Ten years after Emma vanished at the pond, I woke to hundreds of rubber ducks covering our pool. The note tied to the biggest promised I could see my daughter again, but the address did not lead to a grave, a kidnapper, or a miracle. It led somewhere worse: back to the child grief erased.
The neighbor’s dog started barking at 6:03.
Not the usual warning bark at a squirrel.
This was frantic.
I was already awake.
I always was on that date.
The tenth anniversary of Emma’s disappearance had sat with me all night while Roger slept in the guest room down the hall.
We still shared a house.
The same last name.
Not much else.
Some mornings, we passed in the kitchen like tenants. He poured coffee. I rinsed a mug.
Neither of us asked where the other was going anymore.
I always went to the pond.
Roger always went somewhere else.
***
I tied my robe and walked past Emma’s bedroom. The door was closed. I had dusted the frame the day before without touching the knob.
Outside, the barking kept going.
I opened the back door… and my next breath died in my throat.
Our swimming pool was covered with rubber ducks.
Hundreds of them.
My next breath died in my throat.
Yellow ducks drifted against pirate ducks.
Tiny blue ones disappeared beneath oversized ducks wearing sunglasses.
Some wore crowns, helmets, bow ties, and ridiculous little hats.
They floated so tightly the water almost vanished.
They floated so tightly.
In the center was one larger duck.
A red ribbon was tied around its neck.
A folded note hung from it.
I stepped outside barefoot.
I walked into the shallow end, robe and all, pushing ducks aside until I reached the big one.
The note was damp at the edges.
I unfolded it, and everything in me went terrifyingly still.
“You blamed the wrong person for ten years.”
My first thought was Roger.
My second was that someone knew.
Below it was another line.
“You still have one chance to see your daughter again.”
Then an address.
I screamed so loudly that Mrs. Palmer next door came running across the lawn in slippers.
I called the police.
I screamed so loudly.
Emma was eight when she vanished.
It was a Sunday.
Roger had taken her to the pond at the edge of our neighborhood with a paper bag of breadcrumbs. It had been their ritual every weekend.
Ducks for Roger. Butterflies for Emma.
She carried her butterfly field guide everywhere, even to feed ducks, because she never knew when something with wings might appear.
What happened next changed everything… FULL STORY on the next page.
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