Chương 13
But anger could translate memory.
“What exactly is in the report?”
Bell read the sentence.
Christopher listened.
“That isn’t what I said.”
“Did you say anything similar?”
“Yes.”
Bell exhaled.
“Tell me.”
Christopher did.
Rebecca walked away toward the sink.
When he finished, Bell said, “That’s contextually different.”
“But close enough to be useful to her.”
“Yes.”
Christopher looked at Rebecca’s back.
“Does she claim I’ve hit her before?”
“No.”
“Threatened physical violence?”
“No.”
“Then what is she doing?”
“Building an account of fear.”
Christopher’s voice dropped.
“Was she afraid of me?”
Bell did not answer immediately.
“I can’t know that.”
Christopher watched Rebecca rinse a clean spoon that did not need rinsing.
“She didn’t act afraid.”
“People don’t always act the way you expect.”
“I know.”
“And you did hit her.”
Christopher’s jaw tightened.
“I know that too.”
The call ended.
Rebecca turned.
“Tell me.”
He told her.
She leaned against the counter.
“You said that?”
“Not the way Juliette described it.”
“You said something.”
“Yes.”
Rebecca rubbed her forehead.
“I’m trying very hard not to enjoy being the ex-wife who says you have a temper.”
Christopher looked at her.
“Thank you for your restraint.”
“You once punched a pantry door.”
“I was twenty-nine.”
“The pantry remembers.”
“I paid for the pantry.”
“That is exactly the kind of sentence that made our divorce take eighteen months.”
He looked away.
She was right again.
The pattern was becoming irritating.
Rebecca’s voice softened.
“Did you ever scare Juliette?”
Christopher did not answer quickly.
He searched for moments he had dismissed.
Doors closed too hard.
A voice raised across a room.
Arguments he ended by leaving because he believed walking away made him controlled.
Juliette once telling him, very quietly, that he took up all the air when he was angry.
He had thought she was being dramatic.
“I don’t know.”
Rebecca nodded.
“At least that answer is honest.”
The alarm sounded.
Both of them moved upstairs.
Emma woke slowly when Christopher touched her shoulder.
She frowned at him.
“What?”
“Just checking you.”
“You’re annoying.”
Relief moved through him so violently he had to look away.
Rebecca smiled.
“That sounds normal.”
Emma opened one eye.
“Can I sleep?”
“Yes.”
Christopher pulled the blanket over her shoulder.
She caught his wrist before he could move.
“Dad?”
“Yeah?”
“Are you sleeping here?”
“Yes.”
“On the couch?”
“Probably.”
“Mom’s couch hurts your back.”
Rebecca said, “My couch is perfectly fine.”
Emma ignored her.
“You complain every time.”
Christopher looked at Rebecca.
“She has a point.”
Rebecca folded her arms.
“You can sleep on the floor.”
Emma’s eyes were already closing.
“Dad?”
“I’m here.”
She loosened her grip.
“Don’t leave before I wake up.”
Christopher sat on the edge of the bed.
Tomorrow morning, he might walk into a police station and not walk back out again.
He looked at Rebecca.
She had heard it too.
“I won’t,” he told Emma.
Then he stayed beside her until her breathing settled, knowing that for the second time in twenty-four hours he had made a promise whose keeping might no longer belong entirely to him.
Christopher woke before dawn on Rebecca’s couch with one shoe still on and Emma’s rabbit-shaped night-light glowing faintly from the hallway.
For several seconds he did not remember why he was there.
Then his back hurt, his phone showed 5:41, and the previous day returned all at once.
He sat up carefully.
Rebecca was asleep in the armchair with a blanket over her knees and her glasses crooked against one temple.
Christopher stood, took the glasses from her face, and set them on the table.
She opened one eye.
“Don’t steal those.”
“I’m putting them down.”
“Same difference.”
“You’re delightful in the morning.”
“You married me once.”
“That does weaken my argument.”
She closed her eye again.
“Coffee’s in the cabinet.”
He went to the kitchen.
At six thirty, Emma came downstairs dragging a blanket behind her.
She found Christopher at the table in yesterday’s scrub pants, reading nothing on his phone.
“You’re still here.”
“I said I would be.”
She climbed into the chair beside him.
“Mom snores.”
From the living room Rebecca said, “I can hear you.”
Emma smiled for the first time since the pool.
Christopher made pancakes badly.
The first one tore in half.
The second burned.
Emma ate the third with too much syrup and told him the burned one looked like Florida.
At seven twenty, Aaron Bell texted that he was outside.
Christopher put down his coffee.
Emma noticed immediately.
“You’re going somewhere.”
“For a little while.”
Her smile disappeared.
“Where?”
He crouched beside her chair.
“To talk to the police.”
“About Juliette?”
“Yes.”
“And me?”
“About what happened.”
Emma stared at his face.
“Did you do something bad?”
Christopher felt Rebecca stop moving behind him.
He could have lied.
Instead he said, “I hit Juliette.”
Emma’s eyes widened.
“Because of me?”
“No.”
He answered too quickly and corrected himself.
“I was angry because I thought she hurt you, but hitting her was my choice.”
Emma looked down at the syrup pooled around the edge of her plate.
“Are you in trouble?”
“Maybe.”
She considered that.
“Do grown-ups get grounded?”
Rebecca made a strangled sound that might have been a laugh.
Christopher said, “Sometimes in more complicated ways.”
Emma looked at him.
“Are you coming back?”
“Yes.”
He paused.
“I expect to.”
Rebecca watched him carefully.
Emma reached out and hooked one finger around his.
“Don’t be stupid.”
Christopher nodded.
“I’ll make an effort.”
At the station, Bell met him beside a vending machine and handed him a cup of coffee that tasted worse than the hospital coffee.
“That bad?” Bell asked.
Christopher swallowed.
“Are you trying to weaken me before questioning?”
“I’m trying to keep you awake.”
They went into a small interview room.
Detective Ortiz was there with Mercer.
Christopher gave a formal statement with Bell beside him.
He described the rescue.
He described Juliette’s explanation.
He described accusing her.
May you like
He described the slap.
He did not minimize it.
