I didn’t slow as I passed.
I had to think. I had to remember.
It’d been raining that night, such a heavy rain. Lightning had cracked the sky as she drove away. I’d screamed out her name, but the wind had snatched it away. She was already gone anyway, red taillights in the dark.
No cigar smoke.
It was a sudden flash of knowledge.
My father liked to blow off steam by having a cigar and his favorite spot was out in front of the house. He’d sit in his favorite outdoor chair and watch what little of the main Cul-de-Sac drive was visible from that spot. I hadn’t smelled his cigar that night. Even though I’d heard the front door close twice.
It was possible the rain might’ve masked the smell, but I didn’t think so. Those things were pungent.
My hands clenched on the steering wheel so hard my knuckles showed white against skin. The rug. I couldn’t forget the missing rug. He’d been so proud of that handmade rug, having bought it on his first trip to India as an adult. “Pure silk, boy. One of a kind.” Then, suddenly, it was gone and we never talked about it.
I turned into the street that housed Pari’s private girls school. Cars lined both sides. Knowing the crush that awaited me if I got any nearer the school gates, I parked a little ways back, then got out with my cane.
Sleeping for so many hours, then sitting in Alice’s kitchen, had given my leg enough of a rest that I didn’t have any major problem making my way to the heavy iron gates. It still didn’t feel great to put my weight on it, but the doc had said I had to start trying, so I got on with it. No way in hell did I want to be stuck in my father’s house forever. Dr. Binchy had been adamant he wouldn’t release me from hospital if I was going to be living alone.
I frowned.
Why would Dr. Binchy make that demand when I was fully capable? A broken foot was hardly the injury of the century.
“Bhaiya!” The high-pitched voice cut through my thoughts, a small skinny girl running toward me. My little sister always addressed me by the Hindi word for brother. She was also one of the very few people in the world I truly liked.
I intended to settle a bunch of money on her when she turned eighteen, so she could travel or study as she liked. She was also the main beneficiary in the will my lawyer had made me draw up after my influx of cash.
The money would ensure Pari never had to bargain for her freedom.
I held up a hand so she could high-five it. Afterward, as we drove to the doughnut shop, she regaled me with tales of her day exploring the iconic cone-shaped peak of Rangitoto, the dormant volcano that sat, a majestic and quiet threat, in the Hauraki Gulf. And for a while, I forgot about bones, about a missing rug, and about why Dr. Binchy wouldn’t discharge me without reassurance that I wouldn’t be alone.
13
We ate the warm doughnuts sitting in a small park—it was edging to winter-dark even though it wasn’t yet six, but hadn’t quite crossed the line. Mothers with young children smiled at us as they gathered their offspring from the playground equipment in preparation for heading home. Having Pari with me didn’t make me immune from suspicious stares—but having Pari plus a bum leg worked wonders. A couple of the younger mothers even recognized us from previous visits and waved.
I waved back with a cheek-creasing smile.
“Honey is never wasted, Ari.” My mother, pouting in the mirror as she put on her scarlet lipstick, the color a perfect match to the fluttery red dress that she was wearing for brunch out with Diana … and Alice. “Your father snarls at everyone, and while people are polite to his face, they’ll stab him in the back at the first opportunity. Respect is one thing. Being liked and respected, that’s true power. People will do anything for you if they like you.”
Alice had been twelve years my mother’s junior. Diana, in comparison, had been thirty-seven to my mother’s forty-one when my mother disappeared. Far closer to her in age and experience. The only major difference was that my mother’d had me when she was twenty-five, while Diana had waited till thirty to start her family, but even the divide in the ages of their children hadn’t stood in the way of their friendship.
The two of them had been bonded by indestructible glue by the time Alice came along.
No wonder I’d all but forgotten that Alice had occasionally been invited to their girly dates. All of them in pretty dresses, off to champagne brunches, or to get their nails done. All three of them in my mother’s Jaguar.
“What’s wrong?”
I looked down at my sister. The big brown eyes she’d inherited from her mother almost overwhelmed her narrow face, her skin a warm shade of deep brown, and her hair a rich black Shanti had woven into two neat braids on either side of her head. She’d tied them off with ribbons that matched Pari’s school uniform.
My sister was young enough that the whole discovery of a body might fly over her head, but then again, she had more empathy in her small body than I’d ever develop, so who knew. I’d leave it up to Shanti to decide what to tell her. “My leg,” I said. “It hurts sometimes, but the doc says I have to start trying to use it.”
A smile dusted with sugar. “Your head got better. Your leg will, too.” Then she jumped off the wooden seat and asked if she could play on the swings for a while before we went home.
I nodded, but
