Diane Chamberlain - Secrets She Left Behind

“You love your family very much,” Dr. Jakes said.

I nodded.

He motioned to the box of tissues on the table next to my chair and I took one and pressed it to my eyes. I did not want to cry here. I didn’t want to give this old sloppy fat man the satisfaction of making me cry. But suddenly, that was all I could do. I cried, and he let me. That’s about all I did for the rest of the session. He said that was okay. Good, even. I had a lot of pain inside me, he said, and we’d have plenty of time together to talk it all through.

“Our session’s nearly up,” he said when I’d gone through half the tissues in the box. “But before you leave, I wanted to ask what your plans are for community service. You have three hundred hours, is that correct?”

I let out a long, shivery breath. I needed to pull myself together in case the reporters had tracked me here and were waiting in the veterinarian’s parking lot.

“My mother…she’s a nurse at Douglas Elementary in Sneads Ferry,” I said. “I’m going to help one of the teachers there. I start Monday.”

“Did you arrange this or did your mother?” he asked.

“My mother,” I said.

He looked like he wanted to say something else, but just nodded. “Okay then.” He pushed himself out of the chair with his hands. “We’ll be meeting twice a week,” he said.

“Right.” Mom had scheduled appointments for me into infinity. I didn’t want to have to cry my eyes out twice a week, but it wasn’t like I had a choice. I stood up and gave him what felt like a dopey smile as I walked past him to the door.

It would have been going too far to say I liked him, but I could have sworn he didn’t look as fat when I left as he did when I arrived.

Andy

I HATED POLICE CARS. MOM SAID I WAS JUST SCARED OF THEM because one night a police car took me to jail. So when the police lady wanted me to ride with her to Wal-Mart, I said no. Mom told her I should practice driving, so we’d take our car instead. Mom was being a quick thinker!

I had a cushion thing I put on the driver seat so I could see good through the window. I kept waiting to get taller but it wasn’t happening. Kimmie was taller than me, but she didn’t care. Some girls cared about that but Uncle Marcus said who’d want a girl who cared about something so trivial? Which meant not very important.

I was an excellent driver. We were supposed to follow the police car, so I tried to keep looking at it, but I had trouble.

“You’re losing her, sweetie,” Mom said.

My speedometer thing said thirty-five. “She’s going too fast.”

Mom laughed. “You’re right. You take your time. We’ll catch up to her at the Wal-Mart.”

We came to the corner I hated. There was no light but a lot of cars. I had to look a lot of different ways and wait and wait. A car behind me honked.

“Take your time,” Mom said.

The car honked again. I didn’t know whether to stay stopped or go.

“Brain,” I said. “You gotta stay focused!”

“That’s right,” Mom said. “Ignore that silly horn.”

Finally, when I was really, really sure it was safe, I drove across the street. Then we were at the Wal-Mart, where I got to practice parking between the lines. I was good at that, except for Mom couldn’t get out and I had to do it again.

The police lady leaned against a brick thing with her arms folded. “Thought I lost you,” she said. She was pretty old. She had on a hat, but I saw her gray hair underneath it.

“You went over the speed limit,” I said.

She laughed. “I probably did. Better write myself a ticket.”

“Yup,” I said. “We can wait.”

But she didn’t write herself a ticket at all. Police can get away with things regular people can’t.

Inside, we walked to the place where the pots and pans were. The police lady told me to look at all the boxes to see if any of them looked like the one Miss Sara carried. I thought I remembered it perfect. It was red with a big silver pot on it. But when I saw all the different boxes, I got confused.

“Maybe it was blue.” I pointed to a blue box. Then I saw a yellowy one with a funny pan on it, and my memory said that was it. “I think it was this one,” I said.

“That’s an electric wok,” the police lady said. “I thought you said it was a big pot?”

“What’s an electric rock?” I asked Mom.

“Wok,” she said. “It’s a kind of pan. Is that what it looked like?”

I moved my mouth back and forth like I did when I was thinking hard. I felt so mixed up with all those boxes. Maybe it wasn’t even a pot at all. I pointed to a red box that had a white square bowl thing on it. “Maybe it was that one,” I said.

“A casserole?” Mom asked.

I shook my head, because casseroles had lots of different food in them. I didn’t like them. I didn’t like food to touch.

“Memories can play tricks on you sometimes, can’t they?” Mom said. It was her patient voice.

“Can you narrow it down, Andy?” the police lady asked.

I wasn’t sure what “narrow it down” meant.

“Are there any you’re absolutely sure were not the box she was carrying?” Mom asked.

“The little ones,” I said. “It wasn’t little.”

The police lady’s cell phone rang. Mom and me waited while she talked. Mom winked at me.

“Are you excited about Kimmie coming to dinner?” She used a quiet voice because of the police lady talking on the phone.

“Yes!”

Mom put her finger on her lips.

“Yes,” I whispered. I wanted Maggie to meet Kimmie. Maggie wouldn’t come to swim practice because she didn’t like seeing people yet. That was why Mom said Kimmie could come to dinner.

Kimmie told me, “I used to hate going to Matt’s swim practices, but now I can’t wait so I can see you.”

When she said that, I hugged her. I wasn’t supposed to hug people besides my family, but I had to hug Kimmie then. She didn’t mind. She really didn’t. But she said I smelled like cigarettes. She said, “Please don’t smoke.” I threw my cigarettes away.

“Mom?” I said now. She was looking at a can-opener thing.

“What?”

“Me and Kimmie hug sometimes, but she doesn’t mind so it’s okay. Right?”

Mom kept looking at the can opener. It had a handle and she made it go up and down.

“Where are you when you hug?” she asked.

“The pool and her house and our house.”

“In your room?” She looked at me in a way that told me I better say no, even though we did hug in my room once.

“No,” I said. We were allowed in my room with the door open.

“Hugging’s nice,” Mom said. “And Kimmie’s your girlfriend, right?”

I nodded.

“It’s okay to hug your girlfriend.”

The police lady turned off her phone. “That was the manager,” she said. “No pots or pans have been returned in the last few days.”

“So maybe it wasn’t from this store?” Mom asked.

“Right. Or it wasn’t a pot or pan.” She tipped her head funny and looked at me. “Maybe it was actually a wok or a casserole or a potato peeler,” she said.

“What?” I laughed. She was making a joke.

“Or she never made it to the store,” she said.

“Oh, don’t even say that.” Mom had on her worried look. She had it on a lot since Miss Sara went missing.

Everybody was worried about Miss Sara. I got asked a lot of questions by the police and Mom and Uncle Marcus. Even Maggie asked me questions on account of the Web site thing she’s making. Everybody wanted to know what clothes Miss Sara had on. Things like that. I kept telling them I was too sick that day to remember.