The Missing by Sarah Langan Read Free Book Online

looked sturdy, and there wasn’t a single crack in the concrete base. Every- thing was in order, which was reassuring, she guessed. But disappointing, too. She wanted a reason for the way she felt.
    Soggy paper in hand, Meg turned onto her stomach and crawled out. As she shimmied toward the steps, poison ivy brushed against her faded terry-cloth robe. Their leaves shone like plastic. She wasn’t allergic, but she knew she should avoid the stuff. Still, it was one of those instincts, like waiting until the last minute before swerving around a beer bottle in the road, that came from a place deep down. She wanted to feel the ivy, rub it on her fingers, taste it on her tongue. Eat the white poison berries, just to see what happened. So she picked a few, and put them in the pocket of her robe.
    Then she climbed out and sat on the stoop. The town, along with her family, was still sleeping. Red-orange rays of the coming dawn filtered through the dense pine trees in her yard. Not a single car or neighbor was out- side yet. Back in the house, coarsely ground coffee was percolating over a gas flame. Eggs needed to be poached. Appointments had to be scheduled. Theoretically, the day was full of promise.
    She’d been feeling blue since her son, David, had left for his sophomore year at UCLA two weeks ago. He bleached his hair and eyebrows now, and wore sparkly coral necklaces that made him look . . . pretty . He was either going for the surfer look or working up the cour- age to tell them he was gay. She suspected the latter. Though he’d never said so, she knew Fenstad blamed her. She’d been too affectionate, made her son a mama’s boy. He alluded to it every time she and David went for
    a long walk, had a tickle fight, or baked cookies to- gether. He’d walk into the kitchen with his eyes open wide like David was her lover and he’d caught them in an affair. Then he’d say something ridiculous like, “A man should stand on his own two feet,” and neither she nor David would have any idea how to respond. Fen- stad could be a real dipshit.
    She missed David more than she’d expected, which probably explained why she got involved with Graham Nero last year. Maddie and Fenstad expected hot meals and paid bills, a clean house and smart advice. They appreciated the things she did, certainly; she was no long-suffering martyr. But still, they expected it.
    Take Maddie. Over the summer she’d pierced her belly with a steel ring, using only a swab of alcohol and an ice cube for anesthetic. “ I am so hardcore! ” she’d shouted as she burst into the kitchen with her thumbs, index fingers, and pinkies saluting the ceiling like a heavy metal vixen. Only the blood never stopped gush- ing down her blue polka dot bathing-suit bottoms. To get the ring to puncture her skin more smoothly, she’d coated its point with Crisco, unwitting of the fact that grease is an anticoagulant. When it’s applied, blood won’t clot. They almost had to make a trip to the emer- gency room before Meg’s common sense got the better of her, and she pulled the damn ring out herself so the wound could heal. But that was Maddie. The girl acted first, reasoned later. She didn’t look both ways when she crossed the street, smiled at strangers, and recently had dyed her hair purple before reading the label and realizing that the color was permanent.
    Then there was Fenstad. If left to his own devices he’d limit his diet to beef jerky and wear the laundry from his hamper that smelled least like armpit. Twenty years of marriage, and the man had never learned to
    cook pasta. Once in a while she’d look at these two rubes sitting across from her at the dinner table and wonder: Where the hell am I?
    Meg swiveled on the stoop now. Her crossed legs were numb. Pins and needles pricked through her feet all the way up to her bottom. Oh, God, she was getting old. Somebody should give her a tube of Ben-Gay and a pair of orthopedic shoes and call it a