Baggage Check Read online

  Her mother’s old beige Ford Taurus was parked in its usual spot. Rebecca parked behind it and went to the front door. It was still there, the paper her mother had mentioned: bright yellow with official-looking type. NOTICE OF EVICTION. St. Clair County Health Department. Rebecca knocked on the door as she scanned it. Dear Mrs. Williamson … third notice … unsanitary conditions … multiple violations. There was no answer at the door. Rebecca knocked again, louder.

  “Mama?” she called at the front-room window. “You there?”

  The house was dark and silent. Rebecca walked around back, reaching for the rickety screen door to the back porch and finding it locked, too. There was a strong smell of cat urine coming from the back porch. Rebecca wondered how long it had been since the litter was changed. There had been just one old family cat, Harold, when she moved away during high school, but her mother had acquired a few more after poor Harold died. There were often strays roaming up and down this road out of town, and her mother had a soft heart. The last time Rebecca had visited, there had been three cats in residence. She wondered if Mama had found even more since then.

  She called again without hearing an answer, and thought about walking across the street to Mrs. Pindergrass’s house, in case her mother had walked over there. But there were no cars in the neat driveway facing theirs, and an ominous feeling told her that her mother had not gone on a neighborly visit. For a split second, she considered getting back in the car and heading home to Atlanta. She could be in her apartment and asleep under the covers in three hours flat. Rebecca went back to the car, but instead of getting in, she sighed and unlaced her sandals, tossing them into her suitcase and pulling out canvas tennis shoes instead.

  The key was still hidden in the same spot, tucked in a hollow knot of the big oak tree on the side of the house—where she and Cory had had a tire swing as kids. The crevice was damp and mossy, and the key a little rusty, but she found it easily after she had hoisted herself up onto one of the lower branches. When she brought it down, there was moss and bark wedged beneath the nails on her right hand. What a waste of a manicure.

  The front door was hard to open; once she accomplished it and flicked on a light, she immediately saw why. “Oh, God, Mama.”

  There were cardboard boxes piled high in the front hallway, hiding what had once been her mother’s cherished pink carpet and blocking the door from opening fully. Beyond the boxes were more piles: newspapers, garbage bags, plastic totes, old blankets. Some of them were recognizable—old floral patterns she remembered from childhood. Others were new to her but looked worn and frayed nonetheless. There were also clothes, everywhere. Kids’ clothes, piles of jeans, suits still in dry cleaning bags.

  There was only a sliver of path from the front door to the kitchen, off to the left, and no path at all into the living room on her right. From what she could see of the living room, it was also full of boxes and bags and papers, piled high and perched precariously on top of furniture. Her grandmother’s antique sofa was barely visible beneath the mess, and as she stared at it, a monstrous black cockroach skittered along its soft green cushion to hide itself under a produce box.

  But the worst thing, by far, was the smell. There was the same overpowering odor of cat urine she had experienced on the back porch, along with a sour rotten smell like old meat and a sickly sweet note of molded honey—a smell that immediately made Rebecca think of rodents. For a horrifying moment, she thought perhaps her mother had died in the house and was rotting away in another room. Then she remembered that she had spoken to her only the day before.

  “Oh, God,” she said again, and spun on her heel, bolting back out the front door without bothering to close it. She ran to the bushes on the side of the house and vomited, falling to her knees on the soft earth before realizing that the unmaintained grass all around her was the perfect hideout for rats, snakes, and God knew what else. She wiped her mouth and stood quickly. Her heart raced and her chest tightened. The familiar sensation of panic overtook her—and suddenly every blade of grass felt like the brush of scales or fur or claws against her bare legs. She ran for the open car door, slamming herself in and staring ahead at the old storage shed in front of Mama’s car. Rebecca could only imagine what horrors might await in there.

  She wanted desperately to cry, but the tears would not come. Her body was brimming with fear and exhaustion, leaving no room for the sadness she knew she should be feeling. Where was her mother? How had the house gotten this way? How could Daddy have let this happen? What the hell was she supposed to do now?

  Rebecca gripped the steering wheel and let out an exasperated sound, half moan, half scream. It was an ugly noise but it helped. Some of the panic seemed to be venting itself with each scream, so she continued, slamming her fists into the steering wheel and dashboard for effect. After a couple of minutes, she stopped and stared lifelessly at the back of her mother’s abandoned car, having no idea whatsoever what to do next. Absurdly, she thought of her friends at the beach, wondering what they were doing now and whether they were sad or relieved that she had excused herself from their party. In her mind’s eye, she saw Marci, laughing with her hand on Jake’s arm, and this only made her more miserable.

  A sharp rap on the window startled her out of the daydream. Her hand flew out instinctively and locked the doors. She saw a shadowed face beneath a wide-brimmed hat, and finally, once her eyes could focus on it, the starched khaki uniform of a sheriff’s deputy. He motioned for her to roll down the window, but with her heart still pounding in her ears, she was nervous. She looked at his name tag. A. CHEN. A quick assessment of his face revealed an imposing cleft chin and serious expression highlighted by soft wrinkles around his mouth and eyes. But the eyes themselves seemed friendly enough, dark brown and more curious than menacing. She rolled the window down partway.

  “Ms. Williamson?” he asked. She nodded. “I’m sorry if I scared you. I tried to make noise as I came up, but you were … well, you were sort of screaming. You okay?”

  His thick, woodsy accent reflected Alabama dirt roads and fishing holes. When she heard it, she was embarrassed to discover she’d been expecting an Asian accent based on his name and features. She nodded again. “I’m fine.”

  He nodded in return. “Your mama isn’t here,” he said. “But I reckon you realized that.”

  “Yes, I—I went inside,” she said. She wondered what he was doing here. Apparently he knew something about her mother. “Is she okay?”

  “Yes, ma’am, far as I know,” he said. “She’s up at the county hospital today. Think they have her pretty well sedated. I expect they’ll be calling you soon. I was here yesterday when we brought her in, so when the neighbors called in about the disturb— I mean, the neighbors called to say you were here, I figured I’d come out and talk to you myself. I was on my way home anyway.”

  “Thanks,” Rebecca found herself saying, though she wasn’t exactly sure what she was thanking him for. “You said you were here? What happened?”

  He straightened and moved back a half step. “Do you wanna get out so we can talk? I mean, not that I mind talking to you through the window, but…” Rebecca fumbled for the lock as he said, “I promise not to arrest you or anything.”

  She got out of the car, and they stood awkwardly for a moment, sizing each other up. Finally he said, “Rebecca, right? You don’t remember me, I bet.”

  Dear God. Even at the best of times, Rebecca hated trying to place people from memory, and it was the last thing she wanted to do in the current situation. “Sorry,” she said flatly. “I don’t.”

  “I didn’t think so,” he said. “Alex Chen. I was a couple years older than you, so you probably didn’t pay any attention to me in high school. But I … I played football with your brother. I remember you used to come watch our practices. ’Course, you were just a skinny little thing then.”

  “Oh,” she said softly. He seemed to be searching her face for something, and she shifted uncomfortably. “So … my mother?”
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  “Right,” he said, glancing at the open front door. “Well, I guess you probably saw the inside of the house. I don’t know if you’ve been home much, but it’s been getting worse over the last couple of years. Lots of complaints from the neighbors, especially on hot days. The smell—”

  “I live in Atlanta,” she said, cutting him off. “Home is Atlanta.”

  “Of course,” he said, smiling. “Fun town. Went over there for a bowl game last year.”

  Rebecca decided the best way to get him to get to the point was to keep her own mouth shut. After a pause, he did go on. “So anyway, the health department finally had to serve her an eviction notice. They gave her lots of warnings, I think. Don’t know if she told you?”

  Of course not, Rebecca thought. She’s only my mother.

  She said nothing. He went on. “By this weekend, things had not gotten any better—your mama had more than twenty cats in there, some of ’em not too healthy—and we had to come get her. We were supposed to take her over to the Super 8 so she could get a room, but she wasn’t too happy to go. Anyway, she went a little … she got kind of violent. Scratched Deputy Davis up pretty good, right under the eye. Technically that’s assaulting an officer, you know, but we all felt kinda bad for her. We called Judge Parker and had her put your mom under a seventy-two-hour psychiatric hold instead. That’s why she’s at the county hospital now, but if you want my advice, I think you’re going to want to move her somewhere else for a while. I’m not a doctor, but I think your mom needs more help than she’s going to get in three days at County.”

  “Thank you for your opinion,” Rebecca said coldly. She knew the deputy was intending to be kind, but something about the familiar and sympathetic way he talked to her made her feel infuriated. You don’t know me; you don’t know my family, she thought. “Is there anything else?”

  He only looked taken aback by her rudeness for a second. “Well, you can’t stay here,” he said. “I’m sure you wouldn’t want to, but I feel like I should tell you. It’ll have to be cleaned out and reinspected first.”

  “Of course,” she said stiffly.

  “I don’t know if you’d be staying with your dad or not, but the Super 8 has decent rooms. Clean.”

  “Thank you,” she said numbly. She turned back toward her car, not knowing what she was going to do next, only that she couldn’t go back in that house right now.

  “No problem,” he said. “It was nice to see you again, Rebecca. Take care.”

  Before she could reply, his boots were crunching across the gravel driveway back to his patrol car. She watched him drive away, trying to remember a younger version of his face from high school. Like everything else from that part of her life, it was blank. Just blank.

  11

  Rebecca checked in to the Super 8 as Deputy Chen had suggested. She left a message for her dad and stripped the dated bedspread from the bed before sprawling across the sheets. She got the number for the county hospital from information, only to discover that visiting hours would be ending in less than half an hour and that they would not provide any information without a signed release from her mother. The nurse would technically not acknowledge that her mom was even a patient there, but suggested gently that Rebecca drop by when visiting hours began again at nine the next morning.

  After that, Rebecca stared at her phone, wanting to reach out to someone but not knowing whom to call. She listened to the concerned messages from the beach—the first and the last were from Jake, his voice thick with concern. She felt bad about that, but she still didn’t know what to say. The other two were from Marci and Suzanne, both sounding chipper but curious and asking her to call when she got off tonight. Doubtful, Rebecca thought. Soon, but not today.

  She dialed Valerie, realizing as it went straight to voicemail that she would be in the air now. Rebecca left a short, awkward message. It felt as though the whole world were continuing on without her as she sat, helpless and alone, in a motel in rural Alabama. Atlanta felt thousands of miles away. Her life felt far, far away. She threw an arm over her face and tried to practice breathing with the techniques Calm Your Mind suggested.

  She awoke to darkness hours later. Her stomach growled menacingly, and Rebecca fumbled for her phone, remembering she had not eaten since an early lunch on her way from Atlanta. It was now almost nine. Her body ached from the car ride over and the long, dead sleep in one position on the hotel bed. She pulled herself up, found the light switch, and went to her suitcase. Rebecca had not been back to her apartment since starting her last airline shift five days ago, before the trip to Kiawah Island, and her clothes showed it. She’d been wearing the same jeans since four o’clock this morning. In her suitcase she had her work uniforms, a sandy bathing suit, the wrinkled dress she’d worn at Suzanne and Dylan’s wedding, and a pair of white shorts with a large crimson stain where Beth had spilled wine on her. She was wearing her last pair of underwear.

  She washed her face, reapplied her smeared makeup, and went to the front desk. A tiny older woman with long gray hair and what must have once been a tattoo of a butterfly on her upper arm gave her directions to Walmart. She also informed Rebecca that the two best options for a late dinner were a sports bar on the edge of town and, of course, the Waffle House next door to the motel. Rebecca thanked her and set out.

  She made it to Walmart five minutes before closing, enduring the glares of annoyed cashiers and staff as she zipped past them to the clothing area. With no time to try anything on and not many options available, she grabbed two pairs of inexpensive jeans, an Auburn University T-shirt, and a pack of granny panties. Normally she triple-sanitized new underwear before putting it on, but she decided that since these came in a sealed package it was unlikely they were contaminated.

  She paid for the clothes and changed in the restroom—she was too hungry to go back to her hotel room before dinner. Waffle House was a safe choice, she thought, but as she passed by the signature yellow-and-black sign, she could not bring herself to pull into the parking lot. There was something about the glare of the lights and the harsh Formica tables that she couldn’t stomach tonight. And she needed a drink.

  Dickie’s sports bar was on the edge of town, almost halfway to Gadsden on the quiet two-lane highway. A few miles farther and she guessed she might be able to locate some sort of suburban chain restaurant, with fatty appetizers and a predictable grilled chicken sandwich on the menu, but she had no idea how late they would be open, and she was too famished to take chances. She pulled into the gravel drive from the highway, following a blinking arrow sign with crooked letters: WELCOME TO DICKIE S KAR OKE SUNDAY. Just what I need, she thought darkly. There were a few beat-up cars and pickup trucks in the parking lot behind the building. Maybe, hopefully, Karaoke Sundays were not a big draw.

  Inside, the bar was a little smoky, but homey enough. There was light oak paneling on the walls and booths, and vintage neon beer signs everywhere. NASCAR drivers and country singers grinned or smoldered at her from every wall, depending on the mood their particular poster was trying to convey. The floor even boasted a little sawdust and many, many peanut shells.

  On the far wall, there was a rickety wooden stage big enough for two or three singers, or maybe two guitars. A single spotlight shone weakly on a rolled-up microphone, which sat idle on top of an amplifier. Relieved, Rebecca steered herself toward the bar, where a sullen girl in a forest-green Dickie’s T-shirt and long ponytail glared at her.

  “Do I just sit anywhere?” Rebecca asked.

  The girl made a show of looking all around the bar and the thirty or so empty tables before responding. “You got a reservation?”

  With effort, Rebecca attempted to laugh off the rudeness. “Okay, then, I’ll just be over here.” She gestured to a corner booth as far away from the stage as possible. “Do you have a menu?”

  Another eye roll, and the girl had retrieved a stained page of cream-colored card stock with about twenty items listed in a simple, centered font. She thrust it in
to Rebecca’s hands with a perfunctory, “I’ll be right with you.”

  Rebecca tried a winning smile and a thank you that dripped with honeyed courtesy. The girl was not to be won over, however, and she spun on her heel to attend to a couple of large men at the other end of the bar. Why can I never seem to be charming? It worked so well for Suzanne. Suze could wheedle anything out of just about anyone—male or female—with a graceful smile and an effortless word. Rebecca had studied her for years and tried her best to emulate her style, but to no avail. Even in the air, she could handle nearly any flight situation, but she did not have the gift for disarming angry customers or plying coworkers for favors, the way Valerie and others seemed to.

  She made her way to the booth in the back, focusing on what she would order if the girl ever came over. She debated a salad, her usual choice, but decided that a place like this was more likely to offer her wilted iceberg lettuce with stale croutons and a gallon of ranch dressing than anything with nutritional value. Besides, she was starving. She settled on Buffalo wings with celery and carrots and a bottle of Bud Light. This seemed to meet with the tacit approval of the scowling waitress, who at least did not roll her eyes when Rebecca ordered.

  The food arrived quickly and the waitress included a large stack of napkins. Rebecca used the hand sanitizer in her purse to convert one of these to a wet wipe for the surface of the table, which had several names and even a few vulgar limericks carved into it. As she ate, she tried to figure out what her plan would be for the next day. She had felt disconnected from her family for so long. It was strange to be thrust back into Oreville under these circumstances, and even stranger to feel that she was supposed to take charge of the situation somehow.