“This is so unlike her,” Mother mumbled.
I looked up at her quickly. “It’s unlike me, too.”
“Yes,” she said, nodding. “Yes.”
Simon returned. “They’re on their way,” he said. “You don’t even know which direction she took?”
“She just told me they were meeting at a place he had decided on because it was close enough for her to go to his house and get back before the movie ended,” I replied, wiping the tears from my cheeks.
“To his house?” Mother said, the words taking a strong grip on her worst fears. “She went to his house, to a strange man’s house?”
“That was the plan she told me they had made.”
“Does he live alone? How old is he? How did she meet him on the Internet?”
“I don’t know any of that. She wouldn’t tell me that much,” I said.
“Men who do this sort of thing know how to find vulnerable young girls,” Simon said, nodding like some sort of expert on teenage girls. I looked at him with an expression that shouted, Shut up. You’re making it all worse. I guess I was effective. He backed up a step.
“How long has this been going on?” Mother asked.
“Maybe six weeks, maybe seven.”
“And you both kept this a secret from me that long?” she asked, her face now a portrait of disbelief. She looked like a little girl who had just learned that Santa Claus was not real, something I’d never believed. Most of life was a fairy tale. Who needed to add a fat man with a beard?
“You were . . .” I looked at Simon. “Busy with your own problems. At least, that was what Kaylee thought, and I did, too. She convinced me that you’d only start worrying so much about us that you would be unhappy again, and we were both upset at how horribly Daddy had treated you. She said that would all be my fault if I told.”
“This is so unlike them,” Mother told Simon. “They’ve never done anything even remotely like this.”
“Do you know his name?” Simon asked.
“She told me a name, but I’m not sure it’s his real name.”
“What does that mean?” Mother demanded.
“He could have made up a name,” Simon said, “or your sister could have made one up. Right?” he asked, as if I was now the expert.
“Maybe,” I said. I turned back to Mother. “He might be right. I don’t know if she wanted to tell me his real name, so she could have made it up just to shut me up because I kept asking her.”
“What name did she tell you?” Simon demanded.
“Bob Brukowski,” I said. “It never sounded real to me.”
“I can’t believe this,” Mother said, shaking her head. “This is not happening. It’s not happening.” She put her hands over her ears, as if she could simply block out reality and return to our perfect world by closing and opening her eyes.
“It’s a problem all over the country now,” Simon said. “Young girls being exploited through computers.”
She pulled her hands from her ears as if they had been glued to them and made two fists. “It’s not a problem for me! Or it shouldn’t be,” Mother said. The veins in her neck looked like they might burst. Her eyes were bulging, and her nostrils widened.
He pressed his thin lips together and nodded. A police patrol car pulled up to the curb, and two officers got out quickly. Simon turned and hurried to them, happy, I thought, to get away from her. He explained what was happening, and the officers came over to us.
“Mrs. Fitzgerald,” the taller one said, “I’m Officer Donald, and this is Officer Monday.” He took out a small notepad. “What’s your daughter’s name and age?”
“Her name is Kaylee Blossom Fitzgerald, and she’s sixteen. This is her sister, Haylee. They are identical twins, so you don’t need a photograph to recognize her,” Mother said. “Or you can take one of Haylee with your cell phone. There’s not an iota of difference between them, down to how many freckles they each have. They wear their hair the same way, and they are dressed in the same outfit, the same color tonight. They sound the same, too.”
Both policemen looked at me, astounded. The shorter one almost smiled at how ridiculous Mother sounded.
“Haylee,” Officer Donald said, “why don’t you tell us everything that went on between your sister and this man. Don’t leave out anything because you think it’s too small a detail or not important, okay?”