Chapter Seventeen
Back upstairs, I slide the video into the slot, rewind it, and press play.
At the same time, I aim my cell phone at the screen and start recording.
I sit through it all again, thankful I know how it ends.
When it’s over, I eject the tape and slip it into my tote.
Then I return to the kitchen, to my coffee.
I push my tangled hair off my face and wind it into a messy knot and check my other messages.
Amy’s called and left a text message. I need to call her, fill her in.
But the thought of trying to explain all this to her makes me even more tired than I already am.
I open her text and exhale a loud breath.
Christopher’s ex isn’t pushing it any further. Especially after this was posted. Take a look. When are you coming home!
At least something good has happened. I click the link and watch an amateur video of a woman and a screaming child in a grocery store.
The Sack and Save. Charlie. The stock boys who’d been videoing.
Charles LaSalle had reposted their reel, tagged my podcast’s account, and captioned it: This is the real Dr. Willa.
Something shifts inside of me. The knot of anxiety around my career loosens slightly.
I pour another cup of coffee and turn to the sketchbook I snagged on my way downstairs. I woke up thinking about it, about Mabry’s sketches. My subconscious at work while I slept.
I pull the cover open and thumb through the drawings, stopping at the last picture.
The one I saw when I first opened this book.
The little girl with a finger over her mouth, like she has a secret.
The boy with her. Looking at it now, with less anxiety to cloud my view, it hits me.
The eyes, narrow, set far apart. The jawline.
This little girl is not little at all. She’s frail, sick.
And she’s an Arceneaux. I run a finger over the sketch. Emily.
The image is so lifelike that it feels like something Mabry saw.
A moment captured. But what moment? From the looks of the drawing, a secret one.
Maybe, like me, Emily snuck out to see a boy, more than once.
And on this occasion, Mabry was there as well, watching them.
A little mouse in the shadows. It seems she was out of my sight more than I remember.
I wasn’t as in control of her as I thought.
Ermine mentioned Emily’s illnesses and rumors of Liv Arceneaux feeding poison to Eddie.
Just rumors, but that type of thing is not unheard of.
MSBP. Munchausen syndrome by proxy. Caregivers who create illness in the one they are caring for.
Sometimes they go too far. I look at the sketch again, and goose bumps cover my arms.
I rinse my mug in the kitchen sink and catch my reflection in the window above it.
Wild hair and sad eyes, like Mama looked on our last full day at Shadow Bluff.
It was the day after our baptism. Mama’s room was quiet and dark and smelled like cinnamon and cloves with an undercurrent of smoke and booze.
Two lumps slept under the covers, one larger, one smaller.
Mabry lay on her side, hugging a pillow.
No way I’d let her get sucked into the vortex of a Krystal Lynn spiral.
Only one family member was allowed to come apart at a time. That member was always Mama.
Mabry stirred and opened her large eyes. She blinked at me and immediately started to cry. Then she whispered, “Okra.”
“Shhh.” I patted her small shoulder. “Come with me.”
I pulled Mabry’s hand, but Mama’s long slender arm snaked from under the bedspread and wrapped around Mabry’s waist.
“Don’t you take my baby.” Mama spoke with her eyes still shut.
“Something’s scaring her,” I said.
Mama opened a crusty eye. “You’re scaring her.” She wormed her way into a seated position, snatched her cigarettes from the bedside table, and balanced one in between her lips. She flicked her lighter and inhaled.
Mabry started to cry harder.
At the exact same time, Mama and I said, “Oh, stop crying.”
Mabry blinked.
“Get up,” I said to Mama. I pulled Mabry from the bed. “We’re getting the hell out of here.”
“Look at you gettin’ all bossy.”
“You’re the one who said when preachers get involved, it’s time to leave.”
“Yeah, but I’m tired now.” She fell back onto her pillow.
“Too bad.”
I flung the sheets off her, and she yelled, “Hey!” The tops of her legs were as bruised as her face.
“Get up, Mama. It’s time to start acting like a grown-up.”
She shuffled into this very kitchen, barefoot and wearing a robe, her hair a greasy tangle, her eyes puffy slits.
“Well, lookee who decided to grace us with her presence?” Petunia sniffed at Mama.
“You know, you girls should have been in church with us today,” Pearl said to me. “Reverend talked about Proverbs eleven. ‘Whoever troubles his own household will inherit the wind, and the fool will be the servant to the wise of heart.’”
Mama plopped into a chair. “Got any coffee?” Her voice came out like that of a raspy lounge singer.
I placed a cup in front of her.
Mama looked up at me. “Creamer?”
“You can drink it black.”
Mama rubbed her nose and sipped.
Pearl and Petunia looked at one another. Pearl said, “We’ve been talking. Petunia and I.”
Petunia said, “We’re concerned.”
“For the girls,” Pearl finished.
“We . . . ,” Petunia started.
“We . . . ,” Pearl said.
Mama’s eyes narrowed. “Oh, for Christ’s sake, spit it out already.”
“You need to clean up, Krystal Lynn,” Petunia said. “This is why those girls don’t have a daddy.”
I studied Mama as she fished a cigarette from her robe pocket, lit it, and blew smoke into Petunia’s face. No one mentioned our father. Ever.
“Of course,” Petunia said, “you’re just like her. Your mama was just as troubled as you are.”
Mama’s face hardened. This is another topic we never discussed, our grandmother, my aunts’ sister. From the look on Mama’s face, it was going to stay that way.
Pearl scowled. “If you don’t watch out, someone’s gonna take these girls from you.”
“That right?” Mama said. “You wanna take ’em? Go ahead.” She swirled her cigarette around. “You can have ’em.” Mama laughed.
Mabry whimpered and looked at me with wide eyes.
I studied Mama. If she ended up like her mother, did that mean I’d end up like mine? Something hard in my stomach said there was no way I’d let that happen. “We’ll be fine,” I said to the Aunts.
Mama stopped laughing. Mabry tried to crawl into her lap, but Mama pushed her away.
“We need a car,” I said to Mama.
“What happened to that fancy red car?” Pearl said.
“Got rid of it,” Mama said, never breaking my gaze.
“Go get us a car,” I said. “Now.”
I exhale, turn away from my reflection in the kitchen window, and head upstairs. I can’t stay in this house, waiting for Travis to call. There are too many things to think about here. I need to move. And there’s someone I want to talk to.
Upstairs, I start to brush my hair, then realize how long it’s been since I washed it.
It’s time to clean up. I shower, work leave-in conditioner through my hair, then detangle it, pulling a little harder than I should.
When I’m done, I hop out, brush my teeth, and slide on the ugly orange boots.
I forgo the silk shirts, though, for the wrinkled and stained T-shirt.
Where I’m going, no one will give a shit what I’m wearing.
Then I spot the VCR. The police station.
I’m heading there after my stop. I glance down at my outfit.
They won’t give a shit, either, as long as I take them what they need.
I grab my tote, checking to make sure the tape is still in it.
In my car, I open my phone and search a name until I find the address. Not that I really need it. Even though I’ve only been there a couple of times, I know exactly where it is.
I wait in front of Ace’s Hardware until they open. I run inside, grab what I need, then pull back onto Main and follow my GPS to a potholed dirt road on the north side of town. It winds through dense woods until it dead-ends into a rutted dirt driveway. I stop and kill the engine.
The Arceneauxes’ house is a sagging heap of bricks.
A blue tarp covers part of the roof, and old cars in different states of disrepair fill the yard.
Trash and weeds fight for dominance. Off to one side sits a grassy area covered in large pieces of playground equipment, sand piles, and discarded tools, and I remember Travis telling me Doyle’s job involved building playground equipment for schools.
Next to the equipment is a dilapidated shed that looks like a metal shop, a place Eddie could make his little metal dolls.
I slide my car into park and stare at the dark house in front of me.
This could be a stupid mistake, but I can’t get the brothers off my mind.
I debate again if I should have called Travis.
But it’s a little late for that now. I’m here. I need to follow my momentum.
The curtains on the front window move slightly. I make out the outline of a face before it disappears. They know I’m here.
My boots crunch across the dead, dry grass on my way to the front door.
I pull the screen door open and knock. Nothing.
I wait, knock again. The front door creaks open, and a waft of cigarette smoke assaults me.
I pull back and stare at the tall thin woman in front of me.
Her hair is stringy with sections of her pink scalp showing through.
“Mrs. Arceneaux?”
She inhales through withered, pale lips, exhales. “Yeah.” She ashes her brown cigarette onto the floor. “Who are you?”
“My name is Dr. Willa Watters.”
“We don’t need no doctor.”
She starts to shut the door, and I prop my foot against it. “I’m a . . . friend of Travis’s. I wondered if I could talk to you and to Eddie?”
“No,” she says and slams the door in my face.