“Where’s Joni?” Ben asked. Joey, of course, didn’t answer, but Ben’s nose inspired him to investigate the kitchen.
In the kitchen, Ben found Joni stirring a copper pot on the stove. Her boyfriend, Booker, was sitting at the table.
“How’s it going, Booker?”
“All right, my man.” They slapped hands.
“How’s the shoulder?” Booker’s shoulder was slowly mending from an injury he’d received in Ben’s living room several months ago. He’d managed to save Christina and Joey’s lives, but he’d gotten a nasty knife wound in the process.
“Only hurts when I laugh.” Booker was a big, muscular man; he worked out regularly at a gym downtown. “And I only laugh when Joni does her striptease routine.”
“Booker!” Joni whirled around, aiming a wooden spoon at his head.
“Just a joke, Joni. Just a joke.” He turned his head and gave Ben a pronounced wink.
Joni was wearing jeans and a T-shirt (R.E.M. RULES!) that covered her tall, lean figure like a drape. The ensemble was completed by ten-hole utility boots and the usual baseball cap turned backward. Her short black hair was tucked behind her ears. Joni had a twin sister, Jami, but since Joni had cut her hair, they had gone from being seemingly identical to being barely discernible as members of the same family.
Ben leaned over the stove and inhaled. “Boy, that smells good. But you’re not supposed to do the cooking. That’s my job.”
“Well, you had that conference today, so I knew you’d probably be late. So I started dinner.”
“That was very considerate of you. I didn’t know you could cook.”
“Actually, Booker did all the cooking. All I’ve done is stir.”
“Booker! You?”
Booker shrugged. “What can I say? I’m a Renaissance man.”
“Evidently.” Ben took another deep whiff. “What is it, anyway?”
Joni peered intently into the pot. “Uh … soup.”
“Soup. Good. What kind?”
“Uhhh … you know … just soup.”
“Just soup? C’mon, what is it?”
“I’m not clear on all the details.”
Booker interrupted. “Beer cheese soup. The best.”
“Beer cheese? As in beer?” Ben frowned. “We don’t have any alcoholic beverages in this house.”
Booker smiled. “Brought my own.”
“But we can’t give Joey something that has beer in it!”
Booker smiled. “I prepared young Master Joseph the usual assorted vegetable platter.”
Along with his other eccentricities, Joey had an astounding (for his age) preference for food that was actually healthy. “Well, still. You know I don’t approve of having alcohol in the house.”
“Relax, Ben. We just put in a smidgen. And we poured the rest down the drain. And sterilized the drain with Lysol.” She poked him in the stomach. “What an old woman you’ve become. You’re worse than Mrs. Marmelstein.”
“I don’t mean to be a pain. But it’s a big responsibility, looking after a little kid.”
“You don’t have to tell me,” she said. “After all, I’m his nanny.”
And a darn good nanny she had been, too. Ben had had doubts when, out of desperation, he had promoted her from occasional babysitter to full-fledged nanny status, but she had proven herself time and time again. Almost overnight she had gone from goofy, irresponsible teenager to dedicated, mature caregiver. She fed Joey, bathed Joey, changed Joey, and put up with his odd behavior whenever he wasn’t at school and Ben couldn’t be at home.
Ben felt a furry nuzzling at his feet. “Hi there, Giselle.” Giselle was his cat, a black Burmese who was a past birthday present from Christina. “Are you telling me that you love me, or that you’re hungry?”
Foolish question. Ben took a can of Feline’s Fancy out of the cupboard and scraped it into her bowl. She gobbled it down in well under a minute, then plodded out of the room.
“Not very friendly today,” Ben commented.
“Giselle is undergoing a lot of stress,” Joni explained. “She’s never had a rival for your affection before.”
“A rival?” Joey.
“Oh. Has she been … misbehaving?”
Joni laid down her spoon and turned off the heat. “Let’s just say it’s best to keep them in separate rooms.”
“I had no idea. Thanks for the tip.” He glanced into the soup pot. “Is dinner about ready?”
“Ten more minutes,” Joni replied. “Why don’t you get out of the monkey suit?
“Deal.” Ben left the kitchen and walked toward his bedroom. On his way, he noticed Joey in the living room. He was still playing with his animals, obsessively lining them up. The expression on his face suggested that he was deep in thought, contemplating some weighty matter. But what?
Ms. Hammerstein’s words came back to him unbidden. He isn’t like the other children.
Ben could fuss and fume all he wanted in public, but privately he knew she was right.
I can’t help wondering whether Joey might not be better off in a more stable environment.
Well, who wouldn’t be? Ben threw his coat onto his bed. Where was his box, anyway?
He lay down on the hardwood floor and reached under the bed. A moment later, he withdrew a shoebox-size wooden box.
Ben lifted the metal clasp and peered inside. This was his childhood treasure chest, the place where he kept his most cherished belongings. There was a Captain Action action figure, a Frisbee, and a Magic 8-Ball. An almost complete deck of Mars Attacks trading cards. A toy phaser. A genuine Superman Krypto-Ray gun. There was a picture of Ben in the third grade, gap-toothed and towheaded.
All the treasures of his childhood. All the things he loved best. Sorted and counted and organized a thousand times over.
Memories were so unreliable. Sometimes he felt like this was all he had left of his childhood, all that remained. He had been a very shy kid, very quiet. Didn’t socialize, didn’t play well with other children. Seemed to be in a world of his own.
Hmmm.
Ben closed the box. He didn’t have time for this indulgence. He should be out there playing with his nephew, trying to engage him, to draw him out of his shell. Being the best substitute daddy he could be, and ignoring …
I can’t help wondering whether Joey might not be better off in a more stable environment. You want what’s best for Joey, don’t you?
He did, of course.
Ben wanted to do the right thing.
But sometimes it was hard as hell to know what that was.
Chapter 8
HE GRIPPED THE STEERING wheel with such intensity that the cold white knuckles of his hands shone in the moonlight. His face was flushed and sweaty; his head was pressed forward so far his nose nearly touched the wheel. He drove in a blind panic, with no conscious thought in his brain except the one central overwhelming one that was more instinct than thought.
… gotta go… gotta get out … gotta go … gotta get out … gotta get away …
He still couldn’t sort it out in his head. It had all been so violent, so fast and final. He tried to retrace the events of the day, the afternoon, the evening, but it was all a blur, a confused random assortment of images he didn’t understand, like a computer that had short-circuited and spewed out all its data in one instantaneous jumbled mess. The only thing he remembered clearly was the one sight burned in his brain—Caroline draped over the chair, blood dripping from her mouth.
Oh my God. Oh my God.