Hard Time (27 page)

Eric stood and she slapped his back as they hugged, saying, “Can’t get over how big you got, inside.”

“It’s that luxury health club they got at Cousins.” He stepped back to nod in my direction. “Kris, this is Annie. The one you chewed out on the phone.”

I cringed on the inside and accepted Kristina’s shake. “Nice to meet you. Officially.”

“You, too,” she said, sounding more resigned than delighted.

Whatever.
Close enough. I had a better chance of being hit by a meteorite than of getting an apology out of this woman—that much seemed clear. She scared me, anyhow. I kept my expectations low, hoping for civility.

“Surprised you came for this visit,” she said to me, her tone impossible to get a read on.

“I um . . .” May as well be honest. “The whole thing freaks me out a little. Eric figured it might be good for me to come, so I could see there’s nothing to worry about.”

She shot her brother a
look
. “Nothing to worry about?”

“Probably not, Kris. That shit’s a coward—always has been. He doesn’t have a death wish. ’Specially not if he’s sober—”

Their mom tossed her hands up fretfully, trying to shoo the topic like a cloud of gnats. “I don’t want to talk about that horrible man.”

“That horrible man’s the reason I’m home this weekend,” Eric reminded her. “No point sugarcoating it.”

“But not tonight, baby. Okay?”

He sighed, dropping his shoulders in a show of surrender.

Paula turned to me. “Give me your glass, Annie.”

I let her refresh my wine, and the conversation turned to Christmas—what my family’s traditions were, what the winter was like in South Carolina. More an interview than a conversation, really, and Eric and Kris kept quiet, preoccupied by a different, unspoken interrogation. I spotted them shooting one another meaningful looks, Eric’s probably demanding things like,
Anybody seen him around
? Kris’s blasé expression told me nothing, but Eric seemed to read something from it. He frowned at her and sipped his wine. At one point she announced she needed a smoke, and Eric went with her. I could see them through the window when I went to the sink to rinse my hands. I watched him steal her cigarette and take a long drag, though he didn’t light one for himself. He hugged his arms against the cold, the two of them trading grave looks and words I couldn’t make out over the radio.

I didn’t like one bit that a petty part of me was jealous of their obvious bond. It looked nothing like the one I shared with him, like this was a side of him I’d not yet met. A deeply important side—the one capable of his crime. He looked like a stranger out there, a hard, handsome, serious man, breath fogging in the winter air to mimic his sister’s smoke. He felt very far away, standing just beyond that pane of glass.

Dinner was served shortly. On paper it was nearly exactly what my own mom had made on Christmas. Roasted and stuffed chicken, dressing, mashed potatoes, green beans. The potatoes were from a box, the gravy from a can, the beans from a freezer bag; all of which might’ve scandalized my mother, but it tasted fine, just a little different. Frankly I preferred their gravy.

I ate slowly, keeping pace with the others who were talking way more than me. Paula caught Eric up with all the neighborhood gossip, and he pretended to find it all riveting . . . though I was pretty sure he couldn’t give less of a damn about some dispute between the neighbors over property boundaries in relation to unattended dog turds.

After dinner we all tackled the dishes, then retired to the living room to flip channels. Eric and I sat on the couch, Paula in an old wicker rocker and Kristina lounging splay-legged on the carpet with a couple of pillows under her head and Scooter curled beside her hip. We didn’t really watch anything, just made fun of stuff and drifted in and out of remembrances triggered by whatever floated by on the screen.

At some point Paula grabbed a photo album from the bookcase, and I flipped through it, fascinated by shots of Eric as a boy, then a teenager. Lots of pictures of him standing on the sand in swim trunks, in front of what I guessed was the lake he’d driven me to. He’d been smaller back then, of course, his narrow frame missing the tattoos and chest hair and punishing build. But the same eyes, same overgrown hair, only curlier. He smiled a lot more in those images than he did these days, eyes often squinted against the sunshine. There were hardly any photos from the winter. And only a few featuring a man I assumed was Eric and Kris’s dad. Tall guy, black hair and beard, his frame broader than Eric’s and carrying more fat. Not a single shot of Kristina with a baby.

I tuned out of the conversation, preoccupied with questions I planned to save for after the women had gone to bed.

Paula called it a night around eleven, telling Kristina, “You wake me and there’ll be hell to pay.” They were sharing Paula’s bed so Eric and I could have the foldout.

“I’m not the one who snores,” Kris called after her mom.

I added, “Good night! Thank you for dinner—it was amazing.”

“Yeah,” Eric shouted. “Great dinner. See you in the morning.”

Kristina swirled the clear plastic tumbler in her hand, her drink drained mainly to ice. I was nursing my third glass of wine in four hours, and neither Eric nor his mom had topped up after dinner. Kristina had switched to screwdrivers, and though she didn’t sound especially tipsy, she had to be feeling them by now, at the rate she was going. She left us and returned with a fresh round, taking her mom’s spot in the rocker with a lamenting sigh.

“Remote,” she said, snapping her fingers, and caught it when Eric tossed it her way. Ice cubes clattered against plastic as she scanned the channels.

“Don’t like how quick you’re sucking those down,” Eric scolded in a lazy tone.

“You my sponsor now?”

“Just saying.”

“Oh well
pardon me
for being stressed out. Or have you forgotten who might roll into town at any moment?”

They’d been waiting hours to have this talk, I could tell. Waiting for their mom to turn in so they wouldn’t upset her.

“I haven’t forgotten,” he said coolly. “I’m here, aren’t I?”

Kristina smiled, the gesture cruel, and she kept her eyes on the screen. “And color me surprised, what with the company you’ve been keeping.”

Wait. Did she mean me? My balls always took a few moments to gather themselves, and I wasn’t fast to snap back. I was always the one who thought up the perfect retort a good two hours after any given spat.

Eric was quicker than me. “Company I keep feels pretty passionate about me not doing anything stupid and fucking up my parole. Which is more than I can say for my family, lately.”

Whoa.

Did that mean he was on my side in all this? After we’d bickered ourselves hoarse for the past week?

Kristina laughed. An ugly, mean little noise. “She gettin’ to you, then?”

“I’m here for you,” he said evenly. “She’s here for me, much as she hates that I even chose to come.”

Mentally, my brows rose at that. He’d never once made it sound like a choice. Had my ultimatum held more water than he’d let me realize?

Kristina demanded, “She the reason you didn’t come until he’d been released for four fucking days?”

“No. That’s because I have a job now, and a PO to answer to, and debts to pay.”

“Debts to pay,” she repeated. “Some fines to the fucking feds. What about making that night up to me, Eric? What about that?”

“Jesus.” I sat up straight, anger and words tumbling free like a landslide. “Are you blaming your brother for your assault? How the fuck is that his fault?”

She rolled her eyes, not meeting mine. “Stay out of this, princess.”

Princess?
Oh, it was
on
now. “No, I won’t stay out of it. How
dare
you lay that on him?”

“It’s okay, Annie,” Eric said. “There’s no winning with her. Don’t bother try—”

“He gave up five years of his life for your . . . for your honor,” I told her. I sounded shrill and petulant, but fuck it. “That not compensation enough for however it is you feel like he disappointed you?”

She stared me down. “My
honor?
Jesus, kid. You clearly don’t know shit about me, you think I’ve got any honor. And didn’t Eric tell me you threatened to sic him on your nasty ex?”

Oh, great.
“I—”

He cut in. “She didn’t mean it.”

“She said it, didn’t she?” Kris’s eyes narrowed in my direction.

“I did say it,” I admitted. “And I felt so shitty about it I cried after.”

“Boo-hoo, pretty princess. Boo-hoo.”

And then I said two words I’d never spoken to anyone aloud. I’d written them on a boy’s hand in Sharpie, yes, but never actually heard them in my own voice. “Fuck you.”

“Christ,” Eric muttered and rubbed his thighs, looking to the ceiling as if seeking reinforcements. “Both of you, please.”

“Why are you so fucking
mean
?” I demanded of Kris. Too late my brain supplied,
Daddy issues. Dead toddler. Violent assault.

“Why are you so fucking
surprised
?” she shot back, and she had a point.

“Forget it.” I sank against the cushions, standing down. “He’s right. There’s no point trying to talk to you, is there?”

She stared at me a long moment before speaking, leaning forward to rest her elbows on her knees. “You think you saved my brother or some shit, don’t you? Found his sorry ass in prison and shined your happy, rosy light all over him? Rescued him, made him all better? You like a fixer-upper, Annie?”

Scooter whined, sounding anxious.

“I know I love him,” I said quietly. “I know he’s saved me, in some ways. I know I want what’s best for him.”

“Turning him against his own family?”

I shook my head, faking a calm I felt no particle of. “Nope.”

“Bull.”

“I love this man,” I said, touching his arm. It was rigid as wood. “And I want him to be safe, and have a future. I don’t want him to be treated like some bodyguard or attack dog—no matter what bullshit I might have said to my ex, when I was out-of-my-mind pissed off. I want him to get what he deserves. A future. A good life.”

“You think you love my brother more than I do? Bitch, please. Thirty-two years versus five months. Get over yourself.”

“I never said that!” So much for my cool act. “And I don’t love him more, or better—it’s not a contest.”

“Coulda fooled me, the way you’re so fucking determined to win it.”

I glared, anger roiling in my chest. “I think it’s selfish, that you ask him to put his life and his future in harm’s way, for your own sense of security. If something did go down, he could get sent back to prison for ten years, all because you were too selfish or cowardly to testify or get yourself a restraining order.”

“You—”

I plowed straight over her. “And I’m selfish, too. I want him in my life. I want him safe, and free, and not just for his own good. For mine. I’m just as selfish as you, maybe.”

Eric stood, cutting off whatever venom Kristina’s parted lips were poised to spit at me. “Enough. Kris—get out. Annie, get ready for bed.” He flipped the blinds shut. “You two still got shit to say to each other, write it down and we’ll deal with it tomorrow.”

Kris managed, “She—” before Eric cut her off, a few decibels shy of shouting.

“Shut up. Go to bed.”

And wonder of wonders, she did. She stood, tossing the remote on the cushion beside me, and left the room without so much as a muttered word, the dog at her heels. Her silence shocked me more than a hollered curse would have. As I changed into pajamas and Eric unfurled the foldout, I wondered if Kris would wake her mom and tell her what a psycho bitch her son had brought home.

“Let it go,” Eric ordered, reading the worries on my face.

“Oh sure, no problem.”

He clicked off the TV, tossed a layer of sheets over the mattress, then a couple of blankets, and added the pillows his mom had stacked by the wall.

“Get in,” he said. The order would’ve been rude if he hadn’t sounded so completely defeated.

I wanted to wash my face and brush my teeth, but my adrenaline was waning, and I didn’t relish running into Kris and getting into a fistfight outside the house’s only bathroom.

I climbed under the covers and sighed up at a water-stained ceiling panel. Emotions rolled through me, making it feel as though I were lying on an inflatable beach lounger, pitched around by the waves.

It was kind of funny, though. If this evening’s main event had somehow gone down before I’d worked at Cousins, I’d be way more of a wreck than I was now. I’d probably be crying. Crying, and desperately trying to figure out what concessions to make to stop Kris from being angry with me.

But not anymore, nope. After swimming for eight hours a week in the Olympic-sized pool of human conflict known as prison, I’d learned to live inside these uncomfortable sensations, as I might force myself to function through a head cold.
Just feelings
,
I reminded myself, same as if I’d been spooked by an altercation in the dayroom.

“I’m sorry,” I muttered, still staring at the ceiling. “Not for what I said—but for giving you such a headache. I meant everything I said.”

“I know you did. And no need to apologize. I always get a headache when I come home. That ain’t new.”

“Tell me she’s kind to you, when it’s just you two.”

He stripped to his shorts and flipped off the lamp, and the Christmas lights framing the window. Didn’t reply until he’d climbed in beside me.

“She looked out for me, my whole childhood,” he said. “She was a bully, but she stood up for me. To other kids, to my dad even. She warned me away from the wrong girls, when I was in high school. Sounds controlling, I know, but looking back, she always knew what was best for me. So it’s hard to deny her what she feels she needs from me, now.”

“What do you mean, the wrong girls?”

“The kinds who make trouble. The kind who want saving. Or attention. Who get followed around by the drama they make for themselves.”

“What kind of drama?”

“One came after me, real aggressive, one summer when I was maybe sixteen,” Eric said. “I knew she was a fucking mess, but she was real pretty and I was real horny, and the way she wanted me . . . I felt like I was ten feet tall. My sister told me, ‘Don’t you fucking dare.’ And she just about ran that girl off by force. I was fucking livid.”