Good Neighbors(89)

Gertie continues to live in the house they shared in Van Nuys, California. I visited her there. The house is a split-level ranch. There’s a white picket fence, but the lawn is untended. Squatters occupy many of the surrounding houses, now that temperatures regularly reach 120 degrees.

Gertie sat across from me on an old couch and spoke between her grandchild’s squawks. The child is a two-year-old boy, belonging to Julia Wilde, who lives in nearby Sherman Oaks. Julia works as a social worker for foster children. Larry Wilde dropped out of college to found a video game company in Montreal. Both children declined my requests for an interview, but Larry sent this email:

Dear Sir,

Thank you for your interest in my story. It is not mine to tell. It belongs only to a girl who fell a long time ago.

Sincerely,

Larry Wilde

Gertie wore a low-cut shirt and chunky silver necklace with silver eye shadow that matched. Despite all this time on the West Coast, her Brooklyn accent remained thick. I asked her if she believed Arlo had harmed the Maple Street children and she denied it. I asked her how she could be sure.

“You’re the only reporter still schlepping this story of Arlo’s guilt. Nobody else who’s investigated the case agrees with you. But you’re so loud about it that people believe you,” she answered. “You kind of remind me of Rhea.”

I asked her to clarify.

“You know what’s scary? It’s not outside.” Gertie pointed at her heart. “It’s in here. That’s what scared Rhea.

“When I think about Rhea, sometimes I remember this old woman who lived in the apartment next door. She could hardly walk and she was alone most days. One time, I was just too tired. I wasn’t myself and I hadn’t recovered from my breakdown. But Larry didn’t care about that. He was just little. Less than three months. He had spells. And there’d been a snowstorm, so Julia couldn’t get to daycare. We were stuck for the second or third day in a row. Sometimes it’s just like that. A messy scream of a day. And the thing about Julia was that she was always so worried about me, trying to help and scared I’d fall apart. But then, that made her anxious and difficult, too. It’s hard coming from the other side of that, when you’re the mom but you don’t have such great tools to reassure. You feel bad, and that makes you feel ungenerous.

“I got so frazzled I frightened myself. I went next door to Mrs. Cotton, and I knocked and as soon as she answered I started crying. I looked a mess. She followed me back and she sat and watched while I tried to calm the kids. Entertain them, at least. I wasn’t any good at it. I had no experience with it except what I’d made up or read in books. Mrs. Cotton was too old to do anything. She just sat. She hardly even talked. I probably should have fed her. But then it got late and Larry cried himself tired and Julia finally relaxed. I made her some tea and we sat. She hadn’t done anything. Just been a body in the room, same thing she’d have done at home, but it helped. I had a witness, I told her that day, that I’d been scared I was going to do something bad to them. I acted like it was the most shameful confession in the world. I was sobbing. And she looked at me like I was crazy. We all have those days, she told me.

“After that, she came for every storm. I loved her. And then she moved to a nursing home in Poughkeepsie.

“I think about that lady sometimes, when I think about what happened on Maple Street. I won’t pretend to be as smart as her, but Rhea and I were alike in a lot of ways. The difference was, I wasn’t as scared to show people my mess.”

Gertie broke here, to feed her grandson. She then cranked the generator and turned on a static-riddled screen. Reception on the West Coast is better than most other parts of North America. The child watched, transfixed.

I asked her whether Larry had moved to Canada for a reason.

“The thing is,” she said, leaning forward. “Everything’s falling apart. The heat’s so bad I can’t walk in my own neighborhood. Long Island’s pretty much underwater, so I guess nobody over there’s worried about white trash like me and Arlo lowering property values anymore. Everybody smart moves to Canada. I wish Julia would go, but she’s loyal. She won’t leave those foster kids. And I won’t leave her… People talk about how the children of Maple Street suffered after what happened, like it’s evidence of what Arlo did. But except for those poor twins, the Rat Pack turned out [okay]. They get together every year. They have a ball. Sam’s family keeps complaining about how he stopped playing sports. Who cares? He was the youngest kid to start an LGBTQ club at Garden City Middle School. Dave turned out okay, too. He’s a family therapist. Charlie followed Julia out to LA and makes vegan desserts. They’re gross but he makes Julia happy, so what does my opinion matter? Lainee manages offices. Larry’s earning coin in Montreal… The kid could buy all of Garden City if he wanted. What’s left of it.

“The thing is, the world’s breaking up. Fifteen years ago, we all saw it coming. We still do. Maybe there’s even something we can do about it. But it’s so much easier to invent boogeymen. That’s all we were to Maple Street: boogeymen.”

I asked her how she could be sure, 100 percent beyond a shadow of a doubt, that Arlo Wilde had not molested the children of Maple Street, many of whom were now suffering significantly.

“The question is: What evidence would prove to you that he didn’t?” she asked.