Driving With the Top Down (26 page)

They walked through every street and alley in the main part of town, even though with every step their efforts seemed more and more hopeless. The place was so crowded and loud that Tamara could actually have been inside any one of the places they’d checked, and they might have just missed her anyway.

Anger was now mingling with Colleen’s nervousness. This was incredibly irresponsible of Tamara. Selfish. She couldn’t have called when she knew time was getting on? Even texted?

“I’m sure she’s fine,” said Bitty.

“No, you’re not. Of course you’re not sure. You can’t be.”

“Well, I know, but what am I supposed to say in this situation?”

“I don’t know, maybe nothing?”

Colleen’s fear was getting the better of her. As they walked along finding nothing, and she dug through every gaggle of teenagers with her eyes, she became more and more afraid. What if Tamara’s phone really had died? And she hadn’t been sure where their hotel was? That could happen easily. Maybe she went for a walk and got lost.

Maybe someone around her had seen her and offered her help.

“I’m not just angry,” Colleen admitted to Bitty, “I’m really
afraid
something has happened to her.”

“Don’t you know her to be kind of wild, though? It’s been two and a half hours or so, right? For a rebellious teenager, that’s nothing. She probably met some people and is inconsiderate enough not to let you know, but is ultimately fine.”

“You were the one who suggested maybe she had brought drugs along on the trip with her!”

“Yes, but that’s not … Well, it’s as likely as anything else, but I’m sure she didn’t bring along something she’s never done before, if she did bring it. Or maybe she didn’t do that at all, she doesn’t know anyone here, and who wants to do drugs by herself?”

“People who are addicted to drugs do, Bitty.”

“Well…”

She seemed to have no real response. They walked in silence some more. The shops were emptying out, and the bars were certainly letting in only people with IDs at this hour. Although, who knew, the kid probably had a fake.

They walked to the fort, Castillo de San Marcos, where Colleen remembered Kevin telling her ahead of time that there were visible bullet holes still left in the stonework. It was dark there, and an ideal place for an angsting teenager to crouch against a wall, feeling sorry for herself. But no. Still no Tamara.

The last real shot at a good place to find her was on the Flagler College campus in town. They walked in the grand entrance, into the women’s room off the main hall, up to the rotunda, where kids sat doing homework and eating vending machine food, and then down onto the grounds. Through gazebos, the lawn where some mini-adults sat having “dates.” Into the library and the student center. But no Tamara.

“She’s dumb,” said Bitty. “If she wanted to get away for a bit and have a good time, this is where she
should
have come.”

Colleen managed a laugh, before stopping and sitting down on one of the low stone walls. “Should I call the police?”

“They won’t do anything about a teenager who’s been missing in a college town for, what, maybe two hours?”

Colleen knew that was true. If the police were called every time a bored student moved from one party to another without telling anyone, they’d never get any of their important work done. Never mind that this
felt
important; it also wasn’t outside Tamara’s established behavioral patterns. This was
exactly
the kind of thing that had gotten her into trouble to begin with: reckless behavior with no regard for the consequences. Admittedly, maybe she hadn’t had anyone watching for her and worrying in the past, but she knew Collen and Bitty would be.

Didn’t she?

Finally, Bitty said what Colleen was thinking. “Do you think we should go back to the hotel? That’s the one place she knows
we’d
be if she came back looking for
us
.”

Colleen nodded. It was the only thing they could do right now.

“I lost my friend’s dog once,” said Colleen. “And I was up all night trying to find him. All night, just driving up and down and up and down the roads, looking for this fat ugly bulldog, and I knew that I couldn’t give up. Because if you give up, then you lose all chance of finding him.”

“This is different. She’s a sixteen-year-old girl. And she’s smart. She might be, you know, a little foolish, but she’s not stupid. She’ll come back. She’ll find a way.”

“I’m not afraid she’s run away forever so much.” Though now that she’d said that, she
was
afraid of it. “I’m afraid something happened to her. I’m afraid that she’s led a life of messing up, and that tonight is the one night she didn’t set out to do that, and she ends up hurt. Like Alice Haylon in school.”

Alice Haylon had been a smart girl who went a little crazy at parties. She drank almost every night of the week, was loud and showy and definitely rather reckless. The kind of girl who never turned down a dare. But ultimately, she was a great girl. So when she died in a car accident, it had broken everyone’s hearts, but not necessarily shocked anyone. The shock had come when it was discovered that drugs and alcohol had had no play in her death. So the number of times Alice had gone to parties or driven back with someone who was a little buzzed—or hell, sometimes definitely shouldn’t have been behind a wheel—she had survived. And one time when she was on her way to do whatever, she had died. It had hit everyone who knew her like a one-two punch. First she was dead. Then she was dead, but not for the reasons people had assumed.

“I know what you mean,” said Bitty, a shadow crossing her face. “I know exactly what you mean.”

“I feel like she’s so close to being okay, you know? She’s smart. She’s kindhearted. She’s just bored and has nobody. Nobody in the world she feels truly loves her or would be there for her, no matter what. Everyone deserves that. Everyone. I don’t want to feel like there’s any chance in the world I could lose her before I get a chance to try to help her.”

*   *   *

THEY SAT AWAKE
for hours, the TV on, but not getting any further than the screen. Colleen and Bitty were silent, not wanting to overthink things too much. They just sat there in tense silence, Colleen’s worry colliding hard with aggravation that this might all be the inconsideration of a teenager, ruining her night on a trip she’d planned to take alone for her own reasons.

She was lost in that thought when there was a clumsy scratching and bumping at the door, and in stumbled Tamara, white faced, red under the eyes, with tear streaks. Bitty was sitting at the small table, and looked at Tamara with alarm.

“Where have you been?”

Colleen had set out to ask it harshly and angrily, but it came out desperate and relieved. She didn’t feel like she knew Tamara well enough to run up and embrace her, and she also didn’t know how angry she should be yet.

“I’m sorry.”

Colleen stood, suddenly with all the energy in the world, and stared Tamara down.

“I just went for a walk, and … and I got lost.”

“Why are you such a mess?” Bitty asked. “You look like you’ve been through a war.”

Tamara looked past Colleen to the mirror, seemingly startled by the horror-movie survivor she saw staring back at her.

Tamara took a deep breath and said, “I met some guys and asked them for a cigarette. They invited me to a party, it was right there, walking distance, so I went. They offered me weed, and I haven’t smoked since I left, and I just kind of accepted out of habit. But it was different. It fucked me up. Sorry for the language.” She hung her head. “It was called a dab. I don’t know anything about it. I thought I was going to die. And then my phone—well, my phone did die. And then I came here as soon as I could.”

Colleen was in shock. At the fact that Tamara had been honest. At the fact that she was here, and okay. At all of it.

“Should we go to the hospital?” asked Bitty.

“No, I feel normal now,” said Tamara. “I’m just so sorry I did that. I’m so so sorry—”

Colleen was inclined to reach for her and tell her it was okay, she was just glad she was alive. But again, she couldn’t do that.

“Let’s look it up,” said Bitty. “Tamara, charge your phone. Colleen, can you look it up? See what it is?”

“Good thinking.”

Twenty minutes later, after Colleen had texted a friend who was a nurse, Bitty had accessed her premium membership to a medical Web site, and Tamara had Googled it, they knew what dab was. She should be okay. It wasn’t inherently dangerous. But it could make you feel like hell on earth.

And it had.

“I don’t know what to say to you, Tamara. I was really worried about you. I don’t know what I would have done if something had happened.”

Tamara looked surprised.

And Colleen, in turn,
felt
surprised that Tam should feel surprised. Had no one ever worried about her before? Had no one ever told her they were glad she got home safely?

“I thought you guys would just go out to eat and…” Tamara’s voice drifted off.

“And what? See if you showed up again? Get in the car and go on without you? There was
nothing
we could do but sit here until you returned. Unless, of course, you were gone twenty-four to forty-eight grueling, nerve-racking hours—at which point, I could call the police. The lack of consideration for our feelings, for
my
feelings, is incomprehensible, Tamara. I was scared out of my mind.”

“I’m sorry,” Tamara said. “Really.”

Colleen wasn’t through. “I really thought you weren’t doing this kind of thing on the trip. As a mother, my rule is that you can’t get in trouble if you tell the truth. I’m very glad you were honest. But I’m still so sad that you felt the need to go do this.”

Tamara nodded sadly. “Me too.”

“Did something happen, Tamara?” asked Bitty. She rarely spoke, but when she did, she seemed to ask the right questions.

“Yeah, it’s nothing. Just dumb teenager stuff. I overreacted and freaked out.”

They both waited for her to choose to go on.

She didn’t. Unsurprisingly.

Colleen shot Bitty a quick look, then said, “Tam, come outside with me for a minute. I need some fresh air.”

“I just came in.”

“Come out.” She put a hand on Tam’s narrow shoulder and guided her outside.

It was beautiful outside. Now that she was able to relax, Colleen could see it. There was nothing quite like looking at a clear night sky behind palm fronds on a really warm night. It never seemed to get this warm at night in Maryland.

“What happened?” Colleen asked without preamble.

“Nothing.” Tam wouldn’t meet her eyes. “I just went for a walk. It’s cool here, and I doubt I’ll ever be back, so…”

Colleen struggled with an impluse to reassure her that, yes, of
course
she’d be back and that her life would have many happy events—big and small—in the future. But it wasn’t up to her, and for all she knew, and all she suspected, Tam might
not
ever go anyplace nice again. Maybe she’d just rot under Chris’s court-ordered care until she was eighteen and could be booted out (or married some stringy loser to get away) to face a life of struggle without the foundation that a nurturing family unit gives. People succeeded against the odds, certainly. All the time. But did Tamara have that drive? Colleen just didn’t know yet.

And it was beginning to feel like she wasn’t going to have time to find out.

“Is that code for you don’t want to talk about it?”

“No,” Tamara said, but so defensively, it sounded like
no-wahhh.

Colleen looked her in the eye. “You don’t have to talk to me. But don’t ever lie to me. No one wins when someone’s lying.”

Tamara looked right back at her. “I don’t want to talk about it.”

Which left Colleen with the very ultimatum she’d just implied. “Okay, then. But you listen to me, Tamara Bradley: I’m not giving up on you. You can’t just push me away with some attitude and a brick wall of protection. I’m your family forever, and even if I weren’t, I’d care just as much just from having gotten to know you as I have. So my offer stands right now, and it will stand in a month, and it will stand in ten years. If you ever want to talk, you are safe coming to me. Do you understand?”

“Yeah, thanks, that’s cool,” Tam said, looking away and sounding for all the world like a dull-witted, burned-out teenager.

But Colleen had caught the glint of tears in the girl’s eyes as she turned her face toward the light. “It’s late,” she said. “If you’re hungry, there’s fried shrimp in the fridge. We both need rest. Tomorrow’s going to be a big day.”

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

Colleen

This was a stupid plan. Childish. Like something from a universally panned chick flick.

So why Colleen kept driving south of St. Augustine instead of just admitting the trip was going badly in every possible way, she didn’t know.

She just had to do this.

She had to confront her.

Julia. The woman who would be Kevin’s wife if Colleen hadn’t stepped in and ruined it for them.

Maybe it was just because she’d been haunted by Julia for so long that Colleen reached a wall where she either had to have resolution or … what? Give up? No, she wasn’t going to
give up
or stop living or leave her marriage or anything, but she was going to continue on the path of self-doubt she’d been on for fifteen years, and where would
that
lead? Obviously not to any sort of mecca. Just a quiet extinguishing someday.

It was midafternoon on Sunday. In a few hours, she and Bitty and Tamara would be heading back north, and all this would be behind her. She just had to get it over with.

The house was a typical expensive Florida Mediterranean model, on a generous lot. Colleen could hear the ocean beyond it—nice backyard. As she parked the car and walked up to the front door, she felt vulnerable; there was no turning back, no way to dodge out and go to the place next door and pretend to be looking for someone else or something. Of course, no matter what she could come up with, it would be a dumb lie, so why was she even considering it?