The First Stone (14 page)

Her mother had run into Brett in the hallway. Or, more accurately, Brett and another wheeler had almost run into her. Despite what Brett must have told Diane, though, Leeza could tell her mother reallywasn't prepared for the obvious toll the day's events had taken on her. Nor. in fact, was Leeza, who, following another nap that afternoon, had used a mirror to assess the damage. She looked like the “before” shot in those make-over pictures she often saw in magazines. Her skin, already pale from weeks in a hospital room, now seemed ashen, and her face had a waxen quality that reminded her of the rubber masks her mother used to buy her and Ellen at Hallowe'en. Disney characters with permanent smiles. How many times, she wondered, had she ended up sobbing behind those smiles? The time she fell while walking down a neighbor's front steps, her mask blocking her view. Or the time she'd dropped her whole bag of Hallowe'en candy in a puddle while crossing the street behind Ellen.

As she grew older, of course, she'd learned you didn't need a Disney mask to hide behind. You could paint a pretty convincing mask of your own when you knew how. You just had to get the muscles all pointed in the right direction and then concentrate on holding everything together. Like the day her mother had told them about the divorce. And then when they'd learned their father was marrying the flight attendant he'd had the affair with and was moving with her to Toronto. And again when it became clear Leeza and Ellen weren't his first—or even his fourth or fifth—priority, that weeks without seeing him would become months, and then years.

And, of course, when the doctor had told them about Ellen.

“Yes,” she said to her mother now. “I've had quite a day.”

Her toneless comment hung in the air, and her mother made no attempt to press her further. “I've been meaning to tell you,” she said, reaching into her purse and pulling out a piece of paper. “The school called shortly after the accident. Your teachers agreed to disregard the final exams you missed, and they made up their marks based on your semester's work. I've been carrying your report card around in my purse but I kept forgetting to show it to you. Do you want to see it?”

Leeza made a sound that could have been a yes or a no. Diane rummaged through a purse the size of a beach bag and pulled out a brown envelope. She opened it, took out the report card and held it up for her daughter to see. “Great marks. The lowest was the 88 in chemistry. You beat Jennifer.”

Leeza's eyes widened, revealing interest for the first time. “You've seen her? Jen?”

“A while ago,” Diane said. “She and Robin brought me the report card.”

A while ago
. Leeza turned away.

Diane continued brightly, as if unaware of the pall that had settled over them. “I've been meaning to let them know you've been transferred here. But whatwith the hearing and all—” She stopped suddenly, tried to recover. “I'll give them a call later. I'm sure they'll—”

“Hearing.” Leeza repeated the word as if it were foreign to her, as if she were trying it out, seeing how it sounded, how it felt in her mouth. She said it again, remembering. “What happened?”

Diane busied herself putting the report card back into the envelope. “When would you like to see them? Robin and Jennifer.”

“What happened at the hearing?”

Diane sighed. “Leezie, honey, there's no point in—”

“What happened?”

Diane looked at the envelope in her hands, studied the torn parts where she'd opened it. She looked at Leeza, as though trying not to see
her
torn parts, kept her voice low and even as she explained what had happened that last day at the courthouse. Leeza had heard her use that low and even voice only once before. On the phone with Proule's Funeral Home making arrangements. As though, in the act of accepting the inevitable, she had given up some part of herself.

Neither of them said anything for a while. It was Leeza who finally spoke first. “Why'd he do it?”

“Because …” her mother began, then stopped. She took a breath, released it before continuing. “Because he wanted to,” she said.

Another silence. Then, “And he just gets …” Thewords caught in Leeza's throat. She could make no more.

“He gets nothing,” her mother finished. She put her arms around Leeza as gently as she could, held her while both of them wept.

“Your turn, Reef,” said Frank Colville.

Everyone in the family room looked at Reef, waiting for him to speak. Reef hated this part more than anything else, but he knew by now that they'd go on waiting until he spoke. One of Colville's rules:
Honor your commitments
. And at North Hills, one of your commitments was spilling your guts in the family room every night at 6:00. “Issue exploration” was Colville's name for it, but what it amounted to was a whine-and-whimper session when everybody got to bitch about something that was bothering him and everyone else got to suggest—what did Colville call it?—”strategies for resolving the problem,” or some such bullshit. And somehow the process was supposed to “empower them.” Another of Colville's phrases. Right.

It wasn't that Reef didn't have things to complain about. Hell, if he'd
wanted
to, he'd have ranted nonstop about what life the last two weeks had been like. He'd have said how listening to a bunch of losers moan over how misunderstood they were wasenough to make him puke. How their infighting and back-stabbing were worse than any group of girls he'd ever seen. How those goddamn “weekly duties” Colville assigned them were a pain in the ass and he'd give anything not to wash another dish, clean another shower or vacuum another rug—unless, of course, it was his
own
dish, shower and rug that he didn't have to share with these dickheads. At the top of his list, though, would be that fucking greenhouse out back. The thing hadn't been used in years, yet for some reason it was Reef's job to repair it, like world food production would rise 10 percent once he managed to replace all those broken panels. He only had to look at the bandages on his fingers to remind himself what Issue Number One was for Reef Kennedy.

But, of course, he didn't say any of those things. Frank Colville was a few bricks short of a load if he thought Reef was going to take part in all that touchy-feely family room sharing shit. So Reef fell back on his old standby: the lack of toilet paper in the third-floor bathroom. Although he'd already used that one a few times, he didn't have the energy—or the inclination—to make up something else. And besides, since Alex was still the only other “resident” on the third floor, Reef was pretty sure he could count on the fairy to take offense and launch into his wounded drama queen routine, which was always good for a laugh. That is, if you could forget about rule number two. Inthe last two weeks, though, Reef had learned how to laugh on the inside without letting anyone know he was busting a gut at their expense.

The room was oddly quiet and he looked up to see everyone staring at him. Even Alex was silent, apparently now impervious to the toilet paper attack. One of Colville's eyebrows was raised, an expression everyone including Reef now recognized as one of impatience. “Somethin' else?” Reef asked.

Colville made a tent with his fingers and he studied them for a moment. Then, turning his gaze on Reef, he sighed and leaned back in his chair. “Why are you wasting everyone's time, Reef?”

Reef returned his stare without blinking. “I wasn't the one who came up with this family room sh—” He paused for just a second, remembering how his profanity had earned him more than a few “extra jobs” since day one. He continued carefully, “—stuff. If you don't wanna hear what's botherin' me, don't ask the question.”

Colville's expression did not change. He brought his hands up and pressed his index fingers to his lips, then lowered his hands and folded them in his lap. “I
do
want to hear what's bothering you, Reef. We
all
do. That's why I'm asking the question.”

“And I
told
you—”

Colville cut him off. “Don't you ever get tired of playing the part?”

Reef blinked. “What part?”

“The I-don't-need-anybody-tough-guy routine. Doesn't it get old after a while?”

It was Reef's turn to look at his fingers. He tried not to make fists. For one thing, his fingers hurt—he wasn't used to working with a hammer, and its metal head had found his fingers nearly as often as the nails they'd held. But he also didn't want to give Colville the satisfaction of knowing he'd hit home. “I don't need a routine,” he said.

Colville leaned forward. “That's where you're wrong, Reef. We all need routines. Most human beings can't handle a life that's always in flux. We'd go crazy if there weren't constants we could depend on. We instinctively look for patterns, and when we don't find them, we create our own. It's our innate need for security, for normalcy.”

“But you don't think I'm normal, is that it?” Reef fought the urge to stand up, cross the room and ram his bandage-covered knuckles into Colville's face.

“On the contrary, Reef, I think you're
very
normal. It's just that you've become so good at sustaining the patterns you've created that you can't see a way outside them.”

Reef swallowed, the sound in his throat like air bubbling up through ketchup. Two minutes outside with you alone, you sonuvabitch. With no court ruling, no group home regulations, no “additional duties”—nothing. Just you and me. Then we'd see what patterns I could create, all right. On your fucking face.

Reef was suddenly conscious of five other pairs of eyes on him, their owners waiting for his response with open-mouthed interest.

“Do me a favor,” Colville said.

Reef blinked again. “Favor?”

“Be honest. With me, with us, with yourself. Say one thing you'd like to see happen here that would make a difference to you.”

Reef let the moments pile up on each other, let the silence occupy space in that room. Then, “I'd like to see toilet paper in the third-floor bathroom.”

“Jeez, man, you sure get off on yankin' Frank's chain.” Owen pointed the remote at the television, flicking back and forth between a sitcom and a movie in which Emma Thompson played some bald professor dying of cancer. He flicked so rapidly that at times it seemed as though the laugh track were part of the movie, the chuckles and guffaws an ironic counterpoint to the cancer victim's tragic life. When Reef didn't reply, Owen pressed the “mute” button and turned to face him. “I really thought he was gonna lose it.”

Reef dragged his eyes from the television screen to Owen. “You think so?”

“Didn't you?”

Reef grinned. Yeah. There was a moment when he'd thought Colville might actually let his guard down, show them he was human and not just somepsychology-spouting ex-con with a degree in sanctimonious bullshit. But it hadn't happened. Not yet. anyway. Maybe soon, though. If Reef kept the pressure on. And he was good at that. After all, he had plenty of time. He certainly wasn't going anywhere.

In that, however, he was wrong.

“Reef. Got a minute?”

Reef turned to see Colville in the doorway. “What's up?”

“I need to see you in my office.” He turned and walked down the hallway toward the front of the house, his solid bulk making the oak floorboards groan.

“Doesn't sound good,” Owen said.

Reef shrugged. What could Colville do to him? He'd done his work,
technically
followed every one of his goddamn regulations, hadn't earned an “extra job” in two days, hadn't had any contact with his friends, hadn't even left the house except to pick up groceries when he was on kitchen detail, building materials for the greenhouse and some personal stuff—Colville himself had driven him there and back in his pickup. There were days, of course, when he'd have given his right arm for a snort or a joint or even a lousy Bud Lite, but he'd played the game, kept his nose clean. What could Colville possibly do to him?

“Sit down.” Colville said when Reef entered his office.

Reef slumped into the same chair he'd sat in his firstday at North Hills. Nothing in the office had changed. Same neat rows of binders, same neat piles of papers.
Jesus, Colville
, Reef thought.
And you accuse me of clinging to patterns. You're textbook, man
.

Colville closed the door but didn't go around behind his desk. Instead, he pulled up a chair beside Reef and sat down. In his hands was a folder. “You've got two weeks under your belt, Reef. How would you say things are going?”

Reef thought about the question, wondered if this was going to be one of those empowering self-assessment sessions he'd heard Alex describe. He hoped it wouldn't take too long. He wanted to see if the bald chick croaked. “Okay, I guess,” he replied.

Colville's face didn't betray his thoughts. “You've toed the line, all right. Although you're still giving me lip service. I'd hoped that would've eased up a little by now.”

Reef thought suddenly about an old Sandra Bullock movie that Alex had watched a few nights ago. Alex was big on Bullock, wanted to
be
Bullock, in fact. The movie was stupid and Reef had left the family room ten minutes after it started. He might have guessed it'd be a turkey with a name like
Hope Floats
. He thought about that title now. Apparently. Colville still thought hope was a good thing. He hadn't learned that hope sinks like a fuckin' stone.