Then She Was Gone

Noelle went out at every opportunity, hoping to run into Floyd, and eventually, they met at the neighborhood convenience store. Floyd remembered her, and they exchanged friendly banter. The next time they ran into one another, Floyd asked her to dinner. A few days later, he asked her over to his house, and they slept together. Noelle knew he wanted her for sex, but she was just glad to be in a relationship with him. 

After being with Floyd for a year, Noelle met Sara-Jade. She tried to be nice to Sara-Jade by holding out her hand for a handshake, but SJ ran away and threw a fit. SJ’s reaction made Noelle feel unattractive, and from that moment on, she harbored hate and resentment for SJ. Sara-Jade was a difficult child, constantly screaming and fighting, and she consumed all of Floyd’s attention when she was with him. Noelle feels she and Floyd bonded over their dismay at SJ’s behavior and recalls Floyd telling her, “Maybe if you and I had a child, maybe it would like me” (182).  

All Laurel can think about is finding more information about Noelle Donnelly. She finds the tutor’s phone number in an old address book, and when she dials it, a young man answers. He’s Joshua, Noelle’s nephew, and he and his brother are living in Noelle’s old house. Laurel introduces herself as a friend of Poppy’s and asks to come over. When Laurel pulls up to the house, she recognizes the area from the CCTV footage. Noelle’s house is directly across from the car where Ellie stopped to check her reflection.

The boys have no idea where their aunt could be. Floyd never let the Donnelly family have contact with Poppy. Laurel asks about Noelle’s private things, hoping to find answers in a diary. She explains how the mysteries of Noelle’s disappearance and Ellie’s disappearance seem to share some kind of connection, and Joshua offers to show Laurel the basement. It has a single high window, TV, sofa, chair, and three locks on the door. Laurel immediately feels unnerved seeing the bareness and strangeness of the room. Perhaps the most bizarre part is the stack of hamster cages against the wall, which Joshua says were filled with over 20 dead hamsters when his uncles came to the house after Noelle disappeared. Before she leaves, Laurel notices a watermelon lip balm sticking out from under the sofa and pockets it, feeling that it, “belongs to her” (192). Shaken by the sight of Noelle’s basement, Laurel hurries home and goes straight to Ellie’s room, where she finds a set of three lip balms. The watermelon lip balm she found at Noelle’s fits perfectly with the others, forming a set. 

Noelle unexpectedly got pregnant, and Floyd went with her to her first doctor’s appointment. He was sweet to her, holding her hand in the waiting room, and Noelle could sense his excitement. Another child would mean a chance for a better child than the uncontrollable Sara-Jade. When the ultra-sound technician couldn’t find a heartbeat, Noelle could sense Floyd’s annoyance, as if the miscarriage was her fault. Noelle was crushed by Floyd’s annoyance more than by losing the baby. A few years later, when Noelle was 44, she conceived again, but then miscarried for a second time and never told Floyd about the baby. The day she miscarried was the day she first met Ellie. Seeing Ellie’s beautiful family, shining personality, and perfect life, Noelle became obsessed with her. 

Laurel visits her mother and doesn’t voice her feelings of unease when her mother asks about Floyd. Her mother tells Laurel she won’t see her again, and Laurel recognizes her mother’s sense that death will take her soon.

Noelle always wanted to be a “golden girl” like Ellie (205), and to have all of the attention and perfection girls like Ellie seem to have. Finding out that Ellie had a boyfriend, Theo, Noelle thought about the perfect babies they would make. She’d brought Ellie gifts and been extra nice to her, so when Laurel called to say Ellie didn’t need a tutor anymore, she became angry. She started stalking Ellie, waiting in a café to see Ellie pass by, and learning the route she took to and from school. Noelle felt like seeing her would somehow make her feel better. One day when she saw Ellie, she approached her, and she could see on Ellie’s face that she didn’t recognize her for the first few moments. Noelle says Ellie, “failed to verify my existence” (208), and this drove her to take action.

After spending an evening with Floyd and Poppy, Laurel convinces herself that she has been jumping to conclusions. Floyd is so wonderful that he can’t possibly be involved in Ellie’s disappearance. Then the next morning, her feelings of unease are back. She takes Poppy out to a café on Noelle’s road and points out Noelle’s house. She tells Poppy she has met some of her cousins, and that she has a whole family on her mother’s side that she has never met. Poppy agrees to go to Noelle’s old house and meet her cousins, and she recognizes the wallpaper in her old bedroom. Then Laurel takes her to the basement, and Poppy reacts with fear. She can’t bring herself to go in the room because she remembers thinking that a monster lived down there.

Laurel doesn’t tell Floyd about visiting Noelle’s house with Poppy, and she fights to keep herself from jumping to conclusions. The next morning on the walk to her car, she notices Theo, Ellie’s boyfriend, standing outside of a store. As she watches, a smiling Hanna comes out to join Theo.