Chris Whitaker - We Begin at the End

Their room was the converted attic. Duchess followed Robin up the stairs. They had a small bath to themselves, a basin and tub and toothbrushes in a cup. Some dog-eared books on a small shelf, Famous Five , a selection of Dr. Seuss.

“You want to change out of your smart clothes?”

He lay back on his bed and rolled away so she could not see him cry. His shoulders shook lightly and she went over and sat beside him. When she placed a hand on his arm he shrugged her away.

“You shouldn’t have even come today. You hated Grandpa. Even when he was kind you said mean things to him because you’re just mean all the way through.”

He stared at the skylight above them, snow drifted down, borrowed shelter all that kept them from the wilds now.

“I’m sorry,” she said.

“You always say that.”

She poked his ribs. He did not smile.

“You want to read a book?”

“No.”

“You want to throw snowballs at Mary Lou’s face? I could make them out of pure ice.”

Almost a smile.

“Or I could nail Mr. Price with one. Break a tooth. Spear Mrs. Price with an icicle. We could make Henry eat yellow snow.”

“How do you make yellow snow?”

“Piss in it.”

He laughed then. She pulled him in.

“Will we be alright?” he said.

“We will.”

“How?”

“We’ll—”

“You can’t look after us. And I don’t think Mr. Price wants us here.”

“They get twelve hundred bucks each month to look after us.”

“So they might keep us for all that money.”

“No. This is just foster care, remember what Shelly said. She’ll try and find us a decent family to stay with forever.”

“With a farm and animals?”

“Maybe.”

“And we can go do Grandpa’s ashes soon.”

“When they call Shelly.”

“So we’ll be alright then. Everything will be alright.”

She kissed his head. She did not like lying to her brother. In the bathroom she found small scissors and cut his nails. “I should’ve done this before.”

He watched her. “You look like Mom again. You should eat.”

She rolled her eyes. He smiled.

That night they ate mashed potatoes and sausage, together in the small room, in front of the television set. They still wore their funeral clothes.

“She knows how to cook at least,” Robin said as he ate. “I could eat two of these sausages.”

Duchess moved to knife her sausage onto his plate but he pushed her hand away. “Not yours. You need to eat too.”

“I’ll go see if I can get you another.”

She grabbed her plate and walked slowly down the hallway, Robin shut in, cartoons playing. On the wall were family photos, one at Disney with Henry and Mary Lou wearing mouse ears, one at Kennedy, another at the Canyon. Mr. Price and Henry wore matching ball caps.

There was a sign, BLESS THIS MESS, a caricature of Mrs. Price by the water, her smile way bigger than Duchess had ever seen it.

She stopped by the kitchen door and heard them at the dining table, Mr. Price asking Mary Lou about her test, then Henry about softball. She waited till Henry started talking then slipped into the kitchen.

“Duchess.”

She turned. Silence as they looked her way.

“I just … Robin liked the sausage so I was looking for another.”

“All gone,” Mr. Price said.

“Oh.”

She glanced at Mary Lou’s plate and saw she had three.

Duchess turned and left them, forked her own sausage and held it out. As she got back she passed it over to Robin.

“You ate yours already?” he said.

“Yeah. They were good.”

“Told you.”

When the house was sleeping she moved silent down the stairs and into Mr. Price’s study. All wood, neat stacks of books on finance and currency. At the computer she searched “Vincent King” and read all she could about the case. It confused her, that Vincent didn’t plead it out and cop life when his guilt was clear like that. The newspapers said he still didn’t speak, not at the arraignment, and still had not instructed a lawyer.

The D.A. was slick, she was going to bat for Star Radley and her orphans. Those poor children .

She spun quick when she heard someone at the door.

“You’re not supposed to be in Daddy’s office.”

Mary Lou. Well fed, hair brushed daily by Mrs. Price, skin mottled by acne. She was fifteen and Duchess guessed she was the kind of girl that would one day wear a purity ring before losing it the first time she drank liquor.

“I had to use the computer.”

“I have to tell him.”

Duchess loaded her voice with childlike fear. “Oh please don’t tell Daddy on me.”

“You should watch it.”

“Or?”

“You think you’re the first kids we had here?”

Duchess stared at her.

“I heard you talking to your brother. You think you’ll get placed?” Mary Lou laughed.

“Why wouldn’t we?”

“Well, Robin might. He’s young enough, decent enough. But I heard Daddy talking about you, all your troubles, who’s going to want you?”

Duchess took a step forward.

Mary Lou took a step forward. “You want to hit me, don’t you? Lash out. That’s what kids like you do.”

Duchess clenched her fist.

“Do it then.” A smile, knowing.

Duchess felt the adrenaline kick, the fire burn. And then she looked back, at the computer screen. A picture of the scene that night, the small house on Ivy Ranch Road, a blur of neighbors and reporters. And the picture beside, Cape Haven PD. Walk. Smiling. Her reminder of everything good.

She slipped past Mary Lou, took a breath, and went back up the stairs.

30

WALK WOKE AT HIS DESK, sunlight found strewn papers.

He struggled to straighten, the pain so bad he almost cried out. He found pills in his drawer and swallowed two without water.

He’d had Leah order new pants, shirt, jacket. The scales told him he’d lost twenty-five pounds.

The knocking, he didn’t know how long it had gone on for but there was something frantic in it.

He staggered to his feet, tried a stretch and almost puked with the pain. He sucked down a breath, pushed his chest out and stepped from his office, and then slumped a little when he saw it was just Ernie Coughlin from the hardware store.

“Morning.” Walk opened the door to him but Ernie didn’t cross the threshold.

“The butcher. Where is he?” Ernie barked it, hands tucked into a brown apron.

Walk shook the confusion away.

“The butcher,” Ernie repeated. “It’s after seven now. He gets back from vacation, same day every year, why hasn’t the shop opened up?”

“Hunting. Archery, right? Maybe he’s taken another day.”

“Dumb bastard, chasing turkeys all over. Twenty-two years, Walk. Since he took over from his father. Twenty-two years I’ve been buying breakfast sausage from him. I take it over the road and Rosie cooks it up. Three pancakes, syrup, two cups of strong coffee.”

“Can’t you just eat the sausage Rosie buys in?”

Ernie looked at him with something like disgust.

“You see the newspaper? New homes on the edge of town.They’ll ruin this place. I take it you’ll vote against.”

Walk nodded, yawned, tucked his shirt into his pants. “I’ll go see him.”

Ernie shook his head once and then turned and left.

Back at his desk he dialed Milton but got the machine. Then he went right back to watching security tapes from Cedar Heights. Moses, on the gatehouse, had given them up without much of a fight, didn’t even ask for the kind of paperwork Walk did not possess.

There was almost no movement, but the quality was so bad he had to focus hard in case anyone left on foot. He didn’t know the timescales involved so he faced up to days of recording. He watched the day pass, the mailman, the neighbor with the Ford.