I spin to Valencia. “I swear I didn’t do this!”
She looks at me with the most pitying look I’ve ever received—and I was homeless until last week. She has tears in her eyes that she keeps trying to wipe away.
“It’s okay! I know. I’m sure it was a mistake with the fertilizer.”
“No! I didn’t fertilize them. I lied because of the whole paint thing! I didn’t want you to be angry at me for not doing it so I lied and said I did but I didn’t.” The desperation in my voice must frighten her because she walks quickly to me and pulls me to her.
“It’s okay! I’m not mad. And I believe you.”
“Maybe blight, then,” Gramma Sharon adds. But even she doesn’t sound convinced.
But Valencia nods. “Probably that. It has been humid lately.” It sounds like she’s trying to convince herself. I have no idea what weather conditions cause blight but I’m pretty damn sure that’s not what happened to Valencia’s hydrangeas.
Both Valencia and now Gramma Sharon are doubting me. Theydon’t say it, but I know they don’t believe the excuses they’re coming up with. I didn’t do this, yet the shame is still there, deep and painful in my gut, and it makes me want to run. Right now. Barefoot and all out until I can get far away from this place.
Because now that doubt is in their heads, and I’ll never gain their trust again. But what’s worst of all is I don’t know why I care so much. These two are strangers. I’m lying to them. I shouldn’t care—I should let them think whatever they want, and when I’m gone and they realize I was a fraud all along, they’ll be happy to know their instincts weren’t wrong.
I want to scream. Tell them both the truth. That someone else is doing all this.
But I still can’t. Right now, they’re both lying to themselves, coming up with any other explanation for why these things could be happening. As soon as they know the truth, they’ll never believe me again. I mean, who would believe a word from someone who told a grieving family he was their missing kid?
Valencia leaves for work, still insisting she believes me and she’ll replace the bushes. I go into the living room to sulk. But Gramma Sharon doesn’t bother giving me the space. She follows me and plops down in the chair across from me.
“You know how I know you’re telling the truth?” she asks, breaking the silence.
Wait. Is she for real? “How?”
“Because you didn’t bother coming up with an excuse. You flat-out admitted you lied to her before—which, as far as lies go, kid, was about as appropriate as you can get when lying to your parents. I liedabout doing chores when I was your age, too. My dad would find out and...” She puts her hands up like she’s going to leave it at that. “He was a drunk. Probably get my taste for bourbon from him. Though I didn’t know he was a drunk till I was older, which is also when I realized how much he lied. But he’d never admit he was wrong. When he said he was working late but came home smelling like cigarettes and booze, and my mother asked why there was a dent on the front bumper of the car, he’d lie and say someone hit him at the train station. ’Course, the yellow paint on the dent matched the yellow poles at the station parking lot.”
Her eyes drift over to Marcus’s bar cart. Shiny with mixing tools and bottles of liquor. And she shakes her head.
“Liars bury themselves in more lies because they know if they admit to one, they’re admitting to them all.” Gramma Sharon reaches over and nudges my knee. “So stop looking so damn guilty. They’re plants. Plants die. Blight happens, or they’re old.”
“You really believe me?”
“I do.”
I didn’t think it was possible to love Gramma Sharon any more.
“Do you think Mom does?”
She thinks for a moment. “I do. But I think right now, she’s upset and hasn’t moved past that grief. They were old plants, and I think she put a little more of her emotions into planting and taking care of them than most people might. She planted those hydrangeas when she was about ready to pop with you. Sixteen years is a long time to take care of something.”
Especially when she spent a good portion of those sixteen years taking care of the hydrangeas instead of Nate.
“Get your shoes on. I’m gonna pee, then let’s get out of here.” She stands and heads toward the bathroom. But when I go upstairs to get my shoes, a thought comes to me. I slip them on and race down the stairs and out to the garage.
Next to the wire rack full of tools and painting supplies is a wooden workbench with gardening equipment. And right on top, next to a rusty pair of gardening shears, is the box of Miracid. I pick it up and look closely.
It’s still sealed.
It wasn’t the fertilizer that killed the plants. So something else must have been dumped on them instead. Which means someone outside the house could have done it. Or at least someone who knew how to kill a bunch of sixteen-year-old hydrangeas.
Twenty-Seven
Gramma Sharon and I spend the morning driving around. Then she takes me to a Mexican place the next town over where we split crab nachos before walking around some of the kitschier stores that pull in most of their money during the summer months when tourists flock to the eastern shore.
It should feel like I have a babysitter, but Gramma Sharon doesn’t treat me the way Marcus and Valencia do. Though Valencia has shifted slightly since finding me about to run off. As if she isn’t constantly watching me like an overprotective mama bear.
