FIVE IN THE MORNING. Don’t know how long I’ve been awake. I was having a dream—no, a nightmare—about Cassie, that she was on a TV show. The set was a bedroom with hokey furniture, like out of a sitcom. I was watching, but then she noticed me, and dragged me onto the set. The lights were blinding. “Come on, Vernie,” she urged. “Get into the bed.”
The director started yelling at me to hurry and take off my clothes so they could shoot the scene. When I explained to him that I wasn’t the actor, but the writer of the show, he started laughing. Then they all laughed. “You?” they said. “The writer?”
I woke up to this scratching sound. At first, I thought maybe a mouse was trapped inside the walls. But then I realized it’s outside. I’ve lain here for ten minutes, listening. This house is so badly insulated.
Finally, I get up and go to the window. In the moonlight, I can see Sage’s mom outside in her nightgown and slippers. She’s dragging a bucket on the sidewalk. I think it’s a bucket of chalk. And she’s writing something.
When she finally goes inside, I go out to have a look. In purple, pink, and yellow chalk, Eve has written over and over on the sidewalk: JESUS SAVES.
I know Sage will be nuts when she sees it, so I go inside and fill a pail with water.
Mom’s already to the coffeemaker before she notices me. “Vern, what are you doing up?”
I tell her about the writings. She grabs a couple of sponges, puts on her coat, and follows me out. It takes only a few minutes to wash the chalk off. We’re almost done when Eve appears, her hair all crazy, her nightgown on backward. No robe or coat.
“Filthy pigs!” she yells.
“Go back to bed,” Mom orders. “I’ll bring you some breakfast later.”
“Okay, Miriam.” She goes back inside.
“Did you see those curtains in the trash can?” Mom says.
“Uh, yeah.”
“They’re all burned up.”
“I think there was... a small fire there.”
Mom gets her lawyer look. “When was that?”
“A couple of weeks ago.”
“Odd that you didn’t mention it.”
“Sage put it out. It’s okay.”
“What?”
“All these years I’ve wanted to get her some help, to make her see a psychiatrist, and to protect that poor girl.”
“We’ve been here. We’ve protected Sage.”
“The house could’ve burned down. And what about Eve? What kind of life is she living? She needs help.”
“You’re just mad ’cause she’s after Dad,” I joke, but the look she gives me lets me know it’s not funny.
“I wish Robert hadn’t left.”
“Why did he?”
“This.” She motions to the sidewalk. “This is why he left. He was the target of her craziness. One time, he bought a new car. Since it was blue, Eve raged and screamed at him that she’d wanted a green car and he should’ve known it. The poor guy. You should’ve seen the way his face fell. Then Eve drove off in it.”
“And?”
“When she got back, the car was a mess. It looked like she’d driven it through a muddy swamp. The fender was smashed. One of the doors was dented.”
“Oh, it’s that car.”
“Yes, the same car they have now. Three weeks later, he left. He came over and told us he had a job offer in Oklahoma and he was taking it. ‘What’s going to happen to Sage?’ I asked him. Robert said, ‘Eve never goes after Sage. She adores her. I’m the one who gets her mad. I can’t do anything right.’”
“Was it true?”
“She screamed and threw things at Robert, but Sage was the apple of her eye. She wasn’t abusive to Sage.”
“So he just walked out? What a coward.”
“That’s how I saw it.”
“Did you ever hear from him again?”
“For a few years, he wrote. Work was going well. He met someone. He remarried, moved to Texas, had a baby. But the letters became less frequent, then finally stopped.”
“You never told me this stuff before.”
“Who needs to think about it?” She covers her face with her hands. “I’m going to get Eve seen somewhere. She told Dad she has a social worker. She may need to be hospitalized. Sage can stay with us.”
“Sage barely talks to me anymore.”
“Why not?”
I shrug. I’m past the age where I want to spill my guts to Mommy, although it’s tempting. “She’s busy.”