Good Girl Bad (16)
“Oh, fuck off, Nate,” Rebecca says, her voice cold. “You’re being a jerk, for a change. You’d love it, wouldn’t you? My new husband to prefer our daughter. You’re disgusting. And you’re wrong. Leroy was home all night. With me. And as far as I know, Tabby was with Freddy.”
They’re both silent. Then at the same time they both start: “But Fred said—” They don’t need to finish the sentence. Fred had said they hadn’t seen Tabby all weekend.
“Fuck.” Rebecca slams her hands on the console in front of her. “Well, she came home when she said she would. Did you see that?”
“Yes. She rode her bike in at about ten. It was too dark for me to see much, but she seemed calm. Not in a rush, or worried, or agitated or anything.”
“I don’t think she told me she was meeting Freddy. I don’t think she lied about it. I think I just assumed, because she doesn’t seem to see anyone else these days.” Rebecca seems defeated, all the fight and anger gone out of her. For a moment, Nate feels almost sorry for her. Has she really not noticed how reserved Tabby has become? How different from the child he remembers when they were together?
Here, Nate winces, though. Because he has had something to do with that, hasn’t he?
Rebecca might not have noticed, but Nate has. And what, exactly, has he done to help his eldest daughter or even talk to her about what he’s noticed?
For the longest time, he’s thought that it would work itself out, that he didn’t really need to do anything, but now he wonders whether Tabby is missing precisely because he did nothing.
He could take a guess at why Tabby is so quiet. And he did absolutely nothing to help her.
Nate hesitates.
He wonders how much he should tell Rebecca. If, for instance, he should share his theory about what was going wrong for Tabby. If he should share with her Tabby’s solution to the problem.
If he should tell her how long he sat outside her house.
And who else he saw out there.
As he weighs how much to share with Rebecca, though, her phone rings, and as she listens to the person on the other end, her face goes white.
The phone slips from her fingers, sliding underneath her seat, a tinny, distant voice calling out indistinctly from under there, and Nate thinks he is going to vomit, wrenching the steering wheel into a crooked park on the sidewalk, his breath coming in little gasps.
“Bec. Bec. What? What is it?” His words are urgent, he’s fumbling for her phone underneath her seat, wanting to know but not wanting to know, and she breathes out, her voice empty and distant: “They’ve found Leroy. He’s dead.”
14
Three Months Earlier
“You’re not exactly helping yourself, though, are you?”
Leroy is trying to look patient, but Tabby can sense his frustration.
He came into her room a few minutes ago, locking the door behind him. The lock is new. When she’d looked at it, then looked back at him, he hadn’t quite met her eyes.
Was he just subtly letting her know there was a lock there now? Without having to spell it out to her?
God forbid they should talk about it.
“Look, your mom’s under a lot of pressure at work. She’s trying to wrap up a big project. She just needs a little understanding and cooperation from you. But it’s like you’re trying to upset her, and I don’t understand. Why would you do that, Tab?” He comes and sits on her bed, edges closer to her, and she remembers all the times he’s done exactly the wrong thing, and feels overcome with rage.
“You keep coming in here, thinking you have some right, thinking you can help, but have you ever helped, Leroy? Or have you just made things worse?”
Even a few short months ago, it would have been inconceivable to Tabby to talk to Leroy this way. But things have changed, now. She’s buoyed up by love. She can see other options, a future, and anything less than honesty and action feels like a betrayal.
Leroy claims to love her, but what has he ever done but make it worse?
“I try to help.” Leroy falters, looking worried. “I thought I was helping. What do you actually want me to do, Tab? I’m just trying to keep everyone happy.”
“No.” Tabby shakes her head emphatically. “No, you’re not, Leroy. Stop lying to yourself, and to me. You’re trying to keep Rebecca happy. Not me. Not Genevieve. And you can’t do both. You have to choose. Me, or Rebecca. You can’t keep us both happy, do you understand?”
Leroy looks shocked, like he genuinely hasn’t realized this, and Tabby wonders how stupid he thinks she is, or how stupid he might in fact be himself. She can feel power coursing through her, and it’s a revelation to her that she can be powerful, that she can say things and decide things and have some control over things. She would never have thought this possible. In fact, she’s been doing the exact opposite of this and she now feels sorry for that girl, the Tabitha of two, three, four months ago, who huddled in her room and let things happen to her. Who crept around and tried so hard to do everything right. It was sensational, to do something so different. To stop trying. To make mess, instead of perfection. And what difference did it actually make to the outcome? Leroy would still slink into her room, she would still feel terrible and afraid—but that all happened whether she cooperated or not. So she might as well complain, loudly.