Chương 8
He answered with, “If you’re coming over, bring tranquilizers.”
“I’m not coming over.”
“For whom?”
“Everyone.”
“That seems fair.”
Claire sat at the table again.
“What happened after Daniel asked your mother who his father was?”
Peter’s humor vanished.
“I didn’t hear the first part.”
“What did you hear?”
“Denise came out of Mom’s room and told Daniel he was being a selfish bastard.”
“Why?”
“She said Mom had spent his whole life protecting him and he was repaying her by interrogating her.”
Claire looked at Frank’s letter.
“Protecting him from what?”
“That was Daniel’s question.”
“And Denise?”
“Stopped talking.”
“Did she look surprised by what Daniel told her?”
Peter took a moment.
“No.”
The answer carried more weight than Claire expected.
“Did you know?”
“No.”
“About Daniel?”
“No.”
“About anything?”
“I knew Mom and Dad had a terrible year around the time Daniel was born.”
Claire straightened.
“How?”
“Dad told me once.”
“When?”
“A couple years ago.”
“What did he say?”
“That Daniel saved their marriage.”
Peter gave a tired laugh.
“I thought he meant babies make people grow up.”
“They usually don’t.”
“Yeah, I’m revising the interpretation.”
Claire heard a door shut on his end.
“Where’s Daniel?”
“On my porch.”
“Keep him there.”
“I’m his younger brother, not a correctional facility.”
“Peter.”
“I have his keys.”
“Thank you.”
“Don’t make it sentimental.”
“And the cake?”
There was a pause.
“You’re asking about the cake?”
“I don’t know why.”
“It’s in my refrigerator.”
“Good.”
“Claire, are you okay?”
“No.”
“Okay.”
It was the right answer.
She ended the call.
For several minutes she did nothing useful.
She rinsed Mara’s glass, wiped the orange cheese dust from the counter, then noticed she had already wiped it clean.
Frank’s letter remained open beneath the pendant light.
She folded it along its creases and slid it into the envelope.
Then she took it back out.
At ten seventeen, Evelyn called.
Claire let the first call end.
The second time, she answered.
“Is Mara awake?” Evelyn asked.
“No.”
“What about Daniel?”
“He’s at Peter’s.”
“I know.”
“Then why ask?”
“I needed to hear you say it.”
Claire waited.
Evelyn exhaled unevenly.
“I owe you something.”
“You owe several people something.”
“I know.”
Claire nearly laughed at the phrase.
“Then start.”
“I found Frank’s receipt for Mara’s test after he died.”
Claire went still.
Evelyn had offered it without being asked.
“I knew there had been a test before today.”
“Why didn’t you tell us?”
“Because I thought I understood what it meant.”
“And you removed Mara’s photographs.”
“Yes.”
The answer came stripped of defense.
“I thought you had lied to Daniel.”
“You punished Mara for what you thought I did.”
“Yes.”
Claire looked toward the stairs.
“That was cruel.”
“I know.”
“Don’t say you know.”
Evelyn swallowed audibly.
“All right.”
For a moment neither spoke.
Then Evelyn said, “There’s something else.”
Claire waited.
“I lied to Daniel tonight.”
“About what?”
“When I said I didn’t know which one.”
Claire sat straighter.
“I did know the possibilities.”
“Possibilities?”
“Two.”
“Frank wasn’t one?”
“No.”
The word was barely audible.
Claire stared at the handwriting in front of her.
“Who?”
“One was Richard.”
“Frank’s brother?”
“Yes.”
Claire stood without meaning to.
“And the other?”
“A man named Michael Reyes.”
The name was unfamiliar.
“Who was he?”
“We worked together.”
“Did Frank know?”
“Not then.”
“Later?”
“I don’t know what Frank learned.”
“He learned something.”
“What do you mean?”
Claire picked up the letter.
“He tested Daniel.”
Nothing came from Evelyn’s end.
“He what?”
“Frank tested Daniel after he tested Mara.”
“No.”
“He wrote it down.”
“No, Claire.”
“I have the letter.”
Evelyn’s breathing became shallow.
“What did it say?”
“That Daniel wasn’t biologically related to him.”
“Those exact words?”
Claire looked down.
“Yes.”
Another silence.
Not denial this time.
Calculation.
“Then Richard—”
“Wait.”
Claire stopped herself.
She was about to make the same leap Frank had made with Mara.
A result was not an explanation.
“What kind of test was it?”
“I don’t know.”
“What laboratory?”
“I don’t know.”
“Did Frank include the report?”
“No.”
“Then we don’t know what relationship it tested for.”
Evelyn said nothing.
“If it was only a paternity comparison, it could exclude Frank as Daniel’s father without excluding Richard.”
“I don’t understand.”
“Neither do I, not well enough.”
Claire pressed the heel of her hand against her eye.
“And I’m not going to turn another person into an answer because we’re scared.”
Evelyn began crying.
Quietly this time.
Claire let her.
After a while Evelyn said, “Frank saw a lawyer.”
Claire lowered her hand.
“What?”
“Three weeks before he went into the hospital.”
“Why are you telling me now?”
“Because if he tested Daniel, then I don’t know what he changed.”
“What did he tell you?”
“That he was fixing paperwork.”
“The will?”
“I assumed so.”
“Was it changed?”
“Not the will.”
“How do you know?”
“Peter and I met with the estate attorney after the funeral.”
Claire looked at the envelope.
“What paperwork, then?”
“I don’t know.”
“Who was the lawyer?”
“Alan Whitcomb.”
Claire wrote the name on the back of an unopened electric bill.
Evelyn continued before Claire could ask anything else.
“Michael had a photograph.”
“What?”
“This is going to sound stupid.”
“Tonight has survived worse.”
“We all lived in the same apartment complex for a while.”
“You and Frank?”
“And Richard, for a few months.”
“And Michael.”
“Yes.”
Evelyn’s voice thinned.
“There was a picture from a cookout.”
“Why does that matter?”
“Because Frank kept it.”
Claire stopped writing.
“Why?”
“I don’t know.”
“Where?”
“He had boxes of old photographs scanned after the basement pipe burst.”
Claire remembered that.
Frank had spent two weekends complaining about the price of digitizing pictures he claimed nobody wanted.
“He gave Daniel and Peter copies on those little hard drives.”
“And you?”
“I had the folder on our old family cloud account.”
May you like
Claire looked toward the stairs.
The laptop she shared with Mara automatically signed into that account because Mara used the old scanned photographs for school projects and birthday collages.
