“What happened?” I say again, this time a little louder. “How come you didn’t call? Why didn’t you come by to see if I was okay?”

She does turn around then. I don’t know what I was expecting—pity, maybe?—but I’m totally unprepared for how she looks: like her face is a plaster mold on the verge of collapse. Horribly, the fact that she’s about to cry makes me feel a teensy, tiny bit better.

“I didn’t know what to say. I didn’t know what I could say. I felt—” She breaks off. And suddenly she is crying, in big hiccuping gulps, without bothering to try and conceal it. I’m shocked into silence. I haven’t seen Ariana cry since she was in fifth grade, when we bribed Nick into helping us pierce our ears and Nick was so nervous she slipped and drove the safety pin straight into Ariana’s neck. “I’m so sorry. It was all my fault. I was a terrible friend. Maybe . . . maybe if I’d been better . . .”

All my anger has turned to pity. “Stop,” I say. “Stop. You were a great friend. You are a great friend. Come on,” I say, when she doesn’t stop crying. “It’s all right.” Without knowing it, I’ve crossed the space between us. When I hug her, I can feel her ribs poking into me. She’s so thin she hardly feels real; I think of birds, and hollow bones, and flying away.

“Sorry,” she says again, and pulls back, dragging a hand across her nose. Her eyes are raw-looking, as if she hasn’t slept in days. “I’ve just been kind of fucked-up lately.”

“Join the club,” I say, which at least gets a laugh out of her—the ragged, low-throated laugh Ariana claims to have inherited from her grandfather, a cross-country trucker and lifelong two-packs-a-day smoker.

A pair of headlights sweep around the bend, temporarily blinding. It’s only then I realize how quiet it is outside. Normally, even as dusk falls, there are kids darting across front yards, shouting, playing Wiffle ball, chasing one another in and out of the woods. Not until Cheryl pokes her head out of the passenger-side window and yells, “Yoo-hoo!” do I remember I’m supposed to have dinner with my dad tonight.

Ariana seizes my wrist. “Let’s hang out, okay? Let’s hang out, just you and me. We can go swimming at the Drink or something.”

I make a face. “I’ve had enough of the Drink for a while.” Ariana looks so disappointed I quickly add, “But yeah, sure. Something like that.” Even as I say it, though, I know we won’t. We never used to make plans. Hanging with Ariana was just part of my rhythm, as easy as falling asleep.

It’s like the accident punched a hole straight through my life. Now there’s only Before and After.

Dad taps the horn. He hasn’t turned off the brights yet, and it feels like we’re standing on a movie set. Ariana pivots toward the car, raising a hand to her eyes, but she doesn’t wave. My parents used to love Ariana, but ever since she shaved half her head freshman year and started scamming on tattoo artists to give her piercings for free, they’ve soured on her. It’s a shame, my mom likes to say. She was such a pretty girl.

Now it’s my turn to apologize. “Sorry,” I say. “Dad has custody for dinner, apparently.”

Ariana rolls her eyes. I’m glad she’s stopped crying. She looks more like her old self. “I get it, believe me.” Ariana’s parents got divorced when she was five, and since then she’s had a stepdad and more “uncles” than I can count. “Don’t forget what I said about hanging out, okay? Call me anytime. I mean it.”

She’s trying so hard, I force a smile. “Sure.”

She turns and crosses back to her car, grimacing a little as she passes in front of the glare of my dad’s headlights. I have the desperate urge to run after her, to slide into the front seat and tell her to gun it, to peel off into the darkness, leaving Dad and Cheryl and the patchwork of sleepy houses and empty lawns behind.

“Ari!” I call out. When she looks up, I lift the plastic bag. “Thanks.”

“No problem.” She smiles, just a little, even though she still looks sad. “I always liked it when you called me Ari.”

Then she’s gone.

www.theShorelineBlotter.com_july23

by Margie Nichols

Have the police finally caught a break in the Madeline Snow case?

Sources close to the investigation tell this reporter that the police have named Nicholas Sanderson, 43, an accountant with a home in the upscale beachfront community of Heron Bay, a “person of interest.”

What does this mean, exactly? According to Frank Hernandez, the commanding officer in charge of the search for Madeline Snow, “We’re investigating a possible connection between Sanderson and the Snow family. That’s all. No further comment.”

No further comment? Really? After a little digging, here’s what I’ve learned: Nicholas Sanderson and his wife vacation a good forty-five miles from the Snow residence. They attend different churches, and at no time have Mr. or Mrs. Snow used Sanderson for his accounting services. Nicholas Sanderson has no children, and no obvious connection to Springfield, where the Snows live.

So what’s the connection? Post your thoughts/comments below.

Doesn’t mean anything. Sanderson could’ve met Madeline anywhere—hanging out at the beach, shopping at Walmart, whatever. Maybe he reached out to her online. Madeline’s sister has a car, doesn’t she?

posted by: bettyb00p at 10:37 a.m.