The Mystery of Hollow Places(46)
Without thinking, I smile over at Chad. “Want to help us track down Todd Malachai?”
“That’s the spirit!” he says, and shakes me gently by the neck the way he does when we play video games. His hand is big and dry and warm.
When we’re almost home we drive ahead of the weather, and the clouds turn white all at once and the last bit of sun streaks through. I think there must be a rainbow somewhere, with the road still glittering. While we’re stopped at a light I crane my neck around to search the gray block of sky behind me, but there’s nothing there.
FIFTEEN
“You’re spending quite a lot of time with them.” Lindy works to free the zipper where it’s caught on the black plastic. “I don’t want you getting in their hair . . . Oh, Immy!” She gasps. Red fabric tumbles out of the bag. “You’re going to look so beautiful! Did you try it on? Do you love it?”
Is it my imagination, or are my stepmother’s cool blue eyes a little dewy? “I guess. It’s no big deal or anything.”
“It is a big deal,” she corrects me. “I just can’t believe how mature you are. You’re almost a grown-up.”
I don’t like the “almost” part—I’m the grown-up who’s hot on my dad’s trail. Not Lindy, not Officer Griffin, not anybody older or supposedly more mature than me. But it doesn’t help my case to argue the compliment. “Thanks, Lindy.”
Running her fingers over the skirt of the dress, the slightly plunging neckline, and the thick red halter straps, she sighs. “I want you to know how proud I am of you, Immy. Of how you’re handling yourself in all of this. And I know your dad . . .” She covers her mouth with a shaking hand and coughs out an ugly half sob.
It’s totally horrifying. I have no idea what to do, what to say. I get awkward around tears, embarrassed; for the crier or for myself as the cried-upon, I don’t know. Probably both. I almost always knew how to handle Dad in his bad times. I could lead him to bed when he’d drunk too much on a very not-great night, make myself breakfast the next morning, get myself to the school bus and leave a list of things for him to do that day, because sometimes he needed a reason to climb out of bed. I’m well-equipped for that. But crying? Usually I would fall back on a bad joke: Hey, Dad, two cows were standing in a field. The first said, ‘What do you think about this mad cow disease?’ The second said, ‘Doesn’t bother me, I’m a duck.’ Get it? Because he’s crazy? Come on, Dad, that’s funny.
I can’t think of a joke to tell Lindy, and the moment drags on. And on.
“I’m sorry, Immy.” She thumbs a tear from the corner of her eye. “Don’t pay attention to me. I’m just . . . This is a beautiful dress. Maybe we can find an updo to match—something old-fashioned and romantic?”
“Yeah.” I smile for her. “Maybe.”
“I’ll hang this up in the hall closet, okay? I don’t think there’s much space in yours, and I don’t want it to wrinkle.”
When she whisks the garment bag out of the room, I seize my chance and back toward the front door. My hand on the knob, I call, “Lindy, I’ll be back after dinner, okay? Not too late! And then maybe we can talk about . . . prom shoes!” Then I’m out and away and free and gulping big, grateful breaths of freezing air, like a fish thrown back into the sea after finding itself caught in a net.
Though I was only making an excuse to investigate Todd Malachai with Jessa and Chad, it turns out the Prices really are making dinner when they let me in out of the rain. They invite me to eat with them, so I can’t exactly refuse. On a normal day I love eating with Jessa’s family, which is thoroughly normal and one I admit I’ve sometimes pretended was my own. Tonight, it’s all I can do to joke with them in the kitchen when I’ve got my freshest lead yet, waiting to be chased. For a minute I consider begging off, going back home, locking myself in my bedroom to try to find Todd myself. But I’ve gotten used to having partners these past few days. It didn’t even occur to me to look him up alone, and how weird is that?
“Up high, Immy.” Mr. Price holds his hand in prime high-five position, and though Jessa rolls her eyes, I slap his palm. He has the same white-blond hair as Chad, though he doesn’t have his son’s tan or sweet green eyes or flat stomach or awesome sense of humor. He’s just spectacularly, typically father-like. I can smell his familiar cologne over the tuna sizzling on their stovetop grill.
“How was your business trip?” I ask.
He scratches his neat beard. “France was enriching, as always.”
“It’s France.” Jessa cuts between us to dump a stack of modern-looking square bowls on the table. “It smells like old cheese.”
Swiveling on a barstool at the kitchen island, Chad snorts. “Really? That’s all you got out of France?”
“Yes, Chadwick. And the memory of the seagull that shit on you under the Arc de Triomphe. That was, like, such a Kodak moment.”
Dr. Van Tassel, looking spa-fresh, raps her spatula on the stove twice as a warning, but Chad slow-claps. “Oh, wow, Jenessa. Your worldly expertise is so wasted in Sugarbrook. You should go someplace where they’ll truly appreciate your international experience. Some kind of house of pancakes, maybe?”