Bright Eyes

by Catherine Anderson

  “And Chad?”

  “He’s not handling it as well. I gave him a Benadryl this morning, and he slept for several hours. Now he’s just lying on the bed, staring at the ceiling.”

  “Thanks for being here, Mom. I worried less, knowing you were here with them.” Natalie patted her mother’s shoulder. “I better go up to see him.”

  “When supper’s done, I’ll fix him a plate and bring it up.”

  “That’ll be great.” At the archway, Natalie turned back. “How’s it going with you and Pop?”

  Naomi rolled her eyes. “Don’t ask.”

  After giving Rosie a hug and telling her all about the ride in a police car, Natalie went upstairs to Chad’s room, one of two small gable bedrooms at each end of the second floor. Both rooms had been used for storage until Natalie moved home with the kids. Now all the boxes had been moved to an outbuilding, and the rooms were being used as sleeping quarters. Natalie had done her best with a limited amount of money to personalize the rooms for her children, but they were still sadly lacking compared to the rooms they’d had while living with their father.

  When Natalie opened the door, Chad didn’t stir. He just stared sightlessly at the sharply sloped ceiling as if he hadn’t heard her. His twin-sized bed was unmade, the spread, blanket, and sheet rumpled beneath him. Natalie quietly closed the door behind her.

  “Hey, big guy. I’m home.”

  Chad didn’t move. Natalie walked slowly to the bed, her sneakers making funny squeaky sounds on the hardwood floor. As she sat on the edge of the mattress, Chad squeezed his eyes closed. He lay with his arms at his sides, his hands knotted into fists. When Natalie touched him, his body was rigid.

  “Oh, sweetie.”

  Chad swallowed convulsively. “I thought maybe—you’d never come back. That they’d k-keep you in jail or something.”

  Natalie smoothed his honey-brown hair from his forehead and bent to kiss his cheek. “Why on earth would they put me in jail? I’ve done nothing wrong.”

  Chad lifted his lashes. The pain in his eyes made Natalie want to weep. “I was just afraid. They aren’t going to put you in jail, are they, Mom? Me and Rosie, we’d be all alone.”

  Natalie straightened away. Her first impulse was to pretend Chad’s fears were groundless. But that wouldn’t have been completely true, and she wasn’t going to lie to him. “No matter what happens, Chad, you and Rosie will never be left alone.” She tipped her head to listen to the sounds coming from downstairs. Then she smiled. “Hear that?”

  Chad listened for a second. Naomi was griping at Pete about something, and he was rumbling back. Between exchanges, Valerie’s and Gramps’s voices rang out faintly.

  “That’s your family,” Natalie said softly. “They’re all a little crazy—no argument from me about that. But you know what?”

  Chad shook his head.

  “They’re like the old wallpaper that was on the walls in here. Remember earlier this summer, how I peeled and sanded, trying to get all of it off?”

  Chad nodded.

  “I finally ended up having to texture over it before I painted the room. The darned stuff wouldn’t come off, no matter what. All those people downstairs are like that, stuck to you with so much glue that you’ll never pry them loose. That’s what family is, people who’ll always be there for you, no matter what.”

  “Dad’s really and truly dead, isn’t he?”

  Natalie’s heart squeezed. “I’m afraid so.”

  “And someone killed him?”

  “The police think so.”

  “Why would someone do that, Mom?”

  Natalie remembered her conversation with Zeke at the diner and stared at the worn floor planks. “All I can do is guess, Chad,” she said honestly. “I don’t really know.”

  “Somebody would’ve had to hate Dad a lot to kill him.”

  “Yes.” No man could live as Robert had without making some dangerous enemies. “But let’s not focus on that.”

  Chad’s face crumpled, and he turned to hide his face against his pillow. In a muffled voice, he said, “I wanted to make him proud of me. Now, if I ever get real good at sports and stuff, he’ll never know.”

  Natalie lay down beside her son and gathered him close. He resisted for a moment, but then he clamped his arms around her neck and clung to her almost desperately.

  “I’m already proud of you,” she whispered. “I’m not your dad, and I understand that it’s not exactly the same. But I am so very proud of you, Chad. I always have been, and I always will be. Just you remember that.”

  Natalie felt totally drained by the time Chad drifted back to sleep and she carried his empty supper plate downstairs. She found her family gathered in the kitchen. Naomi had baked sugar cookies, and Valerie was helping Rosie decorate them. Pop and Gramps were snitching the cookies almost as fast as Rosie could get them frosted and sprinkled.

  Natalie smiled and leaned a shoulder against the kitchen archway, her heart swelling with love and more gratitude than she’d ever be able to express with words. What she’d told Chad was true; these people were far from perfect, but they stuck like old wallpaper. Even Pop and Mom were doing their best to tolerate each other.

  “This one’s Grammy,” Rosie said, scrunching her face as she pushed on the handle of the icing tube. “I’m going to make her very beautiful.”

  Pete sent Naomi a long look. “Better put her in a short black skirt and tight sweater, then.”

  “Eat your heart out,” Naomi purred. Then she arched her ebony brows, smiled sweetly, and said, “Absolutely, Rosebud. No grandma clothes for me. When you do Poppy, put him in holey overalls and give him gray whiskers.”

  Natalie’s gaze shifted to her father, who was freshly shaved and in rare form, wearing a clean pinstripe oxford shirt and black Wrangler jeans. It was a bit of a shock for Natalie to realize that her father was still a handsome man when he cleaned up. She wondered what the occasion was and glanced at Valerie, who winked conspiratorially.

  Gramps harrumphed and said, “Why don’t the two of ya just step outside and settle yer differences? I get damned tired of hearin’ ya go on at each other.”

  “No way, Charlie. I might hurt him.” Naomi stepped to a cupboard. Natalie felt fairly sure her mother stretched higher than was necessary to show off her legs as she fetched a wineglass from the top shelf. “I’m having some burgundy. Anyone else care to join me?”

  “You can’t have wine, Naomi,” Pete said. “You have to drive home.”

  “I’m staying the night. Did I forget to mention that?”

  Pete’s eyebrows shot up. “You’re what?”

  Naomi dimpled her cheek in a saucy grin. “You heard me. I took the week off so I can be here to help Natalie.”

  Pete looked as if he’d just swallowed an ice cube. “You ever think to ask the man of the house if you’re welcome?”

  “Am I welcome here, Charlie?” Naomi asked her ex-father-in-law.

  “Are as far as I’m concerned,” Gramps replied. “Just go easy on my wine. Dad-blamed girls already raided my stash this week. I got only that one gallon.”

  Pete’s face had gone almost as red as the burgundy. He pushed up from his chair and stalked outside, slamming the kitchen door behind him with a wall-shuddering thwack. Natalie was accustomed to her parents’ sparring, so she took the tiff in stride. What amazed her was that her dad had just crossed the kitchen without hunching over and holding the small of his back.

  Naomi scraped her bright red thumbnail over the outside of a goblet. “This is disgusting. How long has it been since someone used these wineglasses?” She stepped to the sink to run some water. “I swear, there’s ten years of scum on this thing.”

  Valerie glanced up from the cookie that Rosie was frosting. “Nattie and I used juice glasses for our wine the other night. Why wash them if we aren’t going to drink from them?”

  “This place needs a good cleaning,” Naomi grumped. “I can’t believe that man lives like this.”<
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  From outside, Pop yelled, “You don’t like the accommodations, feel free to leave anytime.”

  Naomi chuckled and called back, “I’ll just muck out a corner and take my chances, thanks.”

  Pete grumbled indistinguishably, a sure sign that he was cussing a blue streak under his breath so Rosie wouldn’t hear. Natalie made her way across the kitchen to get another goblet. “Give this one a scrub while you’re at it, Mom. I’ll join you in self-defense. Can’t you and Pop do one evening without being unpleasant? I don’t need the added stress right now, and neither do the kids.”

  Naomi’s smile faded. “I’m sorry. You’re right. Bad timing. I’ll go out and apologize.”

  “Don’t bother,” Pop yelled through the door. More muttering followed.

  Naomi called back, “If you want to exchange insults with me, you washed-up old fart, come back in here and say it to my face.”

  Natalie grabbed the wet goblet from her mother’s hands. “Better idea. You go outside. The two of you can fight to your heart’s content that way, without subjecting the rest of us to your childish exchanges.”

  Naomi grabbed the goblet back and filled it to the brim with wine. “With a mouth like that, little girl, you can wash your own glass.”

  With the scent of Calvin Klein’s Obsession trailing behind her, Naomi left the kitchen to join her ex-husband on the porch. Within seconds, she and Pete were engaged in a heated argument. Natalie sent Valerie a hopeless look.

  Gramps shook his white head. “Damn foolish nonsense. Why don’t he just say he’s sorry, kiss the woman, and be done with it?”

  Natalie and Valerie riveted their gazes to their grandfather and simultaneously asked, “Sorry for what?”

  “For bein’ a jealous idiot. That girl out there ain’t never looked crosswise at another man. He was out of his ever-lovin’ mind for thinkin’ she did, and he should’ve ate crow ten years ago. Stubborn, that’s what. Damn Westfield pride’s gonna be the death of him.”

  Valerie’s eyebrows lifted toward her hairline. “Pop thought Mom had a thing for some other guy?”

  Gramps settled a disgruntled frown on Rosie. “Worse’n that. Got it in his head she was doin’ the backseat tango after she left the shop every night.”

  Rosie glanced up from the cookie she was decorating. “What’s the backseat tango?”

  Gramps’s neck went ruddy red. “Just never you mind, Rosebud.”

  Natalie sank wearily onto a chair and took a huge swallow of wine. “So that was it.”

  “No wonder everything was fine one day and over the next,” Valerie mused. Then she frowned. “How could Pop think that of Mom?”

  “Green monster ridin’ his shoulder. Wasn’t thinkin’, period. She’d just finished hairdressing school and started to work, makin’ her own money for the first time in their marriage. She went a little wild at first, buyin’ herself pretty clothes and fixin’ up. She took to comin’ home late ’cause she had ladies who came in to get their hair or nails done after they got off work. Yer dad got it in his head that she was triflin’ on him.” Gramps glanced at the back door. “Now he’s too damn proud and stubborn to admit he was wrong for the things he said and done, and she rubs his nose in it every time she sees him. They need their heads knocked together, that’s what.”

  Natalie listened to her parents’ voices for a moment, then took another sip of wine. Not tonight, she wanted to yell at them. As if they’d hear her. They were so intent on fighting that Natalie doubted she could get their attention if she fired the shotgun over their heads. Her stomach knotted. With every hateful word her parents uttered, her nerves drew tighter.

  Finally, when she could bear it no longer, she marched to the back door, jerked it open, and cried, “Enough!”

  Sitting side by side on the step, Pete and Naomi swiveled their heads to stare at her, shocked into silence by the fury in her voice.

  “Not another word,” Natalie said. “If you have so little consideration for me after the day I’ve been through, then at least have some consideration for your grandson. He needs you to be strong and united right now. Do you think he doesn’t realize that I may be arrested?”

  “Ah, honey,” Pete said. “We’re just going on. We don’t mean anything.”

  “Well, I’ve had it up to my eyebrows,” Natalie cried. “My kids lost their father today, in case you’ve forgotten.”

  Light from the kitchen bathed Pete’s and Naomi’s faces. Both of them looked ashamed. Natalie didn’t realize that Rosie had joined her in the doorway until the child piped in with, “Grammy never did the backseat tango with anybody, Poppy. You should just say you’re sorry, then kiss her and make up. Gramps says the Westfield pride is going to be the death of you. I don’t want you to die.”

  Natalie’s parents called a temporary truce for the remainder of the evening, but no apologies were extended by either of them. Pop went off to bed. Gramps adjourned to his living room recliner to snore while he supposedly watched CNN. Naomi remained in the kitchen, pretending, for Rosie’s sake, that the quarrel with Pete had never occurred.

  After getting her daughter to bed an hour later, Natalie felt as if her spine had turned to Jell-O. She sat slumped on a kitchen chair, so exhausted that just the thought of climbing the stairs again nearly overwhelmed her. “Where are you going to sleep tonight, Mom?” she asked sleepily.

  Naomi glanced at the ceiling. “With my favorite granddaughter. She’s so small, the twin-sized bed will do for both of us.” She reached over to smooth Natalie’s hair from her brow. “Ah, sweetie, I’m sorry you’ve had such a bad day. You look as if you’ve been flattened by a train. Leave it to me and your father to make matters worse by getting into a fight. I don’t know what comes over me around that man.”

  Valerie rocked back on her chair. “You’re still crazy about him. That’s the problem. When you’re around him, your brain takes a hike.”

  Naomi puffed up like a little toad on a lily pad. “I am not crazy about him.”

  “Give it up.” Valerie took a sip of wine. “Nattie and I both know you’re lying, that you never stopped loving him. We just didn’t know why you left him until tonight.”

  “Charlie has a big mouth.”

  Natalie yawned and patted her lips. “It’s not as if we’re children, Mom. What’s the big deal? You can’t talk to us honestly about our own father?”

  Naomi glanced uneasily over her shoulder. “He might hear me.”

  “He went to bed,” Valerie replied. “And I think we deserve an explanation. Our family got destroyed. You and Pop used to be so—well, perfect together, and all of a sudden, you left him. I didn’t get it then, and I don’t get it now. How could you throw away all those years of marriage over a silly misunderstanding?”

  Naomi’s cheeks went pink with indignation. “He said horrible things—called me filthy names. I’d never been with anyone else, never even entertained the notion. There’s only been one man for me in my entire life.”

  “Jeez, that sucks.”

  “Valerie Lynn!” Naomi looked at Natalie. “Where did she come from?”

  Valerie peeled her hair back from her forehead. “Recognize this mug, Mom? I’m you all over again.”

  “I was referring to that smart mouth of yours.”

  “Like you don’t have one?” Valerie darted another look at Natalie. “You heard her ripping on Pop tonight. Does she, or does she not, have a smart mouth?”

  Natalie stifled another yawn. “ ’Fraid so, Mom. No offense intended, but you aren’t exactly reticent.”

  Naomi played with the sugar shaker. After licking granules from her dampened fingertip, she flashed the dimple in her cheek and fluttered her long eyelashes. “Well, I swan, I just don’t know what y’all are talkin’ about.”

  “Buh-ruther,” Valerie said with a groan. “It’s a lost cause, Nattie. Let them be miserable for the rest of their lives.” She took another swig of wine. “It’s your funeral, Mom. So what if he was a jerk? He was
a good, faithful, loving husband for, what, twenty-two years? I can’t believe you left him because he had a brain fart. Didn’t he have one screwup coming to him?”

  Naomi’s eyes went shiny with tears. “A screwup, yes. He had a dozen coming, as far as that goes. But he has yet to say he’s sorry for all the things he said to me. And, excuse me, little Miss Know It All, after twenty-two years of being a loyal and faithful wife, I didn’t deserve that from him!”

  Naomi shot to her feet. Valerie rocked forward so suddenly that the chair legs struck the linoleum with a loud whop. From the downstairs master bedroom, Pop yelled, “Quiet it down out there! Damn fool women, getting drunk and raisin’ sand. Go to bed, why don’t you?”

  “Mom, I’m sorry,” Valerie tried.

  Naomi waved her hand as though erasing a chalkboard. “Take his side. See if I care. I will never forgive him for the things he said until he gets down on his knees and begs me. And even then I’ll have to think about it!”

  Chapter Thirteen

  Natalie thought she would fall asleep the moment her head hit the pillow, but instead she followed Chad’s example and stared at the ceiling, her mind racing with concerns about the supper club, her chest aching with sadness for her son. Given her mom and dad’s behavior, how could she fault Chad for being terrified at the thought of being left parentless? In her heart of hearts, Natalie knew her folks would always be there for her kids, no matter what. But it might be a rough road to adulthood for Chad and Rosie, with Pete and Naomi acting like such idiots.

  What if she did end up in jail? Natalie wondered. She wasn’t really afraid for herself. She’d survive, no matter what. But her children needed her. How could she possibly go to sleep while their future lay in the hands of Detective Monroe and his gut instincts?

  A thumping sound brought Natalie upright in bed. Her first thought was that one of the kids had rolled off the mattress onto the floor, and she expected to hear a muffled wail. But then she heard another whisper of noise that jerked her gaze to the window. She saw the hulking black silhouette of a man coming through the opening. For an awful instant, she thought it was a burglar. Then she remembered the handsome second-story man next door, and her heart lifted with gladness.