‘I miss him, Sophie,’ she admitted. ‘I miss him every day.’
Tears spiked behind my eyes, her sudden candour jarring. ‘Me too, Mom. I miss him too.’ I miss us. I miss our family.
‘But sometimes …’ She shook her head, slowly, her gaze drawn to the ground between us, to another time and place, to something I couldn’t access. ‘Sometimes I feel like I might just explode.’
She turned from me abruptly and stalked through the kitchen and into the garden, where she disappeared into her flowers.
I watched her go. I had come to know that feeling all too well.
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
PRISON
The bus to Stateville Correctional Center was airless, the seats dank with years of enmeshed body odour. I curled up by a window near the back and flicked through the playlists on my iPod. I listened to Joshua Radin and watched Chicago fade into remoteness.
I arrived early in the afternoon. My hair was flat against my head where I had leant against the window to sleep. I wound it into a ponytail. My clothes were sticky. The humidity hadn’t broken yet and the heat outside was stifling. The sky was overcast, a thick blanket of blinding white pressing down on me. The air was charged, the ends of my hair floating with static.
A storm was coming.
Inside Stateville, the meeting room smelt like disinfectant. Three prison guards lined the walls, watching with glazed indifference. I tried not to catch their eyes, afraid they might see through me and find out the things I knew.
My father shuffled in to meet me. He was a little slumped over, like the act of keeping his head up required too much energy. He was still wiry and thin, with greying hair that flicked out behind his ears and dipped into big, grey eyes. They used to be bluer, like the ocean.
He lifted his head and his smile lit up his features. For a passing moment, he could transform himself into the father I used to know outside of these walls. ‘Sophie, it’s so good to see you.’
I wasn’t allowed to hug him, so I struggled with what to do with my hands. I settled on an awkward wave/salute.
We sat down. I was studying his face, his neck, his hands – any part of him that I could see – searching for signs of injury. He was studying me just as closely. It threw me a little. The bruises on my face had gone now, and the swelling around my nose had disappeared. I was paler than usual, but other than that, my injuries no longer marked me. Still, he knew about them now, so it made sense that he would try and search them out.
There was a crack running down the back of my plastic chair. It dug into me and I shifted, trying to get comfortable. There was no point. I folded my hands on my lap, searching for the right words. How should I begin? How much should I say?
The discomfort on his face mirrored mine and I almost smiled at how similar we were. He dipped his head and gave me a look. The room around us faded, until it was just the two of us, secured in our own little bubble. He dropped his facade and his face crumpled.
His words tumbled out. ‘I know what happened, Soph. Your mom told me.’
‘Yeah, well,’ I said, lacing my fingers together in front of me. ‘Jack’s an asshole.’
Grief etched itself into the planes of his face, pulling them down until he looked old and weary. ‘I’m so sorry. That’s all I can say. I am sorry all of this has happened to you. I’m sorry your life was in danger and I wasn’t there to help you. I’ll never forgive myself.’
Something settled deep inside me, burning, and I had the sudden urge to clutch at my stomach and rip the feeling out.
‘You don’t have to say sorry,’ I said, sounding angrier than I had meant to. But I was angry with him, about what had happened, about the mess he had made for all of us. ‘It didn’t have anything to do with you.’
He dropped his head into his hands. ‘You’ve been through too much. And I wasn’t there. I’m never there.’
I looked at the crown of his head, where tiny white hairs were beginning to sprout beneath the grey and brown. ‘Dad, I’m fine.’ No thanks to you. I didn’t say it though, I couldn’t be cruel.
He lifted his head. ‘You’re not fine. And neither is your mother. She’s terrified, and I don’t blame her. I’m trying to give her advice but she won’t listen to me. She’s angry at me, Soph. And she has every right to be, but she’s not coping and I’m worried about her.’
‘You and me both.’
I asked the question that needed to be asked, the one flashing at the front of my brain. ‘Have you heard from the man of the hour?’
‘Not yet.’ My father’s breath whistled through his nose. When he spoke again, his words quivered with anger. ‘The things he’s done, the position he’s put you and your mother in. He was supposed to keep you safe in my absence, not risk your lives.’
‘Did you know?’ My fingernails were digging into my hands, making crescent shapes in my skin. ‘Did you know what he was up to all that time?’
‘No.’ I had barely finished my question before he snapped out his answer. ‘Of course I didn’t know.’