We Don't Talk About Carol

by Kristen L. Berry

Then I remembered the old reporting trick—silence could be a useful trap; most people can’t bear to leave it unfilled.

“We’re going to see if that bake shop at Eastern Market has any more lemon butter cheesecakes,

warm pastries, eggs scrambled with cheese, bacon, home fries, coffee, and juice.

and a tricycle abandoned in the yard of a forest green craftsman.

Watching how happy and loving and secure we were didn’t just make me feel that it could be possible; it made me want that life more than I’d ever wanted it before.

“I can’t wait to meet you, little girl.”

talisman

Huh. Michael tutored Marian? He’d said he didn’t know any of the missing girls besides Carol. Maybe he’d forgotten?

Why does everyone’s love for me only exist under the condition that I give up my own dreams? Is that what love is supposed to look like? Why are my dreams worth less than theirs?

All of the girls with missing person reports—every girl except Carol—were last seen walking.

And both Geri and Sally—Barbara’s and Stanley’s sisters—were last seen climbing into a dark early 1950s sedan, likely a Chevy 210.

I suddenly saw the whole experience in a different light. The odd hint of disappointment in his voice when he realized I hadn’t come to Detroit alone. How his wife, Rosa, had prepared that enormous feast only to make an excuse for her and her daughter to leave, as though he’d asked to be alone with me. How he’d looked me up on Instagram prior to my visit and noticed how closely I resembled Carol. The string of Instagram notifications he later left on my account, as he scrolled far back through my photos, as if savoring them.

I meditated on the image of our daughter extra hard then, as though if I concentrated well enough, I might actually be able to will her into existence.

Anger is a secondary emotion, she’d said. We often reach for anger to protect ourselves from experiencing more vulnerable feelings, like sadness or fear.

Just like an optical illusion that reveals itself if you stare at it long enough, the longer I looked at my mother, the more clearly I could see evidence of her pain.

Now that I’m 60 years old, it’s really starting to hit me how little I know about my family. My Ma had a tough upbringing; she doesn’t like talking about her folks, so I don’t know much about them. And now I can’t help thinking that your grandmother who recently passed might have been my grandmother too.

“Her favorite singer’s mother worked as a domestic servant,” I said as the memory returned to me, “and she’d sometimes bring her daughter along to help. Mary Wells—I looked up her bio after I learned how much your mother admired her.”

A flicker coursed through Wesley’s brow. “My ma’s name is Mary. She was born Mary Wright and became Mary Jones when she married my dad.”

Still volunteers at the middle school. Carol is alive.

Carol’s smile twitched. Then she closed the door in our faces.

😂😂😂😂😂😂

Carol’s eyes flew open. “My…trunk?” I nodded. “Michael gave it to us. When Sasha and I went to talk to him in Detroit.” Carol’s hands stilled. “You…talked to Michael?” When I nodded, she took a shuddering breath. “I knew he’d go to Detroit.”

She took a long, unsteady breath. “I know where the bodies are buried,” Carol said. “I helped put them there.”

“Michael was the one in control,” Carol said. “All those years I’d worried about Raymond. Creepy Raymond. Yet here was Michael calling the shots. He told Raymond to tie the girl up and set her down in front of the car, in front of

Michael handed me his shovel and said, ‘Be a good girl and cover up this mess, would you?’

“Did you see the box Sally was buried with?” Carol’s eyes widened. “Did the police find Michael’s ring?”

“You put the ring there. Didn’t you?” I asked.

But Michael didn’t actually love me. He wasn’t actually considering my dreams of moving to Detroit. He was going to the West Coast with or without me. He was just using me until he got to go off to his ‘real life,’ using me as a pawn to help him kill those poor girls.

😕

Bettie and Loretta were buried in the wetlands.

I thought about how adamant Grammy had been that Carol had run away. Maybe it wasn’t a matter of stubborn denial; maybe she’d actually watched Carol leave.

Especially given that authorities were looking into his possible connection to several Black girls who’d gone missing from Oakland and Detroit during the years he resided in those cities.

It was probably a cosmic kindness that his mother and Grammy’s friend, Eloise Hall, died just days before Michael’s arrest. His sister, Yvonne, left North Carolina before the trial began. I couldn’t blame her.