Someone We Know: A Novel

by Shari Lapena

“You actually broke into someone’s house last night?” his mother says, aghast. “I can’t believe this! Raleigh, what were you thinking?” She throws her hands up. “Why on earth would you even do that?”

  He sits there on his bed, speechless, because he doesn’t know how to explain. He does it because it’s a kick, a thrill. He likes to get into other people’s houses and hack into their computers. He doesn’t dare tell her that. She should be glad he’s not doing drugs.

  “Whose house was it?” she demands now.

  His mind seizes. He can’t answer that. If he tells her whose house he was in last night, she’ll completely lose it. He can’t bear to think of what the consequences of that might be.

  “I don’t know,” he lies.

  “Well, where was it?”

  “I can’t remember. What difference does it make? I didn’t take anything! They won’t even know I was there.”

  His mom leans her face in toward him and says, “Oh, they’ll know all right.”

  He looks at her in fear. “What do you mean?”

  “You’re going to get dressed, and then you’re going to show me the house you broke into, and then you’re going to knock on the door and apologize.”

  “I can’t,” he says desperately.

  “You can, and you will,” she says. “Whether you want to or not.”

  He starts to sweat. “Mom, I can’t. Please don’t make me.”

  She looks at him shrewdly. “What else aren’t you telling me?” she asks.

  But at that moment, he hears the front door opening and his dad whistling as he drops his keys on the table in the hall. Raleigh’s heart starts to pound, and he feels slightly sick. His mother he can handle, but his dad—he can’t bear to think of how his dad’s going to react. He didn’t anticipate this; he never thought he’d get caught. Fucking Mark.

  “Get up, now,” his mother commands, ripping the rest of the covers off him. “We’re going to talk to your father.”

  As he makes his way down the stairs in his pajamas, he’s sweating. When they enter the kitchen, his dad looks up in surprise. He can obviously tell from their expressions that something’s up.

  The whistling stops abruptly. “What’s going on?” his dad asks.

  “Maybe we’d better all sit down,” his mother says, pulling out a chair at the kitchen table. “Raleigh has something to tell you, and you’re not going to like it.”

  They all sit. The sound of the chairs scraping against the floor rips at Raleigh’s raw nerves like nails on a chalkboard.

  He has to confess. He knows that. But he doesn’t have to tell them everything. He’s more awake now, better able to think. “Dad, I’m really sorry, and I know it was wrong,” he begins. His voice is trembling, and he thinks it’s a good start. But his dad’s brow has darkened already, and Raleigh’s afraid. He hesitates.

  “What the hell have you done, Raleigh?” his father asks.

  He stares back at his dad, but the words don’t come. For a moment, he feels completely paralyzed.

  “He broke into somebody’s house,” his mother says finally.

  “What?”

  There’s no mistaking the shock and fury in his father’s voice. Raleigh quickly averts his eyes and looks at the floor. He says, “I didn’t break in. I snuck in.”

  “Why the hell did you do that?” his father demands.

  Raleigh shrugs his shoulders, but doesn’t answer. He’s still staring at the floor.

  “When?”

  His mother prods him with a hand on his shoulder. “Raleigh?”

  He finally raises his head and looks at his dad. “Last night.”

  His father looks back at him, his mouth hanging open. “You mean, while we were here having friends over for dinner, and you were supposed to be at a movie, you were actually out sneaking into someone else’s house?” His voice has grown in volume until, by the end of the sentence, his father is shouting. For a moment, there’s silence. The air vibrates with tension. “Were you alone, or were you with someone else?”

  “Alone,” he mumbles.

  “So we can’t even console ourselves with the idea that someone else led you into this completely unacceptable, criminal, behavior?”

  Raleigh wants to put his hands over his ears to block out his dad’s shouting, but he knows this will only incense his dad further. He knows it looks worse that he acted alone.

  “Whose house was it?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “So what happened?” His dad glances at his mom, and then back at him. “Did you get caught?”

  Raleigh shakes his head, and his mom says, “No. I saw a text on his cell phone. Raleigh, show your dad the texts.”

  Raleigh unlocks and hands over the phone, and his dad looks at the screen in disbelief. “Jesus, Raleigh! How could you? Have you done this before?”

  This is the thing about his father—he knows what questions to ask. Things his mother, rattled by shock, didn’t think to ask. Raleigh has done it before, a few times. “Just one other time,” he lies, avoiding his father’s eyes.

  “So you’ve broken into two houses.”

  He nods.

  “Does anyone know?”

  Raleigh shakes his head. “Of course not.”

  “Of course not,” his dad repeats sarcastically. His dad’s sarcasm is worse than his mom’s. “Your friend knows. Who’s he?”

  “Mark. From school.”

  “Anyone else?”

  Raleigh shakes his head reluctantly.

  “Is there any way you might get caught? Security cameras?”

  Raleigh shakes his head again, and looks up at his dad. “There weren’t any security cameras. I checked.”

  “Jesus. I can’t believe you. Is that supposed to make me feel better?”

  “They don’t even know I was there,” Raleigh says defensively. “I was really careful. I told Mom—I never took anything. I didn’t do any harm.”

  “Then what were you doing there?” his dad asks.

  “I don’t know. Just looking around, I guess.”

  “Just looking around, I guess,” his dad repeats, and it makes Raleigh feel about six years old. “What were you looking at? Ladies’ underwear?”

  “No!” Raleigh shouts, flushing hotly with embarrassment. He’s not some kind of a pervert. He mutters, “I was mostly looking in their computers.”

  “Dear God,” his dad shouts, “you went into people’s computers?”

  Raleigh nods miserably.

  His dad slams the table and gets up. He starts pacing around the kitchen, glaring back at Raleigh. “Don’t people use passwords?”

  “Sometimes I can get past them,” he says, his voice quavering.

  “And what did you do, when you were looking around in people’s private computers?”

  “Well . . .” and it all comes out in a rush. He feels his mouth twist as he tries not to cry. “All I did was write some prank emails from—from someone’s email account.” And then, uncharacteristically, he bursts into tears.

  TWO

  Olivia sizes up the situation. Paul is angrier than she’s ever seen him. That makes sense. Raleigh has never done anything remotely like this before. She knows a large part of the anger is because of fear. Are they losing control of their sixteen-year-old son? Why did he do this? He wants for nothing. They’ve brought Raleigh up to know right from wrong. So what is going on?

  She watches him, sniffling miserably in his chair, his father staring at him silently as if deciding what to do, what the appropriate punishment should be.

  What, she asks herself, is the civil, decent thing to do? What will help Raleigh learn from this? What will assuage her own guilt? She wades in carefully. “I think Raleigh should go to these people and apologize.”

  Paul turns on her angrily. “What? You
want him to apologize?”

  For a split second she resents that he has turned his anger on her, but she lets it go. “I don’t mean that’s all. Obviously, he will have to face consequences for his behavior. Very serious consequences. At the very least he should be grounded if we can’t trust him. And we should take his phone away for a while. And restrict his internet time to homework only.”

  Raleigh looks at her, alarmed, as if this is far too harsh a penalty. He really doesn’t get it, she thinks. He doesn’t understand the enormity of what he’s done. She feels a chill settle around her heart. How are you supposed to teach kids anything these days, with all the bad behavior they see around them, on the news, all the time, from people in positions of authority? No one seems to behave well or have any appreciation for boundaries anymore. That’s not how she was brought up. She was taught to say sorry, and to make amends.

  “He can’t apologize,” Paul says firmly.

  “Why not?” she asks.

  “He broke into people’s houses. He went through their computers. He broke the law. If he apologizes, he opens himself up to criminal charges. Do you want that?”

  Her heart seizes with fear. “I don’t know,” she says crossly. “Maybe that’s what he deserves.” But it’s bravado, really. She’s terrified at the thought of her son facing criminal charges, and clearly her husband is, too. She realizes suddenly that they’ll do anything to protect him.

  Paul says, “I think we’d better talk to a lawyer. Just in case.”

  * * *

  —

  The next morning, Sunday, Raleigh is sound asleep when his mother comes into his room and shakes him by the shoulder.

  “You’re getting up, now,” she says.

  And he does. He’s on his very best behavior. He wants his phone and internet access back. And he’s terrified of going to the lawyer, which his dad is going to make him do. Last night at the dinner table his father was saying maybe it would be best, in the long run, if Raleigh were to face charges and take the legal consequences. His dad wouldn’t really make him do that. He thinks he was just trying to scare him. It worked. Raleigh’s shitting bricks.

  Once he’s dressed and downstairs, his mom tells him, “We’re going to get in the car, and you’re going to show me the two houses you broke into.”

  He looks back at her, wary. “Why?”

  “Because I said so,” she says.

  “Where’s Dad?” he asks nervously.

  “He’s gone golfing.”

  They get in her car. She hasn’t even let him have breakfast first. He sits in the passenger seat beside her, his stomach growling and his heart thumping. Maybe his parents talked, after he was in bed, and decided he had to apologize after all.

  “Which way?” she says.

  His brain freezes. He can feel himself starting to sweat. He’s only going to show her a couple of the houses he’s broken into to get her off his back. And he certainly won’t tell her the truth about where he was last night.

  He’s tense as his mother reverses out of the driveway and drives down Sparrow Street. The trees are bright gold and orange and red and everything looks like it did when he was little and his parents raked leaves into a big pile on the lawn for him to jump in. At the corner, he directs her to turn left, and then left again onto Finch Street, the long residential street next to, and parallel to, their own.

  His mom drives slowly along Finch until he points out a house. Number 32, a handsome two-story house painted pale gray with blue shutters and a red front door. She pulls over to the curb and parks, staring at the house as if memorizing it. It’s a sunny day and it’s warm in the car. Raleigh’s heart is pounding harder now and sweat is forming on his forehead and between his shoulder blades. He’s forgotten all about his hunger; now, he just feels sick.

  “You’re sure it was this house?” she asks.

  He nods, shifts his eyes away from hers. She continues to stare at the house. There’s a horrible moment when he thinks she’s going to get out of the car, but it passes. She just sits there. He begins to feel conspicuous. What if the people come out of the house? Is that what she’s waiting for?

  “When did you break into this one?” she asks.

  “I don’t know. A while ago,” he mumbles.

  She turns away from him and studies the house some more.

  “What are we doing here, Mom?” he asks finally.

  She doesn’t answer. She starts the car again and he feels himself go weak with relief.

  “Where’s the other one?” she asks.

  He directs her to turn left again at the end of the street, and left again, until they are back on their own street.

  She looks over at him. “Seriously, you broke into our neighbor’s? We didn’t need to take the car, did we?”

  He doesn’t answer. Silently, he points at Number 79, a two-story white house with a bay window in the front, black shutters, and a double garage.

  Again, she pulls over and stares at the house uneasily. “Are you sure it was this house you broke into last night, Raleigh?”

  He looks at her furtively, wondering what she’s getting at. What’s special about this house?

  As if reading his mind, she says, “His wife ran away from him recently.”

  That’s not my fault, Raleigh thinks sulkily, wishing that he’d shown her a different house.

  His mom starts the car again and pulls out into the street. “Are you sure you didn’t take anything, Raleigh? That it was just a prank?” she says, turning to look at him. “Tell me the truth.”

  He can see how worried she is, and he feels awful for making her feel that way. “I swear, Mom. I didn’t take anything.” At least that’s the truth. He feels bad for what he’s put his parents through, especially his mom.

  Yesterday, he promised his parents he would never do it again, and he means it.

  * * *

  —

  Olivia drives the short way home in silence, turning things over in her mind. The houses on these familiar streets were built decades ago. They’re set far apart and well back from the road, so they are only dimly lit by the streetlights at night; it would be easy to break into them without being seen. She’d never given a thought to that before. Maybe they should get a security system. She recognizes the irony of it; she’s thinking of getting a security system because her own son has been breaking into their neighbors’ homes.

  Tomorrow is Monday. Paul will call a law firm he knows and make an appointment for them to see someone about this. She’d spent a good part of the previous afternoon searching Raleigh’s room as he looked on, miserable. She hadn’t found anything that shouldn’t be there. She and Paul had discussed it again in bed last night. She hardly slept afterward.

  Parenting is so stressful, she thinks, glancing sidelong at her moody son slouched in the seat beside her. You try to do your best, but really, what control do you have over them once they’re not little anymore? You have no idea what’s going on inside their heads, or what they’re up to. What if she’d never seen that text? How long would it have gone on—until he was arrested and the cops showed up at the house? He was breaking into places, snooping through people’s lives, and they’d known nothing about it. If anyone had accused her son of such a thing, she would never have believed it. That’s how little she knows him these days. But she saw those texts herself. He admitted it. She wonders uneasily if he’s keeping any other secrets. She parks the car in their driveway and says, “Raleigh, is there anything else you want to tell me?”

  He turns to her, startled. “What?”

  “You heard me. Is there anything else I should know?” She looks at him, hesitates, and adds, “I don’t necessarily have to tell your father.” He’s obviously surprised at that, but shakes his head. It makes her wonder if she should have said it. She and Paul are supposed to represent a unified front. She says in a n
eutral voice—which takes real effort—“Tell me the truth. Are you doing drugs?”

  He actually smiles. “No, Mom, I’m not doing drugs. This is it, I swear. And I won’t do it again. You can relax.”

  But she can’t relax. Because she’s his mother, and she worries that his breaking into people’s homes—not out of greed, not to steal, but just to “look around”—might indicate that there’s something wrong with him. It isn’t normal, is it? And those emails he sent from someone’s email account worry her. He wouldn’t tell her what they said. She hasn’t really pushed it because she’s not sure she wants to know. How messed up is he? Should he see someone? Some of the kids she knows are seeing therapists, for all kinds of things—anxiety, depression. When she was growing up, kids didn’t see therapists. But it’s a different time.

  When they get inside, she retreats to the office upstairs and closes the door. She knows Paul won’t be home from his golf game for hours. She sits at the computer and types up a letter. A letter of apology, which she will not sign. It is not easy to write. When she’s satisfied with it, she prints two copies and puts them into two plain white envelopes, seals them, and then goes downstairs and places them in the bottom of her purse. She will have to wait until after dark to deliver them. She will go out late to run an errand at the corner store. Then she’ll slip around and deliver the letters. She won’t tell Paul and Raleigh what she’s done; she already knows they wouldn’t approve. But it makes her feel better.

  After a moment’s consideration, she goes back to the computer and deletes the document.

  THREE

  It’s early in the morning on Monday, October 16; the light in the sky has been growing steadily stronger. The air is chilly. Detective Webb stands perfectly still, watching the mist rise off the lake, holding a paper cup of coffee that has long since gone cold. The surface of the lake, farther out, is perfectly still. He hears a bird cry in the distance. It reminds him of camping as a boy. It would be a peaceful scene if it weren’t for the crew of divers and the various vehicles, equipment, and personnel nearby.