Page 16 of The Ghostwriter

Vincent

Friday, June 13, 1975

11:30 p.m.

I lie on top of the covers in the motel, the cheap scratch of the bedspread poking through my T-shirt. Not the one I put on this morning, that I wore to school, then later to the carnival, the one that had blood all over it but still smelled like laundry detergent when I’d pulled it off. The one that was now burned to ashes beneath a pile of trash.

The walls of the room are thin, and I can hear my mother sobbing next door, the low voice of my father trying to console her, grief thick and heavy in his words. The sound of her rakes across me like sharp nails, making me want to jump out of my skin. I wish she would just be quiet for one blessed minute.

Would you kids be quiet for one blessed minute?

That won’t be a problem any longer.

My eyes are dry as I stare at the ceiling, speckled and bumpy, a slashof light from the streetlamp outside casting a stripe across it. The adrenaline of the evening still pumps through me, my heart rate refusing to fall despite the fact that it’s been hours. My head pounds with every heartbeat in the spot where Danny had slammed it into the wall, a lump I can feel just under my hairline.

I imagine the police, still swarming all over our house, the bodies of my brother and sister now removed in a silent ambulance—no flashing lights or loud siren, just a slow acceleration down the cul-de-sac, no need to hurry. I can see in my mind the giant pools of blood left behind—Danny’s in the hallway and Poppy’s in her room. I doubt it will ever come out, though I hope we’ll never live there again.

The police will be looking for evidence. Trying to figure out who could have committed such a horrific crime—the brutal murder of two kids—a stabbing so much more personal than a gunshot. More barbaric than poison. They will find clues, but they will never see the truth.

This morning, I woke up the weird middle child—the volatile, moody one everyone is just a little bit afraid of. And less than twenty-four hours later, I’m the only one left. The one my parents already can’t bear to look at, a sharp reminder of who else is no longer here.

My mother’s crying softens through the wall, and I breathe a little easier, hoping she’ll stop soon. But then it ratchets up again, a loud wail that must have everyone in the motel knowing that we’re here. Thinking about us and what’s happened.

I roll onto my side. I can’t think of Poppy, about what she must have been thinking in her final moments. It’s easier to think about Danny, how hard he fought. How I was almost the one who’d died in that hallway.

The truth I can never say aloud is that I’m not sad about Danny. I’m glad he’s dead.

Chapter 7

After my father leaves for his appointment, I jump in my car, deciding to do a little location research.

First I drive by the motel where they stayed for the three days the house was a crime scene. My father had named it in our conversation, and I remembered it from my childhood. The Starlight Motel out on Highway 150 had been bright yellow with blue trim and had a neon sign that flashed on and off. But when I circle by now, it’s a Radisson. I sit in the parking lot and stare at the beige building, trying to imagine what rooms they might have had.

From there, I head toward my father’s old house on Van Buren. As I drive west, the houses grow smaller, poorer cousins of the estates on the east end. Dirt front yards, aluminum window frames, and older-model cars in driveways: this is where Ojai’s working class lives. No Airbnbs over here. No city transplants living out their retirements in a quaint country town with world-class restaurants and trendy boutiques that cater to the tourists who keep Ojai running. The people who live over here are theones who work at the resort. Who teach at the schools. Who wait on customers in those fancy restaurants and boutiques.

Another right, then another left, and I’m heading down the quiet cul-de-sac, many of the driveways empty of cars on this beautiful Saturday afternoon. And there it is, the house that still looms large in my memory.

I park and take in the familiar features. The porch that spans the front of it, covered with a shingled roof propped up with four posts. Two concrete steps that lead up to the front door. The windows that flank it are uncovered and I think again of my father’s night terror. His certainty that the knife hadn’t been where he’d left it in Poppy’s hiding spot, and I feel a flutter of nerves, wondering if I’d be able to convince whoever lives there now to let me in and look.

I get out of my car and head up the front path as an older man exits the house next door, carrying a basket of gardening tools. “If you’re looking for Frieda, her nephew moved her into a home a few months ago,” he calls to me.

“Oh, that’s too bad,” I say, improvising. “Was she ill?”

He shakes his head, studying me. “Just old.”

“Any idea what they’re going to do with the house?” I ask.

His smile fades, and he sets his gardening tools down. “Are you a reporter?”

I feign confusion and say, “No. Why? Who owns it?”

I close the distance between us and take in his features, placing him around my father’s age, give or take a few years, though he looks much healthier than my father, with tanned skin and muscular legs. “There’s a management company that handles the property,” he tells me. “Markham and Sons. You should direct your questions to them.”

A phone rings from inside his house. He glances toward his open front door and says, “I’d better get that.” He looks back at me as if he’s unsure whether he should leave me unsupervised.

He finally turns and closes the door behind him, leaving his gardeningtools on the steps. I’m about to approach my father’s old house again, but the curtains next door twitch and I see the neighbor watching me. I give a friendly wave and head back to my car, navigating slowly out of the cul-de-sac and around the corner, where I park and google the number for the management company he mentioned.

A woman’s voice answers my call. “Markham and Sons Management Company. Can I help you?”

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