unwrap her delicate self from my body. She should’ve been a model, I swear. As she does, I take in the scene behind her. Auntie Susan is in the waiting area too. My God, I barely even recognized her. I don’t see Dad anywhere. The only other people in here include the woman working behind the desk and a man with his son in the opposite corner of the waiting area. There are only two rows of seats on the right side of the entrance. But we have our own corner it appears, judging by the two coats spilling over one chair and where Auntie has her purse on the coffee table next to two cups of what I know is tea. None of the women in my family drink coffee but me.
My gaze is brought back to Cadence when she sniffs and wipes her eyes, apologizing with that hint of shame for breaking down. Steadying her with a grip on her forearm, I ask her, “Where’s Dad?” The rustling of the plastic around the flowers is all I get in response because Cadence breaks down again, silently crying and walking off to gather a tissue.
Hitching my purse up my shoulder and straightening my coat, I take my time making my way to my auntie.
I set the flowers and my purse down on the end of the coffee table and take off my coat, laying it on the third seat from the end. My auntie in the corner, then my sister, then me.
“Hi Auntie,” I greet her, stepping in front of my sister to lean down and give my auntie a hug. I expect it to be brief but she holds on to me tight, whispering that she’s glad I’m here before she releases me.
Her tone is tense and that’s what keeps me from asking the question again: it’s just her arm, isn’t it? Dread is a difficult thing to swallow; even more difficult to talk through.
“Dad’s talking to the police.” My sister speaks up before the silence passes too long. Her slender fingers run under her eyes gracefully before wiping the mascara that mars the tip of her fingers on her black skinny jeans. I know my sister very well, and she simply threw on those clothes. Yet, she still looks beautiful. Her hair in curls, her face fresh and bright eyed. She’s wearing a chunky cream knit sweater that hangs just low enough to show her chest and the cream against her light brown skin complements her perfectly.
Even with tears in her eyes, she’s beautiful. And she looks just like Mom. Everyone used to say it growing up; her skin is lighter than Mom’s, but that’s the only difference between them. She got our mother’s femininity, and I got our father’s intellect and ruthlessness.
“Why?” I question, crossing my ankles and observing, taking everything in. “What happened that he has to talk to the police?”
My auntie looks off in the distance, staring at the worn mural on the far wall. It’s nothing special, a mundane piece of art displaying trees and a sunrise made of tiny mosaic tiles. Something to comfort people and do nothing more. My auntie stares blankly at it while my sister stares at me, her hand landing on my forearm.
“She broke her arm; she said she fell. But the other bruises are older and she has a number of fractures.” My sister whispers the last sentence, swallowing harshly as she lets the implication hang in the air.
My first thought is that it’s been a long time since they’ve fought. We were children back then and he never touched her like that after. How awful is it, that I know even as my chest goes tight and my fingers cold, that he’s hit her before and yet I don’t want to believe the accusation.
“Did he hit her?” I ask outright. How the question comes out evenly, I don’t know. I can feel them both staring at me, their eyes boring holes into the side of my face as I stare at the steel elevator doors, wishing a doctor would come down and say I could see my mother, so I can ask her, rather than sitting here with people who don’t know. They don’t know. Mom would tell me. She’d tell me the truth. They had their problems early on, but they’re over. She broke her arm, that’s all.
Dad wouldn’t do that; he wouldn’t hit her. My mother is a strong woman. She wouldn’t let him.