Page 155 of Hello, Summer
“I think you’d better take me back to G’mama’s house. I can get my car and my laptop and go over to the office to start making some phone calls.”
“You promised your sister you were going to get some rest,” Skelly reminded her.
“And I will. Just as soon as I make some phone calls. I want to try to track down somebody in Detroit who knew Buddy, or Robert, when he worked there.”
“And then you’ll go back to Felicity Street and sleep. Promise?”
She shuddered. “Not Felicity Street.”
“Can I ask why? Is it Poppell?”
Conley closed her eyes. “Yeah. Well, partly.”
“What else?” he asked. “Something’s bugging you. I can tell.”
“It’s not really Poppell,” she admitted. “Last night, after he called the last time and told me I was going to die, after I called the cops, I went into every room, flipping on the lights. I figured if somebody was out there, they’d think I wasn’t alone. And when I got to my dad’s old bedroom, I just… froze.”
“It’s hard,” Skelly said. “Mama won’t go in Dad’s office, still.”
“I found him,” Conley said. “That day. I’m the one who found the body. Nobody else was home. It was supposed to be a surprise. I walked all around the house, calling his name, and then I went upstairs, thinking, well, maybe he was sleeping.”
Tears welled up in her eyes, and the next minute she was sobbing. “He was dead! He wasn’t supposed to be the one to die. She should have died! She was so selfish, and he loved her so much, and she killed him. She did. When she left the last time, she took everything with her.”
Skelly pulled the car over to the curb, put his arms around her, and let her cry. After five minutes, he handed her a tissue and she blew her nose. “I’m horrible, I know. But I’ll never forgive my mother for what she did to him. Grayson and I, we had G’mama and Pops, and Daddy, of course, but he was so damn lonesome without her. G’mama said he grieved to death.”
“Your dad was a great guy,” Skelly said.
She nodded and took a deep breath. “He didn’t really die of a heart attack, you know.”
“I know.”
“How?” She clutched his wrist. “I never told anybody. G’mama knew, of course, but we never talked about it, and we never told Grayson the truth.”
“I filled his prescriptions,” Skelly said. “He’d been seeing a new doctor after my dad retired. He was on some pretty heavy-duty antidepressants, which he didn’t like. Said they made him feel like a zombie. And he was taking sleeping pills too. I warned him, the last time he got a refill, about mixing the meds. He made some joke about ‘the big sleep,’ but I didn’t think anything of it.”
“You’ve known the truth all this time?” she asked, her voice quavering. “And you never said a word.”
“It wasn’t my truth to tell,” Skelly said, touching her face lightly. “But that’s an awful secret for you to carry around all this time, isn’t it?”
“I guess.” She sniffed and wiped at her face. “Grayson keeps guilt-tripping me about never coming home. I couldn’t tell her about Dad. I couldn’t tell her how the dread just washes over me every time I think about that night. And then I was in the funeral home, and yesterday, during Robinette’s funeral—in the church where Dad was buried from? I think I was having a panic attack. Being in his old room last night?” She shuddered. “I’m not going back to Felicity Street, Skelly. Not after last night.”
The cat meowed softly from the back seat.
Conley turned around. “It’s okay, kitty. You’re not going to Felicity Street either.”
“Is it okay for your oldest friend to have an opinion on this stuff?” Skelly asked.
“I guess.” She sniffed loudly.
“Maybe you should talk to your sister. Like you just did to me. Get this big, dark secret out in the open, and it won’t be so awful.”
“I can’t,” she said, tearing up again.
“You told me,” he pointed out.
“You’re different. You’re Skelly. I can tell you anything.”
He kissed her forehead and sighed. “Anything except the one thing I want to hear.”
