Page 62 of Tear Me Apart

“No. No, no, no. There’s no way. What are you saying, that Lauren somehow bought a baby that had been stolen from a couple in Tennessee, and has raised her as her own this whole time?”

“It’s so much worse than that, Juliet.”

He clicks open the first of the stories. There is a photograph of a young Army officer and his very pretty wife, and at the headline, Juliet sags, her knees turning to jelly.

Fort Campbell Soldier’s Baby Kidnapped,

Wife Murdered

PART TWO

33

NASHVILLE, TENNESSEE

AUGUST 2000

The metal of the casket is the same color as the sky, murky gray with touches of glinting silver as the sun passes behind the clouds. The sound of sobbing, the cries of the justified, the flailing of my heart. Why did I choose such a big casket? She doesn’t fit. It’s the smallest adult coffin they have, but it’s still too large. She is lost inside. They should have handled this. The padding needed to be expanded so her body doesn’t jostle.

The body. Her body.

The words I’ve heard in the past few days are ones I never expected—new, untried, untested.Casket. Body. Funeral. Viewing. Embalming. Autopsy. Severed. Seven-inch non-corrosive steel blade.

Homicide.

The first responders were called in for my family. They came quickly. Only took them three minutes to arrive at the house. But it was already too late.

They were both gone.

I’ve forgotten where my life ends and the evening news begins. The story of my family’s demise plays over and over again. The city is shocked, horrified, on red alert. Everyone is looking for my daughter. For my wife’s murderer.

The sun is completely hidden now, the rain beginning to mist in the hazy air. The people in attendance, the crowd overladen with cops, look at me sympathetically, eyes hooded, shadowed. I know what they see. A tall man, dark hair cut high and tight, ribs still bandaged from a month-old gunshot wound sustained in a double-cross in Afghanistan, eyes angry and sad. A man alone. This is my second funeral this week. In the past few days, I’ve lost my mother, my wife, and my child.

I can’t look at the casket anymore. She’s wearing the blue dress I know she loves, the dark sapphire silk nearly the same color as her eyes. I had to bring her makeup bag to the funeral home intact; I didn’t know what color lipstick she would want. The mascara I had down pat; I always loved to watch her put it on. It came in a red tube, and she’d get so close to the mirror, leaning until she nearly touched her reflection, swooping the black onto her lashes again and again until they fringed her perfect violet eyes in soot. But the lipstick—she wore a different color every day. I let them make the choice. It was better that way.

Umbrellas start to pop open. The priest nods and smiles sadly, a comfort to the bereaved. Arms on mine now, gentle squeezes, hugs. I don’t know who anyone is. They are assigned to protect me. To keep me safe. They couldn’t save my family, but by God, they will not let me die.

I nod and mimic the same sad smile the priest is wearing. It seems appropriate.

The cemetery empties. I’ve been left alone to grieve, to find it in my heart not to throw myself into the hole and die with her. There’s only one reason why I don’t. I must keep myself together in case my child is found.

My daughter. A small, sturdy flower born too early, a week ago today. Before the violence on our tiled kitchen floor. She might as well have been wrenched from my wife’s womb, instead of torn from her breast.

We talked about naming her Ellie, but we ultimately decided on Violet.

V for her mother, and those violet eyes I’ll never see again. V for the valiant effort she made to live despite the odds against it. V, because she is the intersection of two lines cast askew by death, not sturdy right angles, but unbalanced, falling over, not quite down.

V, for Violet.

I can only pray that she lives, and one day, I will see her again.

34

NASHVILLE, TENNESSEE

CURRENT DAY

The bottle hits the edge of the glass, the liquid sloshing into the lowball. Zack Armstrong barely notices the too-heavy clink, nor that he’s missed the glass and hit the table with most of his pour. The bottle is half-empty, and he is well on his way to being trashed.