A Roof Over Their Heads

by M. K. Stelmack

  Seth got the details and swung himself inside. Alexi was curled on the couch, all three kids settled around her, watching Finding Nemo. He’d never seen it, not having had a single kid in his life up until now. On the screen, a father clown fish was calling out frantically to what Seth assumed was Nemo, who was being taken away in a boat.

  Silent tears streamed down Alexi’s face, and the kids were uneasily shifting their focus between the show and their mom. One by one, tears broke from Callie, then Amy, finally Bryn. One by one, Bryn, then Amy and finally Callie looked up at him with deep, pleading eyes. Alexi didn’t look at him, her head bowed, her arms tight around the three kids she had.

  Seth swung away, phone in hand. Time for someone close to the family to do something real.

  * * *

  SETH STOOD IN the bright arc of lights and cameras, his speech on the stand in front of him. Paul had spoken just before him, and he was introduced as a friend of the family. One person after another had reviewed his speech, chiseled it down to just a minute. He was told that no more than seconds would run on the show, but that the entire segment would be uploaded to the station website, released through the RCMP social media and from there go viral to be relayed not only through people they knew but among strangers who couldn’t stand the thought of a lost kid.

  He cleared his throat, and stared at the words. “Matt. I hope you’re well,” he began. He remembered the camera and looked up. The white glare of the camera light stabbed his eyes and when he looked back at his sheet, he saw nothing.

  Later, he realized that it could’ve been reshot. Right then, all he knew was that he was about to fail the family he considered his yet again. Black spots jiggled in his vision. He raised his head and focused on where he thought the camera should be.

  “Matt.” He couldn’t for the life of him remember what he was supposed to say. He plunged on. “My brother and sister, we lost our dad, and I since figured out that we each felt responsible, even though it was an accident. But we never told each other that, otherwise we could’ve set the other straight. Matt, taking the blame for things you didn’t do doesn’t make it better. Doing the wrong thing for the right reasons is still the wrong thing.

  “I know you run when you think you’re done. But you have a mom, and sisters and a brother, and...you have me. Together, we’re six, plenty to fill a house.”

  Where was he going with all this? He needed to finish this. The spots were floating away, objects refocusing. He spotted Mel off to the side. No, by his side. Mel beside him and a whole town behind him.

  Seth stared into the camera. “It’s your choice, Matt. If you can keep away, then it’s probably for the best. For you, anyway. Just let us know—or somebody know—that you’re okay, so we can let you go, too. But if you’re like me and find it too hard to stay away from your mom and your family, then come back to us. Okay?”

  Seth suddenly felt out of words, out of breath. Mel stepped closer. “Come on,” he said, “I’ll take you home.”

  They both knew where that was.

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  IF MATT HADN’T found Cruel Connie so interesting, she wouldn’t have caught him at her house. He’d meant to hitchhike out of town as soon as leaving the school bus but his feet had taken him down Spirit Lake’s back alleys, along her walking trails until he came out at the lake.

  Mom had taken him and the others to the lake only three times for a couple of hours. They’d all wanted to stay longer but something more important always needed doing. “Next summer,” she’d promised, “we’ll spend the entire day there. All of us and all of your friends. We’ll have a party.”

  Matt believed her. Only Seth Greene wouldn’t be there, so it wouldn’t feel like much of a party. Matt found himself building a castle in the cold sand, squatting to observe the seagulls, walking the red gravel path along the shore. He’d done all this before when he was much younger. He couldn’t remember who he was with—if anybody—or how he’d gotten there, but he remembered the sand and the water and the feeling that he was right where he belonged.

  He might’ve stayed all day, except that two women stopped him and asked him why he wasn’t in school, and he’d shrugged and kept walking. Faster.

  His feet slowed him again at the far east end where the boats were moored. At this point he could turn away from the lake, cross two streets and cut back four blocks to a restaurant where he could hide in the back of a pickup with an out-of-town logo. He decided to do that in a bit, after wading in the frigid waters. It was good until once again he caught the looks from a mom with toddlers. Time to move on. Except he hadn’t turned in the direction of the restaurant but walked on until he was well around the lake, beyond the million-dollar lakeside homes and along the narrow shoreline thick with rocks and trees.

  He stopped at an open space to have his sandwich. Two bites into it, he heard people on the narrow path and hid in the bushes as a teenage boy and girl appeared. Her giggles, his murmurs and their deepening noises drove Matt to yell, Gross!

  The boy had returned with, Perv! Thankfully, he hadn’t come after Matt and the two had moved on. He emerged from the bushes in time to see a seagull dip down and take the entire sandwich from where he’d left it on a rock.

  Matt broke then. Yet one more thing stripped from him, one thing meant for him and taken away. He cried, slowly and softly, an endless trickle of defeat.

  Fact was, he didn’t know what to do. If the plan was to live without a dad, then there was no longer any need for a plan. He might as well turn himself over to Marlene and take his chances. He stood, cold and cramped, and headed back to town. The sun was setting when he reached the outskirts, darkness coming faster now that it was October. Chill needled through his jacket and into his flesh. He scanned the parking lot of the restaurant. Two cars and the truck of a local plumber. Two he couldn’t get into and a third that wouldn’t be leaving town. Maybe he should sleep the night somewhere in town, and then try again early tomorrow.

  He knew of the perfect hideout—the backyard shed at Seth Greene’s old house.

  In the rush to move out to the farm, his mom had left a roll of bubble wrap she used for shipping her stuffed toys, the fancy ones with fake jewels and sequins and prosthetic limbs. She refused to retrieve it, she said, if it meant running into her. That was as nasty as his mom spoke of Seth Greene’s sister. The kids, except for Callie who was silent on the subject, secretly called her Cruel Connie. The point was, she wouldn’t come to the shed. She was probably working and wouldn’t be home all night.

  Sure enough, the house lights were off and the wrap was exactly where it was supposed to be. He woke later, cocooned in the warm, noisy wrap, his stomach squeaking from hunger. It hadn’t been that empty in years, and all because of a seagull. Maybe, if Cruel Connie was still at the bar, he could sneak into the house, grab some food and go. He still had a key, so technically it wasn’t break and enter.

  The house was dark as he snuck up the back stairs of the deck, but through the back door window, he’d seen that there was a single overhead stove light on, and in the weak glow, he spotted a person stretched out on the island, an odd-looking one, both stiff and limp at the same time. Connie in a halter top and shorts held a book in one hand and was bending over, kissing the weird person on the mouth.

  Matt turned and ran. He heard the back door open and her shout and he almost reached the back fence when she clamped him on the back of his shirt and dragged him back into the house. She didn’t let go of him as she reached for her phone.

  His gaze slid to the person on the island who had not moved when they entered. Now he knew why. It was a human doll. Which made things really weird. “No, no. Please, don’t. Please.”

  Her thumb paused. “Give me one good reason why not. Screw that. Give me any reason.”

  “Because if I do, Seth Greene will die.”

  She still didn’t let go of him, if
anything her grip had tightened. She leaned right into his face. She had the same green eyes as Seth Greene. “All you did was give me a reason I should call the police. And believe me, I really don’t want to be calling them.” She gave him a shake. “What are you talking about?”

  Maybe it was because her eyes were like Seth Greene’s or because Matt was standing in the kitchen of the place where he was robbed of a chance for a new start, but he said, “All the dads I’ve ever had died. That’s three. Three. Seth Greene is not going to be the fourth.”

  She gave him a look, the kind hairdressers did when they were figuring out what to do with him. Sort of at him but around him, too. Connie set down her phone but held on to him. “Unless you actually shot them or knifed them or poisoned them or drove over them or whatever, you’re not responsible. It’s called bad luck.”

  “But that’s my point. I’m cursed. And this time, if it happens, it will be my fault because I wanted him to be part of our lives. And then he was. And then he left. And then I wanted him back. And then he was. And then he fell off the roof and nearly died. Next time, he will.”

  Connie pointed to the stool by the island, right close to the human doll. “Sit there.”

  She circled around until she was standing over the doll again.

  “You’re not going to kiss it again, are you?”

  She made a disgusted noise. “I wasn’t kissing Annie. I was doing CPR.” She waved a large, soft-covered manual at him.

  “Oh. Very interesting.”

  “You know I’m going to have to call your mom, right?”

  “I’ll just run away.”

  “Can’t if you’re tied to a chair locked in the basement.”

  “You can’t. That’s abuse.”

  “What you’re doing is a crime called public mischief.” She leaned on the doll’s chest and gave it such a savage pump it flinched.

  Running away was a crime? It couldn’t be. He called her bluff. “You’re lying.”

  “It’s when you provide false information or behave in a way that make the police investigate when there’s no reason.”

  She said it so quickly that Matt knew she had to be right. She pinned him with Seth’s eyes. “I’m not making it up. I was charged with it once. Ask your Seth Greene.”

  “I’m a kid. They can’t charge a kid.”

  “That kind of crap follows you through life, one way or another.”

  Yes, he did know that. And he knew that his mom would be worrying, despite leaving her a note. “I just need to come up with a plan.”

  “A plan. For what? To save Seth’s life? Or your own?”

  He shook his head. Annie stared up at him with her lifeless gaze. “I just need to figure things out.”

  “Okay. Here’s the deal. When’s your bedtime?”

  “Eight thirty on school days, nine thirty weekends. Why?”

  “You got until seven thirty tomorrow, which at two in the morning here, is actually today, to come up with your plan. At that point, you got a choice. Either I drive you home to Alexi’s or I call Marlene and she picks you up and she takes you.”

  “You can’t keep me here.”

  “No, because I will have your word, right?”

  “Why should I trust you when you were so mean to me and my mom?”

  “I had my reasons, and don’t ask me what they were because I can’t tell you.”

  “Did you kill someone and needed some place to bury the body?”

  The green eyes narrowed. “Not yet.”

  But he was no longer scared of her. She was a bit like Seth because she didn’t take long to answer him, and kind of like his mom because she was pretty.

  “Why are you learning CPR? Did you find someone you couldn’t resuscitate and now you’re learning so that when it happens again, you’ll know what to do?”

  She gave him a look as if he were either a freak or God. “Yeah,” she said. “Something like that.”

  “So you did kill someone.”

  “No,” she said. “I didn’t. Remember, it’s not me going around thinking that I strike people dead. It’s you.”

  She slung Annie over her shoulder. “Me and her are going to bed. You can sleep on the couch. There’s a blanket on it. Watch for the nails in the floor. You know where the bathroom is.”

  He settled down in the covers. He could hear her moving around, hear her come out of the bathroom, the quiet snick of the light turning off.

  He was comfortable and warm, and he should’ve been able to go to sleep. But it was no use. He raised himself onto his elbow and called out, “Connie?”

  There was a moment of quiet, then an irritable and groggy, “What?”

  “Good night.”

  “Yeah, good night.”

  He settled back down, and sleep came easy. He’d slept straight through to nine when Connie shook him awake to demand an answer. He could only tell her that he wanted home and he wanted Seth Greene.

  “As if I don’t have enough problems,” she told the wall above his head.

  “You stay here,” she said to him. “Inside.”

  And he had. She’d left and returned with the video of Seth while he was making a peanut butter sandwich for lunch.

  * * *

  MATT WATCHED SETH GREENE’S statement on Connie’s phone, and it took all he had not to call his mom and go back home.

  Connie plunked down beside him on the couch and handed him a can of ginger ale. “If that doesn’t prove you’re in the wrong place, you are one seriously screwed-up kid.”

  Matt snapped open the can and drank. “I know I don’t belong here. I just don’t know how to get where I want to be.”

  “Kid, that’s a life issue,” Connie said. She crossed her legs, just like he’d done, and because the couch was the short kind, their knees almost touched. She had a tattoo just above her knee. There was also a tattoo of a long vine that twisted up the side of her leg and disappeared under the cutoffs. It made Connie even more interesting.

  She nudged him. “Hey, I’ve got a plan to catch you Seth Greene.”

  After she told him, he couldn’t call her Cruel Connie anymore.

  * * *

  THIS WAS LIKE a scene from a procedural drama, Seth thought. Matt was on the top ridgeline of their old place, Connie’s house. Alone. The police and fire department were spread out below but so far none had ascended.

  Matt had threatened to jump off if they did.

  Seth doubted he’d carry through, but the kid did cut a dramatic figure with the last hour of sunlight spilling around him.

  Beside Seth, Alexi was made of wood, eyes fixed on Matt. Seth murmured, “He’s okay. I taught him how to sit properly on a roof, and he’s doing it. There’s no wind. And the guys at the fire department are here, too.”

  Her focus didn’t shift. “But why is he even up there?”

  Seth would like to think that the release of his statement that afternoon had done the trick but...he looked over at Connie. She stood by herself, biting her lip, arms banded tight over her chest, appearing to all the world like someone distraught about a lost boy stranded on her roof.

  He didn’t want to leave Alexi right now, but he hadn’t grown up in a family of roofers without knowing how to scale up his own roof. Connie must’ve felt his eyes on her because like a guilty kid she dragged her gaze to his. He tilted his head toward the old wooden rain barrel pushed under the eaves trough.

  Her expression became blank, feigned innocence. She gave a one-shoulder shrug and a faint grin. Exactly what he’d expected.

  Then she did something unexpected. She came across the front lawn to him, to him and Alexi and the kids who sat in a huddle at their feet. Seth straightened as best he could on the crutch. Alexi must’ve noticed because she tore her gaze from Matt to latch on to Connie.

  Alexi’s
hands curled into fists and Seth brought himself tight against her side. “Easy,” he muttered. Thankfully, Connie stopped well outside of their reach.

  “Full confession. I caught him lurking outside the house at two in the morning last night. I brought him in and he made me swear I wouldn’t contact anyone.”

  She’d known all this day and not told anyone? “Why didn’t you tell someone? Do you know how worried we were?”

  A truck pulled up. Ben. Connie’s mouth twisted and she spoke faster. “Yeah, I knew. I told him that, too. But I decided that if it would stop him from running, then I could deal with you bawling me out one more time.”

  Alexi looked up at Matt, small and solid above them all. “Thank you, Connie,” she whispered. “Thank you.”

  “Uh, yeah, no worries,” Connie said, taking note of Ben approaching from the side. “Anyway, I’ll see you later.”

  If her intent was to get away from Ben, it didn’t work because as soon as she moved away, he checked his stride and followed her. Seth might have said something but who was he to talk about wanting someone even when it wasn’t for the best? At least, Ben would only hurt himself. Seth wanted Alexi, even when it would hurt her and four children. Had it stopped him? Heck, no. He’d even justified it, saying that he was best for them. Yet, here a boy had climbed on top of a roof, in no small part because he could not stay away.

  “I love you.”

  What had Alexi just said? Her deep blue eyes were on him.

  “Right now before anything happens, I want you to know that no matter how this turns out, my feelings won’t change. Because you were never the problem.”

  She loved him. Matt was alive. Everything else was a matter of time. Like life itself.

  He pulled her tighter to him, bent his mouth to her ear and—

  A loud truck pulled up.

  “Marlene,” Alexi said, relief and bitterness rolled into one. “Come to take our boy.”

  * * *

  ALEXI COULD SEE no other reason for Marlene showing up. She knew what Matt was up to. He thought he could talk reason into Marlene, but the caseworker’s hands were tied. Her only choice was to investigate.