The Revenge of the Radioactive Lady (31 page)

She set the picture of Suzi down on his desk, facing her, and gazed
at him, her face troubled rather than judgmental. But her words were harsh. “You need to be paying more attention to your family.”

He thought about protesting, making excuses, but didn’t have the energy. “Yeah. I know.”

“Talk to them. Talk to Suzi. Ask her how she is. Ask her what’s been going on.”

“Why don’t
you
tell me, if you know something.”

Nance shook her head. “You ask her.”

“Okay, I will. Now. About Gigi.” Vic suddenly found he wanted to confide in Nance about Gigi cheating with the portfolios, ask her advice.

“Forget about Gigi!” Nance slammed her fist on his desk, causing his desk light to blink. “I can’t stay here anymore and watch you flirt with the Dixie chick. I was going to tell your wife about you and Gigi. I
want
to tell her, but I’ll leave that to you. This is my last day here.”

“You’re quitting?”

“Got that right, sailor.” She flung her red lunch bag into his trash can. “Now go home and be a husband and a daddy.” She stood up and marched out.

Vic sat behind his desk, stunned. Should he find this funny? Should he be offended? Outraged? The woman had threatened him, for God’s sake. What had happened to the sweet little old lady who’d sat in his living room two months ago, eating cake and complimenting? Who was this nasty busybody? Whoever she was, she had some nerve.

* * *

When Vic pulled into the driveway he saw Otis standing in the lower part of the backyard holding a blue metal wand about as long as his forearm. He was shirtless and barefoot, which was unusually careless for him—worried as he usually was about sunburn and fire ants.

He had his back turned, and so Vic tried to sneak up on him. This
seemed to be his day for that. Catching people in the act. Except that he knew what Gigi was doing as soon as he saw her. With Otis, not so much. Vic was struck, again, by how strange it was that his son was a man with hair on his chest, six feet three inches tall, an inch taller then Vic was.

Otis was looking at a little screen on the object, which had a gauge with a red flashing light on it.

“Is that a Geiger counter?”

Unlike Gigi, Otis didn’t jump or yell or even seem startled, because he wasn’t. Of course, he’d heard his father’s car and seen him coming. He was just ignoring his father, watching the needle jump on his machine.

“Oats. I asked you a question.”

“Just a minute,” he said, not looking at Vic, wanting only for his father to go away.

Vic stood there, trying to be patient, when God knows he wasn’t in a patient mood. He felt guilty that he’d allowed himself to be shut out of Otis’s life, and he was angry about having to feel guilty. He knew he should fire Gigi and never have a thing to do with her again and come clean with his boss and risk losing his job; tell Caroline about his dalliance (not an affair, not yet); go in and ask Suzi what was new in her life, as Nancy Archer had commanded him to do, but he didn’t feel ready to do any of that.

Finally Otis turned around and looked at him, eyes unfocused. “Huh?”

Vic asked him the question again.

“Er, well, yeah. Geiger counter. Used.”

“Why do you need it? There’s no radiation in our yard, is there?” Vic knew he should stop talking, but he kept on, running his trap, giving Otis an out. “So, why are you doing this? Just for fun?”

“Yeah,” Otis said, smiling that angelic, surfer-boy grin. “Just for fun!”

“So, what’s it say? Is there anything radioactive?”

Otis looked at Vic like he was the stupidest person to walk the planet. “Do you hear any clicking? That’s what it does if something’s radioactive. Anyway, there’s small amounts of radiation everywhere.”

“Why’s the red light blinking and the needle jumping around?”

“That just shows you it’s working. Okay? God!” Otis went from 0 to 150 in a split second. “Can’t I do anything around here without people asking me a hundred frigging questions?”

Vic took a step back. “Come with me to get some ice cream. I won’t ask you any more questions. We’ll just talk about whatever. The weather. There’s another tropical storm out there. Grayson.”

“I’m already doing something, in case you can’t tell.”

“I love you, Otis.”

No reply.

“Just wanted you to know.” Vic turned, deciding not to go into the house and face any kind of music at all, and trudged back to his car. There probably wouldn’t be any music inside his house to face anyhow. Caroline wouldn’t want to stop whatever she was doing to listen to his tale of woe about Gigi cheating. She’d barely even noticed that he’d been going out after work almost every night. Suzi, whom he’d been instructed to talk to, had been staying at a friend’s house for the past couple of nights and probably wouldn’t even be there.

Driving all the way home just to leave again was unreasonable, but this thought pleased him. He could be unreasonable all by himself. He didn’t need Gigi for that. Most people would say that rooting for a hurricane to hit Tallahassee was unreasonable as well. Why did they all expect him to be the reasonable one? Screw all of them. Fuck all of them.

“I love you, too, Dad,” Otis tossed over his shoulder.

Not having any idea where he was going, Vic cranked up the Volvo and backed out of the driveway like hellhounds were after him, a very unreasonable way to drive.

Caroline had not been able to have a decent conversation with Suzi. Suzi was avoiding her, staying over at Nance’s house, and she’d come back home this evening, only, she informed her mother, to get some clean clothes. In the past Suzi had been something of a home girl—didn’t really like being away from home. So what was up? Suzi clammed up whenever Caroline asked her what was going on. Was she angry at Caroline for something? But Caroline knew better than to get aggressive about asking what was wrong. That would just drive Suzi farther away. She resolved to be patient.

That evening Vic must’ve been working late although he hadn’t called, her father was watching
Antiques Roadshow
in his lair, and Otis was working at … Wendy’s? Caroline was carrying a basket of clean clothing into Suzi’s room and noticed that the door to Ava’s room was closed and there were voices inside. Suzi was in there, talking to Ava! That in itself was something of a miracle. The two of them used to hang out together in Ava’s room all the time. When they were little they played games with their dolls and stuffed animals, and when they were older they read aloud or made up clubs or businesses or TV shows in which they’d star as two sisters who rescued animals. But lately, when they weren’t fighting, they steered clear of each other. Caroline was so glad they were talking that she nearly swooned. She stepped closer to
the door so she could hear what they were saying. She’d never been above snooping, spying, rifling through drawers. Whatever went on in her home was her business.

She heard Suzi say, “He posed me.”

“Naked?” Ava said.

Caroline’s body stiffened. She strained to listen with everything in her being.

“He posed me like this.” Some rustling and thumping noises. “And like this.”

More rustling and thumping. Then the two of them snickered.

“That’s nasty,” Ava said. “Then what?”

Caroline’s hand went to the doorknob and she fought the urge to burst through the door and demand details. She knew she’d find out more if she could make herself stand there and listen as long as she could stand it.

“Then,” Suzi said, “he put his, you know, his thing in my mouth.”

“I’ve never even done that.”

Oh. My. God.

“He wants to see me again,” Suzi said. “He needs me to do this stuff with him because his wife won’t. Don’t you think he’s cute?”

Holy shit. Wife?

“He’s okay,” Ava said.

Silence. Keep talking, Caroline thought. Keep talking, or I’ll beat it out of you.

“He’s so old,” Ava added.

There was some rustling and low talking Caroline couldn’t hear.

Ava said something that sounded like, “Are you going to?”

Suzi spoke a little more loudly. “Nance won’t let me. She said that if I don’t tell she’ll call the police and Paula and make me tell Mom and Dad.”

Paula? Nance? Police? Caroline took a deep breath and tried to
calm down. Don’t yell, she told herself. Don’t scare the poor child. But she was shaking so badly she felt like she was going to fly apart.

She opened the door slowly and went in. She must’ve set the laundry basket down, because she wasn’t carrying it anymore. Both girls looked startled but quickly composed themselves. They were both sitting on Ava’s bed.

Caroline opened her mouth and words came out. “I heard what you were saying. I need to know what’s going on.”

“Nothing!” Suzi said, and actually smiled. She scooted backward on the bed and snatched a purple Elvis-head pillow and clutched it to her chest. What poses had she just been doing a minute ago? Caroline was glad she hadn’t seen Suzi do them.

Ava, on the other hand, was sitting up straight and bug-eyed, watching her mother.

Caroline heard how calm her voice sounded and marveled at it. “I heard you say you gave some man …” should she say
blow job
? “You’re way way too young for that kind of thing. I want to know who it was.”

Now Suzi looked scared. She dug her chin into the pillow she was clutching.

“Honey, tell me who it was,” Caroline said, and then couldn’t help adding. “I can’t believe that you told Mrs. Archer and she didn’t tell me.”

“She
wanted
to tell you,” Suzi said. “I begged her not to. He’ll get into so much trouble.”

“It’s Buff,” Ava said. “That minister dude.”

“That
jerk,
” Caroline said, the shock like ice water filling her body.

“Yeah,” Ava said. “Jerk.”

Suzi reached over and gave Ava a shove. “Thanks a lot. That’s the last time I tell you anything.”

“He’s wolfish,” Ava said. “He tried to get me to do it, but I wouldn’t.
I told him no. Did I do the right thing, Mom?” Ava wanted to be praised for her good decision, highlighting the contrast between herself and her sister. Every occasion was one for sibling rivalry. How could Caroline even be noticing these things right now?

She walked over and sat down on the foot of Ava’s bed. “You did the right thing,” she told Ava. “But I wished you’d told me. Both of you.”

“It’s too embarrassing,” Ava said.

Suzi’s face looked scary blank. Caroline scooted over and tried to hug Suzi, but she shied away. “I only did it,” Suzi said in a robotic voice, “so he’d leave Ava alone. I did it so she wouldn’t have to.”

“I was never going to,” Ava said. “I’d never do that.”

Shut up, Ava. “I’m so sorry you felt you had to do it,” Caroline said. Understatement of the year. Of the century.

“That’s what I do,” Suzi said. “Do things to make other people feel better.” She sighed and stared up at the poster on Ava’s wall—a black-and-white photo of Elvis on his Harley, taken by Alfred Wertheimer. The quintessential good boy trying to act bad. Was that what Suzi had been doing?

“He probably does that kind of stuff all the time,” Ava said.

“That doesn’t help!” Suzi shrieked and slapped the side of Ava’s head.

“Owwww,” Ava howled.

Caroline, moving quickly, caught Suzi up and held her and kept murmuring that it would be okay, that Suzi wasn’t in trouble, that it wasn’t her fault. But her mind was spinning into the future, toward what she had to do next.

She left the girls in Ava’s room; and on the way out she tripped over the laundry basket, stumbled, and nearly fell, and then wished she’d fallen so she’d have a legitimate excuse to cry. She already had a reason, which wasn’t the same as an excuse. She wanted to cry, to scream, to
rant and rave, but she couldn’t make Suzi feel worse than she already did. This was about Suzi, Caroline told herself. Keep the focus on helping Suzi get through this.

In her bedroom she dialed Vic’s cell phone number, but he didn’t pick up. He’d been staying late at work every night. Or at least he always said he was at work, and when he did come home he’d sneak straight down to his computer to check that damn hurricane Web site. Lately all he could talk about was Hurricane Grayson, a category 1 that had come ashore in the Keys that afternoon. She felt a burst of anger toward Vic for not being available. She could follow that train of thought a long way. He was never really available. When it came to her and the kids. Except for Suzi’s soccer. But since he didn’t have soccer anymore, he’d simply disappeared into hurricanes and work.

Gigi! She was probably working with Vic. Ava must have Gigi’s cell phone number, because of the riding lessons. Oh shit. Gigi was Buff’s sister. She dialed Nance’s number.

When Nance answered, Caroline just started talking. “Suzi told me about Buff.”

“I’m sick about it.”

“I bet you are,” Caroline said, allowing a bit of her anger to spill over, even though she knew that Nance wasn’t the right target. She railed at Nance and Nance just listened.

“Call Child Protective Services,” Nance finally suggested.

For some reason this suggestion made Caroline even angrier. “First I’m coming over there to talk to Buff. Are they home?”