Straightened-12
2004 Words
Jodie’s grandmother stepped into the living room and cleared her throat.
Nick jumped to his feet. “Hi, Mrs. Olinstein. I hope we aren’t bothering you. Jodie said we could stop by for a minute. We didn’t mean to ...”
“It’s fine.” She cut him off with a curt nod. Jodie’s grandmother was a frail, somewhat haggard-looking woman, about how Kennedy imagined Vivian Abernathy would appear in thirty years if she were to forgo hair dye, wrinkle cream, and Botox. “Did you get her to tell you where her brother is?”
Nick looked at Kennedy as if she might decipher the old woman’s words.
“No, we just got here a few minutes ago. We ...” He didn’t finish his sentence.
Jodie’s grandmother offered no smile. “I told her she had to tell what she knew or the police would be after her next.”
Kennedy tried to think of some protest. Mrs. Olinstein must not know what she was saying. Maybe she suffered from dementia. Maybe she was an Alzheimer’s patient who lacked a filter between her brain’s thought and language center.
“I told you I don’t know where he is.” Jodie crossed her arms. Kennedy couldn’t imagine her taking that tone with her parents. Maybe there was more to Jodie than she’d seen before.
Mrs. Olinstein stared right at Nick with a smile that was anything but warm. “She’s never been a good liar, that one. It’s strange. You’d think her dad would have taught her. Heaven knows he’s got the experience.”
Nick fidgeted with the fringe on a brown and orange afghan thrown across the back of the couch. “Maybe now’s not the best time to talk about the senator like that.”
Mrs. Olinstein’s long, beaded earrings dangled against each other as she c****d her head to the side. “Why not?” Her voice was grating. “Bad form to speak ill of the dead? I didn’t realize. Well, you’ll have to forgive me. Let’s change the subject, shall we? We can talk about why Noah killed his father and burned his house to the ground.”
“Noah didn’t do any of that.” Hot anger radiated from Jodie’s small frame.
“How would you know?” her grandma asked. “You don’t even know where he’s been all night.” She smiled haughtily.
“He was with Marcos, ok? I heard them on the phone before the fire started. He went over to see Marcos.”
Jodie’s grandmother straightened her back and gave Nick a sickeningly sweet smile. “There now. See? I told you she’d been lying.”
CHAPTER 16Nobody said anything. Kennedy kept waiting for Nick or Jodie to break the silence.
Nothing.
Finally, Jodie’s grandmother spoke. “All right, then. I see that she doesn’t want to say anything else in front of me. Probably thinks that if she talks to you, she’ll be protected under whatever pastor confidentiality laws she’s read about on the internet. Fine by me, little missy. You just remember that whatever you tell your so-called pastor here, the lawyers are going to ask you at your brother’s trial when they prove he’s the one who murdered your father. Now don’t let me interrupt your little heart-to-heart anymore,” she added before anybody could protest. “I’ll just check on the kid. Make sure he’s nice and comfy. Would have been thoughtful if your mother brought me a crib or something else he can sleep in before dumping him off here. He’s probably going to leak right through his diaper and spoil my mattress. Oh, well. That’s what happens when Vivian adopts someone else’s needy orphan against her better judgment. No, don’t bother getting up for me.” She waved her hand in the air in a gesture of dismissal. “I’ll put myself to bed when I’m done, and I’ll trust you to lock up after yourselves when you’re through in my home.”
She went down the hall and disappeared, leaving nothing but an angry afterglow that settled around the room like a gray New England smog.
“All right,” Nick said after another long silence. “Who’s this Marcos? And how do you know that’s where your brother is, or are you just guessing?”
Jodie looked at Kennedy as if she were asking for support, but Kennedy was more confused than a seventh grader picking up Romeo and Juliet for the first time without any footnotes.
“Who’s Marcos?” Nick repeated in a softer tone. “Is he Noah’s friend from school?”
“I don’t know.” Jodie’s voice was small. Timid. It reminded Kennedy of the very first time they talked over the phone almost a full year ago.
“Well, how do you know that’s where Noah is?”
“They talk. Late at night. Our rooms are right next to each other, so sometimes he thinks I’m asleep, but I can hear.”
“Is it his boyfriend?”
“I don’t think so. I’m not sure.”
Kennedy decided if she ever had a daughter of her own, she’d teach her to speak up loud and clear. Life lesson number one: No demure mumbling. It wasn’t feminine. It wasn’t cute. It was annoying, and that was about all.
“What do they talk about?”
Kennedy wasn’t sure she’d be pressing so hard if she were in Nick’s position. Hadn’t Noah been through enough? Didn’t he deserve at least some small shred of privacy? Then again, if he was still a suspect in his father’s murder ...
It couldn’t really be. Could it?
“They talk about boys.” Jodie’s voice was even softer. Maybe she didn’t want her grandma to overhear. Unfortunately, with as public a life as Wayne Abernathy led, there was no way any of these details would stay secret for long.
“So, you mean like boys at school?” Nick gave Kennedy a questioning look. Apparently, he was as lost as she was.
“No, they talk about Noah. About how he likes boys. And they pray.”
“Pray?” Nick repeated.
Jodie nodded. “He asks God to fix him. You know. So he likes girls and stuff.”
Anger flashed through Nick’s eyes. Unfiltered, unmistakable anger. He composed himself after a few seconds. “So this Marcos, he’s like a counselor or something?” His voice was soft, but his whole body remained completely rigid.
“Yeah, maybe something like that.”
“Is he older, then? An adult, I mean?”
“Maybe.” Jodie shrugged. “I never met him.”
“So how do you know Nick was going to meet with this Marcos guy?”
“I heard them talking on the phone. Noah was mad. Said it was all Marcos’s fault, and then he said something like, Fine. You can show me when I get there. I didn’t pay all that much attention. It was late, and I was trying to sleep.”
Nick adjusted one of his dreadlocks that had fallen in front of his face. “Ok, well, we should probably call the detective. They’re looking for him, you know.”
For the first time, Kennedy felt like she could add something useful to the conversation. “If they find Noah, and this Marcos person can prove he was at his house tonight, it could help show your brother’s innocent.”
Nick shot her a warning look. What did it mean? Nick didn’t really think Noah could have ...
“He wouldn’t want me to tell.”
Kennedy had to lean forward to hear Jodie better.
“He’d be embarrassed,” she explained. “You know. Because of what they say.”
Nick patted her knee. “You know when the media gets wind of this, they’ll probably all be gossiping about it soon enough. I just want you to be ready for that. It’s probably not gonna be very nice things they have to say about it.”
“I don’t want Noah to be embarrassed.” There was something endearing and sweet about her gentle insistence.
“Listen,” Kennedy tried, “if we find Marcos fast and prove Noah’s innocent, the media might not have time to learn about everything. Ok? Is there anything you can think of that will help us find out where Marcos lives?”
Jodie pouted. “I don’t think so.”
“No last name? Phone number? Anything?” Kennedy hoped she wasn’t being too pushy. She couldn’t tell from Nick’s frown if he disapproved of her prodding or if he was just serious from the entire night’s events.
An idea flitted into her head, and she sat up taller. “What about his phone? If he talks to Marcos so much, we could get his number off your brother’s cell.”
Nick shook his head. “Noah’s cell is either with him or burned down at the Abernathys’ place, remember?”
“Well, maybe ...” She tried to think. Could Detective Drisklay pull up Noah’s phone records or something? It happened all the time in police novels, didn’t it?
“Wait a minute.” Jodie was always graceful and well-manicured, but it wasn’t until her face lit up that Kennedy could say she was decidedly pretty in every sense of the word. A smile, shy but persistent, spread across her face. “I let Noah use my phone once. He’d left his in the youth group bus that night you all went to play paintball.” She spoke quickly. Freely. For the first time, she sounded youthful.
Excited.
“He wanted to borrow my phone. He said he was calling you to ask about his cell.” She nodded at Nick. “But then he talked for like an hour and a half. Wait, that wasn’t you, was it?”
Nick shook his head. “No, he never called me. I didn’t find his cell in the bus until the next day.”
“I knew it!” Jodie’s eyes were bright. “That means he was talking to Marcos.” She turned a hopeful gaze to Kennedy, who felt like she had missed something important.
Jodie jumped up and grabbed a small handbag from a coat rack by her grandma’s entryway. Kennedy wondered what other thirteen-year-old would carry around a Louis Vuitton purse, or any purse at all for that matter. Kennedy had tried a small handbag once a few years ago and then swore them off until she was at least out of school. She hated the way a single strap made her feel so lopsided and off balance, and none of the really cute purses were large enough to fit a book in, anyway. She’d stick with her backpacks for at least the next decade.
A car pulled into Mrs. Olinstein’s driveway. The headlights shined through the window, beaming shadows across the wall.
Jodie was scrolling on her phone, her face still radiant. “Look! It’s here. An hour and twenty-three minute call. This is it.”
The sound of a car door shutting. Then another.
Nick leaned forward. Kennedy did too, ready to stand up. Jodie buried her face in her screen and didn’t seem to notice anything else. “This is Marcos’s number. We can call him!”
The front door opened. Detective Drisklay sauntered in, followed by Jodie’s mom who looked nearly as frazzled and frail as Mrs. Olinstein had.
“Don’t bother. Marcos Esperanza won’t be answering his phone any time soon.” Detective Drisklay slammed his coffee cup onto the yellow laminate counter. “He’s in the ER right now being treated for multiple stab wounds. Doctors aren’t sure he’s going to make it.”
CHAPTER 17Vivian Abernathy all but collapsed onto the couch as she leaned down to hug her daughter. “How are you, sweetie? Are you ok?”
“Yeah, Mom. I’m fine.” As quickly as it had come, the enthusiastic spark in Jodie’s eyes clouded over again, replaced by a shy quietness. For a thirteen-year-old, she had already been through so much. Kennedy was glad at least something remained of the little girl Jodie should have been. Jodie put her arm around her mother’s shoulders.
Detective Drisklay didn’t waste any time with greetings or small talk. “So who wants to tell me why you were all talking about Marcos Esperanza when I got in?”
Kennedy and Nick exchanged a glance. “Jodie overheard Nick talking to some guy before the fire,” she explained. “She thought maybe if we found him, it might give her brother an alibi to prove he wasn’t there when his dad was murdered.”
“Or else prove that he’s the one that attacked Marcos in the first place,” Drisklay stated in a monotone.
Right. She’d rushed into the night so sure she’d prove Noah’s innocence, but he was getting more and more enmeshed with every new development. First Wayne’s murder and the arson that burned down his house. Then the fire at the Lindgrens’. And now some mysterious guy named Marcos, a counselor who talked and prayed with Noah on a regular basis, who was dying of stab wounds in the ER. It was a good thing Kennedy had slept so long at the Lindgrens’ earlier, because she knew this would turn into one of those nights that never ended. It was already after three.
Jodie and her mom were having a whispered conversation on the couch when Mrs. Olinstein shouted out from down the hall, “Is that you, Vivian? This nephew of yours hasn’t stopped crying since ...”
“Mom,” Vivian called back, “he’s my son now, not my ... Oh, never mind.” She stood up with a heavy sigh. Kennedy couldn’t even begin to fathom the grief she must be experiencing. Her husband murdered. Her son the prime suspect. It sounded like the penultimate act in a Shakespearean play. All they need now was a nurse for Jodie, a lady-in-waiting for Vivian, and a few soldier lackeys to follow Detective Drisklay around. Of course, since this was a tragedy, there’d be no jesters offering witty puns or household servants providing comic relief. There was only one way plays like this ever ended.
Death.
“He’s still whining,” Mrs. Olinstein called out. She had a cackling sort of voice.
- Writer
