scraped hands against my thighs. There’s a world of things he’s left unsaid. Which one is he talking about?
“You should have told me what before?”
“I should have told you about the music.”
I go still. Kaylee too.
“What music, Dad?”
He doesn’t answer, but his eyes close and he leans his head back against the chair, his face pointed at the ceiling. Kaylee secures the bandage and steps away.
“You hear it, Elle. I know you do.”
It’s Virtue and maybe another like him. The music seeps through the walls. I imagine it curling around us, filling the room. But I thought I was the only one who could . . .
The idea strikes hard and fast, like a bird colliding with an unseen window.
“You can hear that?”
He grunts. “Wish I couldn’t.”
“Kay?”
She’s sitting on the couch, looking lost without her phone. “I don’t hear anything, Elle. Should I?”
I shake my head. “No, you’re good.” I turn my attention back to Dad. “When . . . when did you first . . . ?”
“The day your mother disappeared.”
The air whooshes from my lungs, but when I next inhale, I realize he’s just given me a puzzle piece. I open my eyes wider, not wanting to miss a single one.
“That was it, kid. Just the once. Thought I was going crazy, but it faded. It left not long after your mom.”
I’m still, so still, afraid to move. Dad has seven, eight, nine gray hairs in his beard.
“That was it. Just the one time until . . .”
And then I begin to understand.
“That Sunday, in the house,” I say.
Dad keeps his eyes shut, his head tilted back on the seat of the chair. “I’d been hearing it for a couple days by then, but yeah, I know you heard it too that day. And then at the lake—at the blasted lake. It was all I could hear. And then Canaan started whistling that same miserable song. The one I heard in the house. The one I hear when I’m trying to sleep or work. The same one that disappeared with your mom. The same song that follows me everywhere.”
Tears slip down my face now. No warning. Just tears.
And understanding.
“I should have told you, Elle. But how could I, without telling you about your mom? That she disappeared. That I . . .”
“That you buried an empty casket.”
He clears his throat, his face splotchy again. “And now I can’t stop hearing it. It’s everywhere. The noise. The music. I can’t not hear it. And I know that whoever took your mother—whoever it was—I know they’ve returned. They’re the ones responsible for desecrating her grave.”
My head aches and my eyes burn. Dad might not be wrong. It’s the first thing he’s said in weeks that makes any sense. And yet . . .
“You know Canaan had nothing to do with it, right?”
Dad looks past me.
“Tell me you know that. Tell me you understand that Jake and Canaan were just as surprised by Mom’s empty grave as I was.”
Dad remains stubbornly silent.
“Dad!”
Kaylee climbs off the couch and wraps her arms around me.
“He was whistling the same song, Gabrielle.” He says whistling like it’s a nasty word.
I look to my friend, to the helpful expression on her face. She’s not accusing. She’s giving me an opportunity. I see it in the lift of her brows, in the encouragement behind her weak smile. Tell him, her face says. Tell him what you told me.
The air is sticky and uncomfortable—it reeks of the alcohol on Dad’s breath and the dirt caking my clothes—but I take a deep swig of it and press a hand to Dad’s knee.
“I bet all the angels know that song.”
Dad’s eyes narrow and his mouth drops open. “Wh—”
But he doesn’t get to ask his question. Blood explodes on his shoulder, a bright red firework against his white undershirt.
He yells out, lashing, but that just makes the blood run faster. It drips down his arm and Kaylee screams out.
“Dad!” I cry. “Dad!”
But Dad’s head lolls and he drops back, unconscious.
And then Damien’s there, crouching in Dad’s chair, his wings too big for our living room, his body wholly unwelcome in Dad’s favorite seat. He withdraws the talon he’s driven into Dad’s shoulder and leans into my face.
“There’s a reason we’re invisible, girl. You can’t think we’d let you destroy that.”
38
Jake
They reach Main Street unscathed. Jake’s about three strides behind Canaan, and they move fast. Only someone who’s really seen Canaan run would know he’s working hard to keep his pace reasonable.