Page 43 of The Last to Vanish
She ran back through the foyer just as a voice called her name from around the corner. “Elsie? Was that Dad?”
A woman leaned around the wood-paneled wall, taking in the scene in the front foyer. Her face shifted quickly from confusion to a warm and welcoming smile.
“Hi?” she said tentatively, stepping into the room. “Abby, right?”
I tucked my hair behind my ear. “Yes, hi, so sorry to stop by like this. I was just in the area, and I was hoping to catch Harris. I know it’s the weekend.” I winced, for impact. I struggled to remember his wife’s name—she was young, from some other state, Florida, I thought, and not often talked about because the only thing there was to discuss was how infrequently we saw her. She had shoulder-length strawberry blond hair and brown eyes likeher daughter and a softness to both her features and her voice that made me see her through Celeste’s eyes, thinking she didn’t look like she could do the hard things—Samantha. “It’s nice to see you, Samantha. Sorry to interrupt your morning.”
Her smile stretched even wider, if possible. “No, no, come on in.” She had a warmth, an innocence, and I could see why Harris liked her, why she liked Harris. Her hair was pulled back into a loose ponytail, and she wore leggings and an oversize shirt. She was barefoot, like her daughter. The house smelled of syrup and home, and I got a flash of nostalgia for Saturday mornings growing up, when my mom and I used cookie cutters to make pancakes in the shape of hearts.
“I’m sorry, though,” Samantha said. “Harris is out on a call. But you’re welcome to wait, he should be back anytime now. There’s coffee, if you’re interested.”
“Oh, thanks but I’ve had my quota of caffeine for the morning,” I said. I hadn’t, but I didn’t want to get caught up here. Not with Alice’s bag in the back seat, and Trey back at the inn with questions, and Georgia waiting for me to return her car. “I guess that would explain why his cell went to voice mail. I should’ve taken the hint. But I was in the area.”
“Well, it’s nice to get to see you again. How’s it going out at the inn?” she asked.
I was trying to remember when we’d actually interacted last. When Elsie was a young toddler and they’d both stopped by the inn to bring Harris lunch, during our closed workweek two years ago? Most life updates were passed along through Harris. My world had pulled tighter over the last decade, the inn at the center.
But I was realizing how set apart Samantha was here, all alone, with her daughter. I could feel the bones of everything this place used to be, the past not even out of sight. The wallpaper that still lined the living room must’ve been here from when Harris grew up, raisedby his grandparents in this very house. She’d done what she could, adding a family picture of the three of them at the heart of the foyer, and along the wall of the living room was a series of photographs—a trail in the woods, a meandering creek, a burst of flowers—which somehow worked with the floral beige wallpaper behind it.
“It’s all right. A busy time of year.” I shifted on my feet, easing toward the exit again.
“He mentioned you had some issues up there.” She looked over her shoulder, into the living room. “You’re not worried?”
My eyes met hers, and I wondered what exactly Harris had told her—how worriedhehad been, that he hadn’t quite let on.
“The missing journalist,” she added when I didn’t respond, keeping her voice low, in case Elsie was listening—though she was currently sitting less than a foot from the flat-screen TV.
“No, I mean, yes, it’s horrible.” I shook my head.
She nodded slowly. “It’s always a visitor, right?” The corner of her mouth twitched. “Everyone in that town acts like it’sfine. It’s not fine.”
I shook my head. “No,” I repeated. “It’s not fine.”
“What do you make of it?” she asked, biting the side of her thumbnail.
I shook my head rapidly, because I didn’t have an answer. Because that’s why I was here, with Alice’s bag in the back seat of my car. “I don’t know,” I said. The most honest thing I could say.
She sighed, looking around the place. “Living here was supposed to be temporary,” she said. “Then there was always a reason to keep staying… But after that journalist…” She pressed her thin lips together. “I want to go, and Harris promised we would, but do you think he ever can, really? When all his business was built up around the people there?”
I noticed she called Cutter’s Passthere. That she saw herself as an outsider as well.
“It’s a nice place to live,” I said, because what could one say when standing in a family home, at the edge of the place that had slowly become my own over the last decade.
She laughed, then stopped. “Okay,” she said, drawing out the word. “How long does it take, to feel like that?” she asked, and then she added, “It’s just, I’ve been here over four years, and everyone’s friendly, but…”
I grimaced. “Yeah, it takes a little while to get a feel for everyone…”
“Harris tells me I should go to Springwood for anything I need. Not that I know many people there either…”
The question she was asking: Was there something, really, to fear in Cutter’s Pass? No wonder she was lonely out here. It helped in this place to have someone vouch for you. Harris should’ve been enough. Everyone called him in for business, from the sheriff’s office to the elementary school, but otherwise he was kept at arm’s length, too. And he kept us the same. But I had a feeling Harris knew more about this place than he let on—something he wanted to protect his wife from, and I was disturbing that.
I was struck suddenly with the realization that I shouldn’t have come here.
“I have to go. Will you tell Harris I stopped by?” I asked, trying to make a polite exit.
Just then, I saw Harris’s work van pull up the gravel drive. “There he is,” Samantha said with a smile.
“Thanks,” I said, hand on the doorknob. “I don’t want to take any more of your time.”
