Night Road(110)

“Okay, Daddy.” She slid out of his arms and scampered off.

Jude clasped her hands together. She had their full attention now, but she was afraid to say the words out loud. “Lexi came to see me today.”

Zach went very still. “What did she want?”

Jude looked at her son. He was a man; young, but a man, and she was so proud of him she could hardly bear it. When in the last few years had she told him that? “She asked me to supervise her visits with Grace. She can’t afford the court-ordered social worker.”

“What did you say?” Miles asked, moving to stand by his son.

“She can’t get to know … her daughter unless I agree,” Jude said, stalling now.

“What did you say?” Zach asked the question again.

Jude felt the rapid beating of her heart. “I’m scared,” she said softly. It was perhaps the most vulnerable she’d felt in years. She was out of control and uncertain and afraid. Usually she hid those emotions away from Zach and Miles, boxed them up; now she didn’t have that kind of strength.

She moved toward Zach, who had never been afraid when his sister was alive, and never lonely, but now she saw both of those emotions in his eyes. “I don’t want to do it,” Jude said, “but I will.”

“You will?” Zach said quietly.

“For Grace and Mia,” Jude said, gazing up at her son. “And for you.”





Twenty-five





Something weird was happening.

Grace and Ariel were on the sofa, curled up in Grace’s favorite fuzzy yellow blanket. The cabin lights were low and it was dark outside, so she couldn’t really see her wrist mirror, but she knew Ariel was there because she was humming. Ariel loved to hum.

Grace couldn’t tell time, but she knew it was late. She never got to stay up this long after dinner, and the movie on the TV had all kinds of bad words in it, and no one cared that she was hearing it. Or that she saw some guy shoot a bad guy in the head.

No one was paying attention to Grace at all. Daddy and Nana and Papa had been whispering together all night. They’d made a bunch of phone calls and looked at Daddy’s school calendar about twenty times. Grace didn’t know what they were talking about, but Nana kept snapping at Papa, saying things like, I know what you think, Miles, and, What will I say to her? Maybe I’ve made a mistake …

Papa said it was too late for that because Lexi knows and the loud whispering had begun again.

“Who’s Lexi?” Grace asked, looking up from the sofa.

The three grownups stopped talking and looked at her.

“It’s time for bed, Princess,” Daddy said, and Grace wished she’d kept her big fat mouth shut. Whining, she shuffled over to her Papa and opened her arms for a hug. He scooped her up and twirled her around, kissing her neck. She clung to him still, giggling as he let her go, and she slipped back down to the floor.

Grace went to Nana, who stood by the sliding glass door, chewing on her thumbnail. It took a lot of nerve, but Grace said, “Nana? Thanks for playing Chutes and Ladders with me.”

Nana stopped biting her thumbnail and looked down.

Grace tried to smile, but it wasn’t very good.

Then Nana did the most amazing thing: she bent down and picked Grace up.

Grace was so surprised she gasped. She would have hugged her Nana, but it was over so fast Grace barely had time to blink before Nana was whispering, “Night, Gracie. Don’t let the bed bugs bite.”

It was so weird. Grace sidled close to her daddy and slipped her hand in his back pocket, just so she could be close to him. He plucked her up and carried her down to the bathroom they both used. He helped her brush her teeth and get ready for bed. When she had on her jammies, he put her in her bed and sat down beside her.

Her room was messy, with toys everywhere, and her Wall-E comforter in a bunch at the end of the bed. Daddy pulled it up carefully, tucking Grace in.

“Are we gonna read more of The Secret Garden tonight, Daddy?”

“Not tonight, Princess.”

Ask him.

“What?” Grace whispered furiously to her wrist.

“How come you’re talking to Ariel when I’m right here?” Daddy said, frowning at her.

“Ariel thinks something weird is happening.”

“She does, does she? And what does she think it is?”

“What is it?” Grace whispered to her wristband, but Ariel had vanished. “I guess she went to sleep.”

Daddy reached over and unhooked Grace’s wristband.

“Can’t she sleep with me tonight?” Grace mumbled. It was an old fight, and she didn’t expect to win, but she had to ask.

“You know the rules. She sleeps on the nightstand.”

Her daddy stretched out on the narrow bed, with her big stuffed panda bear as a pillow behind him. Grace snuggled against him and looked up. “Daddy?”

He stroked her hair. “What, Gracie?”

“Who’s Lexi?”

He stopped stroking her hair. “Lexi is your mother.”

Grace scrambled to sit up. This was news. “What?”

“Lexi is your mother, Grace.”

“Wow,” Grace said. “Is she a spy?”

“No, honey, she’s not.”