Chapter 5 - The Woman Across the DrivewayAt seven the next morning, Evan found Noah standing at the front window.
The boy was still wearing his striped T-shirt.
He hadn't wanted to change clothes.
Every time Evan suggested it, Noah said he was comfortable.
Evan suspected the shirt felt safe because it was the one he had worn when his father finally came home.
“What are you looking at?” Evan asked.
Noah pointed across the driveway.
“Mrs. Alvarez.”
Their neighbor was collecting her newspaper.
Maria Alvarez had lived next door for eleven years.
She was a retired elementary school teacher who brought cookies at Christmas and occasionally helped Evan accept packages when he traveled.
Evan had barely spoken to her in months.
Noah pressed his fingertips against the window.
“She heard Lily before.”
Evan turned toward him.
“What do you mean?”
“When Claire was yelling. Mrs. Alvarez knocked on the door.”
“What happened?”
“Claire told us to go upstairs.”
“Did Mrs. Alvarez see anything?”
Noah nodded slowly.
“Once.”
Evan watched their neighbor disappear into her garage.
A terrible possibility occurred to him.
Someone outside the house might have known.
Someone might have tried to help.
And he might have been too absent to notice.
He called Rebecca before approaching her.
Rebecca advised him to avoid suggesting answers and let the neighbor describe what she remembered in her own words.
So Evan walked across the driveway alone.
Maria answered after his second knock.
Her welcoming expression faded when she saw his face.
“Evan? Is everything all right?”
“No.”
The answer came out before he could soften it.
“Can I ask you something about Lily?”
Maria looked past him toward the house.
“Is she hurt?”
Evan felt his chest tighten.
“Why would you ask that?”
The older woman gripped the edge of the door.
“Come inside.”
They sat at her small kitchen table.
Evan told her only that he'd witnessed an incident involving Claire and Lily and that authorities were looking into it.
Maria closed her eyes.
“I was afraid of that.”
Evan felt cold.
“What did you see?”
“About three weeks ago, I was bringing over a package. Your front door was partly open.”
She folded her hands.
“Lily was near the bottom of the stairs. She was crying. Claire had one hand around her upper arm.”
Evan leaned forward.
“What happened next?”
“Claire pulled her upright. Too hard.”
“Did Lily fall?”
“No. But she cried out.”
Maria's eyes glistened.
“I asked if everything was okay. Claire said Lily had nearly fallen and was refusing to stand.”
The same explanation Claire had given Evan.
“Did you believe her?”
“I wasn't sure.”
Maria looked ashamed.
“I asked if she wanted help. She said no and closed the door.”
Evan exhaled slowly.
“Did you tell anyone?”
“I tried to call you that afternoon.”
Evan reached for his phone.
Maria continued.
“Claire answered. She said you were unavailable and that Lily had been overtired.”
“Did you leave a message?”
“Yes.”
Evan searched his call history.
Nothing.
Maria brought out her own phone.
She showed him a message she had sent to his number.
Hi, Evan. Please call when you have a moment. I was concerned about something I saw with Lily today.
The message showed as delivered.
Evan recognized the date.
It was a Wednesday when Claire had borrowed his phone to update a family calendar while he was packing for an overnight trip.
He checked his archived messages.
There it was.
Read.
No reply.
He had never seen it.
Maria watched his expression change.
“I assumed you had talked to Claire.”
Evan shook his head.
“I hadn't.”
Maria swallowed.
“There was another afternoon. I heard Lily crying through an open window. Then everything got quiet very suddenly.”
“Did you see what happened?”
“No. And I won't pretend I did.”
Her restraint made Evan trust her more.
“I should have called someone,” she said.
“You did try to help.”
“It wasn't enough.”
Evan recognized the guilt in her voice.
He carried a heavier version of it.
Maria offered to speak to investigators and preserve her messages.
She also remembered one detail that had seemed unimportant at the time.
“After I knocked, Claire came outside. She looked frightened at first. Then she asked if I had a doorbell camera.”
Evan frowned.
“Why?”
“I told her I did.”
“What did she say?”
“She asked whether it could see across the driveway.”
Evan straightened.
“Could it?”
“Only part of your front porch. Mostly the walkway.”
Maria hesitated.
“She seemed relieved when I told her that.”
Evan glanced through the kitchen window toward his home.
The staircase was hidden behind the wooden walls.
But the front entrance was visible.
“Do you still have recordings from that day?”
“I don't know. The system overwrites old footage.”
“Would you check?”
“Of course.”
Maria opened the application.
After several minutes, she found two saved clips.
The first showed a delivery truck.
The second showed Claire standing on the porch, speaking angrily into her phone.
The audio was indistinct.
But one thing was clear.
Claire was not talking to Evan.
The clip showed her ending the call and immediately looking toward Maria's house.
Then she went inside.
Evan asked Maria to preserve the original recording.
As he stood to leave, she touched his sleeve.
“There's something else.”
He turned back.
“Last month, a man came to your house while you were away.”
“Which man?”
“The one who handles your repairs. Nolan.”
Evan nodded.
Maria looked uncomfortable.
“He was carrying a folder. Claire met him outside.”
“That isn't unusual.”
“I know.”
“Then why mention it?”
“Because I heard her say something.”
Evan waited.
Maria lowered her voice.
“She told him, ‘The children are getting harder to control.’”
A long silence followed.
May you like
Then Maria added the part Evan would remember for weeks.
“And he told her, ‘You only need to keep things together until Evan signs.’”
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