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FIFTY-NINE
SUNDAY, JUNE 11TH 8:30 PM
Three Weeks Earlier
While hiding up against the side of the shed outside the Smiths’ residence, I’m left in silence as Corbin struggles to climb up the hill from the shore, seeking the noise he heard from me stepping on a pinecone while I was spying on him and Lara in their search for Fallon.
A whimper, one that could be confused with a wind chime or a heavy branch swaying, pulls my attention to the wall of the shed. The storm doors protruding from the dirt are unhinged and I quietly slither beneath one door panel and scurry down the steps beneath the shed. There’s no light, not a speck, but as I reach a flat cement floor, I hear two sets of lungs breathing heavily. I take a matchbook out of my pocket, something I always carry on me in case my car breaks down and I have trouble lighting a flare. It’s happened before. I strike a spark and illuminate a small space around me within the storm cellar.
After walking through a narrow corridor, two figures come into sight, up lit by a faint glow tracing the outlines of their bodies.
My heart stops, and my throat tightens. I reach for the wall for support and rub my eyes, thinking I might be seeing something that isn’t here.
My flame burns out at the same moment, but their glow is still present. I stumble forward, needing to get a better look at what’s in the corner.
When more of the glow spills to their side, I spot a child with short hair hunched forward with her side against the cement wall. Two small legs dangle over the side of her lap.
“Madden?” I whisper, making my way to the front of where she’s sitting. A baby is in her lap, drinking from a bottle Madden’s feeding her in the light of a small pocket flashlight.
Madden peers up at me, not seeming surprised to find me down here, or anyone for that matter. “Please don’t tell anyone. You can’t. You don’t understand what it’s like,” Madden says. “They don’t love Fallon. They call her a mistake and hide her in a room in the attic so they can’t hear her cry at night. She has made Mom become a mean person, even meaner than she was before Fallon. I don’t want Fallon around either. It would fix the problem and Mom might be nicer to me…”
“You don’t mean that,” I whisper.
“Yes, I do.”
“Madden, let me help you,” I offer, still unsure of what I can do to help aside from turning the little girl in and watching her take the fall for what she felt she had to do to reprieve herself of pain.
“I don’t think that’s a good idea,” she says, looking back down at her sister while pushing the bottle into her mouth harder. “Drink it, stupid.” Fallon begins to whimper, and Madden squeezes her hand around her wrist so tightly, I imagine it will leave a mark.
The bruises. She must be hurting herself and her sisters.
“Here. Why don’t I feed Fallon and you take a break…” I slide down against the wall next to Madden and take Fallon out of her arms, keeping the bottle situated in her mouth.
Madden drops her empty hands into her lap. “Mom and Dad blamed you for Fallon disappearing.”
That wasn’t a secret, and poorly executed. “But why?”
“They didn’t want to blame me,” she says, shrugging. “That news would embarrass her in front of the whole entire town.”
“That’s why your mom decided to call me?” I ask her, unsure of how accurate this information is. Madden nods. “No. That’s not why. Mom and Dad didn’t know what to do and they said they were running out of time, so they called my ‘good-for-nothing’ uncle for help.”
“Your good-for-nothing-uncle?” I snap.
“Well, he’s just my uncle, but they call him ‘good-for-nothing’ too,” she says with a shrug.
“So, your uncle helped your parents…” My body overheats like a pot of water that just began to boil. Anger writhes through me.
“Yeah, they said he would do anything for a penny.” Madden tilts her head to the side. “Which I don’t understand because I find pennies on the ground all the time.” She takes a deep breath. “But Uncle Liam came over a while later and told Mom he had come up with a plan, but he said it would cost her. I think that’s where the pennies came in.”
My pulse rings through my ears.Uncle Liam.I should have known he was involved after I found out Lara was my good old neighbor, Larissa Hoyt. How could I be so stupid?
“A lot of pennies, I think,” Madden says. “Mom and Dad are rich because of the money Grandma and Grandpa left them, but they don’t share their money. Not even with Uncle Liam, so I guess this made him happy.”
They don’t share unless their sacred reputation is at risk.
“So, this setup to blamemefor Fallon being missing was your uncle Liam’s idea?” The nipple of the bottle falls out of Fallon’s mouth. My hands become heavy as I stare across the opening into the darkness, imagining what I would do to Liam if he was standing here right now. Faint laughter grows from behind me, echoing like a taunt. “Shut up!”
“Me?” Madden asks. “I didn’t say anything.”
