Don’t Let Me Go(36)

“Well, hello, little lady,” he said.

So, that was kind of weird, Grace thought. I mean, who talks like that?

“Who are you?” she asked.

“I’m the building super,” he said, which didn’t sound like a thing that made sense in any way.

Felipe, who knew her well enough to know she needed help, said, “Casper is the man who comes and fixes things in our building. The landlord sends him over when something needs fixing.”

Grace narrowed her eyes and looked up at Casper.

“Then how come I’ve never once seen you here?”

Casper laughed in one big, rude snort, and then said, “Guess nothing needed fixing.”

“Are you kidding me? Everything in this place needs fixing.”

Casper stopped smiling.

That was the moment Grace noticed that Mr. Lafferty’s door was standing open just a crack.

“He’s home! Mr. Lafferty is finally home! I have to go tell him thank you.”

A split second later she found herself in Felipe’s arms, her feet dangling and swinging two feet off the ground.

“No,” was all Felipe said.

“Get her,” the super said, though Felipe pretty much already had. “Don’t let her go in there. My God, she’ll have nightmares for a month. Besides, it’s not even sanitary. It’s a biohazard. It’ll have to be professionally cleaned by one of those bio teams that cost a fortune. Owner’ll be pissed.”

Grace relaxed slightly into Felipe’s arms.

“Why can’t I go in?” Grace whispered in his ear.

“Because Mr. Lafferty passed away,” Felipe said.

“Does that mean died?”

“Yeah.”

“Oh.”

Just at that moment Rayleen’s voice came booming up the stairs, calling for Grace, because Grace hadn’t actually bothered to mention that she was going.

“Grace? Where’d you go, honey?”

“Yeah, come up and get the kid,” Casper shouted back, startling Grace. “She’s got no business up here. Take her downstairs.”

Grace looked up to see Rayleen standing at the end of the hall, looking uncomfortable.

“Oh,” Casper said. “I thought it was her mother.”

Rayleen didn’t seem to like that, and she didn’t answer it, either. She just marched down the hall and took Grace from Felipe and held her tightly.

“It was just like you thought,” Casper said. “The…situation…you know, with Lafferty. So thanks for phoning it in. Because, you know, if nobody had noticed for a week, it would’ve been an even bigger mess than it is now. Although, considering how much of a mess it is now, that’s pretty hard to imagine.”

“Come on, Grace,” Rayleen said. “Let’s just go downstairs now.”

? ? ?

“So you knew,” Grace said.

She was sitting at Rayleen’s kitchen table, drinking a glass of milk and occasionally glancing up at the ceiling.

“No,” Rayleen said. “I didn’t know. I wondered. There’s a difference.”

“But you didn’t tell me.”

“Because it might not have been true. And then I would’ve just been getting you all upset over nothing.”

“Well, I’m sure upset now,” Grace said.

“I know you are, honey. I know. We all are.”

“But you didn’t even like him.”

“No. But I didn’t wish anything like that for him.”

“Why did he do it?”

“I don’t know. I really didn’t know him very well.”

“Why do you think?”

Rayleen sighed. “I guess he was unhappy. When people are mean, it usually tells you they’re unhappy.”

“He wasn’t mean to me,” Grace said.

But she never got an answer from Rayleen about that. Maybe no answer was even necessary. It was just true, and it was too late for anybody to explain it to her now. Or even to themselves.

“He was nice to me three times, all just in the last few days or so. So that’s a lot of times, right?”

Rayleen seemed to be lost in thought, but then she came to, just a little bit, like something woke her up from a nap.

“Three?” she asked.

But Grace’s train of thought had moved along by then. “We need to have a meeting.”

“Who?”

“All of us. You and me and Billy and Felipe.”

“What kind of meeting? About what?”

“Well, that’s why you have a meeting,” Grace said. “To tell everybody what the meeting’s about. I’ll go get Felipe.”

She ran for the door, but Rayleen called after her, saying, “Don’t go up there, Grace. Just call him from the bottom of the stairs.”

“Right, right, I know,” Grace said, because it made her a little impatient to be treated like she wouldn’t know a thing like that already.

“Wait,” Rayleen said. “Before you go. You said Mr. Lafferty did three nice things for you. But I only know about two.”

Grace sighed deeply, thinking it should be perfectly self-explanatory.

“The dance floor,” she said, holding up one finger. “The tap shoes,” she said, adding a second. “And he told me what we’re doing wrong with my mom. So that’s three. So now can I go get Felipe?”