“Did you ever ask him if he did it?”
“No,” she said quietly. “I believed in him. I believed and believed and believed . . . then his last appeal was denied and he stopped coming out to see me. By then I was a mess. You remember that day we got in the car accident?”
“Yeah.”
“Waiting for him to come home almost killed me. I don’t want you to go through what I did.”
“I have to believe, Mom,” he said.
“A son should. And the man I married, the one I loved, is worth everything you’re feeling. That’s the man who is your father, not the killer you’ve heard about all your life. But try to . . . understand why I can’t stand beside you on this. I’m just not strong enough. I am ashamed of that.”
Noah reached over and held her hand. “You were alone, though. I have you.”
Winona stood at the window of her beach house, watching the road above. It was the ninth of January, a cold and blustery day that hinted at a coming rainstorm. The low gray sky matched her mood, made everything outside look faded and soggy. An inauspicious start to the new year.
The school bus came into view above the trees, stopping for a few minutes at the top of Mark’s driveway. When it drove off again, she stood there, still staring out at the bare, wintry backyard, feeling a rush of loneliness on this Monday morning.
Last night she’d lain in her lonely bed for hours, trying to figure out how best to proceed with Mark. She’d given him time to come to his senses, assuming he’d walk over here one night and say he was sorry, but it hadn’t happened. November had rolled into December, and then into a new year, and still he hadn’t walked from his house to hers. She made sure to be here a lot, to keep her lights on late into the night, and still, nothing.
Last night, for the first time, she’d wondered if he was waiting for her. She was the one who’d made the mistake (she hadn’t told him about the petition; she should have; she saw that now), so maybe he was waiting for her apology.
The more she thought about it, the more likely it felt.
Dressing carefully, she bundled up in her wool coat and headed next door. With only a moment’s hesitation, she went up the flagstone steps and rang the doorbell.
He answered quickly, coming to the door in his slippers and robe, with his hair still wet from the shower. “Hey,” she said, smiling uncertainly. “I thought maybe you were waiting for me to say I’m sorry.”
The smile she needed so desperately didn’t arrive. “Winona,” he said in an impatient tone, “we’ve had this discussion before. Too often.”
“I know you love me,” she said.
“No, I don’t.”
“But—”
“Did you even speak to my mother? Did you warn her that this firestorm was coming down? Reporters call her every day. She barely leaves the house anymore, she’s so upset.”
“I never said Myrtle was lying on the stand.”
“Oh, really?”
“Eyewitness mistakes are common. I’ve been doing research—”
“Either way you’re saying it’s her fault, and everyone in town knows it.”
“You don’t understand.”
“You don’t understand. You’re hurting everyone with this crusade. Do you really expect us to just accept it?”
“I thought you would, Mark. You know me. I wouldn’t be doing all this for no reason. It’s the right thing. I should have done it a long time ago.”
“That’s the thing: I don’t know you. Obviously I never did. Goodbye.” He stepped back and closed the door.
All the way back to her house, in her car, and into town, Winona replayed his words: No, I don??t. She wasn’t sure which hurt more: the idea that he didn’t love her now or the unsettling truth that he never had. For the first time in years, she longed to talk to Luke, to sit down with him as they had when they were kids, and ask him what was wrong with her, why she was so easy to discard and so difficult to love, but in the years of his absence, their friendship had faded. He called once or twice a year and they talked mostly about his children and her career.
In town, she pulled into her garage and walked around the side of the house and through the front door.
Lisa was at her desk, typing at her computer. “Your father is in the sunroom. He was here at eight when I got in. Sitting on the porch.”