by Ann McMan
“It was an envelope. Full of photographs. Horrible images. Grown men with boys. Doing unspeakable things. Sometimes, two of them with one boy. Sometimes the men wore masks that were more like hoods. Sometimes not. And, I . . . I saw him. I saw him, Evan. And . . . others, too. The judge. Albert. The bishop. All of them engaged in sex acts with children. With children. It made me sick. Literally. I ran from the room and threw up so many times I lost count. I sat on the bathroom floor in my mother’s apartment until I felt strong enough to stand. Then I called for a car to take me back to the airport. Before I left, I returned to the study and picked up the pictures and returned them to the envelope without looking at them, and brought them back with me.” She took a long, deep breath. “I was going to ask you what to do with them. I was going to come straight here from the airport.”
Evan felt sick and distraught at Julia’s revelation. It was impossible for her to imagine the shock this had been for her—the trauma. She knew Julia was right when she said she’d never be able to unsee the horror she’d discovered—hidden for salacious gratification behind a painting that immortalized childhood innocence. Julia was right: there was no going back. She now had to live with this. And Evan would live it with her.
“Why didn’t you come here?” she asked, softly.
“Because I realized I had some things to take care of that could only be done by me. Alone. I had eight hours on an airplane to come to that realization. So, when I got back, I went to my grandmother’s house, and I settled all family business. Which brings us back to where I started.”
Evan started to ask Julia to explain what she meant by her oblique mob reference, but she never got the chance. On the coffee table in front of them, both of their cell phones lit up as long sequences of tri-tone alerts sounded. There were so many she couldn’t count them all.
“What the hell?” Evan snapped up her phone. “Good god. I’ve got about eight breaking news alerts.”
Julia reached out a hand to stop her from reading any of them.
“That’s the other thing I have to tell you,” she said.
◊ ◊ ◊
“What the serious fuck?”
Dan was nearly apoplectic.
“I told you.” Evan related it all—again. “Julia turned everything over to The Washington Post. She contacted an old classmate from Exeter, who’s now an editor in their Washington bureau, and she connected Julia directly with the reporters covering Cawley. They reached out to Cawley’s office for comment before they ran the story. You can intuit the rest.”
“What the fuck made her do that?”
Evan lowered the phone and addressed Julia. “Dan wants to know, ‘what the fuck’ made you turn everything over to the Post?”
Julia tipped her head back and stared at the ceiling. “Tell him I thought it had more credibility than HuffPo.”
Evan repeated Julia’s response, only instead of HuffPo, she substituted Media Matters.
Julia glowered at her.
“Well, I’ll be goddamned,” Dan said. Again.
“Look. We’re both exhausted. Neither of us got any sleep last night.”
“Yeah, all right.” Dan picked up the clue phone. “Call me tomorrow?”
“Count on it,” Evan said. “Good night, Dan.”
“Later,” he said.
Evan tossed her phone down on the coffee table. Then she thought better of it and picked it back up.
“What are you doing?” Julia asked.
“I’m turning the damn thing off. Enough is enough.”
“I’ll second that.” Julia retrieved her phone and did the same thing. “I need to get a new one of these, by the way.”
“How come? Did you drop it or something?”
“In a manner of speaking. I resigned from Donne & Hale this morning.”
“What?”
“Okay,” Julia said in a placating tone. “Before you light up like a Christmas tree, I promise this is my last piece of breaking news.”
“I sure as shit hope so.” Evan sat staring at her like she’d never seen her before. “Why the hell did you do that?”
“Quit the company?”
“Oh, is that what we were talking about? I thought we were still discussing the Ukrainian diaspora.”
“Wiseass.” Julia bumped into her. “When I made the decision to turn everything I’d discovered over to the Post, I understood what it would mean for any future I could ever hope to have with my mother. I burned that bridge pretty thoroughly. I couldn’t take an action like that and keep drinking from the family well. I couldn’t do the same thing I repudiated my mother for doing. I had to let it all go. The business. The houses. The money. All of it.”
“Holy shit.” Evan didn’t know what to say.
“Hey.” Julia nudged her again. “Don’t tell me you’re now rethinking our living arrangements?”
“Hmmmm. Well. Now that you’re a pauper . . .”
“A pauper?” Julia quoted. “I wouldn’t go quite that far.”
“No? How far would you go?”
Julia pushed her backwards on the sofa and crawled on top of her. “About this far?”
“Yeah . . .” Evan wound her hands into Julia’s head of thick dark hair and pulled her closer. “I think we might be able to work something out.”
◊ ◊ ◊
Desiree’s seventeenth birthday was on Saturday, and Ping put on a big spread for the family. “The family” in this instance included Stevie, Evan, Julia and Ben.
Ben complained about having to wear something other than pajama bottoms, Crocs, and one—or both—of his favorite flannel shirts, but Ping said she’d refuse to let his sorry ass through the door if he didn’t clean himself up. Evan was surprised at his appearance when he got there. He’d obviously showered and shaved, and he wore a pair of trousers that nearly fit, and a button-down shirt with a tweed jacket.
“Damn, Ben. You got a job interview after this shindig?” she asked him.
Ben was busy loading his plate up with deviled eggs, pigs in a blanket, baked ham, macaroni and cheese, biscuits and a single stalk of celery.
“Go fuck yourself. Sometimes you gotta pay to play.”
“Shirley teach you that?”
Ben had been creating a precarious tower of biscuits, and he paused in mid-stack. “Who the fuck is Shirley?”
“Seriously?” Evan asked. “The blonde with the fake . . . you know.”
He narrowed his eyes. “I’m gonna need a little more to go on.”
“Yeah. Never mind.” Evan eyed his plate. “What’s with the celery stalk?”
“Ping will chew my ass if I don’t eat fucking vegetables.”
“Right.” Evan nodded. “Good plan. That should throw her right off the scent.”
“Hey?” He asked in a lower tone of voice. “How’s she doing?” He inclined his head toward Julia, who was sitting at the kitchen table, having a cup of hot tea with Ping.
“She’s okay. It’s gonna be a long haul.”
“No shit. The news coverage reads like new installments of Fifty Shades of Gross.”
“Maybe don’t share those insights too broadly around her?”
“I won’t.” He plucked one of his biscuits off the top of his tower and crammed the entire thing into his mouth. It wasn’t pretty.
“Yeah, and with that—I gotta go.” Evan felt a sudden need to change the scenery.
“How come?” Ben asked, displaying a mouthful of flaky goodness.
Evan patted him on the arm. “I think I left the iron on.”
She walked across the room, intending to annoy Stevie, who was entirely taken up with Desiree. The two of them had been inseparable all evening. It was sickeningly sweet.
“Yo, kiddo. It’s time for us to blow this pop stand.”
Stevie’s face fell. “Come on, Mama Uno. It’s only, like, 7:30.”
“I know this will stun you, but I learned how to tell time thirty-five years ago.” She held out her arm to display her wris
twatch. “And when the little hand reaches the nine, Mama Uno turns into a flesh-eating bitch who does unspeakable things—like hiding the car keys or eliminating all the premium channels on someone’s cable package.”
Stevie and Desiree looked at each other, before sighing in tandem.
“Twenty more minutes?” Stevie begged. “Please?”
Evan deliberated. “Do you have plans tonight after this party, Des?”
Desiree perked up at once. “No. Not a thing. I mean, besides watching White Christmas.”
“We were going to watch it together,” Stevie complained. “We’ve been looking forward to it all week.”
“White Christmas?” Evan regarded the pair with disbelief. How could the same kid who was gaga over Alice Glass have her heart set on watching something as smarmy as White Christmas?
“Totally,” Desiree added. She gave Stevie a playful nudge and grinned at Evan. “She has the hots for Rosemary Clooney.”
“Rosemary . . .” Evan blinked at her daughter.
“Woof.” Stevie had a dreamy look on her face. “Total spank bank material.”
Evan let that one go. “I was wondering, if it’s okay with your mother, if you’d like to come home with us, Des—and spend the night? I can take you home tomorrow.”
The two girls nearly jumped out of their skins with excitement.
“That would be so awesome,” Desiree gushed. “Let me go ask her right now.” She squeezed Stevie’s hand and hurried off to find Phyllis.
“Mom, this is so freakin’ cool. Thanks for doing this. Really.”
“Yeah, whatever.” Evan said. “But there are rules, Stevie. Des sleeps in the guest room—in virginal solitude. No exceptions. Understood?”
Stevie looked mortified. “Like I’d do something like that with you and Julia across the hall.”
“I’m so relieved to hear you say, ‘Gee Mom, I’ve decided to wait until I’m really sure I’m ready for such a big step.’ That just warms my cold, dead heart.”
Julia walked over to join them. She was carrying a fat grocery bag filled with foil-wrapped packages. Evan didn’t have to ask what it contained. She caught Ping’s eye. Ping flashed her a big smile and a double thumbs-up. She supposed that meant she’d get a call from Ping tomorrow, and a summary assessment of how Julia was ‘doing,’ post all the traumas of the last few days.
“Are you two ready to go?” Julia hefted the bag. She’d already put on her coat and gloves. “If we leave now, we can make it home in time for White Christmas.”
Evan gaped at her and Stevie burst into peals of merry laughter.
“What’s so funny about that?” Julia asked. “Rosemary Clooney is totally hot.”
Stevie leapt to her feet and hugged Julia. “I love you, Mama Dos.”
Mama Dos? Evan was surprised, but moved, by Stevie’s new moniker for Julia.
Julia noticed it, too. She positively beamed, as she hugged Stevie back.
Evan threw up her hands.
“Tell Julia about our overnight guest,” she said to Stevie. “I’ll go start the car.”
◊ ◊ ◊
After they got home, Julia opted to forgo watching the movie with the girls. She explained that the pair should be allowed to create their own Christmas traditions, without parental supervision. Besides, she told Evan, it was the winter solstice, and there was a supermoon to be seen from the edge of the snowy field behind their house.
So once again, Evan trudged through the fresh drifts carrying two campstools and a flask of cognac.
Just like the last night she’d wandered out here and waited for the heavens to reveal their secrets, there was fresh snow on the ground and a shimmering canopy of stars. Only this time, instead of being stuck in Albuquerque, Julia was right there beside her, scanning the galaxy in an ageless anticipation of magic.
It had been the shortest day of the year. And now they were in the midst of the longest night.
Evan thought the fates guiding their stars had a wry sense of humor. The solstice was the universe’s great equalizer. For this one night, the sun stood still at its greatest distance from the earth.
A celestial caesura.
But tomorrow, the longer nights would end—and the sun, in its petty pace, would creep closer from day to day.
Macbeth knew some things.
As far as she was concerned, their longest nights had already passed.
It was oddly appropriate that they sat here, huddled together in the cold, watching the sky. It was like the epilogue at the end of a book.
An ironic metaphor for Julia, who’d spent her entire professional life helping other people tell their stories. Now it was her turn to speak.
And boy, had she ever commenced that new phase with a bang . . .
There was no doubt Julia would figure things out. Land on her feet. Keep moving forward. It was who she was. Any other course would be impossible for her. She’d already proved that.
Evan’s shoulder was killing her. But she’d finally made her plans to have the damn thing fixed. She’d made a grand ceremony out of presenting Julia with a printout of her appointment with an orthopedic surgeon at Penn. And much to Evan’s chagrin, the surgeon had a damn cancellation, so her appointment date for the procedure got bumped up—to the day after tomorrow.
Hell. She didn’t need two arms to lift a plate of food . . . she could always just sit next to Ben Rush. His plates could feed a multitude—with no basketsful left over.
And Julia had surprised Evan with a gift, too—a new coffee-maker. It was a doozie, with more bells and whistles than a superconducting supercollider.
Which was not a bad metaphor, when she thought about it . . .
Stevie had teased them about how sappy they were, as they stood together in the kitchen, smiling at each other stupidly over their early presents. She’d said they were like that couple in the O. Henry short story.
“You know,” she prompted. “That whole jazz with the hair and combs?”
But Stevie had been right: the exchange of gifts had been like making promises—both as commitments to a shared future. Tonight, that future spread out around them as wide as the bright December sky.
“When will we be able to see it?” Evan’s voice cracked on the night air. She thought she could see the words travel their short distance to Julia.
There was no context for her question, but Julia was unfazed by it. By now she was used to what she called Evan’s “sudden lane changes.”
“See what?” she asked.
“Aquarius.”
The word swirled between them like a dervish before dissipating into space.
“It’s already come and gone,” Julia said quietly. “In October.”
Evan stared at the sky. “Where would it have been?”
Julia pointed at a place on the horizon, just above the dark outline of their house. “Over there—in the southern sky. That’s where Galileo discovered it.”
“Over our porch?” Evan quipped.
“You might say that.”
The little stars.“I’m sorry we missed it.”
“Me, too. But don’t worry.”
Evan looked at her.
Julia smiled. “It always comes back.”
Evan took hold of her hand.
They would wait for it, together. They would wait because the little stars were worth it.
The best things in life always were.
Acknowledgments
“Four” must be my lucky number because I seem to keep making hay during my self-styled Vermont writing residencies. Credit for these small successes goes, as always, to Susan and Mike Tranby, who never fail to welcome me (in room #4) at their little slice of paradise on Lake Champlain. Thank you both for your never-ending kindness, morning coffee runs, and the life-giving indulgences of hot, apple popovers.
Tara Scott is the reason I chose to write this book ahead of some others on my list. “Yes,” she said when I shared the story idea with her. “Write that book. Wri
te it right now.” So, Tara? If this one bombs, I blame you . . .
Sincerest thanks and adoration are heaped at the feet of my two extraordinary editors, Elizabeth Sims and Fay Jacobs. You both pushed me to make this a better book—sometimes with a backhoe. I was humbled by your insights and sage advice—and grateful that I had enough therapy on board to heed it without digesting my organs. Because of you, useful phrases like “search and destroy” entered my editorial lexicon.
Carole Cloud, as always, provided a reality-based assessment of the story—and did her best to help me right-size Philadelphia. Cloudie? You always tell me the truth. What more can I say about why I’ll always trust you. Well . . . except for when it comes to figuring which way to turn on US 29 North. (Don’t ask. It’s complicated.)
Cathi Jones rendered invaluable resource inspiration when I had no idea where Evan should turn to begin her background research on Judge Cawley. I owe you lunch at the Sonoma Wine Bar.
Lynn Buckingham, my sister-in-law (and surgical nurse extraordinaire), spent hours acquainting me with various effects of gunshot wounds and ensuing complications. Both Evan and Julia thank you for your time and expertise.
Carleen (Cars) Spry did a yeoman’s job encouraging me during my self-imposed writing retreat—and checking in on Buddha (likely to update our wine inventory) while I was away. Thanks, Cars, for taking such good care of us. Whenever I grew weary, I heard your dulcet tones chanting, “No handsies!”
Who among us is fortunate enough to boast not one, but two moral compasses? I guess that be me, for I am the beneficiary of the love and constancy of two extraordinary men: Father Jimmy and Father Frank. Together, your combined expressions of grace and good humor encourage me work harder to be a better person.
And as further evidence that God moves in mysterious ways, Father Frank, surprisingly, became my go-to source for selecting precisely the right signature weapon for Maya Jindal. It is because of him that the phrase “single stack, suppressed fire” now occupies a hallowed place alongside “He is risen” in the litany of things he has taught me.
What can I say about my Bywater family? Holy smokes . . . something must be in the water at this joint. The jaw-dropping collection of books this community of authors keeps churning out pushes me to work harder every single day. I’m giddy to be pulled along in your wake. What a wonderful community you are! Special love and thanks go to Marianne K. Martin, Salem West, Kelly Smith, Fay Jacobs, Elizabeth Andersen, Nancy Squires and Rachel Spangler for helping me put my best foot forward. Anna Burke? Well. Just keep doing what you’re doing, Kraken. And don’t forget my phone number down the road when you’re between films and wanna talk with someone you know will always take your calls. I am so proud of you—existing technology cannot measure the respect I have for your talent.
