The Girl Without a Name (16 page)

D
onna is in a flowing, lemonade-pink outfit today, a break from her usual autumn palate. She riffles through the awkward, bulky files. It turns out she had one for Daneesha and a separate one for Candy. (“They just seemed so different to me.”) The newest art projects hang drying on a laundry line with clothespins. It looks like a kindergarten art room with morbid themes.

Detective Adams cocks his head at the line. “Looks like a handy way to hang yourself,” he says, half joking.

“The room is monitored at all times. And locked at night so that— Wait a second,” she interrupts herself. “I found it.” She pulls out the quilt picture with the scratchy noise of dried watercolors rubbing against each other. Candy's quilt is just as I remembered: numbers and letters and suns, all in shades of purple. There's no pattern I can discern, though.

“You think this could be a license plate?” he asks.

“It was a thought.”

He takes the paper and stares at it, like he's trying to see through it. “It's not enough digits, though.”

“Yeah, I noticed that, too.”

“Did you guys see this one?” She pulls out a stack of blank index cards, held with a loose, red rubber band, and lays them out on the table in rows like a memory game. Numbers, letters, suns. All the same numbers and letters. A V D 1 4 7.

“If it's a New York plate,” the detective says, “it's going to have three letters and four numbers, unless it's personalized.”

I lean an elbow on the table, next to a faded blue paint stain. “And what's the sun supposed to mean?”

We pause, and the detective chews on his bottom lip, his eyes squinting.

“What if,” Donna says, “the sun represents something, like happiness? A feeling.”

“But that's so vague,” I argue. “It could mean so many things.”

“Or,” the detective says, “it could just be the sun.” He shifts the cards into a line. “Put these together and we have three letters—let's say VAD, for instance—with four numbers. Maybe there's only three numbers, not four, because she couldn't see one of the numbers in the glare of the sun.” He grins. “Huh? What do you think?” He looks so self-satisfied that I fear he might don a plaid hunting cap and pull out a pipe.

“It's possible,” I admit. “Can you run through the numbers and letters?”

“We can get a partial at least, try some different combinations.” He shakes his head. “It's going to take time, but we'll try.”

I think for a moment, playing with a corner of one of the index cards. “I might have another idea.”

Candy is dazed but somewhat responsive when we come in to see her. So maybe Dr. Berringer is right. Tincture of time and she'll come around. Or maybe the Effexor is breaking through. She's still not speaking, but she's not doing her bunny-nose twitch. And she's making some eye contact and tracking.

I walk over to her with the cards in hand, the detective following me like an oversized shadow.

“Candy, I've got something for you,” I say.

She looks up at me, her cheeks flushed, still sweating.

“These are some pictures you drew. We were wondering if you could help us figure them out.”

She watches us intently but doesn't answer.

“We weren't sure what these meant.” I show her the quilt picture first, then lay the cards on the table. “We were thinking a license plate number maybe?”

She looks down at the cards without expression.

“We were hoping it might help us find Janita,” Detective Adams adds.

Her brown eyes open wider with the mention of her sister's name, but she keeps staring at the cards, so long that the room feels stifling. I steal a glance at Detective Adams, who gives me a somber half grin.
Well, we tried.

I'm a second away from picking the cards up when she reaches out, sluggishly, like a robot. Slowly, methodically, she arranges the cards in a new row.

D V A 1 4 Sun 7.

Then she sinks her head back in her pillow, spent with the effort of engaging with us. Or maybe the effort of remembering.

The detective writes the combination in his notebook, then scoops up the cards and puts them in a baggie from his briefcase. “Evidence,” he says.

“Thank you,” I say to Candy.

And she doesn't answer, but her eyes meet mine. Her stare is strong, angry, like Daneesha, not Candy. Then she closes her eyes and falls back to sleep.

My grandfather clock gongs out nine chimes. Otherwise, Arthur, Mike, and I are sitting in companionable silence watching the newest PBS mystery. The true killer (I think it's the farmer's wife, but Mike is set on the soldier's estranged grandson) is about to be revealed. Right then, my phone pings with a notification. I grab the remote to pause the TV.

“Aw, come on,” Mike objects, “I was finally getting into this stupid show.”

“Yeah, well, remember how you kept doing that to me,” I remind him, “with
Downton Abbey
?” I check my e-mail.

“
Downton Abbey
? Please. Pausing that was just a kindness.”

“Hey, it's the Black and Missing website,” I say. Mike moves closer, reading over my shoulder as I zoom to the website. The response is under Candy's picture.

“Huh,” Mike says. “Odd that she was remembered after the reward was posted.”

“Agreed,” I say. I tap my finger on the remote, chewing on my lip.

“Just call,” he says. “I'll make some more popcorn.” Arthur trails off behind him. I think he actually knows the word
popcorn
. Somewhat leery, I dial the number.

“Hello?”

“Hi, this is Zoe Goldman.”

“Oh, child. Thank the Lord. Thank the Lord, you called me back. I been praying on this moment since I saw the picture. Thank you, Jesus, thank you.”

“Oh…great. Um, it's about Candy?” I ask, taken aback by the effusive response.

“That's right. Candy. I think that's my daughter you got posted up on that website. Candice Jones.”

“Okay, and who am I speaking with?”

“Heaven,” she answers. “Heaven Jones.”

I sit up straighter and catch Mike's eye, pointing to the phone. “Heaven,” I mouth to him. “Your name is Heaven?” I ask her.

“That's right. My momma named me that. I used to hate that name, oh my Lord, but now I like it. Now it suits me just fine.”

The pendulum swings on the grandfather clock. So Heaven is real. “How did you find out about the reward?”

“My friend told me all about it, honey. She tell me somebody found Candy. Put up a reward and everything. Praise be to Jesus.”

“That's right, I—”

“Is she all right? You said she in the hospital? She okay?”

I pause. “She's okay,” I lie.

“Oh, thank you, Jesus. Thank you, Lord. I thought I never see my babies again. How about Janita? How she doing?”

“We don't know. We're actually trying to find Janita.”

“Oh.” The word is laden with unease.

“When was the last time you saw them, Candy and Janita?”

“Oh, girl. It's been more than two years now. I was drugging. Had to give up both my girls when I lost the baby. But I'm done with all that now. I've been saved.”

“Okay. Good. That's good. So where are you now?”

“In Toronto,” she answers. “Living in a nice house. God blesses me every day. Now I just wanna get my girls back when they ready.”

Toronto, just a short drive over the border to Buffalo. “Do you know, did Candy have a scar on her ankle? If you remember?”

There is a pause as she considers this. “You know, I wasn't the best mom. I wasn't always there when they got hurt and all that.” Her voice goes low and serious. “But I don't think she had any scar on her ankle. Unless she got it in the last couple of years.”

“Okay.” I get up and search for something to write on, miming a pen to Mike, and he hands me one. I grab the vet receipt from when Arthur had his stomach pumped after eating a huge bag of M&M's. “Let me take down your information so I can have the detective call you back about that reward.”

She gives it to me, and I pin the paper to the corkboard in the kitchen. As we hang up, I sit back on the couch with Mike. He throws Arthur a piece of popcorn.

“So you think that's her?” he asks.

“It's got to be her.”

“You going to tell the detective?”

“Yeah.” I scratch my chin. “How to explain it without him killing me, however, is the question.” Mike chuckles and grabs the remote to unpause the television detective and let him resume with the final revelation of the killer and how he cleverly sussed him or her out (the farmer's wife or the estranged grandson). Arthur nudges my hip with a new toy, a green monster that lost its squeak. I give the thing a halfhearted throw, and Arthur comes back proudly with it in his jaws, then flops to the floor and gnaws on it with the apparent hope the squeak will be somehow resurrected.

It turns out that Mike was right after all. It was the grandson.

I
'm sorry to hear about Tiffany,” Sam says. “Addiction can be so hard. I've lost a few patients to it.”

“Yeah,” I say. “I just wish I could have done something more.”

“It's certainly a hard disease.”

We pause, him mindlessly tapping his fingers on his yellow pad and me watching the wind blow some leaves in a circle under a cement-gray sky. “We finally went through my mom's stuff,” I say.

“That sounds like a good thing.”

“It was a good thing. And we didn't mutilate each other in the process, which is also a good thing.”

Sam smiles. “And how is Candy?”

“So the plot thickens.” I explain the relationship with her sister and how Heaven called me.

His expression is as startled as Dr. Berringer's. “What does the detective have to say?”

“He's going to call me later this morning.” I yawn. I'm not used to eight-a.m. Saturday appointments, but it's all he had available this week. We cover the basics—Adderall fine. Lexapro fine. Concentration okay, could be better. Life okay, could be better—the usual fare, until my twenty-minute follow-up has run its course.

“You know, Zoe,” he says as we stand up, “since you've been so stable, I was actually going to propose going down to every other week for now.”

I feel a shot of anxiety at the thought, but have to admit he's right. He's more of a security blanket right now than anything. And a few less co-pays wouldn't hurt either. Pretty soon, I'll graduate to every month, then three months, every six months. Yearly? And by that time, I'll have graduated the psychiatry program myself. One full-fledged psychiatrist to another.

I pass by a smiling turkey decoration on my way out. It will be my first Thanksgiving without my mom. Though the last Thanksgiving with Mom was pretty miserable. Scotty's date was some double-D blonde who talked like she just had a lobotomy, Mom spent the whole time in a recliner staring out the window, and my first-ever attempt at a turkey was so burned we ended up ordering pizza. Scotty's cooking this year, so that's something at least.

A handful of raindrops topple down from the sky as I head out to the parking lot.

Sam's office is behind a nondescript storefront sandwiched between a guitar shop on one side and an ever-changing shop on the other. Last year it was a consignment shop. This year it was Patty Cakes, a cupcake store that died in six months. (And come on, who's driving through a blizzard for cupcakes?) Now there's a sign for “Crazy Heart Jewelry. Coming Soon!” Worst-case scenario, Sam could prescribe something for the hearts.

On the way to the car, I soak my foot in a freezing cold puddle. I'm removing my sock with a groan when my phone rings. It's Detective Adams, which is a good sign—it means he's still speaking to me.

“Yeah, hi, Zoe. Heaven's story sticks. She showed us pictures, and it was definitely Candy. I have to assume the other girl in the photo was Janita.”

“Heaven's in Buffalo?”

“No, we went to see her in Toronto this morning. She can't get through customs with a record.” He rips open what sounds like a bag of chips, which seems appalling at this hour of the morning.

“She can't come to the US?”

“No. Before 9/11 maybe, but not now.”

“So it's definitely the girls?”

“Yeah, the picture was from Candy's sixth birthday. You could tell it was her. And Janita looks a lot like that other picture she drew, actually.” Crunching sounds in the background.

“Did she have a birthmark?”

“Yes. And a cleft chin,” he adds before I can ask.

“Hmm,” I say, just holding back an I-told-you-so.

“You'd make a good detective, if you ever feel like a career change. Did I mention I'll be retiring in five years? There'll be a spot opening up.”

I laugh. “No thanks.”

Crunching rings out again. “Did she tell you about the baby that died?”

I think back to the conversation last night. “She did mention something about that. Said she lost her baby.”

“Uh-huh. Turns out she had a two-year-old. Thought Mommy's pills were Skittles and died from an overdose. That's when Candy and Janita went into foster care.”

I tap on the steering wheel. A few raindrops thud onto the windshield. “That's sad.”

Lightning flashes through gray clouds ahead. “Did she tell you what the baby's name was?” he asks.

“No, she didn't. What was it?” The rain builds up, pelting the windshield now, as thunder bangs in the distance.

“Daneesha,” he says.