Miracle Creek(112)
“Anyway,” Abe said, “I’ll arrange to have you all come in for some questions. In the meantime, I know this is shocking and a lot to absorb. But hopefully, you and all the other victims can find some peace and move forward.”
Victims. The word grated at Young, and she forced herself not to wince. Her legs felt weak. Achy, like she’d been standing for hours.
Once Abe left, Young leaned against the door, her forehead on the rough, unfinished wood. She closed her eyes and remembered meeting Elizabeth in the courthouse, just a few hours ago. She’d figured out by then that it was Mary, had known that Elizabeth was innocent. She could see that Elizabeth was feeling ashamed and alone, and she let her apologize to her and said nothing. For all her talk of how they should confess immediately and save Elizabeth from one more moment’s torture, when given the opportunity to take action, to tell Elizabeth the truth, Young didn’t. She ran away. And Elizabeth died.
Behind her, Pak sighed, long and heavy, again and again, as if he was having trouble drawing oxygen into his lungs. After a minute, Pak started speaking, back in Korean again. “None of us could’ve known…” His voice broke. After another minute, he cleared his throat. “Maybe we should talk to Matt and Janine, find out what Abe was talking about. If we can get through this one last thing, maybe…”
Young felt a tickle in her throat. Soft at first, then building as Pak continued talking about what they needed to say to Abe, and she couldn’t stand it anymore, she needed to laugh or sob or both. She clenched her hands into fists, shut her eyes tight, and screamed like Elizabeth had in court—was that just this morning?—until her throat hurt and she ran out of breath. She opened her eyes and turned. She looked at Pak, this man who hadn’t taken even five minutes to mourn Elizabeth’s death before planning the logistics of their cover-up, and said, back in Korean, “We did this. We killed Elizabeth, we pushed her to kill herself. Do you even care?”
Pak looked away, his face crumpled up in so much shame that it pained her to look at him. Beside him, Mary was crying. She said, “Don’t blame Ap-bah. It was my fault. I set the fire and killed people. I should have come forward right away, but I kept saying nothing. And now, Elizabeth is dead, too. I did this.”
“No,” Pak said to Mary, “you kept silent because you thought Elizabeth set up the fire to kill Henry. This morning, as soon as you found out she didn’t, you wanted to go to Abe. If I hadn’t stopped you…” Pak’s voice trailed off. He shut his eyes tight and clenched his teeth, as if it took all his effort to keep his face from crumbling.
“We can all make excuses,” Young said. “Until this morning, you both thought Elizabeth was guilty in her own way and deserved to be punished. And maybe, given the way everything unfolded, that’s even understandable. But that doesn’t change the fact that we all lied—to each other and to Abe. We’ve been lying about so many things for a year, deciding for ourselves what’s just or not, what’s relevant or not. We’re all to blame.”
Pak said, “What happened is tragic, and I’d give anything to change the past. But we can’t. The only thing we can do is to move forward. In a strange way, this is a gift to our family.”
“A gift?” Young said. “An innocent woman’s torture and death is a gift?”
“You’re right. That’s not the right word. I only meant there’s no reason to come forward anymore. Elizabeth is gone. We can’t change that. So—”
“So we might as well take advantage of it, consider ourselves lucky that she killed herself?”
“No, but what would be the point of confessing now? Maybe if she had family, someone who’s affected, but there’s no one.”
Young felt blood drain from her limbs, her muscles lose their strength. Something seemed stuck in her throat, like an invisible hand choking her. “So say nothing and pretend Elizabeth set the fire? The blame will die with her, and we’ll get insurance money and move to L.A. and Mary will go to college? That’s your new plan?”
“There’s no chance of anyone being hurt by this. This will all end,” he said.
“I know you believe that, but you believed that about your first plan, too. You thought putting a cigarette by the oxygen wouldn’t hurt anyone, but two people ended up dead. Your second plan, letting Elizabeth go through the trial—another death. And now you have a third plan, another plan where you know, you’re sure, everything will be okay? How many more dead bodies will it take before you learn? You can’t guarantee results. This started as an accident, but covering everything up has turned all of us into murderers.” Her throat hurt, and she realized she was shouting and Mary sobbing. For the first time she could remember, the sight of Mary’s tears didn’t make her want to ease her daughter’s pain. She wanted Mary to hurt, to think of what she’d done and feel an unbearable shame, because the alternative would mean the unthinkable, that she was a monster.
Mary put her elbows on the table and covered her face with her hands. Young pulled Mary’s hands away from her face. “Look at me,” she said to Mary. “You’ve been trying to just wish this away, like a little kid with a monster in a nightmare. But you can’t escape this.” She looked at Pak. “You think staying silent won’t harm anyone? Look at our daughter. This is killing her. She needs to face what she’s done, not run away. You think if she gets off, she’ll have a moment’s peace? That you or I will? This will stay with her and destroy her.”