came home and found her playing with Rudy. They had all the little plastic figures that I’d bought for him in the museum gift shop—the dinosaurs and polar bears, the Arctic wolves and seals, the great blue whales and giant squids—spread out on the floor. Rudy was pushing the wooden cigar box that served as sled, boat, dirigible, spaceship—whatever mode of transportation his story required—across the blue bath mat that served as lake, ocean, or faraway galaxy. Two polar bears—a big one and a small one—were riding in it.
“The mama bear and baby bear are escaping from the Bombable Snowman,” Rudy was narrating.
“Abominable,” Jill prissily informed him. Then she held up the T. rex that was apparently playing the part of the Abominable Snowman. “Where’s Papa Bear? Can’t he protect Mama Bear and Baby Bear?”
Rudy had stared very hard at the T. rex for several seconds and then swatted it out of Jill’s hand. “Ow!” she had screeched dramatically. It couldn’t have hurt that much. “That wasn’t very nice, Rudy.”
“You’re not very nice,” Rudy had retorted, picking up a triceratops and lobbing it at Jill’s head. The prickly ridges on the dinosaur’s back struck Jill in the forehead and drew blood. Jill squawked as if she’d been clubbed by a baseball bat. I’d stepped in then, but Rudy was already on his feet, kicking at the plastic figures, scattering them across the room, screaming, “There’s no Papa Bear in this story, dumbass!”
Then he ran out. I’d run after him. Later, after Rudy had gone to bed, Jill had confronted me in the shared kitchen. “You’d better open your eyes to what’s going on with that boy or one of these days you’re going to get an unpleasant wake-up call.”
How satisfying it must have been to tell the police that story. He was always violent, he threw things at me, something was really off about him but Tess just wouldn’t see it . . . If you ask me, there’s some bad history there that she’s hiding. And if she’d hide that, well, how can you believe a thing she says?
A door slamming makes me look up. Rachel Lazar storms into the chapel trailing black streamers. One scarf slithers to the floor like a snake. Her eyes dart to me and then she covers her mouth with her hand and scurries over to her friends, who swarm around her and shoot obviously “covert” glances in my direction. Then Dakota lifts her chin defiantly and marches into the back room.
Enough. I get to my feet. I can’t sit here another minute. I’ll go to the police station. Demand to talk to Kevin Bantree. I will tell them that yes, Rudy called me from the Point last night. I went to meet him there. And when I got there Lila was with him. She was breaking up with him. She was breaking his heart. I couldn’t stand to see my son hurt like that—everyone would vouch for my obsessive protectiveness—so I pushed her off the Point. I killed her. It’s all my fault.
And since that last part is true I will make them believe the rest of it.
I’ve made it to the end of the pew but Dakota Wyatt is blocking my way, her face veiled, as if she’s a ghost in a nineteenth-century horror story. “Dakota,” I say, trying to swerve around her. “I don’t have time. I have to go.”
“But I’m supposed to tell you that it’s your turn. The police want to speak with you.”
“Good,” I say, “I’m heading to the station now. I’ll talk to them there.” I bump past Dakota but encounter another obstacle. Haywood Hull is stalled in the middle of the aisle like a foundering trawler.
“Miss Levine,” he says.
The sound of my maiden name in Haywood Hull’s Blueblood Boston accent sends a shiver down my spine. I’m instantly transported back to my schooldays. And from what Jean told me this morning, my old headmaster might very well think I’m one of his adolescent charges. “Mr. Hull,” I say, careful not to call him headmaster, “such a terrible day. I’m afraid I have to be going—”
“I need to have a word with you,” he says, reaching a trembling hand toward my arm.
I do not want him to touch me but neither do I want to be seen batting an old man’s arm away. I step back and motion for him to sit down in the pew. Dakota is still hovering in the aisle.
“Tell the police I’ll be