Read Online No One Tells Everything by Rae Meadows - Free Book Online
Authors: Rae Meadows
Ads: Link
way.
“How come we never talked about Callie?” Grace asks. The wine has loosened her tongue just enough.
“What do you mean talked about her? What was there to talk about?”
“She died and we were sad and we never talked about it.”
“What good would it have done? Why does it matter now?”
“It matters,” Grace says. But she relents. She lets her head fall against the couch and closes her eyes. “It might have.”
Her mother sighs. “Oh, Grace. Let’s not make this a big thing.”
“No, we wouldn’t want to do that,” Grace says.
There are some memories that are tucked away, like the sun, too bright to look at for more than an instant, too powerful and damaging.
That August day twenty-five years ago, her mother was drinking coffee, watering her plants, dusting, getting the house in order in hopes everything else would fall in line. Grace and Callie were playing Monopoly on the floor of the family room and in the way of their mom’s vacuuming. She told them to go outside and run around. She said she didn’t want to hear from them until lunchtime. Their father was nursing a hangover in his den with a Bloody Mary, trying to soften his regret for how things had gone the night before. Callie tried to get him to come outside and play tag. She pulled his lifeless arm and said, “Please, please, please, Daddy,” and tried to tickle him.
“Not now. Your dad needs some quiet.”
“Come on, Callie,” Grace said. “Stop being such a pest.”
If only, each of her parents must have said to themselves innumerable times in the ensuing years. If only I could have that morning back.
Grace’s role in the accident was something else altogether. She was there, the only witness. She didn’t move, didn’t reach out, didn’t grab Callie’s shirt, her hand. She had time to do something but she stayed rooted in the crabgrass at the edge of the yard as Callie tripped into the street, as the car didn’t slow, as the body was lifted into the air. Grace shunned the memory of those moments, and for most of her life has refused to look.
She remembers them now in odd, still frames accompanied by the rapid click, click, click of a camera shutter.
###
Grace wakes up sweating in the late morning sun searing through the window, still in her clothes from the night before. At least she had the wherewithal to take off her shoes. She is already two hours late for work. Her mouth is dry and fuzzy and it hurts to lift her head off the pillow.
“I’m sick again,” she says to Brian’s voice mail, hoping her scratchy voice sounds authentically marred.
Today is the day Charles Raggatt will be arraigned, and Grace drives out to Long Island to see him for the first time. By the time she gets to the courthouse in Mineola, the proceedings are an hour behind. She situates herself in one of the wooden flip seats in the back. The old window doesn’t close all the way and a spring breeze finds her neck. In the first row of spectator seats a Hispanic woman crochets until her son is brought before the judge on some kind of drug charge. The young man juts his chin out with defiant bravado. He has a tattoo of a tear on his cheek. The mother bursts forth with something in Spanish and the boy closes his eyes and sets his jaw. She says his name, Carlos, but he will not look at her. Finally, she crosses herself and then leaves the room.
Other than court personnel, there are only a few people left in the gallery: family members mostly, a reporter taking notes. Three more men are brought in— tough men, hardened men, men with violence and steel in their eyes—one for robbery, another for assault, the third for vehicular homicide. Grace fears the others can hear her rapid breathing. And then there he is. Charles Raggatt. A boy’s face on an oafish body that seems to have swelled in the weeks since his arrest. His face is greasy, his hair matted. He trudges in, cuffed and shackled, wearing the standard-issue orange jumpsuit, led by a
“How come we never talked about Callie?” Grace asks. The wine has loosened her tongue just enough.
“What do you mean talked about her? What was there to talk about?”
“She died and we were sad and we never talked about it.”
“What good would it have done? Why does it matter now?”
“It matters,” Grace says. But she relents. She lets her head fall against the couch and closes her eyes. “It might have.”
Her mother sighs. “Oh, Grace. Let’s not make this a big thing.”
“No, we wouldn’t want to do that,” Grace says.
There are some memories that are tucked away, like the sun, too bright to look at for more than an instant, too powerful and damaging.
That August day twenty-five years ago, her mother was drinking coffee, watering her plants, dusting, getting the house in order in hopes everything else would fall in line. Grace and Callie were playing Monopoly on the floor of the family room and in the way of their mom’s vacuuming. She told them to go outside and run around. She said she didn’t want to hear from them until lunchtime. Their father was nursing a hangover in his den with a Bloody Mary, trying to soften his regret for how things had gone the night before. Callie tried to get him to come outside and play tag. She pulled his lifeless arm and said, “Please, please, please, Daddy,” and tried to tickle him.
“Not now. Your dad needs some quiet.”
“Come on, Callie,” Grace said. “Stop being such a pest.”
If only, each of her parents must have said to themselves innumerable times in the ensuing years. If only I could have that morning back.
Grace’s role in the accident was something else altogether. She was there, the only witness. She didn’t move, didn’t reach out, didn’t grab Callie’s shirt, her hand. She had time to do something but she stayed rooted in the crabgrass at the edge of the yard as Callie tripped into the street, as the car didn’t slow, as the body was lifted into the air. Grace shunned the memory of those moments, and for most of her life has refused to look.
She remembers them now in odd, still frames accompanied by the rapid click, click, click of a camera shutter.
###
Grace wakes up sweating in the late morning sun searing through the window, still in her clothes from the night before. At least she had the wherewithal to take off her shoes. She is already two hours late for work. Her mouth is dry and fuzzy and it hurts to lift her head off the pillow.
“I’m sick again,” she says to Brian’s voice mail, hoping her scratchy voice sounds authentically marred.
Today is the day Charles Raggatt will be arraigned, and Grace drives out to Long Island to see him for the first time. By the time she gets to the courthouse in Mineola, the proceedings are an hour behind. She situates herself in one of the wooden flip seats in the back. The old window doesn’t close all the way and a spring breeze finds her neck. In the first row of spectator seats a Hispanic woman crochets until her son is brought before the judge on some kind of drug charge. The young man juts his chin out with defiant bravado. He has a tattoo of a tear on his cheek. The mother bursts forth with something in Spanish and the boy closes his eyes and sets his jaw. She says his name, Carlos, but he will not look at her. Finally, she crosses herself and then leaves the room.
Other than court personnel, there are only a few people left in the gallery: family members mostly, a reporter taking notes. Three more men are brought in— tough men, hardened men, men with violence and steel in their eyes—one for robbery, another for assault, the third for vehicular homicide. Grace fears the others can hear her rapid breathing. And then there he is. Charles Raggatt. A boy’s face on an oafish body that seems to have swelled in the weeks since his arrest. His face is greasy, his hair matted. He trudges in, cuffed and shackled, wearing the standard-issue orange jumpsuit, led by a
Similar Books
