of it. If you’re always waiting for it to go away, you almost can’t stand to have it in the first place. That’s how I felt with you, Lara. Our pleasure, those deep moments we shared, the union of our bodies, it was as much agony as it was ecstasy. I think I always knew he’d hurt you, that I couldn’t stop him. Now I just try to keep him from hurting anyone else who doesn’t deserve it.
“I’m not pushing her? Trying too hard? William thinks I’m hovering too much.”
“Pushing is okay, as long as you comfort her if she falters, and help her keep trying after that.”
“It might help if you were there?” she says. Shyly, a question.
“I’ll be there,” I say.
I look at my planner, an old-school leather-and-paper behemoth that sits on the desk. The weekdays are packed, every single section filled with scrawl. The weekends, on the other hand, are totally blank into infinity, page after page of nothing. Live your life, Hank. Love, laugh, find someone, start a family. Jesus, get a dog. That’s how you honor Tess. Not like this. That was your sage advice the last time we communicated. A long time ago now.
I pencil the party in, the time, the address. It’s not really a personal invitation, I tell myself. It’s more about helping Angel through a transition that might be uncomfortable.
“Are you going to keep looking into it? Angel’s story.”
“I have one more person I can call.”
She’d stopped hugging her bag, put it on the ground and leaned forward.
“I was wondering if we should just let it go?” Worry etched into her brow.
“Why?”
“Because I want her to move on. If something did happen there, and she was a witness, doesn’t that just hook her into the past, keep her reliving trauma and abuse?”
I get it. She wants to speed Angel on the road to wellness, to a kind of normal. But here’s the thing—you can’t just take the intact pieces forward and try to glue them into a person. You have to bring all the broken, shattered bits, as well. If something happened to Angel there and no one ever deals with it, and worse, no one believes her, that’s a wound that might not heal. I tell her as much.
She listens, nods slowly. I can tell by the way her eyes dart to the left, she’s accessing memories. By the drain of blood from her face, I can tell they’re not good ones. Then, “But we don’t always get justice, do we? Wrongs aren’t always made right. And bad people get away with the worst things—all the time. Do we cling to that, use it as a reason to not move forward into whatever life we may have ahead? Do we stay broken because the people who broke us didn’t get what they deserved?”
The heat comes up to my cheeks and I find I can’t meet her gaze, drop my eyes to a faceted paperweight on my desk. When the light strikes it just right, it casts rainbow shards on the wall behind me.
Yes, I thought, not without a twist of shame. Yes, in fact, some of us do just that.
TWENTY-SEVEN
Really?
Her husband’s hair was a crazed tousle, shirt dotted with mashed avocado, and the kitchen—the aftermath of a kid hurricane, a colorful muddle of Lily’s plastic dishes, sippy cups, utensils, Greg’s coffee cup and lunch plate. The floor, an obstacle course of toys.
“Wow,” said Rain, putting down her bag. “Four hours?”
“I think I’ll head upstairs and pack,” said Gillian diplomatically.
Greg handed Lily over and collapsed on the couch with a great sigh.
It would have been funny if it wasn’t also kind of annoying. Was the hardwiring just different? The whole caregiving thing just not in the male DNA?
Rain wiped the baby’s face, then set about cleaning up the kitchen with Lily balanced on her hip. It took about a minute to clean up, wipe up, even with Lily grabbing for everything.
“It’s not like it’s hard,” he was saying, arm over his eyes. “Not in a bad way, it’s just that it’s so totally consuming.” He was incredulous.
“I didn’t even take a shower,” he went on, as Rain picked up the scattered toys, tossed them in the wicker bin. “I mean—I couldn’t.”
Four hours. Rain smiled, balancing Lily, closing the dishwasher, starting it.
“Dada!” said Lily, giggling, pointing at her father.
“I get it,” she said, trying to keep the sarcasm out of her voice. “It’s a pretty massive tour of duty. I’m sure you’ll