Page 41 of Forget Me Not

It feels like I’m floating as I make my way through the building, sweat prickling my neck once I step into the sun. Then I glide across the parking lot, unlocking my car before sliding into the driver’s seat, immediately reaching for the box by my side.

I open the lid, fingers shaking as I grab all the pictures and flip my way through each one until I come across that print of my parents.

The print I had first seen at the top of this stack, the one of the two of them standing on our porch. Their expressions so blissful, so young and in love.

I turn it around, eyeing the inscription written in pencil.

Alan and Annaliese, March 1984.

I drop the image onto my lap, my mind spinning as I stare at the date.

Then I reach into my bag and grab Marcia’s diary, flipping to the very last entry I read.

It’s dated in April, only a month after this picture was taken, and I close my eyes now, imagining Marcia stepping out of the shower before rummaging around in the bathroom cabinets.

Walking into the kitchen to find Lily perched on a counter, that picture of Annie stuck to the fridge.

I open my eyes again, realizing that wasn’t just any house they broke into.

It was our house. Marcia and Lily had been in our house.

I take a deep breath as I attempt to wrap my mind around Marcia washing off in our guest bathroom downstairs; Lily scouring around in our pantry, plucking an apple from the back of the fridge and dropping her core into the bottom of the sink.

Of course, all this happened long before I existed, before Natalie and I were even born, but it’s still the same house my parents bought before they got married, the very same house where Natalie and I grew up, and the thought of them wandering through all our rooms, sloughing their cells all over the floor, is enough to make my skin clammy with fear.

I lean back in my seat, trying to map it all out in my mind.

Marcia had written about how they used to hop between towns, choosing houses at random so they wouldn’t get caught, and I wonder now, just as Marcia had, if Lily had known my mom was from Claxton, if it came up in passing during their time at the Farm, or if hitting our house had been nothing more than a fluke.

If she had simply been shutting the fridge door and saw that picture of my parents stuck to the surface, my mother’s blond hair uncharacteristically combed and my father’s arms wound around her waist. The boy she had been with since she was sixteen.

She wasn’t committed, Lily had said. To the family, to us.

I slide the diary back into my bag, thinking about how my mother’s face fell the second she saw that picture of Natalie surrounded by vines; that choke in her throat as she muttered Galloway Farm.

She knows Mitchell, which means she must also know more about what happened back then, so much more than she’s been letting on, and I grab my phone before tapping on her number, listening to the ringing before it abruptly ends.

“Hi, you’ve reached Annaliese Campbell. I can’t come to the phone right now…”

I wait impatiently for the recording to stop, launching into a message as soon as it beeps.

“Mom, it’s Claire,” I say, a quiet anger radiating through the phone. “Look, I’m still here, I’m still in town. I’ve been staying over at Galloway and there are clearly some things you need to tell me.”

I fall silent, my leg bouncing up and down as I think.

“Call me back as soon as you get this.”

I end the call, lowering the phone into my cup holder before glancing back down, the picture of my parents still on my lap. I pick it up, moving to slip it back into the box when the new image on top catches my eye.

I lean to the side again, plucking the photo between my fingers.

It’s the one of Natalie and Bethany out in those woods, the one I’ve thought of so many times, but now my eyes zero in on a detail I barely noticed before.

It’s that car in the background, a flash of metal hidden in the trees.

I had seen it the first time I looked at this picture but back then, back in the living room as I sat with my mother, I just assumed the car belonged to one of the kids at the party—but now, I think about the article outlining Katherine’s disappearance.

Her missing camper, the one I’m now sure Mitchell was driving around.

I pull it in closer, squinting as I notice the car’s orange tint. The license plate is still there, still attached to the back, but the image isn’t clear enough to make anything out.

I lower the picture as my mind starts to churn. Thinking about what Chief DiNello just asked me, if I have any proof of these various crimes.

This would be proof.

If Katherine’s camper is still out there, if the plate matches the BOLO issued in 1983, then this would be irrefutable proof that Mitchell was somehow involved. The police would be forced to search his whole property.

They would insist on talking to Marcia, hearing the whole story straight from her lips.

I toss both pictures into the box, ready to crank the engine and make my way back, when my phone starts to vibrate again, the loud clatter in the cup holder making me jump.

I reach out and grab it, swiping at the screen before even bothering to check who it is.

“Mom,” I say, my voice sharp as I push the receiver into my ear. “We need to talk.”

“Ah, no, sorry,” the voice says, and I pull my hand back, eyeing an unknown number on the screen. The same number that tried calling after I left the diner. “Is this Claire Campbell?”

“It is,” I say, attempting to place the voice on the other side of the line. I don’t recognize the number, I have no idea who this could be, though this person does sound familiar. A middle-aged man I know I’ve somehow met.

“Hi, Ms. Campbell, this is Bill from Lowcountry Electronics just letting you know your prints are ready.”

I stay silent, still not exactly sure who this is or what he’s referring to, until it hits me like a slap, the recollection of the film at the bottom of that box.

The film I dropped off almost a week ago now. The film I had forgotten all about.

“Sorry for the back-to-back calls,” he continues. “Just trying to reach you before we close.”

“The prints,” I say, my heartbeat starting to pick up speed as I realize this could be the thing that’s still missing, the hidden piece that might finally form the full picture. “You were able to develop them?”

“Sure was,” he says, a hint of pride in his voice. “The film held up surprisingly well. You said it got lost in some clutter?”

“A shoebox,” I say, a new thrill starting to work its way through my chest. “In the bottom of a drawer.”

“That makes sense. They probably turned out so well because it was kept in the dark.”

“Wow,” I say. “Wow, okay. Thank you so much. I can be there in twenty.”

“Sounds good,” he says. “I’m here ’til five.”

I arrive at the store just before they close, peeling into the same spot as before. Then I jump out of my car and jog inside, recognizing the same man behind the counter. Wire-rimmed glasses on the tip of his nose.

“Hey there,” he says, reaching to the side and grabbing a white envelope. He slides it across the counter as I reach into my purse, fingers trembling as I pull out my wallet. “I think you’ll enjoy looking through these old memories. There’s a lot of really good stuff in there.”

“I’m sure I will,” I say, my foot tapping as he runs my card.

He pushes a receipt across the counter and I sign it quickly before grabbing the envelope and whipping around, gliding my finger beneath the seal.

I’m too impatient to wait until I’m back in the car so I dump the prints into my palm, acutely aware of Bill’s eyes on my back as I take a few more steps toward the door…

but then I stop, staring at the image resting on top.

An image of a woman I don’t recognize.

I lean in closer, trying to make sense of what I’m seeing. The woman looks to be in her forties, maybe. Auburn hair and dark brown eyes. She’s sitting at a picnic table with a beer in her hand and I flip to the next one, a shot of the same woman posing at the base of a redwood.

“Excuse me,” I say, flicking through a couple more before I turn around to find Bill still staring from behind the counter. “I think you gave me the wrong envelope.”

“No,” he says, shaking his head. “That one is yours.”

“But I don’t—” I stop, looking down again at the woman holding a hiking stick, her leg perched on a rock as she stares into the sun. “I don’t know who this person is.”

He stays silent, a prickly expression taking over his face.

“These can’t be right,” I continue, remembering the hesitation I had felt when I first dropped off the roll; the clutter of this place and the fear that Natalie’s last moments might somehow get lost. “This woman is a complete stranger to me.”

“I’m sorry,” Bill says, shoulders tense as his tone turns defensive. “But I don’t know what to tell you. Those pictures are from the roll you dropped off.”

I flip through a few more, though they’re all the same. Various shots from a stranger’s vacation I can’t even begin to comprehend.

“The roll I gave you belonged to my sister,” I press, an anger starting to settle in deep as I think about how close I was to the truth, to finally having this all figured out, only for it to slip straight through my grip. “I know these don’t belong to my sister.”

“Look,” he says as he folds his arms in front of his chest, “I just developed the film you gave me. I can’t control what winds up being on it.”

I sigh, looking down at the stack before slipping the pictures into the envelope, not even bothering to look through the rest. Then I make my way back to the car, a deep disappointment sitting on my chest as I slide onto the seat.

I stare down at the envelope still in my hand, wondering if I should throw it away before deciding to toss it into the bag by my side.

Maybe the film belonged to my parents or something.

Maybe Natalie found it in a box of old memories, the same place she found that picture of them, so I crank the engine, looking at the digital clock on the dash.

It’s five o’clock now, and on the one hand, given all that I’ve learned, I’m not actually sure if I should go back to Galloway…

but on the other hand, if Katherine Prichard’s camper is still out there, if it’s still sitting abandoned in the middle of the woods, then finding it feels like my last shred of hope.

I make the drive in silence, my mind blank and my body on autopilot until I approach that same wooden sign, the arrow begging for me to come back in.

Then I feel my car roll to a stop, my fingers drumming against the wheel as I let myself imagine simply turning around, driving back in the direction of town.

Running from my problems the way I always have ever since that day in the kitchen when I decided it would be easier, safer, to simply sit back and do nothing at all.

Instead, I take a deep breath and turn down the dirt road, bumping my way toward the house in the distance for what, I hope, will be the very last time.