Page 59 of Such a Quiet Place
But Ruby was gone now, and this newest picture had still arrived. And I no longer knew whom I could trust.
I didn’t know whether Mac was a part of this somehow. I didn’t know how much the brothers shared with each other, whether family mattered above all else. I felt entirely afraid and alone.
I was remembering the way Mac came over at the start of summer break, beer in hand, crooked smile on his face—the coincidence of his timing. Whether the rumors of Ruby’s case had brought him to my front door once more. And if so, what he was truly after.
I called my brother again, sitting on the cold floor of the foyer, the photo in my hand.
This time he answered on the first ring. “Harper? Is it Dad?”
“Sorry, no, everyone’s okay,” I said.
“Oh,” he said. “Good.” He paused for a beat. “It’s just, you’ve called twice on a Saturday. I have a missed call from you from earlier.” Our calls were infrequent, our relationship existing primarily on holidays and via parent updates.
“What kind of person would you say I am?” I asked abruptly. I was staring at a photo of evidence I’d hidden. Had listened as Ruby called me an opportunist, unable to be happy as myself.
“Are you drunk?” he asked as answer.
“No. Just if you had to describe me to a friend. LikeMy sister is…”
“The good one,” he said without pause.
“Ha,” I said.
I heard his sigh through the phone. “I guess I would say:I wish I knew her better growing up, but I fucked up our family pretty good.I would say:She gave me more chances than I deserved, and she’s a better person than me.”
I’d forgotten this about my brother: that he was direct and honest, always trying to atone for himself but unable to stop the cycle. I was wrong—nothing existed in him that reminded me of the true Ruby.
In the silence that followed, he said, “Is everything okay? You’re not having some sort of breakdown, are you?”
“Well,” I said, thinking of how to even begin. How to present this without inviting judgment. And then I stopped worrying. It was my brother, and I’d seen him at his worst, and maybe it was only fair that he saw me at mine. “The verdict in my neighbors’ murder was thrown out.”
“Oh, shit,” he said.
“Ruby came back here. To myhouse.It was a mess, and she’s dead.” Silence on the other end. “The police think she was poisoned.”
More silence.
“Hello?” I asked.
“Are you in trouble?” he asked, quick and low.
“No.” A pause. “I don’t think so. I don’t know. Kellen, my God, it’s all horrible.” A horrific mess, with three people dead and an investigation just beginning.
“You should come visit me.”
I laughed. “I don’t need Mom breathing down my neck right now, too.”
“No, I’ve got a new place. God, it’s been a while, Harp.” Our last real conversation was the one on New Year’s Eve, I thought now. Over seven months with neither of us reaching out. “I’m in Philadelphia,” he said. “Well, close to Philadelphia.”
“What?” That was six hours away.
“Long story. But I have a job here, and other than dealing with Mom’s constant calls, it’s a pretty quiet time.”Quiet timeswas the term Mom used for his good times. As ifquietwere a positive thing and not an immense blanket of deception covering what was potentially brewing below.
But I was stuck on his prior statement. “You moved to a new city, you’re only six hours away, and you didn’t tell me?”
“I don’t want to impose.”
“You wouldn’t be,” I said.
