Dead Reckoning

written in our life together: grocery lists, instructions, recipes, even a few personal notes. There was a bundle of them in my dressing table still.
    Sookie, I’m so proud of you graduating from high school. I wish your mom and dad had been here to see you in your cap and gown.
    Sookie, please pick up your room, I can’t vacuum if I can’t see the floor.
     
    Sookie, Jason will pick you up after softball practice, I have to go to a meeting of the Garden Club.
     
    I was sure this letter would be different. I was right. She began formally.
     
    Dear Sookie,
     
    I think you’ll find this, if anyone does. There’s nowhere else I can leave it, and when I think you’re ready I’ll tell you where I put it.
    Tears welled up in my eyes. She’d been murdered before she thought I was ready. Maybe I never would have been ready.
    You know I loved your grandfather more than anything.
    I’d thought I’d known that. They’d had a rock-solid marriage . . . I’d assumed. The evidence suggested that might not have been the case.
    But I did want chilren so bad, so bad. I felt if I had chilren my life would be perfect. I didn’t realize asking God for a perfect life was a stupid thing to do. I got tempted beyond my ability to resist. God was punishing me for my greed, I guess.
    He was so beautiful. But I knew when I saw him that he wasn’t a real person. He told me later he was part human, but I never saw much humanity in him. Your grandfather had left for Baton Rouge, a long trip then. Later that morning we’d had a storm that knocked down a big pine by the driveway so it was blocked. I was trying to saw up the pine so your grandfather would be able to bring the truck back up the driveway. I took a break to go to the back yard to see if the clothes on the line were dry, and he walked out of the woods. When he helped me move the tree—well, he moved it all by himself—I said Thank You, of course. I don’t know if you know this, but if you say Thank You to one of them you’re obligated. I don’t know why, that’s just good manners.
    Claudine had mentioned that in passing when I’d first met her, but I believed she’d told me it was simply a fairy etiquette thing. Mindful of my manners, I’d tried to be sure to never explicitly thank Niall, even when we’d swapped gifts at Christmas. (It had taken every bit of self-control I’d had not to say “Thank you.” I’d said, “Oh, you thought of me! I know I’ll enjoy it,” and clamped my lips together.) But Claude . . . I’d been around him so often, I knew I’d thanked him for taking out the garbage or passing me the salt. Crap!
    Anyway, I asked him if he wanted a drink and he was thirsty, and I was so lonely and I wanted a baby. Your grandpa and me had been married five years by then and not a sign of a baby on the way. I figured something was wrong, though we didn’t find out what until later when a doctor said the mumps had . . . well. Poor Mitchell. Was not his fault, it was the sickness. I just told him it was a miracle we’d had the two, we didn’t need the five or six he’d hoped for. He never even looked at me funny about that. He was so sure I’d never been with someone else. It was coals of fire on my head. Bad enough I did it once, but two years later Fintan came back and I did it again, and those weren’t the only times. It was so strange. Sometimes I would think I smelled him! I would turn around and it was Mitchell.
    But having your dad and Linda was worth the guilt. I loved them so much, and I hope it wasn’t my sin that made them both die so young. At least Linda had Hadley, wherever she may be, and at least Corbett had you and Jason. Watching you grow up has been a blessing and a privlege. I love you both more than I can say.
    Well, I’ve been writing for a long time. I love you, honey. Now I have to tell you about your grandfather’s friend. He was a dark-headed man, real big, talked real fancy. He said he was sort of like yall’s sponsor, like a sort of godfather, but I didn’t trust him any farther than I could throw him. He didn’t look like a man of God. He dropped by after Corbett and Linda were born. After you two came along, I thought maybe he might come around again. Sure enough, he showed up all of a sudden, once while I was keeping Jason, and once while I was keeping you, when you were both in the cradle. He gave each of you a gift, he said, but if so it wasn’t one I could put in the bank account, which would have