hand. The windows of the trailer are dark as we drive away.
The day flies by, with me keeping track of Shea from the corner of my eye all the time, working hard to match him if I can’t beat him. He knows what I’m doing, I think, and pushes harder.
I bump into Mason at one point while I’m rushing around, stacking boxes. We’ve been working side by side for hours. “Sorry,” he says right away, keeping his eyes down.
“My fault.” I watch him dump his rake into a now-full box, stack it on top of four others, and walk off to grab more boxes from the pile that Mr. Wardwell and Duke dropped off the last time they drove through. I wonder if Mason hates me because of lies—or maybe truths—that Shea’s told him. Or maybe he’s somebody who makes up his own mind about people. Either way, it’s a distraction I don’t need, so I train my eyes back on raking.
I walk over to headquarters during lunch, standing in front of Mrs. Wardwell with my hands in my back pockets. She squints at me. She looks bad, pale, with bags under her eyes, like she was up half the night. “Yeah, missy?”
My gaze goes to the green chalkboard, smeared from being erased and rewritten every evening at quitting time. The name Gaines has been bumped up to the seventh slot, with 6,675 pounds raked in three and a half days. “Has a girl ever made top harvester?”