But there’s one more sister whose grim fate still awaits. She’ll just have to make up for this unsatisfying experience.
A hard shoe swings back and jabs Fiona’s crumpled form with another hard kick.
Don’t worry. By the time I’m through with Brynn, she’ll have suffered enough for both of you.
Oh…
I almost forgot.
What kind of birthday party would it be without the song?
“Happy Birthday to you…Happy Birthday to you…Happy Birthday, dear Fiona…Happy Birthday to you.”
“Garth…Do you have a minute?”
He looks up from the rake he was about to lift from its nail on the wall of the backyard shed.
Brynn is standing in the doorway wearing her typical daily uniform: jeans, sneakers, and a sweatshirt, her hair pulled back in a ponytail.
But she looks more haggard than usual, Garth notices. In fact, she has ever since she suffered that bout with the stomach flu.
At least he and the kids didn’t get it. That would be the last thing he needs right now, facing a towering stack of essay tests to grade in addition to everything else he has to get done around here today, especially in the yard.
At least Brynn hasn’t been bugging him about the broken towel bar in the bathroom anymore, but he’s aware that it’s there. Just as he’s aware that the fallen leaves are ankle-deep on their property and blowing into the neighbors’ frequently raked and blown lawns.
If he hadn’t been aware of that fact on his own, he would be now. He was confronted on the driveway yesterday by meticulous homeowner Andrew Chase.
“I’ll get to it tomorrow,” Garth promised.
“It would be better if you got to it today. There’s going to be a lot of wind tonight.”
Garth tried to appease him by saying he’d do his best, but that he was on his way to the campus library.
“On a Saturday night?” the neighbor asked dubiously.
“You sound just like my wife,” Garth cracked, and didn’t get a return smile.
Now, seeing Brynn looking so glum, and obviously needing to talk, Garth sighs and removes his hands from the rake.
“What’s up?” He does his best to sound patient and keep his mind off the waiting leaves and essay tests.
“I have to tell you something, and you might not be thrilled about it.”
Uh-oh.
“Why will I not be thrilled?”
“Because I know sometimes having the kids around is distracting for you, and one more…”
“One more?” His heart stops.
“Fiona asked if Ashley could stay here for a couple of days. And I said yes—without checking with you. And I have to pick her up in an hour, so…I mean, it’s not like you even have a choice.”
Relieved, Garth shrugs. “Is that all?”
“So it’s okay with you?”
“Yeah, sure. Why not.” He pulls the rake off the wall, and adds with a laugh as she turns back toward the house, “You looked so upset that I thought you were going to say you were pregnant or something.”
“I think this sunrise hike was the best thing we ever did,” Ashley tells her father contentedly, watching him load the remains of their picnic breakfast into the back of his Jeep alongside her flowered duffel and backpack.
“I agree. Although it would have been even better if you had seen the actual sunrise,” he says with a laugh.
“Next time I’ll go to bed earlier,” Ashley promises.
“You were in bed by nine.”
“I’ll go to bed at seven thirty so I won’t sleep through the sunrise.”
She was just so tired and it was so dark when Daddy woke her up this morning for their hike. She barely remembers getting dressed and into the Jeep.
“Come on, Ash, wake up,” he kept saying. He even gave her a few sips of his Red Bull. But as they drove up into the mountains, she kept falling back asleep anyway.
She awakened to find herself in the front seat of the Jeep, parked on a majestic overlook. The sun was already well above the horizon, shining brightly on the brilliant foliage.
“It’s about time, Sleepyhead,” Daddy said with a laugh.
Then they hiked up to the waterfall, and ate the strawberry muffins Daddy had made last night, and they drank more Red Bull.
“Don’t tell your mother,” Daddy warned her, and of course Ashley promised not to.
Now, as they climb into the Jeep for the trip back down the mountain, he looks over at her. “So you had fun.”
“Yup.”
“Did you think any more about what we talked about before?”
She knows what he means, but she asks, “What do you mean?”
“Coming to live with me?”
“Oh. Yeah, I’ve thought about it…”
“And?”
“And I want to, but…What about Mom? Will she even let me?”
“If you tell the judge that you want to live with me, that’s what will happen.”
Judge.
So they would have to go to court over it.
“Do I have to decide right now?” she asks her father.
“No, sweetie, you don’t. And you don’t have to decide anything at all, if you want to keep things the way they are. I just want to make sure you’re happy.”
“I know.”
The thing is…She’s not happy with the way things are.
She just doesn’t know if she’s brave enough to do what it would take to change them.
“Okay, guys, got everything?” Brynn asks her sons as they step out the front door.
They’re on their way over to Fiona’s, where she promised to intercept Pat with Ashley. You’d think it was going to be a ten-hour, rather than ten-minute, round trip, judging by all the stuff the boys are bringing.
Caleb has a Step Into Reading book and a snack. Jeremy has a snack, two red Matchbox cars, and his favorite blanket.
“Wait! I forgot my lucky hat!” Caleb is poised to run back inside, but Brynn stops him with a hand on his shoulder.
“Why don’t you leave that here?”
“Why don’t you leave them here?” Garth suggests, coming around from the side yard, rake in hand.
“That’s all right, you’re busy.”
“It’s okay, you can leave them.”
“Nah, I’ll take them with me.”
“Why? They can help me with the leaves.”
“All they’ll want to do is jump in them and make a mess. We’ll be right back. Ashley will be glad to see them.” And I promised Fiona I’d bring them, dammit, so stop making this more difficult than it has to be.
“Okay, see you soon.” Garth shrugs and goes back to his raking.
As Brynn straps the boys into the car, she watches him out of the corner of her eye, remembering what he had said earlier.
I thought you were going to say you were pregnant or something.
She should have just told him about the baby then and there. Didn’t he give her the perfect opening?
Well, not perfect.
There is no perfect opening. She’s been trying to come up with one all weekend, to no avail.
As she drives the network of familiar streets, Caleb reads haltingly aloud from his book, pausing every so often whenever he gets stuck.
Each time it happens, Brynn prompts him with the correct word.
And each time she does that, Caleb says, “But how do you know without looking?”
“Magical Mommy powers,” is her standard reply, and he accepts it more readily, and delightedly, than he would a complicated explanation about idiom and verb conjugation in the English language.
Now they’ve arrived at Fiona’s house, ten minutes early—but none too soon.
To her surprise, Fiona’s silver BMW is in the driveway.
Pat’s Jeep pulls in directly behind Brynn. Seeing her, he waves.
She waves back, wondering if Fee is home after all.
“I’ll be right back, boys.” Brynn gets out
.
So does Pat. He catches Brynn in a heartfelt bear hug.
“Hey! It’s so good to see you.”
“It’s good to see you, too, Pat,” she says, meaning it, and feeling a little guilty.
Sorry, Fee, she thinks dutifully. But she can’t help it; she’s always liked jovial, laid-back Pat. He was a part of her life for all the years he was part of Fiona’s—and then, with the divorce, he just melted away.
“Brynn!” Ashley squeals, coming around the Jeep. “I thought that was you! What are you doing here?”
Before she can answer, Ashley goes on, “Guess what? Me and my dad had a sunrise hike and picnic in the mountains this morning.”
“Um, sunrise?” Pat cocks an eyebrow at his daughter.
Ashley laughs. “Well, I slept through the actual sunrise. Hey, are the boys with you?”
At Brynn’s nod, she hurries past, quickly opening the back door to see Caleb and Jeremy.
“So how are things going?” Brynn asks Pat.
“You know…Things could be better. I miss Ashley like crazy.”
“I can’t even imagine,” she finds herself saying sympathetically.
Sometimes she wishes Fee had just had that second baby and settled into family life. Then the Hagans and the Saddlers could have hung around together: hikes, barbecues, playdates, amusement park outings…
“Whoa…Are those your guys?”
She follows his gaze and smiles. “Yup, those are my guys.”
Pat releases her and sticks his head into the backseat, grinning as Caleb and Jeremy return his hearty greeting.
“God, Brynnie,” he says, turning back to her, “they’re beautiful. And I can’t believe you have two kids that big.”
“You, too! Look at Ashley!”
“Yeah, she’s growing up fast.” He pauses to flash a warm smile in his daughter’s direction. “So what are you doing here? Visiting Fee?”
That he still calls Fiona by her old nickname strikes Brynn unexpectedly. To hear Fiona talk about him, all he ever calls her, behind her back and to her face, are four-and five-letter names.
Of course, Brynn knows there are two sides to every divorce story.
She just sees so little of Pat that it’s easy to fall into Fiona’s bitter mindset where he’s concerned.
“Brynn?” Pat seems to be waiting for something.
Oh! She never answered his question about what she’s doing here.
Here goes, she thinks reluctantly, wishing Fiona hadn’t put her up to this. She looks up at the house, wondering again if Fee is here.
But if she was, she’d probably be out here by now.
No, she’s gone, and wherever she went, she didn’t take her car.
“I’m supposed to pick up Ashley,” Brynn informs Pat.
“Why?”
“Fiona asked me to. Something came up, and she couldn’t be here, so she asked me to get her.”
“What came up?”
“I don’t know.” I’m a terrible liar, Brynn realizes, seeing a glint in Pat’s eyes.
“I bet I do.”
“You do?”
“It’s her birthday,” he says. “I bet she decided to take off somewhere with her new boyfriend, right?”
“What new boyfriend?”
“Ashley told me you said she had a date.”
Brynn stammers, “I—no, I—when was that?”
“Never mind, Brynn. You don’t have to cover for her. It’s okay. She can date. I won’t ask you anything else, other than, when is she supposed to come back? Tonight? Late? Is Ashley spending the night with you?”
Seeing Brynn hesitate, he shakes his head in disapproval. “Never mind. Gotcha. Hey, Ash!”
His daughter pokes her head out of the backseat, where the boys are giggling gleefully. “Yeah, Daddy?”
“You need to run in and get yourself some pajamas to wear tonight and something for school tomorrow. You’re staying at Brynn’s.”
Brynn expects a protest, but Ashley’s face lights up. “I am? Where’s Mom?”
Pat lets Brynn answer that, darn him.
“Your mom had to take care of some business, Ashley, so she thought you might enjoy staying with us.”
“I definitely would,” she says, hiding an enormous yawn behind her hand.
“And she’ll definitely conk out early for you tonight,” Pat tells Brynn, chuckling. “She likes to sleep in on weekends so I had to drag her out of bed in the dark and practically carry her out to the car for the hike.”
“Well, she obviously thought it was worth the lost sleep, right, Ashley?”
“Right!”
“Okay, so go get your stuff, Ash,” Pat says, handing her the backpack. “You’ve got your key, right?”
“I’ll go in with her if you stay here with my kids,” Brynn says hurriedly, knowing Ashley might need enough clothes for more than just one night and day. But she doesn’t want to let on about that to Pat. It would only give him more ammunition against Fee.
Let her explain her impromptu absence to her ex-husband—however long it ends up being—when she gets back.
“Sure, I’ll watch your guys,” Pat says amiably. “I’ve got some great tricks to teach them.”
“Not that disgusting sound you used to make with your arm?” Brynn laughs.
“That, and I’ve accumulated some new ones through the years.” He makes a beeline for the backseat.
Brynn follows Ashley up the steps and watches her fish a key out of her bag.
Ashley opens the door and holds it for Brynn.
“Ladies first.”
“You’re a lady too,” Brynn protests, grinning.
“I’m a kid. You’re the lady.”
Brynn is smiling as she crosses the threshold.
It will be her last smile for a long, long time.
Later—much later, when the shock waves and horror have stopped screaming through her brain and coherent thought has resumed—she’ll be thankful that it was she, and not Ashley, who walked into the house first.
She’ll be thankful that it was she, and not Fiona’s own child, who laid eyes on the hideous tableau that awaited in the dining room, immediately visible through the archway from the front entrance.
She takes it all in somehow in a stark, appalling moment that seems to last an eternity.
The room is decorated for a birthday party: pink streamers, balloons, a cake. It has white frosting and pale pink icing that reads Happy Birthday and, clumsily spelled out in darker icing: DEAR FIONA.
Someone appears to be sitting at the table.
It can’t be…
No, dear God.
It isn’t…
But, God help her, God help all of them, it must be.
The evidence is a telltale swath of auburn hair falling from beneath a pointy paper party hat that appears to defy gravity, tilted so that it seems as though it’s going to topple off.
Fiona’s face is gone. Where her features should be, there is only a sickening mass of blood-blackened flesh.
Don’t scream, Brynn warns herself frantically as the gruesome sight washes over her like an icy wave. You’ll scare Ashley. You’ll scare the boys.
Don’t scream…
But she can’t help it.
Her mouth opens and a piercing screech escapes as she backs away in horror from her best friend’s butchered carcass.
Years from now, the memory will—with luck—be as deliciously vivid as it is right now.
Something like that can sustain a person for life, long after other things have fallen away. Things like youth, good health, money…
None of those things last.
No, all you really have, in the end, is your memory…if that.
I’ll sure as hell fight to keep mine intact.
What a shame it would be to forget the pleasure of gauging out Fiona Fitzgerald’s green eyes with that ridiculously expensive knife she purchased herself.
Then again…What a shame she didn’t know that
it was put to good use. What a shame she didn’t see me, didn’t hear me sing to her.
Oh, well.
The important thing is that the penultimate task has been accomplished.
She’s gone. She can’t hurt me, or anyone else, ever again.
Now only Brynn Saddler is left.
But it won’t be long until she, too, gets what she deserves.
Then it will finally be over, after ten years.
And for me, a new chapter can begin at last.
CHAPTER 20
Quincy Hiles spends most Sunday mornings with his mother and his youngest sister, Wanda, and her family, all of whom still live together in his childhood home.
Today has begun as all the other Sundays do: first, a rousing church service, to be followed by a home-cooked meal in the kitchen. Mama has prepared all his favorites: fried chicken, mashed potatoes with cream gravy, greens with bacon, rolls and butter.
He’ll pay for it later, he’s sure. With his stomach acting up the way it’s been lately, Quincy shouldn’t be eating any of this stuff. But as he sits at the table, watching his mother open the oven to swap the batch of piping hot rolls with a freshly assembled apple pie, his mouth is watering.
Devorah tilts the cookie sheet and the rolls tumble into a waiting basket lined with a blue and white gingham cloth napkin. She sets it in the center of the table, where loaded platters wait to fill the circle of empty plates around the table.
“Michelle, you say grace today,” she instructs the younger of Quincy’s two nieces, who, at fifteen, is taller than he is, and wants to be a model.
“Lord, we thank you for—”
Michelle breaks off as Quincy’s cell phone rings.
“Turn that thing off,” his mother instructs him. “Michelle, go ahead.”
As his niece resumes, he pulls his phone from his pocket, silences the ringer, and holds it on his lap to examine the caller ID window.
Mike Connelly.
Good thing Michelle’s prayer is short and sweet, as always.
“Amen,” Quincy says hurriedly and excuses himself to answer the call, striding with his phone to the next room as he says, “Hiles here, what’s up?”
Don't Scream Page 34