Carissa Ann Lynch - Without a Trace

I took one last look at the trees, at the once-soothing sunrise. Branches morphed into bony claws. They reached for me, gnarly and twisted, eager to pierce through my ragged flesh like broken bones…

Whipping around, I raced back toward the house. A low moan escaped from between my teeth as the house swayed from side to side, like one of those carnival mirrors. The distance between the front door and the tree line suddenly stretched, for what looked like miles…

My sneakers were squishy on the cool, wet grass, and as I slipped and slid across the yard, I imagined the mud was quicksand, sucking me deep down into the earth, consuming me whole…

Once inside, I locked the door and pressed my back against it, sucking in long, craggy breaths until they evened out. It only took a few minutes to still my thumping heart.

That’s better. Well done, Nova, I commended myself. Each time I panicked, it was taking fewer and fewer minutes to calm back down.

Hell, maybe after a few weeks of being here, I won’t have panic attacks at all.

Fumbling for a light switch in the kitchen, I stubbed my toe on Lily’s tiny Cars suitcase. It was still lying in the middle of the kitchen floor, next to my duffel bag, where we’d tossed our luggage last night.

In the light of day, our new kitchen looked different than it did last night. White paint on the cupboards looked yellowish and worn. The sink was rusty, and a slow drip of water ping ping pinged in the basin below. Looking around, I tried to imagine this kitchen as our own—baking cookies for Lily while she sat on the edge of the counter, kicking the backs of her heels against the cupboards below. Normally, I would make her get down because Martin didn’t like that.

But now Lily and I can do whatever we want.

And a rundown, drippy kitchen was better than any sort of kitchen we might share with Martin.

A scarred wooden table with four chairs was set in the kitchen. There were other modest furnishings, too—a chair in the living room, beds and dressers in both bedrooms—which was one reason I chose this place. It was the perfect getaway spot, out in the middle of nowhere, and we didn’t need to bring much to get started.

The refrigerator and cabinets were still empty and in need of a good scrubbing. We’d grabbed some fast food on the way to West Virginia, but I hadn’t wanted to stop at the grocery store yet.

All I wanted to do was get us here.

But now that we were, I’d have to spend the weekend making it as homey and comfortable as possible for Lily.

We’re doing this. We’re starting over. This is our home now.

For months, years , I’d imagined this moment. But then, it had just been a fantasy, a twisted version of hyper-reality. I never really thought I would leave. Even the night before we left, I’d expected myself to back out. To freeze. To panic and collapse in the middle of the street after loading our cases. But I didn’t. And it wasn’t until we were almost a hundred miles outside of Granton that I knew it was really happening…that we were leaving Martin for good.

My duffel bag lay sprawled open on the floor beside the table, from where I’d taken out my pajamas last night. We were so tired when we got here, to the point of delirium. It had taken nearly ten hours to reach Northfolk, the rising hills and winding curves of West Virginia making me skittery and afraid. I couldn’t stop checking the rearview mirror and my heart was thrumming in my ears the entire drive. During the daytime, it hadn’t been so bad. But at night, I’d imagined every pair of headlights were the angry, glowing orbs of Martin’s truck, chasing us up the wild, mountain roads…

Lily had handled the move so well, believing me when I told her that we were going on an adventure. With her mousy brown hair and cornflower blue eyes, she looked just like Martin. But, luckily, she hadn’t inherited his meanness, or his wild mood swings.

Lily was, by all accounts, a normal four-year-old girl. But that wouldn’t have lasted long, not while living with Martin. Eventually, his violence would have moved onto her, seeping into her pores and saturating her life with his poison.

She was innocent, so seemingly unaware, yet she’d already learned to fear her father and his unpredictable ways. And the way Martin looked at her…his eyes searching, evaluating her every move, it made me uneasy.

I’m taking her away from her dad. What kind of mother does that?

Emotions played tug-of-war inside me—I felt guilty for stripping her of her fatherly influence, but I was relieved—exuberant, even—to give her a fresh, safe start in life. During the drive to Northfolk, I’d been so focused on getting away, that the guilt hadn’t had time to settle in yet. And last night, I’d been too tired to stay up worrying. But now…now all those worries came rushing back at once.

What will I tell her when she’s older? Surely, she will remember Martin. Will I tell her why we left? How much memory can a four-year-old retain?

“I m-made the right decision,” I told myself, firmly, for the hundredth time this morning.

Pressing my face against the window pane, my eyes scanned the backyard. From behind a layer of murky glass, the branches no longer seemed murderous or threatening. Even the clouds were wimpy, less dark. It was ironic, really. After years of feeling claustrophobic, shut inside the house with Martin, now it was the outdoors that overwhelmed me.

Everything overwhelms me.

Again, my thought from earlier came crawling back: how can I raise my daughter to be a stronger, better version of me when I’m so scared of the world and the men that live in it?

Clutching the necklace at my throat, my fingers curled around the dainty silver cross that Martin had given me on our anniversary. The holy symbol should have brought me comfort, but all I could think about were his hands pressed against my throat, the crossbars digging sharply into my flesh as I struggled for a tiny bit of air…

Tenderly, I reached back and unclasped it. It seemed wrong to throw it away, but then again, I couldn’t keep it. It hadn’t protected me when I’d needed it to, and expelling Martin’s memory from our lives was my top priority now. Before I could change my mind, I carried the lightweight pendant over to the waste basket and tossed it inside.

I didn’t put on makeup this morning. There was no rushing around to make Martin’s breakfast, or to see him off to work.

No slamming doors or missing shoes or screaming.

No angry fists pummeling my body.

Most mornings, the air felt suffocating and dense. I’d wake up panting, a surge of panic hammering through my bloodstream and lifting me from bed. I was always afraid I’d oversleep, and sometimes I did. If Martin was late for work or didn’t have the things he needed in the mornings, he blamed it on me. And worst of all, he seemed to enjoy punishing me for my mistakes.

He must have been so angry when he realized we were gone. We didn’t take much when we left, just Lily’s suitcase and my bag. But he must have known immediately.

The first thing he probably did was call my cell phone, and from there, it wouldn’t have taken him long to find where I’d left it—on the nightstand next to our bed.

He can’t reach us here.

There was no note. No paper trails. I’d saved up small amounts of cash over the past year, so there wouldn’t be any need for ATM withdrawals. I had enough money to last us for a while, until I could figure out how to get some more.

Pinching my eyes closed, I couldn’t shake the image of his seething blue eyes, the angry caterpillar brows furrowing in anger.