“I get it. A big part me—hell, all of me hates me too for doing it.”

“I know that. Weigh it all up, spread out the blame, and shit, Eddie, it wasn’t your fault. It was the men who came into that bank. They’re the ones responsible. Not you. And we want to let you know how much we’re relying on you now. It’s your job to take care of that little girl. You have to give up everything you can to make sure she’s raised right. And no matter what, we’re always going to be here for her. And for you. Remember that, Eddie. Remember that and you’ll do okay.”

He puts his hand on my shoulder. It’s warm and comforting. For the briefest second I believe him that everything is going to be okay. I take another drink of the beer.

It’s in your blood.

“Sorry?” I say.

“I said you’ll do okay.”

“No, after that. You said something after that.”

“No, I’m pretty sure I didn’t.”

Suddenly I’m also sure he didn’t. It’s in your blood. It was the same voice I heard earlier, the one that told me I’d be hearing from it soon, and now I recognize it. It’s been almost twenty years, but it’s the voice from when I was a kid and the neighbor’s dog wouldn’t stop barking. It’s my dad’s monster—it found me twice when I was nine, and now it’s found me again.

chapter twelve

It’s dark by the time we get home. It’s a three-quarter moon. It throws white light over the house and reflects off the front windows and makes the house look very empty. I park the car in the driveway and can’t be bothered putting it in the garage. Jodie’s car is still parked in town near her work and can stay there a while longer yet. I grab the mail and take Sam inside. One of the things about the new house we were going to get was it had an adjoining garage. It was something we both wanted, because of the brutal Christchurch winters.

Jodie doesn’t have to worry about that anymore, now, does she . . .

“Shut up,” I whisper.

“What, Daddy?” Sam asks, her voice sleepy, her eyes half closed.

“Nothing, honey,” I say, and I carry her inside.

The house has gotten tidier over the last couple of days mainly because I found myself wandering through the rooms, never really sure what to do. Sometimes I’d spend hours in front of the TV, watching the news and staring at whatever else was on. Other times I’d surf the net, looking for updates on the case. Most of the time people would show up to spend time with us. Sam kept mostly to herself. Mogo would show up for food and nothing else. I’d clean the house sporadically, sometimes cleaning the same room only an hour after I’d last done it. I’d play with Sam. We’d watch TV together. We’d sit outside together. It was tough.

I carry Sam down to her bedroom. I keep searching for a glimpse of my wife, a shadow, a movement somewhere, something to let me know in some way she is still here. I lay Sam on her bed—Disney characters scattered in the pattern of the bedspread. She’s asleep again. I get her into her pajamas. She wakes a little but is too tired to help.

I grab a beer from the fridge. I never bought any, but since Saturday friends have been showing up to share their sorrow with me, the women bringing wine, the men, beer, and in the beginning I thought I had enough to last me a lifetime, but now I’m not so sure. Now I think there might only be enough here for a few days. I settle in front of the TV and wait for the news to come on. The bank robbery, the funerals, they don’t even lead the news anymore. The lead story is about a seventy-five-year-old woman who, in the parking lot of a shopping mall, mistook her car for an identical-colored and almost identical-shaped vehicle parked next to it. The owner, seeing her putting her key into his lock, rushed over and shoved her so hard she fell over, hit her head on the sidewalk, and was pronounced dead at the scene. The second story is about a turned-over truck that allowed a few dozen sheep to escape on a notorious stretch of highway in the North Island. Nobody was killed. Then come the funerals, snippets from them both in a montage with slow classical music playing over the top of it, like it’s a movie preview. The coffins are different colors and styles, and everybody is dressed smartly. My daughter gets a lot of attention—it shows us following the coffin. Another daughter—three times Sam’s age—follows the other coffin. Then at the end of the story a brief report saying the men haven’t been captured, and that any member of the public with information is asked to call the hotline listed below.

I finish the beer and grab another. I open up the mail. There are two letters from the bank. The first one is brief.

DEAR MR. HUNTER,

IN WHAT MUST BE A VERY DIFFICULT TIME FOR YOU AND YOUR FAMILY, WE AT SOUTH PACIFIC BANK WOULD LIKE TO OFFER OUR SINCEREST CONDOLENCES FOR THE LOSS OF YOUR WIFE.

THE TRAGIC INCIDENT THAT HAPPENED OUTSIDE THE BANK HAS TOUCHED THE ENTIRE STAFF AND, NEEDLESS TO SAY, YOU AND YOUR FAMILY REMAIN IN OUR THOUGHTS AND OUR PRAYERS.

SINCERELY,

DEAN WELLINGTON

I read the letter a couple of times, looking at the words Dean Wellington used. He managed to sum the entire murder of my wife as an “incident” and convey his horror at it all in two paragraphs. I wonder if he used the words “outside the bank” specifically, hoping it will absolve any responsibility the branch has toward what happened.

The second letter isn’t as brief. It’s obviously a form letter with a brief scrawl of a signature at the bottom. It’s been overnighted down from Auckland, meaning they must have gotten to work on our loan application within hours of Jodie dying.

MR. EDWARD HUNTER,

UNFORTUNATELY, AS YOU KNOW, THE PROPERTY MARKET AT THIS CURRENT TIME IS EXTREMELY VOLATILE, WHICH REQUIRES US TO TIGHTEN THE CRITERIA ON WHICH WE BASE OUR HOME LOANS.

BASED ON THESE CRITERIA, WE ARE UNABLE TO APPROVE YOUR APPLICATION AT THIS TIME.

I read on. The letter goes on for another page, listing some of the criteria that I no longer fit. In the end I skim over the details and go right to the end.

AS THE MARKET IS IN A CONSTANT STATE OF CHANGE, WE WOULD BE HAPPY TO REVIEW THIS DECISION AT A LATER DATE. IN THE MEANTIME, WE HOPE THAT WE CAN CONTINUE TO ASSIST YOU WITH ALL YOUR BANKING NEEDS.

YOURS SINCERELY,

KATIE HUGHES

I read the letter a second time, finishing off my second beer, the anger burning inside me, and yet I feel no disbelief at all. Katie Hughes must have typed this letter up pretty damn fast. I check the postmark and see it got posted on Saturday. I wonder if Hughes or Wellington spent an expensive Friday afternoon with lawyers to see where they stood on the whole “incident.” I finish a third beer while flicking through the phone book.

I’m not sure why I do it, but I look Dean Wellington up and write down his address before finishing off a third beer and deciding it might be about time to head off to bed.

chapter thirteen

I wake up and everything is as it should be. My wife is alive. We’ve bought the new house. Sam is Sam and Mogo is being Mogo. Then those thoughts become blurred, my bedroom comes into focus, and Jodie isn’t in bed next to me. I reach over and her side is cold, untouched, and then it all comes racing back, as it did yesterday morning, and every morning since the . . . for some reason I think accident but that’s the wrong word. Since the what?

The execution the voice says, and I agree, though Dean Wellington would say “incident.”

It’s after eight already. Normally Sam would be up watching cartoons and making a mess, but this morning she’s still asleep, the last few days . . .

Since the execution . . .

The last few days since the execution she’s been sleeping later.

I sit on the porch and eat cereal directly out of the packet. The Tuesday-morning sun is slowly climbing into the sky. There’s a truck and a cherry picker out in the street about half a block away, motors and chainsaws making plenty of noise as they trim tops of trees away from the power lines. My head is slightly fuzzy and my mouth feels like I spent time last night licking the carpet. The cereal is dry and sticks to the roof of it. I think about work and the file I should be working on, and whether not going in today and no longer giving a damn about it means I no longer have a job. I wonder what kind of letter Dean Wellington would send if he knew I was dropping from one income down to none.