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Back The Wilderwomen
Chapters (37)
  1. Copyright Notice
  2. Dedication
  3. BEFORE
  4. AFTER
  5. ONE THOUGHTS ON SUN HATS
  6. TWO TIME FOR CAKE
  7. THREE TWELVE MONTHS
  8. FOUR PSYCHIC KARAOKE
  9. FIVE A SECOND SLEEPING BAG
  10. SIX SIX MONTHS
  11. SEVEN THE EARLY BIRD GETS THE PANCAKE
  12. EIGHT SIX MONTHS
  13. NINE FOLLOW THE MUSIC
  14. TEN THE STARS ARE BRIGHTER IN THE DESERT
  15. ELEVEN SIX MONTHS
  16. TWELVE EVERY STAR HAS A SONG
  17. THIRTEEN PSYCHIC KARAOKE
  18. FOURTEEN ONE MONTH
  19. FIFTEEN A WELL-TRAVELED HAT
  20. SIXTEEN JOEL VS. THE VOLCANO
  21. SEVENTEEN TWO WEEKS
  22. EIGHTEEN HOUSE OF MEMORIES
  23. NINETEEN IF TREES COULD TALK
  24. TWENTY THREE DAYS
  25. TWENTY-ONE SEARCH PARTY
  26. TWENTY-TWO NOT THE SAME ZADIE
  27. TWENTY-THREE WAVES OF SMOKE
  28. TWENTY-FOUR THE DAY OF
  29. TWENTY-FIVE THE SKY IS FULL OF BIRDS
  30. TWENTY-SIX NEST
  31. TWENTY-SEVEN
  32. EPILOGUE
  33. TWENTY-EIGHT A SONG ABOUT A BIRD
  34. ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
  35. Also by Ruth Emmie Lang
  36. ABOUT THE AUTHOR
  37. Newsletter Sign-up

“No.” Finn was adamant. She reached down under the table and reappeared with Nora’s anklet in her hand, their tiny initials glittering pink in the light. “I used to think this had just fallen off her ankle by accident, but now I’m thinking maybe she left it behind on purpose. She was trying to tell us something.”

“Tell us what?”

“To follow her.”

“Wouldn’t it have been easier to just leave a note?” Zadie said hotly. The irony of this statement was not lost on her—having declined her own opportunity to leave such a note that morning. The breakup, the pregnancy—these were words Zadie was waiting to say out loud until the air was salty enough to cure them. But with her beach plans dashed, she could feel them start to rot in her mouth.

“You really think she just ran out on us, don’t you?” Finn’s eyes flashed.

Zadie thought carefully about her answer. “I don’t think there’s any way of knowing why Mom did what she did, and I think chasing after her based on one echo would be a mistake.”

Unlike Zadie, who tried her best to bury her emotions, Finn flew them like a flag. Her indignation was borderline patriotic. “I don’t know why I even told you. You don’t care where she is.”

“That’s not fair.”

“Then why don’t you want to look for her?”

Zadie had looked for Nora. The day she went missing she’d driven around town for hours asking everyone she knew whether they’d seen her mother. When she returned home that evening, she couldn’t stop staring at the iridescent oil stain on the driveway where Nora’s car had once been parked. It was another twenty minutes before she could bring herself to go inside, to tell her sister she’d failed.

Finn got tired of waiting for an answer. “I’m doing this. With or without you.” With that, she pushed her chair away from the table, feet screeching across the linoleum, then hurried out the front door.

“Shit,” Zadie muttered. The woman singing onstage made brief eye contact with her. She’d heard their argument. Most of the room probably had.

Zadie slinked past the other tables and pushed open the front door. Warm air rushed at her face, as did the lonesome sound of an approaching train. The horn sounded again and the warning bells began to chime, an oddly cheerful reminder of something so deadly. Zadie watched Finn’s car pass over the tracks just as the barriers began to fall and the mile-long train split the neighborhood in two.

FIVE A SECOND SLEEPING BAG