Aurora 08 - Poppy Done To Death (6 page)

I wondered how he had learned to do that.

“And in those notices, there was one from two girls who needed a guy to ride with them to Birmingham. They were scared they’d have a flat tire or something, and I can at least change a flat tire. I think. Anyway, Britta never had one.”

Britta. Hmm. “So they took you as far as Birmingham.”

“Yeah.” If possible, Phillip’s face was an even deeper red. I was willing to bet those girls hadn’t known his true age, either, and I was thinking even more grimly that Phillip might need a blood test. “So from Birmingham, I just rode the bus.”

“I’m glad you had the money left for that.”

“Uh, Britta and Margery chipped in on it.”

“You had a lot of adventures,” I said, smiling so I wouldn’t scream. He was lucky to be alive.

“Yeah. I think, you know, I did okay.” He seemed to know that sounding any more boastful than that would get him a good slap on the wrist.

“And all this time your parents haven’t known where you were?”

He nodded.

I could not even imagine how they were feeling.

“How long has that been?” I asked in a voice I just barely managed to keep even.

“Uh, let’s see. Two and a half days to Dallas, a half day to get the ride with Mr. Hammond, then the ride to Texarkana, where I helped him unload the truck, and then the other guy, the one in the pickup, that lasted about two hours, and I hid in the woods. . . .”

I could feel all the blood draining from my face, and I sat down on the hood of Perry’s car, which was the closest.

“Hey, Roe, don’t look so ... It wasn’t as bad as you’re probably thinking. I’d just. . . I’d never imagined . . . He probably wouldn’t have actually, uh, forced me. . . . I just freaked.”

“That’s okay. That’s what people do when they’re faced with a scary situation. Hiding was the best way to make sure you were safe,” I said reasonably, thinking I would even try calling the Psychic Friends hot line to find out who this individual was who had ripped a hole out of my brother’s life. And then I’d rip a hole out of his.

“Now,” I said briskly, “I think you’ve gotten up to four days?”

“I think so. Anyway, I did get a ride with a chartered busload of people who were going to the gambling boats at Tunica— you know, right below Memphis? But I got them to drop me off in Memphis, because I thought I probably had a better chance at getting a ride in a city. And then I met Britta and Margery.”

“So, your mom and dad haven’t known where you were for six days, give or take a day?”

“Uh, well, I called them, you know.”

I closed my eyes. Thank God.

“I called them with my phone card, from pay phones. I’m almost out of minutes on it now. I just told them I was okay. I didn’t tell them I was coming to you.”

And it had never occurred to them, because they hadn’t called me to ask me to be on the lookout. For some reason, that made me angry. My half brother is missing, and my own father can’t call me and let me know?

I realized, looking up at his young face, that Phillip was exhausted. Though I hadn’t been around for much of Phillip’s youth, due to my father’s taking him far away from me—on purpose—when Phillip was in elementary school, I was sure that Phillip had had as sheltered and middle-class an upbringing as his parents could provide in Southern California.

“Maybe they’ll let you stay for a while,” I said. “I sure would like that.”

“I’m sorry they wouldn’t come to your wedding, or your husband’s funeral,” Phillip said miserably. “I really liked Mr. Bartell, when I met him. I tried to make them let me come by myself, but they wouldn’t listen.”

“Hey, bud, that’s okay,” I said. Of course it hadn’t been, but his parents’ bad behavior wasn’t Phillip’s fault. Martin had uncomfortably excused his son, Barrett, who had done pretty much the same thing, but Martin had been quick to become angry with my father and Betty Jo: Of course, he could see that my father had hurt me. Martin and I had stopped in to see them when we’d taken a trip to California. The visit had been very uncomfortable; the only highlight had been seeing Phil-lip.

That had been what—a year and a half ago? I figured Phillip had grown five inches in that time.

“We need to talk a little more about your trip later, and we need to call your folks, and we need to put your clothes in the wash, and you, too. You don’t have any other clothes?” I was trying to sound mature and in charge, but I’d used up a lot of whatever authority I possessed when I was dealing with my errant brother-in-law.

“Uh, I left my backpack when I got out of the truck so fast,” he confessed, his eyes sliding away.

“Then we’ll take care of the clothes situation.”

“Uh, Roe, you dating now? Mom said there was something in a gossip column in one of the movie magazines.”

“Ugh. I didn’t know that. I’m sure not important enough to rate that, so it must be because of Robin Crusoe, the man I’m dating. He’s a writer. I knew him a long time ago, and he came back to Lawrenceton a couple of months back and we started going out.”

“I read
Whimsical Death
.” That was Robin’s nonfiction book, which had made a lot of money and spread his name everywhere. “So I can just hang somewhere else when he’s staying over,” Phillip told me with a man-of-the-world air.

“We’ll talk about that later. It’s not going to be a problem. And Robin’s out of town right now anyway.” But I had to call him, and right away. Robin would be hurt if I didn’t tell him about Poppy as soon as possible. “Now, let me go inside and let them know I have to take the rest of the afternoon off, and we’ll go over to my new house. I told you I’d moved, right?”

“Sure.”

“Okay, then.” I still had my purse clutched in my left hand. I dug out my car keys and pointed out the Volvo to my brother. “You go wait in there while I run in for just a second.”

“Okay,” he said.

I started in the back door of the library, wondering what kind of fool I was to give my car keys to a wandering teenager, and I prayed with all my heart that he would be there when I came back.

Explaining to Sam wasn’t easy, but then talking to Sam was becoming increasingly difficult.

Sam was getting crankier as he got older, and since he was only in his early fifties, he had a lot of room to spare. He’d lost his perfect secretary a few months before, and he hadn’t replaced her. He couldn’t find anyone who even gave a hint that someday she might be almost as good as the lamented Patricia. I wondered how Sam’s wife was taking his prolonged grief. I didn’t know her very well, but Marva had been a junior high algebra teacher a long time, and I didn’t think she’d put up with much foolishness.

To my overwhelming relief, Phillip was in the car when I opened the door. Not only was he in the car but he was sound asleep. His head was tilted back on the cushion, and when I slid into the driver’s seat, I noticed that Phillip had a few long hairs on his chin. I almost burst into tears, and that would have been terrible. I drove to my house as gently as anyone can drive, and when we got there, I maneuvered my little brother (now only chronologically smaller) into the kitchen from the garage, and then into the guest bedroom. He was just barely awake.

“You get into the shower, and then you climb in the bed. I’ll wash your clothes while you’re asleep,” I said. “I’ll even call your mother for you, if that’s okay.”

“Would you?” Phillip was transparently grateful for that. I probably should not have offered, but I couldn’t let them worry a minute longer than necessary about their son, and he was clearly in no shape for an emotional confrontation.

I kept a robe hanging in the closet in the guest room. I pointed it out to Phillip, who looked at it as if he’d never seen such a garment before. I left to give him a little privacy, and in a short time I heard the shower running—and running, and running, and running. Just when I was about to go into the bathroom to see if he’d drowned, the water cut off. I caught a glimpse of Phillip shuffling from the bathroom back into the bedroom, the robe swathed around him. His clothes—and two towels—were in a heap on the floor of the steamy bathroom, and I automatically went through the pockets of his grimy blue jeans so I wouldn’t wash anything I wasn’t supposed to.

I fished out his wallet, a couple of wadded tissues, a pocketknife, some loose change, and two sealed condoms.

Okay, I was horrified. Legally, my brother couldn’t even drive by himself!

I had to sit down and collect myself for a minute. I was reacting as if I were Phillip’s mother—and I was old enough to be Phillip’s mother—but I
wasn’t
. I was his big sister. Phillip had a perfectly functional mother, who admittedly thought I was the devil incarnate, but other than that, she seemed to be a reasonable woman.

I realized that in all the fluster of his arrival I hadn’t asked Phillip exactly why he’d turned up on my doorstep. He’d said that my dad had cheated on his mother, which was all too easy to imagine, but that just didn’t seem like a motivation for hitchhiking across the country. I thought something more must have happened for Phillip to taken such drastic action . . . though it probably hadn’t seemed as scary to Phillip as it would to me, I suddenly realized. At his age, maybe Phillip didn’t appreciate the evils of the world.

On the other hand, he had discovered at the age of six that bad things could and did happen to him, and I didn’t know if that was a lesson that could be forgotten, no matter how young the learner. When he’d lived in Atlanta, I’d kept him for the weekend fairly often, so my dad and Betty Jo could have some couple time. And I’d enjoyed that a lot. But one weekend, Phillip had been abducted while he’d been staying with me, and he would have been killed in a horrible way if I hadn’t shown up when I did; actually, if it hadn’t been for Robin, Phillip and I both would have been killed. I’d bought us a little time, and the crisis had passed, but since then, my dad and Betty Jo had acted as though I’d caused the incident. They’d maintained that seeing me would further traumatize Phillip, and by moving to California and finding jobs there, they’d made sure I’d have to keep my distance. I’d only renewed un-monitored contact with my brother when he’d gotten his own computer. The first person he’d sent an E-mail to—after about twenty of his best friends—had been me. I’d been so proud.

It was time to face the music, whatever tune might be playing today. I looked up my dad’s home number and punched it in.

“Hello?” The voice was Betty Jo’s, and she was strung tightly.

“It’s Aurora,” I said. “I have Phillip.”

“Oh thank God!” Betty Jo burst into tears. “Phil, pick up the other phone. Phillip’s at your daughter’s!”

“Is he okay?” my father asked.

“He seems to be fine. He’s asleep right now.” I hesitated, then decided Phillip’s adventures were his to relate. “I told him I was calling you.”

“How did he get there? What—did you ask him to come see you? We checked his computer, and we found out he’d been sending you E-mails.”

Strike. I rolled my eyes, though no one was there to get the effect. “Then you know that I didn’t invite him here. I would never do that without talking to you first. As far as I can tell, this was completely his idea. He said there was trouble at home.” Counterstrike.

There was a long period of silence, way over there in California.

“Well, not to get into it now,” my dad began, and Betty Jo said sharply, “He walked in on Phil while Phil was sticking it to another woman. Well, not even a woman. A
girl
.”

This was more than I wanted to know, but it did explain Phillip’s extreme reaction. I was willing to bet Phillip knew the girl.

“You two have to work out your own problems. I don’t want to hear the graphic details,” I said flatly. “Let Phillip stay here for a while, okay? I’d love to have him, and this house is big.”

“But you have a boyfriend now,” Betty Jo protested.

“If you’re accusing me of setting a bad example by perhaps sleeping with my steady friend from time to time, well, I think Phillip already knows about the birds and the bees. Especially in view of what you just told me.” Hell, he already
engages
in sex, I thought.

“He would have this week off for Thanksgiving anyway,” Betty Jo said. For once, she sounded subdued. “So, maybe if he could stay for a week... we may work things out, at least decide what we’re going to do.”

“That might be a good thing,” my father said cautiously. “Thanks, Doll.”

I hated being called “Doll.” But he’d always called me that, and he wasn’t going to change now.

“If you need longer, he can go to school here,” I said, as if accomplishing that would be a snap of the fingers. Of course, I hadn’t the faintest clue how to enroll a teenager for school, but how hard could it be?

“Okay,” said Betty Jo. “Okay.” She sounded as though she were trying to persuade herself that this was a good idea. “I can’t believe he went all the way across the country on his own.

When I think of what could have happened to him . . .”

“Roe, thanks,” my father said. For the first time, he talked to me like I was an adult. “I know you’ll take care of him. I bet he just needs someone to talk to.”

“I’ll bet that’s it,” I said, trying to sound reassuring. “He’ll be fine. I’ll watch out for him.”

“No new murders, right?” my father asked nervously.

Not since this morning.

“No, Dad,” I said, as if that was silliest idea I’d ever heard. “Ha ha ha.”

“Say hello to your mother for us,” Betty Jo said, a sop toward courtesy. “And have Phillip call us himself the minute he gets up.”

“He has a lot to answer for,” my father said grimly.

“So do you!” Betty Jo told him. “Good-bye, Roe.”

I was so glad to end the conversation, I almost danced.

The rest of my family was probably wondering where I was. I made a face in my bedroom mirror. When I’d gotten up that morning, my most pressing problem had been whether or not my only pair of intact panty hose was clean.

While Phillip slept, I’d checked Robin’s itinerary and then called him at a store called Murder by the Book, in Houston. The young man who’d answered the phone had been very civil about getting Robin to the phone as soon as he’d been convinced I actually knew Robin and was not a crazed fan who’d dreamed up a clever way to talk to him.