“Also sounds married.”
He laughed.
Nia looked at the pool.
“What do you want to know?”
“Was it as bad as people say?”
Nia thought.
That question had followed the family for decades.
Some people wanted it worse.
Others wanted it smaller.
She answered:
“It was exactly bad enough.”
Evan frowned.
“What does that mean?”
“My father wasn’t beaten.”
“He wasn’t arrested.”
“No gun was pointed at him.”
“The officers checked.”
“She was removed.”
“So if somebody needs a spectacular story, they can say it wasn’t that bad.”
Evan nodded slowly.
Nia continued.
“But I was eleven.”
“I watched an adult enter my home, tell my father he didn’t belong, hit him, call police, and stand there completely certain the system would believe her.”
“That changed how safe this yard felt to me.”
“So yes.”
“It was exactly bad enough.”
Evan looked toward his kitchen.
“My son’s nine.”
Nia smiled faintly.
“Then you understand.”
He did.
A sliding door opened.
Lauren Brooks stepped outside carrying lemonade.
She was blonde, freckled, maybe forty.
She looked at Nia and immediately said:
“Oh.”
Then laughed.
“That sounded ridiculous. Hi.”
Nia smiled.
“Hi.”
Lauren handed her a glass.
“We didn’t know you were coming or I would’ve cleaned.”
Nia looked around immaculate patio.
“Please never say that to someone whose father inspected grout lines for fun.”
Evan groaned.
“He did?”
“Constantly.”
They talked for almost an hour.
Not about Patricia after the first ten minutes.
About the house.
The weird upstairs vent that whistled during high wind.
The kitchen drawer that never closed properly.
The pool light Marcus replaced three times and still complained was too blue.
The plum tree that had stopped producing fruit two years before Nia moved away.
Lauren listened like someone receiving a map from a previous traveler.
Before Nia left, their six-year-old daughter ran outside wearing water wings.
She stopped when she saw Nia.
“Who are you?”
Lauren said:
“This is Ms. Reed. She grew up here.”
The girl looked astonished.
“You lived in my room?”
“Maybe.”
“Which room is yours?”
“Upstairs, second left.”
The child gasped.
“That’s mine!”
Nia smiled.
“Then take care of the windowsill.”
“Why?”
“My dad measured my height there every birthday.”
The child ran inside.
Minutes later she came back.
“There are marks!”
Nia’s throat tightened.
Marcus had never painted over them.
Neither had later owners.
Pencil lines.
Age six.
Seven.
Eight.
Nine.
Ten.
Eleven.
Then no more because Marcus moved the measurements to the pantry when he repainted her room.
The little girl shouted:
“Can I add mine?”
Nia looked at Lauren.
Lauren smiled.
“If you want.”
Nia knelt carefully.
“You should.”
The girl disappeared again.
Nia left through the front door.
Not the gate.
Not because she could not.