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road.
She'd said her place was falling-apart old.  Thanks. The hostess smiled perkily at me.  Another
historical question, I said, turning back to her.  Did Fred Maguire ever work up here?
 Who?
 He was a one-legged war vet, lived in town.
 Oh my god, you mean there really was a One-leg Fred? She blushed.  When I was a kid they used to
tell us scary stories about how if we weren't good One-leg Fred would come out of the falls and get us.
Supposedly twenty years ago he committed suicide and all they ever found was his fake leg, floating in
the lower pond. Learn something new every day, she said.
 Sure do, I replied.
* * *
 Near is a relative term in Maple County. I drove ten, maybe fifteen minutes along the old road before I
came to a cluster of mailboxes. One of them said  Pierce and the road was packed dirt from that point
on. The truck rattled and bounced as I sped on, the sky fully dark now and my headlights showing only
trees on either side of the road.
I came to a two-story house, a half-circle of driveway touching the road in two places, and there was
Lizette's hatchback by the front door. I parked the truck behind the car, wishing I had thought to get
some food at the restaurant, even though I'd used the pretense of bringing her food once already today. I
pressed the bell and couldn't hear it ring probably broken.  Lizette? I shouted. No answer. I tried the
door.
It was open. I stepped into a foyer with wide pine boards for a floor and woven rugs. To my left was the
kitchen, ahead of me stairs to the second floor, to the right, the dining room. I heard a voice in the
kitchen, a man's voice.
 Come here, Lizzie. I stepped into the room and saw a man with his button down shirt untucked from
his pants, his feet bare. I could see the stove as it looked today, unused and unlit, but he leaned down to
the burner, lit his cigarette, and repeated his command.  It's okay, you come here.
I looked around to see who he was talking to, but there was no one. His hands reached toward
someone and he squatted down.  Come give me a hug.
His arms closed around nothing but he suddenly stiffened like he held someone tight.  Listen to me. It
came outlissin-ah-mee.  I told you what would happen if you didn't keep quiet. You gotta play by the
rules, Lizzie, or I won't play nice.
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I could not hear an answer nor see the child I assumed was Lizette. But he held the cigarette
threateningly ... was he burning her with it? My imagination filled in the searing flesh and I closed my eyes.
And then I remembered, if I couldn't erase this trauma from the past I could at least play psychic
housekeeper. I waded through him like he was so much thigh high grass, and papery dust exploded
around me, strands of evil stuff sticking to my jeans and wrapping around my midsection. And the pain
that went through me hit me first in the gut and then in the heart, his black guilt twisted with his intense
love for his stepchild, his desire to protect her strangely mirrored by his desire to defile her, to be her one
and only.
Already I could hear more voices, from the dining room, he and Lizette's mother? The dining room walls
were covered with family photos. I stood by one of Lizette in a twirler's uniform. The glass in the frames
looked like it had been dusted recently and the chairs and table were stacked together at one end of the
room.
 Philip Pierce, I'm talking to you. I could see the ghost of a pearl necklace around her neck, her hair
styled back from her face.
 Yeah, yeah, how am I supposed to know? She stays out till all hours, she hangs around with the wrong
crowd. I'm telling you, she should spend more time at home.
 At home with you?
He was dressed much as before, but with shoes on this time. A lit cigarette flared in his hand as he
waved his arms.  Oh, Jesus, Melissa, we've been through that. Maybe I was rough on her when she was
a kid, but how did I know? I don't know from children....
The woman's face was ugly with suspicion.
 We've been through that, he repeated.  You can ask her. Hell, you, and her school counselor, and her
psychiatrist, and just about everybody else in the goddamn world has asked her already, and you know
the answer. I never touched her. She said so herself ! The real truth is you just can't love me the way you
loved him, isn't that it? He snatched a picture from the wall and smashed it against the dining room table. [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]

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