“How did you know?” Maybe she is mistaken. I still hold on to the chance that maybe it’s all a dream, that I was confused. That the fiction I created, built a life on, is what is real, and she is spewing a lie.
“He told me.” She reaches for me again, and this time I am too weak to fight her. His admission makes it real. Her petite body fits against mine. “A few months back, he told me everything.” Her tears start to soak my blouse as I stand completely still. “He hadn’t been feeling well. Wanted to confess. He said he’d been living with the guilt ever since that night.” She steps back, facing me. Cradles my face in her frail hands. “I’m so sorry, Beti. I’m so sorry.”
RANEE
Three months had passed since Sonya’s birthday. Brent was getting weaker over time. He had gone to the doctor’s but was not a fan of them telling him how to take care of himself. Because of his diabetes, they insisted he limit his sugar intake. He refused to give up on his vice and assumed he would be fine. But time proved him wrong. He started to feel worse and began to fear for his health.
“Ranee,” Brent called out one early morning. They were scheduled to have lunch with Trisha later that afternoon. Ranee had started to clean the house while Brent rested in his favorite chair.
“Yes?” Ranee swiped the counters clean, removing the few specks of dirt.
“Can you get me a glass of water?” he asked. Only recently had he begun to ask rather than tell.
Ranee took her time, secure in the knowledge that he could do nothing but wait for her. Filling a glass with lukewarm water instead of the cold that he preferred, she handed it to him and started to turn away when he said, “Trisha—every time we see her she is happy.”
“Yes,” Ranee agreed. Trisha had made it. Untouched, she was the one Ranee could point to and say something went right. “Her life is everything she wants it to be.”
“Yes.” Brent laid his head back, releasing a deep sigh. “It is good.”
Something in his voice tugged at her, made her stop and stare. “She was the one who was never hurt,” Ranee said, the words an accusation. “She was the lucky one. Happiness is hers to have.”
Opening his eyes, Brent didn’t respond to her statement directly. Instead, he watched her, fear filling his features. “What do you think happens to us when we die?” he asked.
The question took Ranee aback. She rarely gave death a thought when life took so much of her energy. “I don’t know. I imagine we face our creator, have to explain our actions,” she said, jabbing at him however she could. “Give a reason for hurting the ones we did.”
“And if there is no reason?” Brent whispered. “If it was a mistake you never imagined making?”
It was a question Ranee never believed Brent capable of asking. Staring at him, wondering if he felt regret for all of his actions, she asked, “Then why did you do it?”
“You know?” Brent whispered, his round eyes large in his weathered face. “How?”
“I was right here,” Ranee bit out, wondering if he was losing his mind. “Every single day, when you hit me and my two girls, I was standing right here!” she said, her voice nearly a scream.
Closing his eyes, he turned his face away, relief washing over him. Ignoring her outburst, he said, “Never mind.”
There was something he wasn’t telling her, Ranee was sure. She knew it the way she knew what was coming minutes before he started hitting. The way she knew that if there was ever good in his heart, it was long gone. Fear gripped her, pushed her to take a seat across from him. Staring at the man who once held her life in his palm, she demanded, “What did you do?”
“It doesn’t matter,” Brent whispered. A lone tear fell from his eye over his cheek. Too weak to wipe it away, he let it linger, the wetness leaving a trail.