Page 289 of Property of Whiskey

Twila is kneeling beside an old cedar chest beneath the attic window, flipping through envelopes and muttering at both of us.

“Would both of you quit measuring dicks in my mother’s attic?”

I look at Amos. “Mine wins.”

Twila’s head snaps up.

Amos points at me. “Not if I shoot it off.”

The attic goes quiet.

Twila stops with one hand inside the chest, and I forget how breathing works for about half a second. Even Amos looks pissed at himself for saying it.

The attic smells like cedar, dust, old paper, and the dry sweetness of things somebody couldn’t make themselves throw away. Morning light slips through the small window and catches floating dust above boxes marked CHRISTMAS, old clothes sealed beneath plastic, photo albums, a sewing basket, and two quilts folded carefully inside clear bags. Twila’s mother is everywhere up here without actually being here.

Amos already pulled the evidence out before we arrived, but Twila wanted to see exactly where he’d hidden it. I understand why. Some secrets feel different once you see where somebody buried them, and this one spent twelve years beneath a quilt her dead mother made.

Hard to get more personal than that.

Amos sets another banker’s box beside the cedar chest. “That’s everything.”

Twila looks inside. “You copied all this?”

“What I could.”

“Before somebody started deleting the report?”

“Yeah.”

I put the teenage wrestling picture back where I found it.

Reluctantly.

Twila catches me. “You were staring.”

“You were cute.”

“I was sixteen.”

“You were a child. I meant the braces.”

Her eyes narrow. “Good save.”

“Wasn’t saving shit. Those bangs were criminal.”

“Daddy!”

Amos takes one look at the photograph. “He ain’t wrong.”

I grin.

Twila looks betrayed. “Both of you can go to hell.”

“Live there.”

Amos mutters, “Explains a lot.”

Then Twila lifts the first folder from the evidence box, and every bit of humor leaves the attic.