KALYN

STORYTELLING IS ANOTHER Spence tradition, or it used to be. Dad and I might not see each other much, but we’ve had hundreds of conversations. He never hangs up sooner than he has to. Every week of my life, I’ve spoken to him for thirty minutes straight. Minus my toddler years, that adds up to more than three hundred hours of talk.

Most kids get that much time with their dads over just a few months, but still. We make the most of it. You can tell a lot of stories over three hundred hours.

“Have I told you about the time your uncle Hank dropped firecrackers down the church organ? Jiminy Christmas, that was hilarious.” Not that all the stories are hilarious, but Dad tells them anyhow. He talks about overpriced obituaries and tragedies, too.

Dad’s never mentioned the funeral of a sister named Claire.

He’s never mentioned her existence.

And Dad’s definitely never mentioned, oh, you know, that his sister Claire committed the crime that defines all our lives.

That’s the story we’re hearing now, in this crowded kitchen. Every eye is fixed on Gus’s mom as she tells us something true.

There are parts that make me want to yell and interrupt.

But there’s also this feeling hanging around, like the smell of burning sugar, that if anyone stops Mrs. Peake, she won’t finish. This lady’s hidden truths in her house for longer than I’ve breathed air. This feels like some kind of exorcism.

People say you should pull a Band-Aid off all at once.

Give Gus’s mom credit: she’s not a writer for nothing. She might not be funny like Dad, but she can spin a yarn. I bet she’s been writing this in her head for years.

“I was raised in a religious home. It doesn’t really matter what religion; it only matters that it was the kind of religion that gave my devout parents permission, upon walking in on their fifteen-year-old daughter kissing her best friend, to beat their daughter with a belt, send her to a delightful summer camp for conversion therapy, and then move the whole tainted family to a brand-new town. Everyone needed ‘a fresh start.’

“I’ve spent the second half of my life trying to forget the first half. I pretend that camp had no lasting effect. I ended up working my dream job, married to my dream girl, and we’ve raised a son who is better than any I could have dreamed. But there are days when I can’t get dressed, and days when I treat my loved ones like they’re temporary.”

Tamara wipes her eyes.

“In Samsboro, I made a point of dating boys. I made it a spectacle. A parade of handsome young men visited our refurbished farmhouse. I made mistakes. Once I brought home a slender boy with a soft smile and a passion for horticulture. I could see what my father thought when he gazed at this boy from across the dinner table: His waist is so narrow, his face is so pretty. Do I need to call the camp counselors?

“I won’t pretend my motives for dating James were pure. I’d tried not dating for a while, tried making friends and focusing on college applications. But I wasn’t allowed to attend sleepovers or join study groups. My father stared at the empty chair. Do I need to call the camp counselors?

“When James asked me to Winter Carnival, I kissed him on the spot.

“I won’t say ‘I was young,’ because I know that young people are capable of great and terrible things. And I did care about James. He was genuinely talented and gradually he became genuinely kind. James sat at our table, and my father’s noose loosened.

“James was always trying to become better than his father. That was relatable. We’d both done awful things in the name of our fathers. The difference was, James stopped bullying people by the time I met him. I was still doing an awful thing to James.

“Maybe my eyes wandered. Maybe my laughter faltered. The closer friends we became, the more James probably suspected we were only ever going to be that. Whenever I saw doubt in his eyes, I kissed him harder.”

It sounds so Rose-y. Maybe every generation is made of tragic little pretenders.

“Even before we agreed to pretend she never existed, Claire had an atmosphere of absence about her. She was in half my classes and I never noticed. I didn’t meet Claire so much as become aware of her, like waking up and finding a body warm and breathing next to me.

“James and I were spending more and more time at Spence Salvage. Gary wasn’t allowed to go to the Ellis mansion. I met Mr. Ellis all of once and understood that Spences and Ellises were a caustic combination.

“Gary and James really were an odd couple. James was this shining star. Gary looked like he needed a bath, and burn scars mottled his arms. Teachers berated Gary on principle. Yes, the Spences were poor, but it went deeper. Spences looked perpetually ready to catch fire. Spence faces were built for mug shots.

“I have no idea how they became so close. They were inseparable by the time I moved to Samsboro, a buddy-cop duo. You rarely saw one without the other. If James noticed the looks people gave him for hanging out with Gary, it never stopped him. James was so popular that people couldn’t actually say a word. Eventually they saw Gary as comic relief, the hillbilly jester. James never treated Gary that way.”

“Because he wasn’t that way.” Gus presses his fingertips to mine.

I want to wipe my eyes, but I don’t want his fingers to move.

“One day Gary came to class with two black eyes. James wanted to punch the entire universe, but Gary wouldn’t let James near his uncle. The more I saw of Spences, the more I understood their reputation, but also their strange loyalty to one another.”

How many Spences will I never know about? How many of us hit each other?

“Claire and I never spoke where anyone might see us. We cracked jokes around bonfires. Soon my ribs were cracking as my heart pressed against them, watching how she tucked her hair behind her ears.

“Claire wasn’t nice. Not to me, and definitely not to James—she remembered his bullying days. But she treated her mother like a paper rose. Claire was a chronic shoplifter. She painted stolen lipstick on like warrior paint. If I had to pinpoint the first reason I loved her, it may have been that I wanted to be her. If Claire sat at a table with my father, she’d kick the chairs over. She’d bite through the phone cord before he could call counselors.” Beth smiles. “When I met you, Kalyn, I saw Claire. I saw her in red.

“During one of our bonfires, Claire waited for James and Gary to head out into the salvage yard with baseball bats in tow, looking to bash windows—”

Windshield wrecking is another Spence tradition.

“—and then she sat on my lap and asked when I was going to make out with her, already. I couldn’t have kissed James hard enough to redeem the way I kissed Claire. I slept with him for the first time that night.”

If this talk bothers Gus, you’d never know. Maybe he inherited his dad’s face, or maybe this story feels like it belongs to strangers.

“That fall, James and Gary took Tech Ed. Claire and I took Drama. James and Gary were whittling picture frames, and Claire and I were tangled up between the curtains. I didn’t know I was pregnant. By the time I did, Claire was begging me to leave Shitsboro with her.”

Same stupid nickname, same stupid town.

“James’s smile grew so goofy and young when I told him about you. I don’t know what I hoped for.” For the first time in all this, she looks at her son, lets his eyes envelop her. “Gus, I’m going to answer the question you asked me.”

“Okay,” he says, but I’d say he’s anything but.

“I wanted James to ask for an abortion. I couldn’t think that way myself. If there was one thing that scared my father more than me being gay, that was it.”

Gus’s eyes are closed, his lips stretched shut over his crooked teeth.

“Had James suggested . . . ​I’m not proud, but I wanted an out. But your dad was thrilled. He already loved you.” Tears speckle the tablecloth. “I’m so sorry, Gus.”

Gus opens his eyes. “I wasn’t there. Don’t apologize to me.”

“That’s not something you ever need to apologize for.” Tam’s voice is so firm that it almost takes shape in the air. “Don’t you dare.”

“On principle, I understand that. I support the right to choose. But it’s hard to think of those principles when your son is sitting right in front of you.”

Ms. Patrick clears her throat. “I don’t know what to say, as it’s not my place. But you kids really should have listened more in my Sex Ed class.”

It’s insane, but we laugh like freakin’ donkeys.

Hearing this stupid, sad story is leaving us all parched. There’s no way this story can ever be satisfying. I get why Gus looked scared about hearing the truth. The truth doesn’t necessarily make things any better. It doesn’t solve things.

Beth can’t carry on so easily after our outburst. She takes a big breath. “So I agreed to leave. With Claire. It was naive, but that’s the only escape I thought we had. My father never let me go anywhere unless he knew James was with me. We needed to wait for a night when we wouldn’t be missed, and James would be preoccupied.”

“Homecoming,” Gus whispers.

“The only person who could have made Gary betray James was Claire. He wasn’t happy, but he wasn’t surprised. I don’t think Gary cared for ‘lesbians’ as a concept, considering the bigotry he was raised on, but he doted on his little sister. When she asked for his help repairing one of the cars, he handed her the keys to his truck instead.

“The night before the game, my parents went out to dinner. I told them I’d be with James. In reality, Claire drove over to my house and we took this opportunity to load up the truck. But my parents ran into James at Maverick’s. He covered for me, telling them I was waiting in the car. Then James drove straight to my place to see if I was okay. He thought I might have ‘morning sickness or something.’

“James saw Gary’s truck in the driveway. James was not the type to assume the worst of anyone, but the sight must have confused him. And what must have confused him more was my reaction when he asked me about this at school the following day. I was blindsided; I stammered about ‘Gary helping me with something.’

“What must have confused James most was talking to Gary during Tech Ed. Gary denied the truck ever having been there. I know he did, because he confronted Claire and me after school. He was so angry. ‘I hate you for making me do this. James is the only friend I’ve got, and you’re making me do this.’ ”

I don’t know which of us around this table winces hardest.

“James was lied to by both of his friends. What was he supposed to think?”

“He could have trusted you,” I say. “He could have gotten over himself.”

She shakes her head. “James tried to be a good person, but he was far from perfect. He was possessive at times, and he had that temper. He was petrified of becoming his father. For a year, I had lied to him, and maybe he felt that. James was nice, but he wasn’t stupid. When none of us showed up at the game, that was it.

“I don’t know what James was thinking when he walked out on his team at halftime. Did he scan every inch of the stands before he got in the car, or did he simply know we weren’t there? They said he was kidnapped. James kidnapped himself. And yes, he brought a knife with him. It was Gary’s whittling knife, a gift he couldn’t bear to keep.”

“A friendship knife after all,” I say. “These days kids give each other necklaces.”

“It sounds stupid.”

“It doesn’t sound stupid,” Gus says. “It just sounds, um, childish.”

He’s right. Every inch of this story is childish as hell. We dreamed of drifters, of conspiracies and plots. But the truth is so much smaller.

Mrs. Peake keeps talking, faster now, barreling downhill with no bungees to hold her. “James pulled into Spence Salvage. There was Gary’s truck, filled with my stuff, and there was Gary, helping me heft a suitcase into the back, and James just . . . lost it.”

She closes the locket. “I never saw James bully anyone. That was the first time I could imagine what that looked like. He started pulling things from the truck, throwing them to the ground. Then he started screaming.

“Gary was furious because James wouldn’t listen, appalled that James would throw his fists whenever Gary got close. But Gary couldn’t betray Claire by saying what was really going on. Claire was in the trailer, gathering the last of her things.”

Next to me, Grandma’s shoulders tremble.

“If Claire had been outside, maybe she’d have told him the truth. I couldn’t.

“I’ve forgotten most of what was said. I only remember that we were all shouting. At one point James asked me to leave with him. I refused. I wasn’t scared so much as humiliated, like I was back on a bunk bed in a cabin where a priest was forcing me to look at pictures of naked men—men doing—”

This is the exact moment that my mom gets up, walks around the table, and wraps Mrs. Peake in her arms. “It’s all right, hon. You’re almost there.”

“Thank you.” Mrs. Peake looks at Grandma Spence. “Mrs. Spence. Claire insisted two girls on the road had better be prepared to meet trouble. You kept that gun under your nightstand, didn’t you?”

Grandma has been crying softly, breaking my heart. She shakes her head, but it’s not the “no” headshake. It’s a heavier thing, another damn confession.

“It feels almost clinical now, how things unfolded. The more often people recall a memory, the less accurate it becomes. The more the brain reinvents details.”

The part Gus and me needed, maybe we’ve needed to hear our whole lives? It’s just one blunt paragraph, shorter than a news article.

“James held the whittling knife out to Gary, telling him to take it back. Gary shook his head, took me by the shoulders, and turned us around to go. Claire stepped out of the trailer with her grandma’s gun in tow. She saw James, screaming, following us with a knife upraised. Unlike me, Claire had seen James hurt people. She’d sat at Gary’s bedside after James pushed him into that bonfire. I think Claire meant to scare him. I’ll never know. She jumped down from the porch and pulled the trigger twice.”

Hatred and misunderstanding, passed down over decades.

“The moment James hit the ground, Gary was there to catch him. But we could tell.” Her voice shakes. “We could tell an ambulance wouldn’t help. But I could also tell, even then, the very second Claire started weeping. The way Gary looked at her. He wasn’t going to let her suffer for it.”

“Why not?” I say, and anger brings me to my feet. “Why the hell not let her take the fall? She made her own stupid choices. Why should Dad pay for it?”

“To protect everyone, sounds like,” Phil reasons. “To not out Beth. To not out Claire. To not bring the wrath of Ellis down on everyone.”

“She was his baby sister,” Officer Newton reasons, though he looks furious.

“That’s fucking condescending. Claire was the criminal. Why the hell did any of you let Dad sink like that?”

“What would you do,” Gus asks quietly, “if it were me?”

“I’d tell your ass to tell the truth and go to fucking prison! I’d call you an idiot and tell you to face the damn music, and sayonara, Gus, because no one person is ever worth giving up your whole life for, you idiot!”

“But you wouldn’t. You’d hurt yourself first every time.” Gus has never sounded this certain. “How many blows have you already taken for me?”

“That’s not the same.”

“Maybe it is. Maybe you’re your father’s daughter.” Gus smiles, but it’s a painful thing to see, what with his eyes leaking. “You’re still holding my hand, Kay.”

And suddenly I’m a sopping mess of salt water and snot, leaning into his shoulder.

“What I don’t know,” Gus says while his heart beats against my cheek, “what—what I don’t get is how you could all just erase her. It’s awful. Like Claire didn’t exist.”

I exhale. That’s who Grandma was looking for, in all those family photos.

“It was for her sake,” says Mrs. Peake.

“Maybe, when she was still alive,” Gus chokes. “But now . . . ​ it’s only because she’s inconvenient, right? Because she doesn’t fit into the lies you all told.”

No one can answer that.

Officer Newton breaks the hiccupping quiet. “We lost that homecoming game.”

“Mrs. Peake.”

“Yes, Kalyn.” She seems more alive without that bile inside her.

“Why didn’t you and Claire skip town? After it all panned out? I mean, I get you sticking around for the trial and everything, but afterward . . . why weren’t you together?”

She doesn’t answer. Gus slowly raises his hand.

“Because of me, right? Because you were pregnant. Grandpa Ellis didn’t want a source, I mean, a scandal on top of a murder. And he probably, um, offered to help you escape your parents. Am I right?”

Officer Newton says, “More solid police work.”

“He probably just wanted a replacement, um, for James. An heir. Must’ve been a big disappointment when I came out.”

“Don’t say that about yourself.” That comes from every adult here.

“Let him speak,” I mutter.

“It might not be what you think about me. It’s not what I think about myself. But it’s what that jerk thought. If we can’t talk about it, how will we ever resolve it?”

Mrs. Peake nods. “I don’t know how Mortimer knew I was pregnant. James would never have told him. James never even told Gary. Things might have been so different, if he had.”

“Old man Ellis has a reputation for bribing cops,” Mrs. Spence reasons. “Wouldn’t be surprised if he’d bribed some doctors, too.”

Angus whines. No one asks what happens next.

“Shit.” Everyone stares at me. “I’ve gotta be home by eight.”

“Getting ready for the dance?” Phil smirks halfway.

“I’m expecting a call from Dad. Boy, what a call it’ll be. Anyone wanna join?”

Nobody wants to, but Gus stands up first.