Chapter 2 - The Things I Had Stopped Noticing
Charles left the living room before I could ask another question.
He walked into his office and closed the door.
For nearly thirty years, that sound had meant the same thing in our house.
The conversation was over because Charles had decided it was over.
But this time, nobody followed his rules.
Leah carried the baby to the couch. Isaiah stood beside her, staring at the hallway.
“Tell me I'm misunderstanding this,” he said.
I wished I could.
Instead, I went into the kitchen and warmed the bottle Isaiah had brought.
When I returned, the baby had stopped crying but was searching against Leah's shirt with her mouth.
“She's hungry,” I said.
Leah handed her to me.
The little girl was surprisingly light.
“What is her name?”
“Ava,” Isaiah answered.
“Ava,” I repeated.
She blinked up at me.
She had no idea that four adults were standing around her, trying to understand a betrayal that might change all their lives.
All she wanted was her bottle.
I sat down and fed her.
It was the first useful thing anyone had done since the truth began showing itself.
Isaiah sat on the edge of the coffee table.
“I don't understand why Jama wouldn't tell me.”
“Tell you what?” Leah asked softly.
“That Charles was involved with her. If that's what happened.”
He covered his face.
“I knew something was wrong.”
I looked up.
“What do you mean?”
“Last winter she got a job at his office. She was excited. She said Mr. Walker was teaching her about property management.”
I remembered.
Charles had called Jama hardworking and dependable. He had offered to train her for a better-paying position.
I had been proud of him.
Isaiah continued.
“Then she started changing. She stopped coming to Sunday dinners. She got nervous whenever anybody mentioned this house.”
Leah frowned.
“She told me she was tired.”
“That's what she told everyone.”
Isaiah leaned forward.
“One night I asked why she'd quit the office. She said she didn't want to talk about it. Then she cried.”
I remembered a December afternoon.
Jama had arrived at our house to drop off a folder for Charles.
I was standing in the kitchen peeling potatoes.
She had seemed pale and distracted.
I offered her something to eat.
She thanked me, said she wasn't hungry, and asked whether Charles was home.
When I said he was, she went silent.
At the time, I thought she was nervous about work.
Now that memory felt different.
Ava finished half her bottle and fell asleep against my arm.
I looked down at her.
The crescent mark was hidden beneath her sleeper.
That did not make it any less real.
“Isaiah,” I said, “we need to find your sister.”
He nodded.
“I've already called her friends. Nobody's heard from her.”
“Then we make a missing-person report. We don't wait.”
He called the police while Leah checked the hospital information in Ava's diaper bag.
There were diapers, two bottles, formula, a change of clothes, and a small folded blanket.
Everything Jama had packed was practical.
Nothing suggested she intended her daughter to go without care.
There was also a handwritten feeding schedule.
Ava ate roughly every three hours. She liked being held upright afterward. She sometimes cried before settling down for the night.
Jama had written every detail in neat blue ink.
Leah held the paper.
“She planned this.”
“Maybe,” Isaiah said. “But she didn't tell me where she was going.”
I watched the way his hands shook.
He was frightened for his sister and angry that she had left him responsible for a newborn without an explanation.
Both feelings were understandable.
After the police took the initial information, Charles finally came out of his office.
He had changed his shirt.
He looked directly at Isaiah.
“You need to be careful what you tell people. Jama has been under a lot of stress.”
Isaiah stood.
“What are you suggesting?”
“I'm suggesting she's not thinking clearly.”
I recognized the tone.
Charles used it when he wanted people to doubt someone before that person had a chance to speak.
“Enough,” I said.
He turned toward me.
“Denise, I'm trying to help.”
“Then tell us what you know.”
“I don't know anything about where she went.”
“That's not what I asked.”
He glanced at Ava.
“Isn't it more important to find the child's mother?”
“Yes,” I answered. “And we're going to.”
I carried Ava into the spare bedroom and placed her in the portable bassinet Isaiah had brought.
When I returned, Charles was gone again.
Leah joined me in the kitchen.
“Mom, are you okay?”
I started to say yes.
Then I noticed the stack of household account statements beside the refrigerator.
I had been reviewing them before Leah arrived.
Among the ordinary payments was a monthly transfer I had questioned twice.
Nine hundred and fifty dollars.
The same amount.
Month after month.
The recipient was listed as J. Brooks Housing.
Charles had told me it was reimbursement for temporary administrative work.
Now I checked the first transfer.
It had been made seven months earlier.
Long after Jama stopped working for him.
And the most recent payment had gone out just four days before Ava was brought into our house.
I showed Leah.
She looked at the name.
Then at me.
“Mom, why is Dad paying Jama's rent?”
I stared down at the statements.
That question frightened me more than the birthmark.
May you like
Because it suggested this had not been a single terrible mistake.
It suggested Charles had been managing a secret for months.
