“Plus, you’ll have a cool scar,” Charlie is saying. “You can tell everyone that you got into a knife fight and won.”
“Don’t encourage her,” I murmur.
“What’s a knife fight?” Rusty asks.
“It’s a fight with knives,” I tell her, resting my chin on her head. “They’re very bad.”
“Oh,” Rusty says. “It wasn’t a fight, just an accident.”
Charlie finishes wrapped the bandage, presses it against itself.
“What happened?” she asks Rusty.
Instantly, Rusty goes silent, her little body suddenly tense in my lap.
“I wanted to help Levi make roasting sticks,” she says quietly. “And my knife slipped.”
Her knife?
“What knife?” I ask, just as Charlie’s head snaps up and she looks at Rusty.
“The knife I borrowed,” Rusty whispers. Now she’s squirming in my lap, arching her back, trying to get up.
“Borrowed from where?” I ask.
Charlie’s eyes meet mine, wide and hazel, guilt written all over her face. I swallow hard, fighting the rising tide of anger, because I’m pretty sure I know exactly who gave my second grader a goddamn knife.
“Charlie’s workshop,” Rusty finally admits. Charlie’s gone pale beneath her freckles and her gaze drops from mine.
I take a deep breath, jaw clenching, and wonder what the fuck Charlie was thinking.
“I said you couldn’t take that knife,” Charlie admonishes her, gently, glancing at me again. “Did you take it anyway?”
“I just borrowed it,” Rusty says. “I was going to give it back. I’m sorry.”
“I didn’t want you to take it because I didn’t want you to get hurt,” Charlie says, her voice sharper now. “Rusty, if you take something without permission that’s stealing.”
Rusty’s breathing picks up and moments later a sob breaks through. She rubs her eyes with the backs of her hands, flopping sideways against my chest like she’s trying to burrow in.
“I’m sorry, Charlie,” she says. “I didn’t mean to.”
Charlie opens her mouth, looks at me, and shuts it again. I hold Rusty, sniffling and sobbing, against my chest and shake my head at Charlie.
I’ve got questions for her, starting with why the fuck did she have a knife in the first place and ending with how easy was it for her to take it? But I don’t ask them right now, not while Rusty’s having a breakdown on the bathroom floor.
“Just go,” I tell Charlie, my voice tight, clipped.
“I’ll clean up,” she says, touches Rusty’s shoulder one more time, and then she’s gone.
I close my eyes, hold my kid, let her cry, and wonder if any of the parenting books I own cover this situation.Chapter Twenty-EightCharlieTurns out there’s nothing to clean up, because Clara, Eli, Levi, and Caleb did it already: the floor is spotless, the desk is no longer blood-smeared, and Levi is holding a thumb-width stick with one end barely sharpened in one hand and my penknife in the other.
“This yours?” he asks, holding it out on his palm, blade closed.
It’s the one I let her borrow when she wanted to carve a wombat, when I gave her a hunk of soft pine and taught her to be very careful, cutting away from her fingers. The stick looks like it’s oak, much harder. No wonder it slipped and she cut herself.
I feel awful, like there’s a hand around my windpipe. Rusty’s in there, sobbing to Daniel, and it’s my fault. What the hell was I thinking, letting her use a knife and not watching where it went?
“Thanks,” I say, and put it into my pocket, where it weighs heavy as guilt.
“She okay?” Levi asks.
I swallow, my throat tight. I just want to find a corner where I can hide and cry away my guilt, but instead I’m faced with Daniel’s family after letting Rusty slice herself open.
“We should make sure we keep an eye on her hand, but she should be fine,” I say, not meeting anyone’s eye. “Keep it clean, see that it doesn’t get infected, but it should heal okay.”
“I think she might be more upset than really hurt,” Clara adds, sympathetically. “If she’s anything like her dad, she’s mad that she’s not invincible. Come on.”
She heads back downstairs. Caleb puts a hand on my shoulder and rubs it sympathetically, and I nod in thanks.
“I’ll be down in a sec,” I tell them. “I’m just gonna… you know.” Cry, probably.
They leave, footsteps fading down the stairs, the hubbub from the kitchen rising again as I turn toward Rusty’s room, put my face in my hands, and take a deep, deep breath.
Holy fuck, I feel awful. Rusty’s hurt and now Daniel’s pissed at me, all because I wasn’t paying attention, because I totally forgot that she had that knife and didn’t think to double-check—
The floor creaks behind me, and I whirl. Eli’s standing there, alone, arms folded over his chest.
“Is he being a dick about it?” he asks gently.
I bite my lips together and shake my head, afraid that if I try to say anything I’ll start crying.