Dying Breath - Wendy Corsi Staub

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around all that much. His job—something high-ranking in computer technology, which she doesn’t really understand—is demanding, and he was always at the office or traveling. But his stuff was here. When you walk past someone’s favorite Yankees cap hanging on a hook in the mudroom, or reach past their leftover midnight pizza in the fridge when you get milk for your morning cereal, it’s kind of like they’re there.

      Now the hook by the back door is bare, and all that’s ever in the fridge is healthy crap Mom keeps trying to shove down Tess’s throat.

      Also missing from the fridge, besides cold pizza: vodka, white wine, beer…all the booze that used to come and go, almost on a daily basis.

      Mom drank.

      Now she doesn’t.

      Big deal.

      The thing is…

      It’s a big deal. Whether Tess wants it to be or not. All of it: Mom drinking, Mom not drinking, Dad moving out, the countless rules that haven’t changed since then and the new ones that have been added, the silence, the boredom, the lack of freedom…

      God, I hate my life.

      Tess looks back at her notes again.

      Beware the Ides of March.

      Yeah. No kidding.

      She scowls and jabs the VOLUME button on her iPod, raising it so that the hip hop bass throbs almost painfully in her ears.

      She never used to like this kind of music, but lately the angry, rhythmic lyrics appeal to her. Lately a lot of things appeal to her that never did before.

      Which kind of scares her—not that she’d admit it to anyone but herself.

      The school year’s almost over, though.

      Yeah. And as soon as it is, Mom’s going to haul her down to the beach.

      Away from her friends.

      Away from Dad.

      Away from Heath Pickering.

      Standing in her kitchen, eyes squeezed shut, Cam can see the girl pretty clearly: elfin features, upturned nose, straight, wispy, long blond hair. It’s hard to make out the color of her eyes, though—they’re tear-filled, and she keeps squeezing them closed.

      She’s about thirteen years old—maybe fourteen, but small for her age.

      What else?

      She’s filthy, caked in dirt, huddled on the ground. She’s clutching a purple backpack and wearing what looks like a school uniform. One tail of her once-white blouse hangs below her navy vest, and her legs are scraped and bloodied between her blue knee socks and short pleated plaid skirt. Blue and green plaid—Black Watch? Is that what it’s called?

      Around her neck, at the open collar of her blouse, is a silver chain with some kind of small, triangular black pendant hanging from it.

      Watching the child’s narrow little body heave with silent sobs, Cam clenches her hands so hard that what’s left of her methodically bitten fingernails dig painfully into her palms.

      Her own saliva is tainted by the metallic taste of the little girl’s fear; her thoughts by the little girl’s frantic introspection:

      Oh, please, God, don’t let me die. Please.

      Hail Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with thee…

      What if she never gets to go back home?

      Home…

      The girl’s eyes squeeze tightly shut.

      She’s picturing it, Cam realizes. Picturing her home.

      Yes, show me, sweetie.

      Cam does her best to zero in on the image inside the girl’s head.

      Come on, let me see.

      Slowly, it takes shape: a two-story frame house, the architectural style harkening a child’s crayoned drawing: a door centered between two shuttered windows on the first floor, three more windows above on the second, and an A-line roof with a brick chimney on one side.

      The roof is gray-black shingles. The clapboards are white. The shutters are black.

      Towering maple tree sentries guard the front yard.

      There are hundreds of thousands of houses like it throughout the Northeast.

      That’s where it is, Cam is certain—somewhere here in the Northeast. Not right here in Montclair, though. Maybe not even in New Jersey. New York? Pennsylvania? Delaware?

      Where is the girl’s house, dammit?

      Wait, there’s something to the right of the door, beneath the brass, lantern-style light fixture.

      It’s a house number…42!

      But 42 what? What’s the name of the street? Where is it? Show me!

      Helpless, Cam can only watch the image give way to the girl herself again. She’s curled in a fetal position in the shadow of a wall, rocking back and forth.

      The wall appears to be made of rock, the floor of dirt. She’s in some kind of cellar.

      Cam zeroes in on the girl’s face, memorizing her features, watching her bite her trembling lip, wishing she would open her eyes.

      Then, miraculously, she does, as if on cue. Her tear-flooded pupils, Cam sees, are a light hazel shade. Her lashes are sandy, barely visible.

      She’ll need mascara when she grows up, Cam finds herself thinking idly…

      Then, if she gets to grow up.

      A familiar wave of hopeless, helpless panic is beginning to take hold.

      Here is Cam’s own panic, mingling in her gut with the child’s primal fear that even now remains tempered by a wisp of naive hope.

      But Cam knows better.

      Breathe. Focus, she tells herself. Focus on that girl. You can’t help her if you don’t focus.

      Look at the stone wall, the dirt floor…

      Look! What else is there? Where is she?

      Wall, floor—there are no other details; there’s nothing more to go on.

      She’s in a basement of some kind. Where?

      It, too, feels as though it’s located someplace in the Northeast.

      Yes. And not far from the house with white clapboards and black shutters.

      More. You need more. What else? Don’t just look. Smell.

      Musty. Damp.

      Listen…

      There’s water nearby. Moving water.

      Cam can hear it rushing; there’s some kind of current. A creek? A stream? A river?

      She strains for something more, and gradually, she hears it. But not water.

      A faint, rhythmic sound reaches her ears. A sickeningly familiar sound…

      What is it?

      As it grows ominously louder, she sucks in her breath and the smell hits her. The recognizable organic smell of soil. Rich, damp soil, pungent, black, and crumbly.

      She begins to comprehend, and new dread sweeps through her.

      Oh, Lord.

      Lord help that child.

      It’s a shovel; that’s what she’s hearing.

      Every dull, clanging thud seems to slam painfully into Cam herself.

      Somebody’s digging, not far from the girl, maybe somewhere above her.

      Who are you? Cam demands of the person whose hands clench the wooden handle. Let me see your face, dammit.

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