“Hello?” comes a familiar voice.
The anguished jab in her chest takes Clare’s aback.
“Hello?” the voice says again.
“Grace?”
There is a pause, an unnatural silence.
“Grace?” Clare says again. “It’s me. It’s Clare.”
“Clare,” Grace says. “I saw the blocked number. I hoped it was you. Where are you? What’s that noise?”
“It’s the ocean,” Clare says. “I’m outside. Are you okay? It sounds like you’re crying.”
“Clare,” Grace says again. “I’m so sorry. I’m sorry.”
The phone is hot on Clare’s ear. She listens to Grace’s long breaths.
“I’m so sorry,” Grace repeats. “About everything.”
“Hey,” Clare says. “What are you talking about? Did something happen?”
“He convinced me, you know? That you were the bad one. What can I say? I was grieving. I lost a lot in a short time, with Brian leaving, with you gone, and with a new baby, I wasn’t coping. And then I ran into you, and you seemed totally okay, and I just… I reacted.”
The scene is still clear to Clare, encountering her dear friend Grace by chance in the city of her last case, Grace’s shock at seeing Clare over eight months after she’d disappeared. How many times since that day has Clare replayed their conversation, the bitterness Grace displayed? Of all the things that have broken Clare’s heart in the last few months, nothing did so more than the notion that, in her absence, Jason had managed to turn the few people Clare loves against her.
“I’m sorry,” Grace says again.
“It’s okay,” Clare says. “I’m sorry too. I am, honestly.”
“I didn’t know if you’d see my message.”
“What message?” Clare asks.
“I emailed you. I didn’t know how else to reach you.”
“I haven’t checked my old email address in months. Not since I left.”
“So where are you?” Grace asks. “The ocean? What ocean?”
Clare’s silence is answer enough. She thinks of the video Austin took, her arrest in the bar. How far might it have spread by now? Clare’s palms are sweating. Something hangs in the air. Something has happened. But she doesn’t understand what.
“Grace,” Clare says, steady. “You need to tell me what’s going on.”
“A woman came around a few days ago. She was looking for you. She said you two were old friends.”
Clare swallows, closing her eyes.
“I didn’t know her,” Grace continues. “I told her I’d know any old friend of yours. She gave me this story about going to high school with us for a few months while her dad was posted at the army base. She said she remembered me too, that she was here taking a trip down memory lane, but honestly, you know we wouldn’t just forget someone who moved here for a few months. And kids from the army base were never posted to our school. Anyway, the whole things just seemed—”
“What did she look like?” Clare asks.
“Curly hair. She looked like you, actually.”
Clare’s ears are ringing.
“Did she give you her name?”
“No. For the life of me, I don’t know why I didn’t ask her for it.”
“What else?”
“I’m glad you called,” Grace says, a desperate lilt in her voice. “I’m just glad to know that you’re still out there, that you’re okay. After I saw you—”
“Did you tell Jason that you saw me?”
Grace doesn’t answer.
“Okay. I’ll take that as a yes. And this woman. Was she alone?”
“Clare,” Grace says. “I’ve been thinking a lot about the ways I let you down, the things I didn’t see, or the things I did see and just let go because it was… because I didn’t know what to do. But there was something about this woman, it just didn’t sit right, and after she left I pulled out our high school yearbooks and looked at every page. I’m telling you, I scanned every single page of all four books and this woman was not there.” Grace’s voice cracks. “I just got this feeling. I’m so glad you called.”
“Was she alone?” Clare asks again.
“Yes. At least, I think so. The sun was bouncing off her windshield. I couldn’t see anyone else in her car. I know she got into the driver’s seat.”
“Listen,” Clare says. “I’m going to send you an email with a photograph. Right now. I’m emailing it to you from my phone.”
Clare minimizes the call and types out Grace’s email address. She presses send, her heart flipping in her chest.
“It’s sent.”
To think it takes only a split second for a message of such weight, for a photo so crisp and clear, to travel the thousands of miles between Clare and Grace. In the pause, Clare hears the ding of the message arriving to whatever device Grace is using. Grace snivels and lets out a small gasp.
“That’s her!” Grace says. “That’s definitely her.”
An imaginary vise tightens around Clare’s neck. Zoe.
“Clare?” Grace says.
For a moment Clare teeters. She places a hand on the hood of the car to steady herself. It always amazed Clare how the earth continued to spin even in the moments of her most acute pain. Death. Departure. Terror. No matter how bad things get, everything else moves forward. The world always seemed so vast to her. It never seemed small. Until now.
“Clare?” Grace says again. “What can I do?”
“Did she say anything else to you?”
“She asked me where your brother was living now. Where Jason was living. I thought, How would she even know Jason? But it seemed like she did.”
“Did you tell her?”
Grace’s silence is again answer enough.
“Clare?” Grace says. “I’m sorry. I don’t know what I’ve done. The baby was crying and I was flustered. What have I done?”
“It’s okay,” Clare says finally. “I have to go.”
Before Grace can protest, Clare has ended the call. Her number is blocked, she knows, the email encrypted. Grace will not be able to call her back.
In rote motions, Clare makes her way through the prison reception’s processing area: her ID, the
