BooksBarbecue
Back Don't Look for Me
Chapters (62)
  1. Cover
  2. Copyright Notice
  3. Dedication
  4. Chapter One
  5. Chapter Two
  6. Chapter Three
  7. Chapter Four
  8. Chapter Five
  9. Chapter Six
  10. Chapter Seven
  11. Chapter Eight
  12. Chapter Nine
  13. Chapter Ten
  14. Chapter Eleven
  15. Chapter Twelve
  16. Chapter Thirteen
  17. Chapter Fourteen
  18. Chapter Fifteen
  19. Chapter Sixteen
  20. Chapter Seventeen
  21. Chapter Eighteen
  22. Chapter Nineteen
  23. Chapter Twenty
  24. Chapter Twenty-one
  25. Chapter Twenty-two
  26. Chapter Twenty-three
  27. Chapter Twenty-four
  28. Chapter Twenty-five
  29. Chapter Twenty-six
  30. Chapter Twenty-seven
  31. Chapter Twenty-eight
  32. Chapter Twenty-nine
  33. Chapter Thirty
  34. Chapter Thirty-one
  35. Chapter Thirty-two
  36. Chapter Thirty-three
  37. Chapter Thirty-four
  38. Chapter Thirty-five
  39. Chapter Thirty-six
  40. Chapter Thirty-seven
  41. Chapter Thirty-eight
  42. Chapter Thirty-nine
  43. Chapter Forty
  44. Chapter Forty-one
  45. Chapter Forty-two
  46. Chapter Forty-three
  47. Chapter Forty-four
  48. Chapter Forty-five
  49. Chapter Forty-six
  50. Chapter Forty-seven
  51. Chapter Forty-eight
  52. Chapter Forty-nine
  53. Chapter Fifty
  54. Chapter Fifty-one
  55. Chapter Fifty-two
  56. Chapter Fifty-three
  57. Chapter Fifty-four
  58. Chapter Fifty-five
  59. Chapter Fifty-six
  60. Chapter Fifty-seven
  61. Acknowledgments [TK]
  62. Also by Wendy Walker

“I know, sweetheart. Do you want to tell me what there is in the kitchen and I can teach you how to make something?”

She hangs her head, chin to chest, but then raises her narrowed eyes so I can still see them. Her lips disappear under her teeth and her nose scrunches. I call this expression of hers Angry Face. I don’t say this out loud, but I make a note of it, and also what makes it come, and what makes it leave.

“I don’t have any better ideas, but if you do I will try to help you with them,” I say.

Now she crosses her arms and huffs. I try not to laugh, but it is amusing. I haven’t been amused for a very long time. Maybe even for years. There is a new power stirring inside me that has given this impulse of being amused some latitude. Some room to breathe.

“Did he tell you what to do in case of an emergency?” I ask now. “For example, if you got sick, or if there was a fire? Is there a way to reach him? I can help you study and play with you from inside my room, but that’s about it,” I say.

She uncrosses her arms. Angry Face softens, becomes whimsical, mischievous. She tilts her head and pushes one shoulder, always the right one, a little ahead of her chest. This is Coy Face. She knows a secret and she wants me to get it out of her.

Nicole had this face by the time she was four. Annie didn’t have it until she was six or seven, and even then it was more playful than precocious. Evan never had it. My only boy, but I could read him like a book.

I have had time to think these past fourteen days, and not just about the man and Alice and my plan. I think about why I am here, and that perhaps I have finally been sentenced for my crime. I am finally being punished. This has done something to me, shifted my insides.

With this shift has come a reversal of how I had come to see my own daughters. Annie the good girl. Nicole the bad girl. We are not supposed to do that. Parents. Good parents. But I have stopped pretending that I am one. I hate the person Nicole has become these past few years. If I met her on the street, I would thank God she was not my child. I would judge her parents with contempt. Who would allow such behavior? Who would permit their grown child to behave this way?