Starter House(88)

“There might be rituals,” Ella Dane said. “I’ve never done anything like that, but I can find out. I talked to Jack McMure when I went to Columbia for the pictures. . . . We’d have to go back to the house. You need to know who he was, and how he died, and why he can’t rest. You need to know everything about him. And you have to be completely sure you’ve got the name right, that’s what Jack says, otherwise it makes them mad. We’ll have to go back to Greeneburg. Jack told me you have to face him where he’s strongest. Can you do that?”

“I’ll have to,” Lacey said.

Going back to the house meant going back to Eric; a ritual in the house meant Eric would know everything. Oh, how he’d hate it; there was no coming back from that. It was the end of their marriage. The child moved under her skin. Someday he would be fourteen years old, sulky and angry, resenting her for everything she had done (things she hadn’t even done yet), as cruel to her as she had been to Ella Dane. He would never be grateful. He would hate her for the divorce, as she had hated her mother for the loss of Grandpa Merritt. I did this to save your life. Sometime in those years, thirteen, fourteen, fifteen, he would leave her to live with Eric, happy to be free of his crazy mother. Her eyes were hazy with tears, and Drew’s nearness prickled all over her skin; he was thinking of her, paying attention, reaching out. There was no time.





Chapter Thirty-nine

WHAT HE WOULD SAY TO LACEY: he planned it all the way down, four hours alone in the car, not even listening to the radio. He thought through his words and said them out loud, sometimes gesturing with his right hand. What he would say to Lacey—he would speak reasonably, which was the one thing none of his clients did, however often they were deposed; they just wanted to tell her or needed to make her understand; they never meant to hurt anybody, they only wanted to talk.

He only wanted to talk to her. He listed his points of argument:

First, that the life of a single mother was hard, hard on the mother and harder on the child, and she of all people knew that.

Second, that she needed him; although yes, she had supported him through law school, he had dragged her through her education degree, and she would never have passed her certification tests without his help.

Third, that there was nothing wrong with their house, except the ceiling in Ella Dane’s room, and he would ask Dr. Vlk to recommend a psychiatrist.

Fourth, that everybody knew there was no such thing as a haunted house, especially if it had vinyl siding.

Fifth, did she think he had time for this?

Strike that.

Fifth, that a baby needed a father.

Sixth, that Lacey was barely competent to survive on her own, let alone take care of a baby, and her mother was even worse, and that if Eric went to court for custody, he’d have no trouble finding witnesses as to the character of the Kendall women.

Seventh, that he didn’t want to spend another night alone, because he couldn’t sleep. The house whispered.

Eighth, that he loved her.

Ninth, please come home.

A list of ten would be cleaner, but that was all he had. There were flaws in the progressive logic of his thoughts, but it would have to do. And here was Spinet Cove. What a dump. How could people live like this? La Hacienda: red tile roofs and black iron verandas, streaks of rust staining the fake-adobe walls. Whom did they think they were kidding? And why had Lacey come here?

Ella Dane had told him they were in 117, at the end of the row. Now he was here, he forgot his arguments, the structure, the clear reason walking from point to point. If he could remember, she would have to come home, because not even Lacey could disprove his logic, but it was all gone. There she was, in a red sundress, standing in the door of her room and looking out to the beach, where the gulls whirled. He ran across the parking lot before he had time to talk himself into turning around and driving back home.

“Lacey,” he called.

She looked at him without surprise. “Okay,” she said.

She turned and walked back into the room, leaving the door open, so he followed her in. “I need to talk to you,” he said. “Can you please listen?”

“Okay,” she said again, in a dull, uninterested tone, as if he had asked her if she wanted a boiled egg. “I’m almost ready.”

There was a strange smell in the room, worse than the damp carpet and dirty seashell odors of beach hotels. Maybe some kind of sewer leak. He wouldn’t be surprised, in this dump. Lacey’s suitcase was on the bed, packed—if you could call it packing; she had just flung everything in and mashed it down—and ready to go. He’d caught up with her just in time. Where would she go? Probably she herself had no idea. “There’s nothing wrong with our house,” he said, remembering one of his arguments.