The woman crossed the lawn, picking animal hair out of her clothing and smiling. “Hello?” she said to us curiously. She was older than Carl by about ten years, pretty in a faded kind of way, or maybe that was just my competitive side talking.
“We’re friends of Carl’s,” Tina explained curtly.
The woman wiped her shoes on the welcome mat and opened the door, calling, “Carl! You have guests.” She held the door for us. Tina hooked her arm through mine and took me inside with her just as Carl came jogging down the stairs. The house was cramped but lovingly maintained, and though the couch cushions needed fluffing and there were several pairs of shoes heaped in a pile next to the coat rack, the place was hardly a mess, even by my standards.
“Oh, okay. Yeah.” Carl was flustered. “Hey, Lynette,” he said to the woman as they passed each other on the stairs. The whole exchange was befuddling to me. Their dynamic did not seem romantic in the least, and yet they had to live together; otherwise, she wouldn’t feel comfortable going upstairs on her own. Roommates, maybe. His sister?
“There’s coffee made,” Carl said, clearly wanting to avoid the subject of Lynette. I had so many questions for him that I knew I had to pick my battles, and Lynette was not one worth fighting.
“That would be great,” Tina said. We followed him into the kitchen, sun-warmed via a sliding glass door that would be so easy to shatter. I stared at that glass door, quietly seething at the discrepancy in our threat levels, that Carl could write the fawning twaddle he did only because his was tuned so low.
“Milk? Sugar?” Carl asked, stalling before the open refrigerator.
“Sugar,” I said.
“Black,” said Tina.
Carl placed a dented box of white sugar on the kitchen table and poured us each a mug. Cold. On top of being a turncoat, he was a lousy host. This was the thing that undid me.
“What’s going on, Carl?” I asked bluntly. “You’re avoiding my calls. You stopped answering my letters. And what you’re writing about him—I thought journalists were supposed to be unbiased.”
Carl returned the carafe to the coffeemaker and faced me slowly. “Do you not see, Pamela”—he was speaking in this pandering tone that made me want to throw my cold coffee in his face—“the irony in saying that to me when you’re so clearly biased?”
“You wrote that he was working his way through law school,” I pandered right back. I didn’t need to scream and shout; I didn’t even need to raise my voice, the facts were that loud. “But working where?” I made my eyes big—this wasn’t a rhetorical question. I wanted him to give me an answer.
“I’d have to check my notes,” he said.
Tina groaned like someone had made a corny joke.
“I’ll save you the trouble,” I said. “He was collecting unemployment checks, Carl. And stealing antique rugs from nice hotels on the side.”
Carl shrugged in a pouty way that eradicated everything I’d once found attractive about him.
“You also said he’s personable and bright,” I continued acerbically, “with a girlfriend and many friends who believe he is innocent. But his girlfriend was the one who called the tip line on him.” I paused, in case he had a response to this, knowing he would not. His face was baby pink by the time I got to the inarguable kicker: “If this is the route you’re going to go, painting him as some kind of legal shark, at least have a word with your photo editor. It’s disrespectful to be sitting on the counsel table while addressing the judge.”
Tina added disdainfully, “I called your editor, Carl. He said you pulled the Colorado piece yourself. Some bullshit like there not being much to the story after all.”
Carl didn’t deny it, confirming everything.
“Excuse me,” he retorted, “are you with me in the courtroom, seeing what I see every day? Have you spoken to any of his friends and family? Have you spoken to—” He broke off huffily. “Forget it. I don’t have to explain myself to you.”
I gasped. “Are you speaking to him?” That’s what he was about to say, I was certain of it.
“We’ve exchanged a few letters,” Carl admitted.
Tina stared at him like he was the most repugnant person she’d ever shared oxygen with.
“You said the person who did what he did to Denise deserved to burn,” I reminded him, hot tears blurring my vision. I had trusted him, and I was ashamed of how little it had taken. Green eyes. One fair article in the paper about Denise. Carl ducked his head, sweeping breakfast crumbs into his hand and dusting them into the trash can. Then he wiped down the counter with a dampened dish towel for good measure. I knew a thing or two about cleaning to avoid facing oneself.