The Night Sister

It took Piper fifteen minutes to scrub out the tub well enough that she’d feel comfortable putting Lou in it. With Lou hovering in the hallway, Piper continued to make cheerful chitchat while she worked, doing her best to mask her disgust. Finally, she poured a hot bath, got out the soap and shampoo (she even found some peaches-and-cream bubble bath under the sink and added it to the tub). She consulted with Lou, and they picked out a clean outfit of Lou’s very own clothes. “Call me if you need anything,” she said, closing the bathroom door.

She tried Crystal’s cell phone again—no answer. She didn’t bother leaving another message, but used her phone to get online and look up the number for the Mountainview Lodge, where Crystal worked. The woman at the front desk told her Crystal hadn’t shown up for work. “When you do find her,” the woman said, “tell her not to bother coming back to work. Our manager’s pretty pissed. He’s putting an ad in the paper for another girl to come clean.”

Great. Just great.

“You doing okay in there?” Piper called to the closed bathroom door.

“Can you help me wash my hair?” the girl asked.

“Sure.” Piper opened the door and stepped into the warm bathroom, which smelled powerfully of artificial peaches. Lou was lying back under a blanket of bubbles. Her hair was wet, and she smiled up at Piper, reminding her of some sweet water creature—an otter, maybe.

Piper got down on her knees and poured some shampoo into her hands, then began to massage it into Lou’s hair. “Okay, rinse,” she said, and down the girl went, submerging her whole head and face under the water. “Conditioner now,” Piper said when she’d popped back up. “It’ll help us get those tangles out.”

She worked the thick conditioner in. “Let it sit a minute,” Piper said, rinsing her hands in the murky water of the tub, then standing to dry them on a towel. Lou reached up to touch her hair, frothy with milky-white conditioner. Piper noticed purple bruises on the girl’s arm and wrist.

“Lou,” she said, keeping her voice calm, “what happened to your arm?”

“Nothing,” Lou said, plunging it back into the bubble-topped water.

“Sweetie,” Piper said, crouching down at the edge of the tub, “can you show me?”

Lou shook her head hard and fast.

“Did someone do that to you? Did someone hurt you?” Piper suddenly thought about the outfit Lou had been wearing—long pants and a long-sleeved shirt, whereas most kids her age were running around in T-shirts and shorts, thrilled to be out of winter clothes at last. Winters in Vermont were long and hard, and the minute the weather changed, people embraced it and didn’t look back.

“Did…did Crystal do that to you?”

Lou shook her head again.

“Are you sure?”

“It wasn’t her,” Lou said, looking down into her fading bubbles.

“Who, then? Ray?”

Lou’s lower lip started to tremble. She sank down low into the water until her ears were under the surface, her face just breaking it. “Mama,” she said. “It was Mama.”

Then she submerged herself completely and held her breath for so long that Piper was sure the child was trying to drown herself.

At last, she popped back up and began to scoop handfuls of bubbles and sing. Piper stood up on rubbery legs and left the bathroom, closing the door quietly behind her. Her hands were shaking, and her mouth had gone completely dry.

Maybe Amy had been a monster after all, a woman capable of child abuse. Murder, even.

—

After the bath, Piper and Lou unpacked Lou’s things, and Lou seemed to delight in telling her the story of where she had gotten each article of clothing and stuffed animal. Piper made them microwave popcorn, and they watched cartoons on the living-room couch. When it was almost five, Piper sneaked out of the room to call her sister.

“Shit, Margot, I’m not sure what to do here. Crystal’s completely AWOL. No sign of this Ray guy—I don’t even know his last name. I can’t just leave Lou here like this.”

Piper kept her voice low. She was in the kitchen, with her cell phone pressed against her ear, and Lou was in the living room, with the TV blaring some horrible cartoon in which characters shaped like sushi were pummeling each other.

“Just bring her here,” Margot said. “She can keep me company while you run up to the nursing home. When Jason comes home, we’ll figure out what to do. I think he’s got some contacts at child protective services.”