The last secret_ a novel - Mary McGarry Morris [61]
“You didn't let it happen. It's not your fault. You know Oliver. He's—”
“Intractable!” Stephen cries, and two elderly women look up, startled. “But so what? When you see the ship going down, you don't just stand there, do you? No! You damn well do something! You save the people you love!”
Yes, and a chill goes through her. You do. No matter what it takes, or how.
Stephen's cell phone is ringing. It's Donald. Stephen moves nearer the door to tell him what has happened and where he is. Stephen's voice rises. “Let someone else cover! This is where you're needed!”
Flipping open her own phone, Nora walks out to the alcove lined with vending machines. This time, Chloe answers. No, she doesn't know where her father is. She just got in from SAT tutoring and heard her mother's message on the machine. She asks how Uncle Oliver is, grows quiet when Nora says she's not really sure. It sounds like a stroke, though no one's actually said the word yet.
“A stroke,” Chloe repeats, and Nora hears the fear in her voice. “But he's going to be all right, isn't he?” she asks, like her father, needing the positive spin, even if it means being lied to. A cheerful outlook is its own strength, Ken said once when Nora complained about his lack of concern, or at least the appearance of it, during the delivery drivers' strike at the paper when Ken had been quoted as saying the stoppage was more about union politics than wages and worker dissatisfaction.
“That's bullshit,” Nora said.
“Which makes the world go round and round and round,” he laughed, his silken humor and silken life unmarred by want or pain. Until me, she thinks. Is that it? Am I the slub, the chosen flaw? Robin may have married within their circle, but he would choose a woman totally different. An outsider.
“I don't know. If it's a massive enough bleed, there could be paralysis. Or it could even be fatal,” she says, hating herself She's not even sure what she's talking about, but she's here, Ken's not, and Chloe should know that. “Could you call around, Chloe, try and find Dad? Tell him something's happened to his brother.” The unspoken message: His brother. In time of need your father's nowhere to be found. Cruel to do to her, but the child should see. In betraying their mother he betrays them all.
“Where? Who? I don't know who to call.”
“Everyone. Wherever you think he might be.”
“But haven't you?”
“Some places. Maybe you can … maybe you can call some others.”
“Okay.” Chloe's voice is small, uneasy with the mission.
“What's Drew doing?” In her rush out of the house she forgot to tell him exactly where she was going, only that Uncle Oliver was sick.
“Watching television.”
“He's supposed to be working on his term paper.”
“I'll make him turn it off. But Mom … do I have to call the Gendrons?”
Nora listens to her daughter's breathing. “Why? You think he's there?”
In the silence, she can feel Chloe's cringe. “I don't know.”
“No. That's fine. I'm sure we'll find him. Sooner or later.”
Nora and Stephen huddle in the corner. This is as far away as they can get from the coughing. Holding his head, the haggard young man opposite them leans over his knees and moans, then is wracked by a barrage of violent sneezes. Stephen covers his nose and mouth.
“This is ridiculous,” he says behind his hand. “Imagine subjecting healthy people to this.”
“You can wait outside, if you want. I'll come get you,” she says.
“Where the hell's Kenny?”
“I told you. I've been calling. I know there was a meeting with Al Bailey, the new