Harder (Caroline & West #2)(8)

I wanted to say, Define strange, but he looked so tired, I decided to let it go.

Things are already strange. I assume they can only get stranger.

I sneeze loudly and then sniff, wishing I’d packed tissues. Stupid allergies. Dust and mites, mold and dander—all it means is that I never know when someplace is going to set me off. I keep Claritin in my purse, but all I found when I fished around was an empty plastic pill bubble, half-squashed.

I’m going to have to go down the narrow wooden staircase that brought me up here and try to find Joan. Ask if she’s got something I can take.

I hope she’s not asleep already.

When I shift to my side, preparing to move, Frankie says, “Caroline?”

I freeze. In front of me, there are bare two-by-fours with wiring stapled to them. A water stain, dark at the edges, bowed plywood in the middle. A small square window and the moon outside, nearly full.

Behind me, there’s a little girl whose father is dead.

West wanted me here, with her. But what did he want me to say?

“Yeah?”

“Do you think he’ll leave again?”

“Who, West?”

“Yeah.”

I turn toward her and prop myself up on one elbow.

Her sleeping bag is close enough to mine that I can see it rise and fall with her breath.

Hers is My Little Pony. Mine’s Spider-Man.

Her eyes are so big in the dim lighting. She’s got her mother’s brown eyes and sharp chin, but the rest of her is West—cheekbones like wings, eyebrows that come to a peak, a wide mouth, and thick, dark hair. She’s beautiful and so young, her front teeth a little too big for her face.

“I don’t know,” I say honestly.

“But what do you think?”

“I think … I guess he’ll do whatever he decides is best.”

She’s quiet. Then, “Did he ask you to come?”

“No.”

“Why did you, then?”

“I thought … I could help.”

She rises to her elbow, mirroring my position. “What can you do?”

“Not much,” I admit. “Keep you company, if you want me to.”

“Can I tell you something?” she asks.

No. Don’t tell me anything. I don’t know what I’m doing. But that’s just cowardice. I’ve learned to ignore it. “Sure.”

“Mom told them I wasn’t there. But I was. I saw what happened.” Her eyes gleam, wet. “I saw.”

“Do you want to … talk about it?”

She shakes her head. Her tears brim over.

I disentangle my arms from the sleeping bag and put them around her, pulling her close and rubbing her thin small shoulders. “Shh,” I say to this shaking girl. “Shh, shh, it’ll be all right.”

I have no idea if it will.

After a while, her breathing settles and slows. I can tell when she falls asleep—she gets heavier against me.

I’ve been holding back a sneeze for a while now, inhaling deeply and squeezing my eyes shut. As soon as I can, I ease out from beside her and slip down the stairs.

West’s grandma sits with a mug at the table, knitting. A wall-mounted TV flashes a muted newscast. A radio plays oldies, while a crackling noise pours out of what I think might be a police scanner.

Bright pink letters across the front of her long white sleep shirt say “San Francisco.”

Her arms are pale, the flesh loose and veined with red fireworks.

“She asleep?”

“Yeah.”

“Tough kid.”

I guess she is. She kind of has to be.

“You want some coffee?” Joan asks.

“Is it decaf, or …?”

“I don’t drink decaf.”

“No, I’m good. I was just going to duck into the bathroom for a second.”

The toilet seat is freezing. There’s a hole in the plaster above the head end of the tub, positioned so I imagine someone creating it with the back of their skull. Tapping until they dented the sheetrock, pounding until the plaster crumbled.

I sneeze three times on the toilet.

“You have a cold?” she asks when I come out.

“Allergies.”

“You need Sudafed or something?”

“Any kind of antihistamine would be great.”

She gets up carefully, the movements of a woman who’s no longer comfortable in her body. A minute later, she’s back with a bottle of generic allergy medicine and a glass of water.

“Thanks.” I take the pills, then sneeze again.

She pours herself more coffee and sits.

“You and West are close,” she says.

My head is full of snot. It’s too late for me to feel clever, too dark outside for bullshit. “We were.”

“He left Frankie with you.”

“He doesn’t want me here.”

She gives me a pitying look. “Doesn’t want to want you here, more like it.”

We’re quiet. The kitchen fills with the crackling murmuring gibberish of the scanner and the love-complaint of some long-ago vocalist on the radio.

“He tell you how long it’s been since he let me get a look at his face?” Joan asks.

“He said six years, but he didn’t say why.”