Driftwood Summer by Patti Callahan Henry Page B

the family wood-paneled Ford station wagon.
    Maisy whispered to her older sister, who always knew what to do, where to go, who to be, “We’re alone. We’re not supposed to stay in the house alone. Not ever.”
    “No.” Riley placed her hands on Maisy’s shoulders. “They wouldn’t leave us alone in the house. They sent for Harriet. I’m sure Harriet is on her way.”
    They crouched beneath Riley’s covers and waited as evening turned to deep night and Harriet didn’t show. Maisy finally said the dreaded words: “They forgot about us.”
    “No,” Riley said with a certainty that Maisy envied. She never felt certain about anything, always wavering.
    Time passed and finally Riley threw off the covers. “Let’s go. We aren’t allowed home without a grown-up. Mama and Daddy said it’s very dangerous.”
    “Where will we go?” Maisy fought back the sobs that wanted to rise from her stomach. She was counting on Riley to know the right thing to do.
    “Outside. We’ll go outside. We just can’t be in this house alone.”
    Maisy had often felt alone in the Sheffield house, even when Daddy and Mama were in the drawing room reading or talking. Mama’s attention went elsewhere after five p.m. when she had her first martini, while she waited for Daddy to come home. Daddy worked at the military base an hour away, and was often gone on trips. His absence was as palpable as his presence.
    “We can’t go outside in the middle of the night,” Maisy said in a small voice, panic clamping her throat shut.
    “We can’t stay here.” Riley sounded so like their mama that Maisy could only follow.
    They took the quilt from Riley’s bed and walked out the back door to the woods behind their house. “Why can’t we go to the beach?” Maisy asked.
    “Because we need to stay hidden,” Riley said.
    “Yes. Hidden.” Maisy understood.
    When the Palmetto Bluff police found them the next morning, curled into each other on a bed of pine straw under a quilt, the entire town had already begun a search. They returned to Daddy, who was standing on the back porch with fatigue and worry etched in deeper places on his face. “You have a new sister,” he said, and walked away, leaving Maisy and Riley with two officers.
    The taller man spoke first. “You scared your father to death. What were you thinking?”
    Riley stepped toward the officer as if she were older, taller than she was. “It’s quite simple, sir. We are not allowed to be home alone.”
    The two men looked at Maisy and she nodded. “We aren’t.”
    The officer patted Riley on the back. “You’re a good little girl, then, aren’t you?”
    Riley screwed up her face. “Of course I am.”
    Together Maisy and Riley walked into the house. Maisy reached for Riley’s hand and Riley squeezed her sister’s fingers. “Another sister. How much fun.”
    Maisy never asked her parents why they were left alone that night, and the subject was never brought up again. Adalee came home and life continued. Whenever Mama told the story of the night Adalee was born, she never mentioned the fact that the police were sent to look for her two older daughters; she merely spoke of the quick birth and her bravery in not requesting pain medication.

    Those were the good days with her sister, Maisy thought, the days before the betrayal.
    Maisy had been gone for many years now. Her excuses for not coming home were usually loud and insistent, but now they began to sound tinny, small, not really excuses at all. California had aided in her quest to stay away from Riley, from Palmetto Beach. The fact remained: Riley had betrayed Maisy and she had vowed never to speak to Riley again beyond what was required by family obligation. The anger she’d nurtured toward Riley now nestled dormant inside a corner of her heart.
    The summer before Maisy ran away, right after high school graduation, while Mama and Daddy were preoccupied with buying the Logans’ cottage and adoring baby Brayden, Maisy had