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While I walked off the rooms’ dimensions and noted the approximate size in my phone, Jude followed and took photos of each room with hers. In the kitchen she put the plates in the sink and stepped back to take a photo, then paused, attention caught by the stack of mail on the counter. “Ugh. I forgot about that. Brought the mail in last week and forgot to sort it.” She snapped a few pictures swiftly and then began flicking through the catalogs and flyers. “Junk, junk, junk…” Her hand stilled on a white envelope.
“What’s that?”
“Um. I think it’s about my dad. Or maybe from him, I don’t know. It’s from the prison.”
I went to stand beside her. “Do you want me to open it?”
She continued to glower down at the envelope. “No...I can do it.” With a decisive gesture, she ripped the seal and pulled out a single piece of paper, covered with just a few lines of handwritten scrawl. Unashamedly, I read over her shoulder, may hand curled around the nape of her neck.
Dear Jude,
You haven’t come to visit since my incarceration, and that’s all right. Given the circumstances, I am not surprised. I am trying to honor your decision to cut ties, but I did receive distressing news yesterday that I need to pass along.
Your mother was found dead two weeks ago, and has since been buried in our family plot. I am not going to provide details other than to say it appears she did not abandon you and Eleanor, and her death was not due to natural causes.
I would urge caution. I do not know exactly what transpired with your mother, but her death makes me uneasy.
Your loving father.
The letter fluttered to the counter.
“Jude—”
“Give me a minute.” She dropped her hand to clutch the edge of the counter, her knuckles turning white. I stood still behind her, my hand on her neck the only point of contact. Long minutes ticked by, and with each one I could feel her drawing further away. I was familiar with the behavior; it was how Gale responded to grief, too. “I need to… go. Need to go tell Eleanor.”
Lowering my hand, I bracketed her body against the counter with an arm on either side. “Let’s take a minute, Jude.”
Her body stiffened. “I’ve taken a minute, and now I need space.”
“I disagree.”
She turned within the circle of my arms to glare up at me. Except for the angry flames in her eyes, her face was stone. She’d just learned her mother was dead and she could have been a distant relation for all the emotion she was showing. When she spoke, it was through gritted teeth. “This has nothing to do with you, so your opinion means nothing. Move.”
I ignored the dull ache at how quickly she dismissed me. She didn’t mean it. “No.”
Her breath started coming faster at my refusal to accommodate her, and she rubbed the pads of her fingers across her eyes, a fretful twist to her lips. “Damn you, Baron.”
“I know, Pinky.”
She slammed a fist into my chest. “Fuck it all, move! I need to go tell my sister that her mother is dead.”
“We will, I promise. Hit me. Hit me hard.”
Her other fist joined the first, and then she lifted both and pummeled me. I didn’t blink. They were raindrops in a swimming pool, inconsequential. “I have to tell her that she didn’t abandon her. The woman we’ve been hating for months never left us.” Her voice cracked, and she hit me again. “How do I explain that, Baron?”
“That’s not your truth to explain. You can’t help that you believed what was right in front of you.”
“I should have known. She was a good mother. A little caught up in appearances, but she loved us. She had this thing for The Beatles—hence Jude and Eleanor. What if she suffered? What if I had realized earlier that she hadn’t left, that she’d been taken, and I could’ve found her, and… and—” She stopped punching me. Tears poured unchecked down her cheeks as she broke and I wrapped my arms around her, holding her tightly against me. She sagged, mouth open and broken sobs escaping. It was harsh, pained weeping, the soundless kind that hurt your chest and burned your throat.
I pressed my lips against the crown of her head and held her steady as the storm raged through her, until she was spent, and then I picked her up and carried her to the bedroom, laying her down on the mattress and coming down beside her. Her fingers clutched at my shirt and she burrowed into my side.
We lay there for hours, watching the shadows move across the walls and listening to the rain. I convinced her to wait to visit Eleanor until tomorrow, after she’d had a chance to get a grip of her own grief, and then take as many days as she needed to take care of her sister. When the rain stopped we showered, making love once more against the cold tile of the narrow tub.
It was only when she was sound asleep for the night, curled into a tight ball on the mattress, that I left, to return to campus and plan our absences for the next several days.
Whether she wanted to admit it or not, our girl needed us.
Chapter 39: Jude
