Season of Change(15)

                In three steps from the front door, you could be on the stairs, be in the hallway leading to the kitchen, or be in the living room, with its tan velour couch, the scarred coffee tables, an old television, and his father’s brown leather wing chair. The best that could be said about the house was that it had dark planked wood floors.

                “I’ve kept everything the way it was when your grandfather...left.” Slade flipped on the oscillating fan in the living room and then pointed toward the television. “Don’t count on anything other than basic cable.”

                He headed toward the kitchen, hesitating in the narrow doorway when he realized they’d paused at the stairwell. Both girls stared upstairs, trepidation in their gaze. Grace reached for Faith’s hand as if they knew...

                Impossible.

                “You can eat anything you want in the kitchen. I warn you, I eat healthy.” Not that his body was a temple, but he disliked stripping down to a tank top to work out, so he watched what he ate instead.

                His brain registered what it hadn’t wanted to for months—the kitchen was outdated and in need of some serious repair. A drawer had come off its glider. Cabinet hinges were loose, leaving cabinet doors lopsided. And the linoleum... Goldenrod polka dots had been fashionable during the swinging seventies.

                Slade turned around. “We’ll need to make a run into Cloverdale for groceries.” He often ate at Flynn’s. He supposed that would have to change while his daughters were here.

                His daughters were here.

                He’d tried for years to obtain unsupervised visitation. They were here and he was happy, wasn’t he? Or he would’ve been happy if he could’ve arranged for the three of them to stay somewhere else. Somewhere without the memory of death and horrendous mistakes. He could still take them elsewhere.

                But then he imagined Evy’s smirk when he told her they hadn’t stayed in the house. Where they slept shouldn’t matter to the girls. They didn’t know the house had a past. Or that he shared in it. Taking them to a hotel would mean Evy won.

                Sticking with his decision, he led them upstairs, unable to shut out the memory of the last time the girls had been here when they were two years old. Evy’s screams. The horror on her face. Her accusations that everything was his fault. He wouldn’t make a mistake like that again.

                “You’ll be staying in the guest bedroom,” he said. It had two single beds his mother had set up for when her twin sisters visited. He pointed out his room and the bathroom, ignoring the door to the master bedroom completely.

                * * *

                SILENCE WASN’T GOLDEN.

                The girls were mute as he carried their possessions upstairs. The girls sat wordlessly in the truck’s backseat during the thirty-minute drive to and from Cloverdale to shop for groceries and pick up pizza. They played on a tablet after dinner without speaking while he sat in his father’s chair, which always made him feel as if he didn’t belong in the house. The back was too stiff. His legs were too long.

                “How was school this year?”

                Silence.

                “Do you belong to any clubs? Girl Scouts? Sports teams?”

                Silence.

                “What’s school going to be like next year?”

                Silence.