A policeman drove her home, the size of the houses growing with each neighborhood they passed—big, bigger, biggest. He asked her inane questions throughout the drive, like they were just two people passing the time for no particular reason at all. He could’ve been an Uber driver, except for the uniform. He asked her name, even though he already knew what it was: Violet Ramsey. He asked how old she was: Fifteen. What grade she was in: Tenth. What her favorite food was: Sushi. If she’d lived in Raleigh her whole life: Yes. The officer probably thought he was getting her mind off what was happening, but it wasn’t working.
Even as Violet answered his questions, a million questions of her own were running through her mind: Where is my mom? What did she do? What’s going to happen to her? What’s going to happen to me? She looked out the window at the familiar surroundings, keeping watch for their house to come into view, ready to spot that orange pumpkin sitting on the porch like a beacon.
The officer pulled in front of their house and put the car in park but didn’t turn off the engine. A man stood on the front porch right beside the pumpkin, waiting for them. He was a policeman, too, but he wasn’t wearing a uniform. Violet knew from cop shows on TV that that meant he was higher up in the police force, a detective or something.
Someone opened her car door, startling her. She looked up, expecting to see another cop, but instead she saw Mr. Sheridan, from their swim club. Just this summer Violet had helped his daughter learn to jump off the diving board, holding her arms up time after time as she coaxed the little girl to leap. She was four and scared, but, with time, she grew brave. By the end of the summer, she was jumping without Violet there.
Mr. Sheridan had addressed her exactly once this summer, marveling at how Violet had achieved something he could not. They’d stood side by side as they watched his daughter plunge into the water and come up grinning and shrieking, Violet, self-conscious in the new bikini Nicole had talked her into, and Mr. Sheridan, wan and paunchy in his beige swim trunks. And now here they were, blinking at each other as he extended his hand to help her out of the car. His hand was soft and meaty; her own hand disappeared inside it.
“Your mom asked me to come,” he said. Then he cleared his throat, looking pained.
“M-my mom? Asked you?” She had never seen her mother speak to Mr. Sheridan at the pool, or anywhere else for that matter.
He nodded. “I’m her attorney.” He handed her a business card as proof.
She glanced down just long enough to see “Jim Sheridan, Attorney.” Then underneath it, the words “Specializing in Criminal Defense.” She focused on just one word: criminal. He patted her back in an awkward attempt to comfort her, and she shoved the card in the back pocket of her jeans.
Mr. Sheridan pointed at the man waiting on the porch. “I think they want us to hurry this along,” he said. He gave her an apologetic look.
“Hurry what along?” she asked. Her mother’s car was in the driveway. Violet had thought they were taking her home to see her so she could explain what was happening. Obviously something was very wrong. She feared she was going to have to go inside and see her mom in handcuffs, because that was the worst thing she could imagine. But, looking at Mr. Sheridan’s face, she realized that wasn’t what they were there for.
“They’re going to escort you in so you can gather some of your belongings—things you’ll need for a few days, maybe even a week.” Her eyes widened, and he winced. “Jeez, I’m sorry. I thought they told you this already.”
“My mom’s not here?” she asked, sounding stupid, sounding like a child. She pointed at her mother’s car, parked right where she’d left it the evening before. Violet had suspected she hadn’t parked it in the garage because she wanted to carry that big heavy pumpkin right up the front sidewalk and put it on the porch. Violet had watched from her window as her mother struggled under the pumpkin’s weight and roundness. She could barely get a good grip on it and almost dropped it twice.
She’d laughed and knocked on the window at her, but her mother hadn’t heard. She hadn’t told her mom that she saw her carry the pumpkin, never even mentioned the pumpkin at all. She should’ve asked her about it that morning. She should’ve asked why she had bought a pumpkin so early. But her mom had been on her computer with her mouth pulled tight, which meant to leave her alone. Violet was thinking about the upcoming test in first period anyway. They’d barely acknowledged each other. It had been a normal morning.
“They didn’t tell you at the school?” Mr. Sheridan asked.
She shook her head. “They just said that my mom had run into some legal trouble and I had to go home.” She turned her gaze back to the pumpkin, ignoring the man standing beside it. She wondered who could carve it if her mom wasn’t there to help. She doubted she could do it by herself. “Is she in trouble with the IRS?” she asked. “Did she get audited?” Her mom talked a lot about the IRS and audits. As far as Violet knew, it was her biggest fear.
“Sons of bitches,”
