But I held her while Mama yanked Cole out of that room by the scruff of his collar and pushed us all down the hall toward Ava’s room and away from hell.
* * *
I’d been bannedfrom the house.
Even empty, Mama didn’t trust it. As if everything we had witnessed the night before last was the house’s doing. As if it was cursed.
Maybe that was easier to stomach than the truth. But she hadn’t even let the police interview me inside after we saw what we saw.
So, now, Monday morning, I sat on the edge of my bed and stared at my phone while Mama waited for Service Masters to arrive. I’d called Cole three times yesterday. Mama told me he and Ava were staying at his friend Louis’s for now. But she hadn’t seen them since the police left early Sunday morning, so she couldn’t assure me if he was okay or not.
But I couldn’t call a fourth time. Could I?
I scrolled back through the messages I’d started sending yesterday morning.
Me:Are you okay?
Me: How’s Ava?
Two hours later:
Me:What can I do?
Two hours after that:
Me:Mama says you don’t want a funeral.
And then late yesterday afternoon:
Me:A TV crew just left. I’m glad y’all are at Louis’s.
Before I triedto go to bed last night:
Me:Cole, please call me back. I’m so worried about you.
But he hadn’t called back. Maybehe was in shock. From what I could tell, Ava had been. She’d sat in the back of the ambulance, white as the moon, with a blanket wrapped around her shoulders. I was glad she’d been in that emergency vehicle because from there, I didn’t think she could see the two gurneys that were loaded into the coroner’s van.
With his arm around her, Cole hadn’t looked shocked. He’d looked…condemned.
But I hadn’t been able to talk to him then. I didn’t know what I would have said if I had. The moments upstairs before the police arrived were just a blur of Mama barking orders and attempting to restrain Cole. He’d wanted to go to his mother, but Mama hadn’t want him anywhere near that scene.
And after the police took my statement, Mama had banished me to the guesthouse. I hadn’t seen Cole or Ava since.
The door to the guesthouse opened, and I shot off the bed. In our living room, I found Mama wearing a dazed expression. This was new. Over the last two days, I’d seen her focused, almost manic. Now she looked lost.
“Mama?”
My mother raised her eyes to me and frowned. “Cole just told me…”
At the sound of his name, my heart thumped harder in my chest. When Mama didn’t finish her sentence, I grew irritated.
“What? He just told you what?”
Mama drew in and blew out a breath. “He wants me to get the house ready to sell. He’s taking Ava back with him to New Orleans.”
This shouldn’t have surprised me, but I still felt it like a kick in the stomach. Cole had planned to take Ava and his mother to New Orleans before all of this. He was in school. Given the circumstances, orphaned as they now were, of course he’d take his sister with him. And, of course, he’d need to sell the house. How could they keep it now?
But it was their home. And it was our home.
