Lost (39 page)

He nodded. “You understand she’s not in the best of shape.”

“No, I don’t understand. I don’t understand anything. Where did you find her?
When
did you find her?”

“We picked her up about an hour ago in an underground parking garage off Queen Street.”

“An underground parking garage?”

“She’d been in a fight with some other girls. They smacked her around a bit.”

“A fight?”

“Apparently over some guy.”

“I don’t understand.”

“Well, she was pretty drunk.”

“Drunk?”

“She’s been throwing up for the last ten minutes,” Officer Medavoy said matter-of-factly, leading Cindy around the counter toward one of the backrooms. “Maybe you should go easy on her. At least until morning.” He opened the door.

“Julia!” Cindy cried, rushing toward the young girl who sat, battered and wan, on a gray plastic chair in front of a dull brown desk.

Tear-soaked blue eyes stared back at Cindy. “Sorry, Mom,” Heather replied, her voice breaking as she wiped a thin line of spittle away from her bruised chin. “It’s only me. Sorry,” she said again.

“Heather! My God—Heather!” Cindy didn’t know
whether to laugh or cry, so she did both. Heather, not Julia. She hadn’t even considered the possibility it might be Heather. “Oh, my poor baby,” she said, falling to her knees in front of her younger child. “What happened? What did they do to you?” Her fingers fluttered nervously in front of Heather’s trembling chin.

Heather turned her head away, revealing a large scratch on her left cheek. “It’s nothing. I’m okay.”

“The police said you were in a fight with some girls.…”

“It was so stupid. I was at this club. There were these girls—I thought we were getting along great. They offered me a lift home. We got to the garage, and next thing I knew they were all over me, saying I was flirting with one of their boyfriends. It was so ridiculous. He wasn’t even cute.”

“Did you arrest the girls?” Cindy asked the officer.

“They took off before we arrived. Your daughter claims she can’t identify anyone.”

“Heather.…”

“It was dark. It’s no big deal.”

“Of course it’s a big deal. Look at you.”

“I’m okay, Mom. It’s not important. Please, can we just go home?”

Cindy looked to Officer Medavoy for help, but he only shrugged. “Maybe you should take her home, let her sleep on it. Her memory might improve after a good night’s sleep.”

Cindy put her arms around her daughter, helped her to her feet. “Are you okay to walk?”

“I’m fine,” Heather insisted, clinging to Cindy’s side as mother and daughter staggered out into the night.

• • •

T
HEY DROVE HOME
in silence. Several times Cindy turned toward her younger child and tried to speak, but the words froze on her tongue, like pieces of dry ice.

(Flashback: Heather, at eight months, her cherubic little face aglow as she sits on her bedroom carpet watching her big sister dance around the room; Heather, at thirteen months, a proud smile filling her cheeks as she sits on the potty, happily chanting, “Pee pee, pee pee”; Heather, three years old, listening intently as Cindy reads her a bedtime story, the second and fourth fingers of her right hand stuffed inside her mouth, her index finger rubbing a disintegrating pink blanket against the tip of her upturned nose; Heather, at six, dressed as an angel for Halloween; Heather, age twelve, tears filling her eyes as she watches her mother watch Julia drive away in her father’s car.)

“Can I get you anything?” Cindy asked as they walked through the front door, Elvis jumping all over them. “Some hot chocolate? Tea?”

“It’s three o’clock in the morning,” Heather reminded her mother, as she bent down to let Elvis lick the scratches on her cheek.

“Maybe you shouldn’t let him do that,” Cindy cautioned.

Heather straightened her back, headed for the stairs, stopped. “Is Leigh still sleeping in my room?”

“She went home for a few days,” Cindy told her. “Grandma too.”

Heather looked relieved. “Then I think I’ll take a bath, if that’s all right.”

“Do you want me to get it started?”

“I can do it.” Heather was already half out of her clothes by the time she reached the top of the stairs.

“Why don’t you use my tub?” Cindy offered.

Normally Heather jumped at the chance to use Cindy’s bathtub, with its extra leg room and high-powered Jacuzzi. Tonight she just said, “Okay.”

“Maybe tomorrow you should see the doctor,” Cindy said over the sound of running water. “Make sure nothing’s broken.”

“Nothing’s broken, Mom.”

Cindy watched her daughter shed the last of her clothing, then climb into the still-filling tub. “Don’t make it too hot.”

“I won’t.”

“You want some privacy?”

Heather shook her head. “You can stay.”

Cindy lowered the lid on the toilet seat, sat down, gazed at her daughter’s wondrously slim body through her reflection in the mirror, a million questions free-floating around in her brain: What were you doing at that club alone? What were you drinking? How
much
were you drinking?
Why
were you drinking? Instead she asked, “Still feeling sick?”

“No. I’m okay now.”

“You’re sure?”

“I don’t usually get drunk, you know.”

“I know.”

“I don’t usually drink at all.”

“That’s good.”

“Are you going to tell Dad?”

“I don’t know.”

“Have you seen him since …?” Heather’s voice evaporated along with the steam rising from the tub.

“No.”

Heather turned off the taps, then pressed the button on the side of the tub to start the Jacuzzi. Instantly, water began flooding into the tub from several strategically placed openings.

“What about your blind date? Have you seen him again?”

Cindy pictured Neil’s handsome face, tried not to picture it between her legs. “He was here last night.”

“Yeah?”

“Does that upset you?”

“Why would it upset me?”

“Because I know that children of divorce are always kind of hoping their parents will get back together one day.”

“I’m not a child, Mom.”

“I know that.”

“I just want you to be happy,” Heather said.

“Isn’t that supposed to be my line?”

“You can use it too.”

Cindy smiled. “Have you heard from Duncan?”

“We had a long talk. You were right. We’re too young to be so settled. We should be out sleeping around. Like you said.”

Dear God, Cindy thought. Of all times to start listening to me. “How about sleeping with me tonight?”

It was Heather’s turn to smile. “About you and Neil …”

“What about him?”

“Just that I have a good feeling about the two of you.” Heather closed her eyes, didn’t open them again until the automatic timer turned the Jacuzzi off.

• • •

E
LVIS WAS ALREADY
asleep on Cindy’s bed when Cindy guided Heather between the covers. Grudgingly, the dog moved over to accommodate them, eyeing them warily, as if remembering the acrobatics of the other night. Cindy threw her arm across her daughter’s hip, and hugged her close, Heather’s round little bottom snug against the inverse curve of her mother. They lay together in silence for several minutes, like spoons in a drawer, one breathing out as the other breathed in, two parts of the same whole. My baby, Cindy thought. My beautiful, beautiful little girl. “I love you,” she whispered.

And suddenly Heather was sitting up and sobbing in her arms, her slender body convulsing in unexpected anguish. “Oh, Mom, I’m so sorry. Please forgive me. I’m so sorry.”

“What are you talking about? Sweetheart, there’s nothing to forgive.”

“I’ve been such a brat.”

“No, you haven’t.”

“I wasn’t thinking clearly when I gave the police your phone number. I didn’t realize you’d assume it was Julia they had in custody. Of course you’d assume it was Julia. What else would you think? And that awful look on your face when you saw it was only me, how disappointed you were.…”

“No, sweetheart, no. You just caught me off-guard.”

“I said such awful things to her that day, Mom. I told her I never wanted to talk to her again, that the sight of her made me sick.”

Cindy thought of her recent altercation with Leigh. “We all say things in anger that we regret. Julia knows you didn’t really mean them.”

“Does she? I told her I was sorry she’d ever come home, that I wanted her to get out and never come back. Mom,” Heather wailed, “I told her I wished she was dead.”

Cindy slowly pushed Heather away from her side, held her at arm’s length, stared deep into her eyes. “Heather, listen to me. This is very important. No matter what happens, no matter where Julia is or what’s keeping her from us, it has nothing to do with you. Do you understand? You do not have that kind of power. You are not to blame. Do you hear me? You are not to blame.”

Once again, Cindy folded her daughter into her arms, rocking her gently until eventually, Heather drifted into a restless sleep. Through a steady stream of tears, Cindy watched the minutes tick away on the digital clock radio on the nightstand beside the bed. Occasionally Heather muttered something in her sleep, and Cindy strained to make out the words.

“I’m not to blame,” she was saying. “I’m not to blame.”

A
T
exactly seven o’clock the next morning, Cindy got out of bed, sliding up and out from between her daughter and the dog, and tiptoeing into the bathroom, where she showered, brushed her teeth and hair, put on a little makeup, then headed for the closet, where she dressed in a pair of coffee-colored chinos and a crisp white blouse. It had been a long time since she looked crisp, she knew, and it was important that she start keeping up appearances. For Heather’s sake, as well as her own, she decided. She had
two
daughters after all. Not just one.

Heather was still sound asleep when Cindy returned to the bedroom. Elvis had shifted his position, and was now curled up on Cindy’s pillow. He lifted his head as Cindy approached, as if to question what she was doing up after so few hours sleep, then lowered it again as she walked out of the room.

Cindy also questioned what she was doing up so early, but the truth was that she’d never really fallen asleep, and she was getting stiff just lying there in bed. It was better to be up and moving, to try behaving like a functioning adult, to make a pretense at normalcy. When Heather
woke up, she would find her mother dressed and presentable, fixing her pancakes, and eager to hear her plans for the upcoming weekend.

But for now, she would let her daughter sleep.

Cindy walked down the stairs and into the kitchen, prepared a pot of coffee, then sank down at the kitchen table and stared out the sliding glass door. Outside was another perfect day. Leaning back in her chair, Cindy studied the early-morning sky. A large pink cloud, backlit with just a hint of yellow, hung heavy over the Sellicks’ backyard, its lilac underbelly exposed and friendly, like a puppy sleeping on its back. Several wisps had broken free and were drifting to her right. The drifts were purple and in the shape of a woman’s mouth, imprinted on the air like a blot of lipstick on a tissue. Cindy watched the stray fragments gradually fade, then get lost in the deepening blue of day.

Everything disappears, she was thinking. Clouds, people, entire civilizations. Human beings were as fragile, as fleeting, as cool wisps of air.

She stretched her legs out in front of her, hearing her joints groan, like hinges needing to be oiled. Yesterday’s impromptu run had been a foolish venture, especially since she hadn’t worked out in weeks. This is how the body slips into middle age, she thought, patting the slight rounding of her belly as she pushed off her chair, feeling her thigh muscles cramp as she headed for the front door. She needed to start exercising again, she decided, thinking she’d ask Leigh to join her at the gym one afternoon.

The
Globe
and the
Star
lay at her feet when she opened the door, and Cindy scanned the headlines, noting that
the unflattering picture of the Prime Minister was the same on both front pages. “Well, what do you know?” she asked him, bending down to scoop up the papers. “It’s Friday the thirteenth.” Cradling both papers in her arms, she backed into the house, about to close the door when she heard another door opening beside her.

Cindy froze as Faith Sellick emerged from her house and hurried down her front steps, clutching Kyle tightly to her chest, and disappearing around the side of the house. Like Cindy, Faith was neatly dressed for the first time in weeks, the slovenly tartan pajamas replaced by a calf-length, blue cotton dress, her hair pulled into a neat ponytail that pointed, like an arrow, down the center of her back. Seconds later, Faith reentered her line of vision, pushing Kyle’s carriage toward the street, the baby crying loudly inside it.

Where would they be headed this early in the morning? Cindy wondered, straining to see where Faith was going, then abruptly pulling her head back inside her door, like a startled turtle returning to its shell, when Faith suddenly spun around, as if aware of Cindy’s watchful eye.

Cindy waited half a second, then peeked back outside, her eyes following Faith’s swift departure. Ryan’s car was still in the driveway, and Cindy wondered if he knew where his wife was going, if he was even aware she was gone. She thought of phoning him, alerting him to his wife’s absence, then thought better of it, knowing she was the last person in the world he would appreciate hearing from under the circumstances.

Whatever had possessed Julia to get involved with a married man? She could have her pick of any man she wanted. Why choose this one?

Cindy knew the answer even before she’d finished asking herself the question. Julia had been attracted to Ryan Sellick because he was a younger version of the man she loved best in the world. Deliberately or subconsciously, Julia had picked a man just like dear old dad.

“And so it goes,” Cindy muttered, watching Faith push the carriage into the middle of the road from between two parked cars. Where is she going in such a hurry? Cindy asked herself, dropping the newspapers to the floor and stepping onto her front landing, watching Faith turn left onto Avenue Road, heading north.