My cousin, Liondra, was one of those people who manage to turn their lives around dramatically, which is what made it such a painful irony that she died young. She went from a drug-addicted dropout, living at a halfway house, to working for the halfway house, and then to having a degree in social work, healthy, happily married, and the mother of a child, all in a remarkably short time. The key to her personality was that she was very strong-willed. It worked against her when she was young and rebellious, but in her favor once she made up her mind to pursue a different path. Dealing with your own issues can’t protect you from some other idiot driving under the influence, though.
I was devastated when I got the news that she and her husband, Carson, had been killed in an accident right after Thanksgiving. I hadn’t seen much of her the past few years, because of my going to college in a different state, but I always looked up to her as a kid, never gave up on her during her bad years, and just always expected to have more time to get to know her in her new life with her new family. I flew out for the funeral and have a vague memory of seeing the little girl, Danielle, there, along with Carson’s mother, who was caring for her. They both were quiet and blank-faced, which made sense to me, because we were all dazed with the horror of it. I went back to school and sleepwalked through the end of the semester in a state of shock.
But when I went home for Christmas, I had recovered enough to ask about Danielle, and was stunned to learn my parents had not seen or talked to her since the funeral. They said Carson’s mother, Bethany, was difficult to get a hold of, which I quickly discovered to be true. She had a YouTube channel where she unboxed packages of beauty products, and I assumed she didn’t want to be easily contacted because of that; she probably had experience with the sort of weird people who will harass strangers they see online. But I found her address in some of the correspondence from the lawyer who had handled Liondra and Carson’s estate. Since I had a couple weeks’ break after Christmas, I decided to visit.
Bethany lived on a barrier island near Jacksonville, so I had to park my car and take a ferry to get there. I wasn’t thrilled to have to try to find the house on foot, as it was a chilly and damp afternoon. It was a small island, and seemed sparsely populated. I passed only a few other houses looking for hers, which was set at the end of a particularly long driveway. It was a farmhouse style, two stories, with a big wraparound porch.
I rang the doorbell, and after a few moments, the door opened a crack. I recognized Bethany from the wedding and the funeral. She was a carefully made-up woman with fluffy blonde hair that resembled cotton candy. She didn’t seem to recognize me, looking at me with generic suspicion. When I explained who I was, her expression changed. It didn’t get any warmer, though, just more complicated. It was a closed, secretive look, with a rigid smile and hard, flat eyes.
“I’d like to see Danielle, if I may,” I said. I was determined to keep the meeting on a polite footing, whatever her private feelings might be.
“She’s not here,” Bethany said, and I thought she almost closed the door in my face right then. But then she seemed to think better of it, and added, “She’s at school.”
It seemed late in the afternoon for that to me, but what did I know about her after-school activities? “Can I wait?” I asked. “She should be home soon, right? I haven’t seen her for so long. I just want to see how she’s doing.” She seemed to bristle at that, so I added, “I mean, how she’s dealing with everything. It must be hard on both of you.”
There was a long pause as she seemed to think it over. Her manner was really starting to make me uneasy. But then she stepped back, opening the door wider.
“I’d ask you to sit in the kitchen, but I’m setting up a shoot in there.” After a second’s confusion I realized she was talking about her YouTube thing.
“I don’t want to get in your way,” I said, still trying to be polite. She huffed audibly, but I ignored it. “I’ll just wait a while and see if she comes. I’ve come all this way, I’d rather not go without at least seeing her.”
“Go ahead. Wait,” she said. Her voice was strange. But she pointed to a living room that opened off the foyer, and I sat in one of the wingback chairs. It was a relief when she went back to what she was doing in the kitchen. I looked around, taking in a number of framed photos. I could hear sounds of brisk activity coming from the back of the house, and after a moment, Bethany singing.
“Oh, the blood of Jesus, it washes white as snow…”
It dawned on me that all of the photos I saw were of Carson. I stood up and walked around the room a little. I could not find a single picture that included Liondra or Danielle.
I saw more photos on the wall next to the stairs and drifted over to examine them. Childhood pictures of Carson, with people I assumed were his father and grandparents. Still no Liondra or Danielle. Having looked at all the pictures, I found myself at the top of the stairs, and suddenly felt like I had crossed a line, intruded into forbidden territory. But my uneasiness drove me to want to look at Danielle’s room, to see how she was living.
There were four doors off the upstairs landing, one of which was closed. Of the three open doors, one was obviously a bathroom. The first bedroom I peeked in seemed to be Bethany’s. Another framed picture of Carson, on the dresser.
But the other open door looked like a child’s room, with a twin bed and baby-blue walls. I stepped inside and looked around. Toys and books. A little red jacket thrown on a chair. A snail-shaped nightlight. Pictures of planets stuck to the wall with thumbtacks. It was the room of a normal, well-cared-for kid.
“What do you think you’re doing? You have no right to barge in here and snoop around my house like this!” Bethany had appeared in the doorway, and she was furious.
“I just wanted to see her room,” I explained, feeling like I had been caught. I could hardly meet her cold angry eyes.
“Unbelievable,” she said. “But what else would you expect, from her family.” I looked up at her then, feeling my own temper rise, but she was implacable. “You need to leave. Now.”
Despite the bossy tone, there was something pleading in her eyes. Regardless of my anger at her insinuations, I began to feel sorry for her. As a parent, she had suffered the worst loss possible, and not many grandparents expect to find themselves raising their child’s child. By the looks of things, she was managing the best she could, and my showing up might just be a painful reminder to both of them of what they had lost.
“All right, I’m going,” I told her. “Maybe you’re right, I don’t need to disrupt your lives any more.” As I headed toward the stairs, I saw her expression soften, with relief and maybe gratitude. She didn’t say anything else.
Twilight was starting to turn into dark as I left, and the rain was harder and colder. I resigned myself to an uncomfortable walk back to the ferry landing, and started up the drive.
I’m a little confused about what happened next. What I remember is, a loud booming clap of thunder, that made me reflexively freeze and look around. As I Iooked back at the house, I saw what looked like the silhouette of a woman in the window of an upstairs room, dimly outlined by the lightning. Then I noticed Bethany, still standing in the open front door, watching me go. I say this is how I remember it, but I know it isn’t possible, because I saw the lightning after I turned around, and couldn’t have heard the thunder a second earlier. So I guess I don’t really know what it was, that sent a bolt of shock through me, making me stop and look. In my mind it all seemed to happen at once.
I quickly, instinctively turned away again, so that Bethany could not see my shocked reaction to the glimpse of that other woman. My heart was pounding as I continued down the drive, until I was out of her sight. I thought about the layout of the upstairs rooms, and knew without a doubt that that window was the room with the closed door, the one I hadn’t gone in. Something about the sight of that shadow in the window made the fog of suspicion that had been with me all along crystallize painfully into a hard knot in my stomach. I didn’t understand what I had seen, but I knew I couldn’t leave yet. In fact, I almost cried right then, thinking how close I had come to walking away.
But I also knew the door of that house was probably now locked against me. I got strategic then. Looking around at the few neighboring houses, I saw an Amazon package on the porch of one. Without a second’s hesitation, I grabbed it and headed back up Bethany’s long driveway. There were no lights on in the front of the house, so I figured she was back in the kitchen, making her awful videos. I put the package on the porch where I thought it would be visible from the peephole in the door, then rang the doorbell and ducked down out of sight. After a few seconds, the front door started to open, and I shoved hard against it. Bethany let out a little scream and tried to grab at my arm, but I wrenched away and went up the stairs. I could hear her calling me names, but I didn’t listen.
I opened the closed door, and the first thing I noticed was a sick, sour smell. I flipped the switch, but no light came on. But with the light from the landing I could see that the room was mostly empty, with what looked like a little pile of old sheets or clothes at the far end. Bethany, who had followed me up, dug into me with clawlike fingers, and I elbowed her off of me. She shrieked, “I’m calling the police!”
But she didn’t. I think the fact that she didn’t proves more than anything that she knew exactly what she was doing. Because when I went to the sad little heap in the corner, I found Danielle. She was still alive, though I wasn’t sure at first. The doctor at the hospital I took her to said she hadn’t eaten much lately, and had probably been lying there, too weak to move, for a couple of days. Bethany is now trying to claim that she had just been sick with the flu.
I may not need to tell you this, but Danielle resembles Liondra, not Carson.