The Putch girl stood and screamed then, tears rolling past the bright stars on her cheeks. She joined the pack in the middle, where the young man was murmuring soothing words, trying to maintain eye contact with them. “I don’t want them here!” Krissi yelled again.
“Where’s Ben, Patty?” Maggie Hinkel said, her spade-faced daughter sitting beside her, expressionless. “The police really need to talk to Ben. I hope you’re not hiding him.”
“Me? I’ve been trying to find him. I’m trying to straighten this out. Please.” Please help me, please forgive me, please stop screaming.
Maggie Hinkel’s daughter remained quiet, then tugged at her mother’s sleeve. “Mom, I want to leave.” The other girls continued to howl, watching each other. Patty stood, looking down at Krissi and the therapist, who was still cradling the naked doll-boy that was supposed to be Ben. Her stomach seized, flushed her throat with acid.
“I think you should leave,” snapped Mrs. Cates, picking up her daughter like a toddler, the girl’s legs dangling almost to the floor, Mrs. Cates wobbling with the weight.
The young therapist stood up, inserting himself between Patty and Mrs. Cates. He almost put a hand on Patty, then moved it to Mrs. Cates instead. Diane was calling from the door, calling Patty’s name, or Patty wouldn’t have known to move. She was waiting for them to close in on her, scratch her eyes out.
“I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” Patty was yelling into the room, frantic and dizzy. “It’s a mistake, I’m so sorry.”
Then Lou Cates was in front of her, grabbing her by the arm, as if he hadn’t just invited her in, and walking her toward the door, the keening of four girls behind her. Mothers and dads were everywhere, grown-ups taking care of their children, and Patty felt stupid. Not foolish, not embarrassed. Unforgivably stupid. She could hear the parents cooing things to their daughters: good girl, it’s ok-it’s ok, she’s leaving now, you’re safe, we’ll make this all better, hush, hush, baby.
Just before Lou Cates propelled her from the room, Patty turned around to see Krissi Cates in her mother’s arms, her blond hair over one eye. The girl looked at her and said simply, “Ben is going to hell.”
Libby Day
NOW
I’d been commissioned to find Runner, but all my feverish, ambitious action of the past week was slopped on the floor next to my bed, like a soiled nightgown. I couldn’t get up, even when I heard the kids make their sleepy duckwalk past my house. I pictured them in big rubber rainboots, clomping along, leaving rounded footprints in the March muck, and I still couldn’t move.
I’d woken up from a miserable dream, the kind you keep telling yourself doesn’t mean anything, shouldn’t bother you because it’s just a dream, just a dream. It started back at the farm, but it wasn’t the farm really, it was far too bright, too tidy to be the farm, but it was and in the distance, against an orange horizon, Runner was galloping toward the farm, hooting like an Old West cowboy. As he got closer—down our hill, through the gate—I saw that his gallop was actually a rickety, bumpalong motion because his horse had wheels. Its top half was flesh, but the bottom was metal, spindly, like a hospital gurney. The horse whinnied at me in panic, its muscled neck trying to separate from the metal below. Runner leapt down, the creature rolling away, one wheel busted, an irritating grocery cart of an animal. It came to a stop near a tree stump, its eyes going white, still struggling to pull itself apart.
“Don’t worry about that.” Runner grinned at the horse. “I paid for it.”
“You got a bad deal,” I said.
Runner’s jaw tightened and he stood too close to me.
“Your mom says it’s fine,” he muttered.
That’s right! I thought, My mom is alive. The idea felt solid, like a pebble in my pocket. My mom was alive, and how foolish I’d been, all these years thinking otherwise.
“You’d better fix your hand first,” Runner said, pointing at my stumped ring finger. “I brought you these. Hope you like them better than the horse.” He held up a flimsy velvet bag, the kind used for Scrabble, and shook it.
“Oh, I love the horse,” I said, batting away my ill will. The horse had torn its hindquarters from the metal and was bleeding a meaty red oil onto the ground.
From his bag, Runner poured eight or nine fingers. Every time I picked one that looked like mine, I realized it was a pinky finger, a man’s finger, a finger of the wrong color or size.
Runner was pursing his lips at me. “Just take one, OK? It’s not a big deal.”