Good Neighbors Read online

  Cat Hestia, who’d plugged the hose in to begin with, had left for her silent meditation class by then. The Walsh family was gone, too, having scheduled a lobster dinner at Waterzooi. The water kept spraying, none wanting now to turn it off. All thinking it was someone else’s job. They didn’t dare go near that tainted Wilde house right in front of Detective Bianchi, who would see them. They didn’t want to get caught pulling the yellow plastic from the shrubbery just as the Wildes returned from wherever they’d been, either. The family might get the wrong idea. Arlo might shout. Or worse.

  As Detective Bianchi was leaving, Peter Benchley rolled out his door and stopped the man. They spoke for nearly half an hour. Maple Street was surprised—hadn’t known Peter was capable of that level of interaction. This haunted them. What if, all this time that he’d been watching, he’d been seeing, too?

  I’ll swear to it in court, Linda Ottomanelli heard him say. There’s no way Arlo Wilde hurt that girl. Not that day, anyway. Probably not any day.

  Bianchi left.

  The water kept running, flooding the Wildes’ side lawn and reaching into the Schroeders’. Linda Ottomanelli and Rhea Schroeder sat drinking red wine on Rhea’s porch, but the rest stayed inside their houses with their doors shut.

  At last, Rhea stood. She made a big deal of it, arms wide as if to say: It’s always me, isn’t it? The buck stops here. She cut through the Wilde lawn, to the Walsh house, and turned off the hose. Petite and walking with what they noticed was just the hint of a limp, she dragged the Slip ’N Slide toward her porch to allow the Wildes’ lawn to dry. The rest of Maple Street felt silly, that they had not done this.

  They felt ashamed.

  * * *

  While Gertie and Arlo were waiting on the police department front steps, Fred Atlas walked to an outgoing connection and called them back. Arlo explained the problem. Fred told him to sit tight. He had a criminal attorney friend by the name of Nick Sloss, who’d meet him there.

  “I can’t believe this is happening,” Arlo said.

  Silence on the other end for a good few seconds. Arlo waited, shorn of pride. “I think you’d better believe it,” Fred said.

  When they returned, it was explained to the Wildes that because Arlo was the suspect, and Gertie was not, they needed to be placed in different rooms while they waited. This seemed specious—like a divide-and-conquer plan of attack. But they felt that arguing would make it seem like they had secrets to protect—a story they needed to get straight. And in truth, the nature of the accusation was so shocking that they weren’t thinking straight.

  Gennet led Gertie to a new room, shut the door behind him, and sat next to her instead of opposite. “Are you absolutely certain this accusation is false?” He had a kinder demeanor than Hudson. She felt empathy from him, even though his expression, too, was an emotionless mask.

  “It’s a sickness. You’d be helping him if you told me the truth,” Gennet said.

  “Have you met Rhea?” she asked. “Her son threw a rock at our house. This”—she pointed at the fresh scab on her cheek—“this is from her ring. She slapped me. She blames me for what happened to Shelly, I think. Because my kids lived… Or, I don’t know. I can’t pretend to understand how she thinks.”

  Gennet took a photo of her scab. “Did anyone see her slap you?”

  “Sure. The whole crescent. Ask any of them.”

  Gennet wrote this down.

  “I should tell you something,” Gertie said, her voice lowered. “I’m not an eye-for-an-eye person. Bitter just makes more bitter. It’s toxic. Every book says so. So that’s not why I’m saying this, but you tell me you’re doing your job and you want to find out the truth, and I think you’re being honest with me, so I should tell you.”

  Gennet looked up from his notes. He had freckles across the bridge of his nose. His wedding band was an old-fashioned claddagh, heart pointed down. She pictured him meeting his wife at Croxley’s Ale House in New Hyde Park after work, noshing the all-you-can-eat wings. He looked the type.

  “Rhea’s the one who hurt that child. This is her guilt talking.”

  “What makes you say that?”

  “She told me once, that she was unhappy. That she wanted to cause her family hurt. That Shelly galled her. Something about her hair. She hated brushing it. And Julia, my daughter, she told me. She saw the bruises. Said there was evidence Shelly was keeping. Pictures.”

  Gennet kept writing. His pen-to-paper made a soft, reassuring sound.

  “Where’s the evidence?”

  “Her room, I’ll bet? But I don’t know. My daughter said she kept it in something called a Pain Box.”

  “What’s the evidence?”

  “Julia said it hurt her to be hugged.”

  They sat like that, in quiet. Gertie stopped shaking enough to pour herself a glass of water. She let that sink in again: it had hurt Shelly to be hugged. She wondered where Shelly was right then, and if anything had comforted her, at the end.

  “People from your kind of background cope with a lot of stresses.”

  “My background?”

  “You were raised by a Cheerie Maupin in Atlantic City. She had a rap sheet for fraud. You never finished high school. Your husband’s got a rap sheet, too.”

  “That was before I knew him,” Gertie answered. “It was just drugs. He never hurt anyone. He’s not that guy anymore.”

  “But he did hurt someone.” Gennet slid a glossy sheet of paper in Gertie’s direction. It was a photo of a skinny old man with a broken nose. Black hair and tall and reedy. Holes in a dingy white T-shirt. “He broke this man’s nose.”

  “That’s his dad. His dad doesn’t count,” Gertie answered. Her face felt hot.

  “But you said he never hurt anyone. Is there anyone else he hurt, that you don’t think counts?”

  Gertie understood then that there wasn’t any winning over that was going to happen here. She’d been right to tell him about Rhea, but that didn’t make him sympathetic to her cause. They weren’t now best friends. This wasn’t a pageant, she wasn’t sixteen, and no wide, dimpled smile was going to charm him. This realization, or maybe just the baby due in thirteen weeks, and all its hormones, caused her to break down.

  “Do you need a tissue?”

  Gertie opened her purse. “I have my own.” She blew her nose. “People cry under stress. Stop writing. It’s normal to cry.”

  “Mrs. Schroeder was very thorough. She gave an exhaustive statement. She claimed that Shelly slept over your house at least a dozen times.”

  Gertie sniffled.

  “But your daughter, Julia, never slept over at the Schroeders’.”

  “Rhea’s very particular. You know—only one slice of French toast, then everybody’s got to clean their plates and read Shakespeare. Julia had a hard time with that. Shelly, too. They liked to goof around… Why am I getting interrogated? After what I just told you about Rhea, you’re not even calling somebody to look for that evidence?”

  “What about Julia? The detectives on the scene told me your daughter cut her hair short like Shelly Schroeder’s. Why is that?”

  Gertie held her belly. Guppy kicked, stimulated by the cold water. “I’m tired of this. I don’t know what you want me to say.”

  “We’re told your son behaves inappropriately. Self-fondling. You understand that’s a symptom. If we find proof of something untoward, you’ll be charged as an accessory. They’ll both be removed from your home right now. Today.”

  “But I’m not lying,” she said.

  Gennet wrote something else down in his book. “Let’s go over it all again,” he said.

  “No,” she answered.

  Gennet got up, walked out, returned with three slices of pizza and a Coke, plus a beige cotton cardigan he must have borrowed from a coworker.

  “Can we go over it one more time?” he asked.

  Gertie bit into the pizza. She was starved. “I bet you go to Croxley’s for wings. You do, don’t you? I’ll bet when this al
l gets cleared up I’ll see you there, and you’ll feel bad. You’ll say sorry, and you’ll buy my husband a beer.”

  A blush warmed his freckled cheeks. “I really hope so.”

  * * *

  Hudson, clearly the tougher detective, joined Arlo in his room. She smiled warmly when she sat down beside him, and she was a good actress, because that smile reached her eyes.

  “I have to do this,” she said. “I’m inclined to believe you. But this has to be thorough, for your sake.”

  “Okay.”

  “Mrs. Schroeder seems over-the-top. We all thought so.”

  “I guess. Her kid died. Maybe she’s not in her right mind.”

  “Exactly. I mean, come on. What, like you kissed Shelly on the cheek one time, right?”

  “Nope.”

  “Want a Coke?”

  “Nope.”

  “You look pretty rough. You grab a little hair of the dog that bit you this morning?”

  “Nope.”

  “But you were drinking the morning Shelly fell, is that right? Witnesses said they could smell it.”

  “Don’t recall.”

  “Can we test your blood?”

  “Nope.”

  “Your daughter, Julia, cut all her hair off this morning. Why do you think a twelve-year-old girl would do something like that?”

  Arlo flinched. He didn’t like this woman using his daughter’s name.

  “They said when Shelly fell, you were chasing her. Both of them. You weren’t dressed except for a pair of…” She looked through her notes. “Tiger-striped briefs. One witness saw an erection. Can you tell me what had you so aroused?”

  A terrible red blush rose from his neck all the way to his scalp. An erection? Who could imagine such a thing, let alone say it out loud? “Nope.”

  “Do you know why Shelly Schroeder cut her hair?”

  “Nope.”

  “This lawyer thing, is it necessary? I’m starting to feel like you don’t want to cooperate. That’s not the impression you want to give, is it?”

  Despite the cold, a bead of Arlo’s sweat dripped to the table. It was possible that telling his story for a seventh time would, in some way, help his cause, but he doubted it. “Nope.”

  “So tell me what’s going on. Why are you here?”

  “I dunno.”

  Detective Hudson stood. At last, her mask of calm cracked. She didn’t look angry and she didn’t look warm. She just looked finished. Like she’d done her diligence, and could move on to the next thing.

  * * *

  They were both left alone for another couple of hours, awaiting a lawyer who never showed up. Or had the police detained him? Were they allowed to do that?

  Gertie broke down and cried for the second time.

  Once something is said out loud, you can’t help but wonder if it’s true. If you’ve got kids, it’s your job to imagine the worst possible outcome, be it hot coffee near a baby, or slippery rocks at the beach… What if her messed-up history had blinded her to an obvious threat? What if Arlo had done harm? She thought about that, and she thought about the kids, Larry and Julia. Was there a reason Larry touched himself when nervous? They’d had him tested. It wasn’t autism or anything on the spectrum. It wasn’t low intelligence. He actually had a genius IQ and they’d told her that some especially smart kids develop social skills at a slower rate. Every expert said he’d grow out of it. Some kids develop unevenly. He was just weird, because some kids are weird.

  But what if something untoward had been done to him?

  Gertie’d been through so much, abused so often as a kid, that her perspective might be warped. What if it was like all the books said? She’d reproduced her own childhood without knowing it, because damaged people seek more damage?

  And what of Julia? She’d accused Gertie just today of never being on her side. What had she meant by that? Was it possible that Arlo had gotten to both Julia and Shelly at some sleepover? That this had bound them, making their friendship deeper and more turbulent? It would explain their secrecy and closeness, and then the abrupt end to all that.

  Were these accusations real?

  She thought about herself as a girl. How scared she’d been. How she’d believed everything was her responsibility and fault. She’d never spoken unless spoken to, and even then, only ever told people what they’d wanted to hear. And she’d been good at knowing what people wanted to hear. Her life had depended on it. Larry wasn’t like that. If he got mad, you knew it. He had no problem defending himself, and given all the teasing, his self-esteem had held up pretty okay, too. Same with Julia. Together, any rooms those two walked into, they owned. You can’t have strong, happy kids if the people who are supposed to love them most are betraying them. It’s not possible.

  And Arlo. Was he a hunter? Anyone could see that he had a temper. But in the years she’d known him, he’d never lost control. Gertie had come closer to spanking Julia, to grabbing Larry by the arm and forcing him out the door to get where they needed to be on time. Arlo hollered and threatened, sure. But he never hit.

  The real question here: Was Arlo squirrely for little kids? Their own sex life was straightforward. Nothing experimental. But that was her fault. She had scars. It had to be her on top—the way she’d never done it with any of the men before. To make it new and her own. But so vanilla, had he gone outside for fulfillment?

  He fit the profile. A cowed man, ill-used by his dad in ways that are too dark for the movies. It had made him soft and unsure. Overly agreeable in the presence of strong personalities until he felt cornered, and then he barked. But those dark feelings have to go somewhere.

  Maybe they’d gone into the children.

  Her heart was beating too fast. She held the table because things got swimmy. Breathed slow and imagined the smell of chocolate chip cookies until she wasn’t dizzy anymore. She came to a decision then. She had to stop thinking about this. It was making her crazy. Even if Arlo was guilty, she still had to get out of here and back to her kids.

  She wiped her eyes, then Googled a practical question: “Can police detain lawyers?” But the internet was blocked in the room. So she stared at her phone, and then it occurred to her to get the hell up. The door was unlocked. No one stopped her. She went outside and under the sun, where it was warm and she stopped shivering.

  “Can police detain lawyers?” she asked her phone. The answer from the hive mind was a resounding no. Next, she looked up the thing she was really worried about: “What happens to kids when parents go into police custody?” Foster care, it turned out. As soon as tonight, any kinds of people could be alone with Julia and Larry. Doing whatever they pleased to them.

  She stared at her phone, wishing she had someone to call for help. But she didn’t. Her whole life was Arlo.

  * * *

  On Arlo’s end, the time passed even more slowly. What do you do when falsely accused of the worst possible crime? He felt the camera on him, aware that his room was under surveillance. He thought back, trying to remember a time he’d been alone with the child—Shelly Schroeder. Had he ever walked in on the girls when changing? Was that illegal? Had he ever walked around with his shirt off? Was that wrong? What if the newspapers found out? They loved scandals about has-beens. Front-page news. Internet trolls would barrage every interoffice e-mail address they could find. He’d be fired within the hour. And what of Julia and Larry? How would he explain this to them? Would doubt creep, smearing his relationships, so that no one ever trusted him again?

  Eventually, Arlo realized that he, too, could go outside. He smoked three Parliament Lights and called Fred. After a time, Fred called back, explaining that the lawyer was stuck in traffic. After sixty minutes, Arlo called again. Phone tag. This time, Fred seemed concerned, and said he’d check things out. On his way back, Arlo stopped in the room where Gertie was sitting. Realized it was stupid they weren’t together.

  He didn’t come to her like he ordinarily would have. He just stood there, stiff and uncomfortable
, because maybe someone was watching this reunion. Judging it. Maybe Gertie was upset. After what she’d been through in her own childhood, doubt had crept. She no longer loved him.

  He sat one chair away from her. She didn’t ask him to move closer, but she did pass a slice of cold pizza and half a Coke.

  * * *

  At two hours, they went outside and called Fred again. Tag. He called back and told them that Sloss had already arrived at the police station, spoken with the police, discovered that Arlo was a “high-profile” former celebrity, and decided to leave without informing anyone, including Fred. He didn’t want his name associated with a pedophile. It could ruin his career. Fred was calling around, looking for someone else.

  “Will it hurt your career to help me out like this?” Arlo asked.

  “It’s fine,” Fred answered, too quickly.

  “You do believe me, don’t you?”

  “I don’t know,” Fred answered. “I know you’ve been good to me and my wife. Listen, I was hoping I could get this cleared up for you. A lawyer would put it all on record. But at this point, your kids are starting to get upset. Just come home.”

  * * *

  They found Hudson and Gennet in the wide main room, at a pair of open desks. Another man in a more expensive suit was with them. He looked like he’d just come out of court, and for a moment, they both fantasized that he was the lawyer Fred had sent, returned at last.

  “Detective Bianchi,” he said. “I’m supervising this case.” He shook their hands. Firm shake, but not jerk firm.

  “My wife’s ready to drop,” Arlo said. “I’m taking her home. As soon as I find a lawyer, I’m happy to come back and answer all your questions.”

  “Give us just a second,” Bianchi answered as he took both detectives aside. Words were spoken. It lasted twenty more minutes.