Then at Vanessa.
He knew exactly what was happening.
“Lily,” he said. “Stay out of it.”
The video ended.
Neither Rachel nor I spoke.
Finally, I asked, “Can he explain that away?”
“He can try.”
“After telling the caseworker he’d never seen anything like it?”
“That is the important part.”
I looked at the frozen image again.
Mark standing inside the kitchen.
Not around the corner.
Not passing through a doorway.
There.
“Does he know you have this?”
“His attorney knows footage was preserved. I don’t know exactly what Mark knows.”
“Should I call him?”
“No.”
The answer came so fast that I looked at her.
Rachel folded her hands on the table.
“You’ve spent three weeks wanting him to tell the truth. Give him the opportunity.”
I understood what she meant.
I did not particularly enjoy understanding it.
I left without calling Mark.
I didn’t call Vanessa either.
I didn’t send anybody a screenshot with a clever little message underneath.
There was a version of me, probably twenty years younger, who might have enjoyed doing that.
At forty-four, I had finally learned that when somebody is digging a hole, climbing down there to argue with them mostly gets dirt on your clothes.
So I went home.
I made tacos.
Lily complained for nearly twenty minutes because I had bought the wrong shredded cheese.
It was wonderfully ordinary.
Then my phone rang.
Carol.
Mark’s mother.
Carol and I had remained polite after the divorce.
Birthday texts.
Christmas cards.
An occasional I hope you’re doing well that neither of us expected an honest answer to.
I almost ignored the call.
Then I answered.
“Hi, Carol.”
“We need to talk.”
No hello.
That saved time.
“About what?”
“You know what.”
I leaned against the kitchen counter. Lily was upstairs.
“If you mean the investigation, I’m not discussing it with you.”
“This has gone far enough, Claire.”
That sentence did something to me.
Not because Carol raised her voice.
She didn’t.
She sounded tired.
Put upon.
As though I had scheduled the whole crisis during an inconvenient week.
“Lily sent me an emergency note from school.”
“I know.”
“Then I’m not sure what you think has gone too far.”
“Children get dramatic.”
I closed my eyes.
“She was afraid.”
“Vanessa is strict. That isn’t the same thing.”
I looked at the refrigerator.
A school picture of Lily was held in place by a magnet shaped like a slice of pizza.
“Did you ever see Vanessa send Noah to bed without dinner?”
Silence.
Not a long silence.
Long enough.
“Carol?”
“When I was growing up, if we didn’t behave, sometimes we went to bed without supper. We survived.”
“That wasn’t my question.”
“You are making this sound much uglier than it was.”
There it was.
Not no.
Not never.
Just a request to use nicer words.
“Did you see her do it?”
Carol exhaled.
“Yes.”
“How many times?”
“I didn’t count.”
My hand tightened around the phone.
“Did Mark know?”
“Claire, you know Mark. He hates conflict.”
I laughed once.
Carol went quiet.
“What?”
“Nothing.”
“No. What?”
“I spent twelve years married to him. I know he hates conflict.”
“He was trying to keep peace in his home.”
“And Lily was trying to feed a seven-year-old.”
“You’re twisting this.”
“No. I’m finally asking very simple questions.”
Carol’s voice hardened.
“Do you realize what you’re doing to this family?”
I looked toward the stairs.
A month earlier, that question might have worked on me.
I might have worried about Mark’s marriage.
Lily’s relationship with her grandmother.
Christmas.
Birthdays.
School concerts.
Whether everybody could still sit in the same row without making things uncomfortable.
Those things mattered.
They simply didn’t matter first.
Carol continued.