The Initial Insult - Mindy McGinnis Page 0,46

the riverbank, assaulted. They’re effing dead.

Assaulted?!!? Someone touched that little girl???? Why don’t we know about this??? I have kids. I need to know what’s going on!!!!! I have a RIGHT to know what’s going on.

She wasn’t assaulted. My cousin is an EMT. She had injuries consistent with being in a mild collision, and some head trauma.

—You shouldn’t be repeating what first responders say.

—First responders shouldn’t be talking!!!!!

Hey you sicko thought she got touched you’re the one with head trauma

Page Admin here, I’m locking down this thread to prevent further discussion. This is an ongoing police investigation and nothing being posted here is relevant or helpful.

No, it’s not relevant, or helpful. I already knew all these things—and also that Facebook is a shit show. But one phrase does stand out: This is an ongoing police investigation.

It still is, three years later. Nobody knows if my parents are alive or dead, and if I follow both options to their logical conclusions, the answer is ugly. Either they abandoned me, or they’re dead. My throat closes up. These aren’t new thoughts; they’re the same ones that have been bubbling up for years, repeating themselves as I lay curled in my bed—or the stable, if Cecil decided I hadn’t earned the right to come inside for the night.

But there are other thoughts, too, like the fact that Mom would have known I’d end up living with either Cecil or Aunt Lenore, raised alongside wild animals in cages, or growing up in a house that was falling down.

Or they’re dead. Their bodies rotting somewhere, all bone by now, like the ones scattered around the panther’s pen. Something to nothing.

I’ve turned over both options, plenty of times.

I don’t know which one I prefer.

I log off the computer, copying down the hotline that was set up for the public to call with information on the Montor disappearance, although I doubt it’s still active.

The light is fading by the time I leave the library, clouds rolling in to cover up the sun. Dead leaves skitter across the pavement while I watch a few kids from school unlock their bikes from the rack and take off for home, hoping to beat the rain.

I’ve got no chance of that. I’m on foot, with a ways to go. This is something I didn’t think about when I dodged Mrs. Anho at school. The bus is my ride home. Well, it’s my ride back to where I live. Now, I’m stuck walking.

I zip up my coat—an old Carhartt jacket I’d found at a church yard sale, with the price tag of ten dollars on it. I’d showed it to Cecil, telling him it was a steal.

“Steal, damn right,” he’d said, and tossed it into the truck without paying for it.

I keep my head down as I walk out of town, the sidewalks stopping once I’m outside the village limits. I’m on the berm then, boots kicking up gravel when it starts to rain. The drops are cold and wet, heavy and starting to pelt me, starting to sting, when the first car goes by.

They slow down, and when I glance up the driver—a man—inspects me, seems to consider stopping, then decides not to. Can’t say I blame him. He’s watching his own ass. Something I’ve learned plenty about living at Amontillado Animal Attractions. The next driver, though, is a woman, and she goes so far as to roll her window down until someone leans over the back seat and whispers in her ear. Gretchen Astor.

The car moves on.

I’m soaked to my skin, my hair hanging in dark streams by the time I’m headed uphill. I figure I’ve got about five miles to go, and only three if I decide to stop at Ribbit’s house and get dried off. There’s a car coming at me now, headlights on, slicing through the rain. I move over, giving them plenty of room. The last thing I need is to get clipped. This one doesn’t even slow down, doesn’t even consider it. It hits a pothole right in front of me, sending a wave of cold, gritty water into my teeth.

“Fuck you,” I scream, spinning with it as it passes me, both fingers out in a double bird. “Fuck you all over the place!”

I know that car. I’ve ridden in it. Been in the back seat with my best friend, sharing Skittles and handing a Coke back and forth—but only when it was just her dad with us, because her mom is funny about sugar.