The Last Flameling of Solnis

Questions

For a moment, the house is so silent we can hear the hum of the ventilation and the shake of leaves blowing in the autumn wind outside.

     Howard runs a hand through a blonde tuft of curls and down the back of a close fade. He looks back and forth at the two of us with gray eyes and wrinkles budding from their corners. His skin is a slab of holly wood around the edges and flashes rose gold as he blushes. The prisms of the crystal chandelier above us leave both their polar faces stamped with little hexagons and rhombuses of fragmented light.

     Mom's black heels break the silence as she slowly clicks and clacks her way between us. Her brown doe eyes look at me in a way that's new to me. They don't squint and turn to sharp little slits and there's no sympathy or concern or anger, but maybe her eyes are curious.

     No. Her look isn't normal. It isn't like how she looks when she grills me like a witness in court. It isn't the look she gives when I try to put off chores or homework because I'm tired and sore from football practice. And trying to read her expression is like trying to decide if a muted brown color is tinged with red, green, or blue.

  Say something! I think of her to myself as her stare keeps my back pressed against the wooden archway.

     "What evidence do you have of this alleged arson Detective Russell?" Mom shifts her persona as she demands info, holding me in her gaze all the while. Her voice is suddenly formal like when those work calls come in on her days off.

     I must be in a world of trouble. The nerves revealed by my quaking heart tell me it must be true. Howard pulls his phone from the back pocket of his dark blue wrangler jeans.

     "You haven't seen this?" Howard asks as he plays the short Instagram clip that's allowed everyone to judge me and turn my life upside down. My mom's poker face puts my skin on pins and needles as she analyzes every detail of the clip. "There are also some sexual assault allegations being thrown around by the kids at his school, but the alleged victim hasn't come forward. So until then, it's just arson."

     "So when you said you were going to be in Black Hills on business, this is what you meant? Was all this a set up to get closer to your suspect?" My mom demands. Her voice still so steady and collected even though her hand begins to tighten into a fist.

     "Mayor Goodwin requested the help of the nearest state police department to investigate this arson. It just so happened to be mine. I didn't know it would involve you or your son," he offers with a changing tone as well. He looks clean cut like a cop and sounds like one, but I can't help but see him as Howard, the man who just tried to bang my mom.

     My stomach turns at the thought and flips back again as his words registers. Dustin's father sent police here. Did Dustin tell his dad everything? I can imagine Mr. Goodwin saying 'stay away from that Anderson kid from here on out. It's bad for the family image, it goes against our values, and it's unpresidential.'

     "I didn't do anything!" I argue with my own mind, my anger pushing me off the wall.

     "Be quiet Shiloh," my mom cuts with a familiar, squinting glare. She pulls her lavender iPhone from the black Chanel purse she dropped in the corner and starts typing furiously. "Do you need to speak to my client Detective Russell?"

     "So he already has the best counsel money can buy. Great," he gripes. "I do need to ask him a few questions. We can either do that here or I can take him back to New Vine. It's dark out, but the light of the moon could do me just fine."

     "You are certainly sure of yourself detective." Mom observes as her phone chimes. "You do know I only defend clients whose innocence I'm fully convinced of, right?"