Everything to Lose

I went over what I’d told Rollie. “I’m Jeanine …” That was all. No Hilary. No last name. I knew I’d touched a couple of things—the car doors, the victim’s cell phone—but even if they were able to remove my fingerprints, they certainly weren’t anywhere in the system. Nerves suddenly wormed their way through my stomach on whether, if it came to it, Rollie could have ID’d my car.

No. I was sure. I’d parked a ways down the road.

I felt pretty safe.

Which didn’t completely eliminate my fear that the part of the county police force that wasn’t currently on site here would be waiting for me at my house.

They weren’t. Though I did let out a sigh of relief as I drove up the cul-de-sac Jim had developed and into my driveway. Only Elena was there, putting on her coat when she heard me come in through the kitchen door.

“How was he?” I asked, coming in from the garage.

“Eezy tonight, missus.” Her English wasn’t exactly the best, but she was devoted to Brandon and indispensable to me. Not to mention that my son adored her. “Heez in the bed.” She grabbed her bag. “I be in tomorrow at ten. And don’t worry, I pick him up at school.”

“Elena …” I was trying to decide how I should tell her. That I was going to be around for a while. That I had no idea how long I could keep her on, with her present hours. She was like part of the family to me.

“Sí, missus …?” She looked at me with those round, trusting eyes.

“Nothing. I’ll probably be here in the morning, okay?” I knew there had to be some kind of explanation. “Drive home safe.”

She smiled brightly. “Good night, Miz Cantor.”

I closed the door behind her and went through the large brick-and-glass neoclassic Jim had constructed, which was now buried in debt. I had tried to refinance it for years and pull out whatever equity I still had in it, but with home prices still down and Jim’s credit a mess, it simply wasn’t in the cards. Since Jim’s name was still on the note, he was supposed to pick up half of the $1.6 million, interest-only debt, $4,290 a month, a parting gift from the days when lenders were throwing loans at his business. Even though rates had dived in the past year, now I’d have to disclose that I no longer had a job and that Jim’s company had closed. God only knew what workout committee that would put me in. I was scared I could lose the house. In today’s market, the place might go for only 1.6, $1.7. The truth was, I couldn’t leave and I could no longer afford to stay. As it was, I was only praying that some loan officer wouldn’t be reviewing the loan and call me to tell me they were foreclosing.

“I’m home, Brand!” I shouted into his room. “I’ll be up in a minute …”

I went up to my bedroom. High ceilings, a Palladian window overlooking the pool. Which last year I didn’t even open in order to save on the cost. I pulled off my sweater and jeans and threw on the pajama bottoms and yoga T-shirt I usually crawled into bed with. In the bathroom, I pulled my bangs into a scrunchie and took off my makeup. I had short brown hair, a small nose, and wide hazel eyes that I worried were starting to show the strain of everything. I was only thirty-six, had always been told I was pretty, Natalie Portman pretty. But my days of wishing for some handsome knight were over. Everything was all in my hands now.

I went into the kitchen and put on some water for tea, then back down the first-floor hall to Brandon’s room. He was curled up in his bed, playing on his iPad. A design app called FLOW, which always intrigued him, muttering, “Tie, tie, tie, tie …” to himself, which he often did when he was in his own world.

“Hey, guy.” I sat on the corner of his bed.

He didn’t answer, just kept swirling the colorful arrows on the app with his index finger.

“Cool design!” I curled up on the bed next to him.

I always said there were two of him: Sweet Brandon and Mean Brandon. Mean Brandon was where he would say to people who were averting their eyes, “I want to cut off your head.” No matter how many times I took him aside and scolded him, telling him that it was totally inappropriate. When he was four we had a dog, but I had to get rid of it because Brandon once tried to cut off its tail.

There was a time a few years back when I was really worried about him. Who he was inside. Who he would grow up to be. I’d read about these children with what they called C-U tendencies. Callous and unemotional. Kids who seem to carry the gene or the early dispositions that turn them into psychopaths. At times Brandon showed some of the signs. I read about things like the Child Psychopathy Scale and the Inventory of Callous-Unemotional Traits and the Antisocial Process Screening Device. In a particularly defiant stage, I even had him tested. But when everything was in, Brandon tested within only one standard deviation from the norm. Nothing to worry about, I was told.

Sweet Brandon won out.

“Tie, tie, tie, tie, tie …,” he droned to himself. I leaned down and stroked his hair.

Then all of a sudden: “Where were you?”

At times his questions seemed to come from out of nowhere.

“I was just out, hon. On some business.” No chance in the world I would tell him that I was with his dad. “What’d you do tonight?”

He didn’t answer, just kept swirling his finger around on the screen, making his squiggly designs. “I heard you tried to teach Elena how to play.”

No response. Only a shrug.

“How did that go?”

He just kept swirling. “She doesn’t even know what an app is, Mom.”

“You remember, I didn’t either not too long ago. Any homework?”

“Some math. And I had to do some sentences. They were boring.”

“Well, one day you’ll realize that what seems boring now is when you actually learn something …” He didn’t look up and this time I couldn’t even blame him. I couldn’t believe I’d actually said something that trite and parental. I laughed at myself inside.

Once I came home and found him playing happily in the tub. These clumpy brown objects, floating amid the suds. At first I thought they were just some plastic toys he’d brought in. Until I realized in horror what it was. Feces. Brandon’s own. He was smeared in it, having the time of his life. He could also beat his head against the wall if he didn’t get his way. And bite his nails down until they bled. Luckily, a lot of this was in the past.

Before Milton Farms.

Now most of the antisocial behavior seemed to be under control.

“C’mon, let’s climb into bed,” I said, taking the iPad away, praying that he wouldn’t grab for it back and act up. I couldn’t handle that tonight.

But tonight he was Sweet Brandon.

He said, “I did a drawing. Wanna see?”

“How about I look at breakfast tomorrow? Right now it’s late.”

“I want to show it to you.” He jumped out from under the covers, went over to his desk, and brought back his sketchbook. He could draw anything. He had a gift. He just saw things that way. The sketchbook was basically filled with the same kinds of drawings. Monsters and underworld creatures that looked as if they had crawled out of someone’s ghoulish imagination. Mean Brandon, maybe. At first I was concerned. With how he acted sometimes and what was clearly going on in his imagination. It was all pretty dark. And always the same things: these creatures. But the doctors all said it was just a sign of a fertile imagination and not to worry. This one had a horse’s snout, the extended ears of an elf, two legs, scaly skin, and malevolent devilish eyes.

“Jeez, Brand, where do you come up with these things …?”

“He’s called Polydragon. Someone at school said my brain is in another dimension.”

“You’re not in another dimension, Brand …” I took the sketchbook and laid it on the table, wrapped the covers back around him, and cuddled closely. “You’re here. With me. I know that I’m not in another dimension. So you can’t be either. Sorry, dude. Maybe once you could draw a picture of the house. Or me.”

“I guess I could,” he said. “But that would be boring.”

I snuggled close to him. “Not to me.”

He smelled so sweet, the purity of everything that I imagined was good in his soul, that would one day come out. For years he barely uttered a word. He’d ask for things by pointing; he wouldn’t let go of crayons or Magic Markers. He’d simply grunt, cry, or babble gibberish. We didn’t know what was going through his head. Then one day Jim and I had the TV on, and I said, “I wonder what’s on next.” And from out of nowhere Brandon blurted, “CSI: Miami, Mommy.” We turned, flabbergasted, sure that this would open up a new chapter in our lives.

It was six months before he spoke another word.

Now look at him, drawing, holding a conversation. How could I possibly tell him he might lose it all: his school, his tutors? The only home he’d known.

“Do you ever think of going away?” I asked him, squeezing my arm around him over the sheets.

He shrugged. “I like it here.”