Chapter 23
“Good, no boys,” she says, relieved, when we round the corner and pass between the stone posts at the park’s entrance.
In fact, no one is here. The neighborhood parks are surprisingly quiet, even on weekends and during the summer.
I sometimes wonder where all the kids are.
Not now, though. I’m too busy wondering about other things, like whether I might finally overpower Joel next time.
And what next time will be like. I managed to hold myself away last night.
Even though I should’ve gone, for Grub’s sake.
The sky is so blue, the leaves on the Japanese maples electric red.
My intensifying DP is like a filter on a photo where you draw your finger to one side and the clarity turns up, the brightness, the contrast. It’s hard to imagine going back to the duller palette of the state that is supposedly reality.
Ella has just gotten up onto the garish yellow-and-purple board, wobbling and hanging on to my hands with all her might.
I take a couple of steps, pulling her. I am bored already.
I don’t remember getting this easily bored with her before.
Maybe I’m idealizing, but I remember feeling a grateful in-the-momentness that was a relief from my Sedona days of racing-thought misery. Now I’m itching to escape somehow.
Ella lists briefly against me, and I right her as she yelps in fear. “I almost fell!”
This, too, is irritating. The child is so afraid, all the time.
“You’re fine,” I say tersely.
She glances up, her face alert to the difference in my voice.
She feels much lighter than she did recently, when she used to feel unliftable.
“I’m skateboarding!” she shrieks a moment later, as I guide her forward. And then, even more thrilled, “Joel!”
She hops off the board, sending it skittering in the other direction. I whirl around. He’s stepping onto the basketball court, on the other side, handsome in a gray sweater. What do I do? Ella is already halfway to him. She charges, throws her arms around his waist. He bends down, hugs her.
“Ella, did you have a growth spurt? You look taller.” He doesn’t even glance at me.
“Damn it,” I whisper. What is he doing? I walk briskly forward.
“Probably,” Ella says, openly bragging. “I’ve been eating a ton. Titi says I eat three breakfasts like a hobbit.”
He gives her shoulder a squeeze. “You have a good appetite.”
“How’s Mr. Button? I haven’t seen him in a really long time. Titi said you’re too busy these days. Are you making sure you take care of him even if you’re busy? He’s just a cat.” The last part is an admonishment.
He smiles. “He certainly is a cat.” He taps thoughtfully on her very pink helmet. “He’s happy it’s warmer out this weekend. I let him come out in the back with me and he always finds a bug to chase. He’s having a lot of adventures. I think he misses you a little bit, though.”
“I bet he does.” She regards him with judgment and a shy tinge of hurt. “Why don’t you invite us over again?”
I cut him off as he starts to speak: “Joel has a lot more work than usual right now.”
He nods, pretending he’s just noticed me there. “I wish I didn’t. It was much more fun playing music with you.”
Ella’s brows draw in as she considers urging him to invite us over anyway. She won’t be bold enough, I already know. And sure enough, she says instead, “Want to see me skateboard? I’m working on it. You can help me if you want.”
“Definitely.” And to me, “How are you, Tempest?” He’s performing for Ella.
“Fine. How are you, Joel?”
“Fine.”
We stand side by side, watching Ella clamber up onto the board, pink knee and elbow pads protruding, windmilling her arms for balance, her helmet comically round. She’s wearing her rainbow-striped rain boots, which I chose with her sock aversion in mind; they have a thick lining.
“How did you know we’d be here?” I keep my voice down.
“I walked by your house and you were just leaving.”
“That’s creepy.” I’m annoyed that I didn’t notice him stalking us. Shouldn’t my senses be more finely tuned or something now? Why doesn’t that come with the territory? “You could’ve just harassed us there.”
“I didn’t want anyone making a big deal.”
“Like Dee or my mom, who might call 911 on you for being a serial killer.”
Except Dee thinks I should date him, and Mom doesn’t seem to remember the part involving murder. Maybe she doesn’t want to remember that part.
He shrugs.
“Help!” Ella cries, bailing with an exaggerated stagger after a few very tentative pushes.
“You’re doing great!” Joel sounds supportive, correct—the way someone should talk to a child. “Can you try it again?” He’s despicable, I remind myself. This is an act.
“What do you want?” I ask. He smells so good, it’s cruel. I wonder how many times it will take before I am no longer painfully aroused by his presence. Or the thought of him. Or just a single detail of him, like the squareish shape of his thumbnail.
“To talk.”
I turn to face him. “You’re scared to be alone with me.” I get a small rush, a burst of creamy-sriracha adrenaline, at my ability to speak aloud whichever words come to mind.
He refuses to meet my eye. “Don’t.” He raises his hand as though to shield his eyes from the glare of me. I think of the thing Dee said about me glowing like nuclear waste, or whatever. He nods toward Ella. “She’s right there.”
“Yeah. Clever.”
“I want to talk.”
“You could’ve talked the other night.” I can feel the cool itch of the grass, the cold air, the black earth under my fingers as I say this. I can taste my own lust. The way he slid his hand, once, helplessly, down the length of my spine, stroking me.
“Stop it,” he says, as though reading my mind.
I smirk. “Wait. I know. You’re disgusted by me. You hate yourself. You’re a giant victim, you got seduced by an evil— ”
He cuts me off. “I have another deal for you.”
“A brilliant new plan? Since you can’t kill me.” It’s pretty fun, being sarcastic. I feel like I’ll do more of it.
Ella is lying down on the skateboard, propelling herself in cautious strokes with her hands. She drifts across the court, craning her neck to see if we are watching. Joel gives her a thumbs-up.
“I miss that kid,” he says. “I found two more.”
“Two more kids? To buy gluten-free cookies for?”
“Come on, T.” My nickname is mocking. “Demons. Like you.”
“I’m not a demon.”
“You sure?”
“Whatever.” I cross my arms.
“An accountant up in New Hampshire and a painter out in Columbus, Ohio.”
“Am I supposed to beg for their lives?”
“No. Tell me where your father is and they get to live.”
“Holy crap. You’re horrifying.” The adrenaline is no longer enjoyable; the desire curdles in my mouth.
He adjusts his glasses. Innocuous and charming, that whiff of gentle hesitation. He pushes the hair off his forehead. Nightmarishly cute.
“Please help me, Joel!” wails Ella, standing again, abruptly fed up.
“Don’t— ” I start, but he’s crossing to her. “Shouldn’t you be at work?” I call after him. I know he does weekend shifts. “Doesn’t someone need their life saved?”
He’s holding Ella up and she’s laughing as she falls against him.
“Very safe day around here,” he says lightly. “Everyone’s really healthy.”
I hate myself for ever posting about the damned cat. Should’ve taken him right back to the shelter.
Now Ella runs for the swings, pink exoskeleton bobbing brightly. She wants to show Joel how she can spin herself. She’s unclasping her helmet, directing us to sit on a soggy bench nearby.
“Can you sit, too, Joel?” She hauls herself up onto the seat of the swing.
He hesitates, then sits on the edge, as far away from me as possible.
“You were threatening me?” I prompt, breathing him in compulsively.
“Not you.”
“Right. My siblings.”
“You’re not exactly close.”
“How would you know?”
“You would’ve said.”
“You think I lie about literally everything.”
“You only talk about the boy.” There is a fractional pause before he concludes the sentence.
“Grub.” My voice is suddenly untrustworthy, which annoys me. “James.”
He watches Ella. “Nice spinning!”
“No, no! That’s just the start of the spin!”
I reach out, snatch his wrist. He pulls reflexively away, turns his head toward me; our eyes meet.
“Damn it,” he says softly.
“I want you to believe me,” I whisper. I want it intensely in that moment. I am done with him not believing me. “I’m not lying. About any of it. I’m a bad liar. I want you to know what you did.”
I see his throat move as he swallows.
Ella is yelling to catch our attention. Did anyone see her spin?
Neither of us turns. Like a tiny gift from God, she decides to try it again and do a better one.
I’m going to berate him; I’m going to be cold and unflinching and sharp. But instead, my nose threatens incontinence, and tears swell behind the dam of my eyes.
“He was just a boy,” I say. And now I’m crying in earnest. I turn away, wiping my eyes hard, fury clotting the tears in my throat.
I’m aware of Joel’s surprise. And then the natural drift of his hand on the bench, as though he has forgotten for a moment who I am. Or maybe he has remembered. He checks himself an instant later.
“Couldn’t you tell?” I whisper. “When you met him? Couldn’t you tell he wasn’t your enemy?” I look at him.
His face goes blank under my gaze. He looks away.
“I know you know it was wrong. You must know you’re wrong.”
“She told me,” he mutters.
“Who?”
He shakes his head.
His doubt is a tiny opening and I lunge to pull it wider.
“Someone who taught you? Someone like you? Are there more of . . . you?”
He hesitates, and I feel the stress in it, as though he is straining against a wicked, unseen current. Which is exactly what he is doing.
“One other,” he says through his teeth. “That I know of.”
“Who is it?” I feel like I’m a detective, leaning over a metal-legged table to interrogate him. I am also the handcuffs that hold him there.
He flinches slightly, and his voice is gruff and unwilling when he says, “I’ve never met them. She said there was another.”
“Who is ‘she’?”
“Was. My grandmother.” His face closes as soon as he’s said the words; he’s angry at himself.