Chapter 5 - WHAT MY MOTHER THOUGHT SHE WAS DOING
Elaine chose a diner outside Bayfield where my father never went because he disliked the coffee.
She was already seated when I arrived, wearing the blue suit she reserved for church funerals and medical appointments. Her hair was carefully brushed, but she had missed one button on her jacket.
“Where’s Noah?” she asked.
“Safe.”
Her eyes lowered.
“I never believed he would be in danger.”
“You took away his food.”
“Troy said the retrieval vehicle would bring supplies.”
“You removed our emergency beacon.”
“I didn’t know that.”
“You wrote the note.”
Her hand tightened around a folded napkin.
“Richard dictated most of it.”
“You still wrote it.”
“He said you needed a shock. He said grief had made you dependent and angry, and that you were about to destroy the company because you couldn’t see beyond your own pain.”
I leaned back before anger pulled me across the table.
“My son drank from a muddy runoff pool.”
Elaine covered her mouth.
I did not let her turn away.
“He asked me whether you left because he was too expensive.”
“I’m sorry.”
“That’s not an answer.”
She forced herself to look at me.
“The plan was for you to follow the orange survey ribbons to the lower service road. Someone was supposed to meet you before dark. Richard said the experience would prove you couldn’t keep blaming everyone else for your life.”
“There were no ribbons.”
“There were. Troy tied them the previous evening.”
I remembered Noah stopping near the creek to touch a strip of orange plastic on a branch. I had assumed it marked timber work. Farther downhill, I had seen none.
Elaine whispered, “Troy said you activated the beacon around three. He told us a signal showed you moving toward the highway.”
“The beacon was at the company office.”
Her face changed slowly, not with surprise but recognition.
“What?”
“It connected to the office network after we left.”
She gripped the edge of the table.
“Melissa asked him why he had it. He told her you’d handed it over because you wanted to be left alone.”
“Melissa knew?”
“I don’t know what she knew. I only know what I let myself believe.”
She reached into her purse but withdrew her empty hand.
“There was another note.”
My body went still.
“I wrote instructions for Noah. I was afraid you’d refuse to follow the ribbons if they came from us. I slipped the note into the inner seam of his backpack before breakfast and told him to open it if you got lost.”
“He never mentioned it.”
“He may not have found the pocket. Claire sewed it inside when he started kindergarten.”
At home, Noah sat at the dining table while I examined the backpack. Beneath the loose lining, my fingers touched folded paper.
He snatched the bag toward himself.
“Grandma said I wasn’t supposed to show you until after the lesson.”
The word lesson made him begin to cry.
I stopped reaching for the note.
“Then you decide when we open it,” I said.
May you like
Noah stared at the hidden pocket for a long time.
“Not yet.”
