The Lifeguards(74)

Charlie was staring at her, his mouth slightly open.

“I pretended Roma sold drugs. I was just going to report her to the police. I thought it would give me…I don’t know…a few weeks. She poisoned Xavier. She’s going to kill him, Liza. She’s going to kill him.”

“Whitney—”

“You’d do the same, right?” said Whitney, raising her deadened gaze to me. “If someone were trying to hurt Charlie, you’d do anything…wouldn’t you?”





-8-


    Annette


ANNETTE HEADED TOWARD LAREDO, but her son said, “Stop.”

“We’re going to see Grammy and Pops,” said Annette.

Robert held up his phone, showing her a message from Xavier: MEET ME AT SECRET CAVE ASAP? I NEED YOU.

“Mom, I need to go back,” said Robert.

“No,” said Annette.

“Xavier says he needs me,” said Robert, and Annette felt a twinge.

The highway rolled out before them, blinding in the afternoon sun, filled with trucks and car exhaust and the hovering fumes of gasoline. It was her way out.

She paused, approaching a U-turn.





-9-


   Cellphone Transcript Record


   512-XXX-XXXX


                     XAVIER

      Meet me at Secret Cave ASAP? I need you.





                 CHARLIE

      What’s up?



            CHARLIE

      Xavier?



            CHARLIE

      Omw





                 BOBCAT

      Did you mean to text me too?



            BOBCAT

      Xav?



            BOBCAT

      Omw





-10-


    Liza


“I WAS THE ONLY one,” said Whitney. “I was the only one who could stop her.”

“Oh, Whitney,” I said. I knew that Whitney was telling the truth, maybe for the first time in a long time. I understood how terrible it felt to have no plan—to accept that life was an uncontrollable chaos—and how powerful the belief that you were in control of your children’s lives could be. How you could desire the illusion of control so much that to keep it intact, you would become someone you didn’t even recognize.

“It’s the same as what you did,” said Whitney, her voice crackling with anger, gaining strength. “You made up a story about Patrick, and then you lived in that story—you made me help you.”

Charlie looked directly at me. “We don’t have to pretend anymore, Mom,” he said. “Not about Dad, not about anything. I’m OK. I’m good. Look at me, Mom. We’re OK.”

My son. I had taught him to be scared. I had believed I could buy his way to safety, keep all my sad secrets from him. But everything I’d built—the patchwork of employment straining to rip, a house with a fancy address but duct-taped pipes, rich and feckless friends—it was worthless. None of these people or things belonged to me.

Only Charlie, who was mine.

As I looked at his face, I began to see my sister. My blood sister, the one I had left in Cape Cod. Charlie’s cheekbones were the same as Darla’s, his red hair her shade, and his expression—defiant yet hopeful—reminded me powerfully of her.

My sister, so small, looking up at me, starting to realize her life was tough, but still clinging to a belief that I would be the barrier between her and the ugliness beyond. She’d grip my hand when we left our trailer, assuming I could hold her.

But I had let her go.

I had run.

Where were my mother and Darla now? Could I find them and begin to mend what I had ripped apart?

Charlie waited, watching me, to see if I would let him down again.

“Please,” said Whitney. “Charlie, if you can just stay quiet, just do nothing…”

“Mom,” said Charlie in a low but audible voice.

I turned to him.

“Choose me, Mom,” said Charlie.

Whitney’s demeanor changed as she slipped her regal persona back on like a royal costume. She breathed through her nose, raised her chin. “I wish you were a real friend,” she said.

“Whitney, I am a real friend—” I said. I reached down and gripped a chair for balance, the leather sickeningly soft and warm beneath my palm. My other hand landed on the desk, fingering the edge of a decorative sculpture, a two-foot-tall brass replica of the Eiffel Tower.

Whitney stared at me for a long moment. And then she said, “Goodbye.”