“How didn’t you know I was there? Didn’t you come back?” I press, needing all the puzzle pieces with newfound urgency.
She shook her head. “He fired me. He was unraveling, I think. He called me a liability. The last day I worked for him is the day he brought you back to Fishing Lake. He asked me to clean the house, set up a spread. I did that. He said you were sick, that you’d been threatened. I begged him to tell you who he was, who your sister was. He screamed at me to mind my own business. Told me to go home. So I did.” She folds up her tear-dampened tissue into a neat little square and tucks it back into the pocket of her purse. “I did come back once. It was evening. He was sitting on the back deck, drinking a glass of brandy. He said you’d left him. Gone back to the city, stolen some of his money. You were furious about Tara. He blamed me. He was angry as hell.” She shakes her head, a quick snap like a self-admonishment. “I’m afraid of my own shadow most days. Henry Whittaker scared the living daylights out of me.”
I touch her hand. “I forgive you, Penny. And I’m forever thankful.”
She stands up, waves her hand in my direction, and turns to leave. At the door, she pauses and turns back.
“I have nightmares about that fire. Do you know, a week prior to that, I had caught him cutting off the tail of one of the neighbor’s farm cats with a hacksaw? I told his mother.” She retrieves the tissue from her purse, blots her chin and cheeks. “I always thought that fire . . . was retribution. Frank is paralyzed because I snitched on Henry.”
“Oh, Penny,” I say, softly.
“I was scared, Zoe.” She stands in the doorway, backlit by the bright hall lights, looking diminutive. A hunched rounded figure. “I spent years looking over my shoulder. I considered telling you about Tara myself. But I always stopped to wonder, what would he have done to me?”
EPILOGUE
SIX MONTHS LATER
It was Lydia’s idea. In fact, she made all the calls, talked to all the right people. I come home from the CARE office one day, she’s running circles around me like an excited puppy. She grabs my hand, leads me into the living room, and sits me down on the couch, her hands flat on my shoulders.
“Please don’t be mad, okay?”
We’ve moved in together, a different apartment in Hoboken, bigger, more luxurious. Warm and rich colors, browns and oranges. Decorating it has been a form of therapy.
I’m a rich woman now. New York is an intestate succession state, which means that because Henry died without an updated will, as his current wife, I inherited everything: all his liquid assets, his apartments, his stocks and bonds. I’m sure he never counted on that. His will was hopelessly outdated, still named Tara as his sole heir.
“I won’t be mad.” This is all so unlike Lydia, who generally has one lukewarm mood, forever perfecting her bored face. She’s giddy, pushing her palms against her knees, starting and stopping sentences until I finally say, “Oh God, just say it!” out of frustration.
“I found Evelyn.” She takes a deep breath, her hands grasping mine. “The state pays to cremate unclaimed bodies but the funeral homes don’t always do anything with the remains, in case anyone ever wants them.”
I shake my head, nothing about that made sense. I remember that spastic little estate lawyer and his tiny closet office. He said they disposed of her ashes. “What? You’re crazy, Lydia. Evelyn died more than five years ago . . . Anyway, they said that wasn’t true. Most funeral homes’ policy is a few weeks. I talked to a lawyer at the time . . .”
“It doesn’t matter. I talked to the funeral home director. He said he has metal boxes in his basement from the seventies. They can’t bring themselves to dispose of them, although they have every legal right to do so. He said most funeral homes have a basement full of ashes. Which is so sad, when you think about it. But Zoe,” her eyes were shining, bright blue, “they have one labeled Evelyn Lawlor.”
My heart stops, time itself stops. The idea that I could go back, fix the worst thing I ever did . . . I can’t even wrap my head around it. “There has to be a mistake. I don’t even know what funeral home she was sent to.”
“I just called every funeral parlor in the Bay area. It wasn’t that difficult. I think it was maybe the eleventh one I called?” She scrunches up her face, eyes to the ceiling in thought, then shrugs. “It doesn’t matter, the point is, she’s there.” She extends a piece of notebook paper with a name, address, and telephone number. Howey Funeral Service. I stare at it. I could have a memorial for Evelyn. My mom. The only one I’ve ever known. I could think about her without this hollow, empty feeling in my stomach.
“Would you come with me?” I ask softly.