XXXI
We sit in the study, Henry and me on the couch, Mom in Dad’s old reading chair. It feels right to discuss this here, where so many important discussions have taken place. The first time I learned about the wood; the first time Mom and I discussed whether we should have a small, family-only memorial service for Dad; the first time Mom had begged me to pack a suitcase and go into hiding with her, which led to the first time Mom tried to convince me to enroll in homeschooling so I wouldn’t have to work so hard to balance everything. She’d been afraid the pressure was going to be too much for me, that I’d put myself in either the same kind of depression that took hold of Dad, or that I’d lose focus in the wood one day and put myself in an early grave.
Our memorial service was just the two of us and Uncle Joe, planting a ring of tulips around the rock bearing my parents’ initials. Mom carried tulips on her wedding day, and she’d wanted to plant something that would come back every year, just as she hoped Dad would come back to us one day. That he’d stumble out of the wood just like the green stalks sprout out of the thawing winter soil; nothing one day, there the next.
The argument regarding my education happened later that night, when Mom had a panic attack and tried to convince me to leave with her. Instead, I convinced her to stay. I can still see the flash of betrayal in her eyes. I don’t know why homeschooling was the next thing to pop into her head; I imagine it was just one of many thoughts she’d had all day. She’d wanted to win that argument, too, but I couldn’t let her. It may have been selfish, but at the time, being at school was therapeutic. Dad wasn’t imprinted on its white walls or linoleum floors or dented lockers like he was imprinted on everything at home. It wasn’t until later that school stopped being a place of refuge for me and started being a place of normalcy, but its importance in my life didn’t change.
Now, Mom stares out the window, thinking. I told her about my first encounter with Henry in the wood, and my second, and my third. I told her—with Henry’s help—about his parents, and his belief that their disappearance may be connected to Dad. I told her about the council, about Varo, and why I chose to keep everything a secret from her, to protect her from any harm that could come from her knowing too much, a plan that was now blown to hell (“Language, Winter,” Mom reprimanded me). I was even honest about how many nights Henry had stayed in my room (“But it was all innocent, I swear”) and about how I faked being sick so I could stay home with him and pore through the journals. I left out a couple things: the disease spreading through the wood, my run-in with the Sentinels, the fact that I saw a boy flayed to death right in front of me. These are things she would want to know, but I can’t help myself. I still want to protect her as much as I can, even if it’s just protecting her from the confirmation of her greatest fears.
Finally, she looks at me, her shoulders hunched forward a little, as if the weight of my revelations is a heavy yoke to bear. “And you didn’t once think of telling me any of this? You didn’t once think I might understand?”
“I just wanted to—”
“Protect me, I know.” She scoffs, but not at me. At the idea, maybe, or the situation. “Did you know that when we were first married, your father and I would sit at the dinner table every night, and he would tell me everything that had happened in the wood? Every person he encountered, every boring council meeting, every fight with a combatant traveler? We were husband and wife—he couldn’t hide the bruises from me any more than I could hide my concern from him. So he told me everything. It was only when you were old enough to understand our conversations that we started hiding things. It was a team effort, at first. But the less we talked at the dinner table, the less we talked overall, and eventually he stopped telling me anything. Sometimes I think if we had kept talking, if I could have heard the resignation in his voice sooner, if I could have found the courage to tell him he’d had enough, that alcohol wouldn’t solve his problems—but what did I know? I wasn’t a guardian. I couldn’t tell him how to do his job any more than he could tell me how to do mine.”
“Mom—”
“But you never saw any of that,” she continues. “Silence and lies are all you’ve ever known, and so, of course, when you became a guardian, you adopted your father’s habits. I don’t blame you, I really don’t. However, that does not give you the right to sneak a boy—work-related or not—into this house, or to have him sleep in your room without my knowledge, or to lie to me to get out of going to school when you know perfectly well I would have understood you needed to stay home to work.”
The real reason I faked sick—the one I shoved deep into the back of my mind—is a hot coal in my stomach, radiating guilt and shame. “Okay,” I say, “maybe I faked being sick because I was afraid if I told you the real reason I wanted to stay home, you’d use it against me the next time you brought up homeschooling.”
Mom arches a brow. “Maybe?”
“Okay, definitely, but the rest of it was to protect you, and I won’t apologize for that.”
Henry yanks on my sleeve. “Winter.”
I hold up a hand, shushing him. “But I will apologize for how I went about it. I shouldn’t have kept it a secret from you. I’m really sorry.”
Mom watches me, tapping her fingers against the edge of the armrest.
“If it makes you feel any better,” I add, “I felt terrible the whole time I was doing it.”
“The whole time?” Mom asks.
“Well, most of the time. A solid eighty percent.”
Mom laughs. “Oh, you are your father’s daughter, all right. Speaking of which.” She turns to Henry, the light in her eyes dimming. “Do you really think my husband’s disappearance is connected to the disappearance of your parents?”
“Yes, Mrs. Parish,” he says. “I do.”
Mom sighs. “I want it to be clear that I don’t condone what you two have done. The thought of a stranger sneaking around my house the past two days doesn’t exactly sit well with me, especially when that stranger is a teenage boy who’s been sleeping in my daughter’s bedroom. But if what you’re saying is true, if there really is a conspiracy happening within the council, and if it could lead us to discover what exactly happened to Jack, or if we could maybe even find him…” She shakes her head; she won’t go down that road. She clears her throat and starts again. “What I’m trying to say is, Henry can stay here, but he will not be staying in your room. Is that understood?”
Henry nods. “Perfectly.”