Page 72 of Snow Creek

I don’t know.

“Grief is powerful,” I tell her. “I also know sincerity when I see it. I’ll check it out. I’ll call you at the Seaport.”

She grasps my hand and squeezes. “Thank you. I wouldn’t bother you if I wasn’t so sure. My sister and her husband weren’t perfect, though they did the best they could.”

“No one’s perfect, but how do you mean?”

“Hudson was super strict. Wouldn’t let Ellie date. Talk to boys. Grounded her when he caught her. Carrie just let that happen. I guess she didn’t want for her daughter what she’d had for herself. She was pregnant when they married. She was seventeen when she had Ellie. Hudson was the other half of the equation, of course, but he really put the blame on her.”

Thirty-Three

After Laurna departs, I do what everyone does when they want to find out more about a potential date, a neighbor, or a teenage girl with a serious hatred for her parents. I track Ellie’s digital footprints on Facebook, Instagram and even TikTok.

I couldn’t get into her TikTok, but the other social media usual suspects are an easy enough pathway to find more information.

Ellie Burbank’s Instagram feed is not private and is filled with mostly those hook-armed full body shots or the duck-lips pose that girls are certain makes them look sexy. I study the photos. There is no denying that the face on my laptop looks an awful lot like Sarah. The head shape, facial features are right. Hair color is off, but I’ve had a fair amount of experience dyeing my hair. The other thing that strikes me is the amount of makeup. Where Sarah favored the no-makeup look, Ellie is a true believer in heavy application. No light touch for her. Her eyelids are pink and gold hues with glitter, and her lashes are blue and long enough to leave mascara trailings on the face of her phone when taking a selfie.

It could beher.

Her aunt would know better than I do, I think. Or maybe the tragic loss of her sister hurt Laurna to such a grave degree that she’s looking for a reason, or someone, to blame.

My pulse quickens a little as I read a post Ellie Burbank made last year.

My parents are so phony. Everyone thinks that they are good people. They go to church and act all perfect. If one of their friends knew the truth, they’d never talk to them again. I feel like a dumbass for ever looking up to them.

I scroll through others, more benign in content. Posts about her dreams or her crushes, mostly Bieber and Drake and a couple about Halsey. I scroll more and see rants about being homeschooled and how she’s so lonely being stuck studying in the kitchen with only one hour a day internet time.

I look at the timestamp on the posts. They were all uploaded between seven and eight p.m.

At least they let me do this without their eyes all over me. I know they have a net nanny or something like that on my laptop. I know how to empty my history, leaving just a few things that won’t tip off my feelings for them. They won’t let me have a smartphone. Ha ha.

Two things cross my mind. I wonder how it was so easy for me to get into Ellie’s Facebook page if she was so smart about keeping her parents out? Had she changed her privacy settings? And when?

I also wonder about someone who posts as “Tyra Whitcomb”. She’s the most active of Ellie’s friends, always commenting some sycophantic message of support. There are photos of the two of them, in RL, as they tend to say. She’s a pleasant-looking girl, a little heavier than her best friend, but with the same affinity for a theatrical flair with her cosmetics.

I click on her profile, though it’s set to private.

Whitcomb is not that common a surname. I search on our DMV database and find the one closest to the Burbank home; in fact it’s only three doors down.

Next, I dig up their phone number. That’s easy. Just a click away. I feel like I’m the best clicker in the world. That if there was a prize for that expertise, I’d be up for it.

I dial the number.

Troy Whitcomb answers, and I tell him I’m looking for his daughter. His voice is clipped, suggesting that he’s had similar call encounters with law enforcement.

“What has she done now? Do we need a lawyer?”

“Oh no,” I tell him. “Nothing at all. I’m looking into the Burbank case up here and I want to talk to her about Ellie.”

I hope he doesn’t know the geography of the state that well because Jefferson County has no jurisdiction in the Burbank drownings. That’s Clallam County’s domain. Most Seattle area residents don’t think beyond their immediate vicinity. Everything outside of Seattle is either the Olympic peninsula or the other two thirds of the state, eastern Washington.

“Oh that,” he sighs. “That was a tough one. Tyra and Ellie were very close.”

“That’s what I understand,” I say.

From Facebook, I don’t admit.

“I’m a couple hours away,” I say. “I have errands to run in Seattle. I thought I’d call ahead to see if she was available to meet. Tonight?”

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