Page 152 of The Five Year Lie

Finally, after a few questions voiced over my sobbing child, the cops let me go.

But not Woody. He’s being interviewed by law enforcement. I have no idea if he’ll be charged with a crime. I don’t know anything about firearms, or how self-defense is supposed to work.

Zarkey was visibly responsive when they carried him off. But his sister was not. I suspect she’s dead, but I wasn’t willing to inquire in front of Buzz.

If she is, though, then Jay killed her.

Nobody asked me about the knife in the grass. Nobody seems to realize yet that I’m the one who used it.

Although the cops were skeptical about my complete lack of ID.But I referred them to Officer Barski in Portland, Maine. And then I demanded to go to the hospital, while Buzz hiccupped in my arms.

Miraculously, they said yes.

Woody seems to be friendly with the cops. They agreed to call his mother, who fussed over him and then offered to drive us to the hospital.

She’s a sturdy-looking woman with sun-toughened skin and frizzy hair. I don’t even try to make conversation with the back of her head on the ride. All I can do is stare down at Buzz and hope he’ll get past this somehow.

My baby’s sleeping face is tearstained and puffy, and it’s all my fault for being so selfish. I just had to know why Jay left me. I steered us here to satisfy my own curiosity. The result is either that I gave Buzz his daddy back. Or that I gave him a lifelong trauma. Or both.

Only time will tell, and time is determined to move forward at a crawl.

“You should try your mother again,” Mrs. Carter says from the front seat.

“I will. Thank you.” I take the phone that she hands back and redial my mother, who didn’t answer the first time I called.

“Hello?” she chirps as soon as she picks up. “Who is this?”

“Mom, it’s me,” I say. “I’m in Michigan. There’s been some trouble, but Buzz and I are okay.”

She lets out a sob. “Michigan! That’s where Ray was trying to go. But he was arrested at the airport.”

“Really?” I ask, before I realize that I don’t care. He had so many chances to do the right thing. And he didn’t. Not once.

“Do you need me?” my mother asks in a shaky voice. “I’ll come.”

The question takes me by surprise. “Yes,” I tell her. “Bring Frog and Toad.”

The hospital waiting room is nicer than it should be, with blue sofas and matted prints of Michigan landscapes on the walls.

Jay is in surgery for hours. Around midnight, a doctor comes out to tell us in a droning voice that the surgery is complete. He uses phrases likesignificant repairandinternal bleeding.

“Does he wake up?” my child asks.

Only then does the exhausted doctor seem to make eye contact. “Not yet,” he says. “He’s breathing on his own, but it could be a long time. You should go home and sleep.”

But I don’t have a home. And even if it makes me a terrible parent, we aren’t leaving. They move us to a waiting room nearer to the ICU. The sofas are a different shade of blue. Buzz curls up and falls asleep, and one of the nurses brings a blanket to tuck around him.

I wait.

Woody arrives around two in the morning, looking exhausted. He gives me a wan smile. “If you want to go to a hotel, I’ll wait here.”

I shake my head. “Glad to see you’re not in jail.”

“Michigan has a stand your ground law. And my guns are legally registered. They found your knife, by the way. Your prints are probably on it, so I told them you stabbed the guy. Honey, you might have saved Jay’s life.”

“Might have. If he ever wakes up.”

“Hey, none of that,” he whispers. “He’s strong. We’ve been here before. I tied the tourniquet on his leg last time.”