Sadie(34)

“K-Kendall,” I say abruptly. “C-can I b-borrow a swimsuit?”

“They won’t fit you.” She nods to her chest.

“Jesus,” Noah says, because I guess he’s got limits. “You could lend her a tank or shorts or something.” He kicks his legs, pushing the float to the edge of the pool and climbs out. “I’m gonna try Javi again. Not like him not to answer.”

“Whatever,” Kendall says. She groans, getting to her feet like it’s the last thing in the world she wants to be doing and it sends a flare of anger through me that is almost immediately put out for something that feels so much worse.

She doesn’t know her father is a monster.

“Come on,” she mutters and I follow her inside. “You can borrow some of Noah’s trunks and one of his old shirts…”

“D-don’t like sh-sharing, huh?”

“No offense, but you look like you need a shower.”

“N-no offense, b-but you look like a bitch.”

She stops in her tracks and turns to me, smiles nice.

“You can always leave,” she says.

I don’t say anything. She shakes her head like that’s the end of it and we step through the back door. I imagine what it must be like to step through it every day just because it’s your home and you live here. I get that feeling I got when I first saw Montgomery, that if I can’t have any of this for myself all I really want is to see it ruined.

Inside, it’s incredibly stark, monochromatic. The family photos on the wall are professionally shot, black-and-white, all of them taken next to the flowerbeds outside. I study each one as I pass, following Noah’s and Kendall’s progression from babies to toddlers to awkward tweens, to now. Their mother, a lithe blonde with curly hair that keeps getting shorter. Silas and the way he doesn’t change. The most offensive part about him is how inoffensive he looks. Anyone would look at him and think he was safe.

The family portraits suddenly shift to Silas, his T-ball teams.

“There’s Javi,” Kendall says, startling me.

She points him out in a picture. I can’t make myself look.

“What’s wrong with you?” she asks.

“J-just a little h-hungover.”

“I’m not.” She sounds pleased.

I follow her past the living room where there’s a white sofa and just looking at it makes me nervous, the thought of it. When she was nine, Mattie went through a clumsy phase. In fact, I don’t think she ever entirely grew out of it, but when she was nine, it was at its worst. There’s not an inch of our trailer she hasn’t spilled something on.

Kendall leads me into the kitchen. It’s all gray-and-white marble countertops, stainless steel appliances. The table sits in front of a window overlooking the garden side of the house and I can just see the edge of the deck. The rest of the room stretches toward the front door.

“Hold on a sec,” she says, opening the fridge. “I’m starving.”

The front door opens.

“Kendall, whose car is that out there?”

My body turns to ice.

Silas’s back is to us as he shuts the door. He has a bouquet of white roses and baby’s breath in one hand. He scrubs the other through the back of his short blond hair before facing us and when he does, his eyes immediately fall on me.

“Who’s this?” he asks.

“Dad, this is Lera Holden,” Kendall says. “She’s new in town. Did I tell you about her last night? I can’t remember.”

“I’m sure you can’t,” he says drily. He tilts his head back and sizes me up and my fingers twitch. “Holdens … you just moved into the Cornells’ place, right?” I manage a nod. “I heard they had a daughter. That’s your car out there?”

He asks the question with a smile and his smile is all teeth.

I look at Kendall. Her body is half in the fridge.

“C-can I use your b-bathroom?”

Silas reacts to my stutter, a near imperceptible grimace.

“Sure,” he says. “It’s upstairs. Third door on the right.”

I duck past him without thanks and turn a corner that leads to a staircase, my body weak with relief once I’m finally outside his line of vision. It takes a conscious effort to move one foot in front of the other to get me to the top of the landing. There, I listen.

A low murmur. His voice. Kendall’s throaty responses. I creep down the hall and find the bathroom. I push the door open and take a shocked step back.

“G-get out!” a girl yells. “I w-want y-you t-to g-get out of h-here!”

She’s eleven, naked in the tub. Her knees are curled up to her chest and her arms are crossed around them, trying hard to cover her rosebud breasts. When she leans forward, she bares her back, the knots of her spine painfully visible. She presses her head to her knees and turns a hateful gaze to her left, to the man leaning against the sink. He’s taking up the whole bathroom. His arms are crossed, but he’s not moving. She desperately wants him gone, she’s said it out loud and everything, but he’s not moving.

“There’s no need,” he says slowly, “to be like this.”

“G-go a-away! W-where’s M-Mom? Mom!”

“What do you think she’s going to do?”