Salvatore pulled over. He looked at himself in his rearview mirror: grizzled, perspiring, old. He was an adult. With adult responsibilities. He tried to dispel the thought of the mother of a murder suspect with her lips opening to his. Her tongue.
-2-
Barton Hills Mamas
CHARDONNAYISMYJAM
Does anyone know how early a child can be tested for dyslexia? Lulu Rosemary is three and when I do her letter work in the mornings, she consistently thinks the “B” is a “P”！ I’m so freaked out but I don’t want to scar her by seeming alarmed. I try to be low-key and gently correct her. I know BHE has a great dyslexia specialist （part of the reason we moved here from Boston in the first place!）。 Can I contact her now? I do feel it’s important to intervene early so Lulu Rosemary doesn’t fall behind. Help!
LIBRARIANMUM
I think what’s important now is for you to read to Lulu Rosemary and instill a love of books. The rest will fall into place! Join us at “Story Time” at the Twin Oaks Branch of the Austin Public Library every morning at ten!
TESLALUVR
I just want to say that for those of you who imply that Barton Hills is all rich white people, you can see above that a librarian can afford to live here! It’s a mixed community!
LIBRARIANMUM
Ha, true, but my husband was #3 at Uber and is now retired. You might see him around the neighborhood on his recumbent bike! He has a new, unfortunate man bun.
KRISTA-G
Ladies! Newsflash! I live next door to one of the older moms in the ’hood, Liza Bailey. （OG rancher and I think she rents, single mom—not saying that’s bad!） Her 15-year-old son, Charlie, is a lifeguard at Rosewood. Super-nice kid, he plays soccer with the twins out front sometimes and not even paid. Anyway, there was a cop car on our street and a hot cop was just lurking around her lawn!
CHARDONNAYISMYJAM
Hot cop alert! Much more interesting than Lulu Rosemary’s probable dyslexia!
KRISTA-G
#waitingwithbatedbreath
-3-
Whitney
JULES WAS FURIOUS AGAIN. He drove with a cool precision, switching lanes soundlessly, too fast. “Please slow down,” said Whitney.
“I’m in a bit of a hurry to get to our lawyer’s office so he can handle this disaster,” said Jules.
“It’s not a disaster!” cried Xavier from the backseat of the Mercedes. He was still in his running clothes; his father had told him to get the hell in the car and had then screamed for Whitney to join them. They’d left Roma asleep in her room.
“Calm down,” said Whitney. “What happened?”
“I’m having a coffee, scanning the security system,” started Jules, his voice growing louder and louder, “and there’s my own son talking to a police officer in front of the main gate!”
“Honey,” said Whitney, turning around to face Xavier, “why did you talk to the policeman?”
“I was finishing my run,” said Xavier. “And he was parked in front of the house. I didn’t know he was a policeman! I thought maybe he was lost or something. I just…I didn’t do anything. Why are you acting like I’m guilty? Do you think I killed her? Dad? Mom? Do you think that about me?”
“Of course we don’t!” said Whitney.
“We’re just trying to keep you safe,” said Jules. “And they don’t make you give a DNA sample if you’re not a suspect.”
“Honey,” said Whitney, trying to placate her husband. “Xavier didn’t do anything and he wanted to tell the detective exactly that. We don’t need to make this a bigger deal than it is. He hasn’t been accused of anything and he hasn’t been arrested.”
“Do you understand the optics here?” said Jules, his tone black.
“Oh my God,” said Whitney. “The optics. Can you hear yourself?”
“I hate you sometimes, Whitney,” he said.
“Dad!” said Xavier, from the backseat.
“I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I just…I’m under a lot of pressure. What I don’t need is my son being led off in handcuffs.”
“I wasn’t in handcuffs, Dad!” said Xavier. “Why doesn’t anyone ask me what happened?”
Whitney turned around to face him. “I’m sorry, sweetheart,” she said. “What happened?”
“OK,” said Xavier, his voice becoming grave. He took a breath. “So we were going to jump the Cliffs—”
“You didn’t even know her,” interrupted Jules.
“Of course he didn’t,” agreed Whitney.
“It’s like I’m not even here!” said Xavier. “I’m trying to tell you—”
“You didn’t have any idea who she was,” said Jules, cutting him off. “We talked about this, Xavier.”
“Fine,” said Xavier. His voice was low, ice-cold. “Fine,” he repeated. Whitney was silent, watching her son dim. He could turn himself off, turn inward. Whitney wanted to tell him the truth and explain that it would all be over soon.
But if she spoke, Jules would stop it.
Jules thought he was the absolute authority, which Whitney had once found comforting. But once you stopped believing your partner knew what he was doing, life was scary indeed.
-4-
Annette
TOBY TOLD ANNETTE TO go ahead and take her citizenship test, attend her naturalization ceremony, pose in the outfit her Neiman Marcus shopper had bought her: a blue-and-white, long-sleeved—but very short—Valentino dress with six-inch, fire-engine-red, tasseled Louboutin heels. No news from the Austin Police Department was good news, said Toby. DNA analysis took awhile, and besides, Robert was innocent. Toby would be in his suite at the Driskill keeping an eye on the situation.
After the citizenship test, which was complicated but rote （Annette had studied the flash cards endlessly, her friends reading the questions aloud and quizzing her, laughing that they could scarcely answer a single one）， Annette made her way down the hall to the Texas State auditorium. Some of her fellow new Americans carried tiny flags. Some cried. Many were stone-faced, conflicted, even at this final moment.
Louis and Robert and Annette’s parents waited for her in the auditorium. Annette sat in between her mother and father, who held her hands. She felt teary.
“What are you wearing?” asked Maya. Annette smoothed the skirt of the Valentino, which barely covered her underwear.
“It cost eight thousand,” she whispered to her mother and the two women began tittering.
“When you were a baby,” said Maya, trying to control her laughter, “I wrapped you in your great-aunt’s dish towel.”
“It had flowers on it,” said her father, leaning in with a smile.
“Tulips!” cried her mother, laughing hard now.
“We should have named you Tulip,” said her father.
The three of them collapsed into giggles as a man took the podium, ready to address a room of new American citizens. “What’s so funny?” said Louis, leaning in, wanting to be inside the joke.
Annette didn’t answer. Louis would pity her if he knew that she’d once been a scrawny baby in a dish towel. But it wasn’t a sad story to Annette and her parents—it was about bravery and hard work and God. Robert looked at Annette, his eyebrow raised, shooting her a grin. Her son, who had never known hardship, never been wrapped in anything but the softest fabrics. Which side of the joke was he on?