“Want to talk about it?” she asked. Kate’s eyes remained on the television.
“Talk about what?”
“Everything that’s bothering you.”
“Nothing’s bothering me,” Kate replied. “I’m okay.”
“No,” Valerie replied, “you’re not okay.” She put her knitting aside, then got up and turned off the television set. “Are you planning to go back to school tomorrow?”
“I … I don’t know.”
I should have had children, Valerie thought. If I’d had children of my own, I’d know what to do. Or would she? Would she really know what to say to a teenage girl whose father had killed her mother? What was there to say? And yet, Kate couldn’t just go on sitting in front of the television set all day and all evening, moping.
“Well, I think it’s time you went back,” Valerie ventured. Then, sure she knew what was really going on in Kate’s mind, she went on: “What happened wasn’t your fault, Kate, and none of the kids are going to hold it against you.”
Kate turned to stare at Valerie. “Is that what you think?” she asked. “That I’m afraid of what the kids might think?”
“Isn’t it?”
Kate slowly shook her head. “Everybody knew all about Dad,” she said so quietly Valerie had to strain to hear her. “I always talked about what a drunk he is so no one else could do it first.”
Valerie went to the sofa and sat close to Kate. “That couldn’t have been easy.”
“It was better than having everybody gossip.” Her eyes met Valerie’s for the first time. “But he didn’t kill Mom,” she said. “I don’t care how it looks, and I don’t care if he doesn’t remember what happened after I left. All I know is they used to fight every time he got drunk, but he never hit her. He yelled at her, and sometimes he threatened her, but he never hit her. In the end, he always let her take him to the hospital.”
“Then you should be out with your friends, letting them know exactly what you think.”
Kate shook her head silently, and her eyes filled with tears. “I … I’m scared,” she whispered.
“Scared? Scared of what?”
“I’m afraid of what might happen if I leave. I’m afraid I might come back and find you … find you …” Unable to say the words, Kate began sobbing softly, and Valerie held her close.
“Oh, honey, you don’t have to worry about me. What on earth could happen to me?”
“But someone killed Mom,” Kate sobbed. “She was by herself, and someone came in and … and …”
Your father killed her, Valerie thought, but she knew she wouldn’t say it out loud. If Kate didn’t want to believe the evidence, she wouldn’t try to force her to, at least not yet. But after the trial, after Alan Lewis was convicted … She cut the thought off, telling herself that she should at least try to keep an open mind. “No one’s going to do anything to me,” she said. “I’ve been living by myself in this house for five years now, and there’s never been any trouble at all. And I’m not going to let you become a prisoner here.” She stood up briskly, went to pick up the telephone that sat on the table next to her chair, and brought it to the coffee table in front of the sofa. “Now you call Bob Carey and tell him you want to go out for a pizza or something.”
Kate hesitated. “I can’t do that—”
“Of course you can,” Valerie told her. “He comes by every day and drops off your homework, doesn’t he? So why wouldn’t he want to take you out?” She picked up the phone. “What’s his number?”
Kate blurted it out before she could think, and Valerie promptly punched the numbers. When Bob himself answered, she said only, “I have someone here who wants to talk to you,” and handed the phone to Kate. Kate sniffled, but took the phone.
Forty-five minutes later, Valerie stood at the front door. “And no matter what she says, I don’t want her back a minute before eleven,” she told Bob Carey. “She’s been cooped up too long, and she needs a good time.” When Bob’s car had disappeared down the hill, she closed the door, then went back to her knitting.
Ellen was about to call the Medical Center when she heard the patio gate slam once more. Then the door opened, and her husband and son came in. She dropped the receiver back on the hook just as the dial tone switched over to the angry whine of a forgotten phone, and didn’t try to conceal the irritation she was feeling. “You might have told me how long you were going to be gone. What on earth have you been doing?”
“Killing rats,” Alex said.
Ellen paled slightly, and her eyes moved to her husband. “Marsh, what’s he talking about?”
“I’ll tell you later,” Marsh replied, but the look on Ellen’s face told him that she was going to demand an explanation right now. He sighed, and hung his jacket in the armoire that stood opposite the front door. “We were dissecting their brains, to see how much damage they could sustain before they died.”
Ellen’s stomach turned queasy, and she had to struggle to keep her voice steady. “You killed them?” she asked. “You killed those three helpless creatures?”
Marsh nodded. “Honey, you know perfectly well that rats die in laboratories every day. And there was something both Alex and I wanted to know.” He stepped past Ellen and moved into the living room, then glanced at Alex. “Why don’t you make yourself scarce?” he asked. Then he smiled tiredly. “I have a feeling your mother and I are about to have another fight.” Alex started toward the stairs, but Marsh stopped him, fishing in his pocket for his car keys. “Why don’t you go find some of your friends?” he asked, tossing the keys to his son.
Ellen, watching, felt a chill go through her. Something had happened between her husband and her son. She was certain that an alliance had somehow formed between them that she was not a part of. A moment later, when Alex spoke again, she knew she was right.
“You mean do what we were talking about?” he asked, and Marsh nodded. And then something happened that Ellen hadn’t seen since the night of the prom last spring.
Alex smiled.
It was a tentative smile, and it didn’t last long, but it was still a smile. And then he was gone.
Ellen stared after him, then slowly turned to Marsh, her anger evaporating.
“Did you see that?” she breathed. “Marsh, he smiled. He actually smiled!”
Marsh nodded. “But it doesn’t mean anything,” he said. “At least it doesn’t mean anything yet.” Slowly he tried to explain the conversation he and Alex had had on the way home, and what they had decided Alex should do.
“So you see, the smile didn’t really mean anything at all,” he finished fifteen minutes later. “He doesn’t feel anything, Ellen, and he knows it, which is making it even worse. He told me he’s starting to wonder if he’s even human anymore. But he said he can mimic emotions if he wants to, or at least mimic emotional reactions. And that’s what he did. He intellectually figured out that he should be happy that he gets to go out for the evening and use my car, and he knows that when people are happy, they smile. So he smiled. He didn’t feel the smile, and there was nothing spontaneous about it. It was like an actor performing a role.”
The growing chill Ellen had been feeling as Marsh talked turned into a shudder. “Why?” she whispered. “Why should he want to do such a thing?”
“He said people are beginning to think he’s crazy,” Marsh replied. “And he doesn’t want that to happen. He said he doesn’t want to be locked up until he knows what’s wrong with him.”
“Locked up?” The room seemed to be spinning, and for a moment Ellen thought she might faint. “Who would lock him up?”