The Cooper Brothers

Chapter 2

Friday, June 8, 2012

That Friday, the media had caught wind of the story and had begun to stake out Nicholas’ house, where Jack was also staying. The local news stations had begun reporting that police had a suspect and that it was Jack. While Nicholas was out getting groceries with Sophia, Jack walked out to the front lawn, puzzled by the media circus. With a microphone shoved in his face and camera men jostling with one another to get a straight-on view of Jack’s face, he was asked if he had anything to do with his mother’s disappearance as police had suspected.

“Can you imagine that?” he said meekly. “Being told by the police that your mother might be dead and then being accused of doing something to her?”

Quietly, Jack turned away and walked slowly back into the house as reporters yelled more accusations, trying to rile him up.

“They say a neighbor saw her just before she went into the house and she told him that she would be in town all week for work. But she hasn’t come back. Isn’t that odd?”

“Police say you two had an argument. Was there a fight?”

Hearing the reporters’ questions as he pulled up into the driveway, Nicholas wasn’t struck by the strangeness of the situation. Francesca often had outbursts and was known for her unpredictable mood swings. Any little thing could set her off and her tantrums could get especially nasty if she had been drinking. Francesca once made Nicholas help her tie Jack to chair with a power cord because he had been expelled from school. Finding Jack’s whimpering intolerable, Nicholas untied the cords and suffered for it at the hand of his mother.

“He didn’t do it,” Nicholas said resolutely to Sophia, and in no small part, to himself.