The Returning

by Ann Tatlock

  He wanted to believe her. Following her into the kitchen, he started to say, “Do you think Billy—”

  But she interrupted him again. “He should be here in just a few minutes. Owen was going to have Maggie bring him home when she got off her shift.”

  That wasn’t what he was going to ask. He was going to ask her if Billy might be glad to see him. Now he decided to let it drop.

  Andrea opened the oven door and peeked inside, releasing the aroma of pork roasting. Andrea had always been a good cook. John suddenly realized how hungry he was, how his stomach felt like a huge empty valley inside of him.

  She shut the door and, turning swiftly, almost bumped into John. He started and backed up. “I’m sorry,” he said. “I didn’t mean to be in the way.”

  “You’re not in the way,” she assured him. “I’m just not used to . . .”

  She didn’t finish, didn’t seem to know what else to say. John looked around the kitchen, searching for a way to end the awkward moment. “Here,” he said, “can I carry this trash out for you?”

  “Yes. Thank you.” She looked relieved. “You know where the cans are.”

  “Of course.” He pulled the plastic bag out of the wastebasket, tied the top in a knot, and carried it outside. The garbage cans had always been around the back of the cottage so they couldn’t be seen from the lake.

  When he found them, he lifted the lid of one of the cans and dropped the bag inside. As he settled the lid back on, he heard a car slow down and pull over to the side of the narrow road that skirted the lake. He recognized neither the car nor the woman who drove it, but when the passenger-side door opened and a young man got out, John knew Billy was home. He would have known his son anywhere—the small head sprouting like a stunted bud from a thick neck, the flat round face, wide nose, lipless mouth, the slanted eyes.

  For just a moment the boy didn’t move, but then, even from a distance, John could see the small eyes widen, the mouth draw back in a silent laugh, the chinless jaw point skyward. Then Billy moved around the car, and dropping his backpack on the gravel drive, he ran on short but powerful legs toward his father.

  John stood breathless in his son’s embrace while Billy cried out happily, “Dad! It’s Daddy. Daddy’s home!”

  CHAPTER FOUR

  Thank God for Billy, Andrea thought as she watched her son through the kitchen window. In throwing his arms around his father, he had done what neither of the others had done, maybe what neither of them could do—at least not yet. She kept her eyes on Billy and John as they moved toward the walkway together. Then Billy burst into the kitchen, grinning widely, sputtering as he announced, “Look, Mom! Dad’s home!”

  Andrea smiled lovingly at her son. “I know, Billy. Isn’t it wonderful?”

  “Dad’s home!” he said again, as though he couldn’t quite believe it.

  “Yes.”

  “Home to stay!”

  “Yes, Billy. He’s home to stay.”

  “Does Phoebe know? Where is she?”

  “Last we saw, she was heading for her hiding space under the dock.”

  “Again? What for?”

  Andrea looked at John.

  “I’m afraid she’s hiding from me, Billy,” he said.

  “From you?” Billy laughed. “Why would she hide from you?”

  “Well, I guess she’s a little shy. Do you think you could coax her out?”

  “Sure, Dad! Come with me.” Billy smiled confidently, leading the way outside with a wave of his arm.

  Andrea followed but stopped on the porch as her husband and son moved down to the edge of the bank. At the top of the steps leading down to the dock, Billy cupped his mouth with his hands and hollered, “Phoebe Sheldon, this is your brother Billy. Come up here! Come up here now! Say hi to Dad!”

  He dropped his hands and waited. He seemed certain he would get the response he wanted. Soon the blond head bobbed slowly up the steps. Once she reached the top, Phoebe leaped toward her brother, her small arms circling his waist so that her hands met in the small of his back.

  Billy hugged her tightly, then straightened up and pointed at their father. “Look, Phoebe, look. It’s Daddy. Daddy’s home. You got to say hi, okay? Or you’ll make him feel bad.”

  Andrea held her breath as John bent down on one knee, down to the child’s level. He held out an open hand. “Hello, Phoebe,” he said tenderly. “I’m very happy to meet you.”

  He waited. Andrea waited. Phoebe looked up at her brother’s face.

  With an exaggerated sigh, Billy urged, “What are you waiting for, Phoeb? A gold-graved invitation?”

  Andrea laughed quietly to herself. How many times had Billy heard her chide the children with that line: Go on, do as I say! What are you waiting for, a golden-engraved invitation?

  Slowly Phoebe unlocked her hands and let go of Billy. She turned and looked at her father, then touched the palm of his hand briefly, the way a moth alights on a lily and flutters off. She might have said something, but Andrea couldn’t hear.

  Thank God for Billy, Andrea thought again. All hope was not lost. Though heaven knew that even hope had its limits.

  Leaving the three of them to get acquainted, Andrea made her way to the room off the kitchen, Rebekah’s room. The door was closed. Handwritten on a piece of notebook paper and newly taped to the door was the warning: No Adults Allowed.

  Andrea knocked.

  “Go away.”

  “Rebekah, it’s Mom.”

  “I said, go away. Can’t you read the sign?”

  “Beka, please.”

  “What do you want?”

  “To talk with you—just for a minute.”

  The door flew open and Rebekah stood there, her face a mask of defiance.

  “Beka—”

  “I know what you’re going to say.”

  “Oh? And what’s that?”

  “Be nice to Dad.”

  “Well, yes—”

  “I hate him.”

  “I don’t believe that.”

  “Well, it’s true.”

  For a moment Andrea didn’t know how to respond. She studied her daughter’s angry face. “There was a time,” she said slowly, “when you didn’t want anything more than just to sit on your father’s lap—”

  “Don’t go sentimental on me, Mom. I was a kid. Well, I’m not a kid anymore.”

  No. No, she wasn’t. She was a young lady now, and on the whole, Andrea was pleased with how her daughter was turning out. Rebekah was generally pleasant at home, willing to help out around the house without too much complaint. She was fairly responsible, did well at school, and rarely got into any real trouble. But she had a stubborn streak that lately was showing up as defiance toward all authority. Andrea blamed it on teenage angst and expected her daughter to outgrow it eventually. In the meantime, it had to be tamed.

  “Okay, listen, Rebekah, your father’s home whether you like it or not—”

  “I don’t like it.”

  “And we have a chance to make this family work. I won’t have you ruining it for all of us.”

  For one brief moment Andrea thought Rebekah might back down. A certain calm crept over her face, as though she were suddenly remembering the father of years ago. But when she spoke, Andrea’s hope faded.

  “Everything was fine without him, Mom. Why did he have to come home?”

  “Because this is where he belongs, Beka. Where else could he go?”

  Rebekah’s gaze turned cold then, like granite in winter. She pursed her lips, and her eyes froze over with angry unshed tears.

  “I know it’s been hard on you, honey . . .” Andrea began, but before she could finish, the bedroom door slammed, and the latch was snapped shut on the other side.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  Clutching a box of wooden matches, Rebekah ran one bulbous head along the lighting strip. The end of the match sizzled and flared, then settled into a tiny flame. A wisp of gray smoke, smelling of sulfur, drifted upward and disappeared.


  She held the flame to the wick of the largest lavender candle on her nightstand. Lavender was the fragrance for peace. Rebekah had read that in one of the books Lena gave her. She now had a drawer full of lavender candles in the nightstand, as well as three candles of varying sizes in chipped stoneware saucers next to the digital clock.

  Her mother didn’t like her lighting candles indoors, but she didn’t forbid it either. She simply told her to be careful. She trusted Rebekah. So far. Which was how Rebekah wanted it, because as long as her mother trusted her, she could do whatever she wanted to do and maybe even get away with it.

  Of course, that all might change now. Now that there was another grown-up in the house. Another parent, supposedly.

  Once the candle was lighted, Rebekah shook out the match with a flick of her wrist. She added the blackened stick to the pile in the saucer. Leaning toward the flame, she inhaled deeply. Lavender was a pretty scent, and upset as she was, maybe if she let her room fill up with it, the lavender would kick in and help calm her down.

  After all, she needed something, now that he was back.

  At the thought of him she flung herself down on the bed and beat the pillow with her fist. She had missed her father at first. She’d cried a lot, asked when he’d be coming home. Then, as month melted into month, she’d gotten used to his being gone. His absence became the norm. Some days she didn’t even think about him. When other kids asked where her father was, she made up stories to fill in the blank. Finally she grew happy with the way things were. She had friends. She had a boyfriend. She was sixteen years old, and she was having fun. Now he had to come back and change everything.

  “Be nice to your father, Rebekah.”

  Oh sure, and what had he done for her? He’d betrayed her, for starters. Or maybe he’d just been a phony all along, because the father she’d loved wouldn’t have done what he did. She’d practically idolized him, thought he was a hero who could do no wrong. Then, in one night, his true colors came out, and the next thing she knew, he was locked up in prison. As far as she was concerned, two men had died in that accident, not just one. The man she’d known as her father was as good as dead. In fact, it’d be better for all of them if he really were—

  You don’t mean that.

  Yeah, I do. I mean it.

  How can you wish Dad was dead?

  “I can’t help it,” she said aloud. “I—” She froze for several seconds and then hit the pillow with her fist again when she realized she was arguing with herself. Her friends would call her crazy. One head with two people inside who couldn’t even get along with each other.

  She wished she’d been born into a regular family, one where everyone was just a normal person. But right from the start something was wrong, because she went straight from the hospital into a house where there was already an older brother no one would call normal. From the time she was conscious, she’d had to deal with the embarrassment of that—the stares in public, the whispers, the muffled laughter, and later at school, the constant teasing by the other kids. Then, her father! Her father was a prisoner convicted of manslaughter. How many of her friends could claim that distinction? She didn’t know anyone else whose father had spent time in the slammer.

  She squeezed her eyes tight against the thought. Not that all her friends would care about where her dad had been. Her best friend, Lena, who already knew, didn’t care at all. Lena seemed to think families were better off without men around to mess things up. Her own dad had left years ago when the circus came through town and he discovered his high school sweetheart working as a member of the prop crew. When the circus pulled out, so did Mr. Barrett. What a lowlife. Lena’s mom had married again after that, then divorced and married again. And divorced again. Now it was just Lena and her mom, which was how Lena liked it. She didn’t want her mother dating anyone. She said it always ended up bad for her mom.

  “So you think your mom should just spend the rest of her life alone?” Rebekah had once asked.

  “She’s not alone. She’s got me.”

  “Yeah, sure, like that’s going to keep her happy for the next thirty years. You know she’s going to find herself another man someday. Then what?”

  “Simple. I’ll do what I did with the last one. I’ll just get rid of him.”

  “How’d you do that?”

  “I have ways of making things happen.”

  Lena was mysterious and strange and fun, and Rebekah knew she didn’t have to worry about losing her friendship. But what about the others? And most important, what about David? What would he think? He was the best thing to happen to her in a long time. She couldn’t stand the thought of losing him.

  Someone tapped at the door. “Beka, supper’s ready.”

  Rebekah sighed. “All right, Mom. Just a minute.”

  She heard Billy say something in the kitchen and then her father’s reply.

  Strange to hear his voice. Strange to think he was here.

  “I’ve got a secret for you, Bekaboo.”

  Oh yeah, that was what he called her. Bekaboo. It used to make her laugh.

  “What is it, Daddy?”

  “Promise not to tell?”

  She nodded.

  He leaned down and tickled her ear with a whisper. “You’re the apple of my eye.”

  “I’m an apple in your eye?” she squealed.

  “Not in my eye, silly. Of my eye. You’re the apple of my eye.”

  “But what does that mean, Daddy?”

  “It means of all the people in the world, I love you the most.”

  She almost asked him if he loved her more than he loved Mama and Billy, but she didn’t bother. Of course he did. That was easy to believe.

  “Daddy?”

  “Yeah, Beka?”

  “You’re the apple in my eye too.”

  Another tap on the door. “Beka, I don’t want to have to tell you again. Everybody’s waiting on you.”

  Rebekah sat up and blew out the candle. The stupid thing wasn’t doing any good anyway.

  CHAPTER SIX

  “Billy would like to say grace,” Andrea said.

  John glanced apologetically at his son and laid down the fork he had only just picked up. When had this family started saying grace?

  Billy lowered his head, and John followed suit. Then he listened as his son prayed quietly over the food. “God is great. God is good. Lord, thank you for all the food. Amen.”

  When John opened his eyes, he smiled at the boy and said, “Thank you, Billy.”

  “Welcome, Dad.”

  “Where did you learn that?”

  “From the Sunday school teacher. She’s nice.”

  “They let Billy sit in on the little kids’ class,” Rebekah said smugly.

  “I don’t just sit in,” Billy objected. “I’m a helper.”

  “Yeah, right.”

  “I am!”

  “Listen, cut it out, you two.”

  “She started it, Mom.”

  “Let’s drop it, Billy.”

  Billy and Rebekah glared at each other briefly before turning back to their food.

  When the table was quiet again, John asked, “So you go to church, Billy?”

  “Sure I do.” He punctuated his sentence with an energetic nod.

  John looked at Andrea for an explanation. “He walks up to Grace Chapel Sunday mornings,” she said. “It’s not far. When it’s cold, I drive him.”

  John remembered the white frame church just up the road and around the bend. “Oh? Well, I’m glad you’re going, Billy.”

  “Yeah, just think, Billy,” Rebekah said, “you won’t have to go to church alone anymore, since Dad found religion in prison.”

  “Rebekah!”

  “Well, you said so yourself, Mom. You said he got that jailhouse religion.” She thrust her chin up and looked toward the ceiling. “ ‘I’m saved by Jesus, so give me points for good behavior and get me out of here.’ ”

  “That’s enough, Beka.”

  “Of cour
se, it only lasts till they do get out and then—”

  “I said that’s enough, Rebekah!”

  “—they go right back to being jerks. It’s all a farce. Just wait and see.”

  “Beka, I don’t want to hear another word out of you.”

  John steeled himself against the conflict brewing across the table. He didn’t want the meal ending up in angry words, maybe tears. An argument between men behind bars was one thing, but a confrontation between one’s wife and daughter—that was a whole different playing field, far more unnerving. He knew he should step in, be the warden with the authority to subdue the riot. But before he could think of anything to say, Billy took over.

  “Listen, Beka,” Billy scolded, “stop fighting. If you can’t be nice, you can . . . you can . . . go to your room!”

  Rebekah shrieked with laughter. “Like you can tell me what to do!”

  “I’m the older brother.”

  “And that makes you the boss of me? I don’t think so.”

  “I’m not saying I’m your boss. I’m just saying, this is Dad’s first night home. If you want to be ugly, go be ugly somewhere else.”

  Rebekah sneered, then shrugged Billy off and went back to eating. John looked around the table at the others. Andrea, red-faced, pushed her bangs off her forehead and reached for her glass of water. Phoebe rolled a pea around her plate with her fork. Billy munched happily on a dinner roll.

  John swallowed, then cleared his throat. “So, Billy,” he said, “how do you like working for Uncle Owen?”

  Even as he spoke, he chided himself for sidestepping Rebekah’s comments. He should have met them head on. He should have told her it was true, that he was different now, that he was not the man she’d seen being led out of the courtroom in handcuffs. That somewhere between that day and this he had found not religion, but something better, something real. He should have told her, but instead, he had veered back toward the ease of small talk.

  John gradually became aware that Billy was answering his question. “It’s great, Dad. It’s really great. I make money and put it in the bank.”