The Dead of Summer (19 page)

“Why would anyone pretend to be your daddy, anyway?” Lindy asked, staring at me. “Is he trying to get money from your Mama? Like blackmail?”

“I don’t—”

“That’s strange,” Carson interrupted. “It doesn’t say anything about coming here, but his last post was ten days ago and he sent it from his iPhone. Looks like he was in Georgia at the time. Says, ‘time to get what’s rightfully mine.’ Wonder what that’s supposed to mean.”

I shuddered again.
Could he have meant to steal something of Daddy’s from Mama? Could this cuckoo bird really be so delusional that he thought he really was Mark Ryan, not just pretending to be him?

At any rate, he was within driving distance last week. It was looking more and more like this fake Mark Ryan was the owner of the dead corpse in the basement.

“Okay, well now what do we do?” I asked Carson.

“Shouldn’t you go to the police and tell them someone is impersonating your daddy?” Lindy asked, like the answer was the most obvious one on the planet. And it was—if you didn’t have a body in the basement that your Mama might have put there.

“Maybe we should find out what he’s looking to steal,” Carson suggested.

“How are we gonna do that?” I asked.

“Well, what does your Mama have worth stealing?” Lindy asked before blowing a ginormous bubble.

I shrugged. “Nothing. You’ve been to my house, Lindy. You know there’s nothing there.”
Because when we left Texas, we left everything.
I shuddered again.
Why did we leave Texas? Why does Mama never talk about the past? Could that have something to do with this fake Mark Ryan?

“Maybe your Mama has something in her bedroom. You know she locks that place up and gets mad if you go in her room,” Lindy said with a sharp raise of her eyebrow. “We should look to see what she’s hiding in there.”

She had a point. Mama was very secretive about her bedroom and never let me in there. “How am I gonna get in there, Lindy? You know she never leaves the house.”

“She never leaves the house?” Carson asked. “You’re joking, right? She’s gotta leave the house at some point.”

Lindy snorted. “Oh, Carson doesn’t know about your bat-shit crazy mama?”

Thanks Lindy.

“I hadn’t mentioned,” I mumbled, suddenly fascinated by the sole peeling off of my shoe.

Lindy laughed again. “Oh well, Kennedy’s mama—”

“Why don’t you let Kennedy tell me?” Carson suggested, cutting off Lindy’s gossip.

I smiled at him, not sure whether to be grateful or not. Explaining Mama’s “ailment” wasn’t on my top ten list of favorite conversations. If I explained Mama, would Carson think her crazy was hereditary and I was also a couple sandwiches shy of a picnic?

“She’s agoraphobic,” I said finally, not meeting Carson’s eye.

“Oh,” came Carson’s reply. And then, “My daddy doesn’t like to go out too much either.”

I glanced up hopefully.
Maybe he understood?

Lindy corrected him, crushing my hopes. “Oh no, you don’t get it. Kennedy’s mama doesn’t leave the house. I’ve never even seen her
outside
.” She rolled her eyes at Carson conspiratorially. “Not even an arm out the door to get the mail from the mailbox.”

“Really?” Carson wrinkled up his brow on his otherwise flawless face. I sucked in my breath, just waiting. This was it. He was gonna see my mama as a murdering weirdo recluse and he wasn’t gonna want to have anything to do with her daughter. He’d figure that instead of waiting for me to snap and go crazy like Mama, he was gonna run for the hills, never to be seen again. I just knew it.

“Yeah, Kennedy has to do all the shopping and she
walks
everywhere.” Lindy said “walks” in the same tone one might mention syphilis. She was appalled by my walking and had asked me several times why I wasn’t skinnier if I walked so much.

I closed my eyes, waiting for the words.
I think you’re a great girl Kennedy, but I don’t think we can be friends
.
I knew this story; I saw it every day. The looks of pity I got from the neighbors (minus Mrs. Harris) and the whispers I got at school behind my back. The only person (besides good old Mrs. Harris) that didn’t seem to care, was Lindy. And she basically just used it as ammunition against me whenever I would buck her rules or disagree with her. She would remind me what a weirdo my mama was and how she was single-handedly keeping me from ending up just like her.

So I waited for that other shoe to drop. But instead, I felt Carson’s hand slip into mine. “That’s sad. It must be really rough for you to have to do everything outside the house.”

I blinked several times as I stared at him. Then, I stared at his hand. He was holding my hand! He wasn’t running! He had actually reached across Lindy’s lap and grabbed my hand.

Lindy scowled as she stood, pushing apart our hands. “Well, we need to come up with a plan to get into your mama’s bedroom then. She’s never gonna just let us in there.” She wandered toward the sidewalk, completely expecting us to follow her. Carson and I glanced at each other and shrugged simultaneously.

“What do you think we’re gonna find in Mama’s bedroom, Lindy?” I really hoped she didn’t try to be funny and suggest my mama had sex toys or the latest installment of
Kama Sutra
in her bedroom.

“Info about your dead daddy. You know, the reason someone would try to steal his identity.” She spun on her heels and raised her smoky eye at me. “The real reason you moved to Novella. The reason she doesn’t leave the house.”

She was causing my skin to prickle, even in the heat. “Stop it,” I muttered, shoving my hands into the pockets of my jean shorts.

“Am I scaring you?” Lindy asked, deliriously happy at that prospect.

I pulled one hand out of my pocket and waved toward the street. “No, I—”

Carson surprised me by grabbing my hand. Lindy’s eyes widened as she glanced from my hand to Carson’s. And then the scowl was back. “Let’s just figure out how we’re getting in there,” she huffed, stomping off.

We approached the house from the direction of the library. Carson I both stopped in our tracks—the house looked unusually creepy in the daytime. A storm was brewing—we could hear thunder rumbling in the distance.

Lindy was still storming ahead like Grant through Richmond. She turned when she realized we weren’t directly behind her. “What’s the matter with y’all?”

I shook my head, trying to shake the doom and gloom feeling I was getting. “What’s the plan, Lindy?”

“We’ll just go to your house and look in your mama’s room,” she said, eyes a rollin’.

“She’s not just gonna let us wander into her room—”

“We’ll go into
your
room and then sneak into hers,” Lindy said.

I glanced at Carson. I had never had a boy in my room before. Would Mama allow Carson in my room? Even if Lindy was there?

“I don’t think that’ll work,” Carson said. “I think we need to create a diversion so that she doesn’t realize we’re snooping.”

“A der—what?” Lindy asked, scrunching up her wrinkle-free forehead.

“We have to distract her,” I explained, glancing at Carson. He was rolling his own eyes.
Okay, note to self—he doesn’t like them dumb.

“I think you should sneak into the bedroom, and Kennedy and I will distract her mama,” Carson said, pointing to Lindy.

“How am I gonna do that?” Lindy asked, now gazing at herself on her cell phone screen. “Ugh, I need to get some more color,” she said off-handedly.

“She’s a real winner,” Carson whispered to me. I nodded in agreement.

Lindy shoved her phone back into her pocket. “She’s gonna notice if I disappear. Kennedy’s mama loves me.”

I almost snorted. This couldn’t be further from the truth.

“You could climb in through my bedroom window,” I said. “That way she won’t even know you’re there.”

“How am I gonna get up to your bedroom window?” Lindy asked.

“The same way I got out last night. Climb the tree.”

“You snuck out?” Lindy eyed me suspiciously.
Oops. I forgotten to mention that to her, hadn’t I?

“You snuck out to meet
him
?” she practically spat.

I opened my mouth to reply, when Carson draped his arm over my shoulder. “Yeah, she snuck out to meet
me
. Girlfriends sneak out to meet their boyfriends when they don’t want nosy friends around. Got a problem with that?”

Lindy clamped her mouth shut, while mine fell open.

Girlfriend? Did he say
girlfriend
? I must be hearing things.

“Fine,” Lindy said, pursing her Cherry Berry glossed lips closed. “You better distract her good.” She poked Carson in the chest with venom. Then she turned on her heel and stomped off in the direction of my backyard.

We stared after her for a minute before Carson shrugged and said, “Well, we better go see your mama.”

When we reached the front door, I fished my key out of my pocket. I went to stick it in the keyhole, but I paused in mid-air. I had never brought a boy home before. I had certainly never brought anyone home on a day I told my mama about there being a body in the basement. How would she act? Weirder than usual? I was suddenly not sure if this was a great idea.

Unfortunately, I had no time to ponder whether I should go through with it or not, because the door flew open in my face.

Mama stood there, bedraggled-looking hair, full of cobwebs, dirt smudged on her cheeks. On her hands were a pair of yellow rubber gloves.

“Kennedy!” she gasped, obviously shocked to see me on my own front steps. Her eyes darted between me and Carson. “I’ve been trying to call you, Kennedy.” She inhaled sharply, like she was going to start crying any second. “Why didn’t you answer?”

“I was at the library,” I said, offering her a timid smile. “This is Carson.”

Mama’s eyes grew wide and frightened. If I’d thought my mama was crazy before, she looked like a certifiable lunatic now.

“What are you doing, Kennedy?” Her voice rose so high you would have thought an elephant was standing on her toes.

“What are
you
doing, Mama?” I asked, staring down at her rubber gloves. The faint smell of bleach reached my nose.

“Oh, just cleaning!” she practically sang out, forcing a smile. She was nervously picking at the fingertips of the gloves.

“Colt was thirsty.” I pointed to the dog who was actually panting at the moment. “I was going to get him a bowl of water.”

“I’ll get you a bowl of water for the dog. And maybe some sweet tea for you kids. Stay right here,” Mama instructed.

“Outside?” I stared at her.
Why couldn’t we come in? Oh God, she didn’t drag the body up from the basement did she?

“Keep the door closed. Don’t want the heat to get in,” Mama warned as she slammed the door in our faces.

Carson and I looked at each other, wide-eyed.

“I guess we could sit on the swing,” I said, pointing.

“Um, good idea,” Carson replied. “Colt!” Colt rose off his hunches and trotted toward the swing, tongue still dripping out of his mouth. I was about to follow him when Mama came to the front door, tray in her hands. On top of the tray was a bowl of water, a pitcher full of sweet tea, and three glasses.

“Kennedy, could you come open the door for me?” she offered me a weak smile, her hands shaking so badly the ice in the pitcher rattled.

I opened the door and held out my hands to take the tray from her, but to my surprise, Mama stepped out onto the front porch.

“Mama? Are you okay?” I asked while grabbing her arm.

“I’m fine, Kennedy,” she replied, shaking off my arm and stepping over to Carson, big uneasy grin spreading across her face. She set the tray on the grass, her hands trembling like a drunk looking for her next drink. She sank down into the swing, knees practically knocking together.

“I didn’t want you guys inside and being overcome by the smell of bleach,” she explained, smiling tightly at Carson.

The smell of bleach, Mama? Or smell from the rotting corpse of a dead man?

I walked over to the swing with my eyes practically bulging out of my head. The sight of my mama out of the house was absolutely shocking, in more ways than one. The dim lighting of the house hid what I was able to see in the bright sunshine of the backyard. Her hair was graying at the scalp and in desperate need of a cut. Her fine lines and wrinkles had deepened and gave her a haggard appearance.

“Can you pour the sweet tea, Kennedy? I smell like bleach.” She held her now gloveless hands up.

Colt was pawing at the bowl, unable to get at it with the pitcher and glasses around it. I raised my eyebrows at her and placed the bowl on the ground for Colt to greedily lap up.

The woman had been voluntarily imprisoned in our home for well over a thousand days and
today
is the day she chooses to step foot outside the house? Why so brazen? Wasn’t she scared that well…whatever it was that she was frightened of, was going to happen if she left the house? The “whatever”
that was keeping her there for three years now.
Why did it not matter today?

I pondered the meaning of Mama’s bold act as I poured a glass of sweet tea and offered it to Carson.

“So,
Carson
, right?” Mama beamed as he accepted the glass from my hand. I nearly dropped the glass.
How did she know his name?

“Yes,” Carson replied and then took a sip. “Wow, this is amazing.”

“Our lovely neighbor, Mrs. Harris, makes it,” Mama said. “Have you met Mrs. Harris yet? Kennedy tells me that you’re new in town.”

Kennedy told her no such thing!
I eyed her suspiciously as I recalled the journal that I kept tucked between my mattress and box spring. The journal that detailed all that I knew about Carson.
Did she read my journal?

“Yes, we just moved here about three weeks ago,” Carson replied. I poured Mama a glass of sweet tea and thrust it into her shaking hand.

“And you’ve made friends already?” she asked as she grasped the glass with both hands. The condensation building on the outside of the glass made it slippery, and I saw her trying to hold on tightly. I’m sure the trembling didn’t help. “And my little Kennedy, too. My how nice,” Mama gushed. I was certain she didn’t find it “nice” at all. Mama was downright suspicious of Carson for no damn good reason.