“Then I’ll knock again.”
“She doesn’t like people who act like they have authority.”
Raina pulled out of the parking space.
“I don’t have authority over your mother.”
“You act like you have authority over everything.”
The corner of Raina’s mouth almost moved.
“There’s a difference between acting like it and having it.”
They reached the county road.
Eli waited until the school disappeared behind them.
“What did my father do for the club?”
Raina kept her eyes ahead.
“Why now?”
“Because every time you don’t tell me, it gets bigger.”
“That’s not how information works.”
“That’s exactly how information works when everybody else in the room has it.”
Raina drove in silence.
The bare winter trees along the road flashed by in gray vertical lines.
“It will change things,” she said eventually.
Eli turned toward her.
“Then tell me.”
“Not yet.”
His anger rose so quickly it surprised him.
“Why?”
“Because right now you have sixty days, an assessment, school, your mother, and a home situation that is barely stable. One thing at a time.”
“That’s easy for you to say.”
“No,” Raina said. “It isn’t.”
Something in her voice stopped him.
She did not elaborate.
The meeting between Raina and Darla happened four days later.
Eli was not there.
He spent the afternoon at the compound working on an old fuel system assembly that Boon had taken apart twice just so Eli could rebuild it. The task required enough concentration to keep his mind from replaying every possible version of the conversation happening three miles away.
After an hour, Boon said, “She’s not going there to hurt your mother.”
Eli looked up.
He had not spoken in twenty minutes.
“Raina,” Boon clarified. “She’s not going there to judge anyone.”
“My mom doesn’t do well with authority.”
“Raina doesn’t have authority over her.”
“She’ll sound like she does.”
“That part is harder to fix.”
Eli looked back at the assembly.
“How long has your mother been this bad?” Boon asked.
Eli’s hands stopped.
There were versions of Darla Mercer.
Before Caleb disappeared, she laughed sometimes in the kitchen. She worked at a pharmacy warehouse in the next county. She remembered school dates. She wore bright scarves. She bought cheap flowers at the grocery store even when money was tight because, she once said, a house should contain one thing that existed only because it was pretty.
After Caleb disappeared, she became quieter. Then thinner. Then less reliable.
She lost the warehouse job after too many missed shifts. She tried part-time work at a laundromat, then stopped going. Bills became piles. Meals became irregular. Doors became barriers.
The worst of it had been recent.
“My dad held things together,” Eli said. “When he left, nothing held them anymore.”
Boon set down the wrench in his hand.
“And you became the thing holding them.”
Eli did not answer.
He resumed working.
Raina returned at six-fifteen.
Eli was eating dinner at the compound, another development that had occurred without formal announcement. One evening a plate had simply appeared in front of him. After that, if he was there past six, he ate.