Page 90 of The Gallagher Place
Marlowe felt a lull then. A feeling of boredom almost, the card game no longer of interest. She blinked and realized that Nora was taking an unusually long time.
“Where’s Nora?” she asked.
Luke let out a little laugh, his eyes sparkling. “She went to take out the trash, don’t you remember?”
Marlowe didn’t even respond; she just swung her eyes toward Nate, who had gone still, his brow furrowed. Henry stood up. All three of them knew with certainty that she had been gone for too long.
They wouldn’t put it past Nora to come up with a prank. Maybe she was trying to scare them. But that felt wrong; she would have acted by now, banging her palm against the window and giving them a fright.
“Get the flashlight,” Nate snapped at Marlowe.
She stumbled out of her chair and ran to the closet without hesitation.
Nate burst through the door and into the night.
“Nora! Are you there? Nora, where are you?” Nate yelled.
Marlowe staggered onto the lawn. She shivered as her bare feet hit the damp ground. The screen door banged open again as Henry followed. She flicked on the flashlight, and the yellow beam bounced across the lawn, which seemed even larger under the shadow of darkness. She pointed the light toward the road, illuminating the trash bin, tall and isolated. Nora wasn’t there. Marlowe’s gut turned sour.
“This isn’t funny.” Nate’s voice cracked a bit. “If this is a joke, stop it now.”
“Nora, please come out now,” Henry yelled in the direction of the trees.
This wasn’t Nora’s type of prank at all, Marlowe realized. It was too blunt. Nora’s jokes had subtlety and an edge of slyness to them.
“Nora?” Marlowe called. “Nora!”
When there was no answer, Marlowe’s heart surged in panic. Nate started running toward the road, and Marlowe followed, but she knew Nora wouldn’t be crouching behind the bin.
“Did you hear a car?” Nate asked.
Marlowe shook her head. “I don’t know.”
The road was just far enough from the house, and if a car’s lights were off, it would have been easier to remain unseen.
Marlowe spun in a circle, trying to light up the surrounding area, but it was useless. The flashlight just made the shadows of the trees more pronounced, the darkness beyond deeper.
Next to her, Nate made a small choking sound and turned in a slow circle.
“Let’s go back to the house,” Nate hissed. “We need to go back to the house and—and figure this out.”
“We need to get Mom and Dad.” Henry’s voice sounded especially boyish, forever the baby in their pack.
Marlowe turned away from her brothers and yelled into the night. “NORA! NORA!”
There was a beat of silence, and then the name returned from somewhere in the distance.
It was the echo. Sometimes Marlowe and Nora would sit on the lawn during lazy summer evenings and shout, “Hello! Who’s there? Hello?”
And laugh as their voices, dim and twisted by the distant hills, returned to them:Hello! Who’s there? Hello?
Nate grabbed Marlowe’s arm and dragged her back to the house. His breath came out in heavy gasps, but Marlowe wasn’t scared for her own safety. Nora was gone. She had vanished into thin air. Marlowe’s foot banged against the porch step, and the pain cleared her head.
“We need to call 911.”
“Let’s be reasonable about this thing,” Nate said.
Marlowe almost clawed his eyes out. Nothing about Nora taking the trash out and disappearing was reasonable.
