He said, “I want to show you something.”
“Around here?”
“It’s just a few blocks this way.” Will pulled at her shoulder to get her going again. They crossed another street, stepping over a pile of litter. Graffiti was everywhere. Will could practically feel the hair standing up on the back of Sara’s neck.
She asked, “Are you sure about this?”
“Trust me,” he said, though as if on cue, they approached a seedy-looking clump of shirtless teenagers. All of them sported scowls and low-hanging jeans. They were a veritable rainbow coalition of tweakers, representing almost every ethnicity Atlanta had to offer. One of them had a small swastika tattooed on his fish-white belly. Another had a Puerto Rican flag on his chest. Ball caps were turned backward. Teeth were missing or covered in gold. All of them held liquor-shaped brown paper bags in their hands.
Sara leaned closer to Will. He stared back at the kids. Will was six-three on a good day, but pulling back his jacket sent the stronger message. Nothing discouraged conversation more than the fourteen rounds in a government-issued Glock model 23.
Wordlessly, the group turned and headed in the opposite direction. Will let his eyes track them just to make it clear they should keep moving.
“Where are we going?” Sara asked. She obviously hadn’t planned on their afternoon stroll turning into a tour of one of the city’s most crime-ridden areas. They were in the full glare of the sun now. There was no shade in this part of town. No one planted flowers in their front yards. Unlike the dogwood-lined streets in the more affluent areas, there was nothing here but bright xenon streetlights and clear open spaces so the police helicopters could track stolen cars or fleeing perpetrators.
“Just a little bit more,” Will said, rubbing her shoulder in what he hoped was a soothing manner.
They walked silently for a few more blocks. He could feel Sara tense up the farther they got from home.
Will asked, “Do you know what this area is called?”
Sara glanced around at the street signs. “SoNo? Old Fourth Ward?”
“It used to be called Buttermilk Bottom.”
She smiled at the name. “Why?”
“It was a slum. No paved streets. No electricity. See how steep the grade is?” She nodded. “The sewage used to back up here. They said it smelled like buttermilk.” Will saw she wasn’t smiling anymore. He dropped his arm to Sara’s waist as they turned onto Carver Street. He pointed to the boarded-up coffee shop on the corner. “That used to be a grocery store.”
She looked up at him.
“Mrs. Flannigan sent me there every day after school to buy her a pack of Kool 100s and a bottle of Tab.”
“Mrs. Flannigan?”
“She ran the children’s home.”
Sara’s expression didn’t change, but she nodded.
Will felt an odd sensation in his belly, like he’d swallowed a handful of hornets. He didn’t know why he’d brought Sara here. He wasn’t generally impulsive. He’d never been one to volunteer details about his life. Sara knew Will had grown up in care. She knew that his mother had died shortly after he was born. Will assumed she’d figured out the rest on her own. Sara wasn’t just a pediatrician. She’d been the medical examiner back in her small town. She knew what abuse looked like. She knew what Will looked like. Given her training, it wasn’t hard to put together the clues.
“Record shop,” Will said, pointing out another abandoned building. He kept his arm around her waist, guiding her toward their ultimate destination. The hornet sensation got worse. Ashleigh Snyder kept flashing into his mind. The photo they showed on the news must have been from her student ID card. The girl’s blonde hair was pulled back. Her lips showed an amused smile, as if the photographer had said something funny.
Sara asked, “Where did you live?”
Will stopped. They had almost passed the children’s home. The building was so changed that it was barely recognizable. The Spanish Revival brick architecture had been completely bastardized. Large metal awnings eyebrowed the front windows. The red brick had been painted a rheumy yellow. Chunks of the façade were missing. The huge wooden front door that had been gloss black as long as Will could remember was now a garish red. The glass was caked with dirt. In the yard, Mrs. Flannigan’s white painted tires no longer held tulips and pansies. They were no longer white, either. Will was afraid to guess what was inside them now, and he didn’t want to get close enough to find out. There was a sign slapped onto the side of the building.
“ ‘Coming soon: Luxury Condos,’ ” Sara read. “Not too soon, I’m guessing.”
Will stared up at the building. “It didn’t used to be like this.”
Sara’s reluctance was palpable, but she still asked, “Do you want to look inside?”
He wanted to run away from here as fast as he could, but Will forced himself to walk up the front steps. As a kid, he’d always felt a certain amount of dread every time he entered the home. There were new boys constantly in and out. Each of them had something to prove, sometimes with their fists. This time, it wasn’t physical violence that sent a cold fear through Will. It was Ashleigh Snyder. It was the unreasonable connection Will was making because the missing girl looked so much like his mother.
He pressed his face close to the window, but couldn’t see anything other than the reflection of his own eyes staring back. The front door was secured with an expensive-looking padlock. The wood was so rotted that one yank on the hasp pulled out the screws.
Will hesitated, his palm flat to the door. He felt Sara standing behind him, waiting. He wondered what she would do if he changed his mind and walked back down the stairs.
As if sensing his thoughts, she said, “We can go.” Then, more pointedly, “Why don’t we go?”
Will pushed open the door. There was no expected creaking of hinges, but the door caught on the warped wooden floor so that he had to shove it open. Will tested the floorboards as he entered. Though it was still light out, the house was dark, thanks mostly to the heavy awnings and dirty windows. A musky smell greeted him, nothing like the welcoming scent of Pine-Sol and Kool 100s Will recalled from his childhood. He tried the light switch to no avail.
Sara said, “Maybe we should—”
“Looks like it was turned into a hotel.” Will pointed to the caged front desk. Keys still hung from the cubbyholes along the back wall. “Or a halfway house.”
Will glanced around what he guessed was the lobby. Broken glass pipes and tinfoil littered the floor. The crack addicts had demolished the couch and chairs. There were several used condoms melted into the carpet.
“My God,” Sara whispered.
Will felt oddly defensive. “Picture it with the walls painted white, and the sofa this big, yellow, kind of corduroy sectional.” He looked down at the floor. “Same carpet. It was a lot cleaner, though.”
Sara nodded, and he walked toward the back of the building before she could run out the front. The large open spaces from Will’s childhood had been chopped up into single-room apartments, but he could still remember what it had looked like in better times.
He told Sara, “This was the dining hall. There were twelve tables. Kind of like picnic benches, but with tablecloths and nice napkins. Boys on one side, girls on the other. Mrs. Flannigan was careful about letting the girls and boys mingle too much. She said she didn’t need more kids than she already had.”
Sara didn’t laugh at the joke.
“Here.” Will stopped in front of an open doorway. The room was a dark hole. He could easily picture how it used to be. Flowery wallpaper. A metal desk and wooden chair. “This was Mrs. Flannigan’s office.”
“What happened to her?”
“Heart attack. She died before the ambulance got here.” He continued down the hallway and pushed open a familiar-looking swinging door. “The kitchen, obviously.” This space, at least, hadn’t changed. “That’s the same stove from when I was a kid.” Will opened the pantry door. There was still food stacked on the shelves. Mold had turned a loaf of bread into a black brick. Graffiti marred the back of the door. “Fuck you! Fuck you! Fuck you!” was carved into the soft wood.