When We Let Go by Delancey Stewart (read with me .txt) đź“•
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“He didn’t see me.”
Jensen was quiet, and I felt a need to know what the plan was. What would happen now?
“What will you do?” I asked.
Jensen cocked his head to the side and narrowed his eyes, as if trying to decide whether he should tell me anything. “We’ll go see what’s buried up there.” Simple. Of course. “First thing. And if it’s what we think it might be, we’ll make the arrest and get this thing put to bed.”
I nodded. Right. Make the arrest. It was ludicrous, but I was relieved to know that they’d probably arrest him by tomorrow, and that I wouldn’t need to call to cancel our date. It’d be cancelled by default when they took him to prison. For murder.
I still couldn’t wrap my head around it.
“Will you let me know?” I tried to think of a reason why they would. “Just so I can, you know, get closure?”
The officers looked at each other and seemed to pass some kind of information. I wondered momentarily if Rawley ever spoke.
“That’s pretty non-standard,” Jensen said. “But if we make an arrest I’ll call you. And I’ll call you if we don’t.”
“Thank you,” I said.
“We need the memory card from the camera,” he said, holding it out to me to remove.
I ejected it. I’d put in a new one before my hike, so there wasn’t much on it besides trees and animals. And the evidence that would put Connor Charles in prison. “You won’t have to tell him about the photographs, will you? That I took them?”
“No,” Jensen said. “But you don’t need to worry, either. We’ll make sure you’re safe.”
“Okay.” My voice was small and I suddenly felt exhausted.
The officers left, and sadness sank down over me, turning my feet to lead and my heart to stone. I hoped I’d done the right thing.
When I returned home after burying my sister, I was in a quiet mood. I poured a glass of scotch and took it out onto the back deck to think. I wanted to drink to her memory, to her energy.
“Not everything needs a drink to commemorate it.” I could practically hear her voice, and I let myself pretend she was sitting there next to me, at my side, as she had been for so many years.
“Every event in our lives should be marked and appreciated in some way,” I said aloud. “And saying goodbye to you—really saying goodbye … That is something I want to make sure to respect.”
The ghost at my side remained silent after that, and I let my mind roam the vast store of memories I had of us. She’d been only eighteen months younger than I was, and because of the way our lives had turned out, we’d been inseparable. The only real time we’d been apart had been during the first year I went to college, but she’d joined me there just a year later, and our constancy had gone on. We were siblings, but we were like two sides of a coin, best friends. While other siblings fought, we were always of one mind. We didn’t always get along, but maybe we realized that with so many things set against us in the world, we needed each other.
Cathy’s death had been awful, and I’d felt like my soul was literally ripped in half. Maybe it was only beginning to mend.
“I miss you, little sister,” I told her, swallowing down the rest of my scotch.
I didn’t write that night. My sister’s spirit seemed to linger around the house, and I found myself content just to sit with her, to drink a little more than I probably should.
When the police came to the door, I was tipsy, which certainly didn’t help matters. But I was also truthful, and as much as I hated the thought of them disturbing Cathy just when I’d finally put her to rest, I knew it would be done, and what I wanted played very little part in anything.
“There was an eyewitness, Mr. Charles,” one of the detectives said. “Who took photographs of you burying something.”
My mind flew to Maddie, but then ratcheted back. Every tourist who hiked up there had a camera. It could have been anyone. And what had they taken photos of exactly? A grown man crying over a pile of dirt?
“You’ll do what you need to do. You’ll find I’m telling the truth. If you want me to, I’ll take you up there myself.”
“No need,” they’d said.
And I’d watched the police car leave my property and sent a silent apology to Cathy. “It’ll all be over soon,” I promised her. “And then we can both rest.”
The next morning I stayed in my bed long after the sun had pushed its exploring fingers through the louvered blinds in the front room of the trailer, covering the kitchen and couch in lines of yellow light. I stayed there until the phone rang next to me, displaying Connor’s name. I stayed in bed until the phone rang a second time, a half hour later. Officer Jensen. This time I sat up and answered it.
“Ms. Turner?”
“Yes, hello.”
“Just wanted to thank you for your information, and let you know that it turned out to be a false lead. I’ll leave your photo card for you at the post office.”
I sat up straighter. “What?”
“He was burying something, but not what we thought. There’s not enough here to make an arrest.”
I shook my head slowly, this information settling around me like dust. “What was he burying?”
Jensen paused, obviously considering how much to tell me. “An urn.”
“An urn? Like with ashes?” That was still creepy.
“Not a match for the missing girl, if you’re wondering.” He paused. “We were.”
I wondered how they’d figured that out so quickly, but realized they might have gone up and dug soon after we spoke. I imagined a team of police investigators with yellow tape, dark coats and flashlights, swarming up the side of my mountain. I guessed they could have had some kind of mobile forensics lab.
“Oh. Yes, okay. Thank you.” I hung up. What kind of urn was Connor burying, then? Whose ashes were in it? And what was I supposed to do now, go on a date with him as if nothing had happened?
I puttered around the trailer, trying to let my mind settle naturally on some new image of Connor. He’d moved from sexy and intriguing to terrifying and sociopathic over the course of just a few minutes yesterday when I’d discovered him digging off the trail. Now I wasn’t sure what to think. When I analyzed the facts as I understood them, I realized that not much had changed since he’d asked me out. There was no proof of him having done anything wrong, and no real reason why he would be any more dangerous to me now than he was the day before.
As the hours edged away, I decided that though I was confused, I was also relieved. I hadn’t wanted him to be a bad guy—part of what had been so hard yesterday had been the difficulty I’d had getting myself to fully accept that he was capable of murder. I wasn’t sure I’d gotten there at all. And so when it came time to either call him to cancel or take a shower and get ready for dinner, I still hadn’t decided what to do.
I picked up the phone, dialing Connor’s number.
“Maddie.” He sounded happy when he picked up the phone.
“Hey,” I said slowly. My voice was thin and hesitant.
“Uh-oh. What’s wrong?”
“I’m not feeling great. I don’t know if I can do dinner.” Why hadn’t I just said I couldn’t? Why did I leave the door open? “I mean, I can’t.”
“Oh.” Disappointment made his voice lower and my heart sunk a bit. “I’m so sorry. Is there anything I can do? Chicken soup or something?”
Guilt bubbled up in me over the sincerity in his voice. “No, I …” I dropped my head into my hand. What the hell was I doing? “I’m just …”
“You’re not sick, are you?” His voice was flat, emotionless.
I cringed. “No. Not really.”
“What happened?”
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