Kevin threw up his hands and left the table.
“Kevin, wait!”Mary begged, hurrying after him.
Rachel looked at her grandmother.The fan above their heads grumbled its lowwhump-whump-whumpas it tried to dispel the heat of the argument.Condensation dripped off Rachel’s wine glass like tears.They could hear Mary screaming pleas at Kevin in the driveway.
“Gran—” Rachel began, her own throat closing on emotion.
Dora looked right at her, eyes unusually cold, and Rachel saw now the grief that she’d been so adept at hiding.She’d always thought her grandmother had been in perpetual mourning for her lost husband.But all along, she’d been grieving the loss of her entire family.
“It was time, Rachel,” she said.“I’m sorry.”
“You had a son.”
Dora’s eyes glistened with tears.“Yes.”
The ringing in Rachel’s ears drowned out the thrum of the fan.“And what about Grandpa?”she asked.“You said he died of heart failure.”
“And I didn’t lie to you about that.His heart did kill him.But his insane daughter killed his son.Walter Jr.was everything to him.So he drank himself to death and his heart failed.And who could blame him?”
Tears were pouring down Rachel’s face now.She mopped them off her chin as a sickening thought occurred to her.
“Gran,” she said.“Your walks around the cemetery.”She could hardly get the words out.“Your son is buried there, too.Isn’t he?”
Dora’s face crumpled.“Yes, little one.He is.”
“And you fought with Mom this afternoon.When I came in, I could tell.”
“Yes.She wasn’t going to tell Kevin.I believed he needed to know.”
Car doors slammed in the distance.Mary’s voice echoed, unintelligible.
“I need some air,” Dora mumbled.“Excuse me.”She turned and walked toward the door to the back porch, let it slam shut with the clap Rachel had heard a thousand times, but which now made her flinch as though it were a gunshot.
Head reeling, she swiped the tears from her hot cheeks and made to follow her grandmother outside, where they might all be able to cool down.
Rachel had no idea what would happen, what came next.She needed time to think this all over, to ask her mother if there was any more to the story.But Mary hadn’t really tried to defend herself just now, not beyond denial of responsibility—her lifelong modus operandi.She surely would leave, try to patch things up with Kevin.It might be for the best.Then Rachel and Dora could actually talk about all of this.Help Rachel make sense of it all.
But really,doesn’t this explain so much?
She stared out at Dora’s silhouette, standing in the middle of the yard between the two bordering gardens, her greying hair illuminated in the moonlight.Rachel had just reached out for the wooden handle when a figure came barrelling around the side of the house toward Dora.
Mary ran at Dora and gave her an almighty shove.Dora staggered.Mary pushed her again, shouted something.
“Hey!”Rachel cried, wrenching open the door and launching herself onto the porch.She ran for the lawn.“Get off her, Mary!What’s wrong with you?!”
But Mary didn’t even seem to notice her.She lunged at Dora again, screaming like a fire alarm.
“…You just go be with Walt, then!”She gestured to the lake, arms wide and teetering, like a plane that couldn’t right itself.“That’s what you want, isn’t it?”
“Get away from me!”Dora cried.
The cool wind hit Rachel’s face, stinging the tear tracks.“Mary, calm down!”she shouted, reaching the pair of them just in time to intercept Mary’s outstretched arm as she tried to strike Dora.“Just—”
“Don’t youdare,Mary,” Dora growled.She stepped in front of Rachel, facing down her daughter.Rachel’s breath was coming hard and fast, heart beating an allegro against her ribs as she stood on the sidelines.
“Both of you, just stop it!”she cried, but she was invisible to them.All they could see and hear was each other.This showdown had been predetermined long before Rachel was born.She was irrelevant to this inevitable battle, and the way they were looking at one another, dry eyes burning with unrestrained hatred, was frightening.Rachel felt helpless.Unarmed.
“You’ve been like this your whole life,” Dora shouted.“Utterly—”
