Delusive (43 page)

When the cab driver pulled up to the house, I gave him the money for the trip—the money Jaco gave me before he saw me off at the airport—and walked up the driveway with my rolling bag behind me. The stride of my legs, hinted at the pain that hadn’t yet left me, and it provoked the memories of things I didn’t think I’d ever heal from.

I used my key to open the front door, but found it wasn’t locked in the first place—which was odd for my father because he locked the front door at all times. I walked inside the house and was taken by the eerie silence right away.

“Dad?” I called, walking carefully throughout the house. Sitting on a plane for several hours did very little to help me get over the tearing sensation and taking several pain relievers did even less. Whatever Elias had given me before, it wasn’t something that could be purchased over the counter.
 

I went upstairs, calling for my father again. The door to Frankie’s room served as an ominous presence. The silence in the hall was deafening. Usually the rhythmic sounds of the machines filled the halls with their odd music. Today the machines were silent.

I made my way to the door as I had many times before and talked myself out of going inside. My hand turned the knob, faced with more silence when I opened the door. My heart was in my throat, making breathing much less swallowing, difficult.

I looked inside the room seeing only an empty hospital bed and enough boxes to make navigating the room difficult. I thought they might have left without me, but Frankie’s car was still in the driveway. My father would’ve never moved without it.
 

The question was…where was Frankie?
 

A small table next to the bed caught my eye. On top of it was a simple docking station with portable speakers for a cell phone or an electronic device. A device was already attached. Lured to press play by curiosity, I pressed the button. The music I was missing in the hall filled the room; the sound of Frankie’s machines.

“Hanley? I thought you were going to be in Portugal for the week.”

In a daze, I pressed pause, unwilling to look at my father. “I came back early.”

“Oh,” he said simply. “Frankie’s gone ahead with the nurse. I thought I'd move her the same way we did last time since it worked out so well. I found a place in North Carolina. I think you’re going to love it. It’s a small and quiet town with no one to bother us.” He paused for a moment. “I called the transportation company and the nurse to make sure Frankie’s all right. The nurse told me she’s doing well on the trip.”

“Where did you get the money to move her?” I asked rashly.

“Well”—he put his hands in his pockets and gave me an uneasy smile—“I took out a loan. Now”—he pressed his hands out in the air—“I know what you’re going to say—”

“Dad”—I fingered the device in my hands—“why would you need this?”

He didn’t bother to look at it. He just stared at me with a void in his eyes and a faint smile. “Oh, I recorded that for myself a while back. It helps me sleep while she’s traveling—makes me feel like she's still here, so I don't worry so much.”

“Do you mind if I call the transportation place? It might make me feel a little better to hear she’s okay.”

His eyes held a tinge of concern as he took a small step forward. “Is everything all right?”

“Not at all.” Sighing, I rubbed my jittery hands. “Elias knows everything.”

“My God,” he gasped, his mouth falling open. It took him quite a while before he was able to close it again. “Did he hurt you?” Stepping toward me again, he reached out and grasped my shoulders as he scanned every piece of my exposed flesh for a brief moment.

“I’ll heal.”

“I warned you about that man,” he barked, scowling at me. “We have to get on the road right this minute.”

“Before we go, I need to know if anyone other than Elias knows, I need to know that Frankie is safe.”

“I’ll give them a call when we hit the road.” He looked around at the furniture. “Most of these things aren’t ours anyway. Have you packed enough to carry you through for a while?”

It was impossible to ignore the tinge of skepticism that bothered me. It was a pressure at my spine that made movement impossible. Suddenly, I saw the cracks in my father, and why he had such a perfect answer to everything. The last bit of advice his previous nurse gave me played on a constant replay.
 

“Why…won’t you give me the number?” I asked, my voice trembling. “It would make sense to call now, because if Elias’s father knows, he’ll probably go after Frankie. We could be walking right into a trap. Give it to me, and I’ll call on the road. If I don’t get a response, we’ll stay at a hotel and figure things out.”
 

“Ah, hell, Hanley.” He ran a hand over his misshapen brush cut, setting a starry-eyed gaze to the window, allowing unfiltered daylight to pour into the room.

“Dad?”

He remained immovable and still, stuck in a sort of dreamlike state as he continued to stare at the invisible.

I tried to fight, but I couldn’t. For the first time in a long time, I cried real tears, not from physical pain or empathy, but from an emotion so deep and gutting, I couldn’t bear it. “There is no transportation company is there? What happened to Frankie?”

“I see." His lips pursed together, his cheeks bowed out in anger. "That man has filled your head with lies again—”

“This is not about Elias. This is about you not giving me any answers. It’s about you…lying to me. Where…is…Frankie?”

“I’ve told you where she is,” he bellowed, sticking a finger in my face. “I don’t appreciate you questioning me like this.”

The truth was spoken even though he didn’t say a word to confirm it. Clutching the player, I lifted my arm and threw it, allowing it to shatter against the wall beside where he stood. “When did you pull the plug on Frankie? When did you decide to pull the plug on my mother and not tell me? Why did you lead me on and make me think she was still here?”

He blinked rapidly, his eyes watering. “I’m not sure what you’re talking about.”

“Stop lying to me,” I gritted through my teeth, staring up at him through my moisture slicked eyelashes, “or I’ll walk out that door and never come back.”

Tears began to fall down his cheeks. Closing his eyes, he slanted against the wall as though he was thrown against it. “I was so scared this would happen, and it has. I’ve lost you to that man. You don’t even believe your own father.”

“I walked away from Elias,” I replied, exhaustion and frustration taking its toll. “I told you that. He knows the truth. He has nothing to do with this—us. Why can’t you see that? Why would you do this to me? What reason did you have for making me believe she was still here?” I clenched my fists, psyching myself for the inevitable. “I forgave you for so many things. I did the things you asked me to do because I believed in you—I
believed
you. If you can lie about this, what else have you lied about?” Shaking my head in disgust, I brushed past him and grabbed my bag in the hall.

“Wait a minute!” he called out to me.

His voice became distant and silent. I only heard one question I cared to answer. “Where are you going?”

“Back to Roth. To find the answers you won’t give me.”

“You won’t find him. I killed him after what he did.”

I turned on a dime, glaring back at a father who wasn’t the semblance of the man I remembered in the now or the one I grew up with. “What did you say?”

The expressionless look I saw in his eyes before he turned violent or hurt himself had made a return. “I killed him. There is no Roth to find. Enough of this now.” Collecting himself, his posture turned a little more casual. “We need to get on the road.”

“I’m going to find Roth.” I no longer knew what to believe. The truth had been turned around too many times for me to keep up. “I now know why he set the fire,” I continued feebly. “To show me that you were lying to me. I have a feeling he knows a lot more if you are so against me seeing him that you would lie to me and tell me you killed him. You’re not a killer.”

He turned his back on me, remaining that way as though he expected me to leave. With nothing more to say, I did exactly that.

TWENTY-EIGHT

AT THE TICKET COUNTER, I thumbed through my wallet in hopes of finding a credit card I had forgotten about and hadn’t maxed out. When I fingered a card foreign to me, with my name on it, I was stunned. I flipped over the back and found a sticky note. “$50,000 dollar limit on this card. I added you as an authorized user. Don’t spend it all in one place. E.”

“Ma’am?” the attendant called to me. “Are you all right?”

I sniffled and wiped my nose with the back of my hand while nodding. “Yes.” I gave her the card. “I found a card to use.” I watched her anxiously, unsure if Elias had given me the card before or after our final fight. If it had been before, it was very likely he could’ve cut it off.

I had worried for nothing. The card went through and the attendant handed me a ticket and gave me directions to my departure gate.

IT WAS LIKE a prickly hair on the back of my neck that wouldn’t stop irritating me. During the time I had made plans to fly into JFK, got a hotel, and pounded the pavement in search of the facility where I last knew Roth was—or could’ve been—I could tell someone was there in the background, watching me. Whoever it was, it wasn’t a face I recognized.
 

THERE WAS A lone woman at the front desk of the mental health wing of the hospital. She was on a phone call that seemed to go on for about an hour before she asked me what I needed.
 

“I’m here to see Roth Cari.”

She cocked her head to the side and shook her head at me. “Even if he was still here, it’s not a visitation day.”

“What do you mean
was
?”

“I can’t give you that information unless you’re family or a health care provider.”

“Whether or not he’s here, can you tell him Leina Williams wants to see him?” I turned to leave but was halted when she called out to me.

“Wait! Did you say Leina?”

“Yes?” I turned around to regard her.

She rummaged through the desk and the counters, increasingly frustrated as she muttered, “I know I put it here somewhere. AH!” She picked up an envelope and thrust it at me. “He left this for you.”

I walked forward, taking the envelope. Scrawled across the front was my name, Leina, in what I knew to be Roth’s handwriting. “Can you at least tell me if his father came to check him out? His name is Natanael Cari. Please, it’s really important.”

She clutched her chest, looking around skeptically. Satisfied no one was around, she sat down at her computer and tapped a few keys for a moment. “Yes, it was. I remembered the face but not the name.”

“Tan skinned man with green eyes?”

“No. It was a man about three shades darker than your complexion with brown eyes. I figured the kid—Roth—was biracial. He kind-of looked like he could be.” She labeled him as a kid even though Roth was twenty-nine and she looked to be not much older than he. It wasn’t her only slip-up, but I was too occupied with seeking out my truth to play a game of politically correct with her.

I fiddled with my purse and took out a picture of my father. “Did he look like this man?”

“Could’ve been. I didn’t really pay too much attention to him.”

“Thank you,” I told her quickly and raced out of the facility.
 

I leaned against the exterior brick of the hospital, preparing myself to read the letter. But when I opened the envelope, a generic packet of sugar slipped out. Something was written on the small space:

Your father is a fucking liar and a killer.

I held the packet of sugar up toward the sky, completely confused. It was one of many things that didn’t fit or make much sense to me. I looked down the street, perusing the stores to find a place where I could use a public phone.
 

"LEINA?" MY SISTER answered, surprising me. Normally, Whitney was the one to answer her phone and either pacify me or make up excuses for why my sister wasn’t available to speak to me.
 

“Are you having me followed?”

“I don’t have the resources, or a reason…do I?” She exhaled audibly and in an elongated manner. “I thought you called me to discuss something important.”

“I did,” I told her quickly, hoping to pique her interest. She seemed near to hanging up on me, as usual. “What is the real reason you stopped speaking to Dad after our mother—after Frankie died?”

She sighed. "I'm glad you finally know. The question is how much you know."

"I don’t know when our father pulled the plug, but I know it was a long time ago. We had a fight. I found out the truth.”

“Dad pulled the plug on Frankie the day after our visit."

Suddenly, I felt like I was coated in acid. I gasped. “Why didn't you tell me?"

"Because you would've believed me?" she asked sarcastically. "Her ashes have been on my mantle for years. It took me a long time to find them. Our father wanted to keep it a secret from me, too. I pulled some strings to find out what really happened and did what I could to give her a nice ceremony.”