Free Hocus by Jan Burke Page B

everyone tries to call after an earthquake. Zillions of questions trying to be first in line. Shock pushing them all to the back. I sat there gaping at him.
    He took back the photo, stared at it. “I wanted to tell you a long time ago, but—”
    “You had another sister?”
    “Yes. Diana.”
    “You never told me—”
    “Like I said, I wanted to—”
    “But you didn’t.”
    “I made a promise. To my mom.”
    “Your mother made you promise not to tell me about your sister?”
    “Uh, not exactly you personally, although… well, it’s not you. Even before I met you, we didn’t talk about her.”
    “I don’t get it.”
    “Diana had problems,” he said, looking at the photo. But the look on his face didn’t match the words.
    He misses her, I thought. It made me settle down a little. “What kind of problems?”
    “Drugs. Alcohol. God knows what else. And her problems became the whole family’s problems. It was a strain on all of us. No one ever knew what she’d do next. Dad would tell her to come in at ten, she’d get home at three in the morning. Mom would be worried sick, Dad would be pissed as hell. Cassie and I had to listen to the shouting match that would follow. Diana was rebellious as all get-out.”
    “You think that’s all it was? Teenage rebellion?”
    “No, no,” he said, lightly rubbing his thumb along the edge of the photo. “That’s one of the easy answers. Just like — what is it that people always say? You know, the families? ‘Fell in with the wrong crowd.’ Well, in part that was true. Her crowd couldn’t have been more wrong. Assholes, if you ask me. She was proud to hang out with that bunch, and embarrassed about my dad being a cop.
Embarrassed.”
He shook his head. “She was always trying to prove to her friends that she was cool, even if….”
    I waited, but he didn’t finish the sentence. “Where were you keeping this photo? I’ve never seen it before.”
    “In an envelope, taped to the back of the dresser.”
    “Hiding it from me?”
    “No. From my mom. She doesn’t know I have it.”
    “Shit, Frank. You’re almost forty and you’re squirreling things away from your mother. You got a pet frog in there, too?”
    “Very funny,” he said, turning red. “She — ah, Christ, forget it,” he said, and stood up.
    “Hold on, hold on.”
    He didn’t move. I didn’t move.
    “Sit down, Frank. Please.”
    He stayed standing.
    “I’m sorry,” I said. “I’m just confused by all of this.”
    He relented then. After a moment he said, “I’m sorry, too.” He reached over and took my hand. “I never meant for this to happen this way. I wanted to tell you. But this is something that my family hasn’t talked about for years, and I knew I wasn’t going to get my mom to give in overnight. My mom set this policy a long time ago, not long after Diana died. ‘Don’t talk about her. It’s too painful for your father.’ ”
    It wasn’t hard for me to imagine Bea Harriman choosing this way to protect Frank’s dad. Wisely I kept that observation to myself.
    “I think it was too painful for
her,”
Frank went on. “Diana was her favorite, her firstborn. Cassie and I were closer to my dad. Diana was my mother’s darling. Dad always said that when Diana was the only one — before I came along — he spoiled her, too. I never saw it. They were both pretty strict with Cassie and me.”
    “Diana was how much older than you?”
    “Four years. Mom just let her have her way, even then. It was easier than fighting her. Diana was strong willed. By the time Cassie was born, Mom had an infant and a toddler to contend with, and that was more than enough. Everything fell on Mom’s shoulders — Dad wasn’t home much. He worked graveyard shift for a lot of years. Wouldn’t come home until after we were getting ready for school. He’d be asleep when we came back. Trying to make ends meet, he’d catch as much overtime as he could. Gradually he cut back, took on better