A Deep and Dark December(43)

Graham helped his mother into her chair and took his seat. She reached her hand out to Graham across the table. It had been so long since Graham had said grace before eating that it took him a moment to react. Her hand was too small and fragile in his, like a bird wing made of glass. He averted his gaze, trying to avoid how thin her skin was, how the veins stood too proud, blue streaks running through age spots, and how her wedding ring no longer fit, the setting sliding off center.

On his other side he took Ham’s hand. Growing up, he’d measured his own hands against his father’s so often he couldn’t deny the changes that were there, too, how old and shaky Ham had become. He bowed his head, not in prayer, but in acknowledgment that the two people he’d relied on all his life now depended on him. Whether they realized it or not. Whether he wanted the responsibility or not.

He listened to Ham recite the prayer he’d said every night of Graham’s childhood. With his eyes closed, Graham could hear the strain in his father’s voice, the boom of it dampened by illness and age. Graham prayed for the first time in years, asking for more time with his parents and the strength to stay and endure it.

“Amen,” Ham finished and pulled his hand from Graham’s at the same moment his mother did.

Graham hesitated before dragging his hands into his lap. The cold emptiness left behind at their withdrawal echoed in every corner of his mind and body.

“Amen,” Graham repeated, sending his prayer off with a measure of guilt.

“You should’ve invited Susie for dinner,” Catherine said to Graham.

Ham paused in the act of slicing the roast to give Graham a meaningful stare. She was talking about Susie Philpot, his high school girlfriend, Graham suddenly realized.

Graham grabbed the spoon for the lima beans and shoveled some onto his plate, avoiding his mother’s gaze. “She has a report due tomorrow.”

“That’s too bad. I was hoping we could coordinate your outfits for prom… or is it winter formal?”

“The one that’s held in the fall,” Ham interrupted. “Please pass the lima beans, Cate.”

“Lima beans?”

“I got it, Mom.” Graham handed the pan to Ham, and Catherine, like a train jumping tracks, launched into a story about picking pumpkins in the fall with her sisters when she was a child.

Jiggling his leg like a piston, Graham kept his head down and his mouth full. It was all too much. He’d avoided his parent’s reality, but it had chased him down, pinning him beneath its weight. He could almost hear the crashing surf of the bluffs, luring him like a lover, the need to escape rising with every forkful of food. He wished his phone would ring.

Then he remembered that Erin should’ve called him.

Something was wrong. He didn’t know how he knew, he just did. He dropped his fork with a clatter, startling a gasp of reproach out of his mother, and pulled his phone from his pocket. Nothing.

“Duty calls?” Ham asked, a note of reprimand in his voice.

“What? Yeah.” Graham jammed his phone in his pocket and took the excuse his father handed him. “Gotta run.” He leapt up and came around the table to kiss his mother on the cheek. “Thanks for dinner, Mom. It was delicious.”

“Where are you going?” she asked. “I made a cake.”

Graham inched toward the door. “Save me a piece?”

Ham patted his wife’s hand. “Let the boy go. He’s anxious to see his girl.” Ham gave his wife’s hand a squeeze that Graham felt deep in his chest. “I remember being just as eager to see my girl.”

“Oh, Ham.”

“Why don’t we take our cake upstairs?” He heard his dad whisper suggestively to his mom.

Graham was out the door before his mother answered. His parents’ relationship both embarrassed him and made him proud. Sometimes late at night he’d wonder if he’d ever have what they have. If he’d ever settle down and have kids. If he’d ever want his son to be a cop just like him.

With a chirp of tires, he pulled away from his parents’ house. As he wound his way through the darkened streets of San Rey, his thoughts went to Erin and why she hadn’t called. He pulled out his phone and dialed her number. It went straight to voicemail. He tossed his phone into the cup holder and pressed harder on the gas pedal, careening around the corner where Fine’s Hardware stood. He passed the Clippity-Do-Da and turned onto the street that would take him to Erin’s house.

Her house was dark, but her car was parked in the drive. That didn’t mean anything. She could have walked into town or, he thought—with more animosity than he should have—she could’ve decided to overlook the affair between Keith and Deidre and gone out on a date with her boyfriend. He slammed his car door harder than necessary and stomped up her front steps. He knocked, then knocked again. The silence that greeted him ratcheted up the sensations he’d had when he realized she should’ve called. Somewhere in the distance a dog barked.

Why hadn’t she called?

She should’ve left the porch light on. The sense that something was off fisted inside his chest, constricting his breath. He examined the door and the frame, fighting off the urge to boot the door open and charge inside. No sign of forced entry. The windows were closed, but the curtains were parted slightly. He wrestled with the bushes beneath the window to get a look inside. Cupping his hands around his eyes, he peered through the window. A light was on somewhere deeper inside the house. Something was off. His instincts screamed at him.