“What?” I ask.
“You remember all that?”
“I guess so.”
She laughs, a sudden abrupt sound. “My father doesn’t even remember the names of the girls I used to be friends with. I barely remember Annie’s birthday party. You have a great memory.”
I brake at a red light. I don’t bother telling her that sometimes a good memory is a curse. I remember too many faces, too many cries for help, too many agonizing tragedies. My photographs are only a small sliver of all the stuff crammed into my mind that I struggle to keep buried, to compartmentalize, to ignore.
“Anyway.” Nell averts her gaze again. “I’m not friends with those girls anymore.”
“Why not?”
Her body shifts with another shrug. I smother the urge to keep pushing her. I want to know, but I don’t want her to get more hostile than she already is.
Besides, it’s none of my business. Or it shouldn’t be. I’ve spent twenty years running into wars and conflict zones while knowing with every step that I couldn’t do anything for all the people who needed help. I’m not stupid enough to think I can help Nell either—not that she even needs it—but I don’t like how isolated and wary she’s become.
I pull onto Dearborne and into the driveway of Henry’s house. “I’m going to head back out. I want to pick up a car so I don’t have to use yours or your father’s.”
“Both of our cars belong to my father.” She picks up her book bag from the floor and pushes open the door. “He just lets me use one sometimes.”
She shuts the door and strides to the house, her hair a messy tangle around her shoulders. The long strands are the colors of a sparrow’s feathers. I wait until she disappears inside before putting the car into reverse and pulling back onto the street.
A smell drifts into my nose. Something both sweet and spicy, like gingerbread and cinnamon.
As I shift into first gear, I realize it’s the lingering scent of Nell.
CHAPTER 4
Nell
Though I tell myself I’ll get used to having Darius live with us, for the next few days I’m in a heightened state of alertness. It’s unnerving to hear his deep voice echoing through our once-silent house, tangling in conversation with my father’s measured tones.
There’s no escape from him. He’s in the kitchen, my father’s office, the living room, the garden. His footsteps on the stairs, heavier than my father’s, stiffen my spine. His jacket hanging in the front closet, his car keys on the table, even the wrinkled newspaper—all intensify my growing resentment that I can’t be at ease in my own house anymore.
Even in my bedroom, which has always been my refuge from the world, I’m aware of him. From beneath the floorboards and through the heating vents, I hear him below me as he takes a shower or gets ready for bed.
The sounds cause that strange tightening in my belly that only started when he arrived. Unbidden thoughts of him soaping his body in the shower or taking off his shirt invade my mind. I don’t like the intrusion. I’m unable to indulge in my occasional nightly fantasies with him rattling around downstairs.
Whenever we interact, he’s unfailingly polite, almost reserved in his comments about the weather or his appreciation for the dinners I make. I catch no glimpses of the dynamic Uncle Darius I once knew and loved.
His smiles, if one could call them that, are rare and fleeting. A shutter conceals his once-warm brown eyes. A couple of times, I sense him watching me with a pensive regard that forces me to leave the room to avoid his scrutiny.
If it’s not challenging enough to have him in my house, starting next Monday he’ll be at my school too. None of the other students have mentioned either his relationship with my family or his living with us, but the news will spread eventually. I don’t want to be the subject of school “talk” again, even if it springs from the students’ fascination with Darius.
For the rest of the week, I determinedly stick to my routine and try to ignore him. I refuse to think about or speculate on his hostage ordeal. I take the bus to school and stay after at the library as long as I can. I cook dinner and serve it at seven in the dining room, listening to Darius and my father talk about politics, sports, work.
Several times Darius attempts to include me in the conversation—Have you gone to the Impressionist exhibit in San Francisco yet, Nell…You might enjoy a biography I recently finished about Margaret Bourke-White…How’s the new downtown theater?
I’m unable to prevent the feeling that his seemingly harmless questions are designed to find out more, like he tried to do on the way home from school.
Do you go anywhere? Do anything? Got a boy who can take you to the city or the movies?
No. It’s just been me and Dad. If you really want to know, people scare the shit out of me.
I could never tell him the truth, so I respond with short answers designed to keep him out. After dinner, I stay in my bedroom, doing homework and reading until bedtime.
On Friday morning, I wake earlier than usual. The house is silent. After pulling on jeans and a long-sleeved T-shirt, I go to the kitchen.
A scraggly bouquet of late-summer wildflowers blooms from a jelly jar on the table. Asters, goldenrod, daisies. It’s an unexpected burst of color against the drab gray linoleum and Formica.
I get out the flour and start making a batch of blueberry muffins. I discovered the ritual of baking after my mother died. The mechanics of measuring and mixing allow my mind to relax, and I’ve come up with some of my best drawing and story ideas while baking.
As I’m cracking eggs into a bowl, the kitchen door opens. Darius enters, his tread heavy, bringing with him a rush of cold morning air and the smells of dried leaves and dawn.
The air changes, as if it’s been jolted by a wave of electricity. His breath is hard, his face flushed with exertion.
My meditative peace shatters.
“Morning, Nell.” He pauses by the cabinet to get a glass. He’s wearing track pants and a fitted shirt made of a soft, stretchy fabric that clings to his torso in sweat-damp areas. “Is that for breakfast?”
“Yes. Blueberry muffins.” I mix the batter with more force, disliking the tension winding through me. “I didn’t know you’re a runner.”
“Few times a week.” He leans his hips back against the counter and takes a gulp of water. “Feels good to run first thing in the morning.”
I tighten my grip on the spoon. “You obviously do more than just run, though.”
A flush heats my face as soon as the words come out. Now he knows I’m noticing him.
He nods in acknowledgment of my remark, but doesn’t elaborate. Probably he lifts two-hundred-pound weights at the gym and swings around kettle bells and tractor tires.
What kind of physical shape was he in after his escape? How long did it take him to craft the body he has now? Does it make him feel in control, stronger, more powerful?
Well, for heaven’s sake. How could it not?
I gesture toward the wildflowers. “Did you pick those?”
He nods. “Found them near that old railroad bridge.”
A door clicks from down the hall, and my father appears with a large thick envelope. After greeting us both, he sets the envelope on the table and taps his finger on it.