by Dan Kolbet
It's not as if the chances of me finding out about him were slim. It was almost assured. Libby knows Alex's mom, even if she thought Ella was her aunt. Adding me into this equation had to cross his mind. How could he not expect that I'd want to connect those dots, and that it would all eventually lead to him?
Since Alex and Ella aren't "on the best of terms" maybe he didn't know that Jane and Libby lived here at one point. Libby was surprised to learn that she had an uncle, too. So he obviously didn't come around here when they were living with Ella. Yet that seems far-fetched. A mother and son never talk about their missing sister?
I looked Alex straight in the eye that night in the diner. I believed everything he said. And with the exception of who he was, it was all true. I remember thinking that my gut told me to trust him. That he wasn't spinning a tale for my benefit. I don't question that. But there must be some other reason that he pretended to be Frank and didn't tell me who he really was.
I decide to keep my questions to myself or at least not be obvious about it. Ella wouldn't have shown the photographs to us if she was in on some wacky conspiracy, so I have to take her at her word that she just wanted to help her daughter who was afflicted with a mental illness. It's understandable at some level.
So if I fly off the handle and rip the sink from the wall and demand answers, she could alert Alex and any chance I had of getting to the bottom of this whole mess would be gone for good. Better to hold it in, while slowly chipping away at the truth.
Libby doesn't need to have more turmoil in her life created by her mother and me. And telling her what I just learned, without confirming it first, would crush her. So I'm keeping my mouth shut until I know more, which eats at me.
Libby deserves to have answers too, but it's not fair to send her emotions through the grinder while I blindly stumble through this family's lies.
* * *
The next few days are excruciating. I want to jump out of my skin because we're just wasting time here. Libby volunteers us to do repair work in the basement, which you'd think would give me more time to talk with Ella without raising any suspicion, but she's keeping her distance. I don't know if that's intentional or not, but it's frustrating nonetheless. She's aloof and considering everything that's happened, I'd have expected her to want more time with us. While we bag up soggy blankets, grimy Mason jars and plastic knickknacks in the humid, squishy basement, Ella is upstairs nursing her "bad back." I suspect the old bat just wants free labor too. That plumber she claimed was coming over that first night still hasn't shown up. It makes me again wonder who she actually expected at the door when we arrived.
The plumber wasn't even necessary anyway. I was able to use some old tools and a pipe from the hardware store to fix the leak.
"You're a handy guy to have around," Ella says after inspecting the repair. She'd emerged from her room for the first time all day.
"If only your daughter had thought so," I say, just as harshly as I'd intended.
"I can't explain her, dear," she says. "She did what she did for her own reasons. Don't take it personally."
"Really? Don't take it personally? That's bull," I say. "It's nothing but personal."
"Here's how I see it," she says. "Life is very little about what happens to you, but a lot about how you react to it. You see terrible things happen every day and if we allow them to, they will grind us into the dirt. We'll be defeated and helpless. But we have the right to choose how we respond to terrible things, you see. It's how you react to it. That's a choice."
"That doesn't change the fact of what she did," I say.
"No, but you can either wallow in pity or overcome," she says. "What do you choose?"
"You didn't overcome," I say. "You pretended like what she did was OK by ignoring it. You enabled her to do what she did. If you have the right to choose how you react, you should have reacted differently."
"Maybe so," she mutters. "Maybe so."
Libby appears from the other room as Ella starts her slow climb upstairs and back to her room alone.
"You're being very hard on her," Libby says.
"Yes, I am."
"Why? Is she the one you're mad at?"
I have to think for a minute.
"Partially, yes," I say.
"Well, I think your anger is misplaced," she says. "Ella didn't tell the truth, sure, but she did what she could for me when I was here. She didn't ask Mom to be someone else, she just wanted the best for me, even if Mom didn't see it or notice she was doing it. I don't remember every little thing about my time here, but I thought of Ella. Aunt Ella—as family. I remember that."
"You didn't lose two people like I did," I say. I'm bitter and I know it.
"No? How about losing you? Did you forget that? How about the fact that I lived with a mother who was here one day, gone the next? Yeah, I know what it feels like to lose someone."
"That's not what I meant," I begin to say.
"I'm sorry you've been dragged into this, but you're not the only one who is having a hard time," she says.
"I know, I just—"
"Enough," she says. "I need a break."
She stomps through the wet towels on the floor and up the stairs, leaving me alone in the damp basement surrounded by buckets of water and my own inflated sense of self-importance.
* * *
I make the decision to go straight to Colorado as soon as possible. I'll get Libby checked in to her flight to Spokane and have Michelle pick her up at the airport. I'll leave Minnesota and be in Denver in just a few hours. I'll confront Alex and get the answers I need. Then I can finally let Jane rest in peace—and move on. Michelle and our life together is waiting for me back home. I need to finish this.
I lay awake on our final night in Minnesota, trying to figure out what I'm going to tell Libby at the airport when I send her in one direction while I go another. Her flight jitters are not forgotten. I decide to tell her that I need to meet with someone about my books. She knows Kendall was trying to get me to publish them, so maybe she'd buy that story. I hate to lie to her. She doesn't deserve that, but I tell myself that it's for her own protection. Who knows what Alex will say about Jane?
It's best to keep her away from this unknown for now. If, at some later date, I think she needs to meet her uncle and it won't do her any harm, then I'll consider it. But tomorrow, I'll confront him and see what I can find out.
But I never get the chance.
My phone vibrates on the table next to me. I glance at the time on the phone's digital display. It's past 11:00 at night. The number doesn't come up as one of the very few contacts I have saved in my phone, but the 509 area code matches Spokane. I push the answer button.
"Hello," I say.
"Billy, it's me," a familiar female voice says. "I know you don't want to talk to me and I get that. And I know I haven't done anything lately to earn your help, but I'm in trouble and I need you, Billy. When are you coming back to Spokane?"
"What do you need, April?" I ask, knowing that anytime my drug-addict sister wants help, she needs money for drugs or bail.
"I don't want to say it over the phone," she says. "Not here."
"Just ask me for the money," I say, scolding her like a child. "That's all you ever do."
"No, it's not like that this time, Billy, I swear."
"That's what you always say," I say, then wonder out loud, "How did you even get this number?"
"I got it from Kendall. She gave it to me."
"You talked to Kendall? Why?"
"Because I'm in trouble, Billy, and I need my brother. That's why."
"I'm not giving you money, April. I'm just not going to do that. So there's no point in even asking."
There's a long silence on the line as neither of us speak.
"It's not like that . . . that's not why," she finally says.
"Then what? What's so important that you can't tell me over the phone?
And then she says in almost a whisper, "I'm pregnant and someo
ne is trying to hurt me."
Looks like my trip to see Alex will have to wait.
Chapter 47
Spokane, Washington
The worst neighborhood in Spokane, aside from select portions of Hillyard on the north side, is affectionately known as Felony Flats. The West Central Neighborhood is only about three miles from my boyhood home, but it's definitely on the other side of the proverbial tracks. It's one of the city's oldest neighborhoods and it shows. Every crack in the sidewalk is a pothole. Every porch has a brown couch. Every yard has a chain link fence for both security and to keep in the dog that barks all night long.
This isn't to say that there aren't quality people in Felony Flats or families who do their damnedest to keep the neighborhood safe and clean. They exist and they try hard. Yet, these people are few and far between and are quickly losing the fight against the ghetto moniker.
The boundaries of my high school, North Central, cover the entire neighborhood, along with other slices of Spokane that are 10 or more miles away. Nice cookie-cutter neighborhoods with parks in the middle that help bring up the median household income of the school to something just below average. This had the impact of creating classes of have and have-not students. Once you were associated with the ghetto, you stayed in the ghetto.
So as I pull my truck up to the front of a rundown two-story house in Felony Flats, with a sagging front porch, wild curls of peeling blue paint and enormous icicles hanging from the roofline, I'm not surprised to recognize the occupants sitting on the front steps. Well, at least one of them. A skinny Mexican with a pointy nose sits smoking a cigarette. His name is Mix. Next to him is an obese woman in clothes too tight to even mention.
Everybody knows Mix. Legend says that he gave himself that name when he was a kid, claiming that he was both love and hate. He couldn't decide which was more important, so he said he was a mix. Apparently it stuck. I knew Mix from high school. He graduated with my class, although he was a good two years older than everyone else in a cap and gown thanks to his six-year plan. A Super-Duper Senior, if you will.
Even before graduation, Mix had an eye for business. And he was not a bad student, in fact he took honors classes and was a member of the DECA program that taught students about leadership, business and entrepreneurship. He took this education and turned it into a profitable business. But this isn't an American success story. Unfortunately his business was selling drugs to people like my sister.
You didn't mess with Mix. He'd been in the business too long to not be careful and selective about who he associated with. He had muscle to back himself, even if none of it was his own.
I get out of the truck, unzip my jacket and remove my stocking cap despite the cold. I hold my hands clearly visible to my sides, not in the pockets. April had warned me. Don't look like a threat, she said.
I reach the three-foot-high chain link fence and place my hand on the gate handle.
"Yo, what's up, man?" Mix says, flicking his cigarette into the yard. "What you need?"
He's on the other side of the gate, blocking my path in seconds.
"For old time's sake, how about you don't give me a hard time. What do you say?" I ask.
"What the? Billy? Is that my man, Billy Redman? Shee-yit. I ain't seen you since . . . since a while, man. How you been?"
"I'm good, Mix. Thanks," I say, being as polite as possible. "Sorry to just stop by like this. I'm just looking for my sister. Thought I might find her here."
"You done a lot a thinking about it then, huh? Thought you'd just swing by the Mix Motel and hang awhile? Take my lady out? Rip the fiber of my soul from my home and leave me empty inside. That what you gonna do? I'm not so sure about that. No, I'm not."
I hesitate, wondering if Mix actually knows why I'm here and giving me a hard time or if he has been using a bit too much of his own product.
"I don't want any trouble," I say. "I'm just looking for April."
He puts both his hands on the gate and his crazy eyes go a little wider.
"I'm just fuckin' with ya. She's inside. Big as a goddamned house too. Shee-yit. You best chill out man. Gonna have yourself a heart attack or something. Billy Redman. My man."
I follow Mix and his obese lady friend inside the house. The entry hall is filled will stacks and stacks of cardboard boxes that I have to navigate past to get into the living room. The obese woman doesn't even try. She climbs the stairs, which while not completely covered in boxes, are a bit more narrow than usual thanks to stacks on the outside wall.
"Home security," Mix says.
"What do you mean?"
He pulls the lid off of a cardboard box to reveal it is completely filled with dirt and rocks.
"If it can't stop the bullet, I sure as shit hope it slows that fucker down," he says.
It's then that I notice every wall that makes up the front of the house is covered with the dirt-filled boxes too.
"Drive-bys?" I ask.
"Fucking drive-bys," he confirms.
"Don't you think you should cover up the windows too?" I ask.
"So you're the genius that hears gunshots and stands at the window to see who done it?"
"Well, I just mean that—"
"You duck man. That's it. Just duck."
"Gotcha," I say, blushing.
"Don't worry, bro, I got little sis in the back."
He leads me through the kitchen, which to my surprise isn't a science lab for cooking meth. He knocks on a blue and purple door at the end of the hallway. It has a deadbolt on it that opens from the inside.
"Baby girl," he says through the door. "Big brother is here for you. Want me to tell him to piss off?"
He slaps me on the arm to denote he's only kidding. Mix must think he is hilarious.
"No, Mix, don't," she says. "I asked him to come."
"I's just joking. Shee-yit."
She flips the lock and pulls the door open. When I see her, I practically burst into tears.
* * *
"You look incredible!" I say.
"Incredibly enormous," she says with a broad smile.
"Well, that too, I guess."
She hugs me and her massive belly bumps into me.
"Sorry, about that—this little person is always getting in the way!" she says.
"I can see why," I say.
She looks like a different person. Her sandy blonde hair is curled and neat, perfectly framing her slightly chubby face. Her belly is bursting out over a pair of black stretch pants. The tee-shirt trying to contain it is working overtime. April has always had a small frame, even as a kid, so seeing her like this, a soon-to-be mother, is baffling. The ball of belly dwarfs the rest of her. She looks so different than the person I last saw at Trevor's funeral.
"There's only one in there, right?" I ask.
"Thankfully."
"When you said you were pregnant, I didn't think you were this far along. When are you due?"
"Three weeks from now. February 19."
She closes the door and sits down in a rocking chair with a pillow attached to the base. The room is tiny. There's a twin bed under a window and a folding card table with boxes of crackers and some apples. Under the table are several boxes of diapers and wipes. A baby carrier sits in the corner with several blankets. A suitcase is open on the floor that contains her clothes.
Her movements are slow and measured. Careful. And she looks happy. The frantic girl I saw flitting around Trevor's funeral is nowhere to be seen. She looks well. I can't remember the last time she looked so good and healthy. I'm overjoyed, but confused.
When she called she said she was in trouble and needed my help. When she said she was pregnant, I'm ashamed to say, I immediately thought she wanted money for an abortion. I'm not sure what I would have done if she had asked for that. But she didn't and I'm grateful. So, seeing her here today, healthy and ready to pop, I'm not sure why I needed to rush home to see her.
"What's wrong," I ask. "Why did you need to see me so badly? Why couldn't
we just talk over the phone?"
"Because I knew you wouldn't believe me unless you saw me in person," she says. "And that's my fault. I know it. For a long time I was mixed up. Getting high and getting numb to everything. But I'm not that person anymore."
"You've said that before."
"I know I have. I went to rehab—that place that Trevor picked for me. I went on my own. Voluntarily. Got cleaned up. I learned that I can't dip my toe in the water and assume I can escape. I know that one taste and I'll dive right in. I can't touch it. I'm done."
"I'm glad to hear that," I say.
Trevor was the one who always gave her the benefit of the doubt, not me. Every time she messed up or went on a bender and did something stupid he'd be there to help her out. I know I was no help whatsoever. Even our parents were distanced from her and that's the way it had always been. She got along OK with Dad, but not with Mom because Mom was, well, herself and hard to love or sometimes just hard to tolerate.
"I know you're skeptical," she says. "You should be because I deserve that, but I've turned over a new leaf. I'm clean and ready to start my life over again. Just like you."
"Like me?"
"Yes. According to Kendall you're "the man" now. Not some absentee uncle from the sticks. Mom and Dad needed you. Kendall and Gracie needed you. And you swept back into town and started over again. Those girls really look up to you, Brother. They do, a lot, and they should. "
"I don't know about all that."
"Modesty is annoying, so knock it off," she quickly retorts. "You did a good thing. Live with it."
"OK, geez," I say.
"I need a new start too. Like you. This baby needs me to be a different person. I want to be the best mother I can be for the baby and for me."
"You keep calling it baby. Is it a boy or a girl?"
"I don't know. I didn't want to find out."
"It'll be quite the surprise then," I say.
"Tell me about it. Everything has to be green and yellow. No blue or pink. Just in case. Mix has got me a few things. I'm lucky."
She glances around the room at the diapers and baby carrier.
