Secrets She Left Behind by Diane Chamberlain Page B

were not the box she was carrying?” Mom asked.
    “The little ones,” I said. “It wasn’t little.”
    The police lady’s cell phone rang. Mom and me waited while she talked. Mom winked at me.
    “Are you excited about Kimmie coming to dinner?” She used a quiet voice because of the police lady talking on the phone.
    “Yes!”
    Mom put her finger on her lips.
    “Yes,” I whispered. I wanted Maggie to meet Kimmie. Maggie wouldn’t come to swim practice because she didn’t like seeing people yet. That was why Mom said Kimmie could come to dinner.
    Kimmie told me, “I used to hate going to Matt’s swim practices, but now I can’t wait so I can see you.”
    When she said that, I hugged her. I wasn’t supposed to hug people besides my family, but I had to hug Kimmie then. She didn’t mind. She really didn’t. But she said I smelled like cigarettes. She said, “Please don’t smoke.” I threw my cigarettes away.
    “Mom?” I said now. She was looking at a can-opener thing.
    “What?”
    “Me and Kimmie hug sometimes, but she doesn’t mind so it’s okay. Right?”
    Mom kept looking at the can opener. It had a handle and she made it go up and down.
    “Where are you when you hug?” she asked.
    “The pool and her house and our house.”
    “In your room?” She looked at me in a way that told me I better say no, even though we did hug in my room once.
    “No,” I said. We were allowed in my room with the door open.
    “Hugging’s nice,” Mom said. “And Kimmie’s your girlfriend, right?”
    I nodded.
    “It’s okay to hug your girlfriend.”
    The police lady turned off her phone. “That was the manager,” she said. “No pots or pans have been returned in the last few days.”
    “So maybe it wasn’t from this store?” Mom asked.
    “Right. Or it wasn’t a pot or pan.” She tipped her head funny and looked at me. “Maybe it was actually a wok or a casserole or a potato peeler,” she said.
    “What?” I laughed. She was making a joke.
    “Or she never made it to the store,” she said.
    “Oh, don’t even say that.” Mom had on her worried look. She had it on a lot since Miss Sara went missing.
    Everybody was worried about Miss Sara. I got asked a lot of questions by the police and Mom and Uncle Marcus. Even Maggie asked me questions on account of the Web site thing she’s making. Everybody wanted to know what clothes Miss Sara had on. Things like that. I kept telling them I was too sick that day to remember.
    I told my friend Max about the questions and he said it was ’cause I was the last person who saw her. He said the police maybe thought I killed her and cut her up in bags. Like her head in a bag and her arm in a different bag. That was stupid. I told Uncle Marcus what Max said and he said, “Max is just yankin’ your chain.”
    The police lady looked at her watch. “I’m out of time,” she said. “Can you two go to some more stores on your own? Maybe the Bed Bath and Beyond and the Target?”
    Mom nodded. “Of course,” she said. I wished she said no so we could go home and wait for Kimmie.
    But we left the Wal-Mart and went to some more stores. I got more confused in every one of them.
    “I can’t do this anymore,” I told Mom when we walked outside from the Bed and Beyond store. It wasn’t just because I wanted to go home. My head hurt. Maybe I never even saw a box. Maybe I dreamed I saw it.
    “Okay,” she said. “You’ve been a good sport.”
    “You be the one to drive home,” I said. I didn’t feel like driving. I felt bad I messed up about the box.
    “Okay,” Mom said.
    We got in the car. Mom was an excellent driver. She could go real fast in the parking lot around all the cars and everything.
    “I’m sorry, Mom,” I said when we got to the road. “I lost the picture of the box in my head. You know my brain.”
    Mom smiled at me. “I love your brain, Andy,” she said. “Don’t worry about it.”
    But I was worried. Miss Sara could be chopped up in bags