Chapter 5 - Vanessa Let Daniel Believe The Wrong Thing
Daniel stood so fast the chair moved backward.
“You knew she was coming back.”
Vanessa didn't retreat.
“Yes.”
“And after she died, you let me think she had left me.”
“I let you think she hadn't decided.”
“No.”
His voice sharpened.
“You let me spend twelve years believing my wife died while leaving me.”
Vanessa looked at Ava.
Daniel stepped into her line of sight.
“Look at me.”
She did.
“Why?”
Vanessa took a long breath.
“The morning after the accident, you kept saying the same thing.”
“What?”
“She was taking Ava.”
Daniel's face tightened.
“You kept saying it.”
Rachel watched Vanessa carefully.
Vanessa continued.
“You were furious at her.”
“I was in shock.”
“I know.”
“You knew it wasn't true.”
“Yes.”
“So why didn't you correct me?”
Vanessa's eyes filled but she did not cry.
“Because the moment I tried, you asked why she was on that road.”
Nobody spoke.
Daniel knew the answer.
Rachel's apartment had been in that direction.
Vanessa said:
“You looked at me and said, ‘If she wasn't leaving, why was she driving away?’”
Daniel looked toward the fireplace.
Vanessa continued.
“I thought if I told you she'd come back, written a letter, checked on Ava, and then left for Rachel's because of the things you'd said, you would spend the rest of your life believing you sent her into that car.”
Rachel interrupted.
“The other driver ran the light.”
“I know.”
“Julia's crash was not Daniel's fault.”
“I know that now.”
“You knew it then.”
Vanessa looked at her.
“Knowing facts and watching somebody survive them are different things.”
Rachel's expression hardened.
“So you lied.”
“I didn't tell him.”
Ava laughed bitterly.
Vanessa turned.
“Don't.”
“Don't what?”
“Call it something smaller.”
Vanessa absorbed that.
“I withheld it.”
Ava shook her head.
“You've been correcting my words since I was nine. Try harder.”
Vanessa looked at her.
“I let your father believe something I knew was false.”
Better.
Ava sat down again.
Daniel did not.
“How long was protecting me the reason?”
Vanessa's face changed.
That question reached somewhere the others hadn't.
“I don't know.”
“Yes, you do.”
She looked toward the window.
“The first year.”
Daniel waited.
“Maybe two.”
“And after?”
Vanessa didn't answer.
Rachel said:
“After you fell in love with him.”
Vanessa turned sharply.
Rachel continued.
“That made the story convenient.”
Daniel looked between them.
“Don't.”
Rachel said:
“What?”
“Turn this into an affair. There wasn't one.”
“I didn't say there was.”
Vanessa spoke.
“There wasn't.”
Ava watched her.
“We didn't become involved until four years after Julia died.”
Rachel nodded.
“I know.”
That surprised Vanessa.
Rachel continued.
“I also know you were the person he called when he couldn't get out of bed, the person who knew where Ava's preschool forms were, the person who came to every holiday.”
Vanessa's voice tightened.
“Because you didn't.”
Rachel flinched.
Ava looked at her aunt.
That landed.
Rachel folded her arms.
“I couldn't come into this house.”
“Why?”
“Because my sister died after leaving it.”
Daniel lowered his eyes.
Rachel continued:
“And because every time I saw Ava, I saw Julia.”
Ava stared at her.
Rachel's expression cracked.
“I stayed away too.”
No one rescued her.
Ava asked:
“Did Dad stop you?”
“Not really.”
“Vanessa?”
“Sometimes she made it difficult.”
Vanessa opened her mouth.
Rachel raised a hand.
“But no. That's not why I disappeared.”
Ava leaned back.
Another easy villain gone.
Rachel looked at her.
“I was angry. Then ashamed I'd stayed away. Then every year I waited made calling harder.”
Ava nodded once.
She wasn't ready to comfort her.
Daniel looked at Vanessa again.
“When did you start removing Julia's things?”
Vanessa's face tightened.
“Daniel.”
“When?”
“You asked me to box some of them.”
Ava looked at her father.
Daniel stopped.
Vanessa continued.
“You couldn't walk through this room without staring at her piano.”
Daniel sat down.
“You asked me to move the clothes.”
Ava looked between them.
“The photographs?”
Daniel didn't answer.
Vanessa did.
“Some of those were me.”
Ava looked at her.
“How many?”
Vanessa swallowed.
“More than I should have.”
Ava looked toward the hearth.
“You didn't erase Mom alone.”
Daniel said quietly:
“No.”
May you like
For the first time that morning, Vanessa looked relieved.
Ava hated that too.
