Chương 6
“No.”
“She said I was frightened.”
“Yes.”
“I was mad.”
“I know.”
“She always does that.”
“Does what?”
“Makes what happened into how I felt.”
Maria looked at her.
“That is an extremely good description.”
Lily deleted nothing.
Ethan took screenshots and forwarded them to Renee.
Then he removed Caroline from every family account he could think of.
The home security system.
The smart locks.
The school pickup authorization list.
The pediatric medical portal.
The emergency contacts.
The family cloud storage.
Each removal seemed small.
Together they made Lily uneasy.
A person could disappear from a house very quickly now.
Not physically.
Digitally.
At dinner, Caroline’s chair remained empty.
No one sat there.
Eleanor suggested moving it.
Ethan said no.
Lily said nothing.
She kept looking at it.
The next day was Monday.
Ethan asked whether Lily wanted to stay home from school.
She said no too quickly.
He drove her himself.
Normally, the driver took her.
Lily sat in the back seat wearing her navy school sweater and watching traffic move along the wet avenue.
At a red light, Ethan looked at her through the mirror.
“You okay?”
“Yes.”
“You’re very quiet.”
“I’m thinking.”
“Dangerous.”
She did not smile.
He looked back at the road.
At school, Lily learned another thing about truth.
It traveled badly.
By recess, someone had heard that Caroline had been arrested.
She had not.
Someone else heard Lily had found stolen diamonds hidden in her room.
That was closer, but wrong.
A boy named Mason asked whether Lily’s stepmother was going to prison.
Lily said she did not know.
A girl named Ava asked whether Lily had actually stolen something first.
Lily shoved her.
Not hard.
Hard enough.
A teacher saw.
By noon, Lily was sitting in the assistant principal’s office with her arms folded.
Ethan arrived at 12:32.
He sat beside her.
The assistant principal, Mrs. Lowell, explained that Lily had pushed another student.
Ethan listened.
Then he looked at Lily.
“Did you?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“She said I stole the necklace.”
Mrs. Lowell spoke gently.
“That doesn’t make pushing okay.”
“I know.”
“Do you?”
“Yes.”
“Then why did you do it?”
Lily looked at her shoes.
“Because I wanted her to stop talking.”
Mrs. Lowell nodded.
“That makes sense.”
Lily looked up, surprised.
“It still wasn’t okay,” Mrs. Lowell added.
Lily looked down again.
Ethan suppressed a smile.
On the drive home, he did not lecture her.
That annoyed Lily.
“Aren’t you going to say something?”
“I’m deciding.”
“You always decide.”
“That’s generally how speech works.”
She stared out the window.
Finally he said, “You can’t shove people.”
“I know.”
“You may want to shove a lot of people this week.”
She looked at him.
“You can’t.”
“What if they deserve it?”
“Especially then.”
“That’s dumb.”
“Sometimes rules are.”
She watched a cyclist move between cars.
“Did you ever hit somebody?”
Ethan paused.
“Yes.”
Lily turned.
“Who?”
“My brother.”
“You don’t have a brother.”
“I did.”
She frowned.
Ethan did not talk about his childhood often.
“What happened?”
“To him?”
“Yes.”
“He died when he was twenty-two.”
Lily knew that part vaguely.
A car accident.
Something before she was born.
“Why did you hit him?”
“He broke my guitar.”
“On purpose?”
“No.”
“Then why?”
“I was seventeen.”
“That’s not an answer.”
“It is more of an answer than you think.”
Lily considered this.
“Did Grandma punish you?”
“She made me work at your grandfather’s warehouse all summer.”
“For hitting him?”
“For breaking his nose.”
Lily’s eyes widened.
“You broke his nose?”
Ethan grimaced.
“Yes.”
“Wow.”
“Please do not sound impressed.”
“I’m not.”
“You are.”
“A little.”
For the first time since Friday, Lily laughed without immediately feeling guilty for it.
The next problem arrived Wednesday.
Maria’s mother’s surgery had been canceled.
Not because of the Bennetts.
Because the surgeon developed pneumonia.
Maria took the call in the laundry room and cried afterward anyway.
Lily found her there folding towels.
“You said no exaggerated crying.”
Maria looked up.
“What?”
Lily shrugged.
“You don’t cry much.”
Maria laughed through her tears.
“No, I don’t.”
“Is your mom okay?”
“Yes. Just disappointed.”
“When is the surgery now?”
“They don’t know.”
“That’s bad.”
“It’s annoying.”
“Bad annoying?”
“Very bad annoying.”
Lily helped fold towels.
She was terrible at it.
Maria refolded every one after Lily left.
Neither mentioned that.
That afternoon, Caroline requested permission through attorneys to return to the house for clothing and personal items.
Ethan agreed on the condition that Lily not be present.
Lily objected.
“I want to be there.”
“No.”
“Why?”
“Because I said no.”
“That’s not a reason.”
“It is technically a reason.”
“It’s a bad one.”
Ethan was sitting behind his desk.
He leaned back.
“I don’t want you in another confrontation.”
“I won’t talk.”
“I don’t believe that for one second.”
Lily folded her arms.
“That’s rude.”
“It is informed by experience.”
“I want to see what she takes.”
“Why?”
Lily did not know.
That made her angrier.
“Because.”
Ethan studied her.
Then his expression softened.
“You want to know if she’s really leaving.”
Lily looked away.
He had guessed correctly.
She hated that.
“I don’t care.”
“You can care and still be angry.”
“I don’t.”
“All right.”
He did not push.
That helped.
Caroline came Thursday morning at ten.
Lily was at school.
Ethan stayed.
So did Renee.
A security officer accompanied Caroline through the house.
She packed six suitcases.
Clothing.
Shoes.
Jewelry.
Personal documents.
Photographs.
Cosmetics.
A framed watercolor from the upstairs hall that had belonged to her grandmother.
She did not take the wedding portrait from Ethan’s bedroom.
That detail bothered Ethan more than if she had.
At 10:47, Caroline asked to speak to Maria.
Renee said no.
Caroline asked again.
Maria, who had remained in the kitchen, heard her.
She came out.
“I can speak for myself.”
Ethan frowned.
“Maria.”
“It’s okay.”
Renee looked at Maria.
“Do not discuss anything related to the incident.”
Maria nodded.
May you like
They stood in the breakfast room.
Caroline looked smaller without her usual jewelry.
