The Girl of Sand & Fog (25 page)

How is this possible?

Alan looked me in the eyes.

He said it wasn’t true.

My heart shatters.

For a moment, I
believed
him.

CHAPTER 23

I
race through the Malibu house, setting up my cameras on tripods to make sure I
catch every inch of footage of what I plan to have go down here, and repeatedly
run through my mental checklist.

Load tweets into my Hootsuite so they
auto-release.

Schedule Facebook post every thirty minutes.

Make sure the streaming live video feed works.

Record YouTube message for
Kaley’s World
.

Don’t think of anything else.

You’ll fall apart if you do—
but, fuck, how
could my parents do this?

No, don’t think about that.

This has to be undeniable.

If it isn’t, Alan will finesse his way out of the
truth.

How could he do this to my brothers and sisters?
Deny them like he’s always denied me?

Me I could forgive—
never hurting them.

No, Kaley, focus on the tasks in your head.

I want the aluminum bat Aarsi had.

Position spray-paint cans from Zoe’s house so
they’re in every room.

How long until Alan’s security busts in to stop
this?

Denial is a terminal addiction—make it a tab on
my website.

It’s Tuesday.

Is Alan back in California?

I wonder if he’ll see this.

His security sure as fuck will since they’re
spying on me.

Oh, he’ll eventually see this.

I go back to my laptop, trying to ignore Zoe’s
fretting as she wanders in circles, and rapidly click away the necessary posts
to make what I want to have happen here.

Zoe grabs my arm. “Kaley, just talk to me. I’m
sorry I didn’t give you the lab results when they came. I didn’t know what to
do. I was waiting until Bobby was back.”

I ignore her and whirl to face the great room,
trying to figure out the best location to shoot the short video to launch this.

I turn the camera toward the far wall near the
table with the weird family photo array atop it. Yep, know why those pictures
are there now.

“You’re scaring me,” Zoe wails. “What are you doing?
What is this?”

I look at her. “Stand here in the foyer. I don’t
want you in the video.”

“What video? Nope, I’m not moving until you
explain what this is.”

Oh fuck, Zoe, don’t get in my way now.

I shake my head, trying to figure out how to
explain this in Zoe terms. “Have you ever seen that movie
8 Mile
?”

She nods, sniffling and nervously gnawing her
lower lip. “Eminem, right?”

I close my hands on her arms—crap, she’s shaking
like an earthquake—and fix my eyes on her. “Remember the last scene. Focus,
Zoe. Listen. I’m explaining. When Eminem battles and gets up there and tells
everyone everything about him and then he tosses the microphone and says,
‘I’m
outy. Tell these people something they don’t know about me’
?”

The panic on her face rapidly increases but she
nods.

I brush the hair back from her face, hoping to
calm her. “That’s all I’m doing. I’m outing myself. I’m tired of the lies and
the secrets. The tabloids. Natashas of this world. Alan. My mom. I’m just
putting it all out there and maybe someone will hear me and it will get better
and go away. I’m going live with the truth about everything. I’m outing myself.
And if you’re really my friend, Zoe, you won’t stop me.”

She anxiously studies my face. “I don’t think you
should do this. We can still get out of here. You’ve only wrecked one wall.
It’s paint. It can be fixed, right? Isn’t that enough? It’s there. The truth.
Alan will see it. Let’s stop this now. Let’s go.”

I go back to the camera and check the positioning
through the viewfinder. “I can’t leave, Zoe. Not until I’m done.”

I hit record and hurry into the shot, kneeling
down facing the camera, unable to hear the words in my head as I speak them.

Then I see the shot widen by the
auto-programming, so the first tag on the wall I did with the spray-paints from
Zoe’s garage will show in the film.

I stare into the camera. “This is the last
episode of
Kaley’s World
. I’m pretty sure I’m going to be silenced after
this. Shut down after today’s live feed. But I’d like to send one last message
to my dad, Alan Manzone. I’d like to call the remainder of this feed ‘Denial is
a Terminal Addiction.’ So here is our live family therapy.”

I hurry to the computer, stop the recording, and
quickly edit the video. I add the frame with the link for the live feed. I load
it on YouTube, Facebook and my
Kaley’s World
website. I see the
Hootsuite notification that the auto-tweets have started. I check my phone to
make sure the live feed is up and streaming. Yep, Alan’s house.

I grab the bat and the spray-paint. Showtime. Try
denying this, Daddy. And then there is nothing—not in my head, not in my heart,
and not in the room—except a blinding, raging need to swing the bat and cover
the walls in spray-paint with the thoughts I don’t even recognize as my own as
I destroy everything in my father’s house.

*  *  *

My
body is limp, drained of strength and tears, but the bat keeps going. It’s like
it’s running on its own and I can’t stop it. Not even now when there is nothing
left to destroy in Alan’s bedroom.

How long have we been here?

Why hasn’t anyone come to stop it?

I check the security monitor—there are people out
front starting to gather on the street.

Someone knows I’m doing this.

The tweets are working if there are sightseers
here.

I look at the clock.

An hour.

Is that all this has been? It seems longer.

Zoe is sitting just out of view of the cameras
against the wall by the open bedroom door, sobbing hysterically. But she didn’t
bail. She stayed with me. I shut down the rising emotions and crash the
aluminum into a wall mirror.

“Kaley, put down the bat.”

I whirl.

Bobby.

He starts reaching over to shut off the camera.

I rush across the room. “No, don’t turn it off.”

He freezes, those green eyes holding me in an
anxious stare. “OK, I won’t shut it off. I’ll just pause it. OK, baby? Watch.
I’m only pausing it.”

He halts the feed and then steps around the
equipment, his eyes wide and dismayed as he stares at the walls, the room, and
then me.

“How did you get into the house?” I wail. “I
didn’t want you here. I didn’t want you involved in this, Bobby.”

He pulls me up against him. “Shush, Kaley. I got
in the same way you did. The panel. Your mom’s birthday. We came here the last
time together. Remember?”

I stare up at him. “You need to go. Quickly.”

“No point. There are people on the street. Press.
I’m in this whether you want me to be or not. What’s happening here? Why did
you do this, Kaley?”

I rummage in my pocket and shove the test results
at him. He reads them, then starts raking a hand over and over again through
his hair.

“Oh fuck,” he groans as shock registers on his
face. “Why didn’t you talk to me first instead of doing this?”

I snatch the paper back from him. “Because you
would have stopped me, Bobby. And I couldn’t back down from this.”

His palms close on my cheeks, forcing me to meet
his gaze. “Baby, you should have come to me first. You’ve hurt you. You’ve hurt
me. You’ve hurt us. You’ve hurt Zoe. You’ve hurt your family. There’s a crowd
and the media outside. There’s going to be cops soon. You’ve committed a crime.
And you’ve put it on the Internet for everyone to see. They will arrest you.
The cops won’t back down from this either, baby. Please, stop. Put down the
bat. You have to be calm when the police get here. You’ve pushed it too far.
Now you have to calm and we wait.”

Police?

I shake my head and step quickly back from him.
“I’m not going anywhere. Not with anyone. Not until my dad gets here.”

Bobby studies me, his face ragged with alarm.
“OK, baby,” he says soothingly. “Then we’ll stay until your dad gets here. But
it’s time for you to pull it together. Don’t do anything else.”

I set down the bat, sink to the floor on my
knees, and wait for Alan, turning the kinship analysis constantly in my
trembling hands.

*  *  *

I
hear a sound. I look up. Alan.

“Shut everything off. Cut the feed. Turn off the
cameras. And get out of here. Both of you.”

I shut down my reaction to my dad being here,
jump to my feet and rush across the room, dropping to where Bobby has done
nothing but sit with his head in his hands waiting with me for this.

“Bobby, no. Don’t leave. Don’t leave me here
alone with him.”

He pulls me against him, kisses my forehead and
then holds my face in his hands. The look in his eyes rends my heart.

“It will be all right, Kaley. This is what you
wanted. I’m not going anywhere. I’ll be right outside the door. But you need to
do this with him alone.”

He springs to his feet and leaves with Zoe
following close behind him.

Alan starts reading the walls.

My pulse is so fast I can’t think.

The silence between us is torturous.

The wait for the next part of this agony.

“You’ve got my attention, Kaley,” Alan says, his
voice stripped of emotion. “Talk to me. Why would you do something like this?”

He’s staring at the walls.

How can he still not know what
this
is?

“You can’t even look at me,” I hiss. “Maybe if
you could look at me, really see me, you’d already know and I wouldn’t have to
tell you. Goddamn it, look at me.”

He slowly turns to face me, black eyes locking on
black.

“I’m looking at you. This is not the way you deal
with things, Kaley. You didn’t need to do this to talk to me. I will always
listen. I’m always there for you. You didn’t need to do any of this. Say
whatever it is that you got me here to tell me.”

Oh God, what’s that I see on his face?

Confusion?

Fear?

Inability to admit truth when it’s shoved in his
face?

“How would you know if I needed to deal with it
this way or not?” I scream. “You don’t know what it is like to be me. I’ve
tried to talk to you. You can’t hear me. Not ever. But I’m not letting you wall
me out any longer. I can’t. It was almost survivable when I thought it was only
me. But to find out—”

I break off, shaking and unable to look at him.

“Survivable? What was almost survivable?” he probes
gently.

I jump to my feet. “You don’t get to pick the
kids you want. Kids are not disposable items. Why Khloe but deny me? You make
me hate her and I don’t want to because I love her. But, fuck, you are my
father. What kind of man are you? What kind of man can do this?”

I throw the results into his face and watch
through tears as he picks them up and studies them.

The stillness in the room is shocking.

Then it’s as if Alan’s legs give way. He stares
at the paper and collapses to the floor “What is this?”

I fight back my tears.

How could he ask that?

It’s there in his hands.

“You wouldn’t do the test for me so I bought a
kinship DNA test. It’s designed to test siblings. I figured I’d match me to
Khloe and have the truth since she’s the only kid you haven’t denied.”

He looks at me, stunned.

His expression.

My stomach starts to convulse.

Oh God, I didn’t expect this.

I thought he was lying—
but no, he doesn’t
know.

“Who is sample one?” he asks in a voice barely
above a whisper.

“Khloe. Sample two is me. Sample three is
Krystal. And sample four and five are Ethan and Eric. 99.97 percent confirmed
we are not half siblings. We’re all full siblings. We all know who our mother
is, but you being all our dads is a bit much to take in a single day, don’t you
think, Daddy? Now tell me I’ve overreacted here today.”

His eyes never lift from the report. Why doesn’t
he say something?

“Just explain to me why,” I beg. “It’s driving me
crazy. Why did you lie to all of us? Or was it Mom? Did she lie to you? Is that
it? I can’t take not knowing which one of you to hate another minute more.”

“I didn’t know,” he says raggedly, and somewhere
deep inside me I know, I can hear it in his voice, the same way I saw it a
moment ago on his face.