Chapter Twelve
Back in the car, Midge learns that, as expected, there’s nothing in the Greene family’s background to suggest there’s more to Sarah’s story than her mother has revealed to Midge.
Without so much as a parking ticket among them, both parents and her brother have sterling reputations.
So does Sarah herself. Honor roll, church choir, volunteers once a week reading aloud to sight-impaired nursing home residents . . .
She’s definitely a good girl. On paper, anyway.
But that’s exactly what people would have thought about Mary Beth Winterfield back in the day.
The third Winterfield sister was the family’s spirited rebel, but she didn’t get into significant trouble as a young teenager.
That came later—the significant trouble, like robbery and drugs. But the worst was yet to come.
Even now, the mere thought of her makes Midge’s stomach churn.
She drives along Shore Street, keeping an eye out for Sarah.
This would be the most direct route between her house and church, and it’s a main artery in Mulberry Bay, parallel to Main Street, along the water.
It can be a little desolate, depending on the season and time of day.
But right now, on the cusp of a holiday weekend, the area is full of people.
If Sarah walked this way to and from Congregational, someone would have seen her.
At the waterfront park, families are setting up coolers and barbecue supplies in the timber-and-stone pavilions. Charcoal grills waft fragrant smoke that permeates the car’s closed windows. Ribs, steaks . . . is that sausage and peppers?
Midge’s stomach growls. She wonders what Kelly is planning for dinner. She texted earlier saying she’s still at a doctor’s appointment with her mother, and that her decorator, Linden, is at Haven Cliff and will let them in if they get there before she does.
Talia wrote back that traffic is heavy, and her ETA keeps getting pushed back.
On a case so I may be a little late myself, Midge wrote.
Stopping to let a gaggle of pedestrians cross in front of her, she notes that the pebbly town beach is lined with umbrellas, the sparkling water teeming with bathers. It would be so nice to have a swim before the beach closes at dusk, but she has a job to do.
She drives on, past the Dive Inn. It’s one of Midge’s favorite haunts even now that its long-peeling white clapboards are freshly painted pink, the dartboard and pool table have been banished to make way for cushy banquettes, and the old graffiti-scratched, permanently sticky wooden bar top has been replaced with white marble.
A rollicking indoor-outdoor happy hour is underway.
Midge scans the outdoor patio and porch.
Long gone are the days when she knew every patron, and patrons were few.
There are no familiar faces in the horde of summer residents, weekenders, and trendy-looking young people who could be reality TV stars.
The waterfront municipal parking lot is packed. Midge sees license plates from neighboring states as well as Florida, and even a few from Canada. Mulberry Bay tourism has come a long, long way from the ghost town years of her childhood.
At the Landing, people are already milling around outside, waiting to be seated. Formerly a diner/coffee shop where both Talia and her mom Natalie waited tables, it’s been resurrected as an upscale restaurant with a yacht club vibe downstairs and a tiki bar on the outdoor deck above.
On the adjoining pier, anglers are fishing as boats come and go. Musicians are setting up for this evening’s concert in the bandstand, and a few early birds are facing the stage in lawn chairs.
Parked nearby, a couple of carnival food trucks are doing a brisk business. Cotton candy, funnel cakes, snow cones . . .
Midge imagines Sarah, backtracking through here after a long, sweaty walk to church and discovering that her Bible group had been canceled.
She would have definitely been overheated. Probably thirsty, possibly hungry.
Now that Midge has some distance from the Greene house and the reminders of Caroline and her family, the situation seems a little less ominous.
Sarah isn’t Caroline.
Sarah isn’t Junia Stanton.
Sarah is a teenage girl who’s likely just taking her time getting home on a hot summer day. She’s probably cooling off in an air-conditioned store or restaurant or lounging in a shady spot by the water. Yes, and she’s lost track of time—accidentally, or on purpose.
Her mother’s words echo back to Midge. I have ice cream right here in the freezer.
Okay, maybe her daughter respects the frugal practicality, but she must have been disappointed on some level.
And wouldn’t even the most obedient teenager be reluctant to rush home to scrub out garbage cans on an afternoon like this?
Not just the heat wave, but who wouldn’t want to have a little fun on one of the last days of summer?
At Congregational Memorial Church, she follows the short driveway around to the large parking lot. There are two vehicles: a black sedan in the far corner, and a white van close to the side entrance, where the offices are.
Midge pulls up alongside the van. Its sign reads Hot Cool Guys HVAC. The back doors are open, revealing tools and equipment.
She exits her car and glances around.
It’s peaceful here—so quiet compared to the bustle she left behind on Shore Street.
There’s a large grassy area behind the building.
She can see picnic tables, a swing set, and a life-size statue of Jesus perched in a rock garden, surrounded by plants with chewed leaves and decapitated flower heads.
Deer are responsible, Midge knows. They’ve done the same to the flowers in her own yard.
A familiar mucky dampness wafts in the humid air. The lake is back there, beyond the tangled vines and tall grasses at the property’s woodland edge.
Whirring wings dart from the dense foliage, iridescent in the sunlight. A dragonfly.
Midge eyes an opening in the undergrowth. A trail? It must lead back toward the water. Could Sarah have decided to go for a swim after discovering class was canceled?
There’s a No Trespassing sign posted at the edge of the woods, and a closer look tells Midge that there’s no trail. It’s just a slight opening where a couple of twiggy branches are snapped and the long grass is trampled, probably courtesy of deer accessing the rock garden buffet.
Trail or not, Sarah Greene doesn’t strike her as the kind of girl who’d go off into the woods alone.
Not like Caroline.
Not like Junia Stanton.
Then again, there’s more to both their stories than anyone suspected.
Maybe there’s more to this one as well.