For Whom the Minivan Rolls: An Aaron Tucker Mystery - By Jeffrey Cohen Page 0,28
wrote something on the sidewalk?”
Abigail walked down the stairs in her work clothes, still putting on her earrings, just in time to hear Leah ask, “Daddy, what does F-U-C-K mean?”
“Nothing, Honey.”
“Then how come somebody wrote it out on the sidewalk, with Ethan’s name. . .”
Ethan broke my grip on his arms, glared at me, then walked out of the room. He grabbed his backpack off the banister hook, threw it over his shoulder, and barreled his way out of the house, slamming the door behind him.
Abby looked at me.
“What happened?”
“What do you think happened? He’s upset, so he’s taking it out on me because you’re upstairs putting on pantyhose.”
“Hey, it’s not my fault that. . .”
“It’s not mine, either.”
She looked at me and took a long breath. Then, at the least likely time, she reached over and kissed me gently on the cheek. “I know.”
“I know, too.” I held her in my arms, the only time of the day I truly feel right, and exhaled. “I’m sorry.”
“Well, the Ritalin will kick in before he’s at school.”
I groaned. “No, it won’t. He didn’t take his pill before he left.”
Abby stared at me. “Are you kidding?”
“No, and he didn’t eat breakfast, either.”
“Oh, shit.”
“Mommy, what does ‘oh, shit” mean?” Leah suddenly appeared from behind Abby.
“Nothing, Baby.” She looked at me. “You want me to. . .”
“No, I’ll call the nurse and tell her to get a pill into him as soon as he gets there. They know me. Besides, I think I’ll be over there this morning, anyway.”
Abby nodded. After she left, Leah and I had our Dad-and-daughter time, when she usually gets silly with me and plays some game like “move your arm like this.” But today, she just wanted me to sit next to her on the living room couch.
“Daddy, why did somebody write something about Ethan on the sidewalk?”
“I don’t know, Sweetie.”
“Is it something bad?”
“Yes,” I said. “It’s something bad the way they used it. And as far as I can tell, they did it just to be mean.”
“Is that why you and Ethan got into a fight?” Leah hated it when voices were raised in the house. I sometimes wondered how she’d gotten into this family to begin with.
“We didn’t get into a fight, Leah. Ethan was upset, and I got upset with the way he showed it. A fight is where people try to hurt each other, and we never do that.”
“But that’s why he’s upset, right?”
“Right, Baby.”
She sat still for a very long time, which is not at all Leah’s style. “I don’t like who did that to Ethan.” She rested her head on my knee and stared at the TV set, which was turned off.
“Neither do I, Honey.”
After Leah got on the school bus, I got out a bottle of chlorine bleach from the basement laundry room and poured some over the sidewalk. Let it set, and I’ll come back later to hose it down. Maybe that’ll get rid of the stain. Then I packed a lunch for Ethan and walked over to the Buzbee School, where all Midland Heights children—those who attend public school, anyway—go from third to sixth grade. This was Ethan’s third year there, and both he and I are well known in the Buzbee hallways.
I walked up the front steps of the two-story brick building, which stretches all the way across a city block. At the lobby, I made a quick right turn into the main office.
Ramona the school secretary was behind her desk, Jersey hair a foot in the air, drinking an orange soda at 8:20 in the morning. Ramona, it was rumored, had once been the receptionist at an Atlantic City brothel, and, having dealt with all sorts of juvenile behavior, was perfectly suited to her work in an elementary school.
“What’s up, Mr. Tucker?”
“He forgot his lunch, Ramona.” I waved the bag in front of her. Ramona nodded.
“I thought maybe Mrs. Mignano had called you,” she said, taking the lunch bag out of my hand. Ramona flashed me a look, then glanced quickly into the principal’s office behind her.
My lips tightened around my teeth. “Did something happen?”
“Ethan tried to choke someone.”
“He tried to what?”
“Before school, Justin Hartman was getting on Ethan in the playground, and Ethan went for his throat.” Ramona’s voice lowered from its usual glass-breaking pitch to a tone that could only be heard across a football field.
“On the playground? Why wasn’t he in the Before-School Club?” Joan Delbert, a teacher who’s displayed more patience in a single