Missing Piece

It was almost noon when I woke after a night ploughing through classic Twilight Zone episodes. Winter break just started; I figured I was entitled to a little extra shuteye. As I went downstairs to make lunch, the sight that greeted me was that of my mother, standing in the main hall, back facing me and head tilted upwards. I followed her gaze to see that she was looking at the oversized circular window above our equally ostentatious front door. Placed on the mutins of the window were a few figurines, so small that, had I not been looking, I wouldn’t have noticed them.

“About time you got up,” she said, not bothering to face me. She always seemed to know when I was in her vicinity, no matter how quiet I thought I was being. That skill of hers never failed to weird me out.

I hurried downstairs to stand beside her. From there, I got a better view of the window. While I couldn’t discern the minutiae of the figurines, I knew from the previous incidents that they were made from the same hard plastic as the dinosaur toys you’d buy in tubes, intricately painted with far superior artistic skill than I believed anyone in my family had.

The figures were positioned to replicate a chicken fight that I remembered perfectly. It’d gotten everyone grounded for a month and video games banned in the household for a year. There were four figures in total: two boys and two girls. The smaller of the two boys, made to look like me, was sitting on the shoulders of the larger one, who was probably my dad. Directly facing us were two girls in a similar position – the one on the bottom being Catrina, the second oldest, and the one on top being… Sarah.

Seeing that last one, even though she was just a crude depiction of her only two centimeters tall, must’ve gotten under my mother’s skin.

“Another one?” I said, trying to change the topic.

She nodded. “And this makes three…”

Someone from the outside likely would’ve assumed my mom was a maid, not one of the homeowners. Everything from her muted choice of dress to her well-kept, cottony-white hair gave that impression. To be frank, that guess wasn’t far off base. Abigail, or Abby, as our dad called her, was our resident scion of order. She kept things under her tight control and was oftentimes merciless whenever someone disturbed said control. When our mom said no video games for a year, she one hundred percent meant it. I’m still not sure where she managed to hide the console for that long.

“Whoever is responsible, they are growing more brazen in their attacks against the house order,” she said, then turned to look at me with a big smile on her face. That was never a good sign. “Trust me on this, Joseph, whichever one of you little brats is responsible for these will burn.”

“…Well, I’ve got to get lunch now…” She had the darnedest sense of humor.

“Wait,” she said, “I have a job for you once you’ve finished.”

Oh? I thought. Is she enlisting me to search for the culprit behind the figurines? Hell yeah! She’s finally recognizing my deductive aptitude!

“I need you to take Holofernes out. He’s been unruly all day.”

Adjacent to our home was a sizable lake, one that took an hour to encircle fully through the wooded dirt trail.

I probably spent the first ten minutes of the walk just muttering a string of curses to myself. It wasn’t that I disliked Holofernes, quite the opposite, but I had other things I wanted to do besides walk the cat. Primarily, I wanted to get to the bottom of the mystery regarding the figurines. At the time, I was dead-certain that we had a psycho living in either the attic, the basement, or the walls, and his master plan was to place a bunch of models of my family around the house before brutally killing us all – something along those lines.

I say I lived in a house, but it was more like a mansion. There were plenty of places to hide, and it was sequestered in a wooded area apart from the rest of town. I’d already spent many nights daydreaming about this hypothetical psychopath, fully clad in his straitjacket, lying in wait to jump out and shout, “Ooga booga!” at us. It all seemed to fit perfectly.

Maybe I wasn’t as smart as I thought I was.

Holofernes turned his head to mewl at me. Our cat was, as my father put it, “a feisty little bastard,” around him and Mom. Apparently, Holofernes didn’t like adults. Maybe his previous owners abused him; maybe he was merely spiteful for no good reason. It was probably the latter.

But then, I realized that he was trying to get my attention because someone was approaching us. It was Emma, and she was walking her dog. There was an unspoken rule that I oversaw Holofernes, while everyone else kept the shaggy lhasa apso Dee O’Gee from wrecking the place.

“Finally up, Angry Joe?” she said. That nickname irked me.

“No. Em, I think you’re hallucinating. I’m actually still in bed. Of course I’m up!”

Emma laughed dryly. No matter how much I yelled, it never had any effect on her. I suppose that’s just how things were between us.

I wanted to continue in peace, to think more about my hypothetical psychopath in private, but Emma decided to turn around and walk along with me.

“Good!” she said. “I was about to start the second lap. Dee’s feeling antsy this morning. Aren’t you, girl?”

Dee barked energetically. She was always like that.

On the trail, we’d occasionally talk about how finals went or the best-looking upcoming games-slash-movies-slash-books, but it was when I mentioned the figurines that things took a turn.

“Mom’s worried about them,” I said. “She found more before I left.”

“Oh?” Emma said, kicking an errant stone into the lake. “What’s this one like?”

“Remember that time when I was certain Batman could beat Superman in a fight, but then Sarah was all like, ‘Wrong! Superman is one of the most powerful beings in the DCU,’ so then I was like, ‘Seriously? Have you even read The Dark Knight Returns?’ Then she-”

Emma raised her hand for me to stop. “Ah, the infamous chicken fight of ’08. I remember reffing that match from far away, but Mom still didn’t have any trouble finding me. I take it she didn’t react well to seeing Sarah?”

I nodded. Mom tried to hide it, but I could always tell when something was getting to her. Ever since Sarah left, merely mentioning her was a surefire way to put Mom into a terrible wax. Emma leaned close to me, whispering into my ear. “Be honest. Do you think there’s a murderer living in the walls of our house?”

“Yes! That’s exactly what I’m thinking!”

In a singsong tone, she said, “Id-di-ot,” taking care to accentuate each syllable. That really pissed me off.

“Alright, Emma Terrestrial! What’s your big friggin’ theory?”

With her hand that wasn’t holding Dee’s leash, she rubbed her chin, mimicking the appearance of deep thought. She even provided a few overlong “hmm” sounds to sell it.

It pissed me off more.

“Well,” she said, “I think it’s pretty obvious that the one placing the mini-us’s around the house is either a member of the family or well-acquainted.”

“Explain, wench!” I was getting impatient, picking up a twig and throwing it into the lake to assert my power. Emma didn’t seem to notice.

“The scenes that are being presented to us are all involved with… well, you-know-who.”

“What do you mean?” I asked, stopping for brief rest, allowing Holofernes to chase some of the local bug life.

“Christ, I can’t tell if you’re willingly ignoring it or if you’re just that daft. Haven’t you noticed a common theme in what we’re being shown?”

“Yes. They’ve all portrayed us in significant moments from the past. Wow, what a great observation, and might I add: Screw you for calling me stupid.”

Emma chuckled coquettishly as her gait widened. She was purposefully walking faster. “You’re right! I’m just being obtuse, as usual!”

“Wait!” I said, trying to get Holofernes walking, but he wasn’t having any of it. He hissed at me when I tried picking him up; I couldn’t believe he betrayed me. Looking back at Emma, I shouted, “Get back here!”

“Sorry for wasting your time!” was all she said before turning a corner, obscuring her form behind thick trunks and foliage.

As I waited for Holofernes to finish playing, I rattled off each scene to myself. The models were placed in the basement, then the bathroom sink, and finally in the window above the entrance door. Respectively, they depicted the game of flashlight tag the four of us held in the woods, the time Emma lost Dee when walking her, and the epic battle between Sarah and me.

Thinking out loud, it immediately became obvious what Emma was getting at. Everything we’d been shown had to do with a memorable moment between Sarah and one of us.

For flashlight tag in the woods, Sarah and Catrina came up with the idea to team up and scare Emma and me. They loved scary movies, and the entire game was likely all part of their ploy to prank us, though they both got grounded for going overboard with the fake blood and raw meat.

As for Emma losing Dee, that was an easier connection to make. Emma had lost Dee when she was nine. She’d cried her eyes out, thinking she’d lost her friend. Sarah was the first one Emma turned to, and she was also the one to find Dee swimming in the lake. It was winter, and Sarah, without even thinking, plunged into the icy water to get Dee out. Of course, Mom found out when Sarah came back drenched and shivering and promptly grounded them, but it was obvious that Emma appreciated what Sarah did for her.

I should’ve seen the connection earlier, but Mom had been suppressing any mention of Sarah ever since she ran off last year. It was like she pretended Sarah no longer existed, and I guess that rubbed off on me.

But still, one thing nagged at me regarding the latest model set. Emma should have been included.

Upon returning from the walk, I searched the entranceway for Emma. She would’ve been separated from the four of us in the window. Like she’d said, she was the referee for Sarah and I’s little debate.

Mom took the original four figurines down, but I followed an invisible line across from the window. It ended at the opposite wall, which was decorated with several family photos, and sitting on one of their frames was Emma’s figurine. It blended in seamlessly with the rest of us in the photograph. Her figure held small binoculars, as if she was watching us from afar. If I wanted her, I’d need to get the ladder.

In the basement, there was an area set aside for carpentry work, though it was almost always left locked. Mom said there were too many things in the room with which we could kill ourselves. One such item was the ladder I needed.

I knew Mom would be in the garden for a while, so I’d have free reign in the basement for some time. Imagine my surprise when I heard a voice coming from behind me.

“What are you doing?”

I nearly had a heart attack, but, turning around, I saw that it was just Catrina. Her arms were crossed, and she gave me a glare of utter derision. She used to be so rebellious, but that side of her left with Sarah. I think she felt like she needed to be the foundation for me and Emma since she was the oldest.

“Joe, I don’t want to get you in trouble. If you come up right now, I won’t tell Mom you were down here. Dad should be back soon, anyways. Things’ll get more relaxed then, and he can help with whatever you’re trying to accomplish.”

Hugh, our father, was rich, a major executive at this wholesale company called Harrisons Direct. It’s not something I like drawing attention to, but when you live in a mysterious gigantic house in the woods, it’s the elephant in the room that I typically prefer getting out of the way. Still, there were far worse labels to have at school other than “the rich kid”. The only major downside was that he had to take several long business trips throughout the year.

“Hey! I know!” she said, trying her best to sound like her old self. “Let’s go for a walk around the lake.”

Not on your life.

“Can’t,” I said. “Mom missed a figure in the hall. I need a ladder to reach it.”

Catrina raised an eyebrow. “Why can’t she get it?”

“The figure is of Sarah,” I lied.

“Oh… crap.”

Thankfully, Catrina came back shortly with the key, and we got to collecting Emma’s figurine. To my chagrin, she didn’t allow me to use the ladder. “Too risky,” she said, so I was stuck keeping an eye out in case Mom came back inside.

We were aware how any mention of Sarah, no matter how minor, would put Mom into a bad mood that could last for days, one that would negatively impact all of us. Likewise, seeing a Sarah figurine would have a similar effect, so if we could avoid her seeing it, it would result in fewer headaches in the long run.

Naturally, Catrina was upset to find that it was not Sarah they were retrieving, but Emma.

“Heh! Sorry, Cat! I could’ve sworn it was Sarah!” I said as she tossed the figure to me. She scowled as she collapsed the ladder.

“What do you think that’ll prove?” she asked. “It’s probably not even unique. Most likely, it’s some cheap piece of junk either you or Emma painted over.”

“Wait,” I said, “you think I did this?”

She shrugged. “Dunno, maybe? I’m sure you could’ve thrown it on the picture frame without using the ladder. As for why you wanted to get it back, I’m not sure. Maybe you wanted to reuse it for the next model set?”

That stung. My own sister considered me a suspect! The situation was worse than I thought.

“Then again,” she continued, “I’d be more inclined to say this is Emma’s doing. This seems like something she’d do, not to mention how she’s smarter than…” She trailed off.

“She’s what? Come on. What were you going to say? Smarter than me? Was that it?”

“I should probably get back to work,” she said. She was never the best at lying. “I have an online class.”

Funny, I thought. She’d just been ready to go for a walk no more than five minutes ago.

Suppressing my frustration, I thumbed over the miniature Emma, wondering if this really was worth getting.

It didn’t take long to realize it wasn’t. The toy didn’t look like anything my sisters owned. I sighed as I realized what the mini-Emma really was – a dead end.

Before she left, Catrina said one final thing to me, probably after noticing how crestfallen I looked.

“C’mon, champ. Remember, Dad will be back in a few hours!”

“Yeah,” I said, “for a whole weekend. Yippee.” I wasn’t even trying to hide my lack of enthusiasm.

But even as those words escaped my lips, the spark of an idea began to form. Then, all too rapidly, things began to click into place.

That night, after we’d had dinner and said our stock standard welcome back’s to Hugh, I approached him in his study. Alone.

Hugh had this duality to him. Most of the time, he had this impenetrable austerity, complemented by his extensive study filled to brim with dusty books. On the other hand, he sounded like Ned Flanders and had a very, how should I say, Devito-esque stature.

Never one to beat around the bush, I asked him straight: “Are you the one placing the toys around the house?”

“Yeah,” he said like it was nothing. “That’s all me.”

That threw me for a loop.

“I might not be around much, Joe. However, I do notice when things are not in order, and boy, things are greatly out of order. Ironically, it’s Abby who’s to blame, though I hold no malice toward her.”

I’d manufactured this impressive-sounding confrontation in my head, though in retrospect, it was really just what made the most sense. Hugh had the easiest access to toys, methods to enter the house, and the figurines always seemed to show up the day before he returned. Basically, Dad was coming back into town a day earlier than usual, and I had no idea why.

Because he relented so easily, I was unsure how to continue, so I just let him talk.

“It’s your mother’s coping. You see, she deals with her emotions by pretending she doesn’t have them, and that’s just no good.

“Give me until Christmas. By then, everything will be clear.”

Christmas Eve.

I wasn’t sure I did the right thing, not divulging Dad’s secret. When Mom saw the final figurine set on the living room table, she locked herself in her room for the entire day. It was her and Dad; they were holding a baby.

I think we all knew who that baby was.

Christmas day.

Dad entered the house with a smile on his face, carrying five neatly wrapped presents.

Before any of us asked why he had an extra one, someone appeared from behind him.

Sarah entered the house with another five presents.

We stood motionless as Mom approached Sarah, collapsed to her knees, then, in tears, said, “Welcome home.”