The Twisted Window (13 page)

"You're right about that. What do you want to watch?"

"Anything. It doesn't matter." She paused and then continued, "Tracy's not stupid, Gory. She doesn't do senseless things."

"Missing dinner without checking in with us, I'd call that pretty senseless. She had to know it was going to get her in trouble."

"I wish you hadn't thrown such a scene," said Rene.

"She's living here now. She has to conform to our rules."

"Maybe we're being too strict. After all, we've never been parents before."

"And we're not parents now," Gory said. "She made that point in no uncertain terms—'My father's paying you to let me live in your house.' She considers herself our tenant, not part of our family."

"She's so bitter," Irene said with a sigh. "It's frightening to see a young girl so bitter. She made up her mind before she ever got here that she was going to hate Winfield and everybody in it."

"She misses her mother."

"Of course she does, poor dear. That's natural enough. What concerns me, though, is the way she's built her mother up in her mind to the point where she remembers her as too perfect to have been human. Danielle was talented and beautiful, it's true, but she did have faults. She never could stand to be overshadowed by anybody. Even back when we were children, if I ever owned anything she didn't, Dani would find some way of wrecking my pleasure in it.

"I remember one time—now this is going to sound silly—I spent three weeks' allowance on a box of underpants. Those were the days when little girls wore white cotton underwear, but these panties were all the colors of the rainbow. Sad to say, they also had the days of the week embroidered on them, which was something I hadn't realized when I bought them. Danielle made terrible fun of me in front of our school friends. She'd say, 'Pull up your dress, Rene, and let's see what day it is.' It wasn't long before I started hating those panties. I ended up dropping them into the incinerator."

"You think Richard left her because she made fun of his underwear?"

"Cory, stop teasing. I'm serious; I do think that trait of hers had something to do with why their marriage ended. She couldn't stand it that Richard's career took off faster than hers did. The way she treated that man during the last year they were together, I wasn't surprised at all when he finally divorced her."

"After Danielle died, I'd have thought Richard would have jumped at the chance to take Tracy to live with him," Cory said. "Especially when he had tried so hard to get custody."

"He seems to have matured a lot since the time of their divorce," Rene said. "Dani's murder brought home the fact that the world can be a dangerous place. No responsible father would leave a teenage girl alone in a city like Los Angeles while he spent months at a time away on location."

"You think that's why he let us have her?" asked Cory.

"Yes, I do," Rene said. "Danielle's death was a terrible shock to him. I don't think he'd ever really stopped loving her. Calling that night to ask us if we'd take Tracy was probably the hardest thing Richard ever had to do. I'm sure he'd love to have his daughter with him, but he thinks we can give her a safer, stabler home life."

"Well, we're trying our best."

"Yes, we are, but a lot of good it's doing!" She sighed and then said abruptly, "I know this is dumb, but I'm really worried about that funny phone call."

"It probably wasn't even Tracy." Gory flicked the turner again. The cat disappeared from the screen, and a man with a child on his lap came on in its place. The man was white, and the child was black, and they were smiling at each other.

Cory said, "That's Arnold, isn't it?"

"No, I think it's Webster. There are so many shows about people adopting children, and they all seem so happy and well adjusted. What's wrong with us that Tracy isn't able to love us?"

Cory Stevenson flinched at the note of pain in her voice. "It's not us, Rene, it's Tracy. She can't love anybody. There's too much hurt and anger bottled up inside of her. Maybe someday something will happen to break down that wall she's put up around herself, but until then, she's not going to let anybody get through to her. We've just got to keep on doing the best we can and hope she knows we're here for her if she needs us."

"I'm going to call the Carvers again," Rene said. "If the line's still busy, I think we ought to drive over there."

"You know how mad that will make her."

"I want to go anyway. I have this feeling something isn't as it should be."

"What a mother hen you are, Rene!" her husband said fondly.

He pressed another button on the box in his hand, and the television set went dark.

"Ed, do you know where Jamie is?" asked Barbara Hanson.

"Out in the garage, working on the car, I think." Her husband glanced up from the sports section of the evening paper. "Have the boys run out again without cleaning up the kitchen?"

"No, it's not that. They got the dishwasher loaded. There's just something I feel I ought to discuss with Jamie."

Barbara went back into the kitchen and out through the utility room door to the garage. The ceiling light was on, and as Ed had predicted, the lower portion of the youngest of their four children was protruding from beneath the hood of an ancient Dodge Charger.

Barbara gave the blue-jeaned rump a friendly swat.

"Hey, hon, can you haul yourself out of your favorite playground? There's something bothering me, and I'd like to talk about it."

"Sure, Mom. Hang loose for a sec, and I'll be right with you."

There were some clanking sounds as an unseen tool struck repeatedly against something metallic. Then Jamie came inching out from under the car hood, disheveled and plastered with grease but looking triumphant.

"I think I may finally have figured out what the problem is. And Brad was so sure I'd never get this running!"

"It's Brad I want to talk to you about," said Barbara. "I can't get that phone call from him out of my mind."

"I'm sure he feels bad about waking you up like that."

"That's not what worries me," said Barbara. "It was the way he sounded. His voice—he was all worked up. You know, almost hyper. He didn't sound like someone who'd spent the day fishing."

"You don't know how excited Brad gets when he's had a good catch," said Jamie.

"Yes, but, still..." She hesitated, trying to decide how to pave the way for the question she had come out to the garage to ask. Knowing how defensive Jamie always was about Brad, she feared that no matter how she phrased it, it would be considered an unforgivable accusation.

"You know how fond I am of Brad," she began tentatively. "He's been in and out of our house for so many years, I've come to feel that he's almost an extra son."

"What are you getting at, Mom?" Jamie asked suspiciously.

"It's because I love Brad that I'm worried about him," said Barbara. She drew a long breath and took the plunge. "Brad isn't acting normal these days. I think he ought to be getting some counseling. It's as though he isn't living in the same world with the rest of us."

As she had anticipated, Jamie became immediately hostile.

"You know how much stuff has gone wrong for him in the past few years! First, out of the blue, his father drops dead of a heart attack. Then his mother marries a guy Brad can't stand. They get a divorce, and that awful thing happens to Mindy. Isn't that enough to make anybody spacey?"

"From the things Laura Brummer's told me, 'spacey' is an understatement," Barbara said. "She says Brad won't even let her give Mindy's clothes away. And he won't let her take down the high chair. He wants it kept at the table, as though that baby were still there to sit in it."

"Brad's mother's got no right to pass judgment!" snapped Jamie. "She's an emotional mess herself and always has been!"

"Granted, Laura's unstable. Still, she isn't crazy. She's managed to accept what's happened to Mindy, and Brad hasn't."

"Are you trying to say Brad is crazy?"

"No, of course not. You don't have to be crazy to crack under pressure. It seems to me Brad is looking at life in a twisted way. What I'm worried about is that he might lose all touch with reality."

"Just because he called here later at night than he should have? It's natural to lose track of time when you're up in the mountains."

"I don't think Brad was in the mountains," said Barbara. "I do think he was calling long distance—I could hear the hum on the line—but I don't believe he was calling from the Pecos. He said he was phoning from a twenty-four-hour convenience store. There isn't any such store in the village of Terrero."

"How do you know there isn't?"

"I asked your father. If you'll remember, he was up there last fall during deer hunting season. He says there's a grocery store and a gas station, and they both close at six." She paused, waiting for Jamie's reaction. When there was none, she continued, "Where is he really? The two of you always tell each other everything. He must have filled you in on where he was going."

"What he told me was just what he told you on the telephone," said Jamie. "He said he was going up to his dad's old cabin. He said he needed to get away by himself for a while, and he'd be back for school next Monday."

"Was there anything else he told you?" Barbara prodded. "Believe me, dear, I'm not trying to stir up problems. I'm concerned that Brad may be in trouble. I know how loyal you are to him, and I hate to ask you to break a confidence, but I really do think it's important for you to tell me."

The silence that followed this statement seemed interminable. Then, just as she was beginning to think no answer would be forthcoming, Jamie suddenly blurted, "A couple of weeks ago..."

The sentence hung there between them, aching for completion.

"What happened a couple of weeks ago?" Barbara asked gently.

"Brad asked me if I'd go with him to help find Mindy. He said he thought Gavin had taken her to Texas."

"He wanted you to help find Mindy!" Barbara struggled to keep the horror out of her voice. "Brad asked you to do that, and you didn't tell his mother!"

"How could I?" Jamie responded. "You know she couldn't handle it."

"You don't have a choice. You've got to go over there and tell her tomorrow. Dear Lord, now I really am sure there's something wrong with Brad!"

She braced herself for a hot denial.

Instead, Jamie said miserably, "So am I, Mom."

CHAPTER 13

They had been driving for over an hour in total silence.

Tracy sat with her head resting against the back of the seat, watching the highway unwind in front of them in the beam of their headlights like a strand of thread from a swiftly rolling spool. The lights of approaching cars struck her eyes and fell away again at irregular intervals, becoming less frequent the farther they got from Winfield. On either side of the car lay great masses of darkness, broken only occasionally by a flicker of lamplight from the window of a distant farmhouse.

She was surprised to find herself feeling relaxed and drowsy, the way she usually felt after final exams. She had done what she had to do, and the challenge was over. It was behind her now, and the outcome was out of her hands.

"What will happen when we get there?" she asked idly.

She was not particularly worried, merely curious.

"We'll celebrate," Brad said without taking his eyes from the road.

"Celebrate how?"

"You get to choose. You're the heroine of the day. Everybody has their own idea of what a celebration is. I know a lot of kids who go out and get stoned, but I'm not much into that sort of thing myself. Jamie and I like to celebrate the big occasions in our lives by hinging on chocolate mint ice cream."

"You're always talking about Jamie," Tracy commented. "You must be awfully good friends."

"Jamie and I go back a long way," said Brad. "We got to be buddies back in fourth grade. The two of you are alike in a lot of ways. Jamie would have thought about packing up Mindy's clothes. That's the kind of thing that would never have occurred to me."

"So, when we get to Albuquerque, you and Jamie and I will eat ice cream. What happens after that? I mean, what happens to me?"

"You'll bite the bullet and call your aunt, I guess. You're going to have to let her know where you are."

"Uncle Gory will blow his stack when I don't come home tonight," said Tracy. "There's no way I'll ever be able to go back there now."

"You won't have to go back," Brad said. "You can stay with us."

"You mean, live with you? Oh, come on now! What would your mother say?"

"She'll be happy to have you," said Brad. "Mom hates to be alone. If you're there with her I won't feel so guilty about leaving to go off to college."

"You make it sound so simple."

"It will be simple."

"Nothing you think will be simple ever really is."

"Don't worry," Brad said reassuringly. "Everything is going to be great. We've got Mindy, we're headed for home—we've got it made."

Once again they fell into a companionable silence. The only sound in the car was the hiss of wind racing past the open windows. The sweet, rich smells of the countryside washed against Tracy's face, filling her nostrils with the fragrance of grass and earth and flowers and running water.