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Three hours later, Bree drove us back through the streets of Birney. The pain of reading those files was still raw, still searing.
Bree put her hand on mine, said, “I can’t imagine what you’re going through right now, Alex. But I’m here for you, sugar. Any way you need me, I’m here for you.”
“Thank you. I…this just changes everything, you know?”
“I know, baby,” Bree said, and she pulled up in front of the bungalow where the files said my dad had smothered my mother with a pillow.
I got out of the car feeling like I’d just been released from the hospital after a life-threatening illness, weak and unsure of my balance. I started toward the front porch with my mind playing tricks on me, seeing flashes of shattered, disjointed memories: my boyhood self running down the train tracks in the rain; watching my father being dragged by a rope; and, finally, staring at my mother’s dead body in her bed, looking so frail, and small, and empty.
I don’t remember falling, only that I hit the ground hard enough to knock the wind out of me and set my world spinning.
“Alex?” Bree cried, rushing to my side.
“I’m okay.” I gasped. “Must have tripped or…Where’s Nana?”
“Probably inside,” Bree said.
“I need to talk to her,” I said.
“I know you do, but—”
“Dad!” Ali cried, pushing open the screen door and jumping off the stoop.
“I’m okay, son,” I said, getting to my feet. “Just haven’t eaten enough.”
The door slammed again. Naomi came out, looking concerned.
“He got a little dizzy,” Bree explained.
“Where’s Nana?” I asked.
“At Aunt Hattie’s,” she said. “They’re making dinner.”
“I think you need to go inside and lie down, Alex,” Bree said.
“Not now,” I said, and I fixed on my aunt’s house like it was a beacon in the night.
I took my tentative first steps still bewildered and seeking solace from my grandmother. But by the time I was on Hattie’s porch, I was moving fast, angry and seeking answers.
I stormed inside. Aunt Hattie, Aunt Connie, and Uncle Cliff were in the kitchen. My aunts were dipping tilapia fillets in flour, getting them ready to fry, when I walked in and said, “Where’s Nana?”
“Right here,” she said.
My grandmother was tucked into a chair on my left, reading a book.
I went to her, loomed over her, my hands balled into fists, and said, “Why’d you lie to me?”
Nana Mama said, “Take a step back there, young man. And what’d I lie to you about?”
“My mother!” I shouted. “My father! All of it!”
My grandmother shrank from me and raised her arm defensively, as if she thought I might hit her. The truth was I’d been on the verge of doing just that.
It rattled me. I stepped back, glanced around the room. My aunts were staring at me in fear, and Bree and Jannie and Ali and Naomi had come in and were looking at me like I had gone mad.
“None of that now,” Uncle Cliff roared, standing up with his walker and shaking his finger at me. “No mugging old ladies on my train. You sit your ass down, show me your ticket, or I will throw you off, next stop. You hear?”
Uncle Cliff trembled with force, and I was suddenly a kid again, weak and dizzy. I grabbed a chair and sat, put my head in my hands.
