All Fall Down (11 page)

Sunny read off the number Liesel had printed on the pad next to the phone. “Right?”

“Yes. That’s it. Thanks.” Liesel hesitated again. “Okay, well, I should be home by about five. Okay?”

“Okay,” Sunny echoed. Then she hung up.

No “goodbye,” no “see you later.” Liesel stared at the phone in her hand before setting it back in the cradle. She laughed, shaking her head. It was efficient, if not exactly socially savvy.

Then she turned to the folder Rod had left her with a sigh of determination.

Chapter 19

E
ach to his task and not to someone else’s, that was what Papa had taught them. Some do the shopping, some do the cooking. Some the cleaning. Some teach the children. Some, like John Second, handle the money. Some, like Josiah, deal with the blemished, making sure that everything is taken care of in the right ways so that they leave Sanctuary alone. Separation of duties means everyone works together to make Sanctuary a warm, welcoming and functional home, so long as everyone does what they’re meant to do and don’t try to do anything beyond what they’ve been assigned.

Sunny’s mother works in the gardens. She chooses the seeds that will go into the ground from a large catalog, and she writes their names on a list. She is supposed to give the list to Papa, but Josiah is really the one who takes it. He looks it over and uses a calculator to add up all the numbers in the catalog.

“Lots of tomatoes,” he says.

Mama smiles. “We use them for lots of things.”

“I like tomatoes.” Josiah shrugs and reaches to tap Sunny’s shoulder. “What about you, Sunshine? Do you like tomatoes, too?”

The truth is, she doesn’t like them raw in a salad or thick in a sandwich, dripping with mayonnaise. She likes ketchup, though. Spaghetti sauce, too. She nods.

Suddenly, the taste of tomatoes floods her mouth. Saliva squirts, bitter in her mouth. Her throat closes and she thinks she might choke on the flavor of it. That’s been happening a lot lately. Phantom tastes and smells that leave her stomach churning.

Mama doesn’t notice. She’s too busy talking with Josiah about the varieties of brussels sprouts and broccoli. Sweet corn. Sunny loves sweet corn, but even swallowing again and again, she can’t wash the taste of tomatoes from her tongue.

“You think you might like to help your mom in the garden?”

Sunny turns. She likes Josiah much better than his older brother. Josiah is kinder, for one thing. He laughs a lot. He plays the guitar sometimes. And…he has never touched her the way John Second touches all the girls. Josiah and Papa don’t get along very well, though. There’s not supposed to be shouting in Sanctuary, but there often is. Now Josiah’s staring at her with a smile on his face, his hair long to his shoulders, and Sunny wonders what it would be like to touch his hair. It looks like it would feel soft.

“Papa wants Sunny to share the light,” Mama says as she tucks the list neatly into the catalog and hands it to Josiah.

For a moment, Josiah’s brow furrows and the creases at the sides of his mouth get deep. “Of course he does. He has all the prettiest girls and boys doing that.”

Mama looks surprised, then pleased. She nods, looking Sunny up and down. “Then she’s perfect for it.”

The taste of tomatoes is back, harsh and thick and stinging. Sunny shakes her head against the flavor, but also in response to what her mother said. Sunny does not like going out into the world to peddle the pamphlets. She doesn’t like going in the van that smells of feet and sour breath. She doesn’t like being dropped off outside the malls or grocery stores or bank parking lots to stand with her sheaf of pamphlets, begging for a dollar or as much as they’ll give her to read Papa’s word. The blemished can be mean, sometimes even angry. They can be scary. But most of all, Sunny can’t stand being so close to so many things she’s not allowed to have and definitely is not supposed to want.

She’s not meant to avoid temptation, she thinks. It must be so easy for other people in the family to not look even once at the cases of pastry in the coffee shop and wonder at how they’d taste, or the short skirts and high heels blemished women wear and think how pretty they are. But it’s not easy for her.

“It’s why Papa chose you,” Josiah says to her later, when he catches her after dinner and walks down the hall with her, and something in the way he looks at her makes her tell him the truth even though it’s not time to make a report.

“Because he knows I…want? Things?”

Josiah has a nice smile, full of white teeth that have never rotted. “I’ll tell you a secret, Sunshine, if you lean in close.”

She does, heart skipping a little faster as she closes her eyes. She waits for him to press her to the wall or pull her into a room. To touch her. But Josiah’s only caress comes from his breath on her ear.

“We all want things,” he says quietly. “It’s not the wanting that weighs you down and keeps you from going through the gates. It’s when you know something’s not good for you, and you do it anyway. Not just once or even twice, but over and over again. It’s not doing the best you can for your vessel. That’s what ties you down, so you can’t fly.”

He steps back with another smile she can’t stop herself from returning. He’s not like his brother. Not one bit.

“You go out and you spread the light, Sunshine. It’s what you were meant for. Papa saw that, and I see it, too.” Josiah touches his fingers to her cheek for just a second.

She remembered that touch for a long, long time.

Of course, as it turned out, Papa had been wrong about Sunny being meant for leading anyone to the light. She’d failed miserably at selling pamphlets. She’d found her place in Sanctuary, though. Each to his task as Papa said, and not to someone else’s.

Hers had most definitely not been in the kitchen. Beyond her sneaking of food now and again, Sunny barely even set foot in the Sanctuary kitchen. She’d never had a need. Others had the responsibility of cooking the meals. All she’d ever had to do was be on time to eat them.

She should’ve told Liesel the truth, but had been too ashamed to admit it. There’d already been too many things she didn’t know how to do. Now the smoke alarm beat out its cry in a steady pattern, with the others in the house blatting out their own shrieks in counterpoint. When they first went off, Sunny had gone to her knees, hands clapped over her ears, certain the next sound would be Papa’s voice directing them all to go to the chapel.

That would’ve been better than what was happening now. Smoke, acrid and choking, poured from the open oven door. Inside, the chicken had become a blackened lump. The potatoes had exploded all over the inside of the oven. Sunny stood in front of it, one hand covered in a red rubber oven mitt, the other in front of her face, waving a tea towel ineffectually at the smoke.

Bliss, strapped tight into her infant seat on the kitchen table, added her screams to the sounds of the alarm. Peace had broken down into wrenching sobs. Only Happy had maintained any sort of calm, though his eyes were wide and frightened, and he tugged on the hem of her blouse.

“Mama? Why won’t it stop?”

“Hush, my sweetheart. Stand back. Take your sister away.”

Happy took Peace by the hand and backed up a step. Bliss screamed louder, struggling against the straps of her seat on top of the kitchen table, but Sunny didn’t have time to comfort her. The grease that had collected beneath the pan of chicken flamed suddenly, and Sunny reached without thinking to grab at the pan. The pain was instant and intense, and she jerked her fingers back with a cry.

“Sunny! What the hell?” She hadn’t heard the garage door opening over the sound of the fire alarm, but now Chris ran into the kitchen.

He slammed the oven door closed, went to the stove and turned on the fan over the cooktop. He opened the double glass doors leading to the back deck and grabbed another tea towel. He stood under the smoke alarm and swung the towel back and forth until finally the alarm cut off.

He looked at her. “What the hell are you doing?”

She could still see flames inside the oven. Chris turned off the heat, but left the door closed. Tendrils of smoke seeped out from the vents, but not as much as had been pouring out before.

“I was cooking the chicken. Liesel asked me to cook the chicken.” Sunny’s hair had fallen into her eyes. She pushed it back and winced at the pain in her hand. Her fingers were blistered.

“Did you burn yourself?” Chris took her hand in his, not gently enough. “You need ice on that. Go run the water in the sink, cold as it goes. I’ll get some ice.”

He pushed a bowl under the spout on the fridge to get some cubes from the ice maker. The bowl shook, and the ice tumbled out onto the floor. He bent to pick it up and held on to the fridge-door handle for a second when he came back up. He blew out a breath.

“Here.” He gestured at Sunny with the bowl. “Sit down.”

She turned off the water and held her hand out in front of her to sit at the table, though she bent first to look beneath it. “You can come out now.”

Two blond heads poked out from under the table. Sunny gathered them into her arms, hugged them close and kissed the tops of their heads, then looked up at him with a small, nervous smile as she stood.

“I’m sorry,” Sunny said. There was no point in denying anything. “Liesel said to cook the chicken, and I wasn’t sure how to use the oven.”

“Where is Liesel?” Chris flapped the tea towel again, but most of the smoke was now disappearing.

“She called and said she’d be home late, and could I start dinner.” Sunny frowned with a look at the oven. “I’m sorry, Chris,” she repeated.

He gave her a long, strange look. “If you didn’t know how to use it, why didn’t you call her? How the he—heck do you not know how to work a freaking oven?”

Sunny took a deep breath and coughed on the still-thick scent of smoke in the air. She’d made a mess of things, unintentionally, but she had to take responsibility for it. She hugged Happy and Peace to her again, grateful Bliss’s sobs had softened into silent, hitching tears.

She bent to murmur into Happy’s ear, “Take Peace upstairs into the bedroom. Silent feet. Go, now.”

When they’d gone, she faced Chris with a sense of inevitability. “I should have called her, you’re right. I was stupid and silly.”

“You could’ve burned the house down,” Chris said unnecessarily. He tossed the tea towel into the sink and ran his hands through his hair. Everything reeked of smoke, and he went to the glass doors to take a long, deep breath. He turned back. “Look, Sunshine…”

Chris stopped dead. Sunny had pulled a large wooden spoon from the kitchen tool caddy. She held it out to him, and Chris took it automatically. Sunny turned to the kitchen table and leaned over it. She flipped her skirt up, exposing her plain white panties. Her hands on the table squeaked as she put her palms flat on the stainless-steel surface.

She looked at him in resignation over her shoulder, hoping he’d at least be fast.

Chris stepped back, jaw dropping, mouth dry. “Sunny. What the hell?”

And that was how Liesel found them.

Chapter 20

T
he first time Liesel Gottlieb looks across the room and sees Christopher Albright, she’s not looking for him. Her gaze just sort of snags on his face as she scans the crowd the way everyone does at parties. Seeing who’s who.

The second time, though, she’s looking specifically for the blond man with the loud laugh who’s entirely focused on the short redhead in a dress a size too small. She’s all hair and heels and cleavage, and if Liesel were to get much closer, she’s sure the woman would be all perfume, too. That’s okay. Liesel’s a lot more than tits and lipstick, and predatory women like that are lots of fun to usurp.

Liesel waits, though. This party is full of single hotties, and she’s not really that into blonds as a rule. There is something about him, though. The laugh, for one thing. It turns heads, not just hers. The redhead can’t quite keep up with him, though bless her tiny heart, she’s trying.

Liesel circulates. She thinks of leaving. She changes her mind when she passes by the makeshift bar someone’s set up at the kitchen table and finds the blond man struggling with a couple slices of lime and a bottle of rum.

“Mojito?” he asks hopefully.

Liesel eyes the goods and pulls out the ingredients she needs to make up a standard mojito. She mixes the drink and hands it to him. “It would be better with crushed mint and simple syrup, but this will have to do. I hope she likes it.”

His gaze shifts toward the living room for a second. “How do you know it’s not for me?”

“You don’t look like a mojito drinker.” Liesel leans back against the counter. “I figure you for a whiskey sour sort of guy.”

“Oh, yeah?” He gives her his hand to shake. “Chris.”

“Liesel.” He has a nice handshake, firm and warm. Not clammy. “Am I right?”

“Whiskey and soda, actually. But you were close.”

She laughs. “I tended bar to pay for my last couple years of school.”

The conversation moves on from there, one topic flowing into another without any break and sometimes, any sense, though neither of them seems to have trouble understanding the other. They laugh. A lot. He leans in to put a hand on the cabinets next to her head, the drink and the redhead both long forgotten. Liesel tips her head, offers her mouth without a word.

That first kiss goes on and on.

Liesel leaves the party with Christopher, and they kiss again under a streetlight. Again at the corner by the stop sign. Once more on her doorstep, where he leaves her without asking if he can come inside.

She’s not surprised when he calls her the next day, or when he asks her out. She’s not even surprised how much she likes him, because meeting Christopher is like hooking up with an old friend she’s known forever. They just…mesh. They merge.

They were married not quite two years later. Nothing fairy tale about it, no chick-flick drama, just two people who met, fell in love and kept on loving. Facing her husband from across the den, watching him drink his whiskey and soda, Liesel realized how lucky they’d been to have had so few bumps in their road. The problem was, she thought as her husband paced and drank and shut her out, they had no practice at dealing with trouble. It was easy enough to stand together when things were going well. What were they going to do now that things were a little rocky?

Her hands were cold, and she rubbed them together. She leaned on the arm of the couch, not wanting to sit and yet unsure of how long she could keep standing. “You have to talk about this, Christopher.”

He sipped at his drink. “I don’t know what you want me to say.”

“It’s not about what I want you to say. It’s about what you think or feel or need to say.”

He gave her a look. “Really? You want me to talk about how I feel? Or do you want me talk about how
you
want me to feel?”

She wanted to say he was being unfair, but something in his tone stopped her. How
did
she want him to feel? For that matter, how did she feel, herself?

“This is a mistake. We were stupid to think this was the right thing to do. We don’t know anything about where she came from, except that those people were a mess. They all killed themselves, for God’s sake,” Christopher muttered, at least making the attempt to keep his voice down. “And she doesn’t seem to see a damn thing wrong with it, Liesel! Who knows how they messed with her head.”

“So we’ll get her help!”

Christopher tossed back the last of his drink and set the glass on the bookcase with a thud. He paced, hands on his hips, not looking at her. “She almost burned the house down. Did you think about that? How she doesn’t even know how to work an oven? We’re not talking about getting her a little help, Liesel, we’re talking about training her from the ground up.”

“She’s not a dog!”

“No, and you can’t adopt her just like one.”

Liesel sighed. “So what do you want to do?”

“We could get them set up somewhere. There are places they can go—”

“Like what? Foster care? Women’s shelter?”

“She’s a grown woman. We could help her with money. She could apply for help from the state.”

Liesel frowned. “You want to send your daughter and grandchildren away to live on welfare?”

“She wanted me to…spank her.” Christopher’s voice was thick with disgust.

She crossed the room to him, meaning to make this all go away. Make it better somehow. This was her husband in front of her, not some stranger, after all. Yet when she got there to take his hand, it felt different. She kissed the knuckles anyway. “I know.”

“It was sick.”

“I’m not arguing with you about that. But…she didn’t think it was sick. I mean, it must’ve been something they did there. Where she grew up. I told you I saw scars. And I’m not saying it was right, not at all,” Liesel added hastily. “I’m just saying that before we make judgments, before we just write her off, don’t you think we should at least try to find out more about how she was raised? What they believed? Don’t you feel some sort of obligation to her, Christopher?”

The speech rattled out of her in a long string of words she wasn’t even sure made sense, but it felt as if the faster she talked and the more she said, the likelier it would be that something clicked with him. She couldn’t even have said why it was so important to her, exactly.

“This isn’t about me,” Christopher said in a low voice. He backed away from her and rubbed his sweating glass against his forehead. Typical. She was freezing; he was overheated. “And you know it.”

Liesel sat up straight, jaw clenching. “I don’t know what you mean.”

Her husband gave her a long, long look. “They won’t be yours. Those kids.”

As if she was trying to…what? Steal them? Like some freaky, crazy person who snuck into a hospital and tried to walk off with someone else’s newborn? Just hearing him say the words were as bad as if he’d slapped her, and her head rocked back just like he had.

The look on his face was worse.

“How could you…” was all she managed to say out loud before her throat closed up and her teeth bit off the reply. She tried again. “Her mother sent her here.”

“Is that what you want to talk about? My first wife?” Christopher paused, then kept on without waiting for her to answer. “What do you want me to tell you, Liesel? She was a crazy bitch who cheated on me, lied to me and raised my daughter as someone else’s. She never once bothered to make me a part of Sunny’s life. And then when shit went down, Trish sent her to me, and I’m supposed to just…what? Forget all that? Forget about her?”

“No. Not forget. You’re supposed to deal with this, Christopher. She’s your child, and she’s here now, with us. And we have to find some way to make this work, for the sake of those little ones, if nothing else.”

He faced her. “If you had one of your own, would you feel the same way?”

Liesel gaped. “What does that have to do with anything?”

“If you had your own.” She’d never seen him look so hard. It turned her stomach, and she had to look away, but he kept talking. “If I’d let you have a baby—”

“Let me?” Liesel’s throat closed, the words forced and hoarse. “When have I ever needed you to
let me
do anything?”

But he kept on, not listening to her, or at the very least not hearing. Not wanting to hear. “If you had a kid of your own, would you be so jazzed about having them here in this house? If it was a question of your child’s safety over that of some other woman’s children…”

She turned, considering clapping her hands over her ears so she wouldn’t have to listen. His words followed, poked and prodded. Christopher had a caustic sense of humor that could bite when he was angry. Occasionally he could be insensitive, the way Liesel figured all men could be. He could be inattentive. She’d never, ever, thought of him as cruel. Liesel had never looked across the room at Christopher’s face and thought that she might gladly punch him in the junk. Or that she’d simply turn on her heel and walk away without a look back. She’d never imagined she could be angry enough to leave him. Her stomach ached from how easy imagining it became. She wondered if she’d ever be able to forget it. She thought probably she never would.

His words cut at her, not because he was being cruel, though he was. But because inside her, not even in a place that was very deep and not at all a secret, Liesel knew he was right.

“Well,” she said finally, when it became clear he wasn’t going to say any more, “I don’t. Do I? Have my own. And I probably never will. Maybe this is the closest I’ll ever get.”

A long beat of silence cut her to the bone, until at last he said, “I’m sorry.”

Sorry because if they’d had their own it would have been so self-righteously easy to put Sunny and her children aside? Sorry because he understood for the first time how badly she’d wanted a baby of her own? Or simply sorry because they’d tried to do the right thing and now had to deal with the punishment for their good deed?

It didn’t matter.

This was a man she loved, who loved her, and even if they’d never had to get through anything difficult in the past, they were going to get through this now. When Christopher put his arms around her, his chin on top of her head, Liesel pressed herself close to him, the beat of his heart familiar and steady under her cheek. Somehow, they would get through this.