Vanishing Girls Read online

  I flounder toward the shallows, try and turn around, scanning the crowd for Madeline. There must be sixty kids in the wave pool, maybe more. The sun is dazzling. There are blondes everywhere—ducking, popping up grinning, spouting water from their mouths like fountains, all of them more or less identical-looking. Where did she go?

  “You all right?” Rogers is squatting at the edge of the pool, still wearing his pirate hat. “Feeling better?”

  Just then I spot her again, struggling to pull herself onto the deck on arms as skinny as rail spikes. I slosh toward her, tripping on the stupid tail, going face forward down into the water and then dog-paddling the rest of the way. Someone is calling my name. But I have to get to her.

  “Madeline.” I get a hand around her arm and she thuds back into the water, letting out a surprised cry. As soon as she turns around, I see it isn’t Madeline after all. This girl is maybe eleven or twelve, with a bad overbite and bangs cut blunt across her forehead.

  “Sorry,” I say, dropping her arm quickly, even as her mother—a woman wearing denim overall shorts and pigtails, even though she must be in her forties—comes jogging over, her sandals slapping on the wet pavement.

  “Addison? Addison!” She drops to her knees on the pool deck and reaches out a hand for her daughter, glaring at me like I’m some pervert. “Get over here. Now.”

  “Sorry,” I say again. The woman only shoots me another dirty look as the girl, Addison, hauls herself out of the pool. Over the constant noise of shouting and laughter, I hear my name again; when I turn, I see Rogers, frowning, skirting the edge of the pool, trying to make his way over to me. I slosh out of the water, suddenly exhausted, feeling like an idiot, and flop onto the deck, my tail dribbling all over the pavement. A little girl wearing a diaper points and laughs delightedly.

  “What’s going on?” Rogers takes a seat next to me. “You gonna faint on me again?”

  “No. I thought I saw—” I break off, realizing how ridiculous I’ll sound. I thought I saw Madeline Snow underwater. I work the zipper down to my feet and stand up, holding the tail closed so I don’t wind up flashing anyone and getting arrested for indecency. I feel a little better, though, now that my legs aren’t suctioned together. “Did I really faint?”

  Rogers straightens up, too. “Dropped like a pile of rocks,” he says. “Don’t worry, the kids thought it was part of the show. You eat any lunch?”

  I shake my head. “Too hot.”

  “Come on,” he says, putting a hand on my shoulder. “Let’s get you out of the sun.”

  We pass two clowns and a juggler on our way back to the office—all of them subcontracted from a local entertainment company, though I know Doug is out there somewhere, suited up like a magician, doing card tricks—surrounded by thick knots of delighted children.

  Still more people are arriving: so many people, it makes you wonder how all of them could exist, how there can be so many individual lives and stories and needs and disappointments. Looking at the line snaking down from the Plank, while the Whirling Dervish spins around on its track, hurling its passengers in tight ellipses and sending sound waves peaking and crashing, I have the weirdest moment of clarity: all the search parties, all the news stories, all the twenty-four-hour updates and tweet blasts from @FindMadelineSnow are pointless.

  Madeline Snow is gone forever.

  I find Alice in the office, taking her own turn in front of the AC. Donna is not there, thankfully, and the phone keeps ringing, barking shrilly four times and then falling silent again when the automated message—Hello and welcome to Fantasy Land!—kicks on. Rogers insists that I drink three cups of ice water and eat half a turkey sandwich before clocking out.

  “Can’t have any accidents on the way home,” he barks, standing over me and glowering as though by the sheer force of eye contact he could make me digest faster.

  “You’ll come back for the fireworks, right?” Alice says. She has her shoes up on the desk, and the small room smells faintly sour. Alice has explained, with a shrug, that she was working the Cobra when a girl teetered off the ride, grinning, turned to Alice, and puked directly on her shoes.

  “I’ll be back,” I say. The park has extended hours for the anniversary party: we’ll be open until 10:00 p.m., with fireworks beginning at nine. I’m starting to get nervous. Only a few more hours to go. “I’ll be back for sure.”

  Tonight Dara and I wake the beast together. Tonight we ride the Gateway up to the stars.

  FEBRUARY 22

  Dara’s Diary Entry

  Ariana and I went to the Loft to hang out with PJ and Tyson, and then she spent the whole night shoving her tongue down Tyson’s throat and trying to convince us to skinny-dip even though it was, like, fifty degrees. There was another guy there who owns a club in East Norwalk called Beamer’s. He even brought champagne, the real kind. He kept saying I could be a model, until I told him to stop feeding me horseshit. Models are, like, ten feet tall. Still, he was cute. Older, but definitely cute.

  He said if I ever needed a job I could waitress for him and make two or three hundred a day, easy. (!!) That sure as shit beats babysitting Ian Sullivan every other day and trying to keep him from putting his cat in the microwave or burning caterpillars with matchsticks. I swear that kid is going to be a serial killer when he grows up.

  PJ was in a bad mood because he was supposed to get mushrooms, but I guess his guy ran out. Instead we just drank Andre’s champagne and took shots of some nasty shit this girl brought home from France, which tasted like swallowing licorice and rubbing alcohol at the same time.

  I know Dr. Lick Me would tell me I was just trying to avoid my feelings again, but let me tell you something: it didn’t work. All night I kept thinking about Parker. Why the hell is he acting like I have some flesh-eating disease all of a sudden? Hot and cold doesn’t even begin to describe it. More like lukewarm and frigid.

  So I kept puzzling out little hints and vibes he’s been giving me in the past couple of weeks, and all of a sudden I had this moment of total clarity. I’ve been such a fucking idiot.

  Parker’s in love with somebody else.

  Nick

  7:15 p.m.

  I’m meeting Mom and Dad at Sergei’s, since they’ll both be coming straight from work. I have no idea how Dara’s planning to get there, but she isn’t home when I stop in to change. The AC unit is going full blast and all the lights are off; still, the house is old, and just like it has its own rhythms, patterns of creaks and groans and mysterious banging sounds, it has its own internal temperature, which today seems to have settled at around eighty degrees.

  I take a cold shower, gasping when the water hits my back, and then throw on the coolest thing I own, a linen dress that Dara has always hated, saying it makes me look like I’m either going to a wedding or about to be sacrificed as a virgin.

  Sergei’s is a ten-minute walk—fifteen if you go slowly, which I do, trying not to break a sweat. I go around the house and through the backyard, glancing, as always, at the oak tree, half searching for a red flag entwined in its branches, for a secret message from Parker. Nothing but leaves crowd along the heavy branches, shimmering emerald-like in the weakening sun.

  I cut into the thicket of trees that divides our property from our neighbors’. It’s obvious that Dara has been sneaking out recently. There’s a straight path through the growth where branches have been snapped away and the grass trampled.

  I emerge onto Old Hickory Lane two houses down from Parker’s. On a whim, I decide to stop by and see if he’s okay. It isn’t like him to flake on work. His car is in the driveway, but the house is quiet and I can’t tell if he’s home. The curtains in his window—navy-blue stripes, selected by Parker at age six—are shut. I ring the doorbell—the first time I’ve ever used it, the first time I’ve ever noticed the Parkers have a doorbell—and wait, crossing my arms and uncrossing them, hating that I suddenly feel nervous.

  Upstairs, I think I see the curtains twitch in Parker’s room. I take
a step backward, craning my neck for a better view. The curtains are swinging slightly. Someone’s definitely up there.

  I cup my hands to my mouth and shout up to him, like I used to do when we were little and needed him to come down for a game of street stickball or to be our third for double Dutch. But this time, the curtains stay still. No face appears at the window. Finally I’m forced to turn around, backtracking down the street, feeling uncomfortable for no reason, as if someone is watching me, observing my progress. I turn around once at the corner; again, I could swear the curtains twitch, as if someone has just yanked them shut.

  Frustrated, I turn away. I’m already late, but it’s still too hot to do anything but ooze down the street. In less than twenty minutes, I’ll be sitting across from Dara.

  She’ll have to talk to me. She won’t have a choice.

  My stomach is knotted practically to my throat.

  And then, just before I get to Upper Reaches Park, I see her: She’s waiting to board the 22 bus, the one I take to FanLand, standing aside to allow an old woman with a walker to dismount. The halogen lights blazing from the bus shelter bleach her skin practically white and turn her eyes to hollows. She’s hugging herself, and from a distance she looks a lot younger.

  I stop in the middle of the road. “Dara!” I shout. “Dara!”

  She looks up, her expression troubled. I wave, but I’m too far away, and standing in a portion of the street swallowed by long shadows, and she must not see me. With a final glance over her shoulder, she slips onto the bus. The doors whoosh closed, and then she’s gone.

  My phone vibrates. Dad’s calling, probably to scold me for being late. I press ignore and keep walking to Sergei’s, trying to fight a bad feeling. The 22 does run through downtown Somerville, but not before it’s looped north around the park. If she’s planning to show to dinner, it would be far quicker to walk.

  But how could she miss her own birthday dinner?

  Maybe her knees are acting up, or her back is bugging her today. Still, I unconsciously slow down, afraid that I’ll arrive and she won’t be there and then I’ll know: she isn’t coming.

  It’s a quarter to eight by the time I get to Sergei’s, and my stomach turns over: both Mom’s and Dad’s cars are in the lot, parked next to each other, as if this is just another family dinner. As if I might walk in and get suctioned back in time, see Dad checking his teeth in the polished back of a knife while Mom scolds him, see Dara already flitting around the salad bar, concentrating, like an artist putting the finishing touches on a painting, and making sudden grabs for the croutons or the pickled green beans.

  Instead I see Mom sitting alone at the table. Dad is standing in the corner, one hand on his hip, phone plastered to his ear. As I watch, he hangs up, frowning slightly, and dials again.

  Dara’s not here.

  For a second, I feel nauseous. Then the anger comes rushing back.

  I weave around the salad bar and push through the usual crowd—kids pegging one another with crayons, parents slugging back mug-size glasses of wine. As I approach the table, Dad turns and gestures helplessly to Mom.

  “I can’t reach them,” he says. “I can’t reach either of them.” But just then he spots me. “There you are,” he says, presenting his cheek, which feels rough and stinks of aftershave. “I’ve been calling.”

  “Sorry.” I sit down in the seat across from Mom, next to the empty seat intended for Dara. Better to spit it out. “Dara’s not coming.”

  Mom stares at me. “What?”

  I take a deep breath. “Dara’s not coming,” I say. “We don’t need to save her a seat.”

  Mom’s still looking at me as if I’ve just sprouted a second head. “What are you—?”

  “Yoo-hoo! Nick! Sharon! Kevin! Incoming. Excuse me.”

  I look up and see Aunt Jackie moving toward us, deftly navigating the pattern of tables, clutching an enormous, multicolored leather bag to her chest, as though to prevent it from rocketing off on its own and taking out water glasses. As always, she’s wearing multiple colored strands of big jewelry (powerful crystals, she corrected me severely, when I once asked her why she wore so many rocks), so that she looks a little like a human version of a Christmas tree. Her hair is long and loose, swinging halfway to her butt.

  “Sorry, sorry, sorry,” she says. When she bends down to kiss me, I catch a quick whiff of something that smells a little bit like damp earth. “Traffic was terrible. How are you doing?” Aunt Jackie grips Mom’s face for a moment before kissing her.

  “I’m all right,” Mom says, smiling faintly.

  Aunt Jackie studies her face for a minute before releasing her. “What’d I miss?”

  “Nothing.” Dad shakes out his napkin and presents his cheek to Aunt Jackie like he did to me. She plants a big kiss on it, exaggerating the sound, and Dad carefully swipes his skin when she isn’t looking. “Nick was just informing us that her sister isn’t coming.”

  “Don’t get angry at me,” I say.

  “No one’s angry,” Aunt Jackie says brightly, as she sits down next to me. “No one’s angry, right?”

  Dad turns back to the waitress and motions that he wants another drink. There’s already a whiskey—mostly melted ice, at this point—leaving fat rings on the paper tablecloth.

  “I—I don’t understand.” Mom’s eyes are unfocused, a sure sign she’s had a bad day and had to double up on antianxiety meds. “I thought we’d all agreed to have a nice night. To have a family night.”

  “Maybe what Nick meant to say”—Aunt Jackie shoots me a warning look—“is just that Dara’s not here yet. It’s her birthday,” she adds, when I open my mouth to protest. “This is her favorite restaurant. She’ll be here with us.”

  All at once, Mom begins to cry. The transformation is sudden. People always talk about how faces crumble, but Mom’s doesn’t; her eyes go bright, vivid green right before the tears start flowing, but otherwise she looks the same. She doesn’t even try and cover her face, just sits there bawling like a little kid, mouth open, snot bubbling in her nose.

  “Mom, please.” I reach for her hand, which is cold. Already people are turning to stare. It’s been a long time since Mom has had a fit this bad in public.

  “It’s all my fault,” she says. “This was a terrible idea—stupid. I thought going to Sergei’s would help. . . . I thought it would be like old times. But with just the three of us—”

  “What am I, chopped tofu?” Aunt Jackie pipes up, but nobody smiles.

  Anger moves like an itch along my spine, into my neck, down into my chest. I should have known she would flake. I should have known she would find a way to ruin this, too. “This is all Dara’s fault,” I say.

  “Nick,” Aunt Jackie says quickly, as if I’ve cursed.

  “Don’t make this worse,” Dad snaps. He turns to Mom and puts a hand on her back, then immediately withdraws it, as though he’s been burned. “It’ll be okay, Sharon.”

  “It’s not okay,” she says, her voice cresting to a wail. By now, half the restaurant is looking at us.

  “You’re right,” I say. “It’s not okay.”

  “Nicole.” Dad spits out my name. “Enough.”

  “All right,” Aunt Jackie says, her voice low, soothing, as if she’s talking to a group of kids. “Everyone calm down, okay? Let’s all calm down.”

  “I just wanted to have a nice night. Together.”

  “Come on, Sharon.” Dad moves as if to touch her again, but his hand instead finds its way to his whiskey glass, which a waitress has just deposited before scurrying quickly away. A double, judging from the size of it. “It isn’t your fault. It was a nice idea.”

  “It’s not okay,” I repeat, a little louder. No point in keeping my voice down. Everyone is already staring at us. A busboy coming toward us with ice water catches sight of Mom, turns around, and bolts back toward the kitchen. “There’s no point in pretending. You always do this—both of you do.”

  At least Mom stops crying. In
stead she stares at me, openmouthed, her eyes all bleary and red. Dad grips his glass so hard, I wouldn’t be surprised if the whole thing shatters.

  “Nick, honey—” Aunt Jackie starts to say, but Dad cuts her off.

  “What are you talking about?” he says. “Do what?”

  “Pretend,” I say. “Act like nothing’s changed. Act like nothing’s wrong.” I ball up my napkin and throw it on the table, suddenly disgusted and sorry that I even showed up. “We aren’t a family anymore. You made sure of that when you left, Dad.”

  “That’s enough,” Dad says. “Do you hear me?” The angrier Dad gets, the quieter his voice. Now he’s speaking in practically a whisper. His face is a mottled red, like someone choking.

  Weirdly, Mom has gone totally still, totally calm. “She’s right, Kevin,” she says serenely, her eyes floating up past my head again.

  “And you.” I can’t help it; I can’t stop it. I’m never this angry, but it all boils up at once, something black and awful, like a monster in my chest that just wants to tear, and tear, and tear. “You’re on a different planet half the time. You think we don’t notice, but we do. Pills to go to sleep. Pills to wake up. Pills to help you eat, and pills to keep you from eating too much.”

  “I said that’s enough.” Suddenly Dad reaches over the table and grabs my wrist, hard, knocking over a glass of water onto Mom’s lap. Aunt Jackie shouts. Mom yelps and leaps backward, sending her chair clattering to the ground. Dad’s eyes are enormous and bloodshot; he’s holding my wrist so tightly, tears prick my eyes. The restaurant has gone totally silent.

  “Let her go, Kevin,” Aunt Jackie says very calmly. “Kevin.” She has to put her hand on his and pry his fingers from my wrist. The manager—a guy named Corey; Dara used to flirt with him—is moving toward us slowly, obviously mortified.

  Finally Dad lets go. He lets his hand fall in his lap. He blinks. “God.” The color drains out of his face all at once. “My God. Nick, I’m so sorry. I should never have—I don’t know what I was thinking.”