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“But you did say something,” I remind him.
He gives me a quick smile. “So I did. ” He points across the street to the large house sitting kitty-corner to his. It is gray clapboard and is hard to see, hidden behind a screen of old oaks, half of them dead, half still thriving. “I grew up in this house, Ivy. And your mother grew up right there. ”
My breath catches in my chest, like a splinter snagged on cloth, a sharp, sudden twinge. Of course I knew my mother grew up on this side of town, but I’ve never known where. In my mind she’s always existed in some in-between world. I could never quite picture her as a living, breathing person, let alone one who grew up across the street from Bishop’s father.
President Lattimer leans forward, puts his elbows on his knees, and stares at his hands. In this moment, he looks very much like his son. “What do you know about your mother?” he asks me.
“I know you killed her,” I tell him, my voice flat. Sometimes my capacity for self-destruction surprises even me.
He blows out a shaky breath and lowers his forehead to his clasped hands. “That’s a cruel thing to say. ” After a long moment, he raises his head, keeping his eyes on the house where my mother grew up. “But I suppose, in all the ways that count, it’s a true thing as well. ”
I’m glad he admitted it, that we aren’t going to have to pretend. Dancing around the truth is exhausting. “Tell me about her?” I ask, and I half expect him to laugh in my face after what I just said to him. But he only nods.
“We loved each other,” he says simply. “From the time we were very young. ”
I knew what he was going to say, had known since the moment I saw the look on his face as he showed me her house, but my stomach drops all the same, something solid and heavy as iron taking its place. The day is as hot as ever, but I am suddenly cold.
“She was headstrong, your mother. She had the same eyes as you, the same beautiful hair. ” The corner of his mouth turns up at some ancient memory. “She did things without thinking, forever figuring out the consequences after the fact. ” He raises his eyebrows at me.
“That sounds familiar,” I allow, and he laughs.
“But she was full of energy and life and warmth. She made me happy to be alive, even when the world was dark and frightening. I could tell her anything. ”
I can’t help but like the picture he’s painted of my mother, and hope that I am as similar to her as he believes me to be.
He glances at me. “There was never anyone else, for either of us. ”
I’ve always known my parents didn’t marry for love. How could they, with their marriage arranged for them? But the way my father speaks of my mother, I know he did love her by the end. My heart aches to think that the affection may have only flowed one way.
“What happened?” I ask. “Between my mother and you?”
“She thought we would get married. Have children. She thought because I was the president’s son, I could make that happen. ” He looks at me, his blue eyes full of sorrow. “And I suppose I could have. I wanted to, so much. But that wouldn’t have been fair. I can’t expect everyone else to enter into an arranged marriage and not do the same thing myself. Westfall has thrived because we put the needs of the group ahead of individual desire. We start making exceptions, and the whole structure falls apart. ” He sounds like he’s still trying to convince himself, even after all this time.
“So you married Mrs. Lattimer instead?” I ask.
“Yes. I took all the personality tests and sat through the interviews and Erin is who fit me the best. So I married her. And despite what you might think, it hasn’t been a bad match. We have an amazing son. We work well together. In some ways, it’s been a much easier marriage than one to your mother would have been. ”
Which sounds a long way from love to me, but what do I know of love, anyway? I am hardly an expert.
“But I broke your mother’s heart the day I married Erin,” President Lattimer says. He leans back in his chair. “And in return, she broke mine. ”
“When she married my father?”
“No,” he says, shaking his head. “I never blamed her for that. She was only doing what was right. What was expected. I was glad she made a life for herself. And Callie was born…and then you. I thought she was finally happy. Or at least that she’d found a way to move on and let go. ”
“Then how…how did she break your heart?” I don’t want to know. I don’t want to know.
He points again, this time with an unsteady finger, to the lone oak standing on his own front lawn. There are yellow roses blooming at its base. “She hanged herself right there. ” As I watch, he catches a sob between his teeth before it can escape. “More than fifteen years ago, and I still see her there every damn time I walk out the front door. ”
I look back at the tree, but I can’t focus on it. The whole world is a roaring blur around me. What he said cannot be true. It cannot be.
“You’re lying,” I whisper.
“No, I’m not,” he says, and I hear the truth in his voice. “I wish I was. ” He stares at the tree. His voice is far away, gone back to a time when my mother was still alive. “Yellow was her favorite color. ”
I lower my head down between my knees and cover my ears with my hands. I fight off the black spots twirling in front of my eyes through sheer will. My father hardly ever spoke of my mother. When he did, it was as a whip to keep me on the path he wanted me to walk. And this man sitting next to me has flowers planted in her honor, even though the sight of them must torture him a little every day. I want to tear off my own skin to escape his words. I want to curl into a ball and die. I want to kill something and hear it scream.
President Lattimer puts his hand on my back and I buck it off, a high, keening cry bursting from my mouth. “Don’t,” I pant. “Don’t touch me. ”
