My Daughter Smiled at Our Empty Bank Account

I didn’t know what to say.

That was the first turn.

In my head, Jessica and Ethan had ridden off into their disgusting little sunset with my SUV and my savings and maybe a bag of gas station chips between them.

But Jessica sounded alone.

Not brave.

Not sorry enough, either.

“Where are you?” I asked again.

She started crying. Not the soft kind. The hiccuping kind that makes a person sound nine years old, which was dirty of her, because I had an actual nine-year-old watching me from the floor.

“Some motel outside Knoxville,” she said. “He took my phone last night. I had to use the office phone. I got this one from a woman in room twelve. I don’t even have shoes, Emily.”

I looked down at Lily’s bare feet.

One sock had a hole in the toe.

“You have my car,” I said.

“They took it.”

“Who took it?”

“The police.”

Good.

I didn’t say it.

Okay, fine, I almost did.

Instead I said, “Tell me exactly what happened.”

Jessica made a sound like she was choking on the words.

“They said your bank called. Then they said there was evidence. They knew where we were. They had the motel, the license plate, everything. They asked about the tablet. The purple one.”

My eyes moved to Lily.

Her old purple tablet had been missing since the day Jessica left.

I thought it had been lost in the couch or buried under one of Lily’s craft piles. Our house had a way of eating small electronics and hair ties.

Lily picked up the robot’s arm and fitted it into place.

Her face stayed very still.

“What purple tablet?” I asked.

Jessica cursed.

“Don’t do that. Don’t play that. She hid it in the car.”

Lily raised one finger like she was in class and wanted to add something.

I put Jessica on speaker.

“Say that again,” I told her.

Jessica went quiet.