A sudden trill of electronic music erupted from the living room, and a burst of zombie screams from Danny’s game muffled her mother’s reply.
Isobel stepped back from the banister, surprised by her dad’s words but also thankful.
She didn’t think she could have fielded any more questions that night.
The cold seeping through her robe, she turned and made her way toward her bedroom.
She stopped just outside the door, though, arrested by the sound of soft piano music coming from within. Slow and sad, the notes drifted to her through a filter of static.
Isobel pushed her door gently open.
Clear shafts of icy moonlight streamed through her curtains, throwing floral lace patterns onto her carpet and casting her surroundings into different shades of frost blue.
She slipped inside and her attention turned immediately to her digital clock radio.
The numbers on the clock glowed 8:49 in electric blue while the song, composed of overlapping notes and delayed timing, flowed forth from its tiny speakers. In the background, Isobel thought she could detect a woman’s voice humming along, but there was too much interference to be certain.
For a moment, Isobel thought she recognized the tune. She listened hard, the urge to place the refrain so overpowering that it outweighed the more immediate question of who had turned her radio on to begin with.
Isobel shut her door softly behind her. She strode over to where the clock sat on her headboard, hoping that when the song ended, the radio station announcer would mention its title. As she drew closer, however, the song faded out, the speakers sputtering static while another station struggled to take over.
She swiveled the radio’s dial back and forth, but the channel had vanished. Then a fast-paced pop song from one of her usual stations broke through the static, making her jump.
She clicked the radio off. Glowering at the now silent clock, Isobel struggled to grasp the time and the place in which she’d heard that song.
Maybe it was an instrumental number from one of the old-school musicals her mom liked to listen to while she cleaned.
Did that mean her mom had come into her room while she’d been in the bath?
One glance toward her closet door told Isobel that was exactly what had happened.
Varen’s green mechanic’s jacket hung on the outside of the white slatted folding door, the collar looped around the small knob.
The sight of it hanging there, so exposed, jolted Isobel’s heart into hyperspeed.
She had not laid eyes on the jacket since the night she had stowed it away nearly two months ago, the same night she had found and read the note Varen had left for her in one of the pockets.
Oh no. The note.
Isobel rushed to grab the jacket, her hands fumbling through the coarse folds, searching for the pocket that crinkled. Reaching inside, her fingers brushed the piece of stiff paper, and her shoulders sagged with relief.
Had her mom found the note, Isobel knew she would have taken it for the accumulating evidence file. Worse, she might even have shown it to her father.
Isobel knew the act of turning on the radio and hanging the jacket in plain sight had been her mother’s way of making a statement.
Unable to resist, Isobel hugged the jacket close, rewarded with a scent that seized her heart like a clenched fist.
It smelled like him. God. It still smelled like him.
Isobel carried the jacket back to her bed, where she laid it out flat. She stared down at the image of the dead crow etched in black against the white patch of fabric safety-pinned to the back. Letting her fingers trail down one sleeve, she then turned toward her dresser and went to open the top drawer. Pulling out a worn pair of pajama shorts and a loose-fitting T-shirt, she tossed her robe to the floor and got dressed in the dark.
She picked up the jacket again, carefully threading her arms through the sleeves. It slid onto her shoulders with a hushing sound.
Somehow, its stiff weight managed to ground her. She came back to herself, scarcely realizing how far away she had really been.
Not bothering to peel back the covers, Isobel climbed onto her bed. She lay down on her side, facing the window, Varen’s note to her crinkling inside the right pocket.
She gripped the collar of the jacket and tucked it around her chin. She didn’t need to take the note out to know what it said. She’d already memorized the words written there.
Over and over again, she repeated the last line in her head.
I will see you again.
It was something she knew she would have to believe if she wanted to keep from losing her mind.
If she was even going to entertain the idea of leaving for Baltimore on her own, if she was going to try and formulate a plan, a new plan, she would need all her sanity.
