Good Neighbors(53)
“No,” Arlo said. “Josh Fishkin told me to take as long as I need.”
“Are they still gonna pay you?”
Arlo looked at his fingernails, which were clean and filed. She noticed that the kids’ hair was brushed, too; their faces clean. Even under this stress, he’d kept things up. But that was his nature. He was a caretaker. “My name got leaked to the press, so…”
“Leaked how?”
“Just that I’m the guy who wrote that song, and the cops questioned me about what happened to a missing girl. No specifics yet. I was worried paparazzi’d show up at our door, but they’re just using the stuff they find online, plus a picture of our house from the sales records.”
“You’re fired?” she whispered.
“Temporary leave. Half pay.”
“Oh, Arlo.”
“Yeah. It’s not as personal as it feels. On the down low, they told me the division’s closing. It’s a bad time for office products. Nobody really works in offices anymore.”
News played at low volume. On-screen, a picture of the sinkhole flashed, and then Shelly’s seventh-grade class picture. That long, black hair, gossamer as angel wings. Rhea’s voice followed: I just don’t understand it…
“She makes me want to upchuck,” Gertie said.
“The worst. I feel like any second all of Maple Street is gonna drag me out. Dip me in tar ’n’ feathers.”
The kids were listening. This wasn’t for them. Julia stood. Took Larry by the hand. “Can we have some money for Cokes?” she asked. Arlo handed her five dollars, told her to take her time.
Once they were gone, Arlo said, “I don’t think we should go back to Maple Street.”
“Where else is there?”
“Cheerie’s still got that two-bedroom, doesn’t she?”
“Not while I’m alive. Not while I’m dead, either.”
“?’Kay. I called my mom but she took a turn.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Yeah. The Medicare has her covered but she’s in no position… I hate the idea of bringing you back to Maple Street. They got it out for us. The signs are in neon. And the way it affected you…”
She blushed, remembering it from a dense and murky place. “I don’t do well with things in the night. In my bedroom. It’s just a thing with me. I’m not crazy.”
“I know.” Arlo didn’t reach out to her. And that was probably right. Maybe he knew her better than she knew herself. Because she wanted to be touched and consoled by him, her husband, but she wasn’t ready for it yet. The shock of what had happened with the brick was still too fresh. Her nervous system was still in panic mode. “It’s understandable, what with the stuff you’ve been through…”
“Yeah,” Gertie said. “If it hadn’t happened in our bedroom. At night…”
“I know… I talked to Bianchi. He assigned a beat cop to the crescent. But it’s only an eight-hour shift. We’re alone the other sixteen. I’m worried something’ll happen again.”
Gertie took deep breaths to keep from losing control again. “Why are they doing this to us?”
“I don’t know.”
Gertie pressed her hands to her wet eyes. “If they’re so scared of us, why don’t they go? They’re the ones with the money.”
“I think they feel like they’re taking a stand.”
Arlo reached out for her. She flinched. They stayed like that: a hand on a bed, a body inches away. The distance between them felt hot.
“I hate them. I wish they were dead. Every one of them,” she said.
“Yeah.”
The kids came back.
The TV returned from commercial with a new clip. This one was live and in front of the hole, where rescue workers were making a last-effort search. They’d widened the tunnel as much as they’d been able and were now flying in a special diver, just five feet tall, to wriggle through. I trust the truth to come out, Rhea said. My daughter was running from a predator when she fell. I happen to know the police questioned him.
All four of them watched. Thin and shadow-riddled, Rhea looked so haunted by grief that it could have been cancer. Her story was so compelling that even the Wildes almost believed that there was a stranger on Maple Street. A threat.
“It can’t be coincidence. This was her plan since Shelly fell. She’s been laying the track. To blame you,” Gertie whispered.
On-screen, the picture now showed Arlo, standing in front of 116 Maple Street beside Gertie and the kids. Rhea had taken that one, when they’d first moved in. A circle got drawn in red around his neck.
Arlo and the kids looked for the remote in Gertie’s drooling roommate’s bed, but they couldn’t find it. They couldn’t make it stop.
118 Maple Street
Tuesday, July 27
Rhea saw herself on the nighttime news. Static made the image ribbon. It didn’t look like her. Didn’t sound like her. Her face was wrong.
Just like that girl from the Hungarian Pastry Shop.
The hackles along the back of her neck stood on end. She turned, and there was FJ, in the doorway. She had the feeling Ella was there, too, hiding just behind.