Chapter 19
Chapter Nineteen
R ick and Ida were in their bedroom with the door cracked to keep tabs on Frankie. It was ten thirty, and Frankie hadn’t emerged in several hours—not since she’d used the bathroom at seven thirty. Nellie was clued in on the situation and petrified. She’d knocked on the door several times, trying to get Frankie to let her in. But it was no use. Nellie was now in her bedroom, sobbing softly. Ida’s heart felt cracked open.
Rick sat at the edge of the bed with his shoulders drooped. At odd intervals, he tugged his dark curls and glanced at Ida, hoping she had a new strategy, a fresh plan of attack. Ida called Susan Sheridan to tell her about the money, and Susan said, “I’ll call my guy immediately.” She then asked if Ida wanted to alert the police.
“In the morning,” she said.
But the truth was that she didn’t want to involve the police at all.
“What if she’s telling the truth?” Ida said now, hurrying over to sit next to Rick and take his hand. “What if she really did get cash from her client? Maybe they wanted to pay her under the table. It happens all the time. Right?”
Rick shook his head. “There are too many coincidences here. And I’ve watched too many films to know there are never coincidences.”
“But this isn’t a film,” Ida protested. “This is our daughter.”
Her voice warbled, getting louder than she’d planned. Tears stained her cheeks.
“She’s had such a difficult summer,” Rick said. “If this guy really is manipulating her, he knew to target her. He knew she was struggling. That she’d be open to it.”
Ida let out a wail and snapped her hand over her mouth. She didn’t want to cause a scene.
Suddenly, the door to Frankie’s bedroom blasted open. Frankie stood in the hallway, breathing heavily, glaring at them. She wore a big ratty T-shirt and a pair of Rick’s old soccer shorts. This is my daughter. She’s looking at me like she hates me.
“I can hear everything you’re saying!” Frankie cried. “How is that supposed to make me feel?”
Ida was on her feet. “Honey, we’re just worried about you.”
“And I’ve told you not to be worried about me,” Frankie shot back.
Ida wrung her hands and looked at Rick. She didn’t want him to fly off the handle. He’d yelled at the girls maybe three or four times in their lives, and none of those times had ended well. Tears. Slammed doors. Apologies. But we’re all still a family. We’re all still here. We’ve gone through thick and thin together. We’ll get through this, too.
“Should we call the police, Frankie?” Rick asked now. His tone was dark.
Frankie’s legs shook. “What? No!”
“We don’t know what to make of this,” Rick said. “You’ve been running around with some older guy. Some guy who probably doesn’t have your best interests at heart.”
“You just don’t think anyone could ever like me!” Frankie said. “Not now. Now that I’ve gained weight.”
Ida felt the words like a crater. “Honey, you are so beautiful. So, so beautiful. You are worthy of every kind of love.”
But it was too late. Frankie’s self-hatred and sorrow from the previous few months had become a storm. She shot back into her bedroom and slammed the door so hard that it seemed to shake the whole house. Nellie jumped out of her bedroom and glared first at Frankie’s door and then at Rick.
Nellie rasped, “She already feels so awful about herself, Dad.”
Rick hung his head in his hands and shook it. Ida touched Rick’s shoulder.
“That isn’t what he meant at all, honey,” Ida whispered.
Nellie groaned and knocked again on Frankie’s door. “Let me in, Frank!” she cried. “Please.”
But Frankie had no plans to emerge. Not tonight.
Ida faded in and out of consciousness that night. With the door to her bedroom still cracked, she tossed and turned, often touching Rick’s shoulder, shaking him awake to say something like, “We need to make sure she’s safe.” Usually, she was hardly awake when she said it. Rick was hardly awake when he answered, “We will. We’ll keep her safe.”
Ida got up at six thirty and padded downstairs to make herself a pot of coffee and brainstorm what to do next. It was stormy outside, winds rocking up from the Nantucket Sound and plastering themselves across the house. The windows shook in their panes.
Nellie appeared a few minutes later. There were bags under her eyes, and her hair was greasy and wild. It was clear she hadn’t slept.
Rick appeared in the kitchen not long after that.
Together, the three Benson family members, who loved Frankie more than anything else in the world, waited downstairs for some sign of her. Seven turned to seven fifteen, which turned to seven thirty-five. Every second felt painful.
Finally, Nellie got up. “I’m going to break in.”
Ida was wordless, watching as Rick and Nellie searched the kitchen drawers for something that would help them pick Frankie’s lock. They opted for a wine opener, a slender knife, and a few toothpicks. Nellie maybe had a hairpin upstairs; she was going to check.
Upstairs, they ran. Ida hurried up behind them although she’d begun to fear breaking down Frankie’s door. It reminded her too much of her mother and her sister, Sophie. It reminded her of aching with worry, wondering if they’d tear down the door and find Sophie dead.
Frankie’s not dead. She’s never been high. I would have known if she was high.
But Ida knew there was always a first time to get high. Maybe Frankie had decided to experiment? Perhaps it was already over before it had begun?
Ida was sick to her stomach. She sat in a ball in the hallway and watched her husband and daughter pick the lock like con artists in an action film.
It didn’t take long to pick the lock. But when the door opened, it revealed an empty room. A room with a made bed and a clean floor. A room with no Frankie.
Nellie stomped across the room and tore open the closet as though her sister were playing an elaborate game of hide-and-seek. Ida got up, weeping, and entered her daughter’s room. She sensed she’d lost something, as though she’d been carrying something and let it slip through her fingers.
Rick went to the window. It was open, and the wind and rain blasted in from the storm. Due to their air-conditioning, it wasn’t likely that Frankie had opened the window for any other reason save for escaping.
Together, the three Bensons discussed the route Frankie must have taken out the window onto the ledge, over the roof of the garage, and then down into the bushes on the opposite side.
“She must have had help,” Rick said.
And sure enough, when Rick, Ida, and Nellie ran outside into the storm, they found marks where a ladder must have helped bring Frankie to safety from the “horrors” of her home. Rick’s face was difficult to read. He scratched his beard and stalked around the yard. Above them, lightning struck through dark clouds, illuminating the horrible day.
Ida knew that the yacht cruises would be postponed for today.
It didn’t take long for the police to arrive. In the living room, Ida told them what she’d seen: her daughter, the cash. She explained how she thought it might relate to the extended theft at the Nantucket Sunset Cruisers.
Nellie told them everything she knew about Zane. “He’s maybe six-two or six-one,” she said, “with dark curly hair. Dark eyes. Handsome.” Her voice shook.
“Do you know his last name?”
Nellie shook her head. “He offered Frankie gigs. Side hustle stuff. She said it was going to be copywriting.”
“Did she show you any of the copywriting she did for him?” one of the officers asked.
Nellie shook her head and looked at the ground.
The police didn’t have evidence. They had very little to go on.
Even worse, they said, “Frankie is twenty-three years old. Unfortunately, if she wants to leave your home, she has every right to do so.”
They promised they would look into the man named Zane. They promised to keep searching for who might have stolen the money from the Nantucket Sunset Cruisers. They promised to put all the pieces together.
But Rick punched the table the minute they drove their car away from the house. “They don’t know anything,” he muttered. “They’re useless.”
Ida hurried into the kitchen to make tea. Her hands shook so much that she struggled to pour the water and remove the tea bags from their plastic wrapping. Nellie and Rick were listless in the living room, occasionally saying something that the other didn’t respond to.
“Can’t understand what got into her,” Rick muttered.
“Like I told her that guy is a total loser?” Nellie said.
Ida brought them tea, but they didn’t touch it. Later, she would toss it down the sink and wash the mugs with piping-hot water.
It wasn’t till late morning that Ida had to call her sister.
Sophie answered on the second ring. Her bright voice was warm and loving—so unlike it had been when she’d been using drugs.
Ida couldn’t suppress her sobs over the phone.
“What’s going on?” Sophie demanded.
“Can you please come over?” Ida breathed.
Sophie was there within the next twenty minutes. She’d stockpiled her car with snacks she knew Ida liked—tortilla chips with salsa, fancy cheeses, wine that Sophie couldn’t drink but was happy to share, and cookies. But Ida just threw her arms around her little sister and cried and cried.
Sophie and Ida sat in the kitchen, and Ida told her everything. Sophie listened and stitched her eyebrows together. Knowing what she knew about the world and having experienced what she’d experienced, Sophie was not shocked by anything. Ida appreciated that about her. There was no judgment.
Again, Ida wanted to apologize for every time Ida had ever judged Sophie for her addiction. For the ache in her heart she couldn’t shake.
“But she’s never seemed like she was using,” Ida explained.
Sophie bowed her head.
“I would have been able to tell. Right?” Ida asked.
“Every time I’ve seen Frankie, she’s seemed quite clear to me,” Sophie said after a moment.
“And you would be able to tell. Right?” Ida sounded frantic.
“I think so. I do.”
“And does this Zane guy sound like anyone you knew back then?” Ida asked. It wasn’t so long ago that Sophie was still using. Things didn’t change so quickly. Did they?
“Do you have a photo?” Sophie asked.
“We tried to google him, but nothing came up,” Ida said.
“I honestly can’t say,” Sophie admitted. “There were tons of younger guys. Handsome guys. Manipulative guys. But addicts and drug dealers come in all shapes and sizes. I once bought drugs from a fifteen-year-old cheerleader.” Sophie raised her shoulders as though she was done with feeling guilty about her past.
Sophie reached across the table and took Ida’s hand. Ida burst into tears all over again. She thought, Is this the first time Sophie has been there for me instead of the other way around? But she countered that quickly with a no. Sophie had always been there. She’d always loved Ida. And that had been a powerful force in Ida’s life, whether she recognized it or not.