Chapter 7 - Ava Wanted Me To Choose Without Our Father In The Room
Walter did not deny knowing why my name was beneath the stairs.
He asked to go back inside first.
I almost refused out of spite.
Then followed him.
The building owner had given us until noon the next day before an inspector came to assess the unauthorized basement.
Our old secrets now had a deadline.
Walter sat on the training mat.
Not his office.
Mason stayed near the wall.
I showed Walter the message.
“Who sent this?”
“I don't know.”
“Try harder.”
“I don't.”
“Only a few people knew about the names.”
“People stayed down there for years.”
“Did they know Ava?”
“Some.”
Not enough.
I put my phone away.
“Why did she write EMMA?”
Walter looked at his hands.
“She wanted you to make a decision.”
“What decision?”
“Whether to leave home with her.”
I stared.
The room went silent.
“What?”
“The week she stayed downstairs, she wanted to talk to you privately.”
“You said that.”
“She planned to ask if you wanted to move with her.”
“Chicago.”
“Yes.”
I laughed softly.
“I was nineteen.”
“Exactly.”
“What does that mean?”
“She knew you were legally an adult.”
“And Dad would've lost his mind.”
“Yes.”
“Mom?”
“Probably.”
My chest tightened.
“What did Ava think I wanted?”
“She didn't know.”
Finally.
An answer without someone claiming certainty for me.
“What did you tell her?”
“That she needed to ask you.”
“Did she?”
“No.”
“Why?”
Walter looked toward Mason.
Mason said:
“Daniel found her first.”
I shook my head.
“That happened the night she left.”
“Yes.”
“So she had days before that.”
Walter continued:
“She watched you come here once.”
My skin went cold.
“When?”
“You came to pick up her jacket.”
I remembered.
Ava texted:
Can you grab my black jacket from Walter? Left it again.
I stopped by.
Walter handed it to me at the front desk.
I complained that Ava had been sleeping at a friend's place and treating home like a hotel.
Walter had barely spoken.
Ava had been underneath my feet.
I sat.
“What happened?”
Walter said:
“You were angry.”
“I was.”
“You told me your mother wasn't sleeping.”
True.
“You said your father was driving around looking for Ava.”
True.
“You said…”
He stopped.
“What?”
“That Ava was being selfish.”
The word hit.
I had said worse.
Ava was downstairs.
Hearing me through the ceiling?
Walter shook his head when I asked.
“No. Nora was.”
I stared.
“She told Ava?”
“I assume.”
“You don't know?”
“No.”
“Did Ava ever say?”
“She changed her mind about asking you to leave.”
My throat tightened.
“Because of one angry sentence.”
“Probably not one.”
I knew.
The week Ava stopped coming home, I sent texts.
Mom's sick because of this.
Dad hasn't slept.
Why are you punishing us?
Whatever your problem is, grow up and talk to us.
I thought I was mediating.
I was nineteen and very certain that peace meant the person who left needed to come back.
“She thought I chose Dad.”
Walter looked at me.
“She thought you were still inside the same story.”
“What story?”
“That Daniel's fear automatically became everybody else's emergency.”
I hated the sentence.
Because Dad had been afraid.
After our mother—no, Claire was alive. Need no confusion. Our father had lost his older brother suddenly two years earlier. He had become more anxious about family leaving. Ava's move felt like another loss.
But fear wasn't authority.
I could understand that now.
At nineteen, I had called it love.
“Why didn't she contact me after Dad died?”
Walter shook his head.
“I don't know.”
“Did you know he died?”
“Yes.”
“Did Nora?”
“I assume.”
Again.
Assume.
I stood.
“No more.”
Walter looked up.
“No more what?”
“Everybody making decisions based on what they assume somebody else wants.”
Mason laughed once.
I turned.
“What?”
“Nothing.”
“Say it.”
He rubbed his jaw.
“You're doing it too.”
My anger sharpened.
“How?”
“You came in here wanting us to prove Ava was taken.”
I stared.
He continued:
“When I said she left with Nora, you still looked for the person who forced it.”
I stepped closer.
“You lied for five years.”
“Yes.”
“You hit me the second I walked in.”
“Yes.”
“And you're giving me a lesson?”
“No.”
Mason looked down.
“I'm telling you I spent five years wanting Ava to be wrong about me.”
That stopped me.
“What did she say?”
He looked at the floor.
“The last thing she said before leaving.”
I waited.
“She said, ‘You don't listen until somebody agrees with you.’”
Mason swallowed.
“She was talking about Daniel.”
Then:
“I've spent five years wondering if she was talking about me too.”
No need to answer.
A knock came from the front door.
Not three knocks.
Two.
A woman stood outside.
Mid-forties.
Short dark hair.
Navy coat.
Walter stood so quickly his knee cracked.
“Nora.”
She looked through the glass at me.
Then at Walter.
Then Mason.
She did not look happy to see any of us.
When Walter opened the door, Nora Quinn walked in and said:
“Which one of you gave Emma my name?”
Mason answered:
“All of us, eventually.”
Nora closed her eyes.
“Of course.”
I stepped forward.
“Where is my sister?”
Nora looked at me.
Not pity.
Assessment.
Then:
“I don't know.”
My heart dropped.
May you like
She continued before I could speak.
“But I know why she stopped asking me to help her come back.”
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