gruesome—embarrassing, even, during her adolescence—and she hadn’t looked in that closet in years.
She padded barefoot to her mother’s room and opened the door carefully, though she was alone in the house. The closet door squeaked when she opened it, startling her. The wooden and metal implements from her mother’s long-ago taxidermy practice shared shelf space with boxes bearing incomprehensible labels like “Stuffers” and “Merlins wheels.”
Lucy found the soap tin behind a cardboard box of paints and glues. For a moment she stared at the dark, dusty corner of the closet, thinking about her mother moving the little cache of memories from one cramped apartment to another. She pushed the box of paints back into place and shut the closet door, then took the tin to her own room. She crawled back into bed, pulling the sheet up over her lap, then set the tin in her lap and looked at it for a moment. Finally she took a deep breath and pried off the lid. She took out the first few photos, the ones she’d already seen, and laid them facedown. Her plan was to view everything in order, so that if her mother checked, she wouldn’t know the contents had been disturbed.
The next item was a letter, written in a blocky hand on unlined paper, folded in thirds. It was worn along the creases and edges, as though it had been read many times. Patty unfolded it carefully, barely breathing, and read it through. Then she read it a second time.
Lucy:
It is almost three o’clock in the morning, and I think you are asleep. You are only ten or fifteen feet away from me, but it might as well be a thousand miles. Now that you know everything I can teach you, I have nothing more to give. I wish for so many things, but most of all I wish for your happiness. I have had so many long nights to wonder why things happen the way they do, why people get hurt and dreams and plans disappear in a single second, and I am no closer to understanding now than I have ever been. But one thing has changed. I used to believe I could never be happy again, but then you taught me that life continues, even after it seems that everything has ended.
May angels watch over you as you sleep.
Your G., always
Patty read the letter again, and then once more before setting it gently on the stack. Who was G.? Was it possible it was the boy from the picture, the boy who helped out at the motel? But this letter didn’t sound like it had been written by a boy at all. What did Lucy mean to him? Could the letter have been written by Patty’s father? If so, who had he been and what had he taught Lucy?
The doorbell rang, making Patty jump. She set the letter down carefully and raced to the front door, pulling the robe tighter and adjusting the sash. She opened the door without undoing the safety chain, just far enough to see that Inspector Torre waited on the porch, accompanied by a uniformed police officer.
“Miss Takeda,” he said, nodding.
“My mother isn’t here.”
“Yes, we know. She’s at the police station.”
“What? Why is she there? Did you arrest her?”
“No, we asked her to come in and answer some questions. We can call her in a few minutes if you like. But first, Officer Grieg and I would like to come in and take a look around.”
“In—in here? My mother’s house?”
“Yes, Miss Takeda. We have a warrant.” Torre pulled a piece of paper from his pocket, and handed it to her through the narrow opening.
Patty scanned the single page quickly, then forced herself to slow down and read. There—her mother’s address. The date. A bunch of legalese.
She fumbled with the chain, her fingers shaking, then stepped back from the door. The men walked past her, Torre murmuring a polite thank-you as he passed, Grieg already pulling a pair of disposable gloves out of a bag. The situation felt like it was getting away from her, as though she had made a fundamental error from which it would be impossible to recover.
“I think I should talk to my mother. And I wasn’t... I just got out of the shower.” Her more pressing concern was the box of papers sitting on her bed. She winced as she realized she was doubting her mother’s innocence—but it wasn’t that, not really, was it? She just wanted