Starting with her brother, however, would be the easy part.
“Jefferson was always…different.” She and Statler had gone over what he’d done, ad nauseum, and still, to this day, neither could wrap their heads around their quiet, scholarly brother killing their parents.
“He’d never showed any signs of violence,” she told Julian. “He was simply a loner who enjoyed his classes, and spent most of his free time in his room.” Her voice softened. “He pretty much ignored Statler, who was sixteen at the time and busy with sports and social activities, but he was always nice to me.”
Yeah.She’d had a much harder time squaring Jefferson with her parents’ murder than Stat.Statlerstill beat himself up that he’d been too self-absorbed back then to see the signs, and continued to berate himself that he should have known.
“I was pretty young; six years old when things all started to fall apart with Jefferson. I remember my parents being really hard on him. They were always pointing out his shortcomings, as opposed to Statler’s successes. They nagged him constantly to ‘just be normal’. If only we’d known then, that Jefferson had underlying problems.” A tear slid down her cheek, and Julian lifted a finger to catch and swipe it away.
“You don’t have to say any more about it if you don’t want. I get the picture,” Julian told her gently.
“No. I need you to hear it all.” She snapped her spine straight.
“Jefferson was fifteen when he had his first break with reality,” she informed him. “Of course, we didn’t know anything about that until Statler looked into his arrest records, long after the fact. We know now that it was schizophrenia. A lot of personality disorders like that begin around that age, but our parents never dug into it. According to psychiatric court documents, Jeff had been having…delusions for a while. Seeing things. Hearing people who weren’t there. Statler says that our parents should have recognized the signs, but maybe they just didn’t care.” She shrugged. “Jefferson, I remember, retreated to his room even more right before the…incident. He refused to eat dinner with us. He missed a lot of school, which would have been unthinkable, just months before, because he loved it so much.
“My parents, oblivious or not, continued to come down on him. There was a lot of yelling.” She sighed. “As I understand it now, the final straw was them taking away his computer as punishment until he ‘straightened up’. He…” She knew her voice dropped to a whisper. “…he killed them because of that.”
Julian’s support was palpable as she forged on.
“That horrible day, Jeff waited for me and Statler to be out of the house. I went to school, as per normal, then Stat picked me up afterward, and we actually went to watch a baseball game down in Portland.” She laughed ruefully. “Sometime during theday while we were gone, Jefferson…lured our parents into his closet. He locked and barricaded the door so they couldn’t get out. He was smart, so who knows how long he’d prepared for this, but he had everything ready. He’d made a blower set-up. A fan inside a pipe. He attached it to a container he’d filled with bleach and ammonia, and fit the end of it under the door. He filled the space with chlorine gas, leaving them there.”
“Oh, Petula,” Julian commiserated, squeezing her hands. “I’m so sorry.”
She swallowed, struggling to get the rest out. “He was waiting at the door for us when we came home, and immediately told us what he’d done. We thought he was joking, because he showed no emotion at all. So Statler went upstairs. Stat was the one who found them.”
She shivered, remembering Stat’s howls of disbelief.
“Jefferson didn’t stop Stat from calling the police. As a matter of fact, he confessed outright to the authorities when they arrived, without exhibiting any signs of remorse.
“I…we…never saw him again. The police took him away, Statler and I were remanded into state custody, and before the month was out, we were living with the Bothwin’s.”
Those first few months following their parents’ deaths had gone by in a daze for Petula.
“Statler, because he’d found our parents, had to be deposed before a judge. The whole incident…hardened him, and I think the Bothwin’s were a little afraid of him, because while he was in the house, they didn’t…do anything.” She dropped her eyes.
“Petula,” Julian interrupted. “Look at me.” He clutched her hands comfortingly.
She brought her gaze back to his, immediately feeling more grounded.
“Would it help you with the rest if I…held you?” he asked tentatively.
PetulawantedJulian’s arms around her for the next part. His presence was already making her feel more grounded than normal while thinking about the past.
“Yes, please,” she whispered.
He arose, tugged her upright, and led her over to a settee where he sat down first, then eased her down beside him, still holding one hand.
“Is this okay?” he questioned.
Petula couldn’t give him a verbal answer. Her throat suddenly filled with a strange yearning that had her almost gasping for air. She was so drawn to Julian. His strength. His goodness. He was…
Damn, he smelled good. That was the only thing her brain was registering right now as she leaned against him; his cinnamon and pine needles scent.
“Petula?” Julian followed up, sounding worried.
She shook her head and the one word that came out was a non sequitur. “No.”
Immediately Julian let her go, but she grabbed for his hand. With a tug, she wound it up and over her shoulders this time. She found her voice, raspy though it was. “I mean, no, it’s notenough,” she corrected him, gratingly. “I…need to feel you here with me.”
