Part 14 (1/2)

”Anything to eat in this joint?” asked Grady, tearing off for the kitchen.

Mary rushed after her. ”What are you hungry for?”

Grady turned her head, a quizzical expression on her face. ”Why are you so nervous?”

Mary stopped. ”I'm not. I'm trying to show you around.”

”No, you're not. You're nervous.” They stared at each other. ”Are you embarra.s.sed of me? Afraid your mother might smell the trailer park?”

”No, I-”

”I might smell the home owner's a.s.sociation on her. It's combustible.”

”No, it's not that-”

”Yes it is, and it's fine. I'm here for you, and I'm here for me. I needed to get away from a lot of s.h.i.+t.”

Mary nodded.

”Don't you get it?”

She shook her head.

”I'm never going back, never gonna speak to them again.”

”Grady, you don't have to do that. Are you sure you-”

”I've needed this for-” said Grady, pausing, her eyes filled with memory. ”A long, long time.”

Mary reached out, rubbed Grady's arm. Grady put her arm around her, and they walked, like lovers or old friends, into the kitchen. The pantry was full. There was macaroni and cheese, tuna, spaghetti, cans of chili. And chips, lots and lots of chips. Mary had never realized that her diet, when she ate at all, was junk.

They cooked two boxes of macaroni and cheese. Mary topped the pasta with cheese and a load of hot sauce, per Grady's request, and her friend loved it, shoveled heaping spoonfuls into her mouth. Mary thought then that she loved her, this rough girl from some world she would probably never even visit, much less understand.

They were at the kitchen table when the front door opened. Freddie entered first, and Mary was taken aback: Her mother's eyes were puffy, baggy underneath, and a sharp foundation line ran beneath her jaw. Freddie smiled wanly, carefully, as if her face might crack. ”Oh, you're back,” she said, dumped her purse on the kitchen island, then picked up a stack of mail and thumbed through it, taking hesitant steps.

”Mom?” asked Mary, rising.

Freddie stopped short of her daughter, who had opened her arms, and Mary blinked, rocking back on her heels. They shared a silence and Grady watched, still seated at the table. ”This is Grady, Mom,” Mary said, pointing over but not looking.

Freddie nodded. ”Gathered that,” she said, then lowered her eyes, her voice, clenched her fists by her jeans and growled, ”Mary, how could you do this to-”

”To who, Mom?”

”Us, you, the whole family!” shouted Freddie.

”That's my mom, worried about her reputation,” said Mary to Grady, who shrugged, looked away, fiddled with the plastic table mat.

While Mary's face was turned Freddie smacked her. ”Don't you make light of this!” she screamed.

Mary stumbled back, touched the quickly reddening hand print and blinked back the tears.

Grady surprised them both. She smashed her fist on the table so hard all the silverware jumped. Then she stepped between them, pressed two fingers into Freddie's chest, and pushed. Hard. Freddie stumbled back into the kitchen's island, her eyes wider than before. ”How dare you-” she began, but Grady stepped forward like a warrior, her face red, her hand raised. ”Try me, b.i.t.c.h,” she said, and Freddie shut her mouth, stood there motionless, leaned back on the counter as if to rest.

And that's when George strolled in, holding a six pack of Heineken keg-cans. ”What in all of h.e.l.l?” He set the cans on the counter behind Freddie, joined her. ”Are you Grady?”

”d.a.m.n straight, I'm-”

”Sit down, please,” he said, staring right into her furious eyes.

Grady eyed him a moment, then sat, crossing her arms.

George glanced at Mary, who was still rubbing her cheek, then back at his wife. ”Did you hit her?”

”George, you don't-”

”Take a seat and shut up,” he said. Freddie did as she was told. ”You too, Mary.”

When they were all seated, George stood at the head of the table, his knuckles set on the wood-grain. ”Listen, I do not care what happened, only that it doesn't happen again. If any one of you touches another, you will all be out of a place to stay,” he said, straightening up. ”I'm talking to you too, honey,” he said, then smiled broadly, as if the incident was all but forgotten. ”Grady, I apologize you were greeted in this way. Welcome to our home,” he said. ”I hope you don't mind sharing a room with Mary.”

”No, not at all,” Grady said respectfully.

”You two hungry?”

The girls shook their heads. Freddie turned, stared out the sliding gla.s.s door into the backyard.

”Call it a night, then. There's a television in your room.”

They walked across the house, Mary listening to her father chide her mother, she and Grady sharing looks.

3.

Robert forgot all about his mother's diary until the following morning. His hip felt better, and his eyesight was clear. He put the last volume in his briefcase, saw Jenn to her bus, and drove to school. He taught his courses on autopilot, not listening to himself, not remembering a word he'd said.

At lunchtime, he skipped the cafeteria line, headed straight to a table near the back, and opened the book. As they had before, the pa.s.sages struck him as decreasing in lucidity. His mother had been a woman of intelligence but little schooling, a cynical autodidact, and as her condition had grown worse she had struggled to make sense of it all. All her life she'd believed in magic, but as the tumor grew, she harkened back to the stories she'd told in the earlier volumes-the tales of an ancient lineage of witches, their bloodline barely intact. Instead of retelling old stories, though, she spoke of this bloodline's history-how anyone who'd ever had an extrasensory gift had undoubtedly been one of them. It struck Robert as even stranger than the earlier tales-which he'd taken merely as a mythology of her early childhood-because she was naming names and listing dates.

Perhaps he'd been wrong about her mind. But what did it all mean? Exactly how was she cloaking the facts with these tales? Well, s.h.i.+t, he thought. Maybe she really did go apes.h.i.+t.