Free Raveled by Anne McAneny Page A

Shelby’s family? Anything there?”
    I almost laughed at Kevin’s enthusiasm. Quite a contrast to the guy who’d spent the last decade and a half living day to day on the road, never knowing where his next meal or paycheck would come from—though often, it’d be from the same person. After Dad got arrested and Kevin had realized the gravity of the situation, he’d written to East Carolina University and told them he needed to defer admission. I’d often wondered who was on the receiving end of that letter. They must have grabbed the official Student Deferral Form and scanned the preprinted choices under Reasons for Deferral. Had they taken the time to read through Can’t Afford Tuition, Prior Commitment , Attending Community College, and then been disappointed when they couldn’t find the box for Attending Father’s Murder Trial ? They’d probably shrugged, checked Other , and shoved Kevin’s file into a long-forgotten drawer. That was the last attention anyone had paid to Kevin’s future.
    After the trial ended, h e’d taken one of the old fixer-uppers from the garage and hit the road with fewer coins in his pocket than plans in his head. Whereas I’d chosen to get lost in the city, he’d opted for the anonymity of the country, taking advantage of small-town America’s acceptance of the wandering layman. Folks knew to ask minimal questions, to hire on a weekly basis, and to always pay in cash. Never short on jobs or women, Kevin worked in construction, at factories, on farms, and of course, as a mechanic whenever he could. Chalked up over 300,000 miles on that car. He sent my mother money and called faithfully every two weeks. Checked in with me electronically as often as not and we gelled into a years-long, sarcastic back-and-forth, expertly playing the roles of normal siblings. Denial and indifference acted as the outer wrapping for our familial cord. If either of us deigned to whine about our circumstances, the other was required to respond with lighthearted derision. It had rarely happened.
    To hear Kevin now, pestering me for leads on this dusty case so he could settle that rattling in his head, well, it was a foreign relationship I still didn’t know how to handle.
    “ Hey Kev,” I said, “it’s not some warped game. I can’t call all the suspects to the library and spout off a bunch of theories until one of them waves a candlestick and declares they did it in the parlor.”
    “Yeah, sorry. Every day here feels like eternity. I forget you have the real world to navigate.”
    “I plan to see Smitty, but I’m sure he’ll be well-guarded by his Mama Bear. And as for Shelby Anderson, I barely knew her or her family. That might be a tough one.”
    “All right, Allison. Just do the best you can.”
    We hung up. My mother stood next to me, sipping tea. I didn’t know if she’d just brewed it or if it was a reheated cup that had sat on the counter since this morning. Multiple mugs often dotted the kitchen as she seemed to draw more comfort from cradling the warm ceramic than from consuming the contents. Steam rose up and curled in front of the delicate worry lines permanently etched between her brows.
    “Kevin was a good boy,” she said as if I’d suggested otherwise. “ Never hurt anyone. But that Bobby. That Bobby was a rat.” Ah, the clear signal that she was in one of her spells. She never spoke negatively of Bobby Kettrick in lucid moments. If anything, she assigned him attributes he’d never possessed, like humility and kindness.
    She negotiated the length of the kitchen to go join Selena in front of the TV while I went to my room to read Smitty’s statements and testimony. I needed to be ready for his lies. I’d never liked Smitty. Nothing substantive to him, not enough there to dig one’s teeth into. Like a mood ring, he’d turn whatever color necessary to reflect the people around him, none of it meaning anything real. Besides, I’d learned in science class that a mood ring