Her breathing is ragged. She grabs her knees and squeezes hard, as if she can will herself into a state of calm. “Ted and I used to live in Manhattan. Riverside Heights, Upper West Side. I was working for Mount Sinai, thirty-five years old and already burned out. My patients had so many problems. There’s just so much pain in the world, so much misery. And Ted, he had some boring IT job that he hated.
“I guess we were two very unhappy people trying to get pregnant, and we were failing, and the failure made us even more unhappy. We tried all the usual tricks: IVI, IVF, Clomid cycles. Do you know about these things?” Caroline shakes her head. “It doesn’t matter. Nothing worked. We were both working crazy hours but we didn’t even need the money, because my father had left me a fortune. So finally we were like, screw it: Let’s leave our jobs and take a one-year sabbatical. We bought a place in upstate New York on Seneca Lake. The theory being that maybe—in a more relaxed state of mind—we would conceive.
“The only problem is, we get up there and we don’t have any friends. We don’t know a soul. It’s just me and Ted alone in this cabin all summer long. Now Ted, he gets really into wine-making. He takes classes with a local vintner. But me, I’m so bored, Mallory. I don’t know what to do with myself. I try writing, photography, gardening, breadmaking, none of it sticks. And I have this horrible realization that I am just not a very creative person. Isn’t that an awful thing to discover about yourself?”
I try to look sympathetic and encourage her to continue. The way she talks, you’d think we were mother and daughter chatting over coffee and scones at Panera Bread. Not me in a chair with my arms looped behind my back, and Caroline fidgeting with a loaded syringe, anxiously twisting the barrel between her fingers.
“The only thing that gives me any joy is walking. There’s a park on Seneca Lake with nice shaded trails, and that’s where I first met Margit. That’s Anya’s real name: Margit Baroth. I’d see her sitting in the shade of a tree, painting landscapes. She was very talented and I guess I was a little envious. And she always brought her daughter. She had a two-year-old, a little girl named Flora. Margit would just plop her on a blanket and ignore her. For two or three hours at a time. She’d stick a smartphone in the kid’s hands and then completely neglect her. And not just once or twice, Mallory. I saw them every weekend! This was their routine! It made me angry every time I walked past them. I mean—here’s this perfect child, this beautiful little girl, starved for attention, and the mother’s plying her with YouTube videos! Like she’s a burden! I’ve read a lot of research on screen time, Mallory. It’s toxic for a child’s imagination.
“So after a couple times I decided to intervene. I walked over to the blanket and tried to introduce myself, but Margit had no idea what I was saying. I realized she couldn’t speak English. So I tried to pantomime what I meant—I tried to show her she was being an awful mother. And I guess she took that the wrong way. She got angry, I got angry, and pretty soon we were both screaming, me in English and she in Hungarian, until some people finally came over. They had to literally stand between us.
“After that, I tried going to different parks and trails. But I couldn’t stop thinking about that little girl. I felt like I failed her, like I had one chance to intervene and I blew it. So one day, maybe two months after the argument, I went back to the lake. It was a Saturday morning, and there was an incredible hot-air balloon festival. They do it every September, thousands of people show up, and the sky is filled with all these big bright colorful shapes. The perfect thing for a child’s imagination, you know? And Margit is painting one of the balloons but little Flora is just staring at a phone. She’s down on the blanket getting sunburn all over her arms and shoulders.
“And as I stood there, getting madder and madder, I notice something. I see this rabbit wriggling out of the ground. It must have been burrowed nearby. It popped out of the grass and shook itself off and Flora saw it. She called, ‘Anya, anya!’ and she pointed to the rabbit, laughing, but Margit didn’t turn around. She was too caught up in her artwork. She didn’t realize that her little girl had stood up and walked away, that Flora was crossing a field and heading down into a valley. Toward a creek, Mallory. So I had to do something, right? I couldn’t ignore what was happening. I followed Flora into the valley, and by the time I reached her, she was completely lost. She was bawling, hysterical. I knelt beside her and I told her everything was fine. I said I knew how to find her mommy, and I offered to bring her back. And I really meant to, Mallory. I really meant to bring Flora back.”
I almost lose the thread of the story because I am remembering the spirit board and its cryptic message and realizing I put too much faith in Google Translate. The message wasn’t HELP FLOWER—it was HELP FLORA, help her daughter.
“I just wanted to spend a little time with her,” Caroline continues. “Take a short walk and give her some attention. I figured her mother wouldn’t mind. She wouldn’t even know the girl was missing. There was a little trail nearby, heading into a forest, so that’s where we went. Into the woods. Only Margit did notice Flora missing. She was looking all over for her. And somehow she found us. She followed us into the woods. And once she recognized me, she was furious. She started screaming and waving her arms like she was ready to hit me. And I always walk with my Viper, I carry it for personal safety, so I used it to defend myself. I only hit her once, just to make her back off. But I guess she had some kind of neurological disorder because she went down and couldn’t get up. She started having a seizure. She wet her dress, her muscles were shaking. Poor Flora was terrified. And I knew I should call 911 but I also knew how bad this was going to look. I knew if Margit told her version of things, people would misunderstand.
“So I took Flora and I led her behind a tree. I told her to sit down and close her eyes. So she wouldn’t see what happened next. And I don’t actually remember the rest, if you want to know the truth. But that’s the beauty of the human mind. It blocks out all the bad stuff. You know what I’m talking about, right?”