Read Falling for Free Online

immediately, Ingrid thought. For a while they were too present to be dead.
    Damian had got it wrong. Lisa couldn’t possibly be dead.
    Ingrid had to be calm, quite calm, because then she could go there and see for herself. She would drive; she would be fine. And she would take things. Food and water. She went to the basement, got the old cooler, and put bottles of water into it. Then she added bottles of cranberry juice and soda water, and she even put in a freezer pack, since it would keep things cold. Forks and knives and spoons and plastic glasses and napkins printed with clowns and balloons, from a long-ago birthday party. Sandwiches, she thought. She stood in the kitchen wondering about sandwiches and then got a loaf of bread out of the refrigerator.
    She started sobbing again, standing in the kitchen with the loaf of bread in one hand. There was no need for bread or water or cranberry juice. She hung on to the counter. Perhaps she was on the floor, sprawled on its blue-and-white tiles, or maybe she got up from the floor, still holding on to the loaf of bread for dear life. She could have been screaming.
    Greg, she cried, as if he were standing in the kitchen in front of her.
    Greg would have to be told, she thought. Her husband who was not her husband any more. She didn’t even know where he was living just then: whether he was still in hishouseboat in Vancouver. She’d have to be the one to tell him. She’d have to say, Greg, your daughter is dead.
    Maybe she said this out loud. Greg,
Greg
–
    She put the loaf of bread in the cooler. She didn’t make sandwiches; she just stuffed the bread in, squeezing it so it would fit. Bread – she had bread. She tried to think what else she needed, because it was a two-hour drive. But she had no idea. What did a person need on a trip like this? What should she take?
    Nothing was where it was supposed to be. The car keys. Where were they? Things spilled out of the string drawer: tickets, paper clips, a bathing cap. Ingrid’s mother’s yellow bathing cap covered with plastic petals! String, tape, a glove. She couldn’t see. Where were her keys? She didn’t know, she didn’t know. Then she saw the car keys where they were supposed to be, on the hook by the door. She yanked at them and the little shelf fell down, a jangle of keys springing off hooks.
Welcome
, said the shelf, upside down, the keys flung this way and that across the floor.
    But she needed a nightgown, a toothbrush. She ran upstairs, two at a time. Why was she hurrying? Lisa was dead. She found herself in the bathroom taking the toothbrush out of its holder – could that be her own face in the mirror? She held on to the sink, groaning. Whose face was it?
    No, she cried, banging at the mirror so the door of the cabinet flew open and her face disappeared.
    Were these her own hands, putting a nightgown into an overnight bag? Yes, they must be. Underwear. The drawer fell on the floor when she pulled it open. Underwear, socks – a pile of things on the floor. She tried to zip up the overnight bag, but the zipper caught on the underwear. Why did she need an overnight bag, anyway? She left it on the bed andwent downstairs. If she didn’t hurry, her daughter would grow cold. Her own daughter, not someone else’s.
    She took everything out to the car. The cooler, her sunglasses, the car keys. That was right, wasn’t it? Yes. That was right. Then she saw she’d forgotten her purse. Why did she need her purse? Her daughter was dead, for God’s sake. But she still had to have her purse, and she went back for it, tossing it on the passenger seat. She sat in the hot car with her sunglasses on, tears streaming down her face.
    Collect yourself, she said. Collect yourself.
    She wiped her eyes and took deep breaths. If she wasn’t calm, she wouldn’t be able to drive. She wouldn’t be able to do it, and she had to. But when she leaned forward to turn the keys in the ignition, she felt the axe in her chest. She felt the