Chapter 7
In my memories, he smelled like coffee and aftershave and came home after dark.
“Was Dad friends with you?” Annie asked.
Arthur’s expression became complicated.
“No.”
Grace answered instead.
“Dad admired him.”
Arthur flinched at that.
“More than he should have,” Grace added.
I waited.
No one continued.
“What happened?”
Grace looked at me.
“There was an accident with one of the company trucks.”
My stomach tightened.
Our parents had died in a highway accident six years earlier.
I knew that much.
A rainy night.
A wrong turn.
A collision.
Adults had always changed the subject when I asked for details.
“Dad was driving?” I asked.
“No,” Grace said quickly. “It wasn’t the accident that killed Mom and Dad.”
I let out a breath.
“This was before that. Dad was managing the depot when a serious mechanical problem was discovered in several vehicles.”
Arthur spoke quietly.
“He reported it.”
Grace looked at him.
“Eventually.”
Arthur accepted the correction.
“Yes.”
“Dad thought the company would blame him,” Grace continued. “There were arguments. Lawyers. Investigations. He lost his position.”
I stared at Arthur.
“You fired him?”
Arthur didn’t look away.
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Because at the time, I believed he had hidden maintenance reports.”
“Did he?”
Grace answered.
“Not exactly.”
That phrase again.
Not exactly.
Arthur folded his hands over his cane.
“Your father delayed forwarding several reports because he was trying to solve the problem inside the division before headquarters found out. It was a terrible judgment call. But years later, I learned he had also repeatedly requested money for repairs and had been refused by executives above him.”
“By you?”
“No.”
“Your company.”
“Yes.”
The way Arthur said it made clear that the difference did not comfort him.
Grace looked toward the window.
“Dad never really recovered from losing that job.”
I remembered something then.
Dad sitting at our kitchen table late at night with envelopes spread around him.
Mom rubbing his shoulder.
Grace whispering for me to go back to bed.
Arthur continued.
“After your parents died, I learned that Grace had become guardian to both of you.”
“You kept track of us?”
“From a distance.”
May you like
“Why?”
He looked at Grace.
