Her Silent Cry

Twenty-Six

Josie dreamt of Lucy—of racing after her in the park and in the Rosses’ home, which had endless twisting hallways. Every time she got close to the girl and reached her hand out to grasp her arm, Lucy would disappear into thin air. She woke breathless and covered in sweat and immediately headed for the shower. Once both Josie and Noah were ready for the day, she dropped Noah off at the mobile command center. Instead of driving to the Ross home, she doubled back and pulled into the parking lot of Denton West Elementary. It was a one-story sprawling brick building surrounded by immaculate landscaping and perfectly pruned bushes and trees. Josie found a parking spot in the visitors’ area. There was still an hour before students would begin to arrive for the day. She walked to the front entrance. Beside the double doors was a small brown box with a little button on it. Next to it a laminated sign announced that all visitors must report directly to the office. Josie punched the button and then looked up at the camera above the two doors. She took out her police credentials and held them up. Seconds later, there was an audible click as the locks on the doors disengaged.

Inside the building, more laminated signs directed her down the hallway to the right, past several classrooms and the entrance to the auditorium until she reached the office. Her elementary and high schools on the east side of Denton had been like this as well, with the office far from the entrance. She had always wondered why schools didn’t put their offices closer to the front doors. Inside the office, a pert secretary sat behind a desk with a headset on. Josie explained why she was there, showed her ID one more time and waited while the woman made a phone call. Finally, she was given directions to Lucy’s first grade classroom.

After navigating a few more hallways, Josie found Lucy’s teacher, Violet Young, standing just outside the classroom, waiting for her. Josie estimated Violet to be probably in her mid to late twenties. She was curvy with long auburn hair. A burgundy sweater clung to her torso, and stretchy black pants disappeared into knee high brown boots. A necklace made from dried macaroni hung from her neck. She smiled broadly as Josie came down the hallway.

They made introductions, and Violet invited Josie into her classroom, which was filled with tiny desks and chairs between a large teacher’s desk and a brightly colored carpet with the alphabet on it. A whiteboard took up nearly one entire wall. Posters and student artwork fluttered from the other walls. Violet walked to her desk and perched on the end of it. “Has there been any news?” she asked.

“I’m afraid not,” Josie said.

Violet’s gaze swept downward but not before Josie saw her eyes moisten. “This is just unbelievable. We’ve all been devastated. Our sweet Lucy. I can’t even imagine—”

Josie interrupted before she began to cry. “We’re doing everything we can to find Lucy. Working around the clock to bring her home.”

Violet looked back up at Josie. “FBI agents were here yesterday. They interviewed most of the staff.”

“Yes,” Josie said. “I know. They are doing an amazing job. I’m not here to second-guess the interviews they conducted. I’ve been assigned to Mrs. Ross.”

Violet’s hand fluttered to her macaroni necklace, her fingers running over the dried pasta noodles. “How is she?”

“As well as can be expected under the circumstances,” Josie said. “Do you have kids?”

Violet smiled. “No. My students are my kids. At least for now. My husband and I are on a five-year plan to get married, buy a house, get our careers in order and then have kids. Three more years and we can start trying!”

She said it with a note of desperation, as though she had rehearsed this stock answer and given it so many times, she hoped no one would see through it. Josie knew at once the five-year plan was the husband’s idea, not Violet’s. “Well,” Josie offered. “You’ll have all your affairs in order by the time you start your family. Speaking of family, I’ve been spending a lot of time with Lucy’s parents the last two days, and I just thought it might help me connect with them better if I knew more about Lucy. I just kind of wanted to see where she spends her days, ask you what kind of student she is, that sort of thing.”

“Oh, yes, of course.”

Violet weaved through the maze of little desks until she came to one in the center of the room. Her hand rested on its surface, and Josie walked over to stand next to her. “This is Lucy’s desk,” she said. All the desks stood on four metal legs, with an open hollow area beneath the faux wood surface so that students could slide their books and other supplies inside. Each desk had a colorful laminated strip of paper on it. On the top were numbers from zero to ten, then the student’s full name carefully written in marker, and below that the alphabet in upper and lower case. Josie pointed at the little cubby beneath the surface. “Do you mind?”

“Of course not,” Violet said.

Josie squatted down and peered inside the small space. There was a pencil case, some glue, a stack of notebooks and folders and some plastic, toy butterflies. Next to them was a small cylindrical object that appeared to be made of green construction paper.

“It’s a cocoon,” Violet told her. “Well, Lucy would say a chrysalis. I assume you know about the butterfly obsession.”

Josie couldn’t help but laugh with delight at the secret stash in Lucy’s desk. “Yes, I’m well aware. Tell me, what kind of student is Lucy?”

Violet folded her hands together at her waist. “Oh, she’s very bright, and very sweet. She gets distracted easily though. She can be very… single-minded.” At this, she laughed and gestured toward the fake butterfly habitat Lucy had built inside her desk. “It’s a battle to keep her on-task sometimes. Then again, she is only seven.”

Josie stood and walked over to one of the walls where pages of student artwork hung. “How is she socially? Does she make friends easily?”

“Oh yes. She’s very sociable. The other kids love her. Though, sometimes I think—” Violet broke off, a frown on her face.

“Sometimes you think what?” Josie coaxed.

“I really shouldn’t say. It’s not relevant.”

“It doesn’t have to go beyond this room,” Josie promised her. “I’m very interested in your observations.”

Violet looked away again. Her hands waved in the air as she spoke. “Sometimes I think that because Mr. Ross is away all the time and Mrs. Ross seems so… distracted… that Lucy feels—subconsciously—that she has to do things to make people happy in order to get attention and love. It’s almost like on some level she feels invisible except when she does something nice for someone or does what some other kid tells her to do. Like she doesn’t believe people will just like her for herself.”

It was a lot to unpack but Josie started at the beginning. “You think Mrs. Ross is distracted?”

“The times I’ve met her, yes. She just seems like her mind is always elsewhere. I don’t doubt she loves Lucy, that’s not what I’m saying.”

“I know,” Josie said.

“It’s just that sometimes—like at school events or on trips—Lucy will be talking away, and Mrs. Ross will be staring into space. At some point, Lucy realizes that her mom hasn’t heard a word she’s said, and she just stops talking. I mean, not always. A lot of the time, Mrs. Ross seems very engaged, but you can tell by the way Lucy sighs and rolls her eyes when she isn’t paying attention that it’s not a one-time thing.”

Sadness tugged at Josie’s heartstrings. Lots of parents paid little attention to their children though. That didn’t mean that Amy was capable of staging her own daughter’s kidnapping. “I did speak with some of the other mothers who implied that Mrs. Ross is a bit… overprotective.”

Violet laughed. “Yes, that’s accurate. But there’s a difference between being physically present and mentally present. I would say that Mrs. Ross is more physically present than any parent I’ve ever met—almost to the detriment of Lucy’s friendships with other children—but like I said, you can tell that much of the time, her mind is elsewhere.”

Josie brought up one of the other points that Violet had made. “When you say Lucy is pleasing, can you give me any examples that you have observed here at school?”

Violet took a moment to think about it. “Well, there’s another little girl in class who will only give Lucy the time of day if Lucy gives her the cookies from her lunch every day. Lucy does it, even though sometimes you can tell that she really wants those cookies for herself. But then at recess the little girl will tease her or ignore her. I’ve talked to Lucy—and of course, to the other girl—several times about the dynamic and about how to be a good friend, but Lucy still gives in to her a lot.”

“Lucy sounds like she has a good heart though,” Josie said.

“Oh yes,” Violet said. “Without question.”

Josie motioned toward the drawings on the wall. “Which of these are hers?”

Violet walked with Josie along the wall, pointing out each series of drawings. “This assignment was to draw somewhere they had gone on vacation. Here’s Lucy’s—the beach. She loves the beach. These were from an assignment where they had to draw a self-portrait and then underneath their portraits, they had to draw three things that they enjoy or love.” Lucy’s three items, unsurprisingly, included a butterfly as well as a book and two stick figures holding hands—one with short hair and one with long hair. “Those are her parents,” Violet said.

Again, Josie felt a deep ache in her chest for Lucy. All the other children had drawn their favorite toys or an object from their favorite sport, a mythical animal or a cartoon character. Clearly, Lucy’s world was narrower than that of her classmates. There was something to the other mothers’ assertions that Lucy was isolated.

“Here,” Violet said. “These were from a class trip we took to a nearby orchard and pumpkin patch. The kids had to draw their favorite thing about it. As you can see, almost everyone chose the hayride or the small petting zoo. And this display was from a trip we took to the college campus. The drama department was putting on a production of Charlotte’s Web. The kids had to draw their favorite character.”

“What about these?” Josie asked as she came to a section filled with drawings of various bugs—what looked like beetles, ladybugs, bees, some bugs Josie couldn’t identify and butterflies. She immediately recognized Lucy’s picture because she had seen a version of it in Lucy’s room already. It was an adult stick figure in brown clothing with a net holding the hand of a small, blonde female stick figure. Butterflies flew overhead.

“We had a bug expert here a couple of months ago,” Violet said.

Josie raised a brow. “A bug expert?”

Violet smiled. “Oh, the kids loved him. He’s actually a beekeeper. Lives about an hour from here, halfway between here and Philadelphia. He brought beetles, tarantulas, a Madagascar hissing cockroach, some ladybugs, butterflies and a stick bug. He travels all over the state visiting schools.”

“How long was he here?” Josie asked.

“Oh, only a couple of hours. He’s got a pretty polished presentation.”

“Did he seem as though he took a special interest in Lucy?”

“No, not really.”

“Do you have his name and contact information?”

“I gave it to the FBI,” Violet said. “They wanted a list of all visitors to the school in the last six months.” She walked back over to her desk and shuffled through some papers until she found what she was looking for. She handed Josie a scrap of paper with a name and number written on it. The name was John Bausch. Josie took out her phone and snapped a photo of the details. “Did you take any photos when he was here?”

Violet took out her own phone. “A few, yes, although they were mostly of the kids and the insects.”

“You’re allowed to take photos of the children?”

“Oh, yes,” Violet said. “The school sends home a waiver at the beginning of the school year that parents have to sign giving us permission to take photos of the children during school activities. We usually have a few families who don’t want their children’s photos taken, but this year we had permission for the entire class. We are only allowed to share photos we take on the secure district website and app, which only faculty, staff and parents are able to access. I don’t have them on my phone anymore, but I can show you through the app.” She swiped and scrolled through her phone until she found the series of photos and handed it to Josie.

Josie swiped through the pictures until she came to a few photos of John Bausch. In each one of them he was either in profile or his head was bent down toward the children. He was young, perhaps mid to late twenties, with thick brown hair and a clean-shaven face. He wore a pair of khaki pants and a tan polo shirt. Josie wondered if Bausch was the adult in Lucy’s drawings. “Can you send these to me?” Josie asked.

“Well, I can’t,” Violet said. “But I can talk to the principal. There may be some legal issues—”

“A warrant,” Josie said. “I can get one of those within the hour and have it sent over to the principal.”

“That would work,” Violet agreed.

Josie handed Violet a business card, urging her to call if she thought of anything that might be useful.

She walked back over to the wall and tapped a finger against Lucy’s butterfly drawing. “Do you mind if I take this?”

Violet hesitated for a moment and then said, “Sure, I guess.”