The Fall of Never(33)

In the end, that was really all she had: two images of the man whom had initiated her creation—the Proud Hunter and the Weeping Behemoth.

After showering and closing her sister’s bedroom window, Kelly came downstairs and walked along the downstairs hallway in search of either her mother or Glenda to complain about the window being opened. She could find neither of them (in such a large house, no matter how many people occupied it, the damnable thing always felt empty).

A noise from the other end of the hallway gathered her attention, and she went to the end of it, pausing outside what had once been her father’s purple room. The two oak double-doors were not completely closed and there was a light on inside, so she came up to the crack between the two doors and peered in.

She saw her father standing in the middle of the room, his back facing the doors. With only a moment’s hesitation, she pushed the doors open and took one step inside.

“Daddy,” she said.

The room was no longer purple. In fact, it was no longer anything. The hardwood floor was carpetless and caked with dust. The grandiose oil paintings had been removed, the only indication of their existence the darkened rectangles of wood paneling left in their stead. The purple velvet drapes were gone too, having been replaced by functional white blinds. And all those staring animal heads were gone now as well.

He turned to the sound of her voice, and she half-expected him to look just the way he did in her memories, maybe even caressing a tumbler of brandy. But when he turned and faced her, she saw that he was now only the rudimentary caricature of that man, with pieces long lost and too forgotten to be remembered.

“Kelly,” he said. His eyes had dulled over the years and he’d lost too much weight. “This is good.”

She went to him and hugged him awkwardly with one arm. He reciprocated, his movements stiff and confused. He smelled faintly of powder and sleep.

“I was beginning to think I wouldn’t see you,” she said.

“Everything is all right? The trip in—it was fine?”

“Fine.”

“All right.”

She wanted to ask him what happened to his room, what happened to the crushed velvet drapes and the stupid stares of the bodiless wildlife, but didn’t.

“You look well,” he told her. “You’re healthy?”

“I’m good, Dad.”

“That’s good.” He smiled the slightest bit. “And married?”

“Divorced.”

“Did he hit you?” he asked. “Hurt you?”

It was an abrupt question, one she hadn’t anticipated. After a brief hesitation, she said, “No, of course not. It just wasn’t right.”

“But you’re happy now?”

“I’m good,” she said again.

“It’s unfortunate,” he said, his words coming slow, “that it had to be under these circumstances…”

“I’d like to stay until Becky wakes up.”

He nodded. “That’s good. The police explained things to you, then?”

She shook her head. “No,” she said. “No one did. Not mother, not the police. Glenda started to, but…”

“You shouldn’t have to hear such things from Glenda.”

I shouldn’t have to get phone calls in the middle of the night from a stranger telling me my sister’s been beaten half to death, either, she thought.

“Why isn’t she in a hospital where there are doctors and they can keep an eye on her?”

“Because this is where she belongs,” he said.

“That makes no sense.”

“This is her home, Kelly. It was yours once too, in case you’ve forgotten.”

“There should be doctors watching her.”

“Doctors come here,” he said. “There’s nothing they can do in a hospital that they can’t do here.”

“Why is she still unconscious?”

“Why?” mulled her father. He turned away from her and stared at the white blinds over the windows. Outside, it was falling dark. “Why do people do things that hurt other people? Can you answer that question for me? Why did your sister almost die that night? Why did she even leave the house? I don’t know the answers, Kelly, do you? If you know, I’d like you to tell me. Tell me what you know.”

She was at a loss. “I don’t know,” she said.

“So you don’t know then too.” Then he turned back to face her, and his eyes were more alive. “You’ve hated us for a long time,” he said. It was not a question. “It was because we sent you to that hospital.”

“Hospital?” Barred windows, straps on the bedposts. “It was a goddamn asylum. I was fifteen years old.”

“It was a place for you to get better, to get well, and your mother and I didn’t want to see you going through any more pain.”

“Pain,” she repeated, beginning to tremble.

“We didn’t know what else to do. How could we watch you fall apart like that without doing anything about it? You were fifteen, yes, but you had some sort of nervous breakdown. You shut down, shut everyone out. You wouldn’t talk, wouldn’t eat, wouldn’t move, for Christ’s sake. A parent doesn’t just watch that happen—”