The Reappearance of Rachel Price

Only FOX, CNN and ABC outside the next day when Bel got home from school. Dwindling, one news channel at a time. If they followed nursery rhyme logic, they’d all be gone by Saturday, old news. Until something new broke—like Rachel had made it all up—then they’d all come scurrying back, start the song again. Ten white news vans, sitting on the curb.

“Have fun at dancing!” Bel called to Carter as she continued down Milton Street, pulling her hood up to ignore the reporters.

Bel scrambled for her keys in her pocket. She didn’t realize until she looked up. Dad’s truck wasn’t here, but neither was Rachel’s car.

Was Rachel out? Maybe she was still at the Royalty Inn, recording her interview with Ramsey. Bel should have checked the parking lot when they walked past.

She unlocked the front door and stepped inside the house, heart picking up, just in case she needed it.

“Hello?” she called out, to double-check.

No one answered.

She walked through the living room. Tried again. “Hello? Dad? Rachel? You here?” Hand resting on the banister, looking up. “Rachel? Mom?” she said, just as a test. “Mommy dearest?”

Nothing. Not a sound. She was home alone.

She sighed, hand to her chest to slow her heart. She kicked off her shoes and dropped her bag, leaving them where they fell. Rachel kept tidying things away, even though she didn’t know where they lived: putting plates where the bowls lived, mugs where the glasses lived, and Bel’s shoes in the hall closet. So Bel would enjoy leaving them right here while Rachel was gone, the house to herself.

The house to herself.

Bel was an idiot: she hadn’t realized what that meant. Not just a chance to leave her shoes in the way, but a chance to search for answers without Rachel’s prying eyes. Rachel had done it first, snooping in Bel’s room yesterday, so it was her turn now, a fair and equal retaliation. She might have left something in her room, something real, concrete, that Bel could use to unravel her lies.

She’d waited too long already; Rachel could be back any moment.

Bel thundered up the stairs, even the creaky one, and hurried over to the spare-room door. She grabbed the handle and pushed it open, stepping inside. If there was an invisible barrier here too, it wasn’t strong enough to keep her out.

The bed was made, almost too neatly, like it was a prop and not a real place where someone slept. Afternoon sun spilled in through the open curtains, capturing the room in a static yellow glow, claiming Bel too as she stepped farther inside, bending to check under the bed. Nothing but dust.

To the dresser first. On top were some new things: a can of deodorant, two moisturizers and a scented candle. Bel pulled open the top drawer. Underwear, bras and socks; their haul from H&M. She patted around, checking if Rachel had hidden anything underneath or between, but she felt only fabric.

The next drawer had folded tops, new and the old T-shirts Dad had dug out.

Skirt and pants and jeans in the one below. Rachel must have been wearing the shirtdress for her interview.

Nothing in the drawer at the bottom.

Bel turned and caught movement in the corner of her eye. She twisted toward it. A shape, phantom dark, looming there. Bel blinked and let out her breath. It was just a towel, charcoal gray, hanging on the back of the door, still seesawing gently from when she’d shoved it open.

Bel looked beyond, into the hallway, focusing her ears, checking for any sound. The reporters outside should act like an alarm, shouldn’t they? Warning her when Rachel returned with their desperate, shouted questions. It was true, but it wasn’t much comfort. She felt jumpy, even at the sounds her own body made, screws tightening in her gut.

She walked over to the nightstand.

There was an iPhone charging cable wrapped around the base of the lamp, plugged in behind. A glass of water on top, at least two stale sips left behind. No book, but a folded piece of paper, a pen resting on top at a diagonal to keep it down.

Bel moved the pen aside to see what was written there in Rachel’s scrawl.

To-do list:

* Choose menu for Friday

* Book eye test

* Book dentist

* Insurance

* Annabel

Bel’s eyes circled her own name there, at the bottom of the list. Ran her finger across it. Well, what the fuck did that mean? Her name as something to be done, below insurance and dentist. Empty checkboxes, so nothing had been completed yet. And what exactly did Rachel mean by that, what was she planning to do to her?

A shiver passed up Bel’s spine, uncanny and cold, even though the room was warm. She placed the pen back where she’d found it and her eyes settled on the handle of the nightstand drawer. A place for secrets—where Bel kept hers—and the only place left where they could be. Her fingers pinched the air, closing around the rectangular handle. She pulled it open, the wood grating against its carved grooves.

The empty iPhone box was inside, receipt on top. A lip balm. A small packet of Kleenex. That was it. No, that couldn’t be it. Bel had checked everywhere else in the room. There had to be something; she needed something.

The drawer wouldn’t pull out any farther, creaking as Bel tried. She slid the iPhone box to the side to check the dark space behind it.

Wait, there was something here. Something small and pink, buried right at the back.

Bel reached in, closed her fingers around it, tiny and soft.

She pulled it out and held it up to the light.

Light pink, frilled at the top.

It was a baby sock, almost weightless, curled in the palm of her hand.

Bel studied it, held it up and let it dangle. She couldn’t believe her feet had ever been that tiny. Because this was her sock, wasn’t it? It had to be, from before Rachel disappeared. But what was it doing here?

This drawer had been empty that first night after Rachel reappeared, when Dad set up the room for her. Bel had been here when Dad checked the nightstand, blowing dust from the top. This sock was not there. So how was it there now?

There was only one real explanation: Rachel must have brought it with her. Put it in the drawer herself, tucked it right at the back, like she was trying to hide it.

But how was that even possible? If Rachel had the sock when she reappeared, in her pocket maybe, the police would have taken it into evidence, along with the rest of her clothes. But the sock wasn’t in evidence, it was right here. Rachel could have stashed it somewhere before they went off with the police? Somewhere inside the house, or somewhere in town on the way. She’d had plenty of time in the days since to go collect it, bring it back and hide it in the drawer. That was the only possibility, unless Dad kept some of Bel’s baby things around the house—in the attic maybe—and Rachel went searching when she was home alone.

But if Rachel had brought the sock into the house, why was she keeping one of Bel’s baby socks? And how long had she kept it? From when she disappeared?

Bel ran her fingers over the tiny sock, examining it. It felt old, thinning and worn, like this wasn’t the first time fingers had stroked it, trying to take something from it.

Bel couldn’t see any other way, any other origin for this baby sock in her hand. And if that was true, if Rachel had taken a keepsake from Bel the day she disappeared, then that proved it, didn’t it? That she knew she was going to disappear, that she’d planned it, chosen it. You didn’t take a souvenir from your baby daughter if you didn’t plan to leave forever, abandoning her in the backseat of your car.

The sighting in North Conway three months ago: the black jeans and red top gave it away, that Rachel had planned her reappearance. And here, this tiny baby sock betrayed the other half of the story. That Rachel had also planned her disappearance, that she’d chosen to go, like Bel had always known deep down.

It didn’t hurt now, facing the truth, it felt like victory, a confirmation. Rachel cared just enough to keep Bel’s sock, but not enough to stay. The sock was proof, still too flimsy for anyone else, but enough for Bel to keep going. To work out why Rachel chose to disappear, then reappear, and what she’d done with those sixteen years between, other than hold on to Bel’s sock.

The knot writhed in her gut, pulling at its strings.

Bel closed her fist around the baby sock, locked her fingers under her thumb.

Well, why not? It had been hers in the first place, wasn’t Rachel’s to keep. She took the sock with her, leaving the spare room as she’d found it.

Into her bedroom, no longer quite as safe.

Hid the sock in her nightstand instead, buried deep under all those other little secrets.