Good Girl Bad (48)

Both girls are circumspect. The house feels empty and daunting.

Rebecca has gone to stay in a hotel for a couple of weeks, while she finds a therapist to support her to manage the days and weeks and months ahead. She agreed that it was important for the girls to be in their own home, and that Nate should stay with them there until he found a bigger place. But they’ll see Rebecca today for Leroy’s funeral.

The revelations about Moira had crashed into their lives with so much force Nate didn’t know how any of them managed to stand up from the table. After they got Tabby home, there was so much pain to unpack it felt like they sat at that table for months, talking.

It was only a day, of course.

Later, when Tabby was asleep, exhausted and spent, not believing her father’s assurances she wasn’t to blame, not believing Rebecca’s assurances she was going to change, Rebecca had shouted and screamed at her parents: “You did blame me! You blamed me with every look and every action for the next six years!” And they had sobbed and sobbed and sobbed.

“No,” Cheryl had said, shaking her head emphatically. “Whatever you felt, that was us blaming ourselves. It was the thing that made us see how badly we were treating you, how much we were taking out on you that wasn’t your fault. Everyone told us we’d never survive. Moira’s death, right after the affair. But somehow we kept going, together. And we tried. You refused to talk about it. You withdrew into yourself. We could never reach you.”

“You never tried!” Rebecca was sobbing too, and it was utter chaos in the kitchen. Like thirty years of grief had washed in through the windows and they were all drowning in pain, thrashing about, fighting for life. Nate had cried too: for Moira, for Cheryl, for Rob, for Tabby, and even for Rebecca.

“We did try,” Cheryl said. “But we gave up too soon. And we think about it and regret it every single day of our lives.”

To himself, Nate thinks that there’s a gaping chasm between realizing how badly you failed, and doing everything you need to do to fix it. Cheryl and Rob have not even come close. What did trying even look like? How much does wanting to fix it count for, in the end, if you don’t? If you just leave it to get passed on, and on, and on?

Then he looks at Rebecca, and at himself, and his thoughts quiet.

Wasn’t he just the same as them?

Like Nancy, Nate doesn’t need to ask Gen why she didn’t come to him about Tabby and Fred. How can you make good decisions when you’re fourteen years old? How can you make good decisions about such complex things when you don’t trust your parents to protect you? Every time he thinks about it his heart plummets to his feet. The thought of Gen alone, trying to solve this problem, is almost unbearable.

Nevertheless, she had tried to explain: “I just wanted it to stop. I thought Freddy would make Tabby see, would make it stop. I knew it would be bad for Tabby, that Fred was just using her. And getting rid of Fred would be bad for a while, but better once she got over him. I just wanted her to be okay.” Here Gen breaks down in tears, and Nate does, too.

“It’s not your job, sweetheart. It’s my job. And I was failing at it, and I’m sorry you thought you had to take over.”

“No one ever talks about it. You knew. And Mom knew. And Leroy knew. And no one ever just said it. Everyone just tiptoed around pretending we were fine and normal. Like every family worked like this.”

“Is that why things were tense between Leroy and Tabby?” Nate can’t quite grasp why Tabby would blame Leroy, rather than Rebecca. He looks to Tabby for an answer, but her eyes are vacant. He’s not even sure she heard.

“Leroy was safe to be angry with, I suppose. He didn’t help, but he tried. Maybe it was easier to be angry with him for failing, than with Mom for being how she is in the first place.”

Nate stares at Genevieve.

He thinks the shame and the pain might actually kill him, it feels so bad.

All the time he wasted accusing Leroy, imagining awful and creepy things, instead of actually listening to his children. And God, Tabby asked to move in with him. And even after all that bitching about Leroy, he didn’t put his money where his mouth was. If he was really concerned, wouldn’t he have said yes, made it work? Did he just want to complain without taking any responsibility? Even if his motives were dodgy, he could have gotten Tabby somewhere safe. He could have started to help her.

He shoves his fists into his eyes. He doesn’t mind Genevieve seeing him cry, but howling like he feels compelled to do seems too raw, too unfair, too much to burden her with.

At the same time, he wants to just stare at her in wonder.

“You knew what she could drive a person to,” Gen says now. She doesn’t look at Nate. She has that defiant jut to her chin again, and he wonders how many times he will need to apologize, and show he’s fixing it, before she will trust him again. He doesn’t wonder in frustration. He will show her over and over again for as long as it takes.

“That message you sent. To that woman. We knew why you sent it. You didn’t know. And Mom didn’t know. But we did.”

Nate starts. He remembers that fight like it was yesterday. No matter how hard he’s tried to shove it out of mind.

Rebecca had pounced on it, used it to tell him that he was just like her—with a bad temper. Abusing people. But they weren’t the same. They were connected together, sure. That he was so worn down by it, so pummelled by it, like a cornered cat, he just attacked the next person who came near him, who he felt threatened by.