“Do you know why Shelly Schroeder cut her hair?”
“Nope.”
“This lawyer thing, is it necessary? I’m starting to feel like you don’t want to cooperate. That’s not the impression you want to give, is it?”
Despite the cold, a bead of Arlo’s sweat dripped to the table. It was possible that telling his story for a seventh time would, in some way, help his cause, but he doubted it. “Nope.”
“So tell me what’s going on. Why are you here?”
“I dunno.”
Detective Hudson stood. At last, her mask of calm cracked. She didn’t look angry and she didn’t look warm. She just looked finished. Like she’d done her diligence, and could move on to the next thing.
* * *
They were both left alone for another couple of hours, awaiting a lawyer who never showed up. Or had the police detained him? Were they allowed to do that?
Gertie broke down and cried for the second time.
Once something is said out loud, you can’t help but wonder if it’s true. If you’ve got kids, it’s your job to imagine the worst possible outcome, be it hot coffee near a baby, or slippery rocks at the beach… What if her messed-up history had blinded her to an obvious threat? What if Arlo had done harm? She thought about that, and she thought about the kids, Larry and Julia. Was there a reason Larry touched himself when nervous? They’d had him tested. It wasn’t autism or anything on the spectrum. It wasn’t low intelligence. He actually had a genius IQ and they’d told her that some especially smart kids develop social skills at a slower rate. Every expert said he’d grow out of it. Some kids develop unevenly. He was just weird, because some kids are weird.
But what if something untoward had been done to him?
Gertie’d been through so much, abused so often as a kid, that her perspective might be warped. What if it was like all the books said? She’d reproduced her own childhood without knowing it, because damaged people seek more damage?
And what of Julia? She’d accused Gertie just today of never being on her side. What had she meant by that? Was it possible that Arlo had gotten to both Julia and Shelly at some sleepover? That this had bound them, making their friendship deeper and more turbulent? It would explain their secrecy and closeness, and then the abrupt end to all that.
Were these accusations real?
She thought about herself as a girl. How scared she’d been. How she’d believed everything was her responsibility and fault. She’d never spoken unless spoken to, and even then, only ever told people what they’d wanted to hear. And she’d been good at knowing what people wanted to hear. Her life had depended on it. Larry wasn’t like that. If he got mad, you knew it. He had no problem defending himself, and given all the teasing, his self-esteem had held up pretty okay, too. Same with Julia. Together, any rooms those two walked into, they owned. You can’t have strong, happy kids if the people who are supposed to love them most are betraying them. It’s not possible.
And Arlo. Was he a hunter? Anyone could see that he had a temper. But in the years she’d known him, he’d never lost control. Gertie had come closer to spanking Julia, to grabbing Larry by the arm and forcing him out the door to get where they needed to be on time. Arlo hollered and threatened, sure. But he never hit.
The real question here: Was Arlo squirrely for little kids? Their own sex life was straightforward. Nothing experimental. But that was her fault. She had scars. It had to be her on top—the way she’d never done it with any of the men before. To make it new and her own. But so vanilla, had he gone outside for fulfillment?
He fit the profile. A cowed man, ill-used by his dad in ways that are too dark for the movies. It had made him soft and unsure. Overly agreeable in the presence of strong personalities until he felt cornered, and then he barked. But those dark feelings have to go somewhere.
Maybe they’d gone into the children.
Her heart was beating too fast. She held the table because things got swimmy. Breathed slow and imagined the smell of chocolate chip cookies until she wasn’t dizzy anymore. She came to a decision then. She had to stop thinking about this. It was making her crazy. Even if Arlo was guilty, she still had to get out of here and back to her kids.
She wiped her eyes, then Googled a practical question: “Can police detain lawyers?” But the internet was blocked in the room. So she stared at her phone, and then it occurred to her to get the hell up. The door was unlocked. No one stopped her. She went outside and under the sun, where it was warm and she stopped shivering.