Go ahead, said Eli, ask your mom about Santa.
So he did.
People who don’t believe in Santa don’t get presents. That was his mom’s answer. Which even Oliver knew was not an answer.
He pressed. Do you swear to god there’s a Santa?
His mom just looked away. We can believe in all sorts of things that we can’t see or touch. Santa isn’t real or not real. He’s magic.
Magic.
Was magic real?
Why so many questions? his mom wanted to know. He told her about Eli and watched her make the face she made when she was really mad about something and was trying to pretend that she wasn’t.
You know what? she said. There is always going to be someone who will try to take the sparkle out of your life. Don’t let him. Okay? Just enjoy the stories, and for now don’t worry about what’s real and isn’t real. Deal?
He took the deal because he liked getting presents and Easter baskets and money from the Tooth Fairy. But it was clear that Eli, even if he was a bully and sparkle stealer, was right.
They lied.
As Oliver hovered outside the door, Stephen in front of the television, he listened to his parents talking to the strangers. His dad lied about the cut on his head. He lied about the wall. He was probably lying about the cabinets—because his dad was not a handyman. And even the wall project was kind of a joke because he really did suck at things like that. Oliver’s pine derby car had been the worst of everyone’s, really bad. But he didn’t care because they had fun doing it. And Stephen put google eyes on it and it was wobbly and really funny. So, no one would call Dad to help with a home repair project.
Mom lied about everything being all right—her voice all high and her smile fake.
She’d lied about Dad’s boys’ weekend.
And Dad lied about the doorbell. He told the police that it didn’t record. But he told Oliver and Stephen that it did, that all the cameras did. That’s how his dad knew every bad thing they were doing—even when he wasn’t there. That’s what he told Oliver and Stephen, anyway.
I’m always watching! he’d say in a scary voice, then monster-chase them down the hall, everyone screaming.
Was he lying then? Or was he lying now?
Oliver moved closer to the door. If he was quiet and still, his parents forgot he was there. Like now.
Geneva hadn’t come to take them to school today. And Mom was still home. And Dad was that way he was when other guys were around—kind of too loud, laughing a lot. And something was wrong.
Oliver had watched Geneva leave the house on Friday, the way he watched her leave every night from his bedroom window. He even recorded it on his iPad, because that’s what he and Stephen had been doing that afternoon in their room when they weren’t fighting. They were taping each other on this app that played your recording in reverse, so that you flew back up on the bed, or ran backward through the door. Then they were doing slow motion videos to make their stuffed animals look like they were flying. So when he watched Geneva, he hit Record.
He wondered where she went when she left them; he tried to imagine where she lived.
He’d asked her: Where do you live? In a house?
In a castle, she told him, high on a hill.
No, you don’t, he said. There are no castles around here.
Aren’t there?
Do you have a pet dragon? asked Stephen.
That’s a stupid question, Oliver told him. She doesn’t live in a castle. She doesn’t have a dragon.
Geneva laughed. Her eyes were glittery, her lips a glistening pink. She had a lot of freckles and her cheeks were always flushed pink. I just live in an apartment, silly boys. About twenty minutes from here.
Are you married?
Do you have children?
A dog?
Nope. Nope. Nope.
Do you get lonely? Living all by yourself?
Geneva was serving them grilled cheese sandwiches with apple slices. She put a plate in front of each of them. Oliver liked the way she cut the sandwich diagonal just like his mom did. Dad cut them in rectangle halves, or not at all. Just a big square on the plate. Sometimes he didn’t melt the cheese all the way. Or he burned one side because he got distracted by his phone.
How could I get lonely when I have you? she said.
Stephen was satisfied with this. But Oliver liked to watch faces. He could see that her eyes were sad.
I think you do live in a castle, he said to cheer her up. Because you’re as pretty as a princess.
She touched a soft hand to his cheek, smiled. And you’re a very sweet boy.
He didn’t remember what happened next, because they were on to something else. But every night when she left, he watched her go, wondering where she went. And why she was sad.
The last time, he’d watched her all the way to her car. When she got to her car, she stopped and turned around, as if something had gotten her attention. She clutched her bag to the front of her body and frowned. Said something—her mouth was moving. Then she walked out of sight, away from her car. There was someone else on the street, but he couldn’t really see; the big oak in his yard mostly blocked his view. He tried to get a better look.
Then Stephen tackled him because he was hiding the remote, and his mom broke it up again, and they were punished for a while. His iPad, which he’d left recording in the windowsill, was shut off and taken away from him. He forgot all about Geneva.
But when he looked out his window later, her car was still there. At bedtime, he’d tried to tell his mom, but she wouldn’t let him talk.
The car was there all weekend. Which he thought was strange. But grown-ups did lots of strange things that they didn’t always bother to explain. And he forgot about that, too.
Now, he had the uneasy sense that he’d done something wrong, something that would result in having his iPad taken away from him.
As he stood outside the doorway and listened to his parents lie to the strangers, he wondered if maybe he should say something—about how he’d recorded Geneva leaving. But then he just didn’t.
Words didn’t always come out right. And he’d gotten in trouble for saying things he shouldn’t say—like the time he told Mom that Dad slept in his underwear on the couch, in the daytime when she was working. Or that Dad had let them eat toaster waffles for dinner or watch a movie that gave Stephen nightmares. Hey, buddy, his dad said. There’s a bro code. Don’t rat out your old man to your mom. It’s not cool.
Not cool.
That, according to Eli, was the worst thing you could be.
So he just stayed quiet. And when the strangers were finally gone, he was glad. He hoped that they wouldn’t come back. And that tomorrow Geneva would return from her castle and everything would go back to normal.
THIRTEEN
Selena
Lies are a virus. They spread, replicate. One lie breeds more. Selena’s mother always said that, usually when talking about Selena’s father. You have to keep lying to protect the original lie. The idea bounced around Selena’s head now as she watched from the walkway, knowing she should go back inside but frozen.
The detectives crossed the street, wind tossing leaves across the lawn, sun dipping behind clouds. Feeling eyes on her, she turned to see Graham standing in the window, his form dark, face in shadows. Once the cops had left, he’d dropped that genial facade he put on so well. He’d turned sullen, wouldn’t look at her, returned inside.