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I use the knocker, and I swear I’m still lowering it when Mrs. Kilmer throws open the door.
“Mrs. Laughton.” Her face lights up with such a glow that my heart sinks. I tell myself I’m wrong. She’s just happy because her son has come home.
“Hey,” I say. “I’ve been thinking about your son, and I wanted to see whether you’ve heard from him.”
She deflates, and I know she opened this door hoping we’d brought news… because she doesn’t have any.
She doesn’t answer. Just shakes her head.
I glance at Jin, seeing my own disappointment reflected back.
“I’m sorry to hear that,” I say. “I really hoped he’d returned. We managed to get into the basement, though.”
She goes still, and that look on her face now makes me feel cruel, as if I’m intentionally inflicting this pain on her.
“He’s not down there,” I say quickly. “All four of us searched the basement thoroughly because…”
Yep, I need to rip off this bandage. It’s the only way to set her mind at ease on this one score—that her son isn’t dead of an overdose in a hidden corner, our “thorough” search being the half-assed check of people who don’t understand the situation.
“There’s a sleeping bag down there,” I say. “And… used needles.”
Her entire body sags. When she speaks she seems to be forcing the words out. “I was afraid of that. I knew he was going somewhere to… do it, and he swore he didn’t have keys to the house, but I found oil on his shirt once, like from that old furnace.”
“He isn’t down there,” I say. “And we didn’t break the door open. It was ajar this morning. If he was down there, he left.”
Her eyes fill. “I am so sorry. He was—he was such a good boy. He still is, deep down. But when he moved out, he fell in with new friends. I’m trying to get him into a program, but there’s a waiting list.”
“You don’t need to explain,” Jin says softly. “We’re just glad he seems to be okay.”
“If you want to come up and look around the basement,” I say, “please do. I understand why you didn’t explain the situation, but now that we know, we want you to be sure he’s not in the house, and we would strongly suggest you call the police.”
She nods. “May I come over now?”
“Absolutely.”
We walk back with Mrs. Kilmer, and now I do wish I’d driven, because that’s one hell of an awkward walk. Do we talk around her addicted son and his disappearance? Discuss the weatherinstead? Thankfully, Jin takes over the conversation by steering it toward help for her son. Working in a hospital, he has a better understanding of what’s available, and Libby will know even more from her perspective as a therapist.
There are many wonderful things about living in a country with a national health-care system. It allows someone like Mrs. Kilmer to get help she likely couldn’t otherwise afford. However, just because help is free doesn’t mean it’s freely—readily—available for mental-health issues and addiction.
If you can pay, there are private clinics and rehab. The free version has a wait list, and the system isn’t always easy to navigate. Jin offers help with that. He can put Mrs. Kilmer in contact with the right people so Brodie gets the help he needs sooner than he might get it going through the usual channels.
It’s wrong that she needs this kind of networking to get help for her son, but our health-care system isn’t perfect. As someone with a chronic illness, I know very well, though I always hesitate to bring it up in front of Americans, knowing some will leap on “it’s not perfect” as proof that a national health-care system doesn’t work.
Back at the house, I warn Cirillo that Mrs. Kilmer is coming in. I expect he’ll balk, but the guy isn’t a monster. He understands that as much as he might like to keep our “lab” pristine, finding Mrs. Kilmer’s living son is more important than contacting my dead husband.
We take Mrs. Kilmer downstairs. She tries very hard to ignore the sleeping-bag nest, her cheeks coloring each time she glances that way. A symbol of a shame—and maybe a guilt—that she takes very personally.
We let her search the basement to her heart’s content although, again, there’s not much to search. In the end, she must admit that the scenario seems to be what I first imagined. Brodie was in the basement, and then he snuck out last night. The only difference between my theory and the apparent reality is that he didn’t go home.
She apologizes profusely for what he did, but she doesn’t ask us tokeep it a secret, and I appreciate that. I don’t want Brodie losing his job over this. I certainly don’t want Mrs. Kilmer losing hers. But if it comes to a missing-person search where the police need to know he was in the house? Then that’s in his best interests, whatever the fallout.
For now, we’re letting her handle this. She has promised to go to the police. What she tells them will be up to her, for now.
This settles the mystery of the noises I heard the first night and the locked door that was suddenly open. No supernatural explanation needed for either. I can put that aside and get back to the reason we’re here.
We eat lunch together, and then Shania has an online meeting and Cirillo wants to take some readings in the basement, now that it’s open. Jin and I retire to the sitting room. I can’t help it. I’m drawn there, pretending I just find it unexpectedly cozy when I’m really hoping to hear from Anton.
Would I rather be alone? On the one hand, if Anton’s here, I want him to be entirely comfortable reaching out. On the other hand, if anything happens again, I’d like a witness. So when Jin offers to keep me company, I don’t argue.
