CHAPTER 14 - SINS OF OMISSION

Part 1

Bard

A constable came to St. Mary’s and took the descriptions of the men from Bard, who thought he must make a pitiful figure—a pale boy on a camp bed, bruised, bloody, damp, and rumpled. Bard didn’t mention the men’s connection to Palmer Manufacturing. Cassandra still hadn’t explained to him what the police would want to know about what happened at their father’s house, but she told him it was best not to get their father involved. Bridget rang Sister Magdalene back, and the nun insisted that Bard speak to her. Over the line, his mother’s voice was tired, heavy. He managed to get by with his story about locking himself out of the house and assuring her that he was fine.

“Bardie, love, all you had to do was stay in bed, and you couldn’t manage it,” she said, sighing.

“I promise I will take meekly to my bed once I’m home,” Bard said. “No excitement for a fortnight, at least.”

Sister Magdalene fixed him in a disapproving gaze when he hung up. “Sins of omission, Mr. Fox,” she said.

“Sister, my mother has enough to worry about. I’m sure I don’t want to tell her over the phone that her son has been pursued by villains whilst in his pajamas. I’ll fill her in on the details tonight, I promise.”

Sister Magdalene raised her eyebrows. “The same way you promised her just now? How many details do you manage to keep from her with that silver tongue and roguish look, I wonder,” she said.

Bard realized he quite liked Sister Magdalene. “I couldn’t have a better compliment,” he said, and she waved him back to the infirmary.

Cassandra, without an excuse she could use, had to go to her afternoon class. Bard was allowed to doze in the infirmary with the lights dimmed until Victory came to pick them up. The nurse, whose name was actually Sister Anne, brought him a lunch tray from the canteen. 

“We don’t get boys to fuss over here,” she said as Bard ate a wiggly mound of custard, ignoring the roast. “That’s the nice thing about you lot sometimes—you let us take care of you. I used to work in a primary school, and that was the best part. The girls in secondary, they want to prove that they don’t need us. You already know that about your sister. But—secret —“ Sister Anne smiled. She was quite young, just a few years older than he was. “She needs you more than you might think.”

Bard nodded and then set down the lunch tray to lie down once again. When he woke, Cassandra and Victory were standing over him.

“Come on then, old thing,” Victory said. “Haul up, we’re going.”

Bard blinked into half-wakefulness. “We can’t go back to the house. They’ll come back. We have to tell my mother, and—”

“We’ve taken care of that,” Victory interrupted. “I’ll be there—and so will Kai’s uncle and Ms. Jones. And don’t worry—your mother knows they’re coming, but we left it for you and Cassandra to tell her everything that happened.”

“We have a whole posse—or whatever Americans call it—to protect us!” Cassandra said, laughing.

Bard sat up with Victory’s help. “What about Kai?” he said softly. “I want to thank him.”

“He wasn’t sure if he should come,” Victory said. 

“I’ll ring and tell him to come ‘round with his uncle, if you want,” Cassandra said.

“Yes,” he said, averting his eyes. “I’d like him to be there.”

“Bardie,” Cassandra said. “Remember what I said, though—I have to tell you something... something about Kai.”

She and Victory exchanged an anxious look.

“What is it?”

“After we get you settled at home.”

Bard huffed. “I think someone owes me a bloody explanation—”

“Language, Mr. Fox!” called out Sister Magdalene from the hallway outside the infirmary.

“Sorry, Sister, I’m just a bit out of sorts,” Bard called back, fixing Cassandra and Victory with a steady look.

“Let’s just go home,” Cassandra said.

The halls had already cleared of most of the students when they left, Bard leaning on Victory for support. His leg where it was cut throbbed and he limped as he walked.

“I’m supposed to get that stitched up,” he said.

“Well, guess what?” Victory said. “The multi-talented Jude Kalani said he’d tend to you.”

Bard gave her a more-than-dubious look.

“I mentioned your cut and he said he’d take a look. He was a medic in the war before he became a guru or whatever it is,” Victory said. 

“War?” Bard said.

“Vietnam.”

“Oh.” Still, he was uneasy. “But isn’t this why we have the NHS?”

“Look,” Cassandra said. “Victory says Jude and Ms. Jones are arranging everything so that our father doesn’t call the police on Kai—he’d have to admit to kidnapping me to do that, anyway, but Kai would still be in trouble. If you go to hospital, it might not be like the house call—they might ask questions about your concussion, the bruises.”

“What do you mean, they’re ‘arranging everything’?” Bard asked.

“Ms. Jones spoke to my father, too,” Victory said, “and Roger is going to be out at Palmer, but they’ll put out the story that he’s leaving the company instead of being sacked—as long as he turns over his entire severance package to your mother.”

They were outside now, in the cool air and dimming light. Bard breathed in deeply.

“All of it,” he said.

“Yeah—and he’s going to sign our house over to her,” Cassandra said. 

Bard could hear the elation, but also the caution in her voice, as if she weren’t ready to believe it would happen. He was dizzy momentarily—all this done for them—why? While he slept, a cadre of people who surrounded Kai had rearranged his and Cassandra’s lives. He was grateful—and something else as well—but his head hurt too much to interrogate it. He was the fairytale princess, waking to find that everything had changed.

He sat with his head against the window of the passenger seat on the ride home, the cold glass pressing against his bruised temple. It was a short drive, but he had fallen asleep again by the time they reached home. The walk back up to his room was dreamlike. Here was the place where he had last seen Kai—just this morning, but it seemed like so long ago—when Kai had put his hand on Bard’s chest, and Bard had said “Get her back,” and Kai had said, “I’d do anything for you.”

Bard sank into his bed, thinking of it. He couldn’t quite believe it had happened, but he could still feel the warmth of Kai’s hand—it had almost covered his chest entirely, with those long fingers. He had held that hand—at New World, three weeks before. Later, he told himself that the warmth and safety of it had been an illusion. But then he had held it again this morning, and it had been the same—the reassurance of that touch, the belief that Kai meant what he said, could do what he said. And Kai had gotten Cassandra back.

But here, in the familiar quiet of his room—where his glasses still rested on the nightstand and the book he had been reading before he had gotten the concussion, Jude the Obscure by Thomas Hardy, and next to it John Donne’s Meditations, lay on the floor—he could think about what what he felt besides gratitude. It wasn’t quite resentment, not toward everyone who had helped him—but a certain disapproval of himself. What had he done besides run? What had he ever done besides run? He thought of what Cassandra had said, laughingly, the first time he and Kai had met: A legend in his own time. What did he have to offer someone like Kai, who sat under the stage lights and sang something out of his very being? What had he ever done just for himself, for those ambitions he was so sure of?

Bard was settling himself on propped-up pillows, newly dressed in clean pajama bottoms, T-shirt, and cardigan when there was a soft knock on the door—Cassandra. She came in and sat at the foot of his bed, folding her hands on her lap.

“Uh-oh,” Bard said. “This is serious, then.”

“Bardie, I’m going to sound absolutely bonkers telling this to you, but you have to believe me.”

“I’ve been through enough lately that I don’t think anything will sound impossible.”

“Well, just wait.”

Cassandra took a deep breath and then told Bard about what she’d seen Kai do—first, recounting how he’d taken on the two men who’d harassed her.

“So, I knew he could be... physical,” she said. “It was like he went out there needing to hurt them somehow, to... I don’t know, it was like he was so angry that he couldn’t do anything else.”

Bard pictured Kai, his irrepressible exuberance after his performance at New World. What Bard had read as grasping for exposure had merely been Kai’s energy needing to pour out into the cold air along with the steam of his breath. But Bard hadn’t realized that yet. He had never seen someone so open—someone so American—and so it had seemed unnatural, forced because of that.

“He was defending you,” Bard said, then swallowed. He didn’t sound convincing, even to himself. “There have been times, when Father said something cruel to you or Mum that I’ve wished I could do the same.”

“Oh, Bard, no one expects that from you,” Cassandra said. “And it wasn’t just about me—he liked it, being able to hurt them. I haven’t told you everything yet.”

She told him of how Kai had knocked Roger into the car, screaming obscenities and threats. Bard’s head became light, as if breath he drew in sharply remained there instead of filling his lungs. He didn’t pity his father; he was picturing the scene, trying to imagine Cassandra’s fear, Kai as a brute, angry force. Then she described, her voice halting, what came next. Their father’s rage at her, and Kai’s response—the way he had planted his feet, how his eyes turned intense and hard. How Roger had been dragged across the driveway, toward who-knew-what Kai would have done to him if he had reached him.

“Kai said he could have killed him,” Cassandra whispered. “He said he would have killed him.”

Bard swallowed, traced his fingers over his bruised brow. “Wouldn’t either of us do the same, if we could get away with it?” He spoke lightly, liltingly, but at the center of his gut a knot began to form. An image came into focus in his mind—Kai, the boy whose hands and mannerisms struck Bard as so gentle when they first met, transformed into the kind of lad with a scowl and bruised knuckles that Bard knew too well.

“No!” Cassandra cried. “Make him go away forever? Sure. But murder? Anyway, we couldn’t even manage to do it, not like he did.”

“Cassandra, what you’re telling me is impossible. Nobody can do that.”

Tears had sprung in her eyes. “Kai can. Kai did. Ask Victory. She saw it, too. And Jude and Ms. Jones, and those two horrible men. We all saw it. Kai will tell you, too. He doesn’t lie. He told me that he really did what Father said—the charges were true. He said he had to tell you everything before he would tell me, though.”

“I suppose I’ll have to wait for him, then.”

“You don’t believe me.” The accusation in her voice stung him.

“I do,” he said. “I always believe you. But I want an explanation.”

“Kai didn’t have one,” Cassandra said. “Maybe Jude will. Are you all right on your own for a bit? I’m going to make a proper supper for everyone—it’s not fair to make Mum do it. And I expect Kai can eat a lot.”

“What is it with you and feeding people lately?” Bard said.

“What can I say—I’m a natural nurturer.”

Bard snorted, winced, and then leaned over and kissed the top of his sister’s head.

“Oh, g’on now,” Cassandra said, imitating their mother’s brogue. She stood, said, “Remember doctor’s orders—no reading, music, or climbing fences,” and then left the room.