Real Bad Things(11)

The illness? Mono. The kissing disease. Georgia Lee hadn’t thought her mom could come up with something so clever. That her dad’s “concern” could manifest in something so cruel.

One month without contact from Jane. One month with only her bedroom walls and en suite bathroom. One month without news, friends, phone calls, TV, radio, anything. One month with Jane’s face and words on repeat in her mind.

By the time Georgia Lee’s parents let her out of her room, Jane had left town and Georgia Lee had lost ten pounds and any chance of a scholarship, academic or otherwise. At church, she smiled weakly when the preacher thanked the Lord for her recovery. She got saved. Rebaptized. And buried thoughts of Jane and all they’d done, including that night. The Maud police had even moved on. Corpus delicti—no body, no evidence, no crime.

But now?

“Baby?” Rusty said behind her.

Georgia Lee planted a smile on her face, tried to mentally wash her thoughts in case they revealed themselves, and turned toward him.

He squatted behind her chair and wrapped his arms around her. Good and strong. A good man. She gripped his arm.

“I’m sorry,” he said. “I know things are hard right now with the election.”

“No, I’m sorry,” she told him, and she was. About her behavior. About her recent and more frequent fantasies of living alone. About how this troublesome news could affect him and the boys. About how that one night when she was seventeen could ruin all their lives. “I’m sorry about supper. I’ll come home early tomorrow. I can cook up that—”

“Hush.” He kissed her on the head. “I don’t care about supper. I want you to be all right.”

“I am all right.” She disliked insinuations to the contrary, even when they were correct. “I just had an annoying day at work. Can’t nobody—”

“Keep Georgia Lee down,” he finished for her. He laughed in that easy way that cracked her armor. He was her best friend. “Why don’t you come inside?” he asked. “I’ll turn off the TV. We’ll sit and talk, and if the boys start acting up, I’ll beat their asses for you.”

She squeezed his arm. “You’d do that for me?”

“Hell, I’ll beat their butts and lock ’em out of the house for the night.”

“True love.” She swiped at her eyes. The tears were real. She hoped he could see. She hoped he knew she was still in there. That good girl. The one he’d married, so far from who she’d been with Jane.

He gave her one last kiss on the head. “Let’s get a move on, Miss Lane.” Though his tone was kind, the words cut. She wouldn’t change her last name when they married, and it still bothered him. But she couldn’t. Though she was barely aware of it at the time, she knew she needed to keep something of her own before being swallowed by the future and all its unknowns.

Disquiet yawned and stretched within her like long-dormant fault lines, cutting through his kindness. She released her grip and patted his arm. “I’ll be there in a sec.”

He made a move toward her bottle of wine. She clutched it.

“I’ll be there in a sec,” she repeated, trying to keep her tone friendly. He didn’t like it when she sounded angry, even though he could sound angry. He didn’t like her drinking, even though he drank. Didn’t like her close-to-but-not-quite cussing, even though he cussed. There were rules for women, and there were rules for men.

He held his hands up in surrender, offered a warm smile she couldn’t bring herself to return. Instead, she turned her focus to some random point ahead of her.

After he closed the door, she took three deep, cleansing breaths. She would do what she always did. She would remain calm. She would manage the situation. Like old times. Like always.

She unscrewed the lid on her wine. Drinking was her reward for positive thinking. But then she paused.

She set the bottle of wine on the deck floor and steepled her hands for prayer. The wine could wait until she entered the house, closed the door, and drew down the blinds on the pressures of a public life and the frustrations of the private one.

Dear Lord . . .

Thinking better of it, she slipped out of the deck chair and onto her knees, facing the yard, the moon. This latest news from the lock? Nothing but a hurdle. Every winner had those.

They could see things, and they could tell their stories, but they would never know what was in her heart. They would never hear the words she whispered.

Dear Lord, please forgive us for what we did to that man.





Five

JANE

Jane woke with a start. Dreams and memories clung like a film across her mind. Every bone in her body complained from sitting, then walking, then sitting some more. She shielded her eyes from the headlights in the drive.

Diane eased out of the car, purse clenched tight. She peered into the shadows where Jane sat. “Who’s there?”

“Jane.” Then, after a pause: “Your daughter.”

Just speaking the words made Jane shake all over. The last time they’d seen each other had been the day of the confession.

Fry her ass.

She could still hear Diane screaming those words as the officers walked Jane out of the trailer in handcuffs after Jane confessed to Warren’s murder. When they eventually let her go for lack of evidence, Jane had broken into the trailer while Diane was at work and Jason at school. She’d grabbed whatever she could fit into a bag and hauled ass out of town.