Her eyes were still following his taillights when a plastic-cased stack of dry cleaning landed in her arms. It smelled like chemicals and those mints they had at the register at the Chinese buffet. Rhoda slid grocery bag handles up her own arms and slung her heavy laptop case over Eureka’s shoulder.
“Were you trying to hide from me?” Rhoda raised an eyebrow.
“If you’d rather I bailed on my homework, I can hang out here all night.”
“Mmm-hmm.” Rhoda had on the Atlantic-salmon-colored skirt suit today, and black heels that managed to look both uncomfortable and unfashionable. Her dark hair was swept into a twist that always reminded Eureka of an Indian burn. She was really pretty, and sometimes Eureka could even see it—when Rhoda was sleeping, or in the trance of watching her children, the rare moments when her face relaxed. But most of the time, Rhoda just looked late for something. She wore this orangey lipstick, which had worn off while she was instructing tonight’s business class at the university. Little tributaries of faded orange ran down the creases of her lips.
“I called you five times,” Rhoda said, slamming the car door closed with her hip. “You didn’t pick up.”
“I had a meet.”
Rhoda clicked the lock button on her remote. “It looks like you were just bumming around with Brooks. You know it’s a school night. What happened with the therapist? I hope you didn’t do anything to embarrass me.”
Eureka glanced at Rhoda’s lip tributaries, imagining they were tiny poisoned creeks running from a land that had been contaminated with something evil.
She could explain everything to Rhoda, remind her of the weather that afternoon, tell her that Brooks had only swung by for a few minutes, extol Dr. Landry’s clichés—but she knew they were also going to have to discuss the car accident before long, and Eureka needed to store up her energy for that.
As Rhoda’s heels clicked up the brick path to the porch, Eureka followed, mumbling, “Fine, thanks, and how was your day?”
At the top of the porch stairs, Rhoda stopped. Eureka watched the back of her head turn to the right to examine the driveway she’d just pulled into. Then she turned and glared. “Eureka—where’s my Jeep?”
Eureka pointed at her bad ear, stalling. “Sorry. What was that?” She couldn’t tell the story again, not right now, not to Rhoda, not after a day like this. She was as empty and exhausted as if she’d had her stomach pumped again. She gave up.
“The Jeep, Eureka.” Rhoda tapped the toe of her pump on the porch.
Eureka worried a dent into the grass with her bare toe. “Ask Dad. He’s inside.”
Even Rhoda’s back scowled as she turned toward the door and wrenched it open. “Trenton?”
Alone at last in the humid night, Eureka reached inside her cardigan pocket, pulled out the wallet Ander had returned. She looked in the fold and saw a little square of lined notebook paper among her seven dollar bills. He had scrawled in careful black ink:
Ander. A local phone number. And the words I’m sorry.
8
LEGACY
Eureka chewed on her thumbnail, staring at her bobbing knees under the lacquered oak table in the fluorescent-lit boardroom. She’d been dreading this Thursday afternoon since Dad had been summoned to appear at the office of J. Paul Fontenot, Esquire, of Southeast Lafayette.
Diana had never mentioned having a will. Eureka wouldn’t have imagined that her mother and lawyers breathed the same air. But here they were at Diana’s lawyer’s office, gathered to hear the thing read, sandwiched between Diana’s other living relatives—Eureka’s uncle Beau and her aunt Maureen. Eureka had not seen them since the funeral.