Ink and Ashes (14 page)

“Do you think he knew he was going to die?” I asked.

He pushed up his glasses again and paused to gather his thoughts. “I don’t know, Claire. For Henry to die at such a young age . . . I guess it’s possible.” His tired eyes sagged.

The story of how my parents had gotten together was not what I expected, although I didn’t know what to expect anymore. It was definitely more information than I thought he would share. I stared out the window to our front lawn. I could visualize the car parked across the street and the man taking pictures. “Dad, is there any reason the mafia would want to hurt us now that my father’s dead?”

“Not that I can think of,” he said. “Why do you ask?”

I told him about the black SUV, from the first time I saw it, to the guy taking pictures of our houses, to how he followed me out of school just now.

“How long has this been going on?” he asked.

I shrugged. “Maybe a few weeks. About the same time I ordered the autopsy report.” I showed him the top of my hand. “Here’s the license plate number.” The marker had faded to a grayish-purple. “It’s a Nevada plate.”

He squinted. “I can barely read it. What if it had washed away completely?”

“I wrote it down on paper upstairs just in case.”

He took a pen from his desk drawer and copied the information in a notebook in front of him.

“I don’t want you to worry about this. I’m going to take care of everything,” he said. “But if you happen to see the car again, I want you to call the police for help immediately, then call me.”

“I will. Do you think this has anything to do with my father?” I tugged at the loose thread on the hem of my shorts until it broke. “Do you think I started this when I ordered the report?”

“I don’t know.” He pursed his lips as he shook his head.

Maybe he was saying that to make me feel better, but I could tell there was something he wasn’t saying. “Do you have any idea who’s in the car?”

“Perhaps. How’s the team doing without you?”

The way he transitioned into questions about soccer so quickly made something prickle in my gut.

“Fine. I think. We haven’t had any games, so I don’t know. I’ve only been away a few days. At this rate I’ll miss tomorrow’s game, but I’m a little more worried about everything else.”

He picked up his cell phone. “I’m going to call the school and have them tell your brothers to call home. I need to know if they received boxes.”

“They’re at soccer practice by now, so you’ll have to tell the office to give the message to Coach Zindler.”

“Noted. And I’m going to try to reschedule your meeting with the principal while I have them on the line.”

“Okay.” I put my arms on the chair and lifted myself up. “Am I in trouble then? For the autopsy report and all that other stuff?”

He edged around the desk to get to me. He perched on the front of his desk, leaned over, and clasped my face with both hands. “Yes, very much so. But I will deal with you later.” He kissed the top of my head, already dialing the school.

“Love you, Dad,” I said as I left him.

“Love you, too.” He lifted the phone to his ear. “I’m going to take care of this. I’m not going to let anything happen to my princess.”

His gentle tone and the look on his face said he was trying to be convincing, but his anxiety lit up the room.

Dear Otochan,

Today I was thinking about something that happened a long time ago. We’d only lived in Utah a few months, but Fed had spent so much time at our house he felt like my little brother—one I liked. Anyway, we were all playing soccer at the park across the street. Forrest had been in the neighborhood even less time than we had because he moved in a little after. So this was his first time playing with us. He ended up knocking Fed to the ground, and Fed started screaming. Nicholas started to make fun of Fed and called him a baby because he wouldn’t get up. I finally went over and helped Fed roll over. Blood was everywhere. He’d fallen on a sprinkler head, and it had somehow sliced his leg open. I remember I started to cry because I was so scared. All I could think about was how he might die like you. I held Fed’s hand and was probably crying harder than he was.

I don’t know how I could have been so stupid. I was worried he was going to die, but rather than trying to stop the bleeding, I sat there and bawled. I guess I’m lucky that all Fed needed was stitches.

I only have a few memories of you, but one is that I held your hand as you were dying. Mom says she told me to wait with you while she called for an ambulance. I don’t remember that, but I remember I was going to be turning seven in a few weeks. I was worried that you were going to be sick on my birthday and that I would have to wait to open my presents. I know that I wasn’t that old, but sometimes I wonder if there’s something I could have done to save you.

With everything going on right now, I know I don’t ever want to feel like that again. I don’t want to question whether there was something I should or could have done. I want to know I at least tried.

Love,

Claire, age 16

AFTER I LEFT
Dad’s office, I sat down at the piano. I’d played the piano for as long as I could remember, first in Hawaii and then Utah. Once we moved, I studied under a professor at the University of Utah. I missed taking lessons, but I hadn’t missed the four to five hours of practice each day required by Dr. McLloyd. It was nice not to wake up early so I could get a few hours of practice in before school, and I enjoyed having more room in my schedule for other things like soccer.

I chose the Warsaw Concerto by Richard Addinsell. The style reminded me of Rachmaninoff, but Dr. McLloyd had told me the song was composed for a movie. I imagined playing the music to a screenplay of someone else’s life, someone else’s problems.

I finished the piece and checked my phone. School was out, and I had multiple texts from Forrest asking where I was. I texted him briefly to let him know I was at home.

When his Jeep rolled into our driveway to drop off my brothers, I ran out to meet him. I never understood why he always gave us door-to-door service when he lived next door, but it was one of the things I found endearing about him.

My brothers jumped out of the car. “Good to
see
you,” Parker said. “Get it?
See
? Eyeballs?”

“You’re so stupid,” Avery mumbled.

“Did you guys get boxes too?” I asked, making my way to Forrest’s side.

Avery shook his head.

“
Eye
did not.” Parker bent over, laughing harder than anyone at his own joke. They hauled their stuff inside.

I was the only lucky one. I didn’t know how to make sense of everything.

Forrest rolled down his window. “Since when do your brothers know more information about you than I do?” He smiled.

I hung both of my hands on his door. “Yeah, sorry about that. They only knew I was home because Dad called the school.”

“Hey, Kiki,” Nicholas said from the passenger seat. “I’m going to pound the guy when I find out who did that.” He hit his fist against his palm.

“You can have him after I do,” I said.

“So Katie’s party tonight?” Forrest asked.

“Yep,” I said. “What time do you guys want to head over?”

“We’ll be over once we drop off our stuff, and then we can go whenever we feel like it,” said Nicholas.

“See you in a little bit,” Forrest said, and backed out of the driveway.

I headed up to my room to get ready and threw open my dresser drawers. And then I stared.

Nothing stood out. Even though all of my time was spent with these guys, I was still a girl who did, on occasion, care what I looked like. After agonizing forever, I dressed in a gray T-shirt from my last soccer tournament and a pair of jeans, which wasn’t different than what I wore on any given day. I probably should have asked one of the girls from the team to go shopping with me to help with my style, but the kinds of clothes other girls wore looked so uncomfortable. And if I asked Mom to take me, everything would end up being pink.

While I stood in front of the bathroom mirror deciding what to do with my hair, the kitchen below became filled with a chorus of the usual noise. I heard Avery and Fed raid the fridge, open and slam the pantry door, trade insults.

My black hair fell just below my shoulders. I tried to pin some of it up the way other girls did, but it was hopeless. In the end, I stuffed my hair in the usual ponytail, but the elastic snapped and I didn’t have any more in the house. I gave up and left it down.

I brushed on some mascara and tried some eyeliner. Since I didn’t use eyeliner often, I’d never learned how to hold my hand steady. The line looked decent on my left eye, but the right eye took a couple of attempts before I could draw a straight line.

A muffled bumping sound came from my closet. Looking in the direction of the noise, I stiffened. Something shifted again behind the door. I grabbed a hairbrush off the bathroom counter and clutched it until the blood drained out of my hand. Stepping out of the bathroom into my room, I stared at the knob. The rustle of clothing made me stop. I urged my hand to steady itself, but it continued to tremble. Most likely it was a mouse, I told myself. A big one.

I hated mice.

My heart sprinted laps inside my chest. I reached for the handle and yanked open the door.

A huge figure dressed in all black yelled and launched himself at me. I delivered a strong backhand to his face with the brush as I was tackled to the floor. Everything happened so fast that I only realized Parker was in my face when my brush found his cheek.

He rolled off me, gripping his side to contain the laughter.

“Stupid jerk,” I muttered, and punched him in the stomach as hard as I could.

He folded in half. “Jeez! It was just a joke,” he said, rubbing his stomach with one hand and his red cheek with the other.

I threw the brush at him and stormed out.

When I marched into the kitchen, Dad seamlessly interrupted his chat with the guys. “Too much makeup,” he said and kept talking.

Wearing a little mascara and eyeliner hardly equated to “too much makeup,” but the fact that I ever wore makeup at all made him upset.

Fed cracked a toothy grin, his freckled cheeks pushing against the bottom of his eyes. “I think you look great. A princess, like Asayahime.”

“Thanks.” I tried to contain my big smile. Fed was proof brothers could communicate with sentences that didn’t include insults. He’d also never jumped out of my closet and tackled me to the ground.

He tugged my arm and asked me for advice on what to wear. I scanned his blue T-shirt with a picture of a caffeine molecule and assured him he didn’t need to go home and change because he looked fine. I wasn’t the best person to give fashion advice though.

Dad put both hands on the island. “Where are you going?” he asked.

“To Katie’s house,” I said. “All of us are going.”

Avery motioned to Fed to go upstairs so they could avoid the conversation, but Dad stopped them. “Son, I need to speak with you.”

“I’ll meet you up there,” Avery said to Fed.

Fed nodded and disappeared up the stairs.

“Parker,” Dad called. “Can you come down here please?”

I sat on a stool at the island.

Parker lumbered down the stairs and into the kitchen. He seated himself on the stool next to me.

“Look, kids, I don’t think you should go anywhere tonight until I can find out what’s going on,” he said.

Avery walked over and stood behind Parker. “Just because someone doesn’t like Claire?”

Dad closed his eyes and took a deep breath. He opened his eyes and said, “Avery, I think we all know this could be more serious than that, and we can’t say for sure if Claire’s the only one being targeted. Hopefully it isn’t serious, but until I know who did this, I’d feel better if you and your friends hung out here tonight.”

“Okay, I admit it. I did it,” Avery said. He clapped his hands together. “Who’s ready to go?”

Dad stared at him in disbelief, and from the way his nostrils flared, he was crossing over into extreme irritation.

“We’ll stay here,” Parker said.

“Thank you, Parker,” Dad said, still glaring at Avery. “I need to catch a plane for a business trip to Phoenix, but I trust you can behave yourselves until Mom gets home from work.”

“Claire, you heard Dad,” Avery said. “No pole dancing tonight.”

Dad shook his head and rolled his eyes before he went to his room. I remembered the prickly feeling in my gut when I had talked to Dad earlier that afternoon. There was something he was holding back. I had never been sure where he went, but I planned to find out. His briefcase was in his office.

I sprinted to the front of the house, my pulse racing, and slipped into his office. He kept his briefcase by the side of his desk. By now, I knew he wouldn’t place any documents in it until right before he walked out the door. I took the GPS off my necklace and slid the disk inside the luggage tag of the briefcase, behind the paper with his name on it, then ran back into the kitchen.

“Where’d you go?” Avery asked when I returned.

“To the bathroom.”

“Well, thanks to you, we get to stay home tonight,” he said.

“Do you have any idea how annoying you are?” I asked, trying to catch my breath. “It’s not my fault someone sent me
eyeballs
.” Or maybe it was my fault. Why were things happening only to me? I couldn’t help but feel guilty they weren’t allowed to go. If it only affected me, I wouldn’t care as much because parties were never my thing. I didn’t need the added stress of people expecting me to do social things like
talk
. And with Avery grating every nerve, I don’t know why I cared at all that he had to stay home.

“What are we going to do, then?” Parker asked.

“Watch a movie?” I said.

“Boring,” Avery said.

“I can’t think of anything,” Parker said. “Let’s wait for Forrest and Nicholas to get here, and we can decide.”

Dad came back into the kitchen wearing a dark suit and tie with a small travel bag slung over his shoulder and his briefcase in hand. “Claire, your meeting is scheduled for next Friday. That’s the soonest the principal and I could find a time that would work for all of us.”

“Thanks for doing that.” I wanted to bang my head on the island counter in front of me. Missing the meeting was my fault, and I knew it, but it didn’t make the situation any easier.

“Parker,” Dad called over to the family room, “take care of your mom and your sister while I’m gone.”

“Yeah, I know,” Parker said.

Dad said this every time he left for a trip, and it drove me crazy. “I don’t need to be taken care of.” It was the same response I always gave, but it didn’t seem to matter.

“I know,” Dad said to me, “but it doesn’t mean I’ll stop trying. Bye, kids.”

“Bye,” all of us said, and he went to the garage.

We ended up in the family room watching a movie. No one could think of anything else. The movie had been playing about twenty minutes when the doorbell rang. Who could be coming over? Everyone was already here.

No one moved. The doorbell rang again.

“Is anyone going to get that?” I asked.

“Thanks for volunteering,” Avery said.

I got up and went to the front door. I opened the door and found Katie on the other side dressed in a tank top and cutoff shorts. What was she doing here?

“Oh hey,” she said. “Can you come help me get some stuff out of the trunk?”

“Um, sure?” I slipped on some shoes and followed her to the car in our driveway. “What am I helping you with?”

“Stuff for the party. It actually worked out well that Avery called,” she said. “My parents were getting all stressed out that something might get broken at our house, so they were relieved when I told him we moved it to your place.” This was news to me. Avery was going to be first in line for Mom’s wrath if she found out.

“Hmm.” I hoped Mom was working late. “Did you let everyone know the location has changed?”

She pressed a button on her keychain and the trunk of her Passat opened. “Lanie, Mika, Kimi, and Ashley took care of it.” She handed me a box filled with graham crackers, marshmallows, and chocolate bars. “And don’t worry, they’re telling everyone about the no shoes in the house policy.”

Shoes in the house was the least of my worries. Mom was going to kill us.

“I was thinking we could make s’mores,” she said, “because Avery said you could get a fire going in your copper pit.” We do have a backyard that’s ideal for s’mores.

Katie rested a tub of drinks on her hip and closed the trunk. We trekked across the front lawn and up the stairs of the porch. In the entryway, Katie set the tub on the floor so she could untie her shoes. Then she followed me down the hallway, past the stairs, to the family room and kitchen area. I set my box on the island in the kitchen and motioned for her to do the same.

“Hey guys,” Katie called over to the family room.

“Hi,” Nicholas said, from his usual couch. Forrest and Parker waved from the other couch.

“What’s going on?” Parker muttered.

“I’m going to run to the gas station and get some ice,” Katie said. “I’ll be back in ten.”

“No problem,” I said.