“I’m hungry!” she shouted.
“Get some string cheese out of the fridge, and then when this lesson is done, I’ll heat you up some soup.”
The little girl sighed. “You guys are so boring,” she said. She stomped to the fridge, opened the door, and stared inside for a moment. Then she closed it and turned away without taking anything to eat. On her way by Stewie’s chair she punched him on the arm. Surprisingly hard for such a little thing. “You used to be fun,” she said. “Now all you want to do is read.”
She stomped out of the room. Stewie just sat there, rubbing his arm and watching her go.
Then it happened. The moment that sent Stewie’s world crashing about his feet yet again. It came in the form of a very loud noise. A knock, but more than a knock. A huge, ominous pounding on the door. As though someone were striking it with the back of a fist, using all of their strength.
He jumped in his chair. Marilyn jumped, too. He looked at her face and watched all the blood drain out of it. Watched it go white.
“Police!” a big male voice shouted from just outside the front door.
Stewie only sat. Marilyn only sat. Her face grew even whiter, if such a thing were possible.
“Jean Clements?” the big voice shouted through the door. “Open up. We have a warrant for your arrest.”
Stewie felt relief when he heard that, because clearly they had the wrong party. They were at the wrong house. He watched her face, waiting to see that same relief.
It never came.
Another huge pounding made them both jump.
“Get the door,” she said. Quietly. “Talk to them. Keep them occupied. I’ll go out the back.”
She rose and tried to hurry out of the kitchen, but he grabbed her by her sleeve.
“Wait!” he hissed. “What do I say to them?”
“Anything. I don’t care. I just need time to get away.”
“But you’re not Jean Clements.”
But it was too late. She had pulled her sleeve out of his grasp and gotten away from him, and she was headed fast for the back of the house.
Stewie made his way to the door, hands shaking. Knees weak. He had to walk carefully, so they wouldn’t buckle underneath him.
He reached toward the knob, then couldn’t bring himself to do it.
He just stood, frozen in his fear, for what felt like minutes. His hand remained suspended in the air, almost but not quite to the knob.
Then he heard a noise behind him, and he turned.
Marilyn was being led to the front door by a man. He was a tall, broad-shouldered man with a grim expression. He wasn’t wearing a policeman’s uniform, just nondescript clothing—black pants and a dark blue short jacket. But he had a gun in a holster at his waist.
He led her to the front door and opened it, nodding to the plainclothes officer on the front stoop.
He was a shorter man, this second one, and pudgy, and he shook his head at Marilyn in disdain.
“You really think we’re so stupid that we don’t have someone wait at the back door?” he said to Marilyn. He said it flatly, and simply. Just stating a fact. As if he were surprised that she hadn’t noticed the sun was out that day, or something equally obvious.
Marilyn made no reply.
The man who had her by the elbow moved her through the open door and out onto the stoop.
“Wait!” Stewie cried. “Her name is not Jean Clements! Marilyn! Tell them! Tell them your name is not Jean Clements!”
Oddly, she did not.
She was halfway down the stairs, one plainclothes policeman at each of her elbows, when she stopped suddenly and turned back.
“I can’t go,” she said. “I have to look after the little girl.”
“I can stay here with Izzy,” Stewie said.
“You’re too young,” the tall, broad-shouldered cop said. “I’ll drive her in,” he said, more quietly, to his partner. “You stay with the girl.”
Then he led Marilyn to a long black American-made car and placed her in the back seat.
The other cop walked back up the stairs to Stewie.
“Her name is not Jean Clements,” Stewie said.
“It is,” he said flatly. “No matter what she told you. You don’t live here, do you?”
“No, sir.”
“Go home, then. I’ll stay with the girl.”
Completely out of options, his gut heavy and his mind spinning in a dizzying swirl, Stewie did as he had been told.
Chapter Sixteen
Hit the Ground Flapping
Marilyn
At first, she said nothing. She felt as though it might be more prudent to keep her mouth closed. She had been read her Miranda rights, after all. There was a reason they made sure you knew you had the right to remain silent.
They had driven along the lake for what seemed like a strangely long time. She hadn’t realized how many miles it covered if you followed the length rather than the width of it.
Now the lake was long gone, and they had reached the outskirts of the dreaded city. And she was overcome with curiosity regarding how much this policeman knew about her situation.
She was in the back seat of his unmarked car, even though there was no one in the passenger seat. She was on the right side, not directly behind him, looking at the side of his head from behind.
The thrum of the tires on the surface of the highway created a vibration that would have put her to sleep under more normal circumstances. In that moment she was too shot through with pins and needles of fear to find it relaxing.
Curiosity got the best of her, and, after finding what felt like a safe door into a mild, uncontroversial topic of conversation, she spoke.
“I hate this city,” she said.
For a beat or two, he didn’t answer. He cocked his head like a dog trying to understand commands spoken in non-dog English.
“According to your file, you lived here all your life. It’s not like you were just sent here because Eastbridge is here.”
That’s a bad sign, she thought. He knows something about me. He wasn’t just given an address and told to go pick somebody up.
“And your point would be . . . ?”
“When people hate cities, they move away.”
“I got married young. My husband wanted to stay.”
He made no reply. Which didn’t feel particularly strange. What was there, really, for him to say? It was her life, and it had nothing to do with him.
The highway had turned into the broad boulevard of Central Avenue, the long main drag with stoplights at every intersection. He missed the first light and had to stop, which meant he would miss all of them. They were timed that way.
They both stared at the red light together.
“Are you sure what I did is even against the law?” she asked.
He only snorted a short laugh.
She rushed to say more.
“I mean, yes. I ran away. And I was ordered to be there by a judge, but do you arrest someone for that? Or do you just find them and take them back?”
He said nothing for a strange length of time. As if his next words required much careful consideration. The light turned, and he drove.
He glanced over his shoulder, catching her eye. It froze her, all through her insides.
“Look. Mrs. Clements,” he said. “We both know what you did to get arrested.”
So he knew. That was too bad.
He pulled up to the next intersection, and the light, of course, turned red.
“Where are you taking me?” she asked, feeling a bit desperate now. “Are you actually taking me to a jail?”
“I’m going to take you back to Eastbridge and turn you over to them, and then they get to decide if they want to press charges. And, look. Just between you and me. If you still have the money . . . or even some part of the money . . . I know you’ve probably spent some by now, but if you still have some of it stashed somewhere, I’d have someone go and get it, and you can offer it back to them. If they get at least most of the money back, they’re more likely to let a thing like that go without jail time.”
The light turned, and he drove again.
“I have most of it,” she said. “I figured it would have to last for a long time, so I was very thrifty with it.”