Page 65 of Our Daughter's Bones

“You think that I can’t cook for you?” he sneered.

“I-I didn’t say that.”

“I know exactly what you meant!” His voice boomed, and he threw the spatula across the room. It bounced against the pantry door and dropped to the floor with a clang. Mackenzie’s bones began to rattle.

Run. Run. Run.

“I’m sorry, Daddy. I didn’t mean to hurt you.”

The redness in his face began to fade. His bulging eyes softened as he placed his hands on his waist and looked away.

“It’s okay, Micky. It’s your mother’s fault. Not yours. She puts ideas in your head about me. She is the problem. Not me. She has done nothing but bring me down and ruin my damn life. And where is she now? Do you know? Her ten-year-old daughter comes home from school, and her mother isn’t here to receive her and make her food!” He grasped the top of the chair across from her. “I bet she’s out there screwing someone. Your mother is a whore. Do you know what that means, Micky?”

She shook her head. Tears tickled the back of her throat. The corners of her mouth were pulled down, as if by fishhooks.

“It means a woman who doesn’t respect her husband, doesn’t obey him and goes around screwing other men.” A vein on his forehead visibly throbbed. “I don’t want you to be like that. Don’t listen to your mother. Do you want to be a whore, Micky?”

She shook her head again.

“Good girl.” He turned off the stove and put the burned eggs on a plate. Sliding them in front of her, he mumbled, “Eat.”

Mackenzie swallowed down the vomit in the base of her throat.

Please come home, Mom. Please.

He father sat across from her and opened a bottle of Scotch. He gulped down half the bottle. She knew what was coming. So she stuffed her mouth with burned eggs and swallowed before she could taste them, as he watched her with glazed eyes.

Thirty-Four

Mackenzie looked out the window to the parking lot. A black SUV had just parked. Nick climbed out, dressed in a black suit and removing sunglasses against the setting sun. The light breeze ruffled his hair.

A small girl climbed out of the car. She reached just above his waistline. Her light-brown hair was pulled into pigtails. Holding Nick’s hand, she walked toward the diner.

The bell jingled as the door opened.

“Hey, Richard,” Nick waved.

“Nick! The usual?”

“Yeah. Thanks!”

“Aunty Mack!” Luna wrenched her hand away from Nick and raced to Mackenzie. She got out of the booth and spread her arms instinctively. Luna slammed into her, almost knocking the wind out of her lungs. But Mackenzie grinned and picked her up, spinning her around.

Luna squeaked in delight.

“You’re a little tornado, aren’t you?” She put her down and bent so their eyes were level.

“That’s what Daddy says. But I tell him life without me would be boring.”

“She has too much sass for a seven-year-old,” Nick muttered. “Luna, sit down.”

Even though Luna was given an order, she held her head high and strutted to sit inside the booth like she was royalty. Mackenzie still remembered the first time she had seen Luna. She had been a month old and wrapped in a red blanket. Her nose was so tiny that it looked like a dot on her face. Mackenzie had brushed her chubby cheek with her finger. But Luna had grabbed the finger in her small, tight fist, and started licking it.

In that moment, Mackenzie realized that Luna had grabbed onto a piece of her heart that hadn’t been blackened.

“Coconut flakes.”

“Coconut flakes?” Nick sat next to her and looked at them, puzzled.