Page 33 of The Wrong Family

Sam didn’t say this bitterly; rather, he was matter-of-fact, which hurt Juno’s heart. He was so tender in this moment, so vulnerable. It was hard to learn your place in the world when so many people told you different things. She’d confused the hell out of her own kids, God forgive her. In youth, people were plenty stupid—mostly because they thought they were so smart.

“Hey, regarding our conversation earlier… I have a little something for you,” she said, reaching into the paper bag at her feet. She grunted a little as she bent over, but Sam didn’t seem to notice; his eyes were glued to the bag, curiosity on his face. Fighting her uncertainty, Juno pulled out the box of Froot Loops and presented it to him. It was a stupid gift, she was almost embarrassed—except Sam’s face lit up as soon as he saw it.

“Wow. Now that’s ironic! We were just talking about Froot Loops.”

Juno laughed at this. It wasn’t ironic, nor was it a coincidence. But she wasn’t about to confess that she knew Sam loved Froot Loops. How could she explain why she knew that about him?

“Hey, I’ve gotta go.” He looked over his shoulder in the direction of the house. Winnie would be getting home; she could tell that Sam was calculating how long it would take him to get around the lake and if he could beat his mother there. He had a dusting of cinnamon freckles across his nose that made Juno’s heart ache in a way it hadn’t in a long time. Marcus, her oldest, had freckles. It had been so many years since she’d seen him, and she had no idea if those freckles still appeared in the spring like the cherry blossoms had. Sam reached for the Froot Loops. Juno watched in amusement as he dropped to a knee and opened his backpack.

“Thanks for the snack, Juno!”

Juno thrilled. He was such a good boy.

She wanted to make the right decision. Sam did not belong to Winnie and Nigel; they’d taken him from a woman named Josalyn Russel. Her story was tragic: a runaway, young and afraid, got pregnant. She must have been terrified. But that meant Sam had a biological family somewhere: aunts and uncles and cousins, maybe even grandparents. Juno would never have the chance to be a grandmother to her grandchildren, and that cut at her heart. What these people had done was unthinkable.

In that moment, she made her decision: she would find these people, the Russels. She needed to see what type of people they were.

Running into Sam had thrown off the timing of her plan, so she spent the night on the west side of the park, too afraid to sleep, but tired all the way down to her joints. It was warmish outside, and from her bench she could see the Turlin Street house and that gave her some comfort. She considered taking something for her pain—the pills in her bag—but Juno preferred being alert in the park at night. As if emerging from some horror movie, an old drunk stumbled by. Juno knew him from the area; Vic, they called him. Angry guy, from what she recalled. She’d always steered clear. Some of them knew you were there and didn’t care to acknowledge it, but other guys—like Vic—they wanted to get right up in your face, make you uncomfortable. People were the same everywhere you went: the suburbs, prison, the gutters of Seattle: everyone was afraid of their own existence. Afraid they were getting it wrong…afraid of what would come after as a consequence. And in Juno’s opinion, that made people act like irrational assholes.

A dozen yards away, Vic tossed something into the lake. Juno thought she heard him yell “Fuck you, Howie!”What does it take to get some peace and quiet around here?she thought. There was one more anguished hail of “Howieee!” He settled down after that, probably to squirt something into his veins. Juno relaxed a little, fingering the pill in her pocket. She could think in peace. She had a view of Winnie and Nigel’s bedroom—and Sam’s, she thought, her eyes drifting to the window that belonged to the boy’s room.

For Juno, there was the matter of getting back into the house the next morning without triggering the alarm. Her plan was to go through the kitchen door with the key she’d borrowed from the ring of spares. She’d have to time it just right, so that she’d be walking in the back of the house while Sam was leaving through the front. She had a three-minute window to get inside without triggering the alarm. Everything had to be timed just so.

Just so what?she thought.You get back to your little hovel in the ground where you live like a mole. It was almost spring, she could return to the park, walk away from the Crouch house. It had done its job; sheltered her through winter. Juno was certain she would have died if not for the crawl space. And she wasn’t well—far from it.

But she’d chosen the wrong family to follow, a family with deep, dark secrets.No, she chided herself. There was no wrong in doing right. Juno, who’d never believed that there was a reason for everything, had never blamed God for the things that had happened to her—knew that people made their own fate. She was a walking testament to that. But Sam didn’t belong in this mess. On top of that, Juno knew that the Crouches’ marriage was falling apart. Where would Sam go if they got divorced? What would his life be like? He was entitled to a different life, one with his real family. The clock was ticking, and Juno wanted to make sure Sam was okay. Sam was her priority. Sam was caught up in all of this because they’d stolen him. She’d read the police report, seen the little swatches of blood. A baby had been taken. Like hers had been taken from her. And she’d had no rights, no legal standing to see them. Kregger had erased her from their lives.

Juno’s body rocked with a different type of pain. She moaned softly, a purring sound in the back of her throat.Her boys, her boys, her boys.Dale and Marcus. One was the athlete, one was the student. She’d raised them. When Kregger was working long hours in the casino, she’d raised them. Two little boys and nothing but their stepmother. Good thing she’d been equipped. Juno had loved the boys enough to put her doctorate on hold, to be a mother instead of a student. She’d never once resented Kregger for expecting her to raise his young sons; she’d wanted to raise them. And he’d taken them from her. Like Winnie had taken Sam.

Vic let out a cry of pain from the brush. Distracted, she didn’t notice the truck that circled past the house twice, nor did she pay attention to the way it idled on the corner of Aurora and Turlin, the driver tossing a cigarette butt onto Winnie’s immaculate grass.

24

WINNIE

Winnie paused in the doorway of her bedroom, eyes flicking across the room; everything was as it should be. In here, at least, she thought. Maybe it was the stress of life that was getting to her. Yes, that had to be it. After all, hadn’t these thoughts been toying with her mind for years, hounding her relentlessly? Her subconscious was probably clogged up with fear, and it was clearly manifesting in her life. She was still embarrassed about the shadowy thing she’d convinced herself she’d seen in their bedroom window. Maybe she needed more time in therapy. That season of her life was over, that part of herself buried so deeply Winnie had created a new person, a better one, to replace the last. She breathed deeply, coercing her mind into emptying itself of the negative. Everything was going to be all right…everything was going to be all right…

When Winnie went downstairs the next morning in her robe, Samuel was already in the kitchen, sitting at the table with his phone and a bowl of cereal. He was a sight, his hair flattened on one side and poking up on the other. He looked like the little boy she missed, the one who ran to her, eager for hugs and kisses. But she knew all too well that there was a simmering adolescent where her little boy used to be. And he didn’t want his mother’s affection.

As she breezed past him on her way to the sink, feigning indifference, she saw the rainbow Os floating in milk and bit her tongue. He knew he wasn’t allowed to have sugar. But she kept her trap shut about it, to avoid an argument. It was Saturday, and she wanted to make the most of the weekend.

Winnie opened the fridge. “Want to take a walk around the lake after lunch?” Her hand tightened on the handle as she waited for his possible rejection.

Samuel looked up from his phone, unaware that his mother was holding her breath. He shrugged and followed with a weak, “Sure.”

Winnie was relieved. Small victories. That was what her therapist had wanted her to focus on, small victories—not the giant, looming issues that chewed incessantly at her mind. She hid her smile and nonchalantly made her French-press coffee.

But all too soon, he left the kitchen. She cleaned up his empty bowl and the splashes of milk on the counter, wiping aimlessly until the kitchen was spotless. She felt disarmed by Samuel per usual; given favor one minute and having it taken the next. Being a mother was by far the hardest job Winnie had ever taken on, and she had roughly five years left before Samuel went to college.

Nigel often made fun of her for referring to parenting as a contract, but it was. The most unbreakable contract, excruciatingly unrewarding…and yet…it was the thing that most drove her in life, the thing that she simultaneously hated and loved at the same time.No—that’s wrong, thought Winnie. She didn’t hate being a mother, she hated parenting—being the enforcer, the teacher, and most often, the bad guy. Today was her day to be the good guy, to remind her son of the unbreakable bond they shared. She intended to make the most of these last years of his youth; it felt like Samuel was slipping fast from her grasp. He was solemn and slow to laugh, and he regarded both her and Nigel with suspicion. Winnie couldn’t make sense of it. Lately she’d been thinking that perhaps they’d spoiled him. That was a thing with only children; she knew this because Nigel was one. There was an entitlement etched quietly into their minds, a sense that things needed to go their way. They had no one to contend with but doting parents—no siblings to scream in their face, no hair-pulling, kicking, or having to share. The world was their oyster. And on that rare occasion when things didn’t go their way—well, that was when they sulked. These were all the things she told herself were going on with her son. The alternative…well, that she didn’t want to think about.

What does Samuel know?

Winnie placed the washed and dried cereal bowl back into the cabinet harder than she intended. The mugs rattled as she slammed the door closed. It was then she stopped dead in her tracks, spotting the empty Froot Loops container propping open the lid of the recycling bin. Where had he got the Froot Loops from? Winnie had been so distracted by her thoughts that she hadn’t asked herself this until now. There was no way Nigel would buy them for him after the last fight they had about it, and Winnie certainly hadn’t. Unless Samuel bought them for himself. Was that possible? Winnie rode him so much about what he ate, maybe he was purchasing food on his own dime. Sometimes he was home alone after school before one of them got to him, though it had never been for longer than thirty minutes. Would that be enough time for him to walk to the Safeway and back? She put the box on top of the bin, took a photo of it, and sent it to Nigel. His message came back right away.

Where did he get those?

Winnie was relieved by his response.

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