Charley's Web

by Joy Fielding

  Like, do you think your sister is a cold-blooded killer of little children? Charley thought, deciding it would probably be more prudent to take a slower, gentler approach. “Look, why don’t we start with some background information, kind of ease into this.”

  “Background information?”

  “You’re how old exactly?”

  “Twenty-five on May sixteenth.”

  “And you’re not married.”

  “I’m not married,” Pam repeated.

  “Divorced? Engaged?”

  “Single.”

  “Have you always lived at home?”

  “Yes.”

  “Do you work? Outside the home, I mean?”

  Pam shook her head. “My mother’s kind of a full-time job.”

  Charley noted this was said without rancor. “It must be hard for you.”

  “She’s my mother.” Again Pam shrugged. “What would you do?”

  Charley cleared her throat, moved the tape recorder several inches to the right, although it had been perfectly fine where it was. “There’s nobody to help you?”

  “Well, there was Jill, but…”

  “Jill told me that at one time you wanted to join the Peace Corps.”

  “She remembered that? It was so long ago.”

  “She also said you talked of becoming a nun.”

  Pam grimaced. “Kind of hard to be a nun when you’re not Catholic.”

  “She said your father was very upset by that, that he hit you so hard you lost partial hearing in one ear.”

  Reflexively, Pam raised her hand to her left ear. “That was an accident.”

  “An accident he hit you?”

  “An accident he hit me so hard,” Pam qualified. “It wasn’t like I didn’t deserve it.”

  “You think you deserved to be beaten?”

  “I never said I was beaten.”

  “Weren’t you?”

  Pam’s eyes narrowed. “I thought you were going to ask me about Jill.”

  “Well, I’d like to know about both of you,” Charley sidestepped. “I find it interesting that siblings often have such different memories of their childhood. Sometimes you’d never suspect they’d grown up in the same house.”

  “Is that true of you and Bram?”

  “Well, it’s certainly true of me and my sisters,” Charley acknowledged.

  “Alex says your sisters are pretty famous.”

  “Yes, they are.”

  “Are you close?”

  “Not so much.”

  “Why? Are you jealous?”

  The question caught Charley by surprise. “Jealous? No. Well, maybe a little,” she admitted after a pause. Then, “Maybe more than a little.” Was she? Or was she just saying that to disarm Pam, worm her way into her confidence? “Were you jealous of Jill as a child?”

  “Yes,” Pam said simply. “I hated her.”

  “That’s a pretty strong word.”

  “I guess. She was just so pretty and angelic-looking, and everybody was always making such a fuss about her. I resented her for that. The way all she had to do was smile and everybody let her do whatever she wanted. My father used to call her his ‘little cupcake.’ Even Ethan let her get away with murder.” Pam stopped abruptly, perhaps caught off guard by her choice of words. “It was the same way at school,” she continued after several seconds. “The boys hovered like flies. I was pretty jealous of that. I was always shy, nervous around guys. One time, I asked for her advice about this boy I liked, his name was Daniel Lewicki, and she laughed and said, ‘You gotta treat ’em mean to keep ’em keen.’ But I could never do that. Jill said I was hopeless. She said I didn’t deserve to have a boyfriend, that she was gonna get Daniel to ask her out. And she did.”

  “She stole your boyfriend?”

  “Well, we’d never actually gone out.”

  “But you liked him. Jill knew that.”

  “It was no big deal. Besides, she was right—she treated him like dirt, and he just kept coming back for more.”

  “What about Wayne Howland?” Charley asked.

  “The preacher’s son? What about him?”

  “I understand he and Jill were close.”

  “They were friends. But then they had some sort of falling out, and he stopped coming around.”

  “Do you know what caused the falling out?”

  “No. But Jill was stubborn like you wouldn’t believe. It was either her way or no way at all. Maybe Wayne wasn’t quite so ‘keen’ after awhile.”

  Charley tried to reconcile the picture Pam was painting of Jill with Alex’s view of his client as a young woman who’d been abused and manipulated by every man she’d ever met. Of course it was entirely possible that Pam’s animosity toward her sister was coloring her recollections. “What are your feelings for Jill now?”

  “I feel sorry for her.”

  “Because she’s in jail?”

  “Because she’s in pain.”

  “What makes you think she’s in pain?”

  “How could she not be?”

  “Because of what she’s done?”

  “Nobody’s blameless,” Pam said cryptically.

  “What do you mean?”

  There was a long pause. “There were things that happened to Jill,” Pam said slowly, “things I could have prevented, things I should have done.”

  “Such as?”

  Pam shook her head slowly from side to side, said nothing.

  “What things could you have prevented?”

  Pam fidgeted in her seat, looked as if she was considering bolting from the room.

  “Jill told me about Ethan,” Charley said slowly. “About what he did to her.” She reached across the cushions for Pam’s hand, cupped it inside her own. “About what he did to you.”

  Pam pulled her hand away, as if she’d been burned, then folded one arm under the other across her chest. She began swaying back and forth.

  “How old were you when the abuse started?”

  “I don’t want to talk about that.”

  “Okay.” Charley pretended to be reading from her notes. “Can you just confirm a few things for me?”

  Pam said nothing, continued rocking back and forth.

  “Jill said you went to Disney World for your tenth birthday….”

  “I really don’t want to talk about this.”

  “And that she shared a room at the motel with you and Ethan, Ethan in one bed, you and Jill in the other. Is that right?”

  Pam nodded, her entire body starting to tremble.

  “And in the middle of the night, Ethan moved her into his bed, then crawled in beside you. She said she heard you crying and telling him to stop, and that the next morning, there was blood on the sheets.”

  “I can’t do this,” Pam said.

  “Would it be easier if I weren’t here?” Alex asked.

  Charley jumped at the sound of Alex’s voice. She’d forgotten all about him.

  “Maybe you could go check on my mother. If you wouldn’t mind.” Pam motioned toward the rooms at the back of the house. “Through the dining room. The last door on the right.”

  Alex glanced briefly at Charley as he left the room. Go easy, the glance warned.

  “I’m sorry to have to dredge up such painful memories,” Charley began.

  “You keep thinking it’ll get easier with time,” Pam said, speaking as much to herself as to Charley. “What’s that saying? Time heals all wounds?”

  Charley nodded.

  “Well, it’s not true. Some wounds never heal.”

  Charley recalled watching her mother pack for Australia, along with the hollow sensation that filled her chest, as if she’d been stabbed repeatedly and was slowly bleeding out. She remembered discovering the empty cabinet that once held her mother’s extensive doll collection, and the way her body had collapsed in on itself, as if she’d been sucker-punched. She experienced anew the numbness that had overtaken her body as she stood waiting by the front door, night after night,
for her mother to come home. Pam was right, she thought—some wounds never healed.

  “I’m sorry to be such a baby,” Pam said.

  “Please don’t apologize.”

  “I want to cooperate. Jill says it’s important.”

  “What else did she say?”

  “That she doesn’t want me to hold anything back, that she wants me to tell the whole story.”

  “Do you think you can do that?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “I think you can.”

  “It’s not easy. Everybody has his own truth. Nobody ever thinks he’s the bad guy. We all have our own elaborate system of justifications and rationalizations for the things we do. I know Ethan does.”

  “Have you ever talked to him about what happened?”

  Pam laughed, a sharp, hollow sound, like a tree branch snapping in two. “I tried to once. After his wife kicked him out and he moved back here. But he denied everything, said I was just trying to make trouble for him. He insisted he never touched me, that I’d imagined the whole thing.”

  “What about your father?” Charley asked.

  Whatever color had been left in Pam’s face quickly disappeared. Her fingers reached for her left ear. “Sometimes he gets a little rough.”

  “Is it true he shot the family dog?”

  “The dog was old and sick. Shooting him was an act of kindness more than anything else.”

  “You really believe that?”

  “What difference does it make? It happened a long time ago.”

  “Some wounds never heal,” Charley reminded her.

  Pam moaned audibly.

  “Did your father molest you, too? Did he molest Jill?”

  “Look,” Pam said, her voice a plea. “I want to help my sister. I really do. But what you’re talking about happened a long time ago. It’s one thing for Jill to make these accusations public, but I still have to live in this house.”

  “No, you don’t. You can go to the police. They’ll arrest Ethan and your father.”

  “And what about my mother? What would happen to her? I don’t have any money. How can I possibly look after her if they put my father and brother in jail?”

  Charley paused, suddenly remembering her phone conversation with Jill. “Do you think your mother knew about the abuse?”

  “My mother was as much a victim as Jill and I were.”

  “But did she know what was going on?”

  “I don’t know. She was sick a lot. Besides, what could she have done?”

  “She could have protected you, gotten you away from this house.”

  “You think it’s so easy to just walk away?”

  Charley thought about her own mother. How easy had it been for her?

  Pam suddenly reached over and snapped off the tape recorder. “This interview is over.” She stood up. “I think you should go now.”

  “Wait, please.” Charley jumped to her feet. “Just a few more questions.”

  Pam cocked her head to one side, waited for Charley to continue.

  “Do you think Jill murdered those children?”

  “The evidence was pretty overwhelming.”

  “That’s not what I asked.”

  “That’s still my answer.”

  “Do you think she acted alone?”

  “Maybe. Maybe not.”

  “So, you think someone else might have been involved?”

  “It doesn’t really matter what I think, does it?”

  “That depends. Do you think that someone else was Ethan?” Charley pressed, wishing she could turn the recorder back on.

  “The police didn’t seem to think so.”

  “But you disagree?”

  “Not necessarily. Ethan may be a miserable son of a bitch, but I can’t see him killing a bunch of little kids.”

  “Pamela!” a woman’s voice called weakly from the other room. “Pamela, where are you? What’s going on?”

  “I have to go,” Pam said, moving toward the bedrooms in the back as Alex reappeared in the archway.

  “I’m sorry,” Alex apologized. “She woke up, saw me in the doorway. I didn’t mean to scare her.”

  “Pamela!”

  “I’ll be right there.”

  “Can we talk again?” Charley asked, gathering up her tape recorder from the sofa.

  Pam shook her head vehemently from side to side.

  “Take my card,” Charley began, stuffing it into Pam’s reluctant hand. “If you think of anything….”

  “I won’t,” Pam said. “Tell Jill I’m sorry.” She stopped at the entrance to the dining room. “And please remember to give your brother my regards. Those were good times,” she said. And then she was gone.

  CHAPTER 20

  Damn it. What’s wrong with me?” Charley was ranting as she bolted through her front door, letting it slam behind her.

  “Charley?” Her mother approached from the direction of the bedrooms, Bandit at her heels. “You’re home early. Is everything all right?”

  Charley stomped into the living room and plopped down on the sofa, dropping her purse to the floor, and throwing her head back against a pillow. The dog was immediately on the sofa beside her, jumping up and down against her shoulder and licking her face with excitement. Charley struggled to keep Bandit’s tongue away from her lips. “Yes, hello, hello. Now leave me alone. I’m not in the mood. No, things aren’t all right,” she told her mother in the same breath. “Where are the kids?”

  “In their room, changing their clothes. They’ve been cooped up all day because of the rain, so I promised to take them to McDonald’s and a movie. We weren’t expecting you home till much later. What happened, darling? Your interview didn’t go well?”

  “That’s an understatement. Jeez, Bandit! You stuck your tongue right in my mouth!” she wailed as the dog continued his frantic welcome.

  “He’s just happy to see you. He needs a little hug.”

  A hug, Charley thought. The dog needs a hug. What about what I need? Which is what, exactly? she wondered, gathering the squirming ball of white fur into her hands. Immediately Bandit burrowed into the crook of her neck, then went completely still.

  “Amazing,” Elizabeth Webb uttered.

  Charley felt the muscles in her neck and shoulders instantly relax as Bandit’s warmth quickly penetrated her skin.

  “You have a real way with him,” her mother said.

  “I didn’t do anything.”

  “You don’t have to. That’s the wonderful thing about dogs. They love you no matter what you do.”

  “Unlike people,” Charley remarked.

  “People are harder to please.” Her mother sank into the seat beside her. “What’s the matter, darling? You left the house with such enthusiasm.”

  “That was before I realized what a lousy reporter I am.”

  “Who says you’re a lousy reporter?”

  “I do,” Charley admitted. “I’m way out of my depth here, Mom. Looks like I’m as shallow as everyone seems to think.”

  “Who thinks you’re shallow?”

  “I don’t know how to talk to people,” Charley continued, as if her mother hadn’t spoken. “Worse—I don’t know how to get them to talk to me. I don’t know what questions to ask. I don’t even know whether I should be asking questions at all, or just letting them ramble on. I don’t know what’s important and what isn’t. I don’t know who’s important and who isn’t. I don’t know what I’m doing. Period.” She felt her mother’s hand reach over to caress her hair.

  “You sound just like you did when you were a little girl. And don’t say, How would you know?” her mother said just as Charley was about to. “I may not have been around for all of your childhood, but I was there for the first eight years, and I know that anytime you tackled something new, whether it was a game of Chutes and Ladders or a project your teacher had assigned, you’d get yourself all in a flap, convinced you couldn’t do it.”

  “This is a little different.”
>
  “Somehow you always managed to pull it off.”

  “Give me one example,” Charley challenged.

  Her mother gave the matter several seconds thought. “All right. I remember when you were about four years old, and you just had to have this yo-yo. You were so insistent, even after the salesman told you you were too young to manipulate it properly. You were so positive you could master it that I gave in and bought it for you. And, of course, you couldn’t do it. You couldn’t even get it to go up and down, let alone all that fancy stuff. And you cried and carried on, made yourself so miserable I finally told you to throw the damn thing out. But you didn’t. You stuck with it. You kept at it until one day you were handling it like a pro.”

  Charley hunched forward in her seat, eyed her mother skeptically. “Are you making this up?”

  “Yes,” her mother admitted with a sigh. “How did you know?”

  “Because I hate yo-yos. I still can’t work them properly.”

  “All right, so that wasn’t the best example, but it was all I could think of on such short notice. The point I was making is still valid.”

  “Just what point would that be?”

  “That it’s natural to get upset and anxious when you’re tackling something new, but that you’re a bright, talented young woman who will succeed at anything you set your mind to. And if you don’t know the appropriate questions to ask right now, you’ll figure them out soon enough. So stop worrying, and stop being so hard on yourself. Do you want to know what Sharon claimed was the secret to happiness?”

  Charley tried not to flinch at the casual reference to her mother’s deceased lover. “By all means.”

  Her mother pulled her shoulders back and pushed her ample chest forward. “Lower your expectations,” she said.

  “Lower your expectations? That’s it?”

  “That’s enough. Sharon was the happiest person I ever met. Now, why don’t you go change into something more casual and come with us to McDonald’s and the movies?”

  Charley’s head was spinning. Was her mother right? Did she demand too much of herself? Of everyone? Was happiness just a matter of not expecting quite so much? “Would you be mad if I said I’d rather not? I’m just pooped.”

  “Then I have another idea,” her mother said. “Why don’t you let me take the kids to my place for the night? I’ll bring them back in the morning, and we can all go to TooJay’s for breakfast. How does that sound?”