Thicker Than Blood

"Oh, Max," she murmurs. "I want to…yeah."

She turns over. Smiling. At peace.

When her eyes open, they die.

"I was dreaming."

"It was a nice one."

"Yeah. You shaved. I like it."

She sits up, crawls to the end of the bed, and peers down at her son.

"Where’d you go this morning, Andy?"

"Down to the beach. Watched the sun come up."

"I didn’t think you were coming back. Thought that’s how you were going to do it. Just slip away, back to your paradise."

I hear the baby’s soft cry. Vi leans down, lifts him up.

"Are you hungry, little baby boy?" she coos.

Vi slides off the bed and comes to her feet, standing there in panties and undershirt, Max groping at her breasts.

"I’m ready, Andy," she says.

"Ready?"

"To go home."

# # #

I drive 64 west, over the long bridges that span the sounds of Roanoke and Croaton and the Alligator River. We rise and rise above the ocean. The flatness of the coastal plain gives way to rolling pasture and forest, the consistency of the soil turning from sand to rich red clay, those toothpick pines of the eastern swamps now crowded and lost among maple and hickory.

It feels strange to be inland. The farther from the sea we run, the Outer Banks seem more like afterimages of dreams. It would be so easy and comforting to find atonement in the remoteness and disorientation of our imprisonment. I glance at Vi, wondering if she’ll coax the last nine months and what she did on Portsmouth into do

At four o’clock, we skirt the south side of Raleigh and bore westward, across Jordan Lake, through Pittsboro, Siler City, and Ramseur. We enter the town of Lexington as the sun balances on the horizon, so blinding I can scarcely see the road.

"You hungry?" I ask, catching Vi’s eyes in the rearview mirror.

She sits in the back nursing Max.

"I could eat."

"Best barbeque joint on the planet is just ahead. How about we stop there? Besides, the car’s ru

"Fine. I need to change Max anyway."

I pull the Kites’ Impala into the crowded parking lot of Lexington Barbeque # 1.

We walk together, like a family, to the back of the line that snakes out of the front doors.

"Whole fuckin’ town’s here tonight," Vi says.

"Yeah, well, it’s what they call good eatin’."

The evening is muggy and clear, and the hickory-fueled fire inside the kitchen spits the sweetest-smelling smoke up the chimney and out into the cooling night, no greater tease in the world if you’re hungry.

As we inch toward the doors, I glance at the families who’ve come out for their Friday night di

We finally make it inside, find a pair of vacant stools at the counter, and order two large plates. They come in a hurry—chopped pork shoulder, red slaw, hushpuppies, and tall Styrofoam cups of sweet tea. I haven’t had western-style North Carolina barbeque in ages, and it’s better than I remember it.

I finish long before Vi and ask for a piece of peach cobbler.

Max squirms in her lap, making it difficult for her to eat.

"Let me hold him for you," I offer, taking the infant under his arms and lifting him into my lap. I dandle Max on my leg and he smiles.

An older woman on her way to the cash register stops and makes silly faces at him.

The waitress brings my cobbler and a scoop of vanilla ice cream that has already begun to melt. As I stab my fork into a steaming peach slice, Vi says, "I’ve been thinking."

"Yeah?"

"About what I’m going to say happened. I mean, this is all I’ve thought about in the car today."

She glances over her shoulder and then continues, her voice lower, barely more than a whisper above the din of restaurant noise.

"I leave you in a motel in Davidson tonight. We have just enough cash left. Then I go home. I’m sure Max thinks I’m dead. Everyone’ll want to know what happened. It’ll be crazy. I’ll tell them most of the truth. About Rufus and Maxine. About Luther."

"About Portsmouth?"

"What good would that do? I’ll make you a hero, Andy. Say you saved our lives, but that I left you in Ocracoke. Took the car, got the hell out of there. No one will question me ru

"And tomorrow, I find a way to come to you. I’ll bring money. We have some savings, enough to get you home, back to your paradise."

"Vi—"

"Shut up, Andy. This’ll work. You’re i

"You think I’m i

Vi glares at me as if I’ve slapped her. She takes Max and storms out of the restaurant. I leave a twenty with the check under my ice-filled cup and follow her back to the car.

She’s sitting in the front passenger seat when I climb behind the wheel and close the door. We stare through the bug-splattered windshield at families lumbering toward the restaurant.

"Andy," she says, her voice holding at a whisper, as though volume might break it, "you tell me right now what else we were supposed to do."

"I don’t know."

"Well, I have to know that what I did to that poor boy—"

"There are no answers, Vi. All I’m saying is we aren’t i

"But they’d have killed him if you didn’t—"

"I’m telling you, Vi, I did it for me."

She lifts Max up so that his tiny head rests on her shoulder. His eyes begin to glaze and close. He sleeps.

"Only way I’m go

"Then believe that. But I’ve had enough."

"What are you talking about?"

"I can’t go back to Haines Junction and pretend like none of this happened. Hide in the woods till I’m eighty. I’ve killed two people in my life, Vi. Because I was scared of dying. Orson and Rufus were right about me—"

"Andy—"

"No. They were. That’s the kind of man I am. I have murder in my heart. But so do you. So does that little girl walking between her parents. So does your sleeping baby boy."

"I don’t believe that."

"Fine. Believe whatever it takes so you can look yourself in the mirror and not shudder. I can’t anymore. That’s why I’m doing this."

Her voice quivers: "Doing what?"

I hand Vi the car keys.

"Surrendering. To you. Right now. I want you to take me to your precinct tonight. I’m done, Vi."

"Are you crazy?"

Her voice wakes Max. The baby emits a feeble cry.

"You want to go to prison?"

"Think that’s how it’ll end up?"

"Andy, it won’t be too difficult for them to pin murders on you you didn’t do, considering where they found some of those bodies."

"I don’t care. I’m going to tell them the truth. What they do with me is out of my control."

"You go

"I’m going to tell them the truth, Vi."