99

Ellen Graham’s kitchen clock echoed through the rooms of her house as they talked on for hours. In the morning, Ellen would begin to make phone calls—the State Police, the university administration, the FBI—to speak to officials, to lawyers, to journalists, to start her final crusade. But for now she seemed to want company, so Shelly stayed.

Ellen told her about her separation from her husband six months earlier. (“Some couples grow closer with this sort of trauma, they tell me, but most don’t. We didn’t.”) They talked on about their childhoods, their pasts. Shelly told Ellen about her brother—the flag-draped coffin—and then, without intending to, she told her about Jeremy.

Perhaps, Shelly realized even as the story was coming out of her mouth, she’d never intended to tell anyone at all.

Perhaps until this moment, telling it, it hadn’t really happened.

But there was no taking it back now, or denying it, after Ellen’s reaction:

“Oh, my sweet fucking Jesus Christ,” Ellen cried out, and when she leapt to her feet, her own cat, which had sat like a statue through the entire evening, came suddenly to life and ran from the room. Shelly looked at the place where it had been sitting, and felt she could almost see its permanent aura still glowing where it had been.

Ellen began to pace then, and then she went back to the buffet, took out the cigarette she’d tossed into it hours ago, lit it with a shaking match, and dragged on it as if she were trying to smoke it down to the filter all at once. Afterward, she said, “I need a drink, Shelly. What would you like?”

Shelly never had a chance to answer. Ellen returned with a bottle of white wine and two glasses. She poured the wine. They drank in silence until Ellen said, “Your life is in danger, Shelly.”

Shelly said nothing.

“You’re not going back to your apartment, maybe ever, and certainly not tonight,” Ellen said.

“No,” Shelly said. “Tonight I thought I’d find a Motel 6.”

“Of course you won’t,” Ellen said. “For one thing, look at the snow.” She nodded toward the tiny crack between the curtains in her front window. “You can’t drive in that. Plus you have nowhere to go.”

Shelly felt the tears coming in to her eyes. Nowhere to go. But also the kindness, again, and from someone who’d suffered things Shelly could not, herself, begin to imagine. Such a surplus of kindness. Had Shelly ever met anyone kinder?

“No,” Shelly said. “I couldn’t.”

“Yes. I’ll make up the couch for you, sweetheart.”

Ellen poured more wine into Shelly’s glass then, and touched her lightly on the shoulder. She never mentioned Jeremy or Josie again—another bit of compassion for which Shelly was incredibly grateful.

Mostly they drank their wine in silence.

The wine was so pale it made the glasses—beautiful crystal goblets, surely another heirloom, or a wedding gift—look emptier than they had when they were actually empty.

The Raising
Cover.xhtml
Title_Page.xhtml
Dedication.xhtml
Epigraph.xhtml
Contents.xhtml
Prologue.xhtml
Part_1.xhtml
Chapter_1.xhtml
Chapter_2.xhtml
Chapter_3.xhtml
Chapter_4.xhtml
Chapter_5.xhtml
Chapter_6.xhtml
Chapter_7.xhtml
Chapter_8.xhtml
Chapter_9.xhtml
Chapter_10.xhtml
Chapter_11.xhtml
Chapter_12.xhtml
Chapter_13.xhtml
Chapter_14.xhtml
Chapter_15.xhtml
Chapter_16.xhtml
Chapter_17.xhtml
Part_2.xhtml
Chapter_18.xhtml
Chapter_19.xhtml
Chapter_20.xhtml
Chapter_21.xhtml
Chapter_22.xhtml
Chapter_23.xhtml
Chapter_24.xhtml
Chapter_25.xhtml
Chapter_26.xhtml
Chapter_27.xhtml
Chapter_28.xhtml
Chapter_29.xhtml
Chapter_30.xhtml
Chapter_31.xhtml
Chapter_32.xhtml
Chapter_33.xhtml
Chapter_34.xhtml
Chapter_35.xhtml
Chapter_36.xhtml
Part_3.xhtml
Chapter_37.xhtml
Chapter_38.xhtml
Chapter_39.xhtml
Chapter_40.xhtml
Chapter_41.xhtml
Chapter_42.xhtml
Chapter_43.xhtml
Chapter_44.xhtml
Chapter_45.xhtml
Chapter_46.xhtml
Chapter_47.xhtml
Chapter_48.xhtml
Chapter_49.xhtml
Chapter_50.xhtml
Chapter_51.xhtml
Chapter_52.xhtml
Chapter_53.xhtml
Chapter_54.xhtml
Chapter_55.xhtml
Chapter_56.xhtml
Chapter_57.xhtml
Chapter_58.xhtml
Chapter_59.xhtml
Chapter_60.xhtml
Part_4.xhtml
Chapter_61.xhtml
Chapter_62.xhtml
Chapter_63.xhtml
Chapter_64.xhtml
Chapter_65.xhtml
Chapter_66.xhtml
Chapter_67.xhtml
Chapter_68.xhtml
Chapter_69.xhtml
Chapter_70.xhtml
Chapter_71.xhtml
Chapter_72.xhtml
Chapter_73.xhtml
Chapter_74.xhtml
Chapter_75.xhtml
Chapter_76.xhtml
Chapter_77.xhtml
Chapter_78.xhtml
Chapter_79.xhtml
Chapter_80.xhtml
Chapter_81.xhtml
Chapter_82.xhtml
Part_5.xhtml
Chapter_83.xhtml
Chapter_84.xhtml
Chapter_85.xhtml
Chapter_86.xhtml
Chapter_87.xhtml
Chapter_88.xhtml
Chapter_89.xhtml
Chapter_90.xhtml
Chapter_91.xhtml
Chapter_92.xhtml
Chapter_93.xhtml
Chapter_94.xhtml
Chapter_95.xhtml
Chapter_96.xhtml
Chapter_97.xhtml
Chapter_98.xhtml
Chapter_99.xhtml
Chapter_100.xhtml
Chapter_101.xhtml
Chapter_102.xhtml
Chapter_103.xhtml
Chapter_104.xhtml
Chapter_105.xhtml
Part_6.xhtml
Chapter_106.xhtml
Chapter_107.xhtml
Chapter_108.xhtml
Chapter_109.xhtml
Chapter_110.xhtml
Acknowledgments.xhtml
About_the_Author.xhtml
Also_by_the_Author.xhtml
Credits.xhtml
Copyright.xhtml
About_the_Publisher.xhtml