Chapter 50
On Saturday evening, Henry finds his parents sitting in the living room.
They seem surprised to see him. Henry’s father’s eyes track him as he crosses in front of the television and settles onto the sofa, at the opposite end from his mother, who’s staring at him with surprise, with interest, as though he’s the most popular kid in school, settling down at a lunch table of losers.
“Second inning, no score. Seems late for that,” Henry says, looking at the screen.
His dad is watching the Orioles game, of course. He’s watched nearly every game for Henry’s entire life.
“They’re in Chicago,” his dad grunts. “An hour behind us.”
He says nothing more. Henry knows where his father’s loyalty lies. He knows that his mother has filled his father in on everything she thinks she knows. He’s doing it again, Bill, with the woman across the street. I’ve seen him watching her. Why won’t he stop?
She has no idea.
He won’t stop. He can’t. Not now. He’s so close to her, his plan now firm and irrepressible.
Henry smiles and turns his attention back to the screen. He tries to pay attention. Once, the Orioles pitcher strikes someone out and Henry makes an appreciative noise.
“That was a nasty pitch,” says his dad and takes a sip of beer. He doesn’t ask Henry if he wants one, but the vibe is not hostile. It isn’t welcoming, but it’s not uncompanionable, either.
His mother turns the pages of her book and sits with her legs crossed, angled away from her son. Every so often, in the periphery, Henry can see her watching him.
“Fifth inning,” says Henry finally, announcing this for his parents’ benefit. “I’m pretty tired. I’m going to head to bed.”
“All right,” his dad says.
“Night,” says his mother softly, curiously. And he’s certain now that they will recall this. Fifth inning. He said it aloud, imprinted it into their minds.
Importantly, his parents will remember all of this—the first evening in as long as any of them can remember that Henry sat with them. He watched the Orioles game with his dad. During the fifth inning, he went to bed. Later, that’s what they’ll tell the police.
No, they’ll say. None of us left the house at all that night. Henry went to bed, and we went to bed when the game was over. We didn’t see anything. We don’t know anything.
Tonight might not even be the night, but Henry is hoping that it is. Either way, he’s laid the groundwork. He’s ready. But if all he manages is a little reconnaissance, so be it.
In his bedroom, Henry lies down, but on top of the covers, and he doesn’t sleep. He waits. He waits until the sound of the television disappears. He waits until he can hear feet moving above him, then ascending the stairs. He waits long after the footsteps stop.
Once he has waited long enough, he changes into the same dark clothes he wore when he snuck into his next-door neighbor’s house to steal the knife.
He puts on gloves, too. They’re black and too tight for him—he thinks they’re his mother’s—but they’re the first pair he found.
He slips the knife out from beneath his mattress; then he leaves his house with the stealth of a practiced assassin.
And a practiced assassin he is not—obviously. But he’ll do his best.