“The house here doesn’t have a TV,” Marcus said.
“What?” LaTisha said. “You’re kidding, right? They don’t have TV? God, Marcus, what do you do all day? And at night?”
“I swim during the day, and you know, sit on the beach. I read. Listen to music. Hang out…” He almost said, Hang out with Winnie, but he caught himself. “I relax.”
Suddenly, LaTisha’s voice grew suspicious. “You’re calling Dad because you want to come home, right? Geez, Marcus, I don’t blame you. You must be bored to death. Well, I’ll be happy if you come home. I miss you. This place sucks when you’re not here. Pop is practically never home and I have this ridiculous curfew. Eight o’clock. It’s not even dark at eight o’clock. And if he’s not here he has Mrs. Demetrios check on me. I’m almost thirteen, for God’s sake!” She paused to catch her breath and Marcus pictured her young face and her skimpy braids. When Constance first went to jail, LaTisha cried all the time because Mama wasn’t there to do her hair. “I thought I might make a little money this summer, but nobody calls me to baby-sit anymore. They probably think… well, who knows what they think.”
“They probably think you’re going to kill their children,” Marcus said.
“Yeah,” LaTisha said, as though this were something she had realized and accepted long ago. “Anyway, things would be better if you came home.”
“I’m not coming home,” Marcus said. As bad as shit was, at least he wasn’t frying on the griddle of hot city blocks, or worse, trapped inside, supervising his sister, watching reruns of Three’s Company and begging the air conditioner to do a better job. He felt sad about this-home should be a place you wanted to run to no matter what. It should be a refuge. “I just wanted to check in is all.”
“Well, as much as I told you I was glad to get rid of your ass this summer, I’m really not. It feels like everyone is dropping out of this family.”
“I’m not dropping out,” Marcus said.
“I know,” LaTisha said. “It just feels that way.”
“You should… read more,” Marcus said. “Go to the library.”
“Library?” LaTisha said. “Now you sound like Mama.” Before Marcus could assert his obvious difference from their mother, LaTisha added, “I’ll tell Pop you called. You’ll call back-when?”
“Soon,” Marcus promised. “I’ll talk to you later, sis. Okay? Tell Ernestine I said hello.”
He hung up the phone then looked out at the charming Nan-tucket street. He was a person who belonged nowhere.
A few days later, there was a knock on Marcus’s bedroom door. Marcus had his legal pad out and was jotting down notes, if not actual sentences. It hardly mattered to Marcus-he was so relieved to have words on the page, even if those words had no more meaning than entries in a dictionary: “Princeton University,” “smack,” “petty theft,” “child prostitution,” “anger,” “social services,” “intent to kill???” Now that the ball was rolling, or if not rolling than at least moving, of course there would be an interruption. Marcus tucked the legal pad under his white pillows and grumbled, “Come in.”
It was Beth, a fact that both relieved and disappointed him. She looked awful-thin and desiccated like a plant that needed watering. She gave him a smile, though, and held out an envelope. Marcus’s first thought was, Another telegram. Leave me alone, man.
“From Constance,” she said.
Even worse! A fourth letter from Mama.
“Okay,” he said. “Thanks.” He took the envelope from Beth and dropped it on the bed in front of him as though he planned to read it once Beth left. Beth, however, remained in the doorway smiling at him. Then her friendly smile turned into a worried smile and she said, “Can I talk to you for a minute?”
This was the last thing he wanted, though he was surprised it had taken her so long to confront him. Garrett and Winnie had joined forces and so it only made sense that Beth and Marcus would do the same. Except neither of them wanted to. Marcus was used to being cast out on his own-that, after all, was what he’d expected from the summer: the twins wrapped up in their own exclusive cocoon, Beth lost hopelessly in the outer space of her grief. As for Beth, well, she believed she understood her kids well enough to know that whatever was bugging them would pass. But now their bizarre aloofness had lasted more than a week and showed no signs of abating. She needed help.
Beth closed the door to Marcus’s bedroom and sat on his bed. The letter from Constance lay between them, a boundary.
“I was just wondering,” she said, “if maybe you knew what was going on. In this house, I mean. With the kids. Winnie and Garrett. Their behavior. This isn’t like them.”
Marcus lowered his eyelids, an involuntary sign for her to stop. Obviously he knew what she was talking about; he wasn’t an idiot. The question was whether Marcus was going to tell her the bad news. He considered the consequences. If he told Beth the truth-that her secret was out-Winnie would never forgive him. Furthermore, the workings of this family were none of his business. He felt badly for Beth-yes, he did-but he couldn’t speak.
He shrugged.
Beth hooked his gaze, trying to pry him open with her eyes. “Winnie hasn’t said anything to you?”
“Winnie hasn’t said anything to me,” he repeated. “In about ten days.”
“They’re pushing us away,” Beth said. “It’s not like they’re openly hostile, but I’m beginning to feel like their butler. Know what I mean? I’ve been thinking of inviting our therapist to come for the weekend. Kara Schau-you’d like her.”
The therapist. Marcus supposed that’s what rich people did when they had family troubles-invited the therapist for the weekend. He shook his head, then eyed the letter.
“I’d like to be alone now,” Marcus said. “I don’t mean to kick you out of a room of your own house, but I really do want to be alone.”
What could Beth do but respect his wishes? She stood up to go.
“You’ll let me know if you learn anything?” she said.
The woman was just begging him to lie to her. Sometimes, he supposed, that was what people needed.
“Sure,” he said.
That night, Winnie went to the movies with Garrett and Piper. They didn’t invite Marcus along, and it took Beth to ask, “Isn’t Marcus going with you?”
They didn’t answer her, and Marcus quickly stated that he wanted to stay home. He went upstairs to his bedroom, listening through his open window to Winnie’s voice, her laughter, the sound of the car doors slamming. He felt so angry with her, and yet their separation didn’t seem to bother her at all. As the Rover drove off, Marcus pulled Constance’s most recent letter from the inside of his dock shoe and opened it. He decided he would read it, then throw it in the trash.
July 24
Dear Marcus,
Through everything I have never stopped loving you. I will wait as long as it takes.
Mama
Marcus crumpled the letter and threw it at the mirror. “It’s bullshit!” he said, louder than he meant to. “Bullshit!”
The fury in his voice bounced back at him from the white walls of his room. Beth was somewhere in the house but she didn’t call up to him. He opened the other letters; they all said basically the same thing: I love you, child… I think of you every… I pray to hear the sound of your voice…
“It’s bullshit!” Marcus shouted. God, it felt good to yell. It felt good to let go for once. At home, his father and sister would have been frightened, not to mention baffled, by his anger. He ripped the letters in half, though he yearned to destroy them more permanently-with fire or water. He stuffed the pieces of paper back into his dock shoe then threw the shoe at the door of his room, a fast ball. He pulled his notebook out of the drawer, tore out the single page that constituted the sum of his work this summer and started a fresh page.