Mother May I(11)

“Oh, how awful. Should I go get them at school?” They stayed with her so often that they kept pj’s and toothbrushes and even extra clothes and swimsuits there.

“No need. Marshall’s dropping them off.”

“Oh. How’s he doing? How’s Cara?” She always asked that, in exactly this tone, ever since Betsy went out on a routine domestic and did not come home.

“Fine, but, Mom? I really don’t feel great. I need to go lie down.”

“You poor thing! Do you want me to come get Robert?”

“No,” I said, too fast, too hard. I forced myself to soften. “You know how contagious these things are. I don’t want you to catch it either.”

“Okay. Try to get some rest.”

“I will. You’re the sweetest,” I said, and hung up fast.

My cheeks felt wet. I reached up and touched them, wondering when I’d started crying again. But at least I could see my house ahead.

As I pulled up, everything looked so still and quiet. The drive was empty, and no cars were parked out front. She was not here. Robert was not here. The very idea had been lunacy, driven by fear and hope. If Robert was here, why would we pay? But if no one was going to meet me, why had the note told me to go home? I couldn’t make sense of it. Nothing made sense.

I was reaching for the button that would open the garage door when I caught a flash of bright color from the corner of my eye. I stopped the Escalade in the driveway.

A gift bag hung from my front doorknob. It was striped in hot pink and yellow, with lime green curling ribbons and tissue paper exploding out the top. It couldn’t have been there long. It was so garish I would have noticed it when I was leaving.

Had she told me to go home so I’d see this? Perhaps inside the bag I’d find instructions, telling me when and where and how much. I shook my head. It felt random, so risky. We lived in Great Lakes, an old, established Decatur neighborhood, very safe but still urban. Anyone could have come along and taken the bag.

I turned off the car, then got out and ran to my door, hoping this was what she’d wanted me to see. Hoping this would tell me what she wanted. We could pay. If we didn’t have enough, Trey’s family would help. They had never fully warmed to me. They’d liked his first wife, Buckhead born and with the right last name, so much better. But they doted on my babies. Especially Robert, their last and littlest grandchild. The only boy, which mattered way more than it should to my father-in-law. But now I was glad. He would help us. We would pay, and she would give Robert back.

I pulled the bag off the knob. It was light, but I could feel items shifting in the bottom of it. If that old woman had left it, then she’d come in plain view of our front-door camera. The video would already be uploaded to my cell phone.

I let myself in, hurrying through the house, back into our great room, where I dumped the bag out onto my kitchen island. There was a cheaply made smartphone with no casing and no screen protector. This was from the woman who had Robert, then. Had to be. This was how she would tell me where to bring the money. There was also a charging cord and an old Bluetooth, the flat triangular kind that tucked up close beside the ear. The last thing in the bag was a bottle of prescription medication, which struck me as odd. Not related to the other things.

I got out my own cell phone and checked the app that linked to our security camera. One new video had been uploaded almost immediately after I left the house, according to the time stamp. I pressed play.

It was her. The witch I’d seen peering in my window when I was half dreaming. The meemaw I’d shown Marshall at the school. I’d known it all along, but it still sounded a bell of shock deep down inside me. She could have shaded her face with the hat, but instead she locked gazes with the camera. How blatant she was. How bold.

Her eyes were dark pits, deep-set under sparse brows, and her face was webbed in wrinkles. She had sagging jowls and a long, sharp nose. She had to be seventy, at least. I hit pause and used the capture feature to get a still shot. I pulled the picture up onto the screen, staring at her grainy face, looking for softness. She was all angles, with a grim set to her mouth.

I picked up the prescription bottle. It was made of opaque white plastic, and at the top it said, CONTROLLED DRUG. Possession without authority illegal. Keep out of reach of children. Under that was an orange rectangle with the word “HYPNODORM” printed in white block letters, then in smaller text, Flunitrazepam. There was no patient name, no doctor, no pharmacy listed, but the back was tacky, as if a sticker had been peeled away.

I blinked stupidly at it. She had left me a phone and what sounded like tranquilizers or maybe something for anxiety. I shook the bottle, and it rattled softly. Was this a courtesy drug? Illegal sedatives, meant to calm me through the experience so I wouldn’t screw it up? That seemed insane, which was scary. I didn’t want an insane person to have Robert. But it was also oddly polite. A twisted and somehow female kind of thoughtful.

I opened the bottle and tipped it over into my palm. Half a dozen dark blue capsules fell out. I dumped them back in, then traded the bottle for my phone. I was going to Google “Hypnodorm,” but the old woman’s face still stared up from the screen. It froze me for a second, and then the disposable cell phone rang, buzzing against the marble countertop like an insect. I jerked and dropped my own phone with a clatter. It knocked the pill bottle over, and the capsules spilled across the island. One fell onto the floor, rolling away.