“You smell like smoke.” I glance over to my little brother Grady and make a show of sniffing the air before bringing the beer to my lips.
“Occupational hazard,” he says before lifting his chin to where our dad is attempting not to burn steaks on the grill while he shoots the shit with Grayson, our middle brother. “We were doing drills today over at the old gravel yard. I guess I didn’t wash all the smoke off.”
“Hmm,” I murmur, part listening, part lost in thought.
“So, you gonna tell me why you bailed on coming over on the Fourth? I hope like hell she was worth missing out on Mom’s apple pie.” He chuckles. “I guess you enjoyed a different kind of pie, huh?”
“You’re the firefighter, why don’t you go help Dad put those flames out.” Diversion intended to get conversation away from my sex life, but I’m not sure he’s going to buy it. My brothers are nosey fuckers.
He sits there silent for a moment, and I can feel the weight of his stare as I look at the flames flare up on the old Weber again.
“So, you didn’t get laid?” he questions.
“Nah.” Another sip of beer. Another push with my foot to rock the porch swing I’m sitting on.
“What’s the deal, then?”
“Nothing really. It was a long day, and then I ended up chasing ghosts for a bit and lost track of time is all.” I shrug. It’s close enough to the truth.
“You should have just told us you got lost in a call. Is it one I know about?”
“Nah.”
He chuckles. “Are you being a dick, or are you trying to be vague on purpose?”
I’m not trying to be a dick, but I know that once I say something to him, it will become a Malone family free-for-all topic of discussion.
He doesn’t push, which I’m grateful for, but my mind veers back to the ghosts. To the wondering and questioning and wanting to know more.
There’s the creak of my swing. The laughter of my dad and brother. The sound effects Luke, Grayson’s son, is making as he plays with Matchbox cars on the grass. The squeal of kids a few houses down as they chase each other. The hum of a lawn mower somewhere down the street.
“You remember Emmy Reeves?”
Grady’s bottle of beer pauses momentarily on the way to his lips. “Vaguely,” he murmurs. “You two were like Mutt and Jeff. She was at the house all the time or you were at hers . . . and then something happened with her family and she moved, right?”
“Something like that,” I respond, realizing he was only in preschool when it happened and probably doesn’t remember the details. Having a father who was chief of police probably helped keep the facts quiet.
“Why are you bringing her up now?”
“I saw her the other day.”
“No shit. How is she? Did she move back? Is she—”
“I couldn’t tell you.”
“No?” He reaches down and scratches Moose between the ears. The mammoth dog rolls onto his back without a care in the world other than wanting more affection.
“That’s the thing, she wouldn’t talk to me.” I glance up as the screen door opens, and my mom comes out with a basket of buns for the burgers.
“How’s studying going?” she asks, saving me from saying any more.
“It’s going,” I shrug, thinking of the stack of index cards with questions for my detective’s exam on them. They are sitting on my nightstand collecting dust.
“Well, let me know if you need any help studying,” she says, making me laugh. Once our mother always our mother, even when we’re studying as an adult.
“I will.”
“Time to eat, boys.”
And eat we do. The mountain of food all but gone by the time we finish and sit back in our chairs with overstuffed stomachs.
“How was your night out?” Mom asks Grayson, leaning forward on her elbows, eager to hear that after one date he’s ready to marry the girl and give her more grandchildren.
“It was fine.” Grayson shrugs. “Nothing spectacular.”
“He wore cologne,” Luke says and then lifts his eyebrows. “You only wear cologne when you like a girl.”
The whole table laughs. “Is that so?” Grayson says as he tugs down on Luke’s baseball hat and then gives him a noogie.
“That’s what they do on television.”
“Are you going to see her again?” Mom fishes, relentlessly, but Grayson turns to me.
“So who do you have on the line now, Grant?”
I don’t even have to look to know Mom’s rolling her shoulders and getting that sour look on her face. It has become the norm when discussing my lack of settling down and giving her babies to spoil and dote over.
“I don’t have anyone on the line.” I glare at him.
“You always have at least one, if not four, falling hook, line, and sinker,” he continues.
“That’s such bullshit. I do not. I—”
“He has Emmy Reeves on the line,” pipes in Grady, who then grunts as my foot connects with his shin beneath the table.
“Emmy Reeves?” Grayson says at the same time as my mom’s head snaps up to look at my dad.
“Emmy, Emmy?” she asks.
“Fuck off, Grady,” I mutter, knowing he threw me to the wolves to save Grayson’s ass.
But when I meet the expectant eyes of my parents, there is a gravity to Dad’s expression that I haven’t seen since his days on the force. It makes me realize things were probably ten times worse for Emmy than I ever imagined way back when.
As an adult, I can decipher those expressions and understand the things I couldn’t comprehend as a kid.
“Yes. Emmy, Emmy.”
Mom’s face brightens. “Did she contact you on that FaceWorld or InstaGreet everyone is using these days?”
“FaceWorld?” Grady says before letting out an exasperated sigh. “Mom, when are you ever going to catch up with the times? It’s Facebook and Instagram. I told you I’d be more than willing to teach you how to use them if you’d like.”
“And I told you that I’d rather remain happy and oblivious to all the ways people can stalk me online. I’m a cop’s wife, Grady. You keep your personal information off the internet so you can keep your family safe.”
“Yes, Betsy.” Dad nods, trying to stop this bickering before it starts. “So, Grant,” he asks and gives me his investigator’s stare, “how did you connect with her?”
“I saw her in town the other day.” This has my parents sharing another glance. “What’s that look mean?”
“Nothing,” Dad responds.
“Nothing?” I repeat.
“Just surprised to hear she was in Sunnyville. Her mom liked to move around a lot.” Mom’s smile softens. “I used to love that little girl as if she were my own. The daughter I never had. I used to joke with your father that you were going to grow up to marry her someday.”
“Of course you would think that.” I roll my eyes.
“How is she? Was she well?”
I take a long sip of beer and wipe my hands on my napkin before leaning back in my chair and shrugging. “No idea. I was working the crowd at the pub crawl when I saw her.”
“And?” she prompts.
“She saw me, and then she had to leave, so we didn’t really get a chance to talk.” Emmy’s shocked eyes flash through my mind. I’m not sure why I lie to them about it.
“Are you going to see her again?” Dad asks.
“It was so quick, I didn’t get her phone number. Besides, if I wanted to, I wouldn’t know the first place to look for her. She was probably here for the holiday or something and is gone now.”
“You are a cop, dipshit. In case you didn’t know.” The kick to the shin I gave Grady moments ago is returned to me under the table.
“And your point is?” I grunt, glaring at my brother.
“You have all the stalking capabilities you need at the station.”
“Nah, I couldn’t do that,” I reply, but that doesn’t mean the thought hasn’t crossed my mind a time or a hundred.
“Stick with that thought, Grant,” Dad warns. “The last thing you need is to misuse city resources while being considered for the promotion.”
“And the chief speaks,” Grayson adds to lighten the mood with a laugh.
“Do you have more of that cobbler?” Grady asks, effectively shifting the subject, but not before I see one last glance between Mom and Dad that leaves me lost in thought while the conversation moves on.
I was a kid when everything happened with Em, so it was hard for me to reconcile how nice her dad was with what she said happened to her. Now, I’m an adult and have seen things on the job that have taught me that even the nicest of people could do the cruelest of things.
When I apply that knowledge to the little I know of Emerson’s history, I can completely understand why seeing me may have caused some of the memories to rush back.
Chairs shift as the meal ends. The table is cleared. Dishes are washed. Luke helps, but he gets more water on the floor than in the sink. The night wears on.
My hands are on the railing, my body braced as I watch the sun begin to set in the distance.
My mom steps up beside me and slides an arm around my waist. “You’re awfully quiet.”
“Just thinking.”
“About a dispatch or about Emmy?”
I should have known she’d revisit the topic. “A little bit of everything.”
“It’s okay to be curious about her, Grant,” she says.
“Yeah, but for some reason, I don’t think she wants me to be.”
“What do you mean?”
“She bolted, Mom. She saw me, and I swear the look on her face went from happy to anxious. It was as if she was scared of me.”
“You’re a reminder of her past she’s probably chosen to forget.”
“Yeah. I guess.” But that still doesn’t explain why she’s here in Sunnyville or why I can’t stop thinking about her.
“Are you going to see her again?”
“Even if I wanted to, I told you I don’t have any way to—”
“And I raised self-sufficient, resourceful sons. Don’t give me your excuses,” she says, putting me in my place before patting my shoulder and walking back inside.
Betsy Malone has spoken.
The only woman who can put the Malone boys in line.