Page 44 of Gone Tonight
Catherine didn’t seem to hear me. She leaned even closer to the mutilated creature.
“Normal kids don’t do this!” I grabbed her arm, hard, and yanked her away.
Later, I noticed small purple bruises in the shape of my fingerprints marring her upper arm. It was a replica of the injury my mother had inflicted onmyarm the night I got her off Timmy. You know how parents always say, “This is going to hurt me more than it hurts you,” before they spank their child? I swear, it was true. Seeing those marks on her soft little arm gutted me.
But what I couldn’t—and still can’t—get out of my mind was Catherine’s expression when she looked up at me as I interrupted her examination of the dead squirrel. Instead of fear or disgust or sadness—any of the emotions you might expect to see in a little kid who’d just discovered a gory animal carcass—Catherine’s faded denim eyes were serene and gentle.
They were James’s eyes.
That whole long night, I didn’t sleep despite being so exhausted that every inch of me ached.
Even though I’m not scheduled to work at Sam’s today, I rise before the sun and quietly move to the kitchen to make coffee. I plan to do what I usually do on my days off: catch up on laundry, clean the kitchen and bathroom, and go to the library to do my checking.
Catherine’s door is shut. I’ve barely seen her in the last twenty-four hours. She didn’t come home until late last night, long after I’d gotten into bed.
Her absence feels significant.
I bring a mug of coffee into the living area and sit down on the couch, savoring my first sip. At times like these, when the apartment is quiet and the fresh slate of a new day is before me, it’s easier to pretend everything will work out. The mistakes I’ve made, the choices that may not be the right ones—all will be smoothed out in time. The road ahead will be easier than the bumpy portion I’ve traveled this far, I try to tell myself.
If 3 a.m. is the darkest hour of the soul, then dawn is the flip side. Few things conjure more hope in me than a sunrise.
On the coffee table in front of me is the journal Catherine bought, its title mocking me:Tell Me Your Life Story, Mom.
I pick it up and turn a few pages.
Maybe I can write down a nugget for Catherine and leave the page open for her to see. As a sort of peace offering, even though I’m not sure exactly why I feel the need to extend one.
I just have the feeling she’s upset with me.
Catherine doesn’t have many friends. All that moving around we did when she was young prevented her from forming enduring ties. Plus, school and work always took up so much of her time and energy she didn’t have a lot left over for socializing. It’s a little odd that she picked last night to go see a movie, so soon after Dr. Chen told us our days of spending meaningful time together were coming to an end.
I find a page in the journal that has the promptDescribe when you first knew you were going to be a mom. How did you feel?
This is both an easy and a hard question to answer.
I find a pen and write the truth.I felt everything all at once, Catherine. Terrified and happy and sad and determined and awed by the very thought of you. I felt everything. I still feel it all every single day.
CHAPTER SEVENTEENCATHERINE
Sunlight muscles through the cracks in my blinds. I can hear my mother moving around in the kitchen. Every sound has a precise meaning: the gentle bump is the cabinet door above the stove closing; the faint rushing is water flowing from the sink tap; and the gurgle signals the Mr. Coffee machine is doing its job.
I can’t keep avoiding her.
The terrible suspicion I felt yesterday hasn’t abated, but I’m not ready to share it with anyone yet.
I can barely acknowledge it myself.
I’ve heard of Munchausen syndrome by proxy, in which a parent—typically the mother—sickens their child with poisons or unnecessary medication. That manifestation of severe mental illness, which is a form of child abuse, gets a fair amount of media attention.
But this reverse Munchausen, or whatever it is, is something I’ve never heard of before. What kind of mother would go to incredible lengths to fake herowndisease for the sole purpose of keeping her daughter tied to her?
I rise and throw on cutoffs and a top, then head to the bathroom to wash my face and brush my teeth. I make no effort to keep mymovements quiet. There’s no reason to avoid warning my mother I’m about to appear.
When I walk into the living room, I see she has poured me a cup of coffee and left it on the table in front of the couch.
I reach for it and take a sip, then sit down next to her. “Thanks.”
“Did you have fun last night?”
