Freaky Green Eyes (11 page)

Here is what I know, and what I have had to imagine.

Around noon of that day, a Wednesday, when Melanie Blanchard, Krista Connor's friend and neighbor, dropped by Krista's cabin on Deer Point Road, and seeing that Krista's car was in the lane, and knowing that Krista always worked through the morning, she knocked on the door, which was a screen door, but no one answered. She saw that lights were on inside. She called through the door, “Krista? Hi, it's Melanie.” No answer. Rabbit, who usually barked to greet her, did not bark. Krista did not reply. Melanie said, “Krista? Are you here?”

Melanie checked again: yes, Krista's station wagon was in the driveway. Now Melanie saw that Mero Okawa's SUV was parked at the edge of the road, in front of Krista's cabin.

Melanie pushed open the screen door and stepped inside.

She saw: an overturned cane-back chair, a clay vase of dried flowers shattered on the floor, a toppled easel, art supplies on the floor. One of Krista's hand-sewn quilts had been pulled off the sofa. There were stains on it . . . bloodstains? Melanie stared, horrified.

Her friend's cabin looked as if a violent wind had blown through it, knocking some things down and sparing others.

Melanie called to her collie, Princess, who'd been sniffing around out in the driveway, to come inside. Now Princess was sniffing and barking excitedly, in the cabin, at the stained quilt, turning in circles as if an invisible adversary was snapping at her.

“Krista? Are you—anywhere?”

Frightened, Melanie checked the small bathroom
beside the kitchen alcove, which smelled of sweet-spicy dried herbs and flowers: empty.

Melanie climbed up the ladder to check the loft: empty. The antique brass bed was neatly made up, with a quilt bedspread and several needlepoint cushions Krista had made undisturbed.

Melanie would say afterward, pressing her hand to her heart, “I knew. I knew something was wrong. Those lights burning, and things knocked down . . . and the bloodstains. Oh God, I knew.”

But Melanie didn't want to be an alarmist. She checked with Krista's neighbors up and down Deer Point Road, but no one had seen Krista Connor that morning. One of them, a woman, accompanied Melanie and Princess as they walked about Krista's property, peering into the old storage shed and into the hay barn next door. On her cell phone Melanie began dialing mutual friends. First, Mero Okawa at home: a recording. At the Orca Gallery: a recording. When Melanie called other friends, they said they had not seen Krista that morning; some had seen her the
previous evening, in town. She'd been at a gallery opening reception, then at dinner with a large, casual group including Mero Okawa and several other organizers of the Skagit Harbor Arts Festival. The party broke up at about ten
P.M
., and Krista and Mero were observed leaving together. They had more to discuss, and Mero was going to drive Krista home.

Finally, in the early afternoon, Melanie called the Skagit Harbor police.

“I—I want to report a woman missing.”

First he spoke in private with Todd. Then with Samantha. Then—

“Franky? You believe me, don't you?”

He was holding both my hands in his strong warm hands that were twice the size of mine. He was speaking to me earnestly and anxiously as he'd never spoken to me before.

He would protect me and never betray me as she had done.

He would not abandon me. He would fight, fight, fight to stay with me.

“Honey, I've never hurt your mother. I've never
touched her. I don't know where she is, or who she's with, or why she's doing this to us. Why she would want to hurt her own family.”

Dad's eyes shone with tears. Since the day that my mother, Krista Connor, was reported missing in Skagit Harbor, since police and media people were intruding into our lives, we were like a family in a fortress, surrounded by enemies. A fierce flame coursed through us, binding us together.

Dad was saying gently, “I vow to you, honey. I don't know where your mother is. She's disappeared of her own volition. It was something she'd threatened to do, many times. The police will find her, eventually. She'll be exposed. . . .”

The venetian blinds in this room, a study with heavy leather furniture and a darkened computer, were drawn. My head ached—I had to think where we were. Not at home: at Dad's lawyer's house in Pinewood Grove, a gated community on Vashon Island. Mr. Sheehan had brought us here after the front-page article appeared in
The Seattle Times
with the headline—

There was a large photo of my parents in glamorous evening clothes taken at a public event back in January.

After that, things happened quickly.

There had been stories on all the local TV channels. Scavengers, Mr. Sheehan fumed. Strangers swarmed over our lawn and driveway—reporters, photographers, TV crews with cameras like monstrous eyes. No one could leave the house without being confronted. When Dad appeared anywhere, for instance outside police headquarters, accompanied by Mr. Sheehan and one of Mr. Sheehan's assistants, even more media people surrounded him. He tried to smile, as Reid Pierson always did. He tried to be gracious, but the questions were rude and abusive—“Mr. Pierson? Reid? Where's your wife? What's happened
to your wife? Is it true you've been separated? Is it true your wife has a lover? What have the police been asking you? What have you told them?” Hurrying Dad to a waiting limousine with dark-tinted windows so that no one could see inside, Mr. Sheehan would wave these awful people angrily away, like flies.

Except, like flies, they couldn't be waved away long in public.

But now, for a while at least, we were safe. Dad had been questioned for long hours and was fully cooperating with the police investigation. Todd, Samantha, and I were staying with Dad in Mr. Sheehan's big house on Vashon Island, surrounded by a ten-foot wrought-iron fence, safe. Mr. Sheehan was a famous defense attorney and often brought clients to his house for protection from the media. Dad trusted him, and he told us we could trust him, too.

Now Dad was gripping my hands tight, explaining to me that what was happening was Krista Connor's way of punishing her family. Her way of revenge. “I wish I could have spared you, honey. I
didn't want to tell you and Samantha this, but I have told Todd. Your mother has been trying since last spring to win you over. That's what she says—she will ‘win the girls over.' Because she wants a divorce, and she wants full custody of you. She's met someone else she wants to marry. It's all about money, this thing she's staged. Blackmail. She's been demanding millions of dollars as a settlement plus monthly payments, plus child-support payments, and I've refused, because I don't want our family destroyed. I don't give a damn about money. I just care about you, Samantha, and Todd. I don't believe in divorce. I refused her, and this is what she's doing, not just to me, but to all of us. . . . You believe me, honey, don't you?”

I saw in Daddy's eyes the truth shining, and the truth was love, and would protect me.

“Y-yes, Daddy.”

In Daddy's strong arms I broke down and cried, really cried, for the first time since the news had come from Skagit Harbor.

“I hate her. She went
away
.”

Samantha was crying all the time. Her eyes were so red veined and swollen, it was scary to see her. She wasn't eating and felt frail as a sparrow in my arms. Even her hair, which was usually so smooth and fine, was snarled up, and when I tried to comb it through, Samantha whimpered and pushed at me, as if I was hurting her on purpose.

“Samantha, come
on
. You can't let your hair get all snarls.”

“Leave me alone! I hate
you
.”

I wondered if Samantha was remembering how
the last time we'd seen her, in the driveway beside her cabin, Mom had pushed Samantha away without thinking and cried,
Go away. There isn't room
.

In Mr. Sheehan's house, which smelled of expensive liquor and cigars, Samantha and I were sharing a guest room. Our housekeeper, Lorita (that turned out to be her name), wasn't with us in Mr. Sheehan's house, so it was my responsibility to care for Samantha. I didn't mind except Samantha was being very demanding, wanting to sleep with me instead of by herself. If we started out in our separate beds, within a few minutes I'd hear her whisper, “Franky? Can I come with you? I'm so scared.” Most of the time I said yes. Then Samantha would get too hot, or restless, or she'd kick at the covers, or start to grind her teeth, or talk in her sleep, or wake up and start crying, and I couldn't take it—I'd sneak over into the other bed and try to sleep.

I blamed Mom. None of this would be happening, our lives so messed up, if it hadn't been for her.

Krista Connor, I mean. She wasn't “Mom” any longer.

It won't last long, Dad promised. This “siege” the Pierson family is under.

She's hiding, girls. It's her revenge. But she can't hide forever. The police will find her. This nightmare will end
.

Dad wanted to postpone Samantha and me starting school next week, but I refused. It made me wild to think of missing the first days of class. Like I was sick or something! People would say,
Where's Franky? Is she ashamed to show her face?

Actually, my friends were being wonderful. Twyla called me twice a day and left messages if I didn't feel like picking up (“Franky? Just checking in. No need to call back”); Jenn, Katy, Eleanor, Carole called or e-mailed me, and so did Meg Tyler, our swim team coach, plus other teachers from last year, and even a few guys.

I was cautious about contradicting Dad; he was in a jumpy, edgy mood all the time now, mostly talking
on the phone or waiting for it to ring, but I had to tell him, “I'm starting school at Forrester with everyone else, Daddy. I've got to. Please!”

It was a Freaky-stubborn decision. I could hear the wildness in my voice. Dad and Freaky were a dangerous mixture, like gasoline and a lighted match, I had to remember the scene in the Blounts' breakfast room when Dad had grabbed me by the shoulders and shaken, shaken, shaken me when I refused to apologize. . . . “See, people will say I'm hiding out. Like I'm ashamed or something. And I'm not. I want to go back to
normal
.”

Dad was surprised by this, but impressed. “Franky, you've got guts.”

“Does that mean I can start next week?”

“I'm not going to stop you, honey.”

I told myself I didn't need my mother for my life. It would be weird starting school without Mom around, but last spring she'd been away half the time, and this fall she'd have been away too, in Skagit Harbor at the cabin, so there wasn't much difference
in my life practically speaking, was there? If Krista Connor was “missing” or if Krista Connor was “separated” and living in some new place.

This was what I told myself in Mr. Sheehan's house on Vashon Island.

Samantha was only in sixth grade, and lots more vulnerable than I was. I believed that I was becoming more mature under stress, while Samantha was definitely regressing. She was too restless to read for more than a few minutes lately, and she'd always loved reading. Now she was more likely to flick through the TV channels, from channel one to ninety-eight, and back again to one, staring glassy-eyed and expressionless. Samantha definitely didn't want to start school, and I agreed with Dad that she should probably stay home for a while. “At least until Mom comes back.”

Dad looked at me strangely, with a faint, startled smile.

I'd made a slip, calling Krista Connor “Mom.”
Dad didn't like to hear that word from either of his daughters. But sometimes, in a situation like this, I didn't know what else to call her.

Mr. Sheehan was all predictions and promises.

“This will be over soon. When they realize their error.”

Mr. Sheehan spoke in a thrilled, informed TV voice. When he and Dad were together, you'd certainly think that Michael Sheehan, not Reid Pierson, was the TV personality. (For Dad wasn't in his “up” mood much in private. Sometimes he didn't even shave. He had to conserve his energy and enthusiasm and his beaming Reid Pierson smile for when he left the house and was “on.”)

Mr. Sheehan said to Samantha and me, “You're brave girls! Damned brave.”

Freaky figured this guy with his earnest manner for a class-A phony except he was on Dad's side. He knew the “Byzantine” ways of the criminal justice system and would guide Reid Pierson through the
ordeal safely. Freaky was thinking,
Sure, for a fee. A big fee
. I knew that top defense attorneys like Michael Sheehan billed at more than three hundred dollars an hour, and even more in court.

In court?

If there was a trial.

But there can't be a trial—Mom is just hiding away. Mom is not hurt. Mom is alive. Mom is “punishing” us. Isn't she?

Mr. Sheehan repeated we were “brave girls”: “It's damned hard to be the daughters of a celebrity like Reid Pierson. See, the world loves celebrities, especially sports heroes, but they also love to see them messed up. Cops love them, and D.A.s, because, if they can arrest them for something, anything, they get prominent coverage in all the media. Sonsabitches!” Mr. Sheehan spoke so vehemently, with such support of Dad, I wanted to love him.

Except he was coaching us. He never stopped coaching us.

Already I'd been questioned by a woman from
the district attorney's office. Todd had been too. (But not Samantha, who was too young, Mr. Sheehan argued.) Because I was a minor, Dad and Mr. Sheehan had been present. I guess I'd come off sounding kind of sullen, resentful. Mostly I'd been scared. (I have to admit.) Mr. Sheehan said that I would be questioned again, and should make sure that I said what I intended to say, no more and no less. “You never give the adversary a crumb. You make them work, and give them nothing.” I tried to think of the police investigation as some kind of game, a game with rules Mr. Sheehan knew and would share with us, but it stayed with me that the object of the investigation was to locate Krista Connor, and that was a good, desired object. Wasn't it?

You know your mother is gone. You know she isn't coming back
.

Freaky knows
.

In the investigation into Krista Connor's disappearance, lots of people were being questioned. Not just our family but relatives of my mother's,
friends and neighbors and acquaintances in Seattle as well as Skagit Harbor, and probably many others. (Mero Okawa's disappearance was being investigated, too, but exclusively by Skagit County police, and with far less publicity.) I was aware from TV coverage, which was intense, that woods and marshes and abandoned buildings in the Skagit County area were being searched, as well as stretches of the river and other waterways. Expert forensics detectives were working on the crime scene.

I knew that the investigation was primarily a homicide investigation, not a missing-persons investigation. But I tried not to think of it in those terms.

No! Mom isn't gone. I don't believe it
.

She can't be gone. It's like Dad says, some kind of game
.

We, Francesca and Samantha, must help in the game.

“Your father never left home on that night, August twenty-sixth. We've all agreed on that point, girls, yes?”

Samantha, picking at a scab on her knee, nodded yes.

Glassy-eyed Samantha, sickish pale. When Samantha wasn't crying and whining, she switched to zombie mode.

“Your father arrived home directly from the studio, we've ascertained from numerous witnesses, he was ‘exhausted'—‘showing the effect of the codeine medication'—when he sat down to dinner with you at about seven thirty
P.M
., yes? He went then to bed between eight thirty and nine
P.M
., he was heavily medicated to sleep for at least twelve hours. Which he did.” Mr. Sheehan paused for effect, smiling. He might have been addressing a vast, attentive audience. “To the extent of your knowledge, Francesca, Samantha, your father did sleep through the night, and
you would have heard him if he'd left the house
, yes? Todd has sworn to this, and you will swear to this—Francesca, Samantha?”

Samantha's head jerked in a zombie-nod. When I hesitated, Mr. Sheehan stared at me, smiling harder.

“Francesca? Eh?”

I nodded too. Yes. I would swear.

“And so, girls: when you're asked, as you will be, where you believe your father was that night, if he left the house for even five minutes, you will say . . . ?”

Samantha shivered, jamming her thumb against her mouth. In a tiny voice she said, “D-Daddy was home all night. I know he was.”

Mr. Sheehan turned to me. His gaze was steely, shrewd. “Francesca? Be sure—they will try to trip you up if they can.”

I mumbled, “I said. I told you. A hundred times.”

“So one more time won't hurt, dear.”

Still I hesitated. My head felt as if shattered glass was shifting about inside, and it hurt.
Freaky had been awake, Freaky had heard
.

Heard what?

Something
.

But that was a dream. A dream can't be proven
.

I was staring at a pattern of stains on my jogging shoe. Thinking how it happens, you buy a new pair of
shoes and they're terrific-looking and yet one day, and with me it's pretty soon, they get stained and start to look just like the old shoes you've stashed away in your closet with two or three other old pairs you haven't gotten around to tossing away yet. Thinking how fast it can happen, and the shoes are definitely not-new any longer.

A car in the driveway, headlights turned off. A door at the far end of the hall opening. Footsteps?

Definitely can't be proven
.

The glowing-green numerals on the digital clock floating in the darkness beside the bed. Freaky's wide-awake eyes seeing 4:38
A.M
.

Can't! Can't be proven
.

When Mr. Sheehan sweated, his cologne scent turned just slightly rancid, as it was now. He was staring at me, and smiling hard. Samantha, who'd been too listless to glance at me for most of the day, now stared at me too, her thumb jammed against her mouth. I wondered for a nervous moment if I'd uttered some sound, if I'd whimpered or whispered to myself.

“Yes. Sure. I've told you. I can swear: Daddy was home all that night, Daddy never left the house for five minutes, I would've heard Daddy if he had. I swear.”