I knew what Aunt Linda had said, about trying to get back to see me.
And I knew that I couldn’t have left Momma anyway. Not alone. What would she do without me to take care of her? How would she make it?
Still, calling Aunt Linda was like I had given in or something.
We walked down the stairs to the front room. I picked up the phone, steadied it in my hands. Hoped for one moment of calm.
“You okay?” Aaron said.
I nodded. A lie.
“You need help?”
She left me!
“Lacey, I think we need to call someone.”
I squeezed the phone. Nodded again.
Momma was gone. I had to do it. I had to call Aunt Linda. Even if she did leave. There was Mr. Dewey. And that mannequin. All those words on her bedroom walls.
“Let me dial,” Aaron said at last.
I handed the phone over to him for the second time that day. Then I went and peeked out the living room window at our large yard and the houses beyond.
Where was she? Where?
It’s all your fault.
The trees were dark with rain, bending a little with the wind. It was like night outside, the sky dim and clouded over.
All my fault? Yes, yes it was. If I hadn’t insisted on Momma getting that job. If I hadn’t wanted a moment to myself. A chance to stretch without being afraid. A chance to get out of here. None of this would have happened.
I leaned my forehead against the windowpane. It felt cool. “Momma.” I almost couldn’t hear myself. “Where are you? And what in the heck is going on here? Tell me what’s happening.”
I remembered a book I read by Louise Plummer. About a girl whose grandmother was missing. And was found dead under the neighbor’s porch. Was that Momma’s fate? Was she gone from me already? Had she hidden herself under someone else’s porch to stay out of the rain?
She’s dead.
I squeezed my eyes shut. No!
She wasn’t! I knew it! I felt it!
Behind me I heard Aaron’s voice. “Please call Lacey back.” He was leaving a message.
Aunt Linda wasn’t there. Funny how my heart felt like it plunged near my toes. I kept looking out into the yard. Kept staring into the rain. Fogging up the window with breath that kept me from crying.
“Does your aunt work?” Aaron asked.
I looked back at him. Standing there with the phone against his chest. “Yeah. At the library in St. Augustine.”
Aaron called information. I heard him waiting. I thought of Momma missing in the storm. Walking out there lost. All afraid. Confused. There was a crash of lightning so loud I screamed. The lights we’d left on blinked out. The house fell into a muddy-water darkness.
“I’m here, Lacey,” Aaron said. And then, “Linda? You don’t know me. I live in Peace.”
I turned in a slow circle. Aunt Linda.
“Lacey?” Aaron said, into the phone and to me at the same time.
Aunt Linda.
That walk across the living room seemed so long. One of the longest I’ve ever taken. I took the warm phone in my hand and swallowed down at the lump that grew fat in my throat. The way I’d done in school so many times. The way I’d done so many nights after my aunt left. The way I’d wanted to swallow away this past year.
Then I said, “I need you now.”
My mouth grew spitty, like I’d been crying for years.
“Lacey?” Aunt Linda said.
“Yes, it’s me,” I said.
I couldn’t think of the words.
All those words in that room.
“What’s wrong, Lacey?”
“I can’t find Momma,” I said.
“I’ll be there in less than twenty minutes.” The phone clicked dead.
She was on her way.
* * *
AARON AND I sat in the semidarkness for a few minutes. Outside the storm hammered at us. Inside the air was heavy and hot.
“Should we open the windows?” he said.
The thought was so strange. The only windows ever opened in the house were the two in my room where I slept. And before, the ones in Aunt Linda’s room.
I thought for a minute. Momma wouldn’t like it much. But.
“Sure,” I said. “Good idea.”
Around we went, pushing at windows that squeaked out protests at being forced open. Straightaway the air outside started cleansing the air inside. Making it smell newer. Damp and clear and a little chilly.
Lightning made the trees look blue.
“The dining room and the kitchen, too,” I said. “Let’s get those open in there.”
“Okay,” Aaron said.
We made our way through the main floor, letting fresh, clean air into the house. Rain came in some of the screens.
“I’ll clean it up with a towel later,” I said when Aaron pointed it out.
Sadness came at me like the wind.
“My momma,” I said, as we walked into the kitchen. “She thought that evil spirits could get in through the screens. So we kept things closed up.”
He didn’t say anything. I was glad that the lights were off. I couldn’t quite make out his face. He was probably bug-eyed right about now. Evil spirits, right. But I saw him nod.
I let myself down into a chair.
Aaron sat next to me. The smell of rain rushed through the house with the wind.
“My dead granddaddy tells her that.”
“Oh.”
Soon as the words were out of my mouth, I knew I sounded crazy as Momma. If I’d had the energy, I would have defended Granddaddy and Momma. But I was worn out. So tired I was sure I’d never get up from that chair again. And, somehow, the dark made me truthful.
“He doesn’t really talk to her.” I took in a gulp of the storm air. It smelled so new. “I mean, I’ve never heard him myself.”
“That’s good,” Aaron said. He let out a little laugh.
I wanted to laugh, too. Instead, I leaned against the table. Every part of me was heavy as bricks.
“Lacey?” Aaron said.
“She’s not here,” I said at last. “If Momma had been here, we’d have found her
