Blue Water (23 page)

Putting down the pictures, sliding them back into the envelope, I felt as if I was putting away the dark weight of my anger. Again, that unalloyed sadness overwhelmed me: heart to stomach, muscle to bone. How it
hurt,
and there was nothing to distract me, protect me. I would have to stand and take it on my own.

“Will she go to jail?” my mother asked, and I knew she was seeing what I had seen, because her voice sounded small and sad.

“She could. She isn't supposed to be drinking.” I touched the fat settlement agreement. “But this is a financial settlement. Basically, she'd be paying us to keep these photos out of court.”

“With what? Evie says her trust money's gone. The bank's fore-
closing on her house. Her oldest daughter has moved in with friends. From the sound of things, she's ruined herself completely.”

I waited to feel something: vindication, satisfaction. Instead, what I felt was concern. I remembered Amy in that Dairy Castle uniform, moving toward me like a ghost. Thinking to myself, how strange it was, that she'd have to work the same, terrible job her mother had held. Had hated. Cindy Ann had never said so, but I knew.

A thought occurred to me then. “Have you heard where the younger girls are staying?” I asked. “While Cindy Ann's at this hospital, I mean?”

“Who knows? Her mother certainly can't take them. I suppose they're with her other sister, you know, that Jehovah's Witness.”

But I was up out of my chair, pacing around the room.
I'm not supposed to talk on the phone,
that clear little voice had said. The voice of a girl, roughly eight years old.

The voice of Cindy Ann's youngest daughter.

“I know why Toby is avoiding us,” I said. “He and Mallory are taking care of those kids.”

“In that hellhole?” my mother said. “Good god, I hope not. For everybody's sake.”

But I was already making plans. I needed to shower and dress. I needed to phone Lindsey Steinke, set up a time to go over our financials. I needed to stop by our house, check on our tenant, pick out a couple of sweaters, mittens, proper boots. After that, however, I'd be free to do some detective work of my own.

“I'm going to find out,” I said.

 

The potholes scattered through the mill parking lot had been spack
led by thick, yellow slabs of ice. Slowly, cautiously, I pulled around back and parked beside the exterior set of stairs leading up to Toby's apartment. The shades were drawn, but behind them, lights—all the lights, it seemed—were burning gold, the excess spilling out into the gloom. It was barely afternoon and yet, already, there was that sense of impending twilight that seems to linger even on the finest winter days. Clouds lay heavily at the edges of the fields, and the air held the faint, metallic tang that promises below-zero cold. I got out of my mother's car and nudged my backpack onto the floor, fat with the cedar-smelling socks and pullovers I'd taken from the attic. There was no sign of Toby's truck or Mallory's weather-beaten Nova. Still, I could see dark shadows drifting, fishlike, behind the living room shades. Suddenly, I wished I'd waited for my parents, who'd promised to arrive later on in the afternoon. They were probably sitting down to lunch in the Schultzes' warm kitchen just about now: Anna's roast chicken, her pineapple upside-down cake.

“Join us,” my mother had said. “Whatever's going on at the mill will keep for another few hours.”

Instead, I'd called our tenant, Chester Logan. Chester was from Chicago, a twenty-something Internet entrepreneur. He had “checked out of real life”—or so he'd explained, six months earlier—in order to write a technological thriller, something quick and snappy. It was going to sell a million copies, Chester was absolutely certain; Rex and I had listened to the entire plot, sitting at our kitchen table, wishing Chester would just sign the lease and go. Now, Chester was just as certain this novel was going nowhere. He was spending more and more time in Chicago, getting back into the technology game. What would I say if he found a subletter? Or, perhaps Rex and I were getting tired of life at sea? In which case, all I had to do was give him a few days' notice. All I had to do was say
the word.

“Let's talk about this face-to-face,” I said.

Standing in the entryway of the home where I'd lived for nearly twenty years, I struggled not to burst into tears. The floor tiles were crusted with road salt and grit, the living room carpet hopelessly stained. Dried-out pizza boxes littered the kitchen counters, and a pyramid of empty Budweiser cans decorated the antique buffet. Worst of all was the smell of mildew, the dark spot on the ceiling over the dining room light fixture. Had there been some kind of leak? Chester looked pained.

“Sorry. I was filling the Jacuzzi tub, and, I don't know, I kind of fell asleep.”

I told Chester I'd get back to him, after Christmas, about the lease, after I'd had time to think things through. After I'd had a chance to talk with Rex—though, already, I knew what Rex would say.

Put the house on the market.

It was what he'd originally wanted to do.

The landing between Toby's apartment and Mallory's looked exactly as I'd remembered it: abandoned. The wooden railings were rotting, riddled with holes left by carpenter bees. Dead leaves scattered in crackling ribbons, rearranging themselves with each gust of wind. But a homemade wreath hung from Toby's door—the kind made out of pinecones, Styrofoam, glitter—and I recognized the same art project I'd been forced to do, forty years earlier, at school. Behind it, two young voices were arguing, rising and falling in a complicated counterpoint that resolved itself, abruptly, in silence. Putting my ear to the door, I could hear a television sitcom: canned laughter, tinny bursts of applause.

“Cut it out!” someone shrieked, and there was a crash, followed by the sort of scream that means business. I tried the door, but it was
locked; since when had Toby ever locked the door? The doorbell, of course, was broken. I knocked, then hammered with my fists.

“Is everyone okay in there?” I called.

Instantly, the wailing stopped. Someone turned off the TV. I could hear rapid footsteps, a single bleat of dismay, then nothing.

“Is anybody bleeding?” I called. “Just tell me that.”

Another pause. Then:

“Yes.”

“A lot of blood or a little?”

The wailing began again. The first voice said, a bit impatiently, “She's okay. She's always hurting herself.”

Toby had always kept a spare key—heaven knows why—at the top of the doorframe. Feeling around in the grit with my fingertips, I dislodged it. It fell with a Christmasy chime.

“I'm letting myself in,” I said.

“We're not supposed to let
anyone
in,” the first voice said.

“Is that Laurel?” I asked, opening the door.

The last thing I expected was the weight of an opposing body, thrown hard against the back of the door, a reverse battering ram. The door slammed on my shoulder, bounced back; I swore, caught the kick plate against my foot, then nudged my knee through the gap. By the time I wriggled inside, both girls were running, screaming, darting around either side of a large, toppled Christmas tree, which stretched the full length of the living room. A cat—one of Cindy Ann's Angoras—flashed past, round as a puffer fish, every hair standing on end. I could only hope that Mr. Dickens was as deaf as he'd always pretended to be whenever Toby cornered him about apartment repairs.

“It's okay, it's okay,” I kept saying. But whose apartment was this? All of the junk and clutter was gone. Not only could you see the floor—aside from the tree, filling the room with its good, green
smell—but it was carpeted, and the walls were a bright collage of artwork, prints, dozens and dozens of photographs. My mother's photographs, in fact; Toby's share of the framed snapshots that had always embarrassed us so. There he sat, a fat, happy baby. There he was again, holding me in his lap. There was the seemingly endless succession of family pets: the fish and rabbits, the cats and dogs, the terrible lovebird that shrieked and bit us all. Beneath this display was a fat, floral couch, a matching chair and end table. Bookshelves filled with books. Magazines in a basket. The bedroom door closed with a slam, but, before it did, I glimpsed tidy bunk beds, a pink and green rug, the second cat perched on the window ledge. I also saw a little girl, slightly older than Evan would have been, her forehead glossy with blood so red, so brilliant, it looked fake.

Shit.

“Does Toby keep a first aid kit?” I called, stepping into the bathroom. Here, too, everything was tidy. Scoured tiles. Clean towels hanging from the racks. Scented soap in a dish. The only thing I recognized about this place was the cold; I could see my breath with each exhalation.

“I have a gun,” came Laurel's voice. “You better not try anything.”

For all I knew, this was probably true, but my shoulder hurt and I was starting to lose patience.

“For Pete's sake, use your head,” I said. “Would I be looking for a first aid kit if I were trying to
hurt
you?” I found cotton gauze, some iodine. “Now, come out of there so I can look at Monica's forehead.”

“Who are you? How do you know our names?”

“I'm your aunt. Or, at least, I will be as soon as
your
aunt marries my brother. Are you going to open that door, or do I need to call the Cup and Cruller?”

The bedroom door opened. Blessedly, there wasn't any sign of a gun. Just Laurel, standing with folded arms, one hip jutting out. Unlike her sisters, her mother, she was plain: heavyset, fierce as a little bull terrier. Beside her, Monica peered at me impishly, blinking at the blood in her eyes. Both girls wore ski vests over their sweaters. Their noses were running. Their hair needed washing.

“Mal's not working today,” Laurel said.

“Where is she?”

“What happened to your face?”

How tired I was of that question. The flesh-eating bacteria story had worked so well I considered trotting it out again. But I didn't have the energy.

“It's a rash,” I said.

“Oh. I thought that maybe, like, ugly faces just ran in your family or something.”

She was alluding to Toby's birthmark; it took every ounce of self-possession to keep my expression steady. “Actually, this looked much worse a week ago. Now, would one of you tell me what happened?”

To my surprise, Monica skipped forward, hurled herself into my arms. Too late, I remembered my mother's pale coat, but already, it was streaked like a candy cane. Evan had died without losing a single drop of blood; at the wake, he'd truly looked like he was sleeping. And now, here was Monica, this living, talking,
furious
child, bleeding as if she'd slit her jugular.

“She
pushed
me,” she sobbed. “I was up on the chair—”

“I didn't push you,” Laurel said, bored. “You fell. Like I said you would.”

“Did she hit the wall?” I asked. “The end table?”

“She wasn't supposed to touch the tree, okay? We're supposed to decorate it tonight and, I don't know, sing campfire songs.”

“Christmas carols,” Monica howled.

“Mum's in a psycho ward and you're gonna sit around singing Christmas carols? Sweet.”

Abruptly, Monica stopped crying. “Life goes on,” she said. She sounded like a very old woman when she said it.

“Hold still,” I said, and I parted the wet, sticky mass of her hair. There it was, a half-inch cut, just above the hairline. It didn't seem too bad; in fact, the bleeding had nearly stopped. I pressed a clean, white square of gauze against the cut. An odd, animal look came over Laurel's face, part fascination, part loathing. “What are you doing here, anyway?” she said. “Aren't you supposed to hate us?”

I decided not to risk any answer. “Go to the kitchen,” I told her, instead, “and get me some wet paper towels.”

Instead, she turned and disappeared into the bedroom. Fine. The second cat, still on the window ledge, blinked its golden eyes.

“You're okay to walk, right?” I asked Monica, who nodded with her whole head—another good sign, I thought. In the kitchen, I had her hold the gauze while I mopped her face, blotted her hair as best I could. She studied me closely as I worked, her gaze moving over me, feature by feature.

“You're the lady from the accident,” she said.

“Yes,” I said. “I'm going to make you an ice pack, okay?”

“I don't remember it.”

“The accident?” I was digging around in the freezer. “It happened very fast.”

“No,” she said. “I mean, I don't remember
any
of it.”

There were only a few cubes of ice. I wrapped them in a dishcloth printed with roses, settled it onto her head. My shoulder still tingled from the impact of the door; I rubbed it, thinking of Rex. “There are parts I don't remember, either,” I said, ignoring Rex's
voice in my ear:
don't discuss the accident, don't reveal anything
. What would he say, I wondered, if he knew where I was right now?

“But
she
doesn't remember anything for, like, two weeks.” Laurel had reappeared, holding the first cat, draped over her shoulders like a stole. “And she wets the bed. What a nutcase.”

“Shut up.”

“She's going to end up in a psycho ward, too.” She lowered her voice to a criminal's hiss. “In a straitjacket. In a room with padded walls.”

If there really had been a gun in that apartment, I would have been a dead woman. “Where's your aunt today?” I murmured to Monica.

“Helping Grandma move somewhere else.”

“To another nursing home,” Laurel said. “Igor's helping, too.”

Monica's pale eyes flashed. “His name is Toby,” she said. For a moment, I could actually see that they were sisters. Half sisters.