Chapter 11
ELEVEN
FRANKIE
Now
Frankie swallowed the single-pour Scotch Kayla had handed her in one gulp, closing her eyes against the burn.
“Another,” she said, holding out the glass.
“Frankie…”
“Another,” Frankie insisted.
Her friend obliged, and after gulping down drink number two, her core finally started defrosting.
It was common knowledge that “My Only Child” was inspired by the harrowing events when a woman who worked with Estelle had abducted Frankie as a toddler.
In Estelle’s darkest moments, writing the lyrics had provided her comfort and hope—something to hold on to while she prayed for Frankie’s safe return.
“I don’t get it,” Frankie said, her hands clutching the empty glass so tightly that her knuckles ached. “Why would she have lied about this?”
Kayla picked up the notebook that sat on the coffee table before them in Estelle’s living room.
“I don’t know. Maybe she wrote it earlier, and then when you were taken, she came to associate the words with you?
I admit it’s a little strange, but it is possible there’s a perfectly logical explanation. ”
Frankie let out a dark huff. “I seem to be looking for those a lot lately.”
The world had always been a logical place to her before Estelle’s death. The days had followed each other in predictable patterns. A school year led to summer break which led to another school year. Practice made perfect. Choices led to expected outcomes. Questions had answers.
She’d gotten up each morning and had breakfast with Estelle before they’d gone to work.
At Starview, their days had unfolded like a perfectly choreographed dance—students arriving and departing, staff meetings, parent check-ins, a coffee run.
Even the music that had flowed from the practice rooms followed organized principles and orderly rhythms.
She hadn’t imagined these things. She’d lived them. They’d been real.
So why was it feeling more and more like that reality held things she’d missed?
“Even if you’re right, I can’t just let this go,” Frankie said.
“If we’re auctioning off Mom’s things, we have a duty to know they’re legit.
Mom always called this my song, but if it’s not about me…
” Frankie shook her head, willing the buzz from the alcohol to numb the hurt rising inside her.
“I could even understand if she invented a story for the press, but why lie to me about it? That’s what I don’t get.
I mean, did it even happen? Maybe she made the whole thing up.
” She flung her arms out and flopped back on the couch.
“Oh, come on, Frankie. That’s the Scotch talking,” Kayla said.
“Is it?” Frankie sat back up again. “You have to admit the questions are stacking up.”
“And you’ll figure them out. Everything will be fi—”
“Don’t say it. Sorry, but that word is starting to feel like a jinx.”
She gnawed at her lip, her gaze sweeping along white cotton curtains, full bookshelves, framed photos, and potted plants.
It landed on the grand piano that Estelle had splurged on when they’d moved in—Frankie’s first permanent home in her then eleven-year-old life, afforded to them by the success of “My Only Child.” The lore of their early days had been threaded into Frankie’s conscious mind as naturally as their lives unfolded, and never once had she questioned any of it. She’d had no reason to.
“So what are you going to do?” Kayla asked. “As much as I’m with you on verifying the legitimacy of our auction items, it’s not like you can make your concerns public.”
No, she had to be smart about it. Dig without seemingly digging. “Like you said, I’ll figure something out,” she said. “But in the meantime, the fewer people who know, the better.”
Most of all, this could not reach Orla Monroe. Frankie hadn’t heard from the reporter since the night at the library, but she’d be foolish to count her out. Something like this would surely be blood in the water for a woman who called herself a shark.
After several Internet searches about Estelle and kidnappings in the early 1990s that yielded little but references to the song and interviews where Mom had talked about the ordeal, Frankie conceded that it was unlikely she’d find what she was looking for there.
No one had ever been convicted of the crime, and Frankie was unsure if the woman responsible had even been arrested once the police found her.
She’d been an acquaintance of Estelle’s in the music scene, and since Estelle had known the woman’s reason was desperation over not being able to have children of her own, she’d had compassion enough to solve the matter quietly on the condition that the woman sought help.
“Once I had you back, I decided I didn’t want to ruin her life,” Estelle had told Frankie when she’d asked years later, adding that everyone deserved a second chance.
Around age seven, Frankie had gone through a phase where she couldn’t go to sleep, convinced that this faceless woman would return for her, but Estelle had assured her she was far away and that Frankie didn’t have to worry, and before long, her fears had dispersed.
Since then, she hadn’t given it much thought because, in a way, it held no greater significance to her than an ancient account of her falling down while learning to walk or mispronouncing early words.
If not for the song of course.
The song complicated everything because at least one thing about it was a lie, and now that this strand had frayed from their neatly woven history, Frankie had no choice but to pull at it.
Hopefully, this unraveling would lead to a place where she could verify both the authenticity of the song and its circumstances so that they could use the notebook in the auction without reservations, while also explaining the incongruences in Estelle’s story. But if it didn’t…
Well, Frankie didn’t want to think about that. Not yet anyway.
The online searches offering no answers, Frankie turned to her second option—the library.
During her Thursday lunch, she strolled into the bright building where the sun flickered down in shafts from large skylights. She bypassed the information desk and set her course for the research corner and, more specifically, the small sitting area outside the microfiche room.
Hushed laughter reached her ears before she turned down the final stack, but it quieted when she reached the seated ladies responsible for the merriment.
The Word Birds were in the middle of a game of Scrabble, the board almost full on the round table between them.
Discarded crossword puzzles sat on the couch between Irma and Vilma, two sisters who’d once run the town’s flower shop, and a deck of cards stuck out of former third grade teacher Mrs. Villanueva’s belt bag.
The fourth seat where Mrs. Blunt normally sat was empty, but Frankie didn’t let that stop her.
“Hello, ladies,” she said. “How’s the wordsmithing going today?”
Even though she didn’t know these women personally, there had been no question in her mind where she’d turn for assistance when the Internet didn’t deliver.
It was common knowledge in Aspen Creek that the Word Birds knew their way around old records and a database or two—in fact, they’d once done the ancestry charts for the whole city council—and that was exactly the kind of expertise Frankie needed.
“If you hold your horses for another minute or two, we’ll know,” Vilma said, placing down a J, U, K, and E, to extend the already spelled out word “box” into “jukebox.” She pumped her fist and turned to her sister. “Beat that if you can.”
After another two tense rounds, Vilma was crowned the victor, and as Mrs. Villanueva started sweeping the tiles into their box, Irma asked Frankie to sit.
“I take it you didn’t come to see sissy gloat,” she said, pulling a pencil from behind her ear before spreading her crossword out before her. “How are you, Frankie dear?”
It should have felt odd to be so familiarly addressed by someone she’d barely spoken to before, but by now, Frankie had reconciled the fact that everyone knew of her and Estelle whether she liked that or not. And if she wasn’t mistaken, Vilma and Irma had both been at the funeral.
“Keeping busy,” Frankie said. “I’m sure you’ve heard I’m putting together an auction to benefit the school.”
“So wonderful,” Mrs. Villanueva said. “Will there be scratch tickets? I love me some scratch tickets.”
“Not sure about scratch,” Frankie said, “but there will be a raffle with prizes in addition to the silent and live auctions.”
Mrs. Villanueva clasped her hands together in delight.
“Anyway,” Frankie continued, treading carefully with how to phrase her solicitation without giving away too much.
“I’m doing some research about, um, Estelle’s early career and songwriting.
Among other things. And since I could use some help with that, I figured I’d ask you all. No one knows microfiche like you do.”
“That is true.” Vilma nodded sagely. “Although technically, Thora is the one to talk to. Our eyes are not what they were.” She gestured between herself and her sister. “And Ruthie finds the controls somewhat precarious with her tremors.”
As if to corroborate that statement, Mrs. Villanueva held up a crooked hand, demonstrating its movement. “I can barely get through a game of cards these days I’m afraid.”
“And where is Mrs. Blunt today?” Frankie asked.
“At home, I should think,” Irma said. “She’s got that poor grandson of hers mending fences and painting porch chairs and I don’t know what else, and she couldn’t possibly leave him to it without supervision, could she?
” The three old ladies exchanged amused tuts and indulgent eye rolls. “Not very hands-off, our Thora.”
“You should go distract her,” Vilma said. “Give dear Owen a moment to breathe.”
“And then tell her to get her bum knee down here,” Mrs. Villanueva added. “Three people do not a bridge game make.”