of sulky, continuing childhood. He had no interests. He dressed ridiculously, in patched bell-bottoms and flowered, billowing shirts. His only friends were a handful of hippies and hoods who skulked around school like stray cats. Todd was nice enough to Billy, but she knew he didn't really like him. No, that wasn't true. Todd liked everybody. He didn't respect Billy. He thought of him as an oddity, a character. He said, 'He's a real nut, that brother of yours.'
“What was it all about?” she asked.
“Does it matter? What does that have to do with anything?” Billy sucked fiercely on the cigarette. His face was all sharp points and blank, empty spaces. Bony thrust of nose and chin, no cheekbones, a mouth that refused to assume any particular shape. His skin was blurred with acne. Susan worried that his unfinished quality might become permanent.
“Daddy's going through a hard time,” she said. “He has a lot of responsibilities now. I think we have to be patient.”
“Right,” he said. “You should go in. It's cold out here.”
“I'm all right. Where did you get that cigarette, anyway?”
“I do all kinds of things you don't know about. I have a whole other life.”
She nodded. “Maybe I will go in,” she said. “I'm beat.”
“Okay.”
“It's just that he loses control sometimes,” she said. “I think he's getting better. He's trying. We have to be patient.”
“Have you ever noticed how he never breaks stuff?” Billy said. “I used to think that, too. That he just, you know, lost control. But tonight after the fracas I was looking at that little glass chicken on the windowsill. You know? We've had it as long as I can remember, it's been sitting right out there in plain sight, and he's never touched it. So, you know, lately I've been thinking, it's us he wants to hurt. He knows what he's doing. If he was really out of control, he'd have smashed that chicken a long time ago.”
“Did he do something to you?”
“Daddy? Nah. He never laid a hand on me.”
“Billy. Come over here, in the light.”
“I'm all right.”
“Tell me what happened.”
“Just a couple of slaps. Open-handed. They were like kisses.”
“I want you to come over in the light. I want to look at you.”
“Forget it,” he said. “I'm really okay. I just want to tell you one thing.”
“What?”
“I'm going to kill him one day, and when I do, I don't want people going around saying I lost control. Okay? When I kill him I'm not going to hurt anybody else, I'm not going to break anything. But still. I want it to be clear. I want you to say you stood out here with me one night and I told you I was going to kill him. Only him. Nobody else. Will you do that? Will you do that for me?”
She hugged her arms more tightly over her breasts. “You are so stupid,” she said. “I wonder sometimes if you know how stupid you are.”
Susan lay on her bed with the light off. Pink daisies swirled darkly on her wallpaper. When she heard the sound of her father's car she got up, put her robe on, and went downstairs. On her way into the kitchen she looked through the dining-room window, but couldn't see Billy in the back yard. Maybe he'd gone to bed; maybe he was walking around the neighborhood. She took milk from the refrigerator, and was setting a saucepan on the burner when her father came in.
“Hi, Daddy,” she said.
He stood in the doorway, looking at her as if he'd known her once, long ago, but couldn't quite recall her name or the circumstances of their acquaintance. Had he been drinking?
“I couldn't sleep,” she said. “You want to have a glass of milk with me?”
“Susan,” he said.
“Sit down,” she said. She pulled a chair out for him at the kitchen table.
“How are you, Susan?” he asked. “How is school?”
She knew this tone of voice: the careful articulation, the suave, earnest formality. When he drank, his accent returned.
“School's fine, Daddy. Well, school's school. Sit. I'm just going to heat this up, it'll only take a minute.”
He leaned carefully against the refrigerator. His face was ardent and innocent as a boy's. He still wore his work clothes, his white shirt and somberly striped tie. He could beat Billy up, stomp out of the house to get drunk, and return hours later with his tie perfectly knotted.
“You are gonna be queen of the prom,” he said. “Sweetheart, I am so proud