What Janie Found Page 3

  I stayed here! she thought. I gave up my birth family to come back here.

  The irony of it burned as badly as tears.

  “The label on the file folder,’” said Reeve very softly, “was H. J.’”

  Janie flattened her hands on her cheeks and pressed inward toward her nose, squashing everything against its freckled tip. “H. J.,’” she said, voice squeezed between her lips like toothpaste, “stands for Hunting Jaguars.’”

  They all knew what H. J. stood for. But Reeve let it go. “Hex on Jellybeans,’” he agreed.

  I could hex a few people right now, she thought. I’m not ready for this! I’ve never been ready. I wasn’t ready to find out my parents aren’t my parents. I wasn’t ready to find out I was kidnapped. I wasn’t ready to have Reeve sell me on his radio show. I wasn’t ready to have my Connecticut father suffer a heart attack and a stroke. And I’m not ready to find out that he—

  “Perfect timing!’” called a sharp high voice, and sharp high heels stabbed steps and pavement.

  Of Reeve’s two older sisters and one older brother, Lizzie was the scary one. Thinner than anybody, not tall, not beautiful, she didn’t walk, she stalked. Her frown started upward from her chin instead of downward from her forehead, and you fell into her frown, ready to confess to anything.

  As a courtroom lawyer she must be terrifying. Janie could imagine juries cowering in their corner; witnesses desperate to please. How relieved everybody in Connecticut had been when Lizzie decided to practice law in California.

  And now Lizzie was in love.

  This was amazing, but more amazing was that some man had fallen in love with Lizzie. Who would want to spend a lifetime in the same apartment as Lizzie Shields? Everybody was eager to meet William.

  “Come inside, Janie,’” said Lizzie sternly. “We’ll measure you.’”

  Can’t make it, Lizzie, thought Janie. I have a temper tantrum waiting. A file folder to study. Police reports. I probably need to assassinate somebody.

  But this was a chance to dump Reeve and Brian. When Janie went back into that folder, it must be without people who could read her thoughts.

  She opened her door before Lizzie could get closer. I’m never letting anybody get closer again, she thought. Distance is the thing. I can keep Lizzie at a distance. Wedding talk will do it. “What did you decide, Lizzie?’” she asked, in a voice as fluffy as a summer gown. “Long? Short? Flowered? Satin?’”

  “Huh?’” said Brian.

  “This is about dresses,’” Reeve explained. “Lizzie’s getting married. She’s home to make wedding plans. I’m an usher, Janie’s a bridesmaid. Come on, Brian, we’ll file folder later.’”

  Janie shot him a look. He made a time-out signal with his hands and said quickly, “We’ll ask Janie if she’ll let us file folder later when she file folders.’”

  Before, when Reeve signaled capital T, it meant: Time to be alone together. Now it meant: Don’t yell at me. I’m stupid, but I’m nice.

  Janie followed Lizzie into the Shields house. Reeve and Brian trailed. “When is the wedding?’” asked Brian.

  “July twentieth,’” said Lizzie, as if nothing else could ever happen on that date. It was hers. She owned it.

  Mrs. Shields flung open the door. Reeve’s mother might be fifty-five and chubby, but she was hopping up and down like a little girl with a jump rope. She was a happy woman. She had never expected Lizzie to have a traditional wedding. Or any wedding.

  “Hello, everybody!’” caroled Mrs. Shields. “How’s your mother holding up, Janie?’” She didn’t wait for an answer. “You will love the fabric Lizzie chose! It’ll look so nice against your red hair.’”

  Janie could not picture Lizzie choosing fabric. Choosing candidates for sheriff, maybe, but cloth?

  Out came measuring tape and a little notebook covered in white satin and lace.

  “Tell me you didn’t buy that yourself,’” Janie said. Lizzie’s accessories generally had sharp edges.

  Lizzie turned a little pink. “I had to write the details down in something, didn’t I?’”

  “Wow,’” said Janie.

  “Throws you off, doesn’t it?’” agreed Reeve. He shot Janie the twinkle-eyed grin she used to adore. I still adore the grin, she thought, I’m just not sure of the person behind it.

  Reeve poked Lizzie. “Just when you think you know your tough old sister, she turns out to be this sentimental, waltzing—’”

  “Reeve, don’t start anything,’” said his mother.

  “Lizzie started it,’” said Reeve.

  “William, actually,’” said Lizzie, looking soft and pretty.

  Janie had a sudden wave of nausea and had to cross the room, pretending interest in stacks of brides’ magazines with Post-its marking their pages. Don’t start anything. If I go back to that folder, I’m sure starting something. Or finishing it.

  But if I don’t go back to that folder, the facts are still in it.

  If only I hadn’t agreed to handle the bills while Daddy’s sick.

  If only.

  My whole life comes down to that: If only.

  “Lizzie darling, while you have your notebook open,’” said Mrs. Shields, “let’s schedule the bridesmaids’ luncheon.’”

  “Cut,’” said Lizzie. “I’d be bored.’”

  That was the Lizzie they knew and occasionally liked—as long as she didn’t stay too long.

  “Well, at least choose the restaurant for the after-rehearsal dinner,’” said her mother.

  “No rehearsal. We’re grown-ups. We know how to walk down an aisle.’”

  Even Janie had to laugh. Lizzie was edging up toward romance, but she couldn’t quite touch it. How astonishing that Lizzie could be more romantic than Janie. “At least we’ll have great dresses, right?’” she said to Lizzie. “Let me see the picture of my dress. What am I wearing?’”

  Lizzie opened her notebook to the page where she’d taped magazine cutouts of the gowns she had chosen. Reeve and Brian crowded in to see too. Reeve put his hand on Janie’s shoulder.

  “It’s beautiful!’” cried Janie. Partly to extricate herself from Reeve’s touch, she forced Lizzie into a swoon, and the two of them fell backward onto the sofa. “That,’” said Janie, “is the most romantic, the laciest and the most backless dress in the whole world. Now show me your gown, it must be even more beautiful.’”

  Lizzie turned the page.

  Janie sat up straight. “Oh, Lizzie,’” she breathed. “William is going to pass out at the sight of you. You are going to be the loveliest bride on earth.’”

  Brian felt as he so often did around girls. They were another species. He should be taking notes. Field observations.

  How disappointing that the file folder was just about H. J.

  Brian had hoped for something really bad and exciting. It wasn’t. Naturally Mr. Johnson would keep a file on his long-lost daughter. Paid Bills had seemed like the wrong drawer, but as they drove from beach to hospital to here, Brian had figured out that Mr. Johnson would have paid for a private detective and attorneys and stuff, back when he was trying to get Hannah out of the cult. His daughter was a Paid Bill, just like everybody else’s daughter, except that everybody else was writing out checks for braces or college.

  Brian wondered vaguely why Lizzie would have asked Janie to be in her wedding. Weren’t bridesmaids your girlfriends from slumber parties, like his sister Jodie’s endless overnight crowd? But Janie was just a girl next door—and at least ten years younger. In fact, Lizzie had baby-sat for Janie. How come Lizzie didn’t have just law school friends in her wedding?

  Across the room, as clear as handwriting, a look passed between Reeve and Lizzie.

  Reeve asked Lizzie to ask Janie! thought Brian. I bet he wants to be in all kinds of romantic gooey situations with my sister, and what’s romanticker and gooier than a wedding?

  Reeve had let them all down, and Janie was doing the right thing to keep him at a distance. But on Jul
y twentieth, Reeve would be handsome and perfect in one of those black wedding outfits with the starched collar and the ascot, and Janie would look like a British princess in that poofy dress, and she and Reeve would probably even walk down the aisle together. Dance at the reception together.

  And get back together.

  And that would be wrong.

  Brian could not help liking Reeve.

  But Reeve had hurt them all. He didn’t deserve Janie back.

  Janie was touched to be a bridesmaid. That Lizzie should even need bridesmaids was touching. Everybody had expected Lizzie to find a justice of the peace and wrap up her marriage ceremony in three minutes or less.

  It was Lizzie to whom Janie had turned when she recognized her face on the milk carton. Without Lizzie, Janie might have been frozen in place for years. It was an honor to be her bridesmaid.

  Honor.

  A wedding word. A Ten Commandments word.

  I’m sick of honoring my father and mother, thought Janie. They didn’t honor me.

  Unbidden, her other father and mother sprang to her mind.

  Had she honored her New Jersey parents?

  But that was a failure to shove away, and Janie turned physically from the thought, keeping her back to New Jersey, and instead she considered the police report on Hannah Javensen.

  Last seen flying west.

  What an evocative word west was. Laden with distance and departure.

  Did every son and daughter have a moment in which the only possible reaction was: I’m going?

  I’m never coming back. You’ll never see me again. I’m out of here, I’m heading west.

  But you got over it in an hour. Or a year.

  Whoever really just left? Never dialed a phone, never came home for Thanksgiving? That was the thing Janie had always gotten stuck on. The neverness of it. It was like a bad argument in a bad textbook. Between a parent and a child, was there ever really a never?

  And how right she had been to suspect that theory.

  Of course Hannah had been in touch.

  When the phone shrilled, Janie jumped guiltily, as if she were doing something forbidden.

  But I am, she thought. I have touched the past.

  Mrs. Shields answered the phone and she turned pale and shocked. She looked sadly at Janie. “Oh, Miranda,’” she said into the phone. “I’m so sorry. Yes, Janie is right here.’”

  He’s dead, thought Janie. My father is dead. All the technology and all the doctors failed.

  But instead of grief, she just felt more anger.

  How dare he die now? How dare he leave her with that folder? Now it was too late for explanations. With him dead, she could not confront, and scream, and tell him how much she hated him.

  Or how much she loved him.

  She felt like a tiny child strapped into a huge swing; no way to put her feet on the ground, scuff herself to a halt and jump off.

  She took the phone. What do I say to my mother? What comfort do I offer?

  Images of her father wavered in her mind, like heat devils on asphalt.

  He loved good food and good company. He loved coaching after-school sports, always willing to take on a team nobody else wanted, like ninth grade or junior varsity. He loved watching TV with Janie and couldn’t stand it if she left the room and he had to watch alone. He loved documentaries, which Janie despised, but if she flounced out, he’d increase the volume until the house shook with World War II battles or life on coral reefs. He wouldn’t lower the volume until she surrendered. He liked neatness, the edges of things lined up, a tablecloth hanging the same number of inches all the way around. He liked laughing.

  He liked secrets, thought Janie, and she had been right about the tears; they did burn; her cheeks were scorched where they fell.

  Oh, Daddy! she thought. Please don’t be dead. I love you. Stay with us.

  Her mother’s voice was thready and frayed. “They put him back in Intensive Care, Janie. I need you. Please come.’”

  He wasn’t dead after all. He was just closer to it.

  She got clammy, growing so cold she seemed to be shutting down; her machinery freezing up and failing. “I’ll be there in twenty minutes, Mom,’” she said. And forced from her lips the dutiful sentence, “I love you.’”

  She did not love anybody right now.

  She hung up. Her body felt clumsy and unoccupied.

  “I’ll drive you, Janie,’” said Reeve, eager to be involved. “I’ll stay at the hospital with you. Run errands.’”

  “No, thank you, Reeve.’” She felt carved from ice. The warm breath of another person might melt her. “But may Brian spend the night here with you guys? Then I don’t have to worry about Brian or what time Mom and I get home.’”

  Brian did not want to stay with the neighbors. He wanted to be useful. Or at least not in the way. But it got settled without him, Mrs. Shields discussing available beds and Janie sweeping him across the two driveways into her house to get his pajamas and toothbrush.

  “Janie,’” he protested, “let me stay here. I’m fine by myself. I’m not a little kid. I can answer the phone and stuff.’”

  She shook her head. “There’s an answering machine. Got everything?’”

  Brian nodded, defeated. She ushered him out into the warm night and locked the door after them. He knew why she wanted him at Reeve’s. She did not trust him. Alone in her house, so near the desk with the folder, he might be tempted to tiptoe into that office. Open that long drawer. Find out what paper had burned her fingers.

  “I hope your father is okay,’” he said. Except that Janie’s father was not the man in the hospital bed. Brian’s father was Janie’s father. “Drive carefully,’” he said, feeling stupid. Of course she would drive carefully; Janie was an extremely careful kind of person.

  Reeve was standing in the drive, backlit by the lights from his house, frontlit by the lights from Janie’s. Even to Brian he looked puppy-eager and puppy-sweet. “Janie, are you all right?’” he said anxiously.

  She got into the Explorer, not swayed by pleading eyes. “It’ll be easier once I get to the hospital and see.’”

  “I’ll go with you,’” he offered a second time.

  “No, thanks.’”

  Reeve seemed to tremble on the edge of a move.

  Don’t mention the folder, thought Brian. That would be a mistake. It isn’t as important as her father. You bring up the folder, she’ll think less of you.

  He remembered that he wanted Janie to think less of Reeve.

  But he thought that in some way, Janie needed Reeve not to be a jerk. So Brian would have to be the jerk faster. “Are you going to look at the folder without us?’” he asked her.

  That worked. She gave him exactly the look a jerk deserved, started the engine and put her Explorer in reverse. Through the open window, she said, “No. I’m going to burn it.’”

  CHAPTER

  FOUR

  Would she burn the folder?

  It was appealing. The strike of a match. The burst of flame.

  Shredding was trendier but would be more mechanical, and surely not so satisfying.

  Janie and her mother were allowed five minutes in Intensive Care. She could think of no way to refuse, so she followed the nurse and her mother through glass doors into a room with four patients and an overdose of clicking, beeping, humming monitors.

  Lying on the bed before them was a man punctured with tubes, sunken and pale and in need of a shave. She would not have known who this was. She would have said, Oh, the poor man, his poor family, and then walked on, looking for her father.

  Janie’s mother took her husband’s hand, over and over telling Frank how much she loved him. He looked like pie dough, rolled out flat and thin.

  You knew, thought Janie, staring at him. You always knew. When the FBI came, when the police came, when my real parents came—you knew, and you never told. Nobody ever read your face, Frank Johnson.

  Her fingers felt like pencils that she c
ould snap in half and throw away.

  This is my father, she said to herself. I love him, and if he dies, it would be terrible.

  But the thought sprang up: So there, Frank Johnson. This is your punishment.

  They were serious about the five-minute rule. Miranda Johnson knew that, but each time, it upset her to be sent out.

  The waiting room was carpeted in blue and wallpapered in flowers. A television was softly delivering the news, as if, in this dreadful place, any news mattered except news of your own family.

  Miranda Johnson thought of the daughter she and Frank had been so happy to have, so many years ago. Hannah. A fragile child, desperately shy. Never a best friend. Always on the fringes.

  How could a parent solve that? You couldn’t buy friends; you couldn’t teach friends.

  And then the thing they dreamed of (“At college, she’ll find friends’”) happened. Hannah did find a group. A cult, whose leader told Hannah that her parents had no value. Hannah must discard them.

  Parents do not matter, said the cult. They will not matter again.

  How vividly Miranda remembered the college visit when she and Frank first understood; shaking her daughter’s shoulder, shrieking, “These people are sick! They will ruin you!’”

  But Hannah’s friends had told her to expect this. Her parents would try to wreck her new life.

  So Hannah vanished, going west to the cult’s headquarters, never answering the letters her parents wrote over the years. Never agreeing to a compromise. Not one childhood hug or good-night kiss or gently applied Band-Aid mattered. Hannah shrugged off her first eighteen years as if they had never been.

  How joyful then, that sunny afternoon more than a dozen years ago when Hannah had appeared on the doorstep with an adorable daughter of her own. Still thin and pale, eyes still full of confusion, shining hair an eerie halo, Hannah had been clear about one thing: You raise my child.

  And Miranda and Frank were clear about one thing: They would.

  And that meant flight.

  The cult, whose leaders they knew all too well, whose attorneys and thugs they had met in the years of trying to get Hannah out, would regard this beautiful little girl as their property.