John and I went to bed at ten thirty, but while he fell asleep quickly, I couldn’t turn off my brain from both the growing guilt of being dishonest with him about the curfew and my anxiousness about Keisha being out. By lying to John I’d upped the stakes. It was no longer just Keisha’s success on the line here; my dog was in the fight now too, and despite telling myself a hundred different times that she’d be home on time and everything would be fine, I looked at the clock at 11:22, and 11:53, and then again at 12:19, my confidence seriously compromised.
At 12:40 I slid out of bed and went into the kitchen to get my phone. Surely she’d texted me, right?
Wrong.
I texted her instead.
Shannon: Where are you?
I waited and waited for a response. Ten minutes later I called her phone, my stomach getting tighter by the minute as I tried not to imagine what was keeping her. She didn’t answer. I contemplated waking John for exactly three seconds before determining that would only make things worse. We’d made progress tonight, and I didn’t want to ruin that until I knew what had happened.
At two o’clock I was getting really worried. What if she’d been in an accident? Should I call the police? No, I’d have to wake up John before I did anything that drastic. I went into the laundry room and ironed for half an hour, then came out and opened the blinds in the living room so I could see the car as soon as it returned. I sat in the recliner, stood up and straightened the DVDs, sat back down again and tucked my feet underneath me. I texted and called her again.
I wished I had a copy of the Henrietta Lacks book already so I could distract myself with the story, but I’d left book group less than seven hours ago.
It was 3:00 a.m. At what point did I tell John that Keisha wasn’t home? The very thought made me sick. Where was she? If she would just come home soon, it would be okay. I settled in to wait and must have fallen asleep because the garage door woke me, and I was on my feet and in the doorway at the top of the steps leading to the garage in mere seconds.
“I’m so, so sorry,” Keisha said. She got out of the car before I had a chance to ask her what had happened. She hurried to the bottom of the steps and looked up at me apologetically, absolutely contrite. “We went to Jessica’s to watch a movie, and I fell asleep.”
I wanted so badly to believe her. “I texted and called you.”
“I turned off the volume on my phone so I wouldn’t interrupt the movie.”
I looked closely at her. Were her pupils dilated? Was she twitchy and anxious? What would I do if she were? Then would I tell her father?
“I know you don’t want to believe me,” she said, her tone broken. “I’m so sorry, Shannon. I swear I’d never stay out this late on purpose—not after all you and Dad have done. I just lost track of time.”
“I thought you fell asleep,” I said, catching the contradiction.
“I did,” she said quickly. “That’s what I meant. I lost track of time because I was asleep.” She took a step closer to the stairs. “Please don’t kick me out,” she said softly as tears rose in her eyes. “It won’t happen again, I swear.”
Ugh. What was I supposed to do? This was a violation of our contract. If John were the one waiting up for her, she’d have three days to find somewhere else to go. But I hadn’t been comfortable about that part of the agreement from the start. She didn’t even have a job yet. Kicking her out would be throwing her back to the wolves—her old friends who, I felt, held a lot of the blame for her problems. Telling John would be the same as kicking her out myself.
“You’re putting me in a very difficult situation,” I said, and I saw a momentary flash of something in her eyes. Was it victory? Oh, I hoped not. Surely it was regret or repentance. “This can’t happen again.”
“It won’t,” she said, sounding relieved. “I promise, Shannon, it won’t ever happen again. Jessica felt really bad too. She didn’t know I had such a strict curfew; she’d have woken me up if she knew. She thought I should just stay over, but I told her no way, I had to get home. You can call her if you don’t believe me; she’ll tell you all about it.” She held out her phone, but I waved it away. I wasn’t going to call a stranger at four in the morning.
I was too tired to fight and too scared to dig for the truth.
She frowned up at me. “I’m really sorry, Shannon,” she said, coming up the stairs and giving me a hug I couldn’t help but return.
“It’s okay,” I said, more for her benefit than because it was true. It wasn’t okay. She smelled like mouthwash and perfume, which meant she was covering up something she didn’t want me to smell. Something I didn’t want to smell either. With her track record, I was a fool to let this incident go, but John wasn’t going to give her any leeway, and I knew our home was the best place for her right now.
Also, I hadn’t kept up my end of the deal in taking her to NA meetings. Our schedules hadn’t lined up, and since she didn’t have a car, she couldn’t go to the meetings on her own. I needed to get her there; she needed to make new friends who were on a better course. Though I hated knowing she’d been drinking—surely that was all she’d done—I couldn’t ignore the fact that she was an addict. Addiction was a disease, and she wasn’t well yet. But she hadn’t drunk or used since she’d been here; that was an accomplishment I wasn’t willing to undo over one night of poor choices.
I pulled back but kept my hands on her shoulders. “This can’t happen again, Keish, you understand that, right?”
“Totally,” she said with a nod. “It won’t, I promise.”
I nodded and let her go. She gave me a quick hug again and then headed for her room. I shut the garage, locked the door, turned off the lights, and went back to bed, my whole body aching from both the worry and the lack of sleep.
“Huh, wha?” John said groggily, only half awake.
“Nothing,” I whispered. “Go back to sleep.”
He grunted but rolled back on his side and was soon softly snoring. I stared at the dark ceiling for a very long time before sleep overcame me.