Page 87 of Quietly Falling
“No one believed that he was lying, so after school one day I took Mason to the police department and I made a statement. Told them what she was wearing and why I knew she didn’t run away. It was a formality—I knew that—but it made me feel a little better knowing I tried.”
“You were so young; that must have been awful.”
“Daryl wasclearedof suspicion and allowed to continue to foster with his wife who had corroborated his whereabouts at the time of Audrey’s disappearance. I was given the option to be moved to a different family.”
“Did you?”
I shake my head. “They wouldn’t let Mason come with me, and I would have died before I left him.”
“What did you do?”
“I stayed. Got stronger. Learned how to protect myself and him, as well as the other kids that were placed there.” Swallowing hard, I add, “And I wrote a letter to the police department every year on her birthday begging them not to forget about her.” Ella sniffs, wiping a tear from her cheek with her free hand. “Are you sure you want me to keep going?”
“Yes.”
The woods are quiet and it’s such a contrast to the blood pounding in my veins. “Things got worse as we got older. Mason was less interested in keeping his head down and just making it till we could age out, so naturally the verbal abuse morphed into physical. The unspoken threat was Daryl knew I wouldn’t leave Mason, but he never missed an opportunity to remind me he could have me removed at any time.”
“Bodhi.”
“I took as much as I could and taught Mason how to channel his anger into something that wouldn’t get us split up.” I swallow hard. “And that lasted until I was sixteen. I’d gotten a job at the auto parts store to save up some money to get away. But one night when I got back to the house, Daryl had Mason on the ground and he was hitting him. I yelled, ripped him off my brother, and landed a punch on his jaw that made him stumble back into the table.
“There was a steak knife I didn’t see him pick up, so when he charged me, I couldn’t avoid it. I knew I’d die if I didn’t fight. So, I did. I hit him as hard as I could, the knife went flying, and I kept hitting him. I couldn’t stop.” Swallowing hard, I look at her. “Mason pulled me off him.”
“I’m so sorry.”
“When the cops showed up, it was chaos. We all went to the hospital and then Mason was put in an emergency placement. Daryl was arrested and so was I.”
“But you were protecting Mason, protecting yourself.”
“They could have charged me as an adult but they didn’t,” I tell her honestly. “Daryl’s wife said we attacked him, so it was our word against theirs. I served almost two years in juvenile detention, and got out when I turned eighteen.”
“I can’t even imagine what you went through.”
“It could have been worse. I got my GED and took whatever classes they had, kept my head down, and got the hell out of there when my time was up.”
“What happened after?”
“I got a job and an apartment. The foster house Mason was in was all right and I convinced him to stay. They were nice enough and let him come with me on the weekends. I worked double shifts doing anything and everything I could to make us some money—paid what was left for him to get an associate’s degree after his scholarships.”
“And Audrey?”
“A hiker found her remains on some trail a couple of miles from Daryl’s house when I was in juvie. Detectives came and took my statement, but it was years before he was finally convicted. Daryl’s sons threated us to keep quiet and we were scared, but Mason and I both testified. That was the last thing we did before we left New Hampshire to come down here.”
“What happened to your letters?”
“Someone had saved all my letters, put them in her case file.”
I smile at that last part, thinking that whoever received them cared enough about the boy who’d scrawled the words to keep them.
About the young girl who’d gone missing.
“I’m so incredibly proud of you,” she says, hands gentle as she cups my face.
“What?”
“You’re so much more than a survivor. You’ve done so many incredibly beautiful and selfless things with your life, and you walked away from the darkness instead of letting it consume you.”
She must know I can’t even begin to process that let alone respond to it, because she presses her lips to mine in a sweet kiss—no heat, just two people connecting over something profound.
