Jason looked mortified. I'd never seen my beautiful older brother look as embarrassed.
"Movies," he mumbled.
I bent closer to be sure I'd heard him right. "Movies?" I said, incredulously.
"Shhh," he hissed, looking guilty as hell. "We made movies."
I guess I was just as embarrassed as Jason. Sisters and brothers don't need to know everything about each other. "And you gave them a copy," I said tentatively, trying to figure out just how dumb Jason had been.
He looked off in another direction, his hazy blue eyes romantically shiny with tears.
"Moron," I said. "Even allowing for the fact that you couldn't know how this was gonna come to public light, what's gonna happen when you decide to get married? What if one of your ex-flames mails a copy of your little tango to your bride-to-be?"
"Thanks for kicking me when I'm down, Sis."
I took a deep breath. "Okay, okay. You've quit making these little videos, right?"
He nodded emphatically. I didn't believe him.
"And you told Sid Matt all about it, right?"
He nodded less firmly.
"And you think that's why Andy is on your case so much?"
"Yeah," Jason said morosely.
"So, if they test your se**n and it isn't a match for what was inside Maudette and Dawn, you're clear." By now, I was as shifty-faced as my brother. We had never talked about se**n samples before.
"That's what Sid Matt says. I just don't trust that stuff."
My brother didn't trust the most reliable scientific evidence that could be presented in a court. "You think Andy's going to fake the results?"
"No, Andy's okay. He's just doing his job. I just don't know about that DNA stuff."
"Moron," I said, and turned away to get another pitcher of beer for four guys from Ruston, college students on a big night out in the boonies. I could only hope Sid Matt Lancaster was good at persuasion.
I spoke to Jason once more before he left Merlotte's. "Can you help me?" he asked, turning up to me a face I hardly recognized. I was standing by his table, and his date for the night had gone to the ladies' room.
My brother had never asked me for help before.
"How?"
"Can't you just read the minds of the men who come in here and find out if one of them did it?"
"That's not as easy as it sounds, Jason," I said slowly, thinking as I went along. "For one thing, the man would have to be thinking of his crime while he sat here, at the exact moment I listened in. For another thing, I can't always read clear thoughts. Some people, it's just like listening to a radio, I can hear every little thing. Other people, I just get a mass of feelings, not spelled out; it's like hearing someone talk in their sleep, see? You can hear they're talking, you can tell if they're upset or happy, but you can't hear the exact words. And then other times, I can hear a thought, but I can't trace it to its source if the room is crowded."
Jason was staring at me. It was the first time we had talked openly about my disability.
"How do you stop from going crazy?" he asked, shaking his head in amazement.
I was about to try to explain putting up my guard, but Liz Barrett returned to the table, newly lipsticked and fluffed. I watched Jason resume his woman-hunting persona like shrugging on a heavy coat, and I regretted not getting to talk to him more when he was by himself.
That night, as the staff got ready to leave, Arlene asked me if I could baby-sit for her the next evening. It would be an off-day for both of us, and she wanted to go to Shreveport with Rene to see a movie and go out to eat.
"Sure!" I said. "I haven't kept the kids in a while."
Suddenly Arlene's face froze. She half-turned to me, opened her mouth, thought the better of speaking, then thought again. "Will ... ah ... will Bill be there?"
"Yes, we'd planned on watching a movie. I was going to stop by the video rental place, tomorrow morning. But I'll get something for the kids to watch instead." Abruptly, I caught her meaning. "Whoa. You mean you don't want to leave the kids with me if Bill's gonna be there?" I could feel my eyes narrow to slits and my voice drop down to its angry register.
"Sookie," she began helplessly, "honey, I love you. But you can't understand, you're not a mother. I can't leave my kids with a vampire. I just can't."
"No matter that I'm there, and I love your kids, too? No matter that Bill would never in a million years harm a child." I slung my purse over my shoulder and stalked out the back door, leaving Arlene standing there looking torn. By golly, she ought to be upset!
I was a little calmer by the time I turned onto the road to go home, but I was still riled up. I was worried about Jason, miffed at Arlene, and almost permanently frosted at Sam, who was pretending these days that I was a mere acquaintance. I debated whether to just go home rather than going to Bill's; decided that was a good idea.
It was a measure of how much he worried about me that Bill was at my house about fifteen minutes after I should have been at his.
"You didn't come, you didn't call," he said quietly when I answered the door.
"I'm in a temper," I said. "A bad one."
Wisely he kept his distance.
"I apologize for making you worry," I said after a moment. "I won't do that again." I strode away from him, toward the kitchen. He followed behind, or at least I presumed he did. Bill was so quiet you never knew until you looked.
He leaned against the door frame as I stood in the middle of the kitchen floor, wondering why I'd come in the room, feeling a rising tide of anger. I was getting pissed off all over again. I really wanted to throw something, damage something. This was not the way I'd been brought up, to give way to destructive impulses like that. I contained it, screwing my eyes shut, clenching my fists.
"I'm gonna dig a hole," I said, and I marched out the back door. I opened the door to the tool shed, removed the shovel, and stomped to the back of the yard. There was a patch back there where nothing ever grew, I don't know why. I sunk the shovel in, pushed it with my foot, came up with a hunk of soil. I kept on going. The pile of dirt grew as the hole deepened.
"I have excellent arm and shoulder muscles," I said, resting against the shovel and panting.
Bill was sitting in a lawn chair watching. He didn't say anything.
I resumed digging.
Finally, I had a really nice hole.
"Were you going to bury anything?" Bill asked, when he could tell I was done.
"No." I looked down at the cavity in the ground. "I'm going to plant a tree."