Little Mercies. Heather Gudenkauf

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      When I arrive at the familiarly ramshackle neighborhood, I am struck at how depressingly run-down it has gotten through the years. Burnt yellow lawns are edged with rusty metal fences, windows are boarded up and the ones that are intact are covered with grungy sheets or threadbare blankets.

      Before I even turn onto Madison Street, I hear the sirens behind me. I pull to the side of the road to let a police car pass. Please just be precautionary, I say to myself, hoping that help hasn’t arrived too late. I drive the final four blocks as people in the neighboring houses peek out screened windows and step out onto crumbling front steps to see what’s happening. I stop three houses away, throw the van into Park and leap out and hit Lock on my key fob. The temperature has risen in just the few minutes I’ve been driving; the oppressive air crawls heavily into my nostrils and sits like sludge in my chest. Two police cars are idling in front of the house and I rush up to the nearest officer, who has emerged from his squad car and is calmly surveying the house that looks eerily quiet, empty.

      Without looking at me, the officer holds up his hand to silence me before I even speak.

      “Please stay back,” he says.

      “I’m Ellen Moore, the social worker. I called 911,” I say, as if this explains everything.

      He raises his eyebrows, finally looking me in the face. Sweat glistens on his bald forehead, his uniform already darkened with perspiration. “Officer Stamm,” he introduces himself. “Then you probably know a lot more about what’s going on in there than I do. What’s the situation?”

      I try to keep my voice composed, level, but it still shakes with fear. “Manda Haskins lives here with her two children, Kylie who is seven and Krissie is four. Kylie called me a few minutes ago and said that her mom’s boyfriend, whom Manda has a temporary restraining order against, came over last night. Kylie said that this morning he started beating up their mother, so she and her little sister locked themselves in the bathroom and called me. We got disconnected and then I called you. I’m afraid the boyfriend is done with the mom and now is going after the girls.”

      I don’t have time to go into the entire all-too-familiar story of Manda Haskins’s life with Officer Stamm. That Manda is twenty-five years old but still seems to always choose the wrong man. She may have been pretty once, but now Manda looks closer to forty than twenty-five—a meth addiction will do that to you. Her face is set in a permanent scowl. Manda lost custody of Kylie and Krissie two years ago when the police stopped her van and found that she was housing a mobile meth lab inside. She swore that her boyfriend was the one who placed all the drug paraphernalia in the back. In return for testifying against the boyfriend and admitting herself into an inpatient drug treatment center, Manda avoided jail time. In foster care the two children did well and all thought that Manda had done the work. Gotten clean, gotten a job. I’d hoped for so much more for Manda and her girls, but apparently her self-improvement didn’t extend to her choice in men.

      “Any weapons in the house that you know about?” Officer Stamm asks.

      I shake my head. “No. I mean I don’t know. Have you been able find out what’s going on inside?”

      “Not yet. We’re going to walk around the house, take a look in the windows, see if we can hear anything. Have you tried to call the kids back?” Stamm asks.

      “No,” I say. “I was afraid if the phone started ringing it might lead the boyfriend to where Kylie and Krissie are hiding. Should I call now?”

      “Yeah, go ahead. We’ll walk around the perimeter and see if we can hear a phone ringing. That might give us an idea of where the kids are. If the kids or the mom answer, try to find out the status of the situation and keep them on the line.” Stamm and the other officer begin to make their way around the house and I scroll through my received calls to find the number that Kylie called me from, hit Send and the phone goes directly to voice mail. Stamm looks at me over his shoulder and I shake my head in disappointment. He rotates his hand in a keep-trying gesture. I scan my phone looking for Manda’s contact information. In the back of my mind I remember that at one time she had a landline number as well as a cell phone. I locate the number, press Send and an instant later I can hear the faint trill of a phone ringing from within the house.

      A woman, a neighbor I presume, sidles up next to me. “What’s going on?” she asks. I give her a cursory look. She is wearing flip-flops, flannel boxers, a tank top and holds a crusty-nosed toddler on her hip.

      “I’m sorry, I can’t talk right now,” I say to her, and take two steps toward the house. The phone continues to ring and ring. “What’s going on?” the woman asks again, this time more insistently. The boy in her arms begins to giggle, a strange sound amid such a tense situation. I turn to face the woman and immediately recognize her as one my former clients, a woman whose son was removed from her home because of severe neglect. “Jade, Anthony,” I say. I give the little boy’s bare foot a squeeze and he smiles shyly back at me before burying his face in his mother’s shoulder. I lower my phone down to my side as it continues to ring, unanswered from within the house. “It’s Manda Haskins. The police are afraid that she’s got some trouble in there and are worried about her girls.”

      Jade shakes her head, her dark eyes knowingly serious. “Haven’t met her new boyfriend, but I’ve seen him coming and going. Used to be Manda would be outside all the time in her front yard while the girls played. Her Kylie is real good with Anthony here. They would sit in their little pool.” She nods toward the small, round, plastic pool. A yellow duck floats aimlessly and a few Barbie dolls are submerged in the shallow, dirty water. “It’s too hot to be inside.”

      “You don’t see them outside much anymore?” I ask.

      “No.” Jade shifts Anthony to her other hip. “The boyfriend is over all the time and Manda won’t let the girls outside by themselves. Haven’t seen much of them the past three weeks or so...” Jade trails off and we both watch as Officer Stamm and his partner emerge from the other side of the house and make their way back toward to where we are standing.

      “No answer,” I say, indicating the still-ringing phone. “Did you see anything?”

      “No,” the female officer says, running a forearm across her sweaty forehead. “The house is shut down tight. Shades are drawn and the only sound is the phone ringing.”

      We are silent for a moment, quietly regarding the house. I don’t see any sign of activity. “Jesus,” Stamm whispers. “It’s hotter than hell standing out here. Call for another car,” he tells the other officer, “I’m going to go knock on the front door.”

      I’m vaguely aware of movements behind me. Curious onlookers and neighbors trying to see what is going on.

      Jade lays a hand on my arm. “Look,” she says, and all our eyes fix upon the front of the house. “Something’s happening inside.”

      There is movement behind the curtains at the front of the house and my attention returns to the Haskinses’ home. Abruptly the ringing stops and I quickly raise my cell phone to my ear. “Hello,” I say fervently. “Kylie, is that you? Are you okay?”

      “Uh-huh,” the little girl whispers.

      “Where are you?”

      “Inside,” she whispers.

      “Where at inside? Are you in the kitchen, the living room...?”

      “The TV room,” СКАЧАТЬ