His voice breaks. He stops talking. I don’t even think he’s breathing.
Eventually, he clears his throat, but his voice is still rough. “I remember that the week before, there was this story in the news about a guy who walked into his broker’s office and shot up the place. Mom and Dad talked about it at dinner. She said something about how people lose their minds when it comes to money. When they called me to the principal’s office and there were all these FBI agents there, I thought—I thought that’s what had happened. But it wasn’t. I mean … obviously.”
“Yeah,” I whisper.
“They arrested him. They froze everything. Mom had a trust fund from her parents, so they couldn’t touch that, but that was complicated. It took a week for Mom to be able to bail Dad out of jail. Even when he got home, we had no access to anything. Everything of value in the house had been taken. Computers, jewelry, you name it. But that’s not the worst.” Rob’s voice hitches, but he gets it together. “People started showing up at the house.” He glances over. “People who lost their money to him. They would bang on the door at all hours of the night. Once, they broke in and came after Mom—it was awful. She had to call nine-one-one, and one of the cops made a dig about how she shouldn’t be too surprised that people wanted their things back. Like she was the one who stole everything. Once he was out of jail, Mom stood by him in public, but inside the house, she was always screaming at him. On the last night, she was raging out so hard that I couldn’t even understand what she was saying. He was crying. I could hear him through the wall. I’d never heard my father cry before. I put a pillow over my head.”
He stops there. His voice doesn’t break or anything, he just stops. Any emotion has vanished.
That doesn’t feel like a good sign.
“What happened?” I say softly.
“She stormed out. I heard the door slam. Then the garage door cranking up, and then back down. Then silence. And then a gunshot.”
His voice is so quiet and level and even, but the air in the car is dense with dread. We’re flying down the highway, but I feel like we’re heading for a brick wall. I want to brace my feet on the floorboards and stop whatever is coming.
But of course it already came. His father pulled the trigger last February.
I want Rob to stop. I don’t want to hear this. Not in this cool, dispassionate voice. I want my own pillow to pull over my head.
But then he says, “You know the rest.”
No. I don’t. I really don’t. But I feel like he’s given me a pass.
Or maybe he doesn’t want to relive it, either.
He shakes his head. “And I still haven’t said anything about Connor.” Rob takes a breath. “I couldn’t reach Mom that night. After Dad—after.” He swallows. “I couldn’t reach her. I was—I was all by myself. The house was full of cops and paramedics and the blood was … well. You can imagine. I didn’t know what to do. So I called Connor. I hadn’t been allowed to talk to him since everything happened, but I had no one else to call. So I called him.”
“What did he say?”
“Nothing.” Rob glances over. “He didn’t answer. I left some pathetic rambling voice mail, begging him to call me back.”
“And he didn’t.” Not even a question. I already know the answer.
Rob sniffs and looks out at the darkness. “No. He didn’t.”
I don’t know what to offer, what kind of platitudes would make this better. There aren’t any. I can’t fix Rob’s father. I can’t fix his friendship with Connor—if there’s anything worth fixing. I can’t imagine getting a call from a friend needing help and not responding. I can’t even imagine it about my worst enemy.
I frown. “Why?”
My question seems to surprise him. Rob looks away from the road briefly. “What?”
“Why didn’t he call you?”
His hands tighten on the steering wheel, and he looks back at the road. He must punch the accelerator because the car picks up speed. “Because he’s an asshole.”
“No, but—” I bite my lip. I don’t want to make him angry. “He was your best friend, right?”
“Yeah.”
I think of Rachel. “Like—a real friend, though, right? The cry-on-your-shoulder kind?”
Rob’s eyes flick my way. He looks like he wants to deny it, but he also said Connor was the first friend he called after finding his father lying in a pool of blood. “Yes,” he says evenly, dragging the word into three syllables.
“And he ditched you because of what your father did?”
“He ditched me because he thought I was part of it. Just like everyone else.” Rob glances my way. “You realize you’re, like, the only person who’s speaking to me at school?” He rolls his eyes. “You and Owen Goettler.”
“Maybe Connor was never really your friend at all.” Because I still can’t figure out how a close friend could turn his back on someone so absolutely.
Rob flexes his hand. “I don’t think we’re on our way to making up anytime soon.”
We fall into silence again.
“What do you want me to do?” he asks eventually. “Do you want me to take you home?”
I blush again, and I’m glad he can’t see it. “Is it wrong if I say no?”
“Is it wrong if I tell you my mom said to stay out as late as I want?”
Okay, now I’m blushing. “No. But I think my mom would have a problem with that.” I pause. “Want to get coffee?”
He picks up my hand and kisses my knuckles again. I wonder if it’ll ever feel normal.
“Wegmans?” he says. “They’re open until midnight.”
“Yes,” I agree, relaxing down into the seat. “Wegmans.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
Rob
Somehow, I forget about the earrings. I forget that I’m a thief.
Then I get home after midnight and shove ice-cold hands into my pockets for the walk to my front door. I feel the square edges against my fingertips.
Fear and guilt plummet through my body, like a rock dropping into my gut.
This is bigger than a few twenties from the cash box. This is bigger than a pair of shoes.
My breathing is tight and shallow, and I’m frozen in the space between my car and the front door.
I want to undo it. I can’t undo it.
Another thought strikes me: I wonder if my father had a moment like this. I wonder if he ever had these identical thoughts.
The realization is enough to make me move. I climb back into the car, open the glove box, and shove the earrings deep inside. Then I lock the glove box, lock the Jeep, and head for the front door.
It’s fine. It’s fine. They won’t even notice. I know they won’t notice.
These thoughts do nothing to loosen the pit of guilt that’s formed in my abdomen. It refuses to dislodge.
What did Bill say? I did my best to keep you out of it.
Anger swirls around the guilt and swallows it up. I put my key in the lock.
After the noise of the party and the close warmth of sharing space with Maegan, my house feels like a crypt. Mom kept her word and didn’t wait up. The only light on in the main level is the tiny light over the stove. I grab a bottle of Coke out of the refrigerator and press the pedal on the recycling bin to raise the lid.
There’s an empty bottle of wine sitting on top. It’s different from the one Mom was drinking the other day.
Huh.
I turn for the stairs in the dark. I kind of want a shower, but I want sleep more. It’s been a long night. The best thing about sleep is that I don’t need to think about anything.
My father’s bedroom door is open, his feeding pump making a low rhythmic clicking every few seconds. I don’t look in on him. Sometimes he’s just staring at the ceiling, and it freaks me out.
Mom’s door is closed.
Something must have happened tonight. While I was gone. Either a mess or an inexplicable panic attack or something she wouldn’t have wanted to deal
with on her own. A new stab of guilt catches me under the ribs.
Not like I can do anything about it now. I walk past their bedrooms and into the darkness of my own, tilting the bottle of Coke back to take a sip.
Something solid slams into my midsection, hard. I choke on soda and cough. Another hit, and I double over. The bottle goes flying.
Then a fist cracks into my face. I go down. I’ve barely registered the impact of the floor—polished hardwood, thanks, Mom—before a booted foot kicks me right in the abdomen.
All the breath has left my body. My nose is burning from choked soda. Nothing hurts yet, but I feel the promise of pain. Any second now. It’ll come back with the oxygen. I remember from taking hits in lacrosse.
A hand grabs my collar and slams me into the floor again. I need to shout for my mother. She has to get out of the house. She has to call nine-one-one.
I can’t make a sound. I still can’t breathe.
Then a husky male voice speaks right into my face. “How’s it feel, Lachlan?”
Connor. It shouldn’t be a surprise, but it is.
Oxygen finally fights its way into my lungs, and every organ in my abdomen feels like it’s been rearranged. I want to curl in on myself, but he’s still got a fist gripping my collar. Painful little gasps are escaping my throat.
This is retaliation. He must know what I stole. I’m trying to get my brain to fire the right neurons so I can either punch him back or yell for help. His next hit could put me out.
But he doesn’t hit me again. He lets go and straightens, leaving me lying there on the floor.
“What were you doing at my house?” he demands.
“You—you invited me.” I make it to my knees, but the pain in my stomach keeps my forehead pressed to the floor. “How did you get in here?”
“I still have a key, you asshole.” He shifts his weight, and the sound makes me flinch. I’m ready for another kick.
It doesn’t come.
He’s not demanding his mother’s earrings. He’s not accusing me of theft.
“What were you doing there?” he says again. His voice is lower. Threatening.
“I ran into Callie. She mentioned it. Asked me to go.” I break off to wheeze. Connor waits, like some kind of hit man in a movie. “Samantha Day wanted to go, and she convinced me and Maegan to go with her.”
That must not be what he’s expecting—or maybe it’s too boring or too honest. He doesn’t hit me. He doesn’t say anything.
I can hear him breathing. Thinking.
Judging.
Oxygen has cleared my brain. I realize I’ve been drooling on the floor. Nice. I put a hand against the hardwood and push myself upright. The entire side of my face aches, and I touch a hand gingerly to my lip. Maybe I’ve been bleeding on the floor.
“Is this all you wanted?” I say. “To hit me back?”
“What’s the real reason you were there?”
“I just told you.”
“Yeah, well, I don’t trust you.” He’s got me there. In the dark, his mismatched eyes are shadowed and glaring. “You’re lucky I didn’t kill you.”
I glare back at him. “You would’ve been doing me a favor.”
Those words hit him hard. I’m not sure how I can tell, but they do. He says nothing.
An intermittent beeping comes from the hallway. Be-beep. Be-beep. Be-beep.
Connor drops back a step. “What’s that?”
I should scare the shit out of him and tell him it’s an alarm system. “Dad’s feeding tube.”
He takes another step back. He’s not glaring now.
The beeping only means there’s a kink in the line, and it’s not like Dad will starve to death if I don’t go fix it. Depending on the night, I usually wait to see if Mom will get up and take care of it. But her door is closed, and that empty bottle of wine is probably guaranteeing she’s not waking up anytime soon.
I turn away from Connor and head into the hallway. I have no idea if he’s going to wait or follow me or leave altogether, and I really don’t care. I step into Dad’s room and click on the little nightlight beside his bed.
He’s awake and staring at the ceiling. His breathing is a little quick. I wonder if the beeping woke him up, or if it was the scuffle with Connor. Either way, his breathing has an anxious quality to it.
I might resent my father, but I don’t like it when he’s afraid. “You’re all right,” I say gently. “I’ll fix it.”
A tap on the screen of the feeding machine silences the alarm. I pull the tubing free, work out the kink, and refeed it through. After a moment, the rhythmic clicks begin again. His breathing steadies.
“See?” I say, even though he gives me absolutely no acknowledgment. “All better.”
I wait for a moment, as if this will be the time that he blinks and turns to me and says, “Thanks, Rob.”
But of course he doesn’t. He never will.
I click off the light and turn for the doorway.
Connor is standing there.
I’m glad the light is off. This is more humiliating than when he stood over me in the cafeteria. “Don’t start something here,” I say to him, and I make an effort to keep my voice low. “If he gets really upset it can be challenging to calm him down.”
Connor doesn’t move. If I stand here, I’m going to start something myself. So I push past him and head back to my bedroom.
This time I flick the light switch. That full bottle of Coke landed on my bed and leaked all over my quilt. From the looks of it, it’s soaked all the way through.
Great.
I’m so tired.
“I didn’t know he was like that.” Connor speaks from behind me, in the hallway.
“Yeah?” I say without looking. “What did you think he was like?”
“I don’t know. I didn’t—I didn’t know.”
“Would it have made a difference?”
“No.”
At least he’s honest. I sigh and start stripping my bed. Connor vanishes from the doorway.
Good. I hope he locks up.
I make a pile of bedclothes in the corner, then get a towel from my bathroom to lay over the wet spot on the mattress. Just as I’m about to go down the hallway to the linen closet, Connor reappears with folded sheets and a comforter.
This might be more shocking than the fact that he was staking out my bedroom.
“Did you lace these with anthrax?” I ask, making no effort to hide the surprise in my voice.
“Shut up.” He picks up a fitted sheet and shakes it out, then moves to the top corner of my bed. “Are you just going to stand there, or are you going to get the other side?”
I want to stand here, to watch him burn off some of the guilt he’s obviously feeling. I want to feel superior, just for one fraction of a second.
But I also want to go to bed. I know if I’m a dick, he won’t keep making the bed. He’ll walk out.
So I pick up the other corner. We make the bed.
I don’t thank him. My abdomen hurts the whole time.
When we finish, we’re standing on opposite sides of the bed. I finally look at him in the light. A bruise has formed along his jaw where I hit him. I probably have an identical one forming on my own face.
Maegan was right. I do have questions.
How could you ignore me when I called you?
How could you let me go through this alone?
How could you think I’m a thief?
How could you?
I don’t ask any of them. It’s not that I don’t want answers. It’s that I’m scared of what he’d say.
So we stand there staring at each other, saying nothing.
A line forms between Connor’s eyebrows. He inhales.
“Go,” I say, before he can speak. “I’m tired. I don’t have anything to say to you.”
Emotions flicker through his eyes. A quick burst of anger, then pity, then acquiescence. No remorse. No regret.
“Fine,” he says. “Whatever.�
�� He turns and walks out. I wait, listening to his footsteps as he jogs down the staircase. The door opens and closes gently. His key finds the lock.
I don’t get into bed until I hear a car engine fire up down the street.
Thanks to those earrings in my glove box, I don’t sleep at all.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
Maegan
I’ve been home for an hour, and Samantha isn’t home yet. I texted her before I came inside, because I didn’t know how she wanted to handle things with Mom.
MAEGAN: What do you want me to tell Mom? I haven’t gone in yet.
There was a long wait before a text came back, and I was worried she wasn’t going to write back at all. The phone seemed to vibrate with tension.
SAMANTHA: Tell her I ran into a friend from high school who was home for the weekend.
That was easy enough. Mom was half-asleep, watching a food documentary, and she barely mumbled “okay” when I gave her the news.
But now an hour has passed, and Samantha still hasn’t shown up.
I text her again.
MAEGAN: I’m going to sleep. You OK?
SAMANTHA: As OK as I can be, considering you told the whole party I’m pregnant.
I flinch. I did do that.
MAEGAN: They were all hammered. No one will remember.
She doesn’t say anything. I dash out another text.
MAEGAN: All OK with mom on this side
SAMANTHA: Good
Good. Figures.
Guilt and responsibility are wrestling in my head. I quickly do an internet search on my phone. Ten seconds later I have more information than I know what to do with, ranging from fetal alcohol syndrome to reports of how having a few drinks early in pregnancy doesn’t matter at all. I don’t know how much she drank, but she wasn’t falling down. She was able to walk out of there with Craig.
Call It What You Want Page 17