Thicker Than Water

by Brigid Kemmerer

  “Are you sure? Because I can help you out if you need it.”

  I blink at him, surprised. “I’m all right.”

  He nods, then claps me on the shoulder again. “Good. Good for you.” A pause. “I’m going to get a soda across the way while we’re waiting. Do you want anything?”

  “I’m good.”

  Then he’s gone, and I’m left in this line of harried people who all look pissed off that we’re here. At least we’re far enough from Garretts Mill that no one seems to recognize me. I wore my ball cap just in case, but there are enough people here who are my age that I won’t stand out. Somewhere on the other side of the store, a child is wailing. The woman behind me keeps making this tsk-ing huffing sound, as if that’s going to make the store process things more quickly.

  Some little girls dart between customers, playing a game that seems to be a combination of hide-and-seek and tag. Their mother is sitting on one of the few chairs in the store, breastfeeding a baby. There’s a blanket over her shoulder, but it’s pretty obvious. She calls out to the girls every now and again, asking them to settle down before their father gets here, but they obviously don’t give a crap.

  They begin weaving among the people in the line, sliding between people as if they don’t have the slightest hesitation about getting up close and personal with strangers. Tsk-huff behind me does it louder. The man in front of me sighs and clears his throat significantly. I ignore them all and remind myself to always wear a condom.

  “Lexi!” their mother calls. Her shirt is down, and she’s glaring at them while trying to burp the baby at the same time. “Jenna!”

  They giggle and hide behind me. They’re whispering together, and when I shift to move so their mother can see them, they move with me, staying out of sight.

  Now I want to tsk-huff myself.

  Their mother is on her feet, the baby hanging over one arm, pudgy legs dangling. She storms over. “Jenna. Lexi. Get over here and sit down. Right now.” She looks up at me. “I am so sor—”

  She stops short. Her face kind of freezes.

  She’s recognized me. I can feel it in the air. I freeze, too. I don’t know what to do. It’s not like I can make myself look any more innocent. I’m just standing in line.

  The woman snaps into motion. She reaches around me and grabs one of her daughters by the arm, trying to keep the baby out of my reach as if I’ve made a threatening move. I think she’d be grabbing both girls if she had a free hand.

  “Stay away from them,” she says.

  “I didn’t touch them,” I snap back.

  The other little girl is oblivious to her mother’s panic. She giggles and ducks around me, pressing herself between me and the man in front of me.

  “Lexi!” There’s a note of panic in the woman’s voice. The baby squeals and starts crying. “Lexi. Come here. Get away from him.”

  She finally gets a hand on her daughter and jerks her away from me.

  Lexi starts crying.

  We now have the attention of half the people in the store. The huffing woman has stopped.

  I think someone on the other side of the store is taping this.

  A man joins the mother. For a second, I don’t recognize him. He’s in jeans and a polo shirt, and he’s just walked in from the mall, but he’s sizing up the situation.

  My brain snaps to attention. Charlotte’s brother. Matt.

  I can tell from his expression that he’s recognized me on sight, too—not that I expected him to forget me. His voice is clipped and guarded, and he picks up the little girl who lingered behind me. “What’s going on? What did you do to my kids?”

  “I didn’t do anything,” I say tightly. “I’m waiting in line. Just like everyone else.”

  He glares at me for a long moment before looking at the other customers around me. They’ve all given me a wide berth.

  “You shouldn’t be here,” he finally says.

  “Who says? I’m not on house arrest. I’m not allowed to shop?”

  He leans close and speaks low. “You’re a suspect in an active murder investigation, in case you’ve forgotten.”

  I bristle. “Trust me. I haven’t forgotten. Maybe you guys could do your job instead of hassling me.”

  “Does anyone know you’ve left town?”

  Who does this guy think he is? I glare at him. “Go to hell. You’re not my jailer.”

  One of the little girls whispers, “Mommy. He said ‘hell.’” The man moves closer. “You’ll watch your language in front of the children.”

  “Fuck you.” My head is buzzing, like that moment in the cemetery, when I hit Danny without meaning to. I lose awareness of the store, of the other customers, of the fact that we’re in public.

  Matt’s eyes narrow. He’s going to push me. I’m going to push back.

  Then Stan appears beside him, and his tone is calm, very let’s-all-get-along. “Hey. Matt, he’s fine. He’s with me.”

  Like popping a balloon, awareness snaps back into place. I hear the agitated murmurs behind me. The children who are still crying. The baby who is still wailing.

  What the hell just happened?

  Matt glances at Stan, then back at me. “He was causing a scene.”

  “Your kids were causing a scene,” I snap.

  Matt looks like he wishes he was armed. Or maybe he’s wishing we were in a back alley so he could beat the shit out of me. Or the middle of a cemetery.

  “Tom,” says Stan. “Let’s go.”

  “But I didn’t even—”

  “Let’s go. Now.”

  I want to resist. I stood in this line, and I didn’t do anything wrong. But I’m the center of attention, and none of it is good. You’d think some of these people would side with me, but they’re all staring suspiciously.

  “Fine,” I say. “Whatever. Fine.” I move to follow him, but the mother is still staring at me, clutching her squalling baby like I’m going to snatch it out of her arms. Her expression is some combination of fearful and hateful.

  “Better learn to control your kids,” I snap. “I’d hate to see them get hurt by the likes of me.”

  Her eyes widen, and she pulls the baby closer.

  Stan grabs my arm and jerks me toward the front of the store. “Are you crazy?” he growls under his breath. “Tom, you do not threaten a cop’s kids. You don’t threaten anyone’s kids, but especially not—”

  I jerk my arm away from his hand. “I didn’t threaten his kids.”

  “What do you think that sounded like?”

  “I don’t care.” I’m angry and irritated and ashamed that once again, I can’t even get out of the house for a few hours without my life derailing. “He can go to hell. I didn’t do anything.”

  “You can bet I’ll get a call about this later.”

  “Sorry to ruin your evening.”

  “Damn, Tom.” He slams through the doors to the mall, and we walk into a wall of humidity.

  When he gets into the car, I can tell he’s really pissed, because all his motions involve collisions. Slamming door. Jerking the seatbelt. Shoving the key into the ignition.

  It feeds my own anger. “I don’t know what you’re pissed at me about. I didn’t do anything.”

  “It sure didn’t sound like you were being polite and deferential.”

  “It’s not like he was!”

  “He doesn’t have to be. You’re the one under a microscope. Don’t you understand that?”

  I clench my jaw and stare out the window. I hate this.

  I hate it.

  All my earlier excitement about my brother has fizzled and turned into nothing more than a few discarded streamers in the corner of my brain. This is what my life is like now. This and nothing else.

  I almost want to confess to the crime just so I can get out from under that microscope.

  Stan sighs. “I don’t know what’s up with you and the Rookers. I wish you could just stay away from them.”

  My head whips around. Does he know
about Charlotte coming over last night? About her plans to pick me up this evening? Is that about to unravel, too? “What are you even talking about?”

  “I’m talking about what just happened, Tom. What the hell do you think I’m talking about?”

  My heart is stuttering and having trouble keeping up a steady rhythm. I cough. “What?”

  “What, do you have a homing beacon for that family or something?”

  Charlotte’s brother. That’s right.

  She’s going to hear about this.

  Shit.

  I wish I had a phone.

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  CHARLOTTE

  “And then he threatened the kids.” Alison is bouncing the baby in her lap while she picks at mashed potatoes. “You should have felt the atmosphere in the store. I told Matt they need to lock that boy up.”

  My heart feels like it’s taken a direct injection of caffeine. I’ve been pushing food around my plate all evening, but I’m too keyed up to eat. I force enough food into my mouth so I don’t have another episode, but I have to choke it down. Luckily Saturday night is family dinner night, and there are too many people at the table for my mother to notice my lack of appetite.

  Especially with Matt and Alison’s story about what happened at the mall.

  I have to clear my throat, but my voice still comes out with a squeak. “Thomas threatened the kids?”

  “He said I’m lucky they didn’t get hurt.”

  Matt picks up a bottle of beer and takes a sip. “He didn’t quite say that.”

  Alison puts a small bit of potato on her spoon and offers it to the baby. “Close enough. It was threatening. You know it was.”

  Matt spears some chicken with his fork. He grins at Ben across the table. “Yes, dear.”

  Alison rolls her eyes.

  “Did he touch the kids?” says Danny. “I’ll go pick him up right now.”

  My father points at him with his spoon. “You’ll stay right there in your seat.”

  “Ben will go with me,” says Danny. “Won’t you, bro?”

  Ben is actually in uniform, because he’s working later tonight, but he grabs the creamed corn and scoops more onto his plate. “No way. Mom made pie. There’d need to be a felony involved for me to skip pie.”

  Matt’s face turns serious. “There is a felony involved.”

  Ben puts his spoon down. He looks across at Matt. The table is suddenly quiet.

  “No one is going to get anyone,” says Dad. “Do you understand me?”

  Matt and Ben are still looking at each other, having a conversation with their eyes.

  I speak brother fluently, so I can read the looks.

  Do you want me to go pick him up? I’m on the clock at seven.

  Matt shakes his head, almost imperceptibly. Not yet.

  “Are you feeling all right, Alison?” says my grandmother. “You’ve barely touched your dinner.”

  I quickly push more food around my plate before she looks at it. I’m wearing capri pants and a tank top tonight, and somehow that’s escaped her notice.

  Alison shakes her head. “I’m just not feeling very well tonight.”

  Matt puts a hand on her back and rubs. “Let me hold the baby.”

  Alison hands Madalyn over and glances at me. Her face is pale, now that I’m looking at her. “I should have booked you for babysitting tonight. I could use a twelve-hour nap.”

  “I’m already working,” I say quickly.

  “Your mom said.” She grimaces. “Sure you don’t want to take the girls with you, too?”

  Is she serious? There’s no way I can take the girls with me on this “job.”

  He threatened the children.

  The thought hits my head like a two-by-four. I’m supposed to pick Thomas up at seven thirty, and this new fact is poking my sense of self-preservation with ominous warnings. Be careful, Charlotte.

  I think about that drawing of his mother. The intricate detail, the shading around her eyes that spoke of desperation. She looked so tortured; the emotion almost fell off the page. Despite that, you could feel a grudging respect in the sketch. Thomas felt what she was going through, and he held her in high regard.

  He loved her.

  I can’t see someone drawing that picture and later killing his mother.

  Or maybe he loved her too much? I don’t know.

  I don’t know how I can be with him and feel so certain that he’s innocent—but when I’m anywhere else, doubts sneak into my brain and set up shop.

  “I’ll take the girls out for ice cream after the baby is asleep,” says Matt. “You can lie down when we get home.”

  “Yay!” cries Jenna. “Ice cream!”

  Matt points his fork at her. “If you finish all your dinner.”

  She promptly shovels a forkful of broccoli into her mouth.

  “Excuse me,” Alison says. She shoves away from the table and goes down the hallway.

  “Poor thing,” says my mother. “She doesn’t look good at all. You could leave the girls here tonight, Matthew.”

  He grunts and takes another drink of beer. “She’ll be all right.”

  “So sympathetic,” I say.

  “Did you not hear me offer to take the kids out so she could get some sleep?”

  “Nothing is worse than being sick in the summertime,” says Mom. “Do you think it’s the flu?”

  “Yeah,” he says. “The flu that lasts nine months.”

  I gasp. “Matt!”

  Mom has her hands over her mouth. “Oh! How wonderful!”

  “Oh, Matthew,” says my grandmother. “What a blessing.”

  Clearly all I need to do to win her over is have dozens of babies. While wearing floor-length dresses in muted colors and pinning my hair up.

  My father comes around the table to give Matt a one-armed hug. He uses his other arm to grab a biscuit from the basket.

  “Dude,” says Danny. “Do you even know how to use a condom?”

  “What’s a condom?” says Lexi.

  My mother smacks Danny on the back of the head. “Daniel. You watch your mouth.”

  “It’s an apartment building,” I say to Lexi. “You know, a condo. Like that place you stayed at the beach last summer.”

  Matt ruffles her hair. Thank you, he mouths to me.

  “Seriously,” says Ben. A sly grin is on his face. “I think we all deserve an answer to that question.”

  “Eh. Who needs them?” says Matt. He looks very pleased with himself.

  “Alison is going to kill you for telling us without her here,” I tell him.

  “No, she won’t.” The baby starts to fuss, and he gives her his napkin so she can tear it apart. “She needs me to help chase all these kids.”

  Alison reappears through the doorway. She looks a bit green and leans against the molding. “I think I’m going to go sit in the living room if no one minds.”

  Mom rushes to give her a hug. “Oh, Alison. I’m so happy for you.”

  Alison looks startled, then bursts into tears. “I knew I was showing already. I haven’t even lost all the weight from Madalyn.”

  “No, no!” my mother clucks, then ushers her out of the dining room.

  My grandmother goes after them, but throws a pointed glance at me before crossing the threshold. “Charlotte, you can begin clearing.”

  Never mind the four able-bodied men at the table. I sigh.

  “Why is Mommy crying?” whimpers Jenna. She sounds like she might start herself.

  “She’s okay,” says Matt. “Finish your dinner.” He looks across at Ben and says under his breath, “I’m about ready to move in with you. It’s hormone central at my place.”

  “ ‘Yes, dear,’” Ben mocks.

  Matt rolls his eyes. “Exactly.”

  “Maybe you’ll get a boy this time,” says my father.

  “I think he deserves all the girls,” I say.

  “At least I’ve got brothers,” says Matt.

  Brothers. It brings
my mind back to Thomas. I want to ask more questions, but there’s no way to do that without rousing my brothers’ suspicions. I know Danny would jump all over me if I so much as mention Thomas, and I don’t need them even linking my name with his in their thoughts. I’m already on edge enough about tonight.

  “I’d better start clearing,” I say.

  Matt pats Jenna on the back. “Help your aunt,” he says.

  She makes a face, and he gives her a poke. “Jenna. Don’t be rude.”

  That pisses me off. Another girl relegated to dishes. “No,” I say. “Let her play.”

  Jenna beams.

  “If you have a brother,” I tell her pointedly, “make sure he helps you with the dishes.” Then I turn on my heel and carry the first set away from the table.

  I hear Danny yell from behind me. “Hurry up, Char. We need to make room. I heard there’s pie.”

  My irritation hasn’t worn off by the time I get to Stan’s—now Thomas’s—house. Some of it is nerves, but it’s easier to wrap fear in anger and go with that. I’m fifteen minutes late because I was the only one doing dishes. Everyone else was fawning over Alison. She totally deserves it, but that doesn’t mean I deserve to do all the dishes for ten people by myself.

  I barely register the empty driveway before I’m slamming my car door and stomping up the steps to knock.

  Thomas opens the door, and his dark eyes register surprise. “Charlotte. I didn’t think you were—”

  “Here.” I shove a saran-wrapped plate into his chest. “Did you really threaten my nieces?”

  At least he has the grace to look ashamed. He takes the plate. “I know. I’m sorry. I didn’t—it wasn’t a threat. That’s not how I meant it.”

  “Ben was ready to arrest you tonight.”

  A flicker of irritation crosses his features. “I’m surprised they waited that long.”

  “Alison was really upset.”

  “That’s your brother’s wife?”

  “Yeah.”

  “She should have been watching her kids. They were all over the store. She’s lucky someone else didn’t threaten them.”

  “She’s exhausted. She’s pregnant and sick and she was trying to feed the baby. You couldn’t give her a break?”