23. Saturday, November 4, 2023 #3
One of the cats behind her starts that low growl again just as a fourth figure emerges from the side of the house—her mother.
All four of them arriving within seconds of each other but from different exit points.
None with a flashlight to help them make their way in the dark.
None of them wearing a coat or hat to protect against the chill of the night and the light snow that has just started to fall.
The four of them suddenly stop where they are and turn back toward the woods.
Each of them bowing ever so slightly before heading toward the house.
Without thinking, Alice flips the porch light of the cabin on and pushes her mother’s door open. “What are you all doing?” she calls out. “Why were you in the woods?” She’s sure she’s caught them now. How will they explain such strange behavior away? Someone will have to tell her the truth.
“Alice!” Geoff exclaims, sounding surprised and slightly unsettled to see her there. The others stop walking and turn to her but Alice can’t make out the expressions on their faces.
“Tell me,” she demands. “What were you all doing in the woods?”
Geoff sighs heavily, glances at the others, and then comes closer to the cabin. “We were burying Panda.”
“What?” Alice asks, a hitch in her throat.
“After you left, she got out, ran right down the driveway and out onto the road. She was hit by a car.”
Alice puts a hand to her mouth in shock.
She can’t believe what he’s telling her.
Panda was a smart, obedient dog, never running away, always wary of cars.
She hurries down the porch stairs and goes right to Quinn.
“Are you okay?” she asks him, her voice clogged with unshed tears.
Panda was his dog through and through, and after losing Lucy she’s not sure how he’ll cope with it.
Quinn nods. “I’ll be okay.” There’s a heaviness to his voice that sounds more like resignation than sadness. “I knew she wouldn’t live forever.” He lets Alice hug him, even hugs her back, but there are no tears on his cheeks.
Maybe it hasn’t hit him yet. “That’s true, but you can still be sad about it,” she tells him, fighting back her own tears. He nods. “Well, I’m here if you need me,” she adds, not sure what else to say.
Everyone turns together and makes their way into the house, leaving Alice standing there in the backyard with her head spinning. Why didn’t they text or call her? Why didn’t they at least wait for her before they buried Panda?
Through the window, Alice sees her family gathered together in the kitchen, talking. She wants to cry about Panda, let the sorrow over losing such a beautiful dog wash over her, but something else, something stronger, has hold of her mind and body.
Fear.
They are not my family, she thinks. Watching them through the window, they feel like strangers to her, in somebody else’s house, somebody else’s life.
Who are they, then? she wonders—reborn versions of themselves, created by the woods?
Why aren’t they more upset about Panda? Do they not feel anything anymore, while she must feel everything?
The questions rush through her mind as she watches them tilt back their heads and laugh at something, warm and safe inside the house that she bought for them.
You could barricade all the doors and start a fire, she thinks.
Start a gas leak or put all the pills in your work bag in their food.
She shivers so violently that her teeth chatter and her knees tremble.
It is not the cold. It is shock and terror and sorrow.
Is this what Justine Gordon felt right before she killed her husband and her two sons?
Was she torn apart by her love for her family and her fear of what they’d become? Was she torn between her desire to kill them all and her fear of them all dying?
Alice is surprised to see another person step into the light of the kitchen.
Polly goes to him, looping her arm through his and pulling him farther into the room.
He is tall and slim, with messy, dark brown hair, and moves as though he is liquid.
It looks like Polly is introducing him to everyone, and he smiles warmly at them, shaking Geoff’s hand, nodding politely at her mother and Quinn.
Polly breaks away from the group and rushes to the back door, throwing it open. “Mom,” she calls out. “Come inside. I want you to meet my boyfriend, Gray. We’re going to make a fire and play Pictionary.”
She sounds so happy, Alice thinks. Unburdened and carefree, like the Polly before they lost Lucy.
But at the same time just like Lucy, who loved playing Pictionary.
It’s as if that loss hasn’t happened at all.
Have they all forgotten? she wonders. And if given the option, would she not do the same?
Is this not what she asked for? A fresh start, a way to fix her family?
“I’ll be right there,” Alice calls back, her voice cracking with emotion. The shivering in her body has stopped. An unfamiliar calm spreads through her and all of the noise in her head quiets. She knows what she has to do.