STUFFED (The Slate Brothers 2)

“Honey? Are you still there?” my mother asks.

I blink back tears for the millionth time. “Yes, yes, sorry— I got distracted.” I focus my eyes on the Bowen Blaze webpage I have pulled up, where the story’s headline takes up most of the landing page.

“Oh, good, I was afraid we were disconnected. Anyhow, Astrid, it’s nice to see that you’re getting into criminal investigations with the newspaper. I think this will look great on your law school applications. Did you get the brochures we sent?” my mother asks. There’s no malice in her voice, no acknowledgment that I didn’t want the damn brochures, even though she knows that’s the case; my mother is all practicality, all the time.

“I did,” I say.

“It’s certainly the most interesting article you’ve written. I hear it’s being syndicated nationally! Pity you don’t get paid. Or do you? How does that work?” my dad muses.

“Never mind that,” my mother says, and I can hear her slapping him lightly in the chest. “I want to know more about this Carson Slate boy. Now, Astrid— he comes from a powerful family. You let us know if they threaten you in any way. We spoke to your father’s lawyer, and she says the school is responsible for keeping you safe from him—“

“I don’t think you need to worry about that, Mom.”

“I absolutely do! I hear horror stories all the time of jilted men wreaking havoc on women’ lives!”

“It’s not like that, Mom. It’s an article I wrote, but it doesn’t really tell the whole story of Carson Slate. Just the version of the story my editor wanted it to tell.”

“Is Devin your editor? What’s he like? Devin is a nice, strong name,” my mother says thoughtfully.

“Mom. Focus.”

“That’s right, honey, focus,” my father says to my mother. “Astrid, we are just so impressed. Writing for the school paper didn’t seem like a very wise use for your time, but this is really quite an impressive piece. I think it will look great to law schools, and honestly, if you were to want to seriously pursue investigative journalism…well, perhaps that’s a discussion we could have.”

I blink. Is this actually my father on the phone? My father, who for some reason seems to equate being a writer with being a circus artist or prostitute?

“That’s true. We’re proud of you, darling,” my mother says.

“Wow,” I say, or perhaps just breathe— it’s hard to tell. Have they said that, once, since I told them I wanted to be a writer? Since I told them I didn’t want to be a lawyer?

I look down at my computer screen, at the bastardized version of my story. Carson Slate the monster, Devin the snappy investigator working out the alibi, and me, the trap who used her body to lure Carson Slate into spilling his secrets. There’s nothing about the feeling of being chained to one’s parents, about try to escape without cutting ties entirely, about the way Carson feels about his dad and how it’s not entirely unlike the way I feel about my parents, the way everyone feels about their parents, as best as I can tell. That is the better story— and a story that I could have been proud of, even if perhaps my parents wouldn’t have been.

“The story isn’t what you think,” I say, sighing into the phone. “Devin, my editor— he took the story I wrote and he turned it into this giant murder mystery scandal. The truth is, I know Carson Slate. I know him well, at this point. He’s a good person, and he was put in a horrible position around being an alibi for his father. Carson didn’t really know for sure if they had dinner together that night, but he wanted to trust his parent. I understand that.”

“I don’t…think I understand,” my father says slowly, and I can perfectly picture the way his brows are furrowed into a single line.

“I don’t think newspaper reporting is for me,” I reply. “I don’t like boiling people down into facts and headlines. I want more humanity to it. I want to tell a whole story, not a summary of someone’s worst moments.”

“Well, okay, honey,” my mother says, sounding a little worried. “Do you want to switch over to pre-law?”

I smile to myself. “No. I think I’m going to switch to creative writing. I quit the paper, by the way. Devin’s the worst person on earth, and that is his whole story.”

There’s silence for a few moments, then an eruption of voices as my parents begin to talk over one another— creative writing doesn’t even allow you to teach after college, and, that’s not a job, it’s a hobby, and, if you think we’re paying for you to go to school and write fairytales, you’ve got another thing coming, and…

And plenty else. I put the phone down and pull up my version of Carson’s article, reading through it. I understand why, even if Devin wasn’t a dick, it couldn’t have been published in the newspaper.