All the Ugly and Wonderful Things(71)

Until then, Butch had been shaking his head, but he came around the desk and jerked the phone away.

“You dumb cunt. You called the cops out to the house? You called the cops?” he said.

“Valerie and Liam are dead! Somebody shot them! Yes, I called the police!”

“Fuck! Fuck!” Butch tossed the phone on the desk and ran out through the garage. A moment later we heard the car start and drive away. He’d left us there.

“Oh, sweetheart, I’m sorry,” Kellen said.

Mom looked at Wavy and realized what she’d done: blurted it out with no warning. I’m calling the cops on your fiancé, and by the way, your parents are dead. Wavy started trembling. Kellen put his hands on her hips and walked her back until she was sitting on his lap. Wrapping one arm around her shoulders, he tucked her head under his chin. He kissed her hair and said, “I’m here, Wavy. I’m here.”

It seemed like that would be the end of it. Mom would stop yelling and saying awful things, and Kellen would take care of Wavy. He obviously knew how.

They were still sitting like that five minutes later when a police car pulled up. Mom went outside and, when she came back, two sheriff’s deputies were with her.

“Why don’t you girls step outside?” the younger deputy said, while the older one went into the office.

“Come on, Junior,” he said. “You’re gonna have to come with us.”

“Give us a couple minutes, okay?” Kellen said.

“No, you need to let go of her and stand up.”

“Jesus, Delbert, she just found out her mother’s dead. Give us two goddamn minutes.”

The deputy stepped back and we waited. Kellen set Wavy up on the edge of the desk and for a while they hugged each other. She whispered in his ear, and then she kissed him. That didn’t help the situation with the deputies, because it was a movie kiss, like when the hero and heroine are saying good-bye, and maybe they’re never going to see each other again.

The older deputy said, “That’s enough of that. You need to step back and put your hands on your head, Junior.”

Before he did it, Kellen reached into his pockets and tossed a handful of things on the desk: keys, bolts, a pocket knife, and loose coins that rattled across the desk and tumbled to the floor. He unhooked his wallet and tossed it on the desk, too. I could tell he’d done it before, from the way he turned around and laced his hands on the back of his head. The deputy cuffed him, while Wavy sat on the desk, watching.

The deputy turned to Mom and said, “Normally, we’d get another patrol car to take her to the hospital, but things are a little crazy today. We’ve got a real situation up at the Quinn place.”

“I know. This is their daughter. Have they found her brother yet?”

“Holy crap, ma’am. That’s the Quinn girl?” The deputy blinked. “I don’t know. I didn’t know he was missing.”

“I told Nine-One-One.”

“Well, a whole lot’s happened since then, so I’d better radio the sheriff and let him know.”

“Delbert!” The younger deputy shouted from the far garage bay. “There’s blood over here. A lot of it.”

“Ma’am, I need you to get these girls out of here. If you could take them out to the drive so I can secure this place.”

Mom gathered Leslie and me around her, but when she tried to bring Wavy into our huddle, Wavy refused. She put her arms around Kellen, where he stood next to the desk. Mom grabbed the back of Wavy’s T-shirt and tried to pull her away.

“Miss Quinn, you need to step outside,” the deputy said. Wavy didn’t move.

“Wavy, it’s okay.” Kellen couldn’t put his arms around her, but he leaned down and kissed her. “Go outside with your aunt. I love you. It’s gonna be okay, sweetheart.”

She looked up at him and shook her head, but she let Mom lead her away. Even though Wavy wasn’t fighting anymore, Mom kept her shirt clutched in one fist as we walked out through the garage. As we passed the other deputy, we saw what he was looking at. There were a dozen quarter-sized drops of blood on the floor and on a nearby workbench a puddle as big as a dinner plate. An hour before, I might have thought that was a lot of blood, too.

As we stood outside in the sun, I heard the younger deputy say, “Jesus, Mary, and Joseph. I got a gun over here, Delbert. There’s a gun over here with blood on it.”





4

WAVY

Of course Kellen said, “It’s gonna be okay.” He didn’t want me to be scared, but Mama was dead. Not Sad Mama or Good Mama or Scary Mama ever again. Just Dead Mama. And Donal was missing. And Kellen was in handcuffs.

The cops took us to the hospital, where I saw Mr. Cutcheon in the parking lot. He waved at me, but Aunt Brenda wouldn’t let me go to him. The hospital smelled like disinfectant and sadness, like when Mama and Donal had their wreck. In a white room with a maze of blue curtains, a nurse said, “How’s she doing? We’re going to have a private exam room for her in a few minutes. Are you her mother?”

“I’m her aunt. Her mother—” Aunt Brenda couldn’t say it. Dead Mama. Always. That was how death worked. Dead Grandma. I closed my eyes and tried to remember the smell of Grandma’s house. I wanted to smell something nice that wasn’t sadness. I pulled my shirt up over my nose. It smelled like Kellen’s sweat. Safe.