The Favor

by Megan Hart

  Janelle’s stomach tightened. “Don’t you feel good?”

  Stupid question—the woman was eighty-three years old, suffering from high blood pressure, anemia and a brain tumor. Chances were she never felt good. Nan shrugged without taking her hand away from her eyes.

  Janelle got up and put a hand on her shoulder. “Let me help you to bed. I can bring you something in a little while, if you want. Bennett, finish up and then clear the table.”

  Nan didn’t protest when Janelle hooked a hand under her elbow to help her up, proof of how bad she really felt. Janelle guided her grandma through the kitchen and to the hall, though Nan paused at the bathroom.

  “I need to go.”

  “Okay. I can help you.”

  Nan made a noise, but didn’t argue, just let Janelle help her to the toilet. Janelle lifted her nightgown, helped her pull down her incontinence pants. The toilet had been fitted with a high seat and bars, but Nan was still a little unsteady as she sat.

  There was no good way to do this, no way to make it anything but awkward. Janelle had changed her son’s diapers and nursed him through a variety of childhood stomach bugs, but that was completely different than standing in the bathroom doorway as her beloved grandmother groaned with cramps. Nan gripped the railing and turned her face.

  “I’m sorry.”

  “Don’t be sorry.” Janelle forced herself not to cover her mouth and nose with her hand, but after only a few seconds, she had to step outside the bathroom. She closed her eyes and put her face to the door frame, but only for a second because Bennett spoke up from the kitchen.

  “Mama?”

  Janelle donned a smile, turning toward him. “Yeah, buddy.”

  “Can I go play my game?”

  “Is your homework finished?”

  “It’s Friday,” Bennett began, then sighed. “After I’m done?”

  “If you do it now,” she pointed out, “you won’t have to worry about it for the rest of the weekend.”

  The toilet flushed, and Janelle peeked inside the bathroom. Nan was still looking away from her, frail shoulders slumped. “I have to help Nan now. Go do what I asked you to do, please. And we’ll watch a movie or something after I get her to bed.”

  In the bathroom, Janelle stood for a moment, uncertain of how to help. Nan looked at her, and though her face was wan, there was a bit of a twinkle in her eyes. She gestured at the built-in wall cabinet.

  “Baby wipes are in there, honey. We can use those.” The twinkle faded as her mouth turned down. “I’m sorry to even ask you...”

  Janelle opened the cupboard, found the wipes. Shook her head. “Shh, Nan. Don’t.”

  Nan gripped her arm as she moved to help clean her up. “Thank you, Janelle. For coming here.”

  Janelle looked into her grandmother’s eyes. “I’m happy to do it. Let’s get you into bed.”

  It still took much longer to get Nan ready for bed than Janelle had anticipated. First the meds, a plethora of pills from a small plastic case with sections for each day of the week, entirely different from the ones she took in the daytime. Then she had to brush her teeth, which she could still do on her own, but took twice as long as seemed normal. She had to put on her face lotion, not for wrinkles, she said, but to keep her skin from being too dry. Also a simple task that took so much time Janelle found herself itching to take over and just do it for her, rather than watching. She didn’t.

  At last, Nan was in a soft flannel gown and tucked into the double bed that had been her wedding furniture, propped on her pillows, the lamp on and giving her enough light to read by. She held the thick hardcover in shaking hands for a moment before she sighed and let it sink onto the blankets covering her belly. She needed a lap desk, Janelle thought, but a pillow would have to do. She folded one in half and propped the book against it.

  Nan smiled. “Oh, that’s so much better, honey. Thank you. I’m only going to read for a while, then go to sleep. What are you and Benny going to do?”

  “Watch a movie or something.” There was laundry waiting, the kitchen to clean. But Nan didn’t need to know that. “I’m pretty tired, too. I’ll probably turn in early myself.”

  The sound of breaking glass woke Janelle some hours later, after she’d finally managed to fall asleep. Eyes wide and heart pounding, she bolted from bed, out the bedroom door and halfway across the hall before she even really knew she was awake. She went automatically to Bennett’s room, finding his door cracked a little and a faint light from inside. He’d never needed a night-light in California, but had found one here and had been using it. Janelle hadn’t said anything about it and was grateful for it now as she pushed his door open just enough to see that he was sleeping soundly, mouth open, one arm flung above his head.

  She’d been dreaming about Gabe and his brothers, of that night in the woods when everything went wrong, and her skin felt clammy, her pajama shirt damp with sweat that still trickled down her back. When she licked her upper lip, it tasted of nightmares, so she swiped at it with her sleeve. She paused at the head of the stairs, imagining herself tumbling down them headfirst to end up broken at the bottom.

  She might’ve convinced herself she’d dreamed the sound of glass breaking, if not for the hint of light at the bottom of the stairs. She raced down them as fast as she could without making her imagined fall come true. The light was coming from the kitchen. Not bright enough to be from the overhead light. Something smaller. The fridge, she discovered when she went into the kitchen and found Nan at the sink, holding her hand under the water. Glass littered the floor, along with a puddle of spilled juice still spreading as it gurgled from the container lying there.

  “What happened?”

  Nan half turned, the front of her nightgown soaked through with juice. “I was thirsty. Got up. Danged glass was slippery.”

  “Let me see.” Ignoring Nan’s frown, Janelle turned on the overhead light and took her grandmother’s hand gently. “You cut yourself.”

  The wound didn’t look deep, but it was still bleeding. Janelle glanced at the mess on the floor, the juice and glass, then again at the cut. She wrapped it in a clean dish towel. “Stay right here. Don’t move.”

  She shut the fridge door, then tossed another tea towel over the mess on the floor to sop up the juice as she found the broom and dustpan. The glass had broken neatly enough into two sections that didn’t appear to have shattered too badly, though she knew from experience that her bare feet would find any pieces she didn’t sweep up. The floor would be sticky until she could mop it, but for now the mess had been contained.

  She moved back to Nan, who stood patiently at the sink. “Let’s get this taken care of.”

  First, she washed the cut gently, careful not to press too hard. Nan winced, anyway. Janelle spread a thin layer of antibiotic ointment, then wrapped it in gauze bandages. She helped Nan back to her bed and beneath the blankets.

  “What were you doing?” Janelle tried not to sound accusatory or angry.

  “I was thirsty,” Nan said with a frown.

  “You should’ve called for me. I’d have brought you something.”

  “I’m not crippled,” Nan protested. “Besides, you were sleeping. I didn’t want to wake you.”

  “It’s what I’m here for, Nan.”

  Her grandmother frowned again, shifting under the blankets. “I didn’t want to wake Benny.”

  Janelle sighed. A monitor, that’s what she needed. Like the one she’d used for Bennett as a baby. “You can’t... You could’ve really hurt yourself. That’s all. I’m supposed to take care of you. From now on, if you need to get up in the middle of the night, just call for me, okay? I’ll help you.”

  Janelle bent to kiss her cheek. So many times as a child, Nan had bent over her this way, and Janelle found herself echoing what her grandma had always said, what Janelle had always said to Bennett since he was a baby. “Good night, sleep tight, and may the angels watch over you until morning.”

  “They will,” Nan s
aid.

  Upstairs in her own bed, sleep didn’t return so easily. Where were her angels? Janelle turned on her side, looking at the window. She didn’t have any, she thought. She didn’t deserve any.

  She thought of the dream she’d been having, of that night in the woods. Of what had happened after. Terri Gilmore had asked her if she was still in town when Gabe shot Andy in the head, and she’d said no, feeling it was a lie. The truth was she’d already gone, but what she’d done had set everything in motion.

  She might as well have pulled the trigger herself.

  TWELVE

  Then

  “LOOK. I HAVE the string and the cans. It’ll work, it’ll be fun. C’mon, Gabe.” Janelle shows him the paper grocery bag with all the stuff in it.

  Gabe is so tired he only wants to sleep, but Mrs. Moser shoved him out of bed this morning and won’t let him back in the house until lunch. The twins are playing out back in the sandbox, all their trucks and cars rusted. Their buckets are broken, too. They always ask him to come build racing tracks and castles with them, but he doesn’t feel like it today.

  So he’s stuck with this girl and her stupid ideas for a stupid tin can telephone. Gabe refuses to admit he thinks it would be pretty cool, if it works. He looks into the bag. Chicken-and-stars soup. They never have chicken and stars, only chicken noodle. He bets stars taste better.

  “You go up to your room and I’ll go up to mine, and you throw the can across to me,” Janelle says.

  “We’ll get in trouble.”

  “Who’s gonna know?” she says with her hands on her hips.

  “Anyone who looks up there, dummy.”

  Janelle rolls her eyes. “Who’s gonna look up? It’s a skinny string, and there are already wires from the ’lectric pole up there.”

  “Great, so we can get electrocuted?” Gabe yawns without putting a hand over his mouth. He’s so tired his stomach hurts. So tired he wants to die.

  Janelle yawns a second after him, because yawns are the same as colds. Contagious. “We won’t. But if you don’t want to do it, fine.”

  She crumples up the top of the bag and makes like she’s going to go into her house. She doesn’t get very far before Gabe’s telling her to wait. She turns, smiling, and he feels like a jerk because she played him.

  “I can’t go in the house,” he tells her. “Mrs. Moser is cleaning and she said I have to stay out here.”

  Janelle frowns. “Huh?”

  Gabe gestures at his house. “She says we can’t come in until it’s time for lunch.”

  “What if you have to go to the bathroom?”

  Gabe points to the hedgerow at the back of his yard.

  “What if it’s number two?” Janelle makes a face. “Gross!”

  If Mrs. Moser knew Gabe and his brothers all happily peed outside behind the hedge, he’s sure she’d not only insist they come inside to use the toilet, she’d also make them scrub their hands in bleach or something, and he has no idea what sort of cleaning she’d do to the bushes. She already thinks Gabe and his brothers run “too wild.”

  “I know,” Janelle says with a snap of her fingers, before Gabe can come up with a supergross description of where they poop when they’re not allowed in the house. “Get your brothers to ask for a snack, and while she’s distracted, you sneak in the front door and go upstairs.”

  She’s good, this girl. Sneaky. Gabe can’t stop himself from grinning back at her.

  “Why do you want to do this so bad?”

  “Why don’t you?” She asks with that tilt of her head she usually has when looking at him. As if she can never quite figure him out. “It’ll be fun.”

  Fun? Gabe doesn’t know about that. Janelle visits her grandma only once in a while, and even if she is pretty cool for a girl, they’ll get to use the tin can telephone only a few times. If it even works.

  “You don’t have anything better to do,” she points out. “Later, my Nan says we can hook up the sprinkler if you want, but not until after lunch. Can you ride your bike to the park?”

  Gabe shakes his head. “I’m grounded.”

  “You’re grounded all the time. You must get into trouble a lot.”

  He does and he doesn’t. But Gabe doesn’t want to tell Janelle about how his dad gets. Her dad’s young and fun. He drives a motorcycle and wears a leather jacket. She’d never understand.

  Gabe takes the cans and the string, studying how to put them together. “We need a nail and a hammer.”

  “I bet Nan has some in the shed.”

  The shed, set back on the Deckers’ property, looks like a little house. Inside it’s dark and hot, smelling of gasoline from the lawn mower. Tools, deflated basketballs and old sleds line the walls. Built into one side is a set of bunk beds, as if this was once a clubhouse. It’s full of spiders, and they get out in a hurry.

  Gabe punches a hole in each can, and Janelle threads the string. Then she calls the boys over. They come at once. Mikey and Andy like Janelle.

  She explains the idea to them, how they’re to go to the back door and ask Mrs. Moser for Popsicles. If she won’t give them Popsicles, they need to ask for cold drinks with ice. And then, Gabe’s sneaking in the front door while his brothers distract Mrs. Moser at the back.

  He climbs the stairs quickly, holding the cans and string close to him so he doesn’t drop them or get anything tangled up. In his room he opens the window, to see Janelle at hers. She opens it and leans out so far he thinks she might fall.

  “Look, Gabe. We could almost touch hands.” Janelle stretches farther. “Look how close we are.”

  “You better be careful.”

  She laughs and wriggles out the window a little more. “You don’t even have to throw the can! Just pass it to me.”

  Gabe leans out the window. If he falls, he won’t just break, he’ll splatter. He stretches to pass her the can, his belly pressing the windowsill. It takes hardly any time at all for them to stretch the string tight.

  Gabe can’t sit here all day fooling around with it. It’s almost time for lunch, and he has to sneak down the stairs to go outside before Mrs. Moser calls for him. He closes the window and the curtains.

  He’s at the top of the stairs when he gets caught. He didn’t know his dad was home from work that morning, so when the old man’s voice slithers out from the shadows of his dark bedroom, Gabe’s caught like a mouse snatched up by a snake.

  “Come in here.”

  Gabe’s feet don’t want to obey, but he makes himself go in, anyway. He’s no longer tired from being woken up last night and then being unable to fall back to sleep. Now he’s wide, wide awake.

  Dad’s in bed, but not in his pajamas. His curtains are shut tight, the blind drawn. He’s propped on his pillows, on top of the blankets. The small light clipped to his headboard is on, but the rest of the room is dark. In front of him is a box full of pictures and letters.

  “You’re supposed to be outside.”

  “I know,” Gabe says. “I came in because—”

  His father waves a hand at him. “Shut up. I don’t care. Come over here, closer.”

  Gabe does, thinking he could scream if he has to. Last night and all the nights before that, there wasn’t anyone to hear him, so all he had was the ability to fight. Some night, he thinks, he’s going to be too tired to do that anymore. But today Mrs. Moser is downstairs, and surely, if he screams, if he runs, she’ll hear him. She’ll help him...won’t she?

  The old man doesn’t touch him. He just looks at him. Hard, and for a very long time. No smile, nothing that looks like anything nice. He stares until Gabe starts to sweat.

  “She’s the one who wanted kids, you know that? She wanted ’em, I didn’t. I said, ‘Marlena, why do we gotta go and mess up a good thing?’ We had money, we could go out to dinner whenever we wanted. Nice car. I could buy her as many pretty dresses as she wanted. But no, she wanted kids, she said. So she got ’em. And then what? She found out they were as much a pain in the ass as I’d told her.
”

  Gabe says nothing. It’s nothing new; he’s heard this story before. Or ones like it. The details change sometimes, but the stories are almost all the same.

  “You made her sick. You know that?”

  Gabe nods, hoping that if he agrees the old man will let him get out of here.

  “She got sick, and now she’s gone.” His dad heaves a heavy sigh that turns into a choking cough.

  He’s crying. Gabe looks away. He’s seen his father cry before, that’s nothing new. Grown-ups aren’t supposed to cry, he thinks. He won’t when he’s a grown-up. He won’t now, no matter what.

  “This is your fault, you remember that. You just remember it, Gabriel.” Gabe’s dad looks up at him with red eyes, his nose snotty. “And you better understand something else, too. If it’s not you, it will be one of them.”

  Gabe jumps as if someone punched a fist through his chest and grabbed his heart. His stomach is a stone that hits the floor. He can’t breathe or speak; he can’t even move.

  “So you just remember that,” the old man says. “Now you get out of here before I take it into my head to give you the belting you deserve.”

  Gabe does as his father says, making it only halfway down the stairs before his stomach heaves up and out of his throat, and he has to run for the bathroom to lose his breakfast. Mrs. Moser finds him there, crouched over the toilet. She doesn’t scold him. She wets a cloth and puts it on the back of his neck, and despite his every intention, Gabe can’t stop himself from crying.

  It won’t be him. It won’t be him. It won’t be him.

  THIRTEEN

  AT FOURTEEN, JANELLE still wore her hair in a ponytail and slept with her collection of stuffed toys.

  At fifteen, she pierced her nose and dyed her hair black; she bit her fingernails but painted them black, too. She pierced her ears multiple times and wore a safety pin in one.

  At sixteen, she painted her eyes with thick, dark eyeliner and mascara, but left the rest of her face pale. She sneaked out with older boys to drive to Harrisburg and Lancaster to see bands she didn’t even really like. Sometimes she let those boys kiss her.