If You Must Know

by Beck, Jamie

  He’d come for yoga and been sideswiped by Nancy. How dare that woman think it okay to blurt out messages without any idea of the consequence? What damage might she do to my mother? I jogged back inside to confront her. “What made you say that to Eli?”

  Nancy laid her hands on the table. “Someone named Karen gave me a message. I can’t interpret it beyond that.”

  A convenient nonreply. “Gave you how?”

  Nancy peered at me, looking mistrustful of my motives, but ultimately her ego made her prove herself. “Think of me like a tube. When a spirit wants to pass a message, it lowers its energy frequency. Before coming to a reading, I meditate in order to raise my energy frequency to meet spirits in the middle. When a presence comes, energy warms down my legs—sometimes I get goose bumps—so I back away and let that energy come through. Some mediums get visual cues, others can get scents. I mostly receive verbal ones.”

  That she could turn herself into a telephone from heaven sounded like bullshit.

  “Swear to me on your kids—you got kids, right?—that that was real. That you didn’t somehow look up Eli’s license plate before coming inside and then learning something to mess with him.” I didn’t know what to believe, or even what I wanted to believe. But my question was stupid because Nancy wouldn’t admit to scamming us.

  Her eyes flickered. “I never do anything to mess with people.”

  “Erin, apologize.” My mother nervously twisted her earring while Mo looked on from his perch on the sofa. “Nancy came to help me reach your father. What would she gain by hurting your friend?”

  Nancy never did swear on her kids.

  “I don’t know, but it’s careless to share messages when you have no idea how they’ll affect—how they’ll hurt—the recipient.” I picked up the discarded box of clothes and looked at my mother, concern and anger pulsing through me. “I can’t stop you, Mom, but you’ve been warned that this can end badly.”

  Mo jumped off the sofa and followed me to my room, where I deposited him on my bed and then paced, shaking out my hands. I’d need another round of yoga to calm down because pacing this tight space wasn’t helping.

  Not much had changed in here since Amanda and I had slept in the two twin beds laid out in an L shape, each with a pink comforter embellished with purple and white owls. The old posters and small dresser didn’t bug me, but the sense of still being that same odd kid whose opinions were disregarded sure did.

  I grabbed piles of clothes from the box and stuffed them into the drawers to distract myself. The dividers Amanda had eventually inserted to keep her side of each drawer organized made me snort. Her side had always held neatly folded items, while mine had mingled socks and pajamas and shorts without care. If she could’ve divided our entire room, she would’ve. Admittedly, I’d taken full advantage of her willingness to clean up, make my bed, and put away my laundry. These days I’d be on my own.

  Fifteen minutes later, my mother knocked on the door.

  “Come in.” I leaned against the headboard, sitting cross-legged. Mo climbed into my lap, his little face perched on one knee, staring out the window.

  Mom wandered over to sit at the foot of my bed. I braced for a lecture, so I was stunned when she quietly said, “I came to check in. You seemed rattled.”

  “I’m fine.” A white lie, but seeing as how I didn’t understand my own thoughts, I could hardly explain them to her. She wasn’t the parent I’d ever poured my heart out to, and now wasn’t the time to begin. “What about you?”

  Mom pressed her hand to her chest, a childlike smile appearing. “I know you’re concerned, but I’m heartened. Nancy got a message to your friend, which makes me confident that we’ll hear from your father, especially if you and your sister help.” Given the breakdown Amanda had last night, asking her to participate in this farce seemed unwise. Yet how could I snuff out the little bit of joy and hope now reflected in Mom’s eyes? For the first time, I felt selfish for processing only my own grief this past year when I might’ve helped her with hers, too. “If we’re all together with Nancy, William will have to show up.”

  Her whole face softened after mentioning my dad’s name.

  For all our differences, we’d both adored him. Yet as much as I’d loved my father, it wasn’t the same as losing a spouse.

  Parents and children don’t share the same intimacies that couples do. They don’t wake up together. They don’t make major life decisions as one. They don’t create new life together. They don’t even live in the same house after a period of time.

  Yes, I loved my father, but I’d had my own life, too—jobs, hobbies, boyfriends, and friends. On the other hand, my mother had built her whole life around my father. Truly, she started forty-two years ago, when she’d first comforted him in the wake of a bad breakup with some other woman at college. No wonder she was frantic to turn to him now—to get his advice about how to help Amanda and what to do about Lyle.

  And Amanda had been right about the fact that I couldn’t relate to her pain. I’d yet to love a man other than my father with my whole heart and soul. Losing a spouse had broken something different in Mom and my sister than losing Dad had in me. They might never be whole again. Nor would Eli.

  “That’s a beautiful wish, Mom, but I don’t share your faith in Nancy.”

  Her forlorn expression made me feel like an ogre. “Not even after what happened today?”

  “I can’t explain today . . .” Reiterating my license plate theory would earn me only an eye roll and a dismissive wave of the hands, and also make me feel like a shit. “But even if it was one hundred percent authentic, would you actually want to hear from Dad through that woman? It’s freaky, and we’d have no way to verify the truth of anything she’d tell us.” As gently as I could muster, I added, “Given our other priorities, ghost hunting doesn’t seem like the best use of time or money.”

  She stiffened. “Well, I’ve got plenty of time, and it is my money, so I’ll use it however I please.”

  I raised my hands in surrender, now defeated and drained. Not good, because I had even less of a filter under these conditions. “Okay, but if you go broke, we’ll both be living in my crummy old apartment.”

  “Psh.” She fell silent, her lips twisted. I petted Mo, wishing Mom would leave me alone to think, but the way she picked at the quilt warned me the conversation was about to take a turn. “So is this Eli someone special?”

  “He’s the guy who bought Dad’s albums from Max.”

  Her stricken expression implied that she’d misinterpreted me.

  “He didn’t know Max had stolen them,” I hastened to add. “He handed them over immediately upon finding out. He’s a good guy. A songwriter.”

  “You like him.” She raised a brow.

  “What little I know, I like.” I snuggled Mo closer, as if he could protect me from her probing.

  “It’s a little soon after breaking things off with Max to throw yourself into something new, isn’t it?”

  As if anyone’s heart could be bound by so-called rules of propriety. “I’m not throwing myself at him. I merely offered him some free classes because Max cost him so much money.”

  Not entirely the truth, but close enough. She didn’t need to know the effort it took to repress the urge to jump his bones.

  “Good, because whoever Karen is, he still loves her. That much is plain as the nose on your face.”

  That ice water took a minute to shake off. My mom had this way of saying things—honest, true things—that hurt even when she didn’t mean them to. This was one of those times, and as usual, she wasn’t wrong.

  Everything about Eli’s earlier expression and voice had dripped with longing for his wife. He hadn’t said how long ago she’d died, but he’d previously mentioned not writing for a couple of years. A long time to remain withdrawn from the world. “If you believe Nancy actually spoke with her, then she told him to move on.”

  Mom slowly shook her head, chin tucked. “You can’t compete wit
h a memory, Erin. A ghost of one’s beloved is a perfect incarnation of what used to be, untarnished by bad memories or faults. You will always suffer by comparison. I don’t want that for you.”

  I knew my mother was speaking from experience. No matter how many times my dad had told anyone who would listen how he’d hit the jackpot with my mother, she never, ever fully forgot that someone else had been his first love.

  Meanwhile, my entire life had been a series of suffering by comparison—to my siblings, other students—so this wouldn’t be any different, but I kept that to myself. “Well, I can’t help how I feel.”

  Mom sighed. “You’re stubborn.”

  “Maybe.” Mo licked my face and gave me sloppy doggy kisses, which were better than no kisses. “Mom, do you get lonely? I mean, you’re alone a lot. Maybe you need to join a club or find a new friend . . .”

  She batted my knee. “I’ve no interest in dating.”

  “I said ‘friend,’ not ‘boyfriend.’” Interesting that her mind went there, though. Sort of cringey, but interesting. “Then again, you are only sixty-two. Dad wouldn’t want you to live the next twenty or thirty years without any romance.” The mere thought made me a little sad for her.

  Mom practically sprang off the mattress. “If you don’t want to talk about Eli, fine, but don’t nose into my personal life. For goodness’ sake, I’m too old for hot pants. I’ll see you later.”

  She scurried away, leaving me scratching my head. Hot pants? I snorted.

  My class at Give Me Strength wasn’t for another hour, so I lugged myself from the bed and put on an old Doors LP to chill out. “People Are Strange” had begun to play when a crashing sound made me leap off my bed. “Mom?”

  Silence.

  I trotted through the house, calling for her. By the time I reached the empty kitchen, my heart was racing. I flung the door to the garage open.

  “Oh shoot!” Mo and I ran to the driver’s side of the car, which she’d backed into the garage door before opening it.

  Mom sat behind the steering wheel, her white-knuckled hands wrapped around it, tears in her eyes. My heart thundered from panic and guilt. Why had I worked her into a tizzy when the whole reason I was living here was to make sure this kind of thing didn’t happen?

  I flung open the car door. “Are you hurt?” After scanning her from head to toe, I breathed a sigh of relief. No blood.

  “I’m fine. Completely fine.” She glanced up at me, pleading, “Erin, don’t tell Dodo about this.”

  Dodo was the last thing on my mind, for God’s sake. Crossing my heart, I peered back at the rear bumper and the dented garage door. Two additional expenses we couldn’t afford. “Not a peep.”

  Between Nancy Thompson and accidents like this, my mom would be as broke as I was within months. I dreaded calling Amanda, who didn’t need more bad news. Mom’s continual oopsy-daisies were becoming more troubling and dangerous at a time when the Turner family did not need more stress.

  “Let’s go inside. I’ll get you some water and call the garage door company.” She leaned on my shoulder as she pushed out of the car, and I kept hold of her elbow until she was seated at the kitchen table.

  She’d always seemed so together and invincible. Watching her falling apart made me aware that I relied on her toughness more than I’d realized.

  While filling a water glass, I saw the clouds blocking the sun, dimming the light in the kitchen. Hopelessness had never been my thing, but with Amanda, my mother, and Eli all in distress, the blue mood enveloped me. A sluggishness I’d not felt since the early months of missing my dad’s quiet presence returned.

  I handed my mother the glass and took a seat. “I won’t call Dodo, but we have to tell Amanda. This is the third or fourth dangerous incident in a couple weeks. It’s time to make a doctor’s appointment to rule out anything worse.”

  “No!” She slammed the glass on the table.

  “Mom, please. We lost Dad too soon. Don’t ignore your health, too.” Warm tears swam in my eyes. Despite our peevish relationship, I did love my mother. Her behavior of late had me getting concerned about dementia, like her dad had suffered.

  “Okay.” The hardened look in her eyes resembled blue ice. “But only to prove that I’m fine.”

  “Thank you.”

  In one of the rarest moments of my life, I hoped my mom would prove me wrong.

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  AMANDA

  To break the silence, I cranked the soundtrack to the most recent Pride & Prejudice movie upon returning home from work. That music still moved me despite my own fraudulent Mr. Darcy. Channeling Lizzy for the courage needed to handle the task ahead, I sat at the kitchen table and smoothed out the handwritten page of questions for Lyle’s father that I’d compiled this morning. To protect my daughter, my mother, and myself, I had to be better able to predict Lyle’s behavior, which meant I needed the facts about his entire life instead of relying on his version.

  It was past time for this step, but somehow my heart hadn’t gotten the message. It fluttered violently despite my having practiced my introduction at least four times during the short drive home. With the phone held to my ear and my eyes closed, I held my breath while it rang.

  “Hello?” came a gruff, bored voice.

  My body stiffened. It took two heartbeats before I could answer. “Mr. Foster?”

  “Take me off your list—”

  “Wait, I’m not a telemarketer. I’m . . . I’m Lyle’s wife.” So much for practiced eloquence. My gaze settled on the empty space of the kitchen desk that used to house my engagement photo. After my family had left last night, I’d taken every photograph of Lyle out of their frames and cut them into pieces. It struck me then that I’d never seen a picture of Lyle’s father. My husband had never even described the man’s appearance, so I imagined a paunchier, graying version of Lyle, which didn’t calm me down. When he didn’t respond, I asked, “Mr. Foster?”

  A long sigh came through the line. “Is he dead?”

  Goodness, what a question. No wonder Lyle had left home.

  “No!” Despite the many recent moments when I’d wanted to kill him. Maybe not literally, but pretty darn close.

  “Yeah, I suppose people like him have nine lives.”

  I blinked. People like him? An unkind remark, but given what little I knew of this man, I’d expected a derisive tone, not this melancholy one. Having prepared for combat, I had to shift gears and ease my way in.

  “Sorry to call out of the blue. I would’ve reached out sooner, but Lyle never let me. Now I have no choice, because I need to better understand the scars his mom caused. Will you answer a few questions?”

  “‘Scars his mom caused,’ eh?” He scoffed. “Sounds like he sold you the same cock-and-bull story he told his first wife.”

  I slumped back on my chair as if struck by an arrow. Each breath hurt. “His first wife?”

  Lyle hadn’t mentioned that on our marriage license. Not that another lie should startle me at this point. He’d had another wife. A wife! Of all his lies, the one in which he’d said he’d spent a lifetime searching for me somehow suddenly hurt the most. I’d been his second choice—my destiny, it seemed.

  “Dana, or no—Deanna . . . Yeah, Deanna. Only met her once. Sweet girl. Real giving, just like his mother, who spoiled him rotten, God rest her soul.”

  God rest her soul?

  A chill trickled down my spine. First wives and dead mothers were not part of my script. “I’m sorry . . . I . . . Lyle told me his mom left when he was young.”

  “Like I said, cock-and-bull.”

  “So she didn’t leave?”

  “Not on purpose. She died when he was twelve.”

  Had Lyle used the word “abandoned,” or had I filled in the gap when he’d said his mother had left him? Lyle had watched me mourn my father and never once commiserated about having lost a parent. Who was the man I’d married, and how had I been so easily manipulated?

  “I’m so sorry .
. .” My brain chased each new surprise like a rat seeking cheese. “I’m sorry. I feel foolish. So many lies . . . I don’t know what to ask next, or what I expected . . .”

  “Listen . . . er, what’s your name?” He gentled his voice.

  “Amanda.”

  “Okay, Amanda. I’m guessing my son’s finally turned on you, and now you’re looking for a reason why it all went wrong?”

  Heat flushed through me. “Close enough.”

  He clucked on the other end of the line. “He never mentioned Deanna?”

  The part about his mother “leaving” might be hazy, but I’d remember a prior marriage.

  “No.” I shook my head although he couldn’t see me.

  “He probably told you I wasn’t a good father.”

  “Well . . .” This call had been a mistake. Instead of answers there were only more questions. I fidgeted in my seat, uncomfortable and not at all sure any Foster man could be trusted. “It was obvious you were estranged, and he made it sound like you were . . . hard on him.”

  “I was, but only to keep him from running off the rails. He probably kept you away from me because he knew I wouldn’t lie for him.”

  Lie about what? His mother? His first wife? Was there more?

  “I’m so confused. It’s not like his mother’s death or a prior marriage would’ve changed my feelings. Why would he care if you told me the truth?”

  “Because he’s a narcissist. He creates his own truth to control others and feel good about himself. At this point, he probably believes his own lies.”

  “That can’t be right. I mean, he’s done some awful things lately, but he can also be generous and considerate.”

  “He mimics empathy and generosity, but it only lasts until he’s frustrated or disappointed. Bet in the beginning he treated you like a queen. Made you the center of everything, right?”

  “Yes.” I sat straighter. An unpleasant tang filled my mouth in anticipation of more facts I might not want to know about Lyle or myself.

  “Mm-hmm. He sucks people in with charm, then turns them into puppets. Gives them just enough attention to keep them dancing, and withholds affection if you cross him.”