“He knows,” Jake added, hugging Ryan closer and jostling him just the slightest, to signal that they were about to end the conversation. “Pam, I gave him that lecture, times ten. You don’t have to worry about that. I worked him over, and he gets it. Really.”
“Good.” Pam cocked her head, trying to see Ryan’s face. “Ryan? Tell me that your dad’s right and I don’t have to worry about it. Tell me that you’ll always tell me the truth and that you’ll do the right thing, no matter what anybody else says is right. Only you know what’s right, and you have to answer for that, always.”
Ryan kept his head down. Moose thumped his tail on the bed.
Jake jostled Ryan again, feeling the tension build in his son. “He knows.”
“Jake, don’t answer for him. I’d like to hear him tell me himself.” Pam frowned, her head still cocked as she tried to see Ryan’s face. “Ryan?”
“Ryan, answer your mom.” Jake looked over, then held his breath.
Ryan looked up at Pam, his eyes filmed and his expression agonized. After a moment, he cleared his throat. “Mom, I killed Kathleen Lindstrom on Pike Road.”
Chapter Twenty-nine
The next few hours were pure agony, and if Jake expected the truth to be cathartic, it didn’t turn out that way. Ryan became too upset to tell the story, and Jake took over and told her every detail, including their meeting with the lawyer Morris Hubbard, the blackmailer texts, opening of the line of credit to pay the blackmail, the transfer to be delivered by eleven o’clock, his phone conversation with Andrew Voloshin, and his suspicion that Voloshin had been stalking Kathleen Lindstrom. Pam had listened in horrified silence, easing herself into Ryan’s wooden desk chair, still wrapped in the cocoon of her trenchcoat. She kept her pumps on her feet, like a soldier who wanted to die with his boots on. She had said nothing except to ask questions, and Jake felt more and more tense, waiting for the proverbial sword to fall.
“So that’s it,” Jake said, when he had finished. “I’m sorry, honey. I feel horrible about this, and so does Ryan. You know that, you can see that. And I’m so sorry for what this does to you, that it puts you in an awful, awful position—”
“Hold on a second.” Pam raised a hand, weakly, and her voice was pained. “I’m trying to understand how the man I married would leave a young girl dead on the road.”
Jake took it on the chin. “It’s like I explained, honey. I made the best decision I could at the time. I only had a second, I had to react. I’ve replayed it over and over, I know it was wrong. I didn’t know what to do, I just reacted, to protect Ryan.”
“Mom.” Ryan sniffled, sitting next to Jake on the bed. “He thought he was helping me, and he was. He was about to call 911 when I told him about the weed. He woulda called if I hadn’t smoked up. It’s not his fault, it’s mine.”
Jake patted Ryan’s leg, touched. “It’s okay, I can take it. Your mom is right, it was a terrible decision. I knew it was when I made it, the moment I made it.”
Ryan shook his head, distraught. “But Dad, would you make it differently if you had to do over again? You saved us both from prison.” He whipped around to Pam, who was slumped sideways in his desk chair, leaning on his desk. Behind her was a lineup of plasticSouth Parkfigurines and a Funny or Die poster of Will Ferrell. “Mom, what would you have done? Don’t be a judge, be a person.”
“I’m not being a judge,” Pam shot back, shaking her head.
“Then what would you have done, if you were Dad?” Ryan raised his voice, his nose still stuffy from crying, so he sounded oddly like himself as a young boy. “Let’s say you were the one that night on Pike Road. Would you have called the cops and sent me to jail?”
“Inever would’ve been in that position!” Pam shouted, suddenly. “Inever would’ve let you drive!”
“Mom, I can get my license in a month. What difference does it make? It’s arbitrary!”
Pam’s eyes flashed with anger. “All time limits are arbitrary, but that doesn’t mean they’re not limits. The law is made up of time limits. I’ve thrown people out of court because they missed a month-long time limit to file an appeal. And when you get older, try to file your tax return on April 16! It’s not acceptable under the law. You shouldn’t have been driving, and your father shouldn’t have let you drive. He admitted as much. This isall his fault!”
“Agree, I agree.” Jake nodded, dry-mouthed. Pam sounded so angry that she’d passed through the heat of that emotion into a cooler disgust, or worse, disrespect. He wondered if they’d be able to keep their marriage together, but then again, after she went to the police, he’d be in prison and they wouldn’t be a family anymore, anyway.
“No, Dad! Don’t let her put it on you! She’s acting like a judge, and nobody has a right to judge us, even her! Nobody was there but us! Nobody knows what it was like but us!”
“Ryan, are you crazy?” Pam rose, her eyes flashing with anger. “What you did was unlawful and morally wrong. You should know that, and so should your father. I fault him more than you. He’s the adult. He’s the one who’s culpable, not you—”
“Mom, no!” Ryan shouted at her, and Jake put a restraining hand on Ryan’s arm, because he could see the hurt cross Pam’s face. She’d wanted father and son to become closer, but not allied against her, especially in these circumstances.
Pam faced Ryan, agitated. “Ryan, you’re naïve. You don’t know what you’re talking about. The fact is, the law judges you. A court will judge you. A judge will judge you. I’m just the sneak preview.”
Ryan threw up his hands. “You think I don’t know that? You think I don’t know that I’m sending my own father to jail? That I’m going to jail? But right now I don’t need a judge, I need amother.”
Pam gasped, then shut her mouth, stricken. Her fair skin looked suddenly tinged with pink, as if she’d been slapped in the face. Ryan was watching her, his eyes glistening, and before Jake could realize what was happening, Pam had come forward and opened her arms to her son, and Ryan had gotten off the bed to meet her.
“I’m so sorry, Mom. I’m sorry, I’m really sorry. I feel so bad about everything, and about her. Everybody at school is so upset, they have grief counselors and everything—”
“I understand, I’m here. No matter what, I’m here for you and I love you.” Pam held him close even though she was so much shorter, and Ryan found a way to lean his head sideways on top of hers. She hugged him, then rocked him, just the slightest. “We’ll figure this out together.”
“Just don’t blame Dad. It’s not his fault, please.”
