"You said there were a few sightings of her,” I say.
“The same tip mentions having seen her a couple of times before, but that was the only time they thought to take a picture,” Noah says. “But apparently the other times, she just got out of her car and stood beside it, looking around, then drove away."
"And then disappeared."
Chapter Sixteen Lilith
Two weeks ago…
The field was alive now.
What had been an expanse of dry reddish-brown dirt scattered with ragged sun-shriveled stalks was now a sea of tender green. That’s the amazing thing about corn. It grows fast. Sometimes so fast, she imagines she could stand outside and watch it reach and stretch.
That was a moment she always wanted to see. Every year she watched the dips in the field, the divots where she planted the dried corn conserved from the growing season before. Each hole dug in the dirt by hand. Several kernels in each hole to give the best chances for at least one plant to emerge.
Lilith waited for that moment each season. After the spring rains came and the ground warmed up. After there would be no more snow, and the melt sank down deep to the remnants of old roots still clinging to the earth. After the doors stayed open and she was able to step outside and watch the fields.
In good years the warmth came early and lingered rather than sliding back into the chill. When that happened, she only had to wait a couple of weeks before she saw those first tiny hints of green. She wished she could watch them emerge. She wanted to see that first second when the ground cracked, and the corn discovered the sunlight.
Harder days came. Not every kernel grew. She had to thin the plants. There was no way to know which of the kernels kept and carefully dried from the season before would have the chance to germinate. Putting several together created hope that at least one would make it. It was as if the others supported them, encouraged them. They stayed just beneath the surface, out of sight while that one reached for more.
But sometimes more than one fragile, delicate plant grew up out of the same bit of ground. It seemed like a beautiful thing at first. Until the seedlings began to tangle and compete. As they grew stronger, they fought for the sunlight and the rain, the nourishment of the earth. They wouldn’t survive together. She had to thin them.
On that day, she walked out into the field and made decisions. She chose what continued to grow and what was plucked from the ground. She assigned value and offered life.
No one knew that she carried those plants she tore up from the ground out to the back of the field. She took them to the furthest corner, to where the sun was rich and warm, but the edges of the field were uneven. Rather than in long, even rows, she buried those plants in blocks to give them more strength.
It wasn’t just about the corn. The struggle, the growth, the thinning. She knew that. But no one else did. No one else cared.
That day was over for the season. The block of outcasts was sewn and would fight to become whatever it would be. Some would survive. Some wouldn’t. Lilith learned not to worry so much about them. If she did, she would only pay attention to them. The rest of the field might be lost.
So instead, she focused on the plants that stayed in the divots. She waited for them to grow and pulled away the weeds that tried to choke them. The stalks had grown up tall now. Lilith couldn’t see her anymore. The corn had closed around her, concealing her gradually melting away to bone, but protected by the cage around her. The only thing truly recognizable now was strands of long, dark hair.
Even with the cage limiting where Lilith could plant the corn, the field was lush, denser in that area. The ground drew her in like rain.
Lilith’s fingertips trailed along the green leaves and beginnings of silk as she walked between the rows. This was the time of year when she felt at peace in the fields. High enough to conceal, not yet ready to worry about the harvest. It would only last a short time, but she let herself savor it.
That day she reached the end of a row and heard the unmistakable crunch of tires on worn gravel. She knew what that meant. The only thing it could mean. She braced herself as she turned around the end of the row and saw the men already climbing out of the car.
She waited for them to open the back door or the trunk. She tried to figure out what part of the field they would choose. This was too many, too fast.
But no one else came out of the car. They weren’t bringing anyone to the field that day.
She breathed.
They were only there to visit. One of the men walked toward her. His eyes caught the sun and looked like a shot of whiskey. She used to see love in those eyes. Sometimes she thought she still did. But maybe it was only a reflection in the glass.
Chapter Seventeen
"What are you thinking about?" Dean asks later as we sit across a tiny Formica diner table from each other.
We'd gotten a good chunk of the way home by the time Dean decided he was hungry, but I'm pretty sure I hadn't said a word to him since we left the bank. Instead, I spent the trip staring through the window, trying to make sense out of everything that happened there. Now my staring has transferred to the curved window of the diner that looks like it was built out of a converted Airstream RV. Dean's question gets my attention and makes me turn to him.
"Huh?" I ask.
"What are you thinking about?" he
