Life Sentences (8 page)

When Daisy got back to her motel,
there were four messages waiting for her on the motel phone-two from
Truett, one from Fiona and one from Lily. She sat on the edge of her bed and
ate her tasteless club sandwich, going over the morning's events like
over a sore tooth she couldn't stop poking. It was almost noon. It would
be three o'clock back in Boston. She picked up the phone and dialed her mother's
number.

"Hello?" Lily answered
tensely.

"Hi, Mom, it's me."

"I've been thinking about
you all day, sweetheart."

"I met with the lead detective.
He's working very hard." Her clothes had looked fresh that morning.
The air conditioner labored industriously, but the room was still
warm. So warm she wanted to soak her head in a bowl of ice water. "I
went to her apartment today, Mom," she said. "It was so depressing.
I looked through her closet and touched all her things."

"Do they know what happened
yet?"

"No. But they're doing the
best they can."

"She'll get tired of hiding,"
Lily said. "She always does. Then we'll get a phone call."

"Mom." Her head hurt. She
rummaged through the drawers of the bedside table, looking for a bottle
of aspirin. "I think we should prepare ourselves for the
worst."

"Don't be silly," Lily insisted.
"Anna will find her way home. She always does."

"Two other people have gone
missing from De Campo Beach in the past year. The police say Anna makes
three. They think these disappearances could be related. Mom? The police
need to know who Louis's father was."

"What? Why?"

"Because Anna was looking for
him."

"What?" The upset in her
voice was audible.

"She had a copy of Louis's
birth certificate with her. She was trying to find out who Louis's biological
father was." Daisy clutched the receiver. "I know it wasn't Mr.
Barsum."

Lily sighed. "No, of course
not."

"Who, then?"

There was a long silence. Then her
mother started weeping softly on the other end of the line. Just the thought
of her mother hoarding all her precious secrets inside that drafty old
house made Daisy feel disgusted and angry.

"Mom, please. Don't cry."

Lily was making a clogged, constipated
sound. "Mom? The police have asked me to find out… but I really
want to know."

"Did they check the homeless
shelters and halfway houses? Have they tried the local churches? Are
there any real churches in California, Daisy, or just those New Age
places?"

She experienced a level of anxiety
she'd rarely felt before. "You're not going to tell me, are you? Not
even when Anna's life is in danger."

"Would you please stop yelling
at me?" "Nobody's yelling!" Her head hurt. "Listen to
me, Mom. Supposing for a minute that Anna didn't run away, what if she needs
our help? What if her search for Louis's father has something to do with
her disappearance?"

"It couldn't possibly have
anything to do with that. Why are you harassing me?" "I'm not harassing
you, Mom." "It wouldn't make a bit of difference, Daisy. Not
even if I told you everything, it wouldn't help you find your sister. Do
you understand? It's completely irrelevant."

"Fine. I'm exhausted. I'll
call you tomorrow." She hung up and noticed that her hands were shaking.

She lay down on the bed and closed
her eyes. Her heart rate was right up there. She was afraid she'd pressed
her mother too hard. She was angry at herself for not staying in closer touch
with her sister. She was feeling guilty about the thing with Truett. She
never should've have taken him home the other night. Yesterday she'd
snuck into Professor Julia
Truett's
classroom
and had secretly watched her work. Holding a piece of chalk, Julia flicked
her short honey-colored hair out of her face with the back of her hand, a
gesture both efficient and wildly appealing. She was funny and articulate,
and her students burst into applause at the end of her lecture. Why did
Truett want to leave her? She seemed like a remarkable woman.

Now the phone rang, and she leaped
for it. "Mom?"

"Just me," Truett said.
"Sorry to disappoint."

She collapsed back against her
pillow. "Hello, Truett."

"What a tepid response. Your
physiology should go nuts at the sound of my voice. Your face should
flush. Your heart should do flip-flops. Your arms should break out in sweaty
goose bumps…"

"My arms are breaking out in
sweaty goose bumps." She was actually happy to hear his voice.

"I'm having a love affair
with your voice mail, you know."

"Sorry. I'm having a shitty
day."

"Bad news?"

"Nothing good."

"I wish I could help somehow,
Daisy."

"They don't know anything
yet. I'm just sitting here in my motel room staring at the four walls.
Eating a stale sandwich."

"Sounds like a party."

"Yeah." She smiled.
"Me and the
minibar
. Me and the complimentary
soap."

"Careful." He laughed.
"I can only have one serious discussion per day."

"Are you taking care of my mice?"

"Of course."

"How are the myelin levels?"

"Near normal."

"Good."

"If there's anything I can
do, you let me know."

"Thanks. Talk to you later."
She hung up and stared at the ceiling.

Daisy knew she couldn't just he there.
She had to do something. She took a shower, put on some fresh clothes, found
a photograph of Anna she'd brought with her from Vermont, then took a cab
back to De Campo Beach.

Her first stop was a nonprofit soup
kitchen, but the woman in charge wasn't very helpful. "I don't recognize
her," she stated flatly. "Sorry."

"Are there any homeless shelters
nearby?"

"You might try the church on
Pleasant Avenue."

She visited several churches
and homeless shelters, but nobody recognized Anna from her photograph.
Finally, an old priest with crinkly eyes pointed her toward the strand,
where a large throng of homeless men and women were giving off a recreational-chemical
vibe.

"They come here for the social
services and the weather," he explained. "Lots of these abandoned
buildings were damaged in the 1994 Northridge quake, and now we've
got a big problem with squatters."

Daisy spent the rest of the afternoon
wandering in and out of abandoned buildings and trudging up and down the
strand, asking drifters and runaways if they'd seen her sister. The sand
wasn't white like the sand of tropical beaches; it was pink mixed with
chips of mica that made it sparkle. In places, it wasn't so much a beach
as a sand-filled ashtray, with lots of discarded cigarette butts and a
few hypodermic needles thrown in for good measure.

Nobody recognized Anna from her
photograph, so Daisy left the beach and headed north along the boulevard,
passing bike shops and boutiques and organic cafes. "Have you seen
this woman? She's twenty-eight years old. Her name is Anna Hubbard."

Most people were too busy to
stop. Unable to concede defeat, she strolled along the boulevard until
she came to the Santa Monica Promenade. "Excuse me, but have you
seen my sister? She's five foot eight. She has red hair and blue eyes. Do
you recognize her?" She followed a crowd of tourists from Sweden
and Japan down to the end of the pier. Behind her, a little girl shrieked,
"Mommy, a bee stung me!" The sky was the color of a blue party balloon
inflated to the breaking point. Rap music grunted from a boom box, and
a teenage boy swung his head to the beat as if the drums were pummeling
him from inside.

Daisy had been walking for hours.
Her feet were swollen and aching by the time she reached the arcade at
the end of the pier. The large, open space was filled with the sound of
kids' laughter and the jingle-jangle of pin-ball machines. It smelled
like the inside of a grocery bag. It smelled of mustard and hot dogs and
lemonade and floor wax.

She approached a small group of
teenage girls and showed them Anna's picture. "Have you seen my
sister?" she said.

The girls wore looks of intense
disinterest, snapping their gum and rolling their eyes.

"I have," the skinniest
one volunteered. "I used to see her with Roy all the time."

"Who's Roy?" Daisy asked.

The girl shrugged. "Just some
guy." She looked like a rag doll with green button eyes. She had terrible
posture for a teenager, a tattoo of a Japanese character on her arm
and green polish on her nails.

"What's your name?" Daisy
asked her.

"Christie."

"When was the last time you
saw my sister, Christie?"

"I don't know." The girl
made a face. "Back in January, I think. She used to hang out on the promenade
a lot, but I haven't seen her in ages."

"What about Roy? Have you seen
this guy Roy around lately?"

Christie shook her head.

"Do you know where he lives?"

"Nope."

"Does he have a phone number?
A last name?"

"I only know him from the promenade."
Her eyes grew big and round. "Why? What happened?"

"I'm trying to find my sister.
Would you help me find my sister?"

Christie wore a peach-and-white-striped
T-shirt over purple bikini bottoms, and there were green streaks in
her short dark hair. The green in her hair matched the green on her nails
and the green of her eyes. "I don't know," she said cagily.
"Could you loan me some money?"

"How much?" Daisy asked,
and the other girls became keenly interested all of a sudden.

For fifty dollars, Christie agreed
to accompany Daisy back to the De Campo Beach police station, where
Jack interviewed her for about twenty minutes. Then a sketch artist made
a composite of Roy based on Christie's best recollection.

When the sketch was completed,
Jack asked Daisy if she recognized the man in the drawing. Roy had pockmarked
skin, shoulder-length dark hair and the kind of bland, police-sketch stare
that made her fear him instinctively. His nose was long and straight
with slender nostrils. His jaw was square. His forehead was tall and
bony, and narrow coils of dark hair wound down on either side of his head.
He was just the type of powerful-looking loser Anna would fall for.

"I've never seen him before
in my life," Daisy said.

"Can I go now?" Christie
asked impatiently.

After extracting a promise from
her that she would let him know if she ever saw Roy or Anna on the promenade
again, Jack let her go.

"What are you going to do
now?" Daisy said.

"Distribute the artist's composite
to the media."

"But there must be other people
who've seen Roy, right? Are you going down to the promenade to look for
other witnesses? Can I help?"

"It's better to go through
the media," Jack told her firmly. "I'll handle it from here."

She felt a burst of resentment
and went back to her motel, where she got dressed for bed, brushed her teeth,
braided her hair, then stood staring out her window at the courtyard.
The night was very still, not a breeze stirring the palm fronds. The empty pool
was all lit up. You could count the leaves floating on its surface. She
took two aspirins and crawled into bed, then stayed up late reading her
sister's diary.

Daisy found herself delving once
again into Anna's troubled world. She needed a magnifying glass to read
the minuscule handwriting. After an hour, she had translated several
pages:
"I got that tingling sensation
on the back of my arms, that stroking sensation like pussy willows, and I
thought about calling Daisy again. I can't remember the last time we
spoke. I miss her so much. She once told me that people are made out of
the same things as rocks and gas and dust. But a rock won't curl up on the sofa
with you. Gas can't kiss you. Dust doesn’t sing you lullabies. I think Daisy
needs somebody. I think she's as crazy as I am, in her own demented
way."

Anna tried to explain what it
was like being her:
"My thoughts
will split off from my mind and become these jagged pieces of glass that
cut into me and torment me. They burrow under my skin and dig deeper and
deeper, so I won't ever forget. It's like I'm not allowed to forget. Like
I can never forget who I am. It's like being held hostage by my own memories."

Often she focused on her obsession
with Mr. Barsum:
"Where did he go
after Mom found out what he'd done to us? Where is he now? He's probably
still a bank teller. He's probably out there somewhere, getting away
with things."

Around ten o'clock, emotionally
drained and still jet-lagged, Daisy turned off the light and went to bed.
At some point as she was drifting off to sleep, she imagined Anna's breath
against her cheek. The two sisters had once been so close they could finish
each other's sentences. They sometimes spoke Anna's Language. They
played
Monotony
when it rained.
They shared
DNA secrets
late at
night, whispering to each other from their twin beds. DNA meant Daisy and
Anna. Sometimes they conspired against their mother, and Lily would
feel ganged up on. Eventually, the girls grew so close they felt
close-
trophobic
.