‘Eric was always swooping in just when everything was about to get out of control,’ I said. ‘Putting in the cooling rods.’
‘Yeah,’ Aubrey said. ‘That sounds like him.’
Aubrey smiled at the highway. It seemed he wasn’t thinking about it, so the smile looked real. I could see why Eric would have gone for him. Short, curly hair the color of honey. Broad shoulders. What my mother would have called a kind mouth. I hoped that he’d made Eric happy.
‘I just want you to know,’ I said, ‘it’s okay with me that he was gay.’
Aubrey started.
‘He was gay?’
‘Um,’ I said. ‘He wasn’t?’
‘He never told me.’
‘Oh,’ I said, mentally recalculating. ‘Maybe he wasn’t. I assumed … I mean, I just thought since my dad wouldn’t talk about him … my dad’s kind of old-school. Where school means testament. He never really got into that love-thy-neighbor-as-thyself part.’
‘I know the type,’ he said. The smile was actually pointed at me now, and it seemed genuine.
‘There was this big falling-out about three years ago,’ I said. ‘Uncle Eric had called the house, which he almost never did. Dad went out around dinnertime and came back looking deeply pissed off. After that … things were weird. I just assumed …’
I didn’t tell Aubrey that Dad had gathered us all in the living room—me, Mom, my older brother Jay, and Curtis the young one—and said that we weren’t to have anything to do with Uncle Eric anymore. Not any of us. Not ever. He was a pervert and an abomination before God.
Mom had gone sheet-white. The boys just nodded and looked grave. I’d wanted to stand up for him, to say that Uncle Eric was family, and that Dad was being totally unfair and hypocritical. I didn’t, though. It wasn’t a fight I could win.
But Aubrey knew him well enough to have a set of spare keys, and he didn’t think Eric was gay. Maybe Dad had meant something else. I tried to think what exactly had made me think it was that, but I couldn’t come up with anything solid.
Aubrey pulled his minivan off the highway, then through a maze of twisty little streets. One-story bungalows with neatly kept yards snuggled up against each other. About half the picture windows had open curtains; it was like driving past museum dioramas of the American Family. Here was one with an old couple sitting under a cut glass chandelier. One with the backs of two sofa-bound heads and a wall-size Bruce Willis looking troubled and heroic. One with two early-teenage boys, twins to look at them, chasing each other. And then we made a quick dogleg and pulled into a carport beside a brick house. Same lawn, same architecture. No lights, no one in the windows.
‘Thanks,’ I said, reaching around in the seat to grab my bag.
‘Do you want … I mean, I can show you around a little. If you want.’
‘I think I’m just going to grab a shower and order in a pizza or something,’ I said. ‘Decompress. You know.’
‘Okay,’ he said, fishing in his pocket. He came out with a leather fob with two keys and passed it over to me. I took it. The leather was soft and warm. ‘If you need anything, you have my number?’
‘Yeah,’ I said. ‘Thanks for the lift.’
‘If there’s anything I can do …’
I popped open the door. The dome light came on.
‘I’ll let you know,’ I said. ‘Promise.’
‘Your uncle,’ Aubrey said. Then, ‘Your uncle was a very special man.’
‘I know,’ I said.
He seemed like he wanted to say something else, but instead he just made me promise again that I’d call him if I needed help.
There wasn’t much mail in the box—ads and a water bill. I tucked it under my arm while I struggled with the lock. When I finally got the door open, I stumbled in, my bag bumping behind me.
A dim atrium. A darker living room before me. The kitchen door to my left, ajar. A hall to my right, heading back to bedrooms and bathrooms and closets.
‘Hey,’ I said to nothing and no one. ‘I’m home.’
I never would have said it to anyone, but my uncle had been killed at the perfect time. I hated myself for even thinking that, but it was true. If I hadn’t gotten the call from his lawyer, if I hadn’t been able to come here, I would have been reduced to couch surfing with people I knew peripherally from college. I wasn’t welcome at home right now. I hadn’t registered for the next semester at ASU, which technically made me a college dropout.