Other People's Houses(91)
Richard pulled out his phone. “Well then, you should probably call them.”
* * *
? ? ?
It was Michael who answered his phone, and Michael who went to get the boys. Frances and Ava sat on the sofa, side by side, watching the play of police car lights and reporters’ cameras on the inside of the curtains. Eventually Ava cleared her throat.
“Well, it was an effective image, even if it wasn’t very pretty.”
Frances sighed. “You don’t think ‘gaping neck wound’ was maybe a little harsh?”
“Not at all.”
“OK. That makes me feel better.”
“Good.” They lapsed into silence again.
“Are you going to ground Milo for, like, a year?”
Frances shrugged. “Maybe. Right now I’m just so overwhelmingly relieved he’s in one piece and found that I’m ready to throw him a parade. Not a great parenting choice, but whatever.”
Ava shifted a little on the sofa, inching closer to her mom. “You always make us feel like you’d be ready to throw us a parade at a moment’s notice.”
“I do?”
Ava nodded. “Yeah. You’re very . . . supportive.”
“How annoying.”
“It is.”
“Maybe if I were a little firmer with you guys Milo wouldn’t have run away and you wouldn’t be so angry with me all the time.”
Ava looked surprised. “I’m not angry with you all the time.”
“Yes, you are. Or you seem to be, anyway.” Frances put her arm around Ava’s shoulder, and tugged her closer. “I don’t mean to be so annoying. I just never had a teenager before and I’m scrambling to keep up.”
“That’s OK. I’ve never been a teenager before, so we’re in the same boat.”
Frances took a chance. “Who is Piper? Is she the one who’s making you unhappy?”
Ava was silent for a moment, then sighed and answered. “No, she’s really just a girl at school. I thought we were friends, but then suddenly there was all this drama and now we’re not friends.” She closed her eyes, unseen by her mother, who nonetheless squeezed her. “It’s very hard to know what’s going on, you know? No one is what you think they are.” She sighed once more. “Not even me. I don’t know who I am anymore, and when I think I know I change again. It’s very confusing. You and dad are the only ones who stay the same.”
They sat there some more, saying nothing in a companionable way. These quiet moments are the mortar that holds families together, yet they often pass unnoticed. Frances reveled in them; it was her superpower.
“Do you ever feel like running away?” Ava asked her.
Frances shook her head. “Where would I go? Everything I love is here.” She rested her cheek against Ava’s hair, smelling—yet again—her shampoo on someone else’s head. “Do you?”
“Yes and no. Yes, because I’d like to be somewhere else or someone else or sometime else. But no, because you’d just come after me.” She looked at her lap, to hide the happiness she felt at that fact.
“I’m afraid so.”
Ava straightened up and looked at Frances. “You know, I was worried about Theo until I knew he was with Milo. That meant they’d gone under their own steam, rather than being snatched by some asshole, right?”
“Sure. At least, more likely that.”
“And Milo knows what I know, which is that you would never stop looking for him. You told us that all the time when we were little.”
“I did?” Frances pulled a cushion over and hugged it, still a little freaked out by this day, despite her apparent calm. Luckily, Ava seemed sanguine, so that made one of them.
“Yeah. You said it over and over: If you get lost, stay where you are and wait. Daddy and I will be looking for you and we will never stop. If someone takes you, keep fighting, keep making noise and kicking them in the nuts, because we will be hunting for as long as it takes, and we will never stop.” Ava smiled to herself. “I’ve never been scared of being alone, which I guess is a good thing because the chance of anyone wanting to date me with these eyebrows is remote.”
Frances ignored the eyebrow comment. “Did I literally say nuts?”
Ava shrugged. “You may have. You must have told us five hundred times. Ask Milo. You also went on and on and on about paying attention in parking lots, do you remember that?”
Frances ran her hand through her hair, which made it stand up like a radio antenna, unbeknownst to her. “I sound very boring. What did I say about parking lots?”
“You said,” Ava mimicked her mother’s voice, which was apparently like Daisy Duck’s, “they’re looking for spaces, not children, so be careful.”
“Did I sound like I was on helium?”
“No, only in my head.”
“OK.” Frances had a headache. She couldn’t believe she’d been so rude to Anne. Suddenly, though, she started laughing.
Ava looked at her. “Are you hysterical? Do I need to slap you?”
Frances laughed and shook her head. “No, I’m just laughing at the memory of your father’s face.”
“When you yelled at Anne?”