Carissa Ann Lynch - My Sister is Missing

I pulled the covers up to my chin, strangely afraid. ‘Who’s there?’

‘It’s your sister, silly.’

The door was unlocked, and a moment later, Madeline pushed it open a crack and looked in at me. ‘You got everything you need? What time do you want me to wake you up?’

My mind was still angry over the paint and mom, but I said, ‘I’m fine, and I’ll set my alarm myself.’

‘Thanks again for coming, Em. And thanks for staying a while. You have no idea how much this means to me.’

I nodded, still unable to meet her eyes. I wanted to cry about the paint on the walls. I wanted to cry over my mother’s death. Hell, maybe I wanted to cry about dad, too. I wanted to be left alone.

Mom doesn’t live in the layers of paint on the walls, Emily, I reminded myself. But this was exactly why I didn’t want to come home. When I was away, I could push it out of my mind. I could forget. But here, there’s no avoiding the past…

‘Goodnight,’ Madeline said, pulling the door back closed.

‘Madi? Wait. Why didn’t you just tell me over the phone? I don’t understand why it was such a big deal, why this thing with John was some sort of secret?’

My sister peered back in through the crack. Her mouth looked droopy and strained, her eyes getting that far off look in them again…

‘That’s not the only reason I asked you here. There’s more. But we’ll talk about that tomorrow.’

The door clicked shut. I listened to the soft tapping sounds of my sister’s footsteps moving down the hallway. What the hell does that mean? Why is she being so vague and mysterious?

I slipped back out of bed and flipped out the lights. Before getting back in, I tiptoed over to the window and peeked out through the blinds.

The backyard was dark, but I could see billowy shadows dancing in the distance – the trees in the forest never went to sleep.

They were always there, watching me, haunting me, even when I lived far away … those creepy woods were the one thing I hadn’t been able to forget. Sometimes, I still dreamed of falling, falling, falling …

I wonder if it senses me, if it knows I’ve come back home. Again, I scoffed at my own childish notions. Maybe my sister wasn’t the only one acting strangely. Being here was bringing out the worst in me already. Those slender crevices are splitting open—waiting to be filled with memories … memories I’ve lost forever.

What my sister didn’t know was that I had a secret too. Mine wasn’t as cryptic as hers, but it was equally important.

She’d been asking me to come back home for so long. And I’d never planned on actually coming, but there were events that had occurred over the last few weeks that made the timing just right for a trip back home.

I’d lost my job at the paper. I hadn’t told Madi yet, although she’d given me plenty of opportunities to bring it up earlier this evening. But I would. I’ll tell her tomorrow, I decided.

So, even though I could stay and help out with the kids for a while, I couldn’t help much with bills until I found a new job. There wasn’t much work to be had in this town, and even if I did find a job, I didn’t want to stay here long enough to need one anyway.

I crawled back into bed and pinched my eyes shut, desperate to sleep away the worries. I thought it would take hours to drift off, but my mind turned cloudy and wild, and within minutes, I was dreaming of the trees.

When I woke up, the house was shaking, the tat tat tat of heavy rain pounding the windows and rooftop like a gangster from a black-and-white mobster movie. Startled, I sat up straight in bed. Mom’s old sewing room drifted back into focus.

Coming back to Bare Border hadn’t been a dream after all. Too bad.

As though my movements were their own version of an alarm, someone rapped on the door.

‘I’m up, Madi,’ I grumbled.

‘It’s Ben.’ The door creaked open and one big brown eye peered in at me through the crack.

‘It’s storming. Can I get in bed with you?’

I was surprised but tried not to show it. I’d only met my nephew yesterday. ‘Yes, of course.’

I pushed the covers back and motioned for him to crawl in beside me. He bounded toward me like a Saint Bernard minus the slobber. He jumped up and down on the bed, to the count of eight, then wriggled like a worm beneath the blankets.

I wrapped an arm around him and sniffed his soft brown hair. It was too long, scruffy around his ears and hanging too low in his eyes, but it felt soft like feathers and it smelled like the same shampoo Madeline used.

Stealing a glance at my cell phone on the nightstand, I was surprised to see it was nearly eleven in the morning. Sleeping this late wasn’t all that unusual for me, but I was surprised Madeline wasn’t up making breakfast, or whatever motherly things she did on Saturday mornings.

‘Where’s your sister?’ I asked, stroking my fingers through his hair. He shied away from me now, skirting closer to the edge of the bed.

‘She’s been up for hours, too. She’s watching Teen Titans Go . I turned it on for her and poured her a cup of juice. I did spill some on the floor though…’

‘Where’s your mom?’

‘Where’s your mom?’ he repeated my words.

Madeline told me he liked to do this too – repeat words and phrases, and sometimes echo back what he’d just heard. I wasn’t sure if I should repeat my question or move on.

‘Okay, buddy. Let’s just get up. When I was your age, I liked to watch cartoons on Saturday. What is your favorite cartoon?’

‘I don’t watch cartoons. I play Five Nights at Freddy’s. Maybe they will turn it into a cartoon. Want to play it with me?’

I assured him that I would soon and listened as he described every level of the game while I pulled on cotton shorts and my favorite morning hoodie.

Ben told me more about the game as I padded down the hallway and made my way to the kitchen. Coffee. Why hasn’t Madi made coffee yet?

‘Is your mom sleeping in, too?’ I fiddled with the fifteen buttons on the coffee machine before I realized it wasn’t plugged in. Ben didn’t answer me, just stared up at the swooshing black tail on the cat clock, hypnotized. As I scavenged through the cupboard for coffee cups, my foot landed in a puddle of juice.

‘Okay,’ I said, flustered, switching my focus to finding paper towels.

After I cleaned up the spill, I made my way toward my sister’s room. On the way, I passed Shelley. She was sitting pretzel-style on the floor in her room. She was indeed watching Teen Titans Go and her lips were stained purple from the juice drink.

The door to my sister’s bedroom was closed.

‘Does Mommy normally sleep this late? I don’t want to wake her up…’

Shelley noticed me, finally, and waddled out into the hall.

‘No, Mom’s an early bird. Early birds eat worms.’

I smiled. I might have been my mother’s favorite, but she and Madeline had a lot in common; they both liked to get up early – too early for my tastes.

‘Well, your mom and I were up pretty late last night. I probably wore her out.’

Softly, I knocked on my sister’s bedroom door, then waited. Ben clung to my legs now, squeezing my thighs like a vice grip, as he rambled on about that game.

Shelley tiptoed up beside me, gave me a knowing look, and tapped the door with her pointer finger. She was right—it wasn’t closed all the way, and when she jabbed it, the door wobbled forward.

‘Madeline, are you still asleep?’ But even from here, I could see that she wasn’t.

The bed was perfectly made, the corners tucked in tightly, military-style the way she liked them. I pushed the door all the way open. My sister wasn’t in her room.