Killer's Cousin (3 page)

I heard my own breath come back in and out of my lungs. It sounded as if I'd been running.

I
n my hand I felt the weight of Emily's book, and I remembered when she'd given it to me. To us. It hadn't been long after we'd first slept together, and she'd been so delighted with herself. She'd gleefully described her embarrassment at the bookstore; how she'd dallied and hung back in line to make sure she got a female cashier. How she'd also bought a couple of mysteries she didn't want, so that this book wouldn't be her only purchase.

We'd laughed so hard. And then she'd kissed me, coming in close, teasing, and I'd been as self-absorbed as an onion. Astounded at my luck and at the same time confident it was my due.

I was smug, beyond doubt. Maybe I was even dumb, not paying attention to anyone except myself. But I cared about Emily. We were good together. She was
not
frightened of me. I was
not
obsessive and jealous. I would
never
have hurt her. That wasn't me.

That wasn't me
. Not then. Not now. Not ever. No.

But, still … still …

Slowly I became aware that my other hand hurt. For a long moment I could not unclench my fingers. Then, slowly, I could. My palm was bloody. I stared at it. My stomach lurched. I took in one deep breath, and then, carefully, another.

I would not think about Emily, or about Greg's compelling lies, or about my own doubts. I could not afford to.

And I could not afford to waste any emotion on Lily. Or on Julia. I was here in Cambridge. I had a job to do: a year of school to complete in a strange place, surrounded by new people who would at best be suspicious of me, and at worst—

No. I wouldn't think about that.

I moved to the bookcase and, working rapidly, filled the bottom shelves with my old science fiction books: Asimov, Bear, Bujold, Card, Heinlein, others. I tucked Emily's book, inappropriately, behind these other books that I needed to keep but knew I would probably not read again. Then I went to the sink to run cold water over my stinging hand.

I would be attending a private preparatory school called St. Joan's, which had once been an exclusive girls' school.

“But, ten years ago,” Dr. Edythe Walpole, the headmistress, had said during the interview that my father arranged at the beginning of the summer, “we decided
to allow boys to enroll as well.” She'd fixed me with a steady look over her half glasses.

I nodded. I didn't really care about the school's history. She had to know that.

“This is a small school,” said Dr. Walpole. “Small and quiet. Fewer than a hundred students in each grade; classes with a low teacher-student ratio. We pride ourselves on the quality of our faculty; the depth of our courses. I teach a senior seminar in history, myself. Everyone who works here teaches, no matter what else they do.”

Oh, really?
I thought sourly.
The custodian too?
But I just nodded. I was hyperaware of my father, waiting outside the office, probably pacing. We'd flown up together from Baltimore that morning and were due to take another plane back in a couple of hours. “That sounds impressive,” I said. I wondered how much my parents were planning to pay. Twice the normal tuition? More? Despite what the papers said, we weren't rich. How much would this year cost them, on top of all the legal fees?

Silence had fallen. I looked up and saw Dr. Walpole paging thoughtfully through my file. I knew what she was seeing there. The A's. The IQ number. The S.A.T. scores. Probably even the cross-country times. Davey was just about perfect, you see.

I waited. Finally she looked up, at me, at David. “Very well,” she said. “We'll see how it goes.”

I said, “Thank you.” I wanted to say something else—there was a little silence in which I felt I was
expected
to say something else—but I couldn't think what.

In my attic apartment, I winced, remembering.
School would begin the next day. There would be countless such encounters to get through. Weeks, maybe months, to make myself blend into the walls. Settle everybody down. I would just have to do it. For the rest of my life, over and over, I would have to convince everyone—including me—of my harmlessness.

Nearly everything was unpacked. I decided to take a break, go for a walk. See if I could find some local stores. I needed a desk lamp. I needed to get out of the house for a while. I needed—badly—to run, and I would, as soon as I figured out where I'd put my running shoes.

I went down the stairs, through Vic and Julia's apartment, and down again. On the front porch, I nearly careened into a tall, skinny girl carrying a huge canvas. The artist, I guessed, who Vic had mentioned lived on the first floor. “Sorry,” I said. We danced around each other; somehow, the girl managed to keep her grip on the unwieldy canvas.

Behind the canvas I caught a glimpse of her profile: dark skin, a high cheekbone, a sweep of brown hair tucked behind a lovely, delicate ear. Oddly penetrating, her eye stopped on me for an instant and my face flamed. She was beautiful, and she would think I—she'd have read the tabloids, heard what Greg had said …

I ducked my head to hide. The girl might have said something; I wasn't sure. I heard the rattle of her keys as she fumbled with them. Finally she got her door open and edged her canvas inside. I got just a glimpse of the interior of that first room, the living room, and it
astonished me almost out of my hideous self-consciousness. The room was completely empty.

Her door closed, softly.

After another second I looked over at her mailbox and read the name on it. An unusual name: Raina. Raina Doumeng.

T
o my surprise, that evening I got a formal invitation to dinner. Vic knocked on my door to deliver it. “Julia is making a stew tonight,” he said. “Why don't you come down at six?”

“Okay,” I said, wondering if that meant she was just doing the cooking, and would therefore still not make an appearance. But when I came down that night, I found Julia in the kitchen, her back ramrod-straight, her hair shorter than I'd remembered and completely gray. She wore an apron fastened over casual clothes.

Tentatively, I approached and gave her a bouquet of late-summer wildflowers I'd found up the street at a little outdoor fruit and vegetable market. She seemed surprised, and, if not pleased, at least not actively hostile.

“Thank you, David,” she said, my name sounding precise and measured. She examined me and then averted her eyes politely from my long hair, grown,
defiantly, since my Eagle Scout appearance at the trial. She instructed Lily to find a vase for the flowers. “Then tell your father we'll be ready to eat in ten minutes.”

Lily. All at once I could hear her unbelievable questions echo once again in my ears. I forced myself to glance at her, and found her watching me. I looked away.

Did you feel powerful?

She was a little girl. She could not have known what she was asking.

In a few minutes we all took our seats. Julia sat at the foot of the small, rectangular dining room table, Vic at the head, while Lily and I faced each other across the two sides. Julia had placed my flowers directly in the center of the table, making it difficult for me to see Lily.

And soon I felt slightly more relaxed. Julia was making an effort to be cordial, and Vic had ruffled Lily's hair affectionately just before we sat down, making her break out briefly in a smile.

Julia ladled out the stew, passing Vic's down to him via Lily, and we began eating.

“So, you start at St. Joan's tomorrow?” Julia asked me.

“Yes,” I said. The stew was good; I complimented Julia on it and on the bread. She thanked me. There was a little silence.

“St. Joan's is a very good school,” pronounced Julia finally. “I might send Lilian there when the time comes for her to attend high school. I don't want her to stay in public school when she's older. Because you never know. Gangs. Drugs.”

Lily muttered something. I wondered briefly why
Lily was not attending parochial school now, as Kathy had, but then realized that it must be money. “There are probably scholarships for St. Joan's,” I began, and then faltered as I met Julia's glare.

“I can afford to send Lilian to St. Joan's!” she snapped. “I don't need charity!”

“I didn't mean …” I let my voice drift off as Julia continued to glare, and I remembered that my father had offered to help with Kathy's college tuition, and been refused. And of course Kathy hadn't stayed long in college. I looked at Vic, hoping for help, but he was eating with great concentration, wiping the bowl with his bread, not looking up.

More silence. Like Vic, I attended to my dinner. Pretty soon I scraped bottom. I wanted more but the tureen was out of reach and somehow I was reluctant to ask Julia. The bread was nearby; I ate more of it. I turned my head to the right and examined the many family pictures collected in two large frames on the wall. I noted several of Lily, but I did not see Kathy's distinctive red hair.

Finally I couldn't stand the silence anymore. “Vic,” I said, “are you a Patriots fan?”

Vic looked up. “Not really. I prefer baseball.” He hesitated. “But maybe we could go to a game some weekend if you'd like.”

“Sure,” I said weakly, horrified. I did not want to go to a game with Vic; I had just been making conversation. “Sometime.”

“Okay,” said Vic. His eyes flickered away from mine, to the soup tureen, and then down to his own empty plate. He took a slice of bread from the basket.

Next, I tried a question about the house. This met with more response. Vic was seriously into home upkeep and repair. “These old wood frame houses repay the care,” he said. He told me the history of the Boston double- and triple-deckers. “They're democratic, these houses,” he said, looking around the room in satisfaction. “Some people think they're ugly,”—he squinted suspiciously at me—“all crammed together on a street. But I say this house has treated us well.”

It was the perfect opening. “Vic,” I said, “I was wondering about the skylights in the attic. Did you do something with them to diffuse the light differently?”

“A skylight's a skylight. What do you mean?”

“I don't know. Well, there's this shadow I see upstairs sometimes, in the late afternoon. It's tall, thin …”
Almost womanly
, I suddenly thought. “And well … anyway, I just wondered if maybe the light was funny. And also—” I was going to mention the humming, but Vic was frowning at me, shaking his head, and I stopped, uncertain.

“Also what?” Vic said.

I didn't want to go on, but I was stuck. “I … twice at night I've heard this noise … a buzz or a hum …” I stopped again. I thought I felt Lily's eyes on me, but when I looked across, her face was hidden behind the flowers.

Julia said, “Aren't you sleeping well? Why not?”

I could feel all their eyes. “I sleep fine,” I said quickly. “It's just sometimes I hear this noise … I think it must be the wind.”

“Yes,” said Julia. “This is an old house, which you're—” Her eyes narrowed. “Not used to.”

Vic nodded. “Old houses have personalities. Especially wooden houses. They creak.”

“Oh,” I said.

Silence again. Vic reached once more for the bread basket, but I had finished the last slice. I was still hungry. I had carried the tureen to the table for Julia, so I knew there was plenty more. I looked at Vic, and his plate, and then at my plate once more. I looked at Julia, who was patting her mouth with her napkin.

Suddenly I almost laughed.
Please, sir
, I thought,
I want some more
.

“Is there any more stew, Julia?” I said boldly. “I'd like seconds.”

“Of course,” said Julia. “Pass me your plate.”

She didn't look at Vic. She didn't ask Vic if he also wanted seconds. She hadn't, I suddenly realized, said a word to Vic all evening. Or he to her. They hadn't exchanged a single glance, either.

I'm imagining things
, I thought. Shadows, noises, atmosphere … I looked at Vic again, and Julia saw me do it. She said smoothly, “Lilian, ask your father if he'd like seconds.”

I blinked. I received my plate back. Lily said, “Dad, would you like some more stew?”

“Yes, please, Lily,” said Vic.

I watched as Vic passed his plate to Lily, who passed it on to Julia, who filled it generously and passed it back via Lily to Vic.

“Thank you,” said Vic to Lily.

“He says thanks,” said Lily to Julia.

“He's welcome,” said Julia.

“She says you're welcome,” said Lily to Vic.

I opened my mouth. Then I closed it. I looked from Vic to Julia. Vic was eating again and couldn't, wouldn't, meet my eyes. Julia did, though, for the barest second, before lifting her chin and looking away again.

No. I was
not
imagining this, at least. Vic and Julia weren't talking to each other. They were communicating through Lily.

Was I responsible for that, too?

I looked up and saw Lily, smiling sweetly at me. She had leaned sideways to have a good view.

“More bread?” she asked. “I can get you some from the kitchen.”

“No,” I said. “Thank you, but no.”

T
he next morning I went to school. It was a half day; I was supposed to register, pick up my class schedule, sign up for activities. It felt peculiar, getting ready for school by myself. The attic apartment was too quiet. As I ate cereal I remembered how my mother had always insisted on cooking a big breakfast for me on the first day of school. I remembered her ritual questions at dinner:
What were your impressions of your teachers today? Your classes?