Chapter 17
17
ADAM
I follow the power line from the house all the way down the long drive to the road. There’s a low mist hanging over the grounds and everything smells damp and cold. I shove my hands into my jacket pockets. Little critters dash through the undergrowth ahead.
Malakai is less chatty than I would expect for a child. He finds a stick and is content to walk along beside me, kicking at stones and occasionally hitting things.
I see the problem some time before we reach it. A tree, completely black and broken in half. The pole beside it is scorched. Lighting must have jumped to it.
Mal gapes at it and declares it, “fire” or that a “fire” had happened—I’m not sure which.
I take out my phone. The plan is to call the electrician in Fort William to find out how I go about fixing this thing, but I don’t have any bars. On the other side of the road, the barren countryside inclines up a munro.
“We need to find some signal,” I tell Mal.
“Why did you put your house in the middle of nowhere?” he asks as we start the trek.
“I didn’t.”
He rolls his eyes. “I know. It’s old and haunted. That’s what Geoff says. He says it’s hundreds of years old.”
“Parts of it, maybe.”
“I meant why did you choose to buy it? You’ve got that place in New York.”
The kids stayed at the New York apartment for a few weeks before we came here. It’s a penthouse, but much smaller. They had to share rooms and there was no garden, let alone all of this. Still, his candor is refreshing. Especially from him. After the thing with the piano, I thought that Mal was terrified of me. Maybe Belle was right.
Belle. The way his eyes glowed in the firelight, his flushed cheeks, his golden hair…
“I didn’t choose this house. My husband did.”
“That’s why he’s still there now?”
My stomach goes cold and all thoughts of Belle’s gentle smile fly from my mind. What do I even say to that? “You shouldn’t believe everything you hear.”
“You don’t believe in ghosts?”
Oh, I believe in ghosts. The ghost that shivers across my senses every time I enter what was meant to be our wing. The ghost of deeds done that shouldn’t have been, of things said that I wish I could take back, of my past self who I despise. The ghost of my father’s hard face and my mother’s indifference. And that first punch I threw, the one that started everything. I know all about ghosts.
“Nope.”
“How did he die?” Mal thwacks at a small bush, scattering dew. There’s that candor again.
I pack my emotions into the little box where they belong and answer simply, “He was ill.”
“I guess he didn’t like phone calls.”
I’m grateful that we’re back on the topic of the manor’s location. “He didn’t like people.”
“Then why’s the house so big?”
“He wanted to adopt and raise a whole horde of kids.”
Mal laughs. “Children are people.”
“People are children who’ve made strings of bad decisions and who’ve been corrupted by society.”
Mal stops walking and stares at me. A beat passes, then he swallows and drops his gaze to his feet.
Dammit. See, Belle? This is why this is a bad idea. I pull out my phone and check for signal. One, lonely, bar.
I try the electrician and get through. When I ask his advice on how to fix the problem, he tells me in no uncertain terms that I am not to go near the power line as there are thousands of volts of electricity running through it and I will likely die.
Not as discouraging a prospect right now as he might think.
It’s a long wait for the lineman and pole crew, who need to travel from town to make the repairs. Mal hankers down in the grass on the side of the road and keeps his own counsel. If Belle were here, he’d know what to say to the boy.
I pace at first, then eventually settle beside him. “You can go back to the house if you like.”
He pokes the ground with his stick. “After we go back to social services, are you going to foster more kids?”
So that’s what he’s been chewing over. Guilt doesn’t so much twist in my gut as stab me.
I watch him, his intense focus on that stick. “I’m not planning on it.”
He glances at me, furtive. “Why did you choose me?”
These questions were so much easier to answer on paper. A number of truths fly through my mind. You were available. You were convenient. I felt sorry for you.
Now, faced with the reality of him, the one I give is, “The social worker chose you.”
He flinches. Wrong answer.
I sigh and wipe my hand across my face. “That’s not true. I don’t know why I said that. I read your file and I liked what I saw.”
He purses his lips. “You’re not a very good liar.”
“I’m an excellent liar. It was my job, you know?”
“Your job was beating people up.”
“ Pretending to beat people up.”
Mal shakes his head, but he’s still looking out at the empty road and the bleak landscape beyond. “You made a mistake.”
“I did?”
“Ben makes sense. He’s bad at writing but he’s all sweet like a little lost prince. They’ll love him. And Alisha makes sense. Specially after she wanted to bring Enrique. She’s smart, and ticks the diversity box and she’ll?—”
“Hold on. Stop.” Is this really how he sees the foundation? “Where did you get this?”
“It’s obvious. You need us to raise money.” He stabs the sand with his stick. “But I’m a mistake.”
“Why would you think that?”
He shrugs.
“Is this about what I said earlier? About people?”
Another shrug.
“It’s true that I need to raise money for the foundation. So I can help kids in care. More kids like you guys. But you’re wrong about my choices. I chose you four because I wanted to give you a chance.”
“Three.”
“Three?”
“You chose three of us. You didn’t choose Enrique.”
I take a deep breath and pinch the bridge of my nose. “Your social worker felt you had potential. All of you. You just needed someone to believe in you.”
He still avoids my gaze. “Is that why you hired Jonathan? Paid someone to believe in us?”
“What? No. I’m the someone.”
He lifts his eyebrows. The expression is more skeptical than surprised. Jaded already at age 12. He mutters something. I think I hear the word, “mistake” again, but he refuses to repeat what he said and we fall back into uncomfortable silence.
Eventually the truck pulls up and Mal galvanizes. I insist he keeps a good social distance from the men, and he’s happy to interrogate them from afar. The only information I want is when the power will be back, but I don’t manage to get a word in as he learns about transformers and substations and they show him all the melted and damaged bits and pieces, clearly charmed by his enthusiasm. At least he’s learning something today.
Although, when we head back, it’s my heart that’s heavy with new knowledge. Belle was right. It was never my intention, our intention, that these kids see themselves this way, as… employees, recruited to serve the foundation. How can I change an unfeeling system when I’m just as unfeeling?
Now you’re starting to get it, mon cher, Lloyd’s voice says in my mind. To be a parent, you have to feel. Scary, isn’t it?
I’ve done everything I can to avoid f eeling for the last 13 years, I reply, silently.
But you’re starting to feel things now, aren’t you? Finally, the ice is thawing.
I look out at the peaks of the munros. Only tall Ben Nevis is still snow-brushed. I recall Belle’s letter: As winter melts from the Scottish peaks and spring sweeps the land with color and warmth, I cannot help but feel envious.
He’s colorful and warm, isn’t he? The Lloyd voice says.
For a moment I let myself imagine that Lloyd did somehow concoct that storm last night, that he arranged so Belle and I would be close together, talking softly. That I’d be walking here with this boy and hear his true concerns. I know it’s just a fantasy, like the voice I hear in my head, but it’s comforting nonetheless.