The One I Left Behind Read Free

books that she referred to again and again, the ones that had influenced her: The Poetics of Space, A Pattern Language, The Timeless Way of Building, Design with Nature, Notes on the Synthesis of Form, as well as a small collection of nature guides. Tucked here and there among the books were Reggie’s other great source of inspiration: bird nests, shells, pinecones, interestingly shaped stones, a round paper wasp nest, milkweed pods, acorns, and beechnuts.
    Reggie went for the phone on her desk, stumbling and splashing hot espresso over her hand.
    Shit! What was she in such a hurry for? Who did she expect to hear on the other end? Charlie? Not very likely. The last time they’d spoken was when they bumped into each other accidently at the grocery store just before they’d both graduated from separate high schools. Tara, maybe, teasing her, telling her she had sixty seconds to gather everything she cared about?
    No. What she really thought was that it was Him again.
    She’d been getting the calls for years, first at home, then college, then in every apartment and house she’d ever lived in. He never said a word. But she could hear him breathing, could almost feel the puffs of fetid moisture touch her good ear as he inhaled, then exhaled, each breath mocking her, saying, I know how to find you . And somehow, she knew, she just knew, that it was Neptune. And one of these days, he might actually open his mouth and speak. She let herself imagine it: his voice rushing through the phone like water, washing over her, through her . Maybe he’d tell her the one thing she’d always wanted to know: what he’d done with her mother, why she was the only victim whose body was never found. The others had been displayed so publicly, but all they ever found of Vera was her right hand.
    What was it that made Vera different?
    “Hello?” Reggie stammered.
    Say something, damn it , she willed. Don’t just breathe this time .
    “Regina? It’s Lorraine.”
    “Oh. Good morning,” Reggie said through gritted teeth. She set down the small ceramic cup and shook her stinging hand, pissed that she’d burned herself hurrying for Lorraine. Why the hell was her aunt phoning at this hour? Usually she called each Sunday at five. And Reggie often managed to be out. (Or at least pretended to be—lurking in a corner, glass of pinot noir in hand, hiding like a child, as if the red eye on the answering machine could see her as she listened to her aunt’s disembodied voice.)
    “I just got a call from a social worker down in Massachusetts.” This was typical of Lorraine—getting right down to business—no useless preamble about the weather or any silly “all’s well here, how are you?” There was a long pause while Reggie waited for her to continue. But she didn’t.
    “Let me guess,” Reggie said. “She heard what a disturbed and traumatized family we were and was offering her services?”
    Reggie could almost see Lorraine rolling her eyes, looking over the top of her glasses and down her nose, disapproving. Lorraine standing in the kitchen with its faded wallpaper, her hair pulled back in a bun so tight it pulled the wrinkles from her forehead. And she’d be wearing Grandpa Andre’s old fishing vest, of course, stained and reeking of decades of dead trout.
    Reggie picked up the cup of espresso again and took a sip.
    “No, Regina. It seems they’ve found your mother. Alive.”
    Reggie spat out the coffee, dropped the cup onto the floor, watching it fall in slow motion, dark espresso splattering the sustainably harvested floorboards.
    It wasn’t possible. Her mother was dead. They all knew it. They’d had a memorial service twenty-five years ago. Reggie could still remember the hordes of reporters outside; the way the preacher smelled of booze; and how Lorraine’s voice shook when she read the Dickinson poem “Because I Could Not Stop for Death.”
    At last Reggie whispered, “What?”
    “They’re quite sure it’s her,”