The Leaving Part 22

"Hot air balloon?"

"It's on this morning's news." He opened a bill. "They each have one unique memory."

"I hadn't seen." She turned the TV on. They were doing the weather, but it would cycle back soon; if not, she could look for the story on her phone. "So you'll do it?"

He tossed the bill back onto the pile. "I'll do it. I just need to, you know, figure out how one even goes about doing that, talk to my lawyer, speak with the police, the FBI. And you realize it's going to bring out some crazy people."

She went and kissed him on the cheek. "Thanks, Dad. You'll see. It's the right thing to do. The right message to send."

He went to finish getting ready for work, and she just sat at the kitchen island and waited for the segment to air again, which it did. She watched as Lucas and Scarlett and Kristen stood together in a playground-looked like the one over by the Publix-and stated their memories one by one.

Sam would have more theories, for sure, but Avery could now think of nothing other than Scarlett. She remembered looking up to her as a kid, remembered chasing her around the playground, playing games about fairies, and hunting for treasure.

Now she was back, alive, gorgeous, and she was standing next to Lucas. She was standing so very close to Lucas that it annoyed Avery, and then she was annoyed that it annoyed her. She needed to find Max-or his body, Sam!-and move on. She did not need to be daydreaming about Lucas or any of them. She did not need to be replaying her conversation with him at Opus 6, rewriting it so that it ended with her in his arms. So that it ended with an embrace, a kiss.

This was why she'd distanced herself from Ryan in the first place. So that she could go forward, pa.s.s Go. Lucas would be a backward move.

She could not stop thinking about him.

Finally, she heard the sound of the garage door opening, and the car pulling out, and the door closing, and the car going away down the street. The coast clear, she went into the garage and rooted around for the bolt cutters. Her dad had bought them during a brief period a few years back when her mom had taken up biking around the neighborhood. Mom kept forgetting the combination for her lock, so she kept calling, needing to be picked up at random places. Or she'd end up walking home, then sending Dad out to retrieve the bike.

Thank G.o.d that was all over with.

The bike was collecting dust and spiderwebs over by the subzero freezer.

Cutters in hand, Avery headed out on foot, taking a back way through the Youngs' yard-so as to avoid walking past the strip-mall security cameras with the clippers in hand-and down the bike path that ran along the bay.

She slowed and watched a guy who was paddleboarding by. His dog was on the board with him-a tiny burst of gray-and-white fluff, just sitting by the guy's feet as he paddled past.

People could really be ridiculous.

She didn't feel like talking to Ryan.

She didn't feel like asking for permission.

If she had, she wouldn't have bothered bringing the cutters.

She needed to get into the RV, didn't know why she hadn't thought of it yesterday. So when she finally got to the back end of Opus 6, she bypa.s.sed the house and approached it. Would the old video-game console she and Ryan had hooked up out there when they were like ten (her) and thirteen (him) still be there? Would their secret candy-bar stash in the oven have been eaten by mice? Would she hear the echoes of their younger selves talking, all those years ago, about their messed-up parents and how it was okay because in a few years, they'd be able to leave town?

The lock was open, just dangling there as her foot crunched a branch.

"Who's there?" came a voice. "Ryan?"

The door creaked open and Lucas popped his head out. "No."

No.

No.

No.

"I came to apologize," she said. Would he see it in her eyes? That she'd had . . . thoughts . . . about him?

He scratched his neck.

"I shouldn't have mentioned the carousel." Saying it made it feel true.

"Come in." He swatted the air. "It's too buggy out here."

Climbing up the entry steps, she followed him in, ducking around cobwebs lit white by sun rays peeking from behind curtains. The walls were just as she remembered them-covered with corkboards layered thick with newspaper clippings and police reports, and whiteboards covered in wild writing.

"You've been here before?" he asked.

"Not in a long time." She looked around to see what, if anything, might have changed. "But yeah, me and Ryan used to hang out here sometimes."

"I haven't found anything that makes sense to me."

He saw the tool in her hand.

"So you didn't come to apologize." He seemed confused about it, like he was a new person and hadn't read his instruction manual yet.

"But I do want to apologize"-she gently put the cutters down-"now that I'm here."

He waved an arm. "What are you hoping to find?"

She had been hoping that something would just stand out. "I thought I'd know when I found it?"

He nodded and she felt something weird between them, some kind of bond forming out of unpredictable atoms. And yet, when she thought about mentioning the note from Max-the most recent break in the case, if it was one-or the reward, she couldn't bring herself to.

What if they're all lying?

"Well, have a look around, I guess," he said, and Avery turned toward a whiteboard: AUGUST 9TH. IS DATE SIGNIFICANT?.

WHY THEM?.

WHY THAT DAY?.

All of which were good questions, but they'd all been asking those questions for a long time and still had no answers. What she was looking for was something new or at least something that felt new, now that they were all back except for Max.

Lucas was flipping through a binder of clippings of some kind.

She went to the whiteboard that was divided into six boxes. Each box had a name in it, and Avery's eyes landed on the box for "Scarlett." She'd been over this board many times before-so many times that she could almost recite by heart the bullets under the photo of five-year-old Scarlett that was taped to it.

* SAID SHE WAS GOING "TO THE LEAVING"

* PRIOR CONTACT WITH ABDUCTOR THAT SHE MIGHT RECALL?

* MOTHER, TAMARA, SUSPECTS ALIEN ABDUCTION * WHERE IS HER FATHER? [FBI CLEARED HIM. LIVES IN JERSEY. NEW FAMILY.]

Next to that was the box about Lucas; she knew these bullets well, too.

* ACCORDING TO RYAN, ONE WEEK BEFORE IT HAPPENED, LUCAS SAID THEY WERE BEING FOLLOWED BY A MAN CARRYING WRAPPING PAPER. THEY WERE COMING HOME FROM THE BALL GAME.

"Do you remember being followed?" she braved. "The week before?"

"No." Lucas came to her side and stood there quietly for a second, then said, "Who knows if it was anything anyway, I guess?"

Lucas stood very close to her now-so close that she could smell his sweat, see his pores, imagine what his skin would feel like.

Sam wouldn't like any of this, wouldn't like how much she liked it.

She didn't care.

It wasn't going to be like that.

She couldn't let it be.

She read her brother's bullets: * MOTHER, JILLIAN, DEPRESSED.

* FATHER, PAUL, TRAVELS FOR WORK. MOSTLY TO SEATTLE. WORKS FOR A TECH COMPANY.

* SISTER, AVERY. ONE YEAR YOUNGER.

She didn't like seeing her name, still there in Will's notes after all this time, didn't like that he'd kept caring long after she'd stopped.

"What was he like?" Lucas said. "Max. Do you even remember?"

Avery turned to him. "Yes and no. I just remember everything being happier, you know? Everybody just . . . normal?"

He nodded. "We used to all be friends?"

"Me and Max and you and Ryan, yeah."

She remembered a fort they'd built out of sheets. Flashlights under there on a rainy day, shadow animals.

"What about Scarlett?" he asked. "Were we friends, too?"

Oh please no.

". . . and the others?"

No no no.

Because why would he ask about Scarlett first? Why would he separate her from "the others"?

They'd been standing so close in that playground.

Hadn't they?

Were they . . . involved?

She said, "We knew Scarlett. I remember being sad about her being gone, but I'm not sure about the others. Why?"

Why else?

"Just wondering." He looked away. "I remember certain things from before . . . like my dog and my brother . . . but I don't remember any of the others in any specific way, really. You said Max and I were best friends?"

"Yeah. You were at our house a lot. I remember being annoyed about it. Because you were boys and you didn't want me around."

"What did we do? Me and Max?"

She felt like she was digging deep and hitting stone. Then felt a strange panic about how much she had forgotten, just in the course of a normal life. People who were gone only lived on in your memory if you had memories. Why hadn't she held on tighter?

To Max.

To everything.

She said, "You made forts and tents. You played with LEGOs and action figures. All that stuff is still there if you can believe it. His room. My mother turned it into a shrine."

"I don't think they saved anything of mine." He nodded up toward the house.

"Sorry," she said. "Your father. I guess he wasn't the most sentimental guy. Not in the traditional way."

"Did you know him well?" he asked.

Did she? Not really. What had she been doing all this time?

"Only really through your brother. Sorry."

"It's okay. Seeing all this research, and Opus 6. It's better than old toys, right? And it shows that he . . ."

"Loved you," she said, and her face pulsed hot.

He nodded and turned away from her and sifted through some clippings. She faced the whiteboards, overwhelmed with useless facts.

"Did you really mean what you said?" He had moved over to a small desk and was riffling through the papers there. "That you think we're hiding something?"

Avery looked at him, felt him transforming before her eyes-from an alien fake person into a real-life boy. Someone not to fear or distrust. Someone, maybe, to . . . pity? Or love?

"I'm really sorry I said that," she said, pretty sure that she meant it.

"Why the change of heart? Why trust me now?"

Why.

Why.

Why?