The Girl in Cabin 13

CHAPTER SIX

"No, no,  you  don't  understand. It was  everywhere. In his ears. In his  hair. It  was 

the  most  ridiculous thing I've ever seen." Jake's laughing almost  as  hard  as  I  am,

making it   difficult   to   understand    exactly   what    he's    saying.  We're   walking

through  snow  that  fell  heavily  over  the  town  three  days   ago   but   has

started to melt in  the  slightly  warmer   temperatures. Those  warmer  them-

peratures are still keeping me chilled to the  bone  most  of  the  day, but  the

time I get to spend with Jake is very effective at distracting me.

    We've seen each other every day since I  arrived  in  Feathered  Nest, and

the closer  we  get , the  more  I  feel  like  he's  infiltrating  me  into  the  real

version of  this  towns. Showing  me  around  and  intruding   me  to  people

gives  me  and   in  with  then,  automatically  giving  me  more  credibility. It

lets me have conversations  with  them  without  the  cocked  eyebrows  and

hesitant  speech, or  at  least  twitch  less  of  it. Gradually, I'm  getting  more

comfortable. When he goes into the  bar  in  the  evenings, I  bury  myself  in

the case, filling pages  with  notes  and  making  every  link  and  connection

I can.

    Yesterdays I got the  opportunity  to  talk  to  then  mother  of  one  of  the

missing people. Even a year after the last  time  she  saw  her  daughter, she

gets  emotional  just  saying  her   name.  It   hard   to   watch   her   struggle

with  herself  to  talk  without  dissolving  into  tears. I  comforted  her, telling

her it was alright to cry, but part  of  me  felt  fake  offering  the  comfort. I'm

the one who still buries my face in my pillow  to  cry  over  my  parents.  And

it has been much longer than a year.

    There was something  about  the  conversation  that  struck   me. Though

she fully accepted her daughter  was  gone,  abducted   by   someone,  and

very  likely  killed,  she  couldn't  wrap  her  mind  around  the  way   it   hap-

pened. Her blood  was  found  strewn  across  the  alley  behind  where  she

worked, but her mother said she would never have  gone  back  there  alone

in the dark. It just didn't make  any  sense.  Her  daughter   hated   the   dark

and  didn't  even  like  to  walk  through  her  own  home  by  herself  without

turning in all the  lights. She  just  couldn't  imagine  her  going  out  into  the

alley bring out the trash without someone being there with her.

    "I'm still tumbling that around in my head as I  walk  along  beside  Jake,

listening to  him  tell  me  stories  about  his  childhood  here  in  Feathered
 
Nest.  His  mother,  father,  brother,  and  sister  ensured  he  rarely   had  a