Lisa Unger - Darkness My Old Friend

“Your father was a good man, Michael,” Hank had said. “But his affairs are a disaster. I’m going to do this work pro bono. After the medical bills, though, I don’t know what will be left for you and your sister.”

Yet neither of these things was keeping him in The Hollows. He’d had a passing interest in that tunnel for years. And his father’s matters could be settled from afar. But when he learned from his sister that his father was ill and about to die, that she couldn’t (wouldn’t) with two children travel home to see it through, something powerful drew him back.

They’d both been estranged from Mack, for myriad reasons. But Michael wasn’t drawn home to make amends, or to find peace. He wanted answers to questions he had never dared ask about his mother’s disappearance.

“What happened to her, Dad?” He’d asked in the hospital room while his father lay dying.

Mack had looked at him as if through a fog. The hospital room was dim except for the light washing in from the hallway. The man in the other bed was snoring. His father was in a palliative state, only pain relief now. There was no treatment for a body so riddled with cancer.

“You know,” he said. “You know.”

“No, I don’t,” Michael said. “She left that night, and we never heard from her again. Not a phone call. Not a card. I’ve looked for her, Dad, for years. She didn’t run off. She never divorced you, never changed her name. She never worked again. Cara’s looked for her, too. We’ve hired people to find her.”

He locked eyes with his father. But he wasn’t sure his father could see him. The old man’s gaze was unfocused and watery.

“She may not have loved you,” Michael said. “She may have wanted to leave you. But she loved us, Cara and me. She did love us.”

“She did love us,” his father said. But it was just an echo, a meaningless repetition of Michael’s words.

Michael wasn’t sure how long he sat there with his father, who looked as shriveled and empty as a corn husk. How long did he just sit listening to his father’s rattling breath? Michael dozed in the chair, saw the night nurse come in briefly and cast him a sad smile. She thought him the dutiful son, sitting at his father’s deathbed.

But he wasn’t that. He was a grave robber, waiting for the night watchman to drift off once and for all. Then, and only then, could he dig his fingers into the earth and exhume the truth.

Willow could tell that her mother liked Principal Ivy. Bethany seemed to have a thing lately for geeky-looking guys.

I’ve had my fill of cool, Willow. These days it’s kindness, honesty, and stability that impress me . Read: boring, snorts-when-he-laughs, totally lame. Not that her mother actually dated. She never went anywhere that didn’t have something to do with work. She didn’t even seem to have any friends anymore, except her agent-who was so annoying that Willow wasn’t sure how anyone could stand him.

Mr. Ivy wasn’t a total geek. Still, that sweater had to go. Argyle? Really? He could do something about his hair, too. Maybe mess it up a little. That careful look, parted on the side, brushed back from his face-not working for him.

“I know you’ve been having a hard time adjusting to the move and the new school. So I’m going to be lenient here. Of course, your friend Jolie was suspended last week for cutting school. But that was her third offense. I don’t think we have to go there. Do we?”

Willow shook her head vigorously, did her best to seem contrite. She wouldn’t really mind being at the house for a week, watching television and sleeping late. On the other hand, her mother would make her life a homeschooling hell. So she might as well just come here.

“We really appreciate your understanding, Mr. Ivy,” said her mother. Bethany was doing her good-conservative-mom routine. She was even wearing a skirt.

“Please, call me Henry.”

Oh, brother . He had the goofy smile men often had around her mother.

Willow looked around Mr. Ivy’s office, blanking out on whatever small talk he and her mother were making now. There was a wall of pictures-Mr. Ivy with various students, accepting an award, dressed in the school-mascot costume, with the Wildcat costume’s head tucked under his arm. There was a case of trophies, not for sports but for things like the chess and science clubs and the debate team, dorky stuff like that.

“She’s a good student, Mr. Ivy… I mean, Henry,” her mother said. Could she be any more overeager? “And very bright. But she is struggling.”

“I know it. I’ve seen her school record. Her teachers here see a lot of potential, too. Mr. Vance speaks very highly of her, her advanced comprehension and her creative writing. I think we can all work together to keep her on track.”

Obviously Mr. Vance hadn’t ratted her out for being so inappropriate in class. For some reason that only made her feel worse about it.

“I’m glad you feel that way,” said Bethany. She seemed to relax a bit. “I think so, too.”

Sitting there looking out the window now at the kids heading to the field for that mundane misery they called physical education but which everyone knew was just school-sanctioned torture for anyone other than the naturally thin and athletic, Willow felt it. As she listened to her mother and Mr. Ivy talk about her behavior, her schoolwork, their expectations, Willow felt the now-familiar dark lash of anger. It turned to something cold and black inside her, and she let herself sink into it.

She’d felt it the first time she realized that her father was gone and that he wasn’t coming back. That he’d call when he should, make all the appropriate appearances, send money and gifts. But that he’d moved on in a way that fathers weren’t supposed to ever move on from their children. And then she finally understood what they’d told her, that he wasn’t her natural father, not her biological father. They’d carefully explained to her over the years that he was her stepfather but it was just the same, that he couldn’t love her any more if she had been his real daughter. But that just wasn’t true, was it? His love for Willow was intimately connected to his love for her mother. And when he stopped loving Bethany, he’d stopped loving Willow, too. He stopped wanting to be her father.

And on the day that this finally dawned on her, she felt this thing settle inside her-but it wasn’t a thing, really. It was this terrible, ugly absence, a hollow. And she didn’t fight it off, though something told her that she should, she should fight it back with all her strength. But she didn’t. She couldn’t. It was like drinking something that made you sick but liking the sickness somehow.

Willow had seen Jolie when they’d entered the school. Jolie was leaning against her locker, and she gave Willow that sly smile she had. The smile asked, Wanna get high, girl? And Willow did. She did want to get high, so high that her whole world was just a small black dot a million miles away. Willow loved that smile of Jolie’s. It made so many promises.

“Are you listening, Willow?”

“Yes. I’m listening.” But, startled, she’d said it with that sullen snap her mother hated . And Bethany’s face changed just like that. It went from open and hopeful to tired and disappointed in a millisecond. And probably nobody but Willow would even have noticed. She’d seen that look a lot. She didn’t think her mother herself was aware of the expression on her face. It wasn’t something she did on purpose, like her stern look or her trying-to-be-patient look. This was the expression that her face took on when all the other masks she wore failed her.