3. Alicia

Seven hours.That's how much time had passed since Alicia collected two-and-a-half-year-old Theo from the police station and brought him to his new foster home. Seven hours since he scampered out of her grasp and disappeared under the dining room table. Seven hours since Alicia sat on the linoleum floor and promised him she would wait until he was ready to come out. Alicia always kept her promises to the kids. Which meant now she might have to die on this linoleum floor.

"Hey, buddy, I think Bluey might be on the TV," Alicia tried, without much hope. "Should we go and see?"

Theo didn't turn his little blond head from the wall. She had to admire his resolve. Since they'd arrived, he hadn't spoken, he'd refused all food and drink, and, if smell was anything to go by, he'd soiled himself. Still, he wouldn't budge.

Last night, he'd been taken to the police station by a neighbor who'd discovered him playing on the road at midnight, wearing nothing but a dirty nappy. Apparently his father had been too inebriated to realize he was gone. His mother had yet to be located and it wasn't looking hopeful. Alicia had hoped that returning Theo to Trish's, where he'd spent a few months earlier in the year, might provide Theo with some reassurance; but, if anything, his understanding of what was happening made things worse. His head remained down, his tiny, twiggy arms remained ramrod straight by his sides.

"Do you like chocolate?" she asked, as another foster kid, Aaron, sloped into the kitchen, and started rummaging in the cupboards, presumably for food. "I've got a Kit Kat here. Want some?"

Alicia broke off a chocolate finger and held it out to Theo under the table. To her delight, he scooted across the floor to inspect it.

"Ow!" she cried, as she felt the sharp milk teeth clamp down hard on her own fingers.

"You walked into that one," Aaron said, sitting at the table now, devouring a bag of crisps.

His comment delighted Alicia no end. In her experience, when kids felt comfortable enough to dis you, in her experience, it meant you were doing something right. As for the bite, Alicia had suffered worse. The fact was it took a certain kind of person to choose a woefully paid, underappreciated career in which most of the people you dealt with wanted to cause you physical harm. Alicia didn't blame the kids for disliking her—after all, in most instances she was the one who separated them from their parents. Of course they wanted to hit her, kick her, spit on her. It wore a lot of social workers down after a while, but for Alicia the opposite was true: knowing these kids had some fight left in them buoyed her. If there was one thing foster kids needed, it was fight.

Besides, Alicia had learned to accept being poorly treated a long time ago. It felt familiar, and in a way—even comforting. Like coming home.

"Oh yeah?" Alicia said to Aaron. "You think you can do better?"

"Five bucks says I can."

"Make it ten." Frankly Alicia would have paid a hundred, but Aaron held out his hand to shake on it, so Alicia did.

Alicia wasn't Aaron's caseworker, but she had a soft spot for him. At seventeen, Aaron had reached those precarious months before he aged out of foster care, and she always felt for those kids. The last time she'd seen Aaron she'd given him her card and told him to get in touch if he wanted some information about services and programs for kids aging out, or scholarships if he was interested in university. So far he hadn't reached out, and she suspected her card was in the rubbish bin, but there was always room for hope.

"Watch and learn," Aaron said, grabbing a fistful of his crisps and holding them under the table, palm up, like a kid feeding an animal at a petting zoo.

"Be careful," Alicia said. "He's got a sharp set of chompers."

As Theo glanced toward Aaron's outstretched hand, Alicia's phone rang. Normally she wouldn't answer the phone in this situation, but given that she likely wasn't getting out of here anytime soon, she decided to make an exception.

"Ten bucks," she said to Aaron. She stood up and accepted the call. "Hello?"

"Am I speaking to Alicia Connelly?"

"If you're a debt collector, no," Alicia said. "If I've won the lottery, yes."

She glanced at Aaron, who rolled his eyes. Theo was looking at Aaron's outstretched palm.

"Alicia, my name is Detective Ashleigh Patel," the woman said. "Have you got a minute?"

Alicia glanced at her watch. Six P.M. Not the latest call she'd had for crisis care, but late enough that it would be a struggle to find a family who'd be ready to take in a child tonight. Usually, it was a case manager who called to give her the particulars of a child's situation, but occasionally she did receive a call direct from the police. She got out her notebook and clicked her pen, waiting for the onslaught of grisly information—about the physical and emotional state of the child or children, their age or ages, and any previous history in the foster system.

"Sure. What have you got for me?"

A pause. "Actually, this is related to an investigation I'm working on. I'm hoping you might be able to help me."

Alicia unclicked her pen. "What investigation?"

Theo started eating the crisps directly from Aaron's hand, like a baby goat. Aaron made a grossed-out face, but he kept his hand there. He held his other hand out to Alicia, rubbing his index finger and thumb together. "Ten bucks," he mouthed. Alicia reached into her pocket for her wallet.

"It's in relation to a discovery made at Wild Meadows foster home in Port Agatha. I understand you grew up there?"

Alicia froze, her hand still in her pocket. "What?"

"I said it's in relation to—"

"Yes, sorry. I heard." She walked to the kitchen counter and leaned against it for support. "And yes… I… I spent a few years at Wild Meadows foster home when I was a kid."

Alicia's chest became tight. She had been waiting for this phone call for twenty-five years. Not looking forward to it… but waiting. It felt terrifying and exciting and important. Like the part of the movie when the truth starts to come out and the prisoner begins to believe they might have a shot at escaping death row.

"Well, as you may or may not be aware, Wild Meadows has recently been demolished. And while excavating, the construction workers uncovered…"

Aaron lowered another fistful of crisps under the table for Theo. Salt and crumbs were all over the boy's face and the floor.

"… human remains. Bones, really. It looks like they've been there awhile. Possibly since the time that you were living there."

Alicia began to shake. She may have been waiting for this call for years but that didn't mean she was prepared for it. How could one prepare for something like this? Something that would, should, blow up her entire life?

"Are you there?" the detective asked.

"I'm here," she said. But she wasn't, not really. She was already back at Wild Meadows, reliving everything that had happened there twenty-five years ago with new, clear eyes.