Chương 8
By Sunday morning, the broken horse had become the only subject nobody in the family wanted to discuss and the reason nobody could discuss anything else.
Helen canceled lunch.
Margaret texted Claire that this was unprecedented and therefore possibly evidence of the apocalypse.
Claire showed Ethan.
He laughed.
“What’s apocalypse?”
“Something Aunt Margaret shouldn’t be teaching you.”
At eleven, Robert came over.
He carried a rectangular archival box.
Claire opened the door and stared at it.
“You brought the horse?”
“No.”
“Then what’s in the box?”
“Nothing.”
“Dad.”
“I made two.”
“Of course you did.”
He looked faintly embarrassed.
“I thought one might be useful for Ethan’s drawings.”
Claire took the box.
It was beautifully made.
Thick gray board, reinforced corners, fitted lid.
“You spent all morning doing this?”
“Last night too.”
“Dad, normal people buy storage boxes.”
“I’m aware.”
Ethan appeared.
“Grandpa!”
Robert smiled.
“Hey, buddy.”
Ethan noticed the box.
“What’s that?”
“Your mother says it’s evidence I have too much free time.”
“It’s nice.”
“Thank you.”
“Is the horse in the other one?”
Robert’s smile faded.
“Yes.”
“Can I see it?”
Claire looked at her father.
Robert looked at her.
Neither answered immediately.
Ethan sighed.
“You guys do that too much.”
“Do what?” Claire asked.
“Look at each other instead of answering me.”
Robert coughed into his fist.
Claire sat on the edge of the couch.
“The pieces are sharp.”
“I know.”
“Why do you want to see them?”
Ethan shrugged.
“I just do.”
Robert said, “I can bring one piece that isn’t sharp next time.”
Claire glanced at him.
He added, “If your mom says it’s okay.”
Ethan looked at Claire.
“Can he?”
“Yes.”
“Okay.”
Robert sat in the armchair Daniel had once called the orthopedic throne.
For a few minutes he asked Ethan about school.
Then Ethan went upstairs.
Robert waited until his footsteps faded.
“Vanessa left our house this morning.”
“Where’d she go?”
“Home.”
“With Ryan?”
“Yes.”
“How was that?”
“Cold.”
Claire sat across from him.
“What do you want to tell me?”
Her father adjusted one cuff.
“I spoke to the insurer.”
Claire tensed.
“About the horse?”
“Yes.”
“Dad, we’re not paying for it.”
“I didn’t say you were.”
“Vanessa did.”
“I know.”
Robert removed his glasses and cleaned them with the edge of his shirt.
“The horse is insured with several other items.”
“Okay.”
“They asked what happened.”
“And?”
“I told them.”
Claire waited.
Robert put his glasses back on.
“They asked whether the person responsible was a guest.”
“And you said?”
“I said she was my daughter.”
Claire let out a breath.
“Vanessa knows?”
“Yes.”
“How did she take that?”
“Poorly.”
“I’m shocked.”
Robert looked at her.
“She offered to pay for it.”
That surprised Claire.
“All forty thousand?”
“The insured value isn’t the same as what I originally paid.”
“I don’t care about the accounting.”
“I know.”
He rubbed his thumb against the armrest.
“She said if money would end this, she’d pay.”
Claire stared at him.
“There it is.”
“What?”
“She thinks the horse is the problem.”
Robert nodded slowly.
“I told her it isn’t.”
Claire studied her father.
“What happened to you?”
“Excuse me?”
“You’ve had a personality transplant in forty-eight hours.”
He almost smiled.
“I watched the recording again.”
“Why?”
“I wanted to see if I missed anything.”
“Did you?”
“No.”
He looked toward the stairs.
“I watched Ethan.”
Claire said nothing.
“He was showing your mother his drawing. Vanessa came over. He wasn’t misbehaving. He wasn’t running. He wasn’t touching the horse.”
“I know.”
“When she pointed at him, he looked at her like he believed she must know something he didn’t.”
Claire’s throat tightened.
Robert continued.
“I knew that look.”
She stared at him.
“From when?”
“You.”
The room seemed to shrink.
Robert looked down at his hands.
“I remembered the lamp.”
Claire did not speak.
“And some other things.”
“What things?”
“The dent in the Buick.”
Claire had forgotten the Buick.
Vanessa had backed into a concrete post at the mall and convinced their parents Claire had scratched the car with her bicycle.
Claire let out a strange laugh.
“Oh my God.”
“You remember.”
“I do now.”
“I made you pay for part of the repair out of your summer job money.”
“Eighty dollars.”
Robert winced.
“You remember the amount?”
“I was fifteen. Eighty dollars was a national debt.”
“I’m sorry.”
Claire looked toward the window.
A neighbor was walking a golden retriever along the sidewalk. The dog stopped to inspect a mailbox. The owner waited.
Ordinary Sunday.
Robert said, “I should have listened.”
“Yes.”
“I thought I was teaching both of you accountability.”
“You were teaching me that evidence didn’t matter if Vanessa cried first.”
He took that without defending himself.
Claire felt cruel and relieved.
She disliked both feelings.
“I’m not saying you ruined my childhood,” she said.
“I know.”
“You were a good dad.”
“I was a busy dad.”
“Both can be true.”
Robert nodded.
They sat quietly.
Then he said, “Vanessa says you’ve always hated her.”
Claire laughed.
“No.”
“You haven’t?”
“I worshipped her.”
That was the humiliating truth.
Until Claire was nearly sixteen, Vanessa had been the most impressive person in the world.
Six years older. Beautiful. Quick. Certain. She knew how to curl hair, sneak into concerts, order at restaurants without looking nervous. She could talk their mother into extending curfew and their father into lending her the car.
Claire had copied her handwriting for a year.
“She was my sister,” Claire said. “I wanted her to like me.”
Robert’s expression tightened.
“Does she know that?”
“She did then.”
“What changed?”
Claire thought about it.
“I stopped believing her.”
Robert nodded once.
“That’ll do it.”
The next week was quiet.
Too quiet.
Vanessa did not call.
Ryan sent one message asking whether Ethan was okay.
Claire answered: He is doing better.
At school, Ethan’s teacher emailed that he seemed distracted during reading group but otherwise normal. Claire read the word normal several times.
May you like
Normal was not a destination.
It was a disguise children learned.
