Chapter 9: Night on the Living Room Floor
We didn't move him upstairs. Dad tried once, put his arm under Grandpa Arthur's shoulders and tried to lift, and Arthur made a sound in his throat and went pale and his hands shook so hard Dad stopped.
That was how I knew he wasn't going to walk out of that hole behind the portrait. Not that night.
Dad dragged the tall cushions off the couch and the extra blanket from the hall closet. I brought my sleeping bag and the flat pillow from my bed. We made a pallet right on the living room floor, away from the torn canvas but where we could still see the dark gap between those gray metal doors. Dad kept checking over his shoulder at that gap like it might close on its own.
Arthur was lighter than I remembered. Dad and I got him onto the pallet slow, one arm at a time. His light-colored shirt hung loose. When his sleeve rode up I saw the red marks around his wrists, raw and dented in where the ties had been. His ankles had the same marks. He didn't complain. He just breathed, shallow and fast, then slower when Dad tucked the blanket around his legs.
"Small sips," Dad said, quiet. He'd filled a glass only halfway from the kitchen. He crouched and held it to Arthur's mouth with both hands so it wouldn't spill. Arthur's lips were cracked. He took a sip and coughed and Dad pulled the glass back and waited. I counted his breaths without meaning to. In, out. In, out. There was a sore on his left heel I could see when the blanket shifted, a dark spot where his skin had broken.
Susan and Vincent didn't help with the pallet. They stood by the dining table for a minute watching, then went into the kitchen. The doors between the kitchen and living room don't latch all the way, so we heard them even when they tried to whisper.
Vincent had his phone out. "We need Mr. Lowell," he said. "Before anyone else makes a call for us."
Susan's voice was tight. "We don't call 911. We call our attorney. We get ahead of this."
I looked at Dad. He heard it too. His jaw went tight but he didn't answer them. He just kept his hand on Arthur's shoulder, steady.
"Damage control," Susan whispered. "Those folders are still in this house, Vincent. If Marcus gives them to anyone—"
"He won't tonight," Vincent said. "He doesn't understand what he's doing."
They kept talking about statements and consent and what Dad would do. Neither of them asked how Arthur was breathing. Neither of them brought water.
After a while their voices dropped lower and I couldn't make out the words, just the tone. Vincent was pacing. The refrigerator opened and closed. I heard a chair scrape.
I stayed on the floor next to the pallet. Dad sat against the front of the couch so he could see both Arthur and the kitchen doorway. He didn't turn on the big overhead light. He left the floor lamp on low, warm light that didn't reach all the way to the corners. The house got quiet except for the furnace kicking on and Arthur's breathing.
Around midnight Dad went to check the front door was locked and came right back. He whispered, "You want to go to bed? I'll stay."
I shook my head. "I'm good here."
He didn't argue. He handed me the glass of water so I could hold it.
Arthur's eyes opened. They'd been closed for a long time. He looked at me and then at Dad, and his hand moved a little on the blanket toward mine. His fingers were cold.
"You heard me," he said. His voice was hoarse, barely there.
I nodded. My throat felt thick. "I heard the knocking."
He tried to smile. It didn't reach all the way. "Workshop code," he whispered. "Remember? You were seven. I taught you on the workbench. Two quick, one slow."
I did remember. We'd spent a whole afternoon in his garage tapping on a scrap piece of pine, him showing me how he and his brother used to talk through the wall. He'd called it our tap code. Two quick, one slow meant it's me, I'm here. I'd forgotten until he said it, and then it came back all at once — the smell of sawdust, his hand over mine helping me get the rhythm right.
"You kept doing it," I said.
"Every evening," he whispered. "When I heard you walk past. I thought maybe you'd remember."
My eyes stung. I held his hand tighter, careful of his wrist. "I did," I said.
May you like
Behind us, the kitchen went quiet. Vincent's call had ended. I could see their shadows in the doorway, standing there, not coming closer. Dad shifted so his body was between them and the pallet, just a little.
Arthur's breathing evened out after that. He took another small sip when Dad lifted the glass again and didn't cough this time. I stayed awake and watched the rise and fall under the blanket and listened to the house creak, and every time his breath hitched I put my hand on his arm so he'd know we were still there.
