If Chatham’s call made any difference, it isn’t apparent.
The world carries on, as it usually does. Thirty-six hours after the story about the Goudy tract broke, no one, except maybe the police, knows how Baby A ended up by the rivers, or who Baby A might be. No one knows if there’s a Baby B, and if there is, if her remains might match Rachel Bachton’s DNA. And so far, there’s no mention of bones, or the scent of them, found beneath the floorboards of a stable.
My own Babies A and B—my sisters—are feeling better today. This morning, they’d begged Rosie to bring them to my game—we’ll see, she’d said—but they didn’t show.
And Chatham . . . I can’t quite get a handle on her since we went to the rave. She’s preoccupied, distracted. I can’t blame her, but I wish she’d let me in on whatever it is she’s mulling over. Maybe she’s just waiting for the authorities to swoop down and take her back into protective custody.
I’m trying not to think about that.
“Nice fucking game.”
I look up from the locker room bench to see Novak standing over me. He’s managed to step into some jeans, but his shirt’s still dangling from his hand, and he’s bare-chested, as if any minute now, he’s bound to emulate a silverback and pound his fists against his chest. “Yeah,” I say. “It was.”
It turns out the douche bag can catch a rope, after all.
“See what happens when you fucking trust me?”
I could remind him that I’ve hit him in the numbers before, and he literally dropped the ball. I could tell him trust has to be earned. But I don’t want to get into it, so I say, “Trust isn’t the issue. When you’re open, I’ll get it to you.”
It’s a good night for Novak to perform, too. Even though Coach didn’t say anything about it, the scout from Northwestern was here again tonight to watch us play. The guy even gave me a nod as I walked off the field. I’m about to share this tidbit, when Novak hits me with:
“So I’m thinking I might ask that girl from the diner to wear my spare jersey next week. For Homecoming.”
He’s talking about Chatham.
“You know, the one who gave me cake that day.”
“Yeah.”
“The one you can’t close the deal with.”
I shrug a shoulder, even though I know what Novak doesn’t seem to realize: there’s more to closing the deal than getting between a girl’s legs. Chatham will be wearing number fourteen on her back next Friday night, and she’ll be with me all day Saturday. At the parade. At the dance. I might even take her downtown to Navy Pier after, if she doesn’t have to work too early Sunday morning. “Give it a shot.”
“Yeah? You don’t mind?”
Wait. Is this a courtesy? I’d considered it sarcasm, but . . .
“She’s kinda cute, you know,” he says, “and she’s new, so she hasn’t figured out yet I’m an asshole, so . . .”
“Actually, Novak, I’m sort of—”
“I appreciate it, buddy.” He claps me on the shoulder, and says, in Holden Caulfield fashion, “I really do.”
“She’s going with me,” I blurt out.
“Oh.” He takes a step back and finally shoves his arms and head through his shirt. “Well, good for you.”
“Yeah.”
“She’s a nice girl.”
Something in the way he says it, in the smirk on his face, makes me pause. How would he know if she’s a nice girl or not? Does this mean he’s talked to her? That he’s tried something on her?
Again, he claps me on the shoulder, but this time it’s with such force that I know it’s not meant to be friendly, as much as it’s an attempt to duel with me. He’s always got to be a total jerk.
Jensen passes us on his way out of the locker room. “Going to the Tiny E?”
Novak and I don’t interrupt our staring contest—which is ridiculous, right?—but I nod. “I’ll be there.”
“Let’s see which one of us can get there first.” Novak makes a show of air-fucking an imaginary girl.
“Whatever.” I turn away. I don’t want to see that shit. It’s insulting to girls, both real and imaginary. And it’s insulting to air, too.
Still, if he’s going to be that way . . . game on. I finish dressing and get out of there as quickly as possible, which turns out to be about three hundred feet ahead of Novak. I dash through the parking lot and climb into my Explorer, but the engine doesn’t turn over when I turn the key. Great.
I try again. And again.
Finally, after a few whinnies—and after Novak peels out of the lot in his Jetta—the engine revs to life, and I manage to catch him on Washington. I pass him on the stretch, give him a middle-finger salute.
But he cuts me off on the next curve.
Then I take the lead again, and while we arrive at the same time, I pull straight into a parallel spot. Novak has to back in like usual, so I’m first inside. A few guys are already crowded around the center table.
Chatham’s at the counter, serving the customers sitting there. I catch her glance, and give her a flash of a smile.
But Novak shoves me—the idiot practically bowls into me—when he passes, and only to get to a seat at the center table, as if I mind sitting on the outskirts—and I don’t. Seniors should sit at the center table.
Chatham rolls her eyes.
It’s then I catch the sense of dread hanging in the air, and somehow, I know. I know before I take in the details of a guy at the counter . . .
The work boots with the broken laces on the left boot.
The patch sewn into the right elbow of the insulated, gray plaid flannel jacket.
The dingy baseball cap worn backward and sporting the trademark C, the one everyone’s been wearing since the curse of the billy goat was broken.
It’s Damien Wick.
I know the drill. I can’t stay. If he imposes on a place I’m frequenting, he’s in violation of the order of protection. But if I willingly enter a place he’s occupying, all bets are off.
My heart is banging like mad, but it’s not because I’m afraid. Not really. It’s more that I just can’t believe it. He knows the team comes here. He’s here for one reason: to fuck up my life. He may as well be pissing his scent around the perimeter of the place, reserving it as his territory.
And this place, of all places! It’s where Chatham works. If Damien starts coming here, starts chatting her up every second he gets . . . The man is poisonous. If he knew what Chatham means to me, he’d be filling her head with all sorts of stories of my weaknesses. He’d make me out to be a wuss, at best. At worst, he’d do all he could to make her feel uncomfortable, like a rabbit in the middle of a wolf pack.
A sick feeling tumbles in my gut, and sweat breaks on my forehead.
I catch Chatham’s attention and mime that I’ll call her later.
I don’t explain; I just turn and head for the door. I don’t even want him to know I’m here, so the more quietly I leave, the better. If I’m not here one day, maybe Damien will give up the territorial pissing contest.
Unfortunately, Novak realizes I’m heading out and says, “Michaels! You fucking pussy!”
I’m only halfway past the threshold, and while I don’t look back, I can feel Damien’s stare burning a hole into my back. I hop back into my SUV.
I pull out my phone and text Chatham: Couldn’t stay. Damien at Tiny E. Be careful.
Then I add: See me after?
I know she probably doesn’t even have her phone on her. I can’t imagine what her boss would do if she was texting when the diner was full of customers. But when she does check her phone, she’ll understand why I had to leave. Nothing will change. She’s still going to wear my jersey. We’re still going to the Homecoming dance. Damien can’t ruin everything.
After fighting again with the engine for a few turns of the key, I slowly pull away from the curb.
When I’m far enough away to breathe more deeply, I let out a scream of rage and pound a fist against the roof of the Explorer, against the headrest on the passenger seat, on the dashboard.
I think about that slimeball, Novak, trying to weasel in on Chatham, thinking that because I left, he could have a crack at her, and maybe even assuming that I left because he intimidated me.
I think about Damien’s smug smile, when he must have realized I was leaving only because he was there.
Then I think about Damien’s assuming I’d left for whatever reason Novak’s spewing, about Damien’s taking it as confirmation that I am a pussy, and it fueling his urges to come over and prove it to me.
I think back to my twelfth year:
I’m not doing a god-damned thing. Just sitting on the back patio with a game of Solitaire laid out on the table in front of me, when a fist comes flying at my head.
A flash of silver.
A twinkling of stars at the periphery of my vision.
And I’m on the concrete, and this monster is on top of me, pounding on me. Jabbing me in the kidneys. Calling me a pussy. Daring me to hit back.
But I take it. I take it so Rosie doesn’t have to. So he won’t even think about shaking the babies, which he threatens to do on a daily basis.
I hear it over and over again, echoing in the dark closets of my memories: Hit back, you fucking pussy! What? Not man enough to defend yourself? Fucking hit me back!
I pull into the driveway and cough over tears. I lean my head against the steering wheel for a few seconds so I can catch my breath.
My hand hurts from all the pounding on my car. Maybe I’ve even dented the roof, but it’s not like I could notice a new dent in the midst of all the old ones.
After a few more deep breaths, I pull myself together.
The house is quiet when I enter. The twins are whispering to each other in the living room. Once I close the door, Margaret peers at me through the rungs of the railing. “Joshy,” she whispers.
“Hi.”
The sound of a broom whisking against the floor meets my ears.
Rosie looks up then, and pauses in the midst of her sweeping. She’s wearing her usual expression—one that says she’s utterly disappointed in me, in life, in the world in general—but the second she really looks at me, she softens. Maybe she can sense I’m upset. Or maybe it shows I’ve let a few tears slip. “You’re home early.” Usually, she’d be in her scrubs already, but she’s wearing a pair of yoga pants and a sweatshirt.
“Yeah. Damien was at the Tiny Elvis, so . . .”
She nods. “Okay.”
I go to take off my shoes.
“Leave them on if you’re coming up. I was wiping the table, and the cloth caught the hoof of the unicorn.”
I look down at the sparkly purple shards in the dustpan. She’s stepping a little gingerly as she moves, and there’s a slight tremor in her voice.
“You okay?”
“I’m fine, Josh.”
I take the broom from her hands.
“Josh.” She grips the back of a chair and takes a step closer.
I narrow my glance and take a step back, so she has to follow me.
Yep. She’s sort of limping. But not like something’s wrong with a foot. Like she’s hurt. I’ve seen this sort of walk before.
“Was he here?” I ask.
“Josh, I’m fine.”
I raise my voice: “What happened?”
Margaret and Caroline shut up.
“It was an accident. We were joking, all right? And I lost my footing.” Her glance toward the stairs tells me she fell down them. On its own, the incident is semi-believable. But toss in the broken unicorn, and it doesn’t make sense.
“It doesn’t have to be this way.” I’m practically whispering, so the girls don’t hear. I sit at the table. “You can call the cops and tell them the truth for once.”
“He didn’t do anything this time.” She joins me, sitting across from me.
“He’s seeing someone else, you know.”
Her eyes widen for a split second, but she quickly controls her reaction. “He wouldn’t dare—”
“I saw him come out of the Churchill. She’s young, super thin. Rough around the edges.”
My phone buzzes with a text alert. I glance at my phone and see it’s a message from Jensen. He’s probably just wondering why I left.
“I know you better than anyone on this planet,” I say. “You go from man to miserable-fucking man, but you know who’s been here for you every time they drop you on your fucking head? Me. They come and go. Breeze in, shake us up, and leave our lives after a few months, a few years, maybe. Guess who’s been here the longest?” I point my thumb at my heart. “Me. I’ve been with you longer than any man, and I’m the only man you’ve ever been able to count on.”
She opens her mouth to reply, but I don’t give her the chance.
“And I know Damien’s back because you think you can’t make it on your own. But Rosie, you’ve been on your own since you were knocked up at seventeen. You’ve been doing this on your own our whole lives. I can’t do this anymore. It’s him or me.”
“God, Josh, don’t make me choose. I’m the mother. I get to say who stays and who goes, and you’re staying. Can’t you just—”
“The funny thing is that you think I have any choice in the matter. That you think I’m making you choose. There is no choice, Rosie.”
She lets out a sigh. “The ring.”
“What?”
“Damien said he brought a ring. Remember, he threw a box up the stairs.”
“Yeah.”
“Do you have it? I want to wear it.”
“I’m sorry. I don’t know where it is.” I look her right in the eye when I lie to her.
“Oh, God.” She hides her face in her hands. “God, what am I going to do?”
Her voice catches, like she’s about to cry, and I’m suddenly sorry I lied. I’m about to come clean when she says, “It’s fine.” She wipes a knuckle under her eyes and pushes back from the table and stands. “I’m fine. I’m sure it’ll turn up.” She cups a cold hand at the back of my neck and kisses the top of my head.
A rush of warm emotion courses through me. I haven’t felt this sense of warmth between my mother and me since I was about nine or ten.
“Go out. See Aiden. Go be sixteen.”
It’s funny: I’ve been waiting a lifetime to hear her say those words, but now that she’s spoken them, I don’t feel right leaving. I’m worried about her, about the girls.
My phone buzzes again.
I glance at it. Chatham.