Crossed Lines

by Lana Sky

  “Anything,” the woman says with a shrug. “Anything you’d like. Your hopes. Dreams. What you ate for dinner. I just want you to try to incorporate words or phrases you don’t normally use. Let’s start with one. How about…” She taps her chin like she’s thinking, but it’s painfully obvious she already has a phrase in mind. “This is what I discovered about myself today.”

  My teeth strain against their gums, protesting how hard I’m gritting them. “Okay,” I finally say.

  “Good. Then we’ll continue this tomorrow.” The tutor packs up her things and heads for the hallway. In a suspiciously timed coincidence, she nearly runs right into Thorny.

  So he is home after all. I sneak a peek from the window, but Elaine’s still on the balcony. One of her hands plays with the ends of her hair as she leans against the railing, speaking into her cell phone.

  Odd.

  “How was she?” Thorny asks the tutor. Suspicion laces his tone.

  I guess I’m not the only one struggling with my good behavior. His nonverbal cues cut right to the point: Give me a reason to break this off. Just a single one.

  “She did great,” my tutor says. “Same time tomorrow, Maryanne?”

  “Yes,” I say cheerfully. “Thank you, ma’am.”

  Thorny glances me over, his eyes narrowed. “I’ll walk you out, Jane.” He offers his arm to the tutor and they head toward the front of the house. Where he’ll question her again, more earnestly. Be honest. You can tell me. What asinine thing did she do today?

  Asinine. It’s one of the new words sprinkled on a vocabulary list I find tucked inside the cover of my journal. Asinine. Beatific. Egregious. Cautious. Denigrate…

  Printed at the bottom of the sheet is my phrase for the day. What have I discovered about myself?

  Well, for one, being good is fucking hard. The clock on the wall claims it’s barely noon. It feels later than that. An eternity since Thorny made his bet.

  One month.

  I have to sequester myself in the tutoring room just to last another hour. It’s not my fault. There are so many naughty things around here that a bad girl could stick her nose into. Nosy little questions, for instance.

  Elaine puts her phone down, her faint smile fading. Thorny comes up behind her and her grip tightens on the banister as she looks back. She must say something to him, because he shakes his head and moves to stand at the opposite end of the railing. When Elaine faces the water again, her tiny smile is gone.

  I don’t realize I’m tapping my pen against the journal’s cover until I miss and strike the table. Thwack! The noise reminds me of thunder. It’ll probably rain again today, erasing the hard work the sun put into drying out the fields and the lonely beach.

  I’ve been into metaphors a lot lately, so I can’t help feeling as though the current weather is a giant one for what my presence does to Thorny and Elaine. It looms overhead, stealing the sunlight from their bright, cheerful lives. Boo hoo.

  Thorny bet that I couldn’t last the week.

  But can he?

  He shifts as if sensing my naughty thoughts and his head swivels in my direction. I swear he’s glaring at me through the window, daring me to test his limits.

  But I don’t.

  I merely tap the nib of my pen against a blank page, mulling over my assignment. Good, dutiful daughters do their homework. They journal down their feelings in nice, neat paragraphs with no concern that they might be read by anyone else down the line. Naïveté is the word du jour.

  That’s the trap of a diary: they’re practically designed to be read. This bright-red cover screams intrigue to anyone willing to turn the page—and everyone knows that secrets make the best weapon fodder. I learned that the hard way. Those written about are forever trapped on the page, locked within a certain context or moment with no shading to color the perspective. Just emotion.

  It’s the most dangerous thing of all. Friends can seem more nefarious on paper. Cool teachers might be given more scrutiny.

  And stuffy, overbearing uncles might not seem so perfect after all.

  Elaine promised I’d have “the rest of the day” to myself like some alluring present, just for me. In practice, there’s nowhere to go. No gossip to overhear. No headmistresses with buttons to push.

  Fuck all. There’s just a boring house to explore and offices to sneak into. Thorny doesn’t even bother to lock his, but that’s just a part of his game: even the drawers are empty in here. The books on the shelves aren’t his. The computer only holds generic programs, and I can’t even find the hint of a manuscript when I peek through the files.

  He’s called my bluff, old Thorny, and he’s hidden his toys without even giving me the chance to play with them.

  Annoyed, I find myself wandering the property again. I return to the tree house. Get bored. Wander down a path leading to the beach.

  Find sand.

  Return to the main house.

  Find it empty.

  Wash, rinse, and repeat.

  By dinnertime, I’m convinced I’ll die of boredom in a month. So what does it matter if I break the rules now? They both make it so fucking tempting.

  Elaine floats into the dining room carrying a platter of baked chicken and a bowl of salad balanced on both hands. Gracefully, she sets them in the center of the table. Her yellow dress makes her shine as purplish clouds outside obscure the real sun. She’s a pretty, lifeless substitute, taking her place at one end of the table.

  Thorny, her surly storm cloud, takes the opposite end.

  Like a good daughter, I stay in the middle, fidgeting like lightning caught between them.

  “How was your day?” Elaine wonders as she serves herself. “Jane’s a wonderful teacher. She helped me with a few articles once upon a time.”

  That’s right. Elaine writes too. She “writes” for fancy feminist journals that make more room for her pictures than her actual articles. She’s social justice eye candy.

  “It was fine.” I nibble on a piece of chicken. Choke it down. Thorny’s watching, I realize, waiting for a flaw to pounce on. Meeting his gaze, I grin as sweetly as I can. So good am I. “Marvelous, actually. I learned so much—”

  “Maryanne,” Thorny interjects. It’s not so much of a warning as a gentle tug on that stupid invisible leash. Watch yourself.

  Ignoring him, I face Elaine. “How was your day, Ellie?”

  “Not too bad,” she replies, beaming. “I’m just getting my final notes together. I go on assignment in a few months.”

  Assignment. “You’re leaving?”

  “Just for work, and long after you graduate.” She sounds so excited. So proud. “I’m examining the lives of some of the indigenous cultures of Central America.”

  Oh. All of a sudden, the scene on the balcony makes more sense.

  “Were you talking to a subject on the phone earlier?” I ask.

  Because good, real people notice the actions of those around them and parrot them back. To make them feel seen. Heard. It’s called reflecting, according to my therapist. It lets the people around you know that you care. It’s nice.

  “A what?” Elaine goes three shades paler than her thick screen of makeup. She’s a golden face perched atop an ivory body. “I… Um, yes,” she says, her gaze flicking toward Thorny and back. “Just a subject. A friend.”

  “You’re going on assignment again?” Thorny makes the question sound oh-so harmless.

  But where I accidentally stepped into a verbal bear trap, he throws a grenade.

  “We t-talked about this.” Elaine flattens her hands against the table, fighting to keep her smile wide. “Belize. For six weeks. We talked about this.”

  “Have we?” Thorny cocks an eyebrow and pushes back from the table. “I’ll be in the study.”

  He leaves, and Elaine clears her throat, piling salad onto her plate. “We’ll just…finish eating,” she says. “Tell me more about your day, huh?”

  “It was fine,” I say.

  And nothing else.
>
  We play our charade in silence as Thorny’s footsteps echo throughout the house, making it very clear that he’s not in the study. He’s heading toward the balcony. Even as the rain falls.

  He stands out there and lets every drop pelt him on the way down.

  Dreams are the catalyst for naughty behavior. It’s why I’m prescribed one hundred and fifty milligrams of trazodone before I go to bed. Which I wash down with five milligrams of Ambien, ten milligrams of melatonin, and fifty milligrams of Benadryl.

  I take them every night, as diligently as a five-year-old chews their vitamin gummies. A handful a day keeps the doctor away.

  But, tonight, something seeps through. I’m back there, if only for a second. In that house. That room.

  Daddy’s cologne tickles my nose, decidedly off. There’s some sharper smell overpowering the crisp Calvin Klein. The same way Mama smelled after one of her dinner parties, when her words slurred into a sloppy mixture of French and English.

  Boozy.

  He should be awake by now. I’m going to be late for ballet. Irritated, I march around the leather chaise Mama likes to lounge on, toward the massive closet at the back of their suite.

  I hear it first. That slow, unnatural swish. The creak of the clothing rack straining…

  A shadow flickers just beyond the open closet door. The light is on.

  “Daddy?”

  He doesn’t say anything.

  And then I look up…

  “What the hell do you mean ‘I should have known’?”

  I blink my eyes open and find a twisted layer of cotton cocooning my limbs. It’s dark in the room, and something soft tickles my face when I try to sit up. Canopy, I remember as my heart races. I’m in Thorny’s house, in my perfect new room. Rain lashes at the windows—but that’s not the storm that woke me up.

  It’s the one playing out down below in the form of shouting voices and shattering glass.

  “Keep your voice down,” Elaine pleads. “And I’ve mentioned it. Maybe you forgot, but I did—”

  “He’ll be there, won’t he?” Thorny phrases the question like a whip. “I was wondering why you had the nerve to invite him to dinner.”

  “Don’t do this.” Elaine gasps. “James, please—”

  “Will he?”

  “He’s sponsoring the trip, but it’s not—”

  “So why wait a few months?” Thorny demands. “For my sake? Because of her?”

  “It’s just business!”

  “Sure it is.” He laughs, and goosebumps prickle my skin, chafing against the sheets. “So why wait? Be my fucking guest. Go now.”

  “James!”

  “Go be with him. Don’t let me stop you,” Thorny taunts. “Go perform your ‘business.’”

  “Just keep your voice down,” Elaine stage-whispers, but she’s louder than he is. “What if Maryanne hears you?”

  “Don’t. Don’t you dare use her as your excuse.”

  “You’re the one who brought her here,” Elaine snipes. “Why? Because you wanted to add gasoline to the fire? I’m not the one using her as an excuse… James, please! Where are you going?”

  “Out.”

  Two sets of footsteps race toward, I assume, the foyer. A heavier set leads the way as lighter, quicker steps desperately gain on them.

  “We need to talk about this, please. Just listen to me—”

  “Call him,” Thorny says over the sound of a door opening. “Tell him you can be there by the end of the week. You have my blessing.”

  The door slams shut.

  Elaine sighs. Then sobs, but in smothered little snippets. Eventually, she wanders deeper into the house, though never upstairs.

  She’s watching from a window, I bet. Waiting for him to come back.

  I burrow beneath the blankets, smothering a laugh into the sheets. Oh, Elaine. I learned that lesson years ago.

  He never does.

  The thing about bad dreams is that they linger, infesting everything. All the dark thoughts you fight so hard to shove into that deep, dank hole in the pit of your mind escape.

  Only when you wake up, the rest of the world pretends like none of the bad things ever happened. You just have to choke on the memories all day until they finally crawl back to where they came from.

  “Good morning!” Elaine greets as I descend the stairs. She’s smiling, her hair perfectly coiffed, her dress a flowy, flouncy pink.

  She was wrong the other day. I look nothing like the parent who should not be named.

  She does, superficial happiness and all.

  “Jane should be here any moment,” she says. “You can wait for her in the study. I have some errands to run, but I’ll be back tonight, and we’ll have a chat. Just you and me. What do you think?”

  Her white teeth sparkle in the sun, her makeup flawless.

  “Okay,” I say.

  “Great!” She skips through the front door, and I watch from the window as her shoulders slump the moment she descends the front steps. Thorny’s car isn’t the one waiting out front for her; it’s a black one driven by someone I can’t see. Just like that, she’s gone in a flash.

  Thorny isn’t home, either. I can smell it. The air tastes different without his signature scent of wine and cologne. Mommy and Daddy left the baby home alone.

  I can’t resist. I creep up to their room, scouring the neatly made bed and the immaculate closet for clues. Maybe they had make-up sex? That’s what grown-ups do, after all. Scream at each other and fuck.

  My parents did it.

  “Don’t pretend like you care, mon cher,” my mother used to snipe at my father. “You’ll rant and rave, and then we’ll fuck. Ça va? You never change.”

  But Thorny’s not the make-up-sex type. He’s way too brooding for that. No. He prefers to lord his power over those who dare to cross him. For days. For years, even. Silence is his favorite weapon, withheld at will. A truly cruel punishment of his creation would be this: disappearing.

  The door to the balcony creaks. When I tiptoe toward it, I find it unlocked. Stepping onto the deck, I spot a hazy figure wandering the beach, sandwiched between ocean and sand.

  “He hates going down to the beach,” Elaine had said.

  I guess Thorny has his own secrets.

  I don’t know how long I watch him. When I finally hear the sound of knocking on the front door, my face feels hot, inflamed by the sun. Jane the tutor is waiting on the front steps, her briefcase in hand.

  Together, we work through mind-numbing assignments until Jane asks to see my notebook. When she realizes that it’s still empty, she frowns, disappointed.

  “I want you to try writing something down now,” she instructs, placing the book in front of me. “You don’t even have to show me what it says. Just practice.”

  Practice. I bite my lower lip and scribble down the first sentence that comes to mind: This is fucking stupid. Stupid. STUPID. StUpId.

  “Now, write about something else,” she prompts. “Something maybe you can’t say out loud. We can keep these journals private, if you’d like. Just try forming words in a new way.”

  A new way.

  My father didn’t slip and fall, I write. He hanged himself.

  That’s the naughty truth I’m not allowed to say out loud. There. I lift my pen and wait for the freedom that Jane seems to think can be experienced by scratching out words in watery ink. Nothing yet.

  I am bored, I write. Still nothing.

  “I think this is a good place for our final lesson,” Jane suggests. “I want you to use our last hour to write. Anything at all. Just get the words out. Play with them. Maybe try writing a story if you’d like—”

  “Like my uncle?”

  “Well, yes,” she says, smiling. She thinks it’s a fitting aspiration. “Though it’s been so long since he’s written anything. Maybe you can trigger his inspiration? You probably have his flair for drama.”

  “I’ll write something different, then.” I sound so unimpressed.

>   Thorny has been on the New York Times bestselling blah blah blah list more than once. His work inspires legions of fans who love reading lame, by-the-book crime dramas without an ounce of tawdry romance or sex. It’s because Thorny is such a creative mind that Grandmama thought he’d communicate best with a traumatized child. He could tell me fantastical stories to take my mind off the horror I witnessed. Tales of unicorns and princesses who vomit glitter. Normal stuff.

  I never told her what tales Thorny wove for me instead. Like when he sat me down, looked me dead in my innocent, teeny eyes, and declared, “I am not your father. Wanting me to be isn’t healthy, Maryanne. Just stop it!”

  Lifting my pen, I try to take Jane’s advice.

  I hate James Thorne. This time, I do feel something: a prickle in my chest. Probably indigestion—I bet those eggs Elaine made for breakfast were poisoned. Sighing, I rip the page out and crumble it into a ball. I aim for the wastebasket in the corner and miss. Swish. The ball bounces away, and I turn my attention to a brand-new page.

  Unbeknownst—another new vocabulary word—to Jane, I spend the rest of her hour drawing stick people in the fringes of the margins. They meander through their happy stick lives, keeping the other figures at a safe distance with their linear appendages. Finished, I take a walk around the house and consider throwing my journal into the ocean.

  I start toward the beach but return to the house when I realize how damn hot it is. So hot that my sandals stick to the bottoms of my feet. Seeking the AC, I wander into the living room. Where I find Thorny scowling on the balcony, a beer in hand.

  He sips.

  I sneak onto a chair near the window and scribble a doodle onto a page, watching him all the while.

  Sip. Sip.

  Scribble. Scribble.

  I don’t know what gives me away. Maybe I’m writing too loudly. Breathing too loudly. Existing too loudly. He turns and glowers when he finds me, my face pressed against the glass. Tossing his head back, he drains the beer and knocks the bottle over the railing. Deliberately.

  Uh-oh. My stomach clenches as he marches toward me. I stand, backing out of his reach the moment he yanks on the sliding glass door. Slam! If I had been any closer, my fingers would have been caught.