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“Yes. She had to live through all of that trouble with Robbie, her father and I falling apart, getting divorced. No matter how hard youmight try, you can’t really shield the younger child. They know what’s going on. They absorb all that toxicity like a little sponge. Lisette always tried to be the peacemaker, bless her. She did everything she could to be the good kid, and the good kid always gets short shrift in these situations,” B’Lynn said. “I always tried to be conscious of that, and I still failed as often as not.
“Of course, Robert lavished attention on Lisette as if she was his only child. Thank God she’s a smart girl. Kids see right through us,” she said, dipping a tiny spoon into an antique china sugar bowl and stirring it into her coffee. “Did Robert ever call you back?”
“No, ma’am.”
She shook her head, scowling, and reached for her cell phone. Annie watched her pull up a contact and make the call, then wait for an answer. She rolled her eyes and mouthed,Voicemail.
“Robert, it’s B’Lynn,” she said. “I know you prefer to act like you don’t have a son, but you do, and he’s missing. The very least you can do is return the phone calls of the detective trying to find him. Imagine how you can bend her ear going on about how hard your life has been because of Robbie and your ball-busting ex-wife. She might even pretend to feel sorry for you, you narcissistic ass. Answer your damn phone!”
She ended the call and heaved a sigh as she set the phone aside. “Well, that felt good, anyway,” she said, raising her mug to her lips. “To think I used to worship that man. The things my generation of women were raised to value…What a bill of goods.”
She shook her head and sighed again. “His own father doesn’t care that he’s missing. Why would I expect anyone else to? I turn on the news this morning and all I hear about is Marc Mercier, Marc Mercier, Marc Mercier. Hometown hero. The savior of the youth football league. Missing three days. Everyone is up in arms about Marc. Robbie Fontenot barely gets a mention. His picture wasn’t on the screen long enough for me to recognize him. There’s so many layers of irony in that, I don’t know where to start.”
“It seems odd that they both happen to be missing,” Annie said.“Cops don’t like coincidences. Robbie hadn’t mentioned Marc to you?”
“No. Not at all. You have to understand. When Robbie got hurt, his life as he knew it ended. He lost his identity…and Marc Mercier stepped in and took his place on the football team, and the world kept on turning without missing a beat,” B’Lynn said. “Don’t get me wrong. Marc was a nice enough boy, even if he always did seem like he was running for political office. He was talented. Life gave him an opportunity, and he succeeded. But for Robbie…It was hard to watch. And nothing ever got better after that. It only got worse. So no, I don’t see him seeking out Marc for any reason.”
“It’s ten years ago,” Annie said.
“Ten years and how many stays in rehab? How many nights in jail? How many failures? How many disappointments?”
“Did Robbie blame Marc somehow?”
“Blame, no. Resent? How could he not?” she asked. “My God, I’m the adult, and look at me. I resent Marc for getting better news coverage than Robbie. How disgusting is that? If I were a better person, I would be calling his mother to offer my support.”
“Do you know the family?” Annie asked.
“Not really, no. They weren’t part of our social circle. Not to sound like an absolute snob, but doctors and lawyers mingle with doctors and lawyers. That’s just how that is. Boring as hell when I look back on it.”
“Those aren’t your friends anymore?”
“No. Robert kept those friends in the divorce. I became much too real for them. Dealing with an addicted child strips away your social veneer. You just don’t have any tolerance for pretentious nonsense. Anyway, you would have thought having an addict in the family was a communicable disease. They couldn’t stay far enough away. What kind of friends are those, I ask you?”
“Not very good ones,” Annie said. “Didn’t you find a support network? Al-Anon? Or a church group or something?”
“Oh, sure, for a while. Al-Anon. No church group would haveme!” She laughed. “I’m too angry for them, too happy to call out God on his bullshit, pardon my language. I stuck with Al-Anon, but when the problem goes on and on and on…I got tired of the pity. After a while I just felt like a burden on the rest of them. A shining example of how not to succeed. I stepped away to give them hope.”
And shouldered the burden herself. She was so small and delicate. How had she not been crushed by the weight of it all?
“You find your own way to tough it out,” she said. “Or you walk away. Or it destroys you. Those are your choices.”
“Are Robbie and his sister close?” Annie asked.
“In their own way. Robbie’s very aware of how his problems impacted Lisette. But he’s her big brother, even so, and she loves him.”
“She hasn’t heard from him?”
“She told me he called her on Halloween morning. That was their holiday. Robbie used to take Lisette trick-or-treating.”
“And he didn’t say anything to her about his plans for the evening?”
“She said no. I didn’t mention it before because there was nothing to say.”
“I’ll want to speak to her anyway,” Annie said. “Robbie was seen that night downtown at Monster Bash.”
“Ah, well, that would be Lisette covering up for him with me, then,” she said. “She’s still his baby sister, but Robbie is a grown man. I realize he’s not going to lock himself in a cell. He’s going to live his life. He can go out if he wants to. I just have to hope he doesn’t make a bad choice while he’s at it. Who saw him?”
“I don’t know,” Annie admitted. “I had a text from another detective that Robbie had been seen that night in the vicinity of Evangeline Bank and Trust. I’ll get more details later, and I’ll be looking at surveillance video to see who he might have been with.”
