TWENTY-SEVEN

“Want to get that first,” her father said.  “See who it is?”

He’d flipped a switch and was all at ease now.  That quiet almost southern drawl of his.

Her father was fucking crazy.

She felt a deep conflict here.  On the one hand to go to the door would be to admit into their home the potential for some sort of normalcy, a breath of air from the outside world, some person or persons who in all probability weren’t beating up on their wives and keeping women in the fruit cellar and their kids under lock and key.  On the other hand there was the potential for all this shit to be exposed.  The potential for shame.  Eventually for ridicule.

But Peg was seething.  Furious not only with her father but with her mother too.  She’d sat there stunned during her mother’s tirade, not believing what she was hearing.  Enough’s enough?  Finally?  Now?  She’s leaving him now?  Just because Brian’s shown himself to be the sick little fuck he is?  When what’s been going on out in the barn has been going on for years?  Why wasn’t it going too far when he nightly raped and finally knocked up his own fucking daughter?  Why wasn’t enough enough then?

You’re taking me with you?  Over my dead body.

Screw her mother too.  Darleen excepted, they could all go to hell.

She went to the door, opened it but then damn near closed it again.  She was furious all right.  But she wasn’t quite prepared for this much.

“Miss Raton?”

~ * ~

The look on Peg’s face told her all she needed to know.  That she was right.  She saw fear and confusion and plenty of it.  Even anger.  She pitied the girl — she truly did — but this needed to be done.  Her parents needed to know, if they didn’t already.  And if they did know, Genevieve was certain she could help.

She managed a smile.

“Hi, Peg.  Going to let me in?”

“This…this really isn’t the time…”

“Sure it is.  Come on, Peg, I’m not going to hurt you.  I’m here to help.”

“You can’t help, Miss Raton.”

“How do you know that?”

“I just…do.”

This wasn’t going well.  She couldn’t very well force her way in.

“You’d be surprised,” she said.  “I know counselors, doctors, all kinds of people.”

“I said this isn’t the time, Miss Raton!”

She was thinking, family spat?  Maybe the girl was right.  Maybe this wasn’t the time.  But she was here now.  She couldn’t see herself leaving and then coming back if and when it was more convenient.  But she was stumped for a good answer.

Then the father stepped out from behind her — Christopher Cleek — looking genial enough and smiling.

“Where’s your manners, Peggy?” he said.  “Please, come on in.”

She stepped inside and he offered her his hand.  The hand felt slightly clammy though the grip was firm.  There was a scent coming off him, though.  Some kind of chemical smell.  Like old booze — but it wasn’t that.  She couldn’t place it.

He steered her into the living room.

“How are you, Miss Raton?  Geometry, right?  I remember you from Parents’ Night.  Good to see you again.  Please, have a seat.  Can I get you anything?  Cup of coffee?  Soft drink?”

He directed her to the plush velvet chair.  She sat facing the two of them on the couch.

“I’m fine, thanks,” she said.

She wasn’t fine.  Not exactly.  But it wasn’t anything a cup of coffee was going to fix either.  She’d never done anything remotely like this before — gone to the parents’ house on some student’s behalf.  She was confident in the classroom.  Here she felt shy, out of place and just a little scared.  But mostly what she felt was determination.  To get this out into the open finally.  It was what somebody — anybody — should have done for Dorothy.

“May I talk to you and your wife privately, Mr. Cleek?”

“Call me Chris, Miss Raton, please.  And you are?”

“Genevieve.”

“Genevieve.  Beautiful name.  You’re French Canadian?”

She smiled.  “My dad was Louisiana cajun, Mr…Chris.  He fell in love with a girl from Ottawa.”

“He followed his heart.”

“Yes, he did.”

“That’s good.  We should all do that.  She’s not feeling too well, Genevieve.  My wife I mean.  She’s having herself a nap.  This is about Peg, I gather?”

“Yes.”

“Then she should hear it, don’t you think?  My boy too.  No secrets in this family.  Brian?  Come on in, son.”

She’d seen him leaning halfway in and halfway out of the room against the doorframe.  Lurking was the word that came to her.  A tall thin boy she vaguely remembered seeing around school but had never met.

Time to gird your loins, woman, she thought.  Time to get on with it.

“I’ve observed some…distressing behavior lately, Mr. Cleek.”

“Chris.”

“Chris.  Peggy’s not looking well.  She’s had to rush off to use the ladies’ restroom several times during class.  Her studies are off.  And she’s taken to wearing clothes much too big for her.”

He shrugged and smiled again, the picture of amiable old dad.  “She likes to borrow my sweats.  So?”

“Does Peggy have a boyfriend, do you know?”

She saw Peg’s head dip down to her chest as though waiting for the axe.  She hated doing this to the poor girl.  But she was doing it for the poor girl.

“No,” Cleek said.  “And I’d know it if she did.  Why?”

“I believe…I believe that Peg is pregnant, Mr. Cleek.”

“Pregnant.”

It came out flat, emotionless.  She’d have expected much more.  She’d have expected something.

“I am not!” Peg said.

And that was not emotionless.  It was tense as hell and there were tears beginning to form behind the words.  But Cleek seemed to ignore his daughter.  Cleek’s focus was directly on her.

“What makes you think my daughter is pregnant, Miss Raton?”

She noted that they were no longer Chris and Genevieve, they were back on formal terms.  It was actually a relief.

“She’s showing, Mr. Cleek.  Not very much yet but that won’t last much longer.”

“Any of your colleagues concur with this opinion, Miss Raton?”

“What?  I wouldn’t know.  I haven’t discussed it with them.  I thought it best to come directly to you and your wife.”

“And you did well to do so.”

He leaned in close and she knew what that smell was now.  He smelled like old rotting meat.  There were girls in class whose personal hygiene was well south of what it should have been and when they got their period they smelled the same way.  Old spoiled meet.

And a meanness had crept into his voice that she didn’t like.

“I thought you teachers were supposed to listen,” he said.  “You don’t listen too well, Miss Raton.  I told you that Peggy didn’t have a boyfriend and that I’d know it if she did, right?  Didn’t I?”

“Yes, but…”

“You accusing Brian here?”

He motioned toward his son.  The boy was grinning.  What’s going on here? she thought.  What have I stepped into?

“He’s just a boy, Miss Raton.”

“No, of course not…”

“Dad,” Peg was tugging on his arm.  He pulled away.

“You accusing me?”

“No, I…”

Get out of here, she thought.  There’s something seriously wrong with this guy.  She stood up.  So did he.

“You saying that?  Are you?”

She held her ground.  Short of sprinting for the door there was nothing else she could do.  Besides, this guy was beginning to piss her off, too.

“I said nothing of the sort, Mr. Cleek.”

“In my own home.  You accuse me.”

He was right in her face now — way into her space — and his voice had gone eerily soft.

“Right here in my own home,” he said.

“I did not.  I never said…”

But I didn’t have to, did I? she thought.  You said it for me.  You fucked your own daughter, you bastard, you sick piece of shit.  You fucked her and got her pregnant and now I‘ve stuck it to you, haven‘t I?  You miserable sack of…

She never saw it coming.

~ * ~

But Peg did.

Peg saw her father strike a woman for the second time that night.

Open-handed this time but with no less power and right across the side of her head.  So that one moment Miss Raton was standing there in front of her and the next she was on the floor, her head striking the antique pie safe so hard it rattled the plates inside.  She saw her teacher’s eyelids flutter once and then close.

“Jesus, daddy!  What did you…?”

 “Shut up, Peggy.  This is all your own damn fault, you little bitch.  Get out of here!  Go out to the barn.  Go get me some rope!”

“Rope?  What are you going to do with rope?”

“Go!  Now!”

“No!”

“I’ll go,” said her brother.

She heard the front door slam.  Her father was glaring at her.  Her father wanted to hit her too.

“Get out of my sight,” he said.  “You brought this on.  You and that sweet little cunt of yours.  Go help your mother.”