Twenty-Eight
Gage found Moira sitting on a front porch step, like she’d been waiting for him. He hopped off his skateboard, tucked it under
his arm, and walked up to her. They had some of the same classes together, had made out a couple of times, and had been hanging
out two nights earlier. Not together, exactly. They’d both just wound up at the same place at the same time with the same
people.
“Sorry about your gramps,” she said.
“So it’s on the news.”
Moira shrugged. “I don’t know. Maybe.”
“How’d you know?”
“I heard my mom talking. I heard your name.”
“Why would she be talking about me?”
“She got some forensic report or something.”
“Wait, what?”
“You don’t know my mom’s, like, a cop? A detective?”
Gage said nothing for several seconds. “Since when?”
“Whaddya mean, since when? It’s not like she became a cop on Tuesday. She’s been doing this for years. You must be the only
one who doesn’t know. Why do you think everyone was freaked out when she tracked me down?”
But Gage had missed that, leaving moments earlier. “When was your mom talking about me? What did she say?”
“Okay, I don’t think she was actually talking about you, she said your last name, but she was talking to some guy about another
Chartwell, and I figured that was your grandfather or something. Right?”
Gage let out a breath, nodded. “Yeah. He died.”
“And not, like, from a heart attack or something.”
“No. Is your mom here now?”
Moira shook her head. “She had to work. Because of the call she got. And I’m just hanging around, because I’m on lockdown
and she’s supposed to come back and if I’m not here I won’t just be grounded for this weekend but probably till I go to college
or something. She went nuts because she could smell weed, gave me the whole lecture about how even if I’m not smoking it,
if some other cops came by I’d be in as much trouble as everybody else. Like, at least till I’m nineteen.”
“So your mom doesn’t know you were the one who brought the stuff.”
Moira grinned. “Yeah, and I’d kinda like you to keep that on the down-low.”
“How’d you get it?”
There were cannabis stores everywhere these days, but the owners were usually pretty strict about checking for proof of age.
“Guy I know, goes to Humber. He sold me some. You wanna sit down?”
She edged her butt over a couple of inches so Gage could plunk down next to her.
“You look deep in thought.”
“I guess,” he said.
“Were you close?”
“To my grandpa?”
“No, Batman. Yeah, your grandpa.”
“Yeah. He was great.”
“I don’t have any grandparents. I mean, I did, I must have, right, or I wouldn’t be here, but they were all dead before I
was born.”
“You mean, your mom’s parents and your dad’s parents?”
She nodded, bit her lip. “Even if my dad’s were alive, probably wouldn’t see them because he’s not in our lives. He’s a gambler.”
“What, like, scratch and win tickets?”
That made Moira laugh. “Geez, farm boy, is that what you think gambling is?”
“I know there’s casinos and stuff too.”
“He’s a professional gambler. It’s his job.”
“Fuck off.”
“It’s true. He goes all over the world, playing poker and stuff. Real high stakes, like in a James Bond movie. Does okay most
of the time.”
“I never heard of that. That’s weird.”
“That’s my dad.”
“Well, everybody’s got shit they’re dealing with I guess,” Gage said. “I was just talking to someone whose aunt got killed
in a bank robbery. She was a teller and even though she handed over the money the robbers shot her. And then the cops killed
them when they came out of the bank.”
“That’d make a good podcast,” Moira said.
“Huh?”
“You don’t listen to them? There’s hundreds. True crime. I love them. I guess it’s in my blood or something. Maybe they already
did one.” She got out her phone. “What’s the name of the dead lady?”
Gage tried to recall what Alicia had told him. Her aunt’s last name—Zane—that she’d been killed in 1999, in Oshawa.
Moira added more key words, like bank and holdup and takedown.
Finally, she said, “There’s no podcast, and there’s no story about it either. Not one thing.”
“Maybe it’s too old. Stories didn’t go online back then.”
“I can find other stories from around that time, but not your friend’s.”
“It doesn’t matter,” Gage said. “I don’t even know why I brought it up.”
“Because everybody’s got shit they’re dealing with. That’s what you said.”
“Oh yeah, right.”
They sat for another minute, saying nothing. Moira nudged him playfully with her elbow. When he didn’t return the nudge, she
gave him a stronger poke.
“Come on, talk to me.”
Gage seemed to be trying to work up the nerve to say something. He wet his lips, getting ready.
Finally, he said, “Can I ask you a question?”
“Is it a math question? I’m not good with those.”
“I’m being serious.”
“Fine, yes, you can ask me a question.”
“If you knew that someone in your family had done a really bad thing, would you tell or would you keep it a secret?”
“What kind of a bad thing?”
“Just . . . really bad.”
“I don’t know. Like, I guess it would depend on how close I was to that person. And when you say tell, do you mean, like,
the police? Or other people in that family? Like if you saw your sister’s husband having sex with someone else, would you tell her? Because for sure, I
would tell. She’d have a right to know. Except I don’t have a sister. But just pretending. Like that?”
“Not really. Something worse.”
“In my book, cheating would be pretty bad, but okay. Would this be something that you actually saw this person do?”
Gage thought about that, then shook his head. “Not exactly.”
“Because if it’s just a rumor, then I would say no, until you really knew for sure, and then, maybe. But you’re not giving
me enough details.”
Gage offered none. He got to his feet. “I have to go.”
“No rush,” she said.
“No, I can’t stay. Thanks for talking to me.”
He started to walk away, but she grabbed his arm and stopped him. Gage, startled, stood there as she got to her feet, wrapped
her arms around him, and squeezed.
“You’ll do the right thing,” she said.
He was inclined to break her grip, but it felt good, and he decided to let her hold him for another thirty seconds. But he
knew, any longer than that, and he’d lose it.