Page 79 of Finders Keepers
“Did he tell you why he did it?”
“Oh. Um.” I can already tell what my mother’s response is going to be if I tell her he did it because he wanted to spend time with me. She’s going to switch sides so fast, and I want her onmyside, dammit. “It’s…complicated.”
She gives me a look like she knows I’m not telling her everything, but all she says is, “Do you want me to make those brownies you like, with the salted caramel swirled on top?”
“Yes, please.” My voice is small and childlike, but this time I’m fully embracing it. I’m going to let my mom take care of me, the way she wasn’t able to the first time Quentin broke my heart—mostly because I wouldn’t tell her what was wrong, but then also because she was so preoccupied dealing with the aftermath of Dad’s accident. I was afraid to use up Mom’s limited supply of love and care. But as she places a gentle kiss on my temple before making her way to the kitchen, I understand now it’s the most limitless thing on the planet. That reverberations of it will remain even after she’s gone, inside me where my own limitless supply has been growing, waiting for the moment it will be activated. First I need to find someone worthy of it.
Or maybe I should direct some of it toward myself. I’m going to need it back in Boston, when I’m alone again.
Mom’s voice drifts into the dining room, interrupting my thoughts. “On the upside, at least you didn’t get picked up by the police this time around.”
Hold up, what!?
“Um, I don’t know what you mean. I never…” I turn and meet her gaze through the open doorway. I’m not fooling her even a bit. “How long have you known?”
“Mr. Bell called us that night to tell us everything. Did you really think he wouldn’t?”
“I mean, sort of. Yeah.” I can’t believe I’ve carried that secret for so many years and my parents knew all along. More to the point, I can’t believe they didn’t punish me. “Why weren’t you mad?”
“Because you were a good kid, Nina. We knew your heart. We didn’t think you’d be making a habit of it. Besides, you were always your own harshest critic. If you made a mistake, we knew you didn’t need us to tell you.”
She’s right. I did make a mistake, and I did know it.
I just wish I had a better sense of if I’m making one now.
•••
For the nextfive days, I cry and mope around the house like a woeful ghost. Mom must fill Dad in on the most basic details, because he tells me he’s “sorry about what happened” when we pass in the hallway the first morning, then otherwise gives me an extra-wide berth. It isn’t long before even hearing evidence of Quentin’s existence next door starts making me too sad, and I haul my comforter down to the couch, where at least we aren’t sharing a bedroom wall and my window can’t taunt me with memories. I consider leaving and going back north, crashing on a friend’s couch for a week or two until I have the offer letterfrom Malbyrne and can use it to get a new apartment. But this isn’t over yet.
There’s still the unopened puzzle box, up in my room. I occasionally sit on my bed, staring at it, considering how it might open and what it might contain. Then I inevitably get too annoyed and angry that I’m doing this alone and shove it back into the top drawer of my nightstand. I spend most of my time consoling myself with my favorite comfort foods (thanks to my mother), making a bunch of macramé plant hangers (also thanks to my mother), and getting way too intoFormula 1: Drive to Survive(that one’s actually thanks to Hanako; we’ve been texting).
But inevitably I hit the limit of how many baked goods I can possibly consume, and soon thereafter I run out of both string and episodes featuring horrific crashes and Guenther Steiner being eminently quotable. I take it as a sign that it’s time to get myself together again. This was the type of all-encompassing sulking I came here hoping to partake of back in June, which Quentin ruined with his presence and talent for getting me to laugh and smile and agree to his stupid challenges. I finally got to do it, just not over the things I thought had made me sad. Now, though, I’m finished. Like Forrest Gump deciding he’s run far enough. Time to do something else.
Like figure out how to open that damn box.
36
“Hello!” I shoutdown the basement stairs as I descend. “It’s Nina Hunnicutt! Your daughter! I’m coming down!” My father is sometimes so focused on his work that he isn’t aware of much else and will startle if you simply appear in his periphery. Considering he often works with things that are sharp or tiny, he’s reasonably asked that we announce our presence loudly before visiting his workshop. I wait on the landing for him to respond before going any farther.
“Roger that,” he calls back.
When I reach him, he’s already turned around on his stool, wiping his hands on a cloth and waiting for me to tell him what I need.
“Hi, Dad,” I say, dropping a small kiss on his temple where his hair has turned salt-and-pepper. “Know anything about puzzle boxes? I’ve got one here, and I’m worried about breaking it if I try to open it myself. It’s an antique.”
“Let’s see.” He holds out his large palm—stained slightly green from who knows what—and I sit the wooden box atop it.My father studies it for a few minutes, turning it this way and that, tapping here and there, giving it a light shake beside his ear. It looks a little like a doctor giving a patient an examination; I’m half expecting him to ask the box if it hurts at all when he presses here. What about…here? “Hmm.” He shakes it once more. “Ah. Okay.”
“Do you know how to do it?” I ask.
“I have a guess. No clue if it’s right, though. Shouldn’t hurt to try it.” He hands it back over to me. “Put it down over there,” he says, flicking a finger in the direction of a large wooden table pressed up against the wall perpendicular to his workbench. “More space.”
“And then…?”
“Spin it,” he says.
“Spin it?”
“Yep. Clockwise. Like a top. The lid should lift right off.”
