If you were visiting this town for the first time, you wouldn’t notice it. You’d be busy running your errand, dropping by the coffee shop or the grocery stor to pick something up for the long drive home. You’d be wearing your earphones listening to some true crime podcast or talking to your mother about the new neighbors. You’d check your map and you'd go—quickly.
You wouldn’t see it the way I have all these years—the town's too quiet, like someone turned the volume down. Dogs don’t bark and car horns don’t honk. There’s never a teenager driving by with their stereo too loud or some kid fussing. If you’d ask, no one would say a thing about it—nothing strange or peculiar, and trust me, I’ve tried. Countless times I’ve tried to turn up my radio or give a little shout, but then I just forget about it. And I carry about my quiet, muted day.
So as I pass the shops, the post office and barber shop, I want to drive a crowbar into the panes of glass and revel in the noise. I’m almost at the coffee shop to meet Malinda so I take out my little notebook and review it, the notes and the address. I didn’t forget them—I just wanted them top of mind. I stare at the picture for a second, but not too long so that the tears don’t come.
I see my sister Malinda sitting there in the shop and she checks her phone to make sure she has it right.
I join her in the booth. “Jared, Jesus Christ. What’s going on that you needed to pull me away from the kids? Why couldn’t I bring them?”
I hold up my hands and say, “I’m fine. I am. And I just didn’t want to get the kids involved.”
“Involved in what?”
“I have to ask you something. And I need you to think really hard about the answer. Don’t just blurt out what you think at first.”
“What are you—”
“Malinda. Just stop and think. Do you know a Brian Coffey?”
“Coffey. Like a relative of ours? We don’t have a Brian—”
“Think.”
She rolled her eyes and I honestly believe she then thought about it. Malinda was the one who sent out the Christmas cards and remembered the birthdays. She knew the family tree, our convoluted and wiry tree.
“There is no Brian. I’m sorry. None related to us at least. Maybe in—”
I take the picture, the one of us at the park. Seven years ago. He was five.
She picks up and stares at it.
“Who is that? That’s us, right, but who’s the little boy you’re holding.”
I keep the grief down. I hold it down like I’m trying to hold back an ocean of pain.
I tap the picture to make a point. “That’s Brian Coffey. He’s my son.”
She laughed but a worried laugh, a weighted down one.
“You must be off your meds, Jared. What are you talking about?”
“Listen, Malinda I know how it sounds. But that’s my son. Your nephew. You would send him Transformers birthday cards. He loved vanilla cake with white frosting that you gave him enormous shit about. You took him to see monster truck rallies. He always loved the Giant Zombie.”
Her eyes flicker for a second. A flicker of remembrance I hoped.
“No, no, what is this about? Why are you telling me this? This is all made up—you are off your meds, and you made that picture up. I’m leaving.” She started to scoot out of the booth.
I’m sorry, Malinda. I really am. I put the incantation on my lips, one I swore I’d never say again.
“524 Crawley St.”
She froze like she’d been thrown into the lake just as it started to harden into ice. She scooted back in.
“That’s our old house, Jared.” She said it like warning, a dire warning.
“He went there. He went inside, Malinda. That’s why everyone has forgotten him. It’s why I’m starting to. We have to go in and get him. Right now.”
She shook her head almost violently. “I’m not going back to that house. And you and your pretend son can deal with that.” She bolted out of the booth at a full sprint, but when she hit the street, she slowed down into a friendly walk to not attract attention, to not make any noise.
If someone shared this with you, I publish a weekly(ish) newsletter where you can get my fiction, recommendations and just commentary on the writing world. You can sign up for it at the link above.