Chapter Eighty-One. Ingrid
CHAPTER EIGHTY-ONE
INGRID
I’ve brought my camera back out so I can capture this strange beauty pageant in the dark.
The silhouette of the audience against the snow-lit windows.
Sabrina’s clean back handspring in her silver unitard.
Hannah, her head shaved bare, her arms outstretched as she hits the high note.
Another contestant waiting side stage, exhaling a cloud of breath into the cold.
Near the windows, Travis mans the music. I can just see the shape of him past the blinding beam of the tripod lights.
Ben sits alone in the corner. A man hovers nearby, clearly posted there to keep watch.
And I realize—that’s been Ben’s whole life in Anhalt since he moved back, what, twenty years ago?
Hidden in a house that used to be a home, once filled with his mother’s cooking and the noise of family, now only his father, drinking himself to death.
The woods and the river he loved, haunted by Izzy’s ghost. And every time he came into town—just to pick up a package at the post office, to buy a week’s worth of groceries—he had to face the same stares.
The boys he used to play football with, now grown men who look at him like he’s a killer.
I haven’t spoken to him since he got here, not really. Just my panicked outburst—What were you thinking? And I haven’t tried again, not with the weight of the whole town’s eyes pressing down. Not with my parents watching.
But, they’re all distracted now. So I slip away from the stage, picking my way over the crisscrossing extension cords.
I pass by the boys, Kayden, Billy, and Teddy, hunched against the frosted windows, a phone balanced between them and plugged into a power strip. Some video plays, something they must’ve downloaded when the internet was stable. But then I catch a phrase—“twenty-five years of secrets”—and freeze.
“Isabelle Whitmore was going places. She dreamt of one day traveling the world.” It’s the low, deliberate cadence of a man trying to sound more important than he is. But he keeps going, repeating exact details I divulged to Travis over dinner.
My stomach lurches. I turn and snatch the phone from Kayden’s hand.
“Hey!” he says.
I jab the pause button before the voice can continue. “Where did you get this?”
Kayden blinks up at me, defensive. “It’s just a podcast. Everyone’s listening to it.”
Heat floods my face. I whirl around. Travis stands beside the speaker, watching Sabrina’s acrobatic act, waiting for his cue with the music.
I march straight to him, slam the phone against his chest. “You used me.”
For a moment, he has the audacity to look confused, but when he glances down, sees his own podcast clearly on the screen, his face falls. “I didn’t use you, Ingrid. I like you.”
I scoff, frustration like a vine up the core of me.
I don’t care if he likes me. I think of Izzy lying on the front lawn picking dandelion petals.
He loves me, he loves me not. I care that he tricked me.
That I could be so easily tricked. That I told him things I haven’t told anyone else, and why?
Because his cheek dimples when he smiles?
Because he spun me a story about scattering his granddad’s ashes at the lake?
I feel stupid and angry, and worst of all, I feel broken.
Like I have no compass for people. I hand out trust and suspicion like I’m throwing darts blindfolded.
“Look, this,” he says, pointing to the podcast. “It’s important to me, okay?
I’m a journalist. I care about what happened to your sister.
People care. Lots of people, Ingrid. There are whole subreddits dedicated to this story.
People want to know what happened. I emailed you.
I called you. I left, like, four voicemails. But you never responded. No one did.”
Delete and block. That’s what I’ve always done.
I imagine Travis back in Indiana, googling Izzy’s name, trolling through internet theories, combing my social media pages.
Back in the bar, when he sent me that drink, when he flashed me that smile, he knew exactly who I was.
And every word out of his mouth after that has been calculated, tailored to reel me in.
He wanted a story, and he was willing to do anything to get it. Suddenly, a sick thought blindsides me. “Oh my God. Was it you? Did you send me a note? An invitation? Just tell me the truth.”
But the confusion on his face is genuine.
He has no idea what I’m talking about. He wasn’t the one who sent me that invitation.
“I sent you emails,” he says again. “Messaged you on Instagram. On everything. I just wanted an interview. There is so little information out there about this case, because no one in this town talks. But then I got here, and I realized that they will talk, just not to a reporter, you know? And, man, do they talk.” He actually smiles, like he’s proud of himself.
“I got people to talk. Me. I did that. And then the kids found those bones in The Hollow.” A quick, stunned laugh escapes him, like he still can’t believe his own luck.
“My dad didn’t get it. Didn’t think a podcast could be a real job. ” He puts air quotes around the words.
I think of his trio of impressive brothers, of baby Travis, the mama’s boy, mediocre in a family where the bar is unattainably high.
“But now I’ve gone viral,” he says, his eyes widening at the word. I was addicted to attention, he’d told me. And I had been charmed. That’s the word Mom had used for him earlier today. He’s a real charmer, isn’t he? And what is a charmer but someone who casts a spell, who seduces, who deceives?
“Those bones?” I say quietly, repeating his words back to him.
His brow twitches. “You know what I mean.” He tries to reach out and put a hand to my arm, but I pull away.
“You don’t care about Izzy.” She was never a person to him. And neither was I. We were just content.
“I care about the truth,” he says. “It’s like you with your photography. You said a photo captures a single true moment in time, right? That’s all I’m doing. We’re the same, really.”
He looks so earnest when he says it, like he truly believes he’s doing something noble. Like he has fooled even himself. And I almost feel sorry for him.
“No, Travis,” I say. “We aren’t the same.”
I turn from him. Behind me, the boys gape up at us, and I toss Kayden his phone back.
“Dude, is this really your podcast?” Kayden asks, staring up at Travis.
“Wait,” Billy says, grabbing the phone, scrolling down through episodes. “This is all … our shit. Stuff we told you.”
Teddy pushes to his feet. “You’ve been hanging out with us just to—what—fill your podcast? That’s fucked-up, man.”
Travis opens his mouth, fumbling for an answer, but the boys are standing now, their voices piling over his, accusations tumbling, overlapping, relentless.
Because I wasn’t the only person Travis Magnuson tricked.
My heart still hammers, blood rushing hot through my veins, I’m so angry that the cold draft slipping across the back of my neck almost feels good.
Almost. Until I realize there shouldn’t be a draft.
Not with every door and window bolted tight.
I turn. Their voices blur behind me. Travis’s excuses are drowning under the boys’ outrage, but I’m not listening anymore.
I am being drawn down the dark corridor toward that red exit sign, like a moth who doesn’t know better. As the sounds of the pageant—the music and the crowd’s applause—fade, the air grows colder, tighter, raising the hair along my arms, every nerve strung tight.
Then I see it: the door cracked open to the storm.