House of Glass

“How’s Livvy?”

“Okay, I think. I think I convinced her that they weren’t here to hurt anyone.”

“I just wish I knew if they were coming back. I mean, maybe they just took what they wanted and left already.”

“No, they would have had to bring a car to load it all, and gone through the garage, unless they were really stupid. We would have heard the garage door. Besides, I hear them moving around up there.”

“Oh.” Jen tried to keep the disappointment from her voice. Why were they still in her home? “Maybe they’re just waiting until everyone’s in for the night, so they don’t call attention to themselves.”

“Maybe. Though pulling up a car late at night has its own risks, if someone sees them. They’d be more likely to notice a strange car at three in the morning.”

“Who’s up at three in the morning?” Jen demanded, and then wished she hadn’t, because the look Ted gave her conveyed what they both knew: that she was up at that hour as often as not. Lately, sleeping through the night had been nearly impossible for her; her doctor said it might be from perimenopause.

“I think we need to prepare for the possibility that we might be stuck here overnight,” Ted said.

“Oh, my God—there’s no way. They can’t just leave us down here—”

Ted reached for her, gently pushing the hair from her eyes, tilting up her face to look at him. “I know, sweetheart, I know.” His voice was heavy with emotion. “But maybe the kids can get some rest, if we just try to make it seem as normal as possible.”

“There’s nothing normal about this!” Jen felt the panic nipping at her. She wasn’t sure she could keep acting like nothing was wrong—pretending even for a few minutes with Teddy had exhausted her.

“We can do this,” Ted said as though sensing what she was feeling. “Together. We’ll stay busy and keep our minds off it, okay? And you’re right—they could leave at any time. And meanwhile we can move stuff around to make it comfortable down here for the kids. We can set it up kind of like it used to be upstairs.”

Jen looked around her at the crowded shelves, the furniture stacked up near the wall. When they’d bought the new living room furniture a couple years ago, Ted decided to sell the old stuff on Craigslist and dragged it all down to the basement, where it sat gathering dust. It had been one of their first arguments after he was laid off: Jen asked if he couldn’t finally get rid of all that junk now that he had time on his hands.

“Okay,” she whispered, because she couldn’t think of anything better to do, especially since Livvy and Teddy were occupied with the play set, and she didn’t want to interrupt and risk upsetting them.

First they took down the old dining room chairs, fussy dark walnut things with uncomfortable thin red damask cushions, and lined them up along the basement wall. The love seat was heavy and narrowly missed crushing Jen’s toe as it slid to the floor. They lifted the old coffee table down and set it next to the kids on the carpet.

Ted searched the shelves for the nonperishable food he thought he’d stored during his emergency preparedness phase, and Jen dug out the old quilts her grandmother had made. She found them packed in a box on a high shelf, and laid them out on the sofa. Livvy looked up from the floor.

“We’re going to sleep down here?” she asked, and then before Jen could answer, “What’s Daddy doing?”

Jen followed her gaze. Ted was at the top of the stairs with a flashlight and a screwdriver. Little light carried up the stairs, and his face was shadowed as he poked around at the knob.

Fear constricted Jen’s throat. If Ted managed to get the door open, he could get himself shot—or even worse, he might enrage the men upstairs, and invite their wrath on all of them. Before she could react, the door crashed open, sending Ted scrambling. The flashlight and screwdriver clattered down the wooden steps, and Ted cursed, falling a few steps until he was able to right himself by grabbing the handrail.

The door banged against the wall and swung back. A man stood in the door frame, but Jen couldn’t tell if it was Dan or Ryan. Something glinted dully, but Jen didn’t realize it was a gun until it had gone off, the report echoing dully. The man disappeared back into the hall, slamming the door shut behind him.

Jen raced up the steps. She heard Livvy screaming and the sound of the key turning on the other side of the door. Ted was holding his shin, muttering. Blood trickled down his forearm.

“What happened? Are you hurt?” Jen heard the panic in her own voice and knew the kids could hear it, too. She forced herself to stay calm.

“I’m fine.”

“But the gun—he shot—”

“Didn’t hit me. This is just from running into the handrail. I think he was just aiming for the wall.” Ted grimaced, wiping at the blood with the tail of his shirt. In the poor light Jen couldn’t see how bad it was. “Trying to make a point, I guess.”

“Daddy, come down here!” Livvy wailed frantically, and behind her, Teddy started to cry.

“I’m fine, I’m fine,” Ted said, getting up painfully and holding on to the handrail. Jen did her best to help him down the steps, as he favored his bruised hip. In the light she could see that the gash on his forearm wasn’t bad.

Livvy seized her father’s good arm. “Daddy, you can’t go up there! They could have killed you!”

“No, that was just...laying out the rules,” Ted said, managing a tight smile. “They never meant to hurt me. They’re not killers.”

“How do you know that?” Livvy demanded as Jen went to Teddy, lifting him into her arms.

“They’re just not.” Jen knew Ted was trying to reassure Livvy, to convince her they were safe. But even if the men fired this time as a warning, how could he be sure that next time they wouldn’t shoot to kill? “I don’t know what they want, but if they were going to hurt us they would have done it already. They’re probably just trying to figure out what’s worth taking.”

Teddy whimpered against Jen’s neck, and she rocked him, trying to calm him, feeling guilty about the lie she’d told him.

“That was scary, wasn’t it?” she asked quietly. “I don’t think I like this game anymore, do you?”

Teddy shook his head against her neck. She felt the dampness of his tears against her skin. Looking around the room for something to distract him with, she had an idea.

“Let’s do the wash, okay?” she said. “Do you want to help?”

Teddy stopped snuffling and allowed her to put him down. “Laundry baseball,” he said, running for the basket of soiled towels.

Laundry baseball was a game Jen had invented to keep Teddy occupied. She tossed items from the dirty laundry pile to him, and he batted them with a hollow plastic bat, sorting them into dark and light piles. She always had to sort them again afterward, but the sound of his laughter more than made up for the extra effort.

Teddy found his bat under the folding table and swung it. Jen tossed the washcloths to him, and he batted them to the ground. She poured the detergent into the plastic cup and picked him up so he could empty it into the receptacle. They put the towels in together, and Jen held him so he could press the start button, and he watched as the water began to spray against the convex round window.

She backed away cautiously, making sure he was truly distracted. He’d often stay rapt through most of the cycle when she let him, watching the slap of the drenched towels, the sloshing of the suds and waves of water.

Ted and Livvy were picking the toys up off the floor and putting them back into the box, both looking dazed. Jen crouched next to Livvy and touched her shoulder, making her jump. “You’re doing fine, sweetheart,” she murmured. “You’re so good with Teddy. I’m so glad you’re here for him.”

Livvy picked up the toys one at a time and tossed them into the box, her lips moving slightly, as if she were talking to herself.

“Let’s let Livvy finish this up,” Jen said pointedly. Ted straightened up and they went back to the corner of the basement.

“What were you thinking?” Jen hissed, the moment she judged herself out of range of Livvy hearing. “That was a crazy chance to take, Ted. You could have—”

Ted held up his hands to stop her. “I know, I know, I’m sorry. It was...” He swallowed, looked away. “I thought maybe I could... I thought if something happened, I could at least hold them off long enough, and you and the kids—” He slammed his fist into the sleeping bags stored on the shelf, making the shelves shake.

“Ted, don’t!” But Livvy hadn’t looked up. She had slumped against the coffee table, and she was trying to untangle a length of string that was attached to a toy spacecraft. “Please. I need you to keep it together. All right. I understand, you wanted to do something—”

“To stop them. To protect my family.”

“And instead, now Livvy’s twice as scared.”

“I didn’t know they were going to shoot—”

“You didn’t know? Two guys come in our house with guns and you didn’t know it was a possibility? And then telling her that they’re not going to hurt us, practically guaranteeing it, how can she trust you? She’s not stupid, Ted, she has to know how bad this is, and lying to her isn’t going to help.”

“I wasn’t lying, Jen, I just really didn’t think—don’t think—they have any intention of hurting us. If they got caught, that would make the charges against them so much worse. They know that. They aren’t some out-of-control tweakers looking for their next fix. They’ve got to have a plan.”