“Yeah, and who shakes their asses, egging em on?” Don Peters shouted. His face was red. Veins were standing out on the sides of his neck. “Who’s pulling the motherfucking strings, Mr. Egghead Smartboy?”
There was a spatter of applause. Michaela rolled her eyes and was about to speak. Full of meth, blood pressure redlining, she felt like she could go on for perhaps six hours, the length of a Puritan sermon. But before she could start, Howland was off again.
“Thoughtfully put, sir, the contribution of a true intellectual, and a belief that many men advance, usually ones with a certain sense of inferiority when it comes to the fairer s—”
Don started to rise. “Who are you calling inferior, jackwad?”
Frank pulled him down, wanting to keep this one close. If Fritz Meshaum had really gotten hold of something, he needed to talk to Don Peters about it. Because he was pretty sure Don worked at the prison.
“Let me go,” Don snarled.
Frank slid his hand up to Don’s armpit and squeezed. “You need to calm down.”
Don grimaced, but didn’t say anything more.
“Here is an interesting fact,” Howland continued. “During the second half of the nineteenth century, most deep-mining operations, including those right here in Appalachia, employed workers called coolies. No, not Chinese peons; these were young men, sometimes boys as young as twelve, whose job it was to stand next to machinery that had a tendency to overheat. The coolies had a barrel of water, or a pipe, if there was a spring nearby. Their task was to pour water over the belts and pistons, to keep them cool. Hence the name coolies. I would submit that women have historically served the same function, restraining men—at least when possible—from their very worst, most abhorrent acts.”
He looked around at his audience. The smile had left his face.
“But now it seems the coolies are gone, or going. How long before men—soon to be the only sex—fall on each other with their guns and bombs and nuclear weapons? How long before the machine overheats and explodes?”
Frank had heard enough. It wasn’t the future of the entire human race he cared about. If it could be saved, that would be a side-effect. What he cared about was Nana. He wanted to kiss her sweet face, and to apologize for stretching her favorite shirt. Tell her he would never do it again. He could not do those things unless she was awake.
“Come on,” he said to Don. “Outside. I want to talk to you.”
“About what?”
Frank leaned close to Peters’s ear. “Is there really a woman at the prison who can sleep without growing webs and then wake up?”
Don craned around to look at Frank. “Hey, you’re the town dogcatcher, aren’t you?”
“That’s right.” Frank let the dogcatcher bullshit slide. “And you’re Don who works at the prison.”
“Yeah,” said Don. “That’s me. So let’s talk.”
8
Clint and Lila had gone out to the back porch, the overhead light turning them into actors on a stage. They were looking toward the pool where Anton Dubcek had been skimming for dead bugs less than twenty-four hours earlier. Clint wondered idly where Anton was now. Sleeping, likely as not. Dreaming of willing young women rather than preparing for an unpleasant conversation with his wife. If so, Clint envied him.
“Tell me about Sheila Norcross, honey. The girl you saw at the basketball game.”
Lila favored him with an ugly smile of which he would have thought her incapable. It showed all of her teeth. Above it, her eyes—deep in their sockets now, with dark brown circles beneath them—glittered. “As if you don’t know. Honey.”
Put on your therapist’s hat, he told himself. Remember that she’s high on dope and running on fumes. Exhausted people can slip very easily into paranoia. But it was hard. He saw the outline of it; she thought that some girl he’d never heard of was his daughter by Shan Parks. But it was impossible, and when your wife accused you of something impossible, and everything else in the world was, by any rational standard, more important and immediate, it was very, very hard to keep from losing your temper.
“Tell me what you know. Then I’ll tell you what I know. But let’s begin with one simple fact. That girl is not my daughter, whether she has my name or not, and I have never broken our marriage vows.” She turned as if to go back inside. He caught her by the arm. “Please. Tell me before—”
Before you go to sleep and we lose whatever chance we have to square this, he thought.
“Before it can fester any more than it already has.”
Lila shrugged. “Does it even matter, with everything else?”
His very thought a moment ago, but he could have said it matters to you. He kept his mouth closed instead. Because in spite of all that was happening in the wider world, it mattered to him, too.
“You know I never even wanted this pool, don’t you?” Lila asked.
“What?” Clint was baffled. What did the pool have to do with anything?
“Mom? Dad?” Jared was standing inside the screen door, listening.
“Jared, go back inside. This is between your mother and m—”
“No, let him listen,” Lila said. “If you insist on going through this, we will. Don’t you think he should know about his half-sister?” She turned to Jared. “She’s a year younger than you, she has blond hair, she’s a talented basketball player, and she’s as pretty as a picture. As you would be, if you were a girl. Because, see, she looks like you, Jere.”
“Dad?” His brow was furrowed. “What’s she talking about?”
Clint gave up. It was too late to do anything else. “Why don’t you tell us, Lila? Start from the beginning.”
9
Lila went through it, starting with the Curriculum Committee, and what Dorothy Harper had said to her afterward, how she hadn’t really thought much of it, but did an Internet search the next day. The search had brought her to the article, which included a mention of Shannon Parks, whom Clint had spoken of once before, and a striking photograph of Sheila Norcross. “She could almost be your twin, Jared.”
Jared slowly turned to his father.
The three of them now sat at the kitchen table.
Clint shook his head, but couldn’t help wondering what his face was showing. Because he felt guilty. As if there had really been something to feel guilty about. It was an interesting phenomenon. That night in 2002 what he’d whispered in Shannon’s ear was, “You know, I’ll always be there if you need me.” When she’d responded, “What if I needed you tonight?” Clint had said that was the one thing he couldn’t do. If he had slept with her, there would have been something to feel guilty about, but he’d refused her, so it was all good. Wasn’t it?
Maybe, but why had he never told Lila about the encounter? He couldn’t remember and he wasn’t required to defend what happened fifteen years before. She might as well demand that he explain why he’d knocked Jason down in the Burtells’ backyard for nothing more than a chocolate milkshake.
“Is that it?” Clint asked. He couldn’t resist adding, “Tell me that’s not all, Lila.”
“No, that’s not all,” she said. “Are you going to tell me that you didn’t know Shannon Parks?”