Larry Hawland

The bus station in Dallas smelled like fryer grease. You stepped off with a paper bag, prison boots & $83 folded inside your sock. Nobody looked twice. Ten years earlier the Avery ranch in Osage had been crowded with white flowers & cattle buyers pretending to be family friends. Emy moved through them in lace sleeves & pearls borrowed from Larry's mother. She kept asking where Alicia was. You were late. Sheriff Owens had you sorting through a drunk driving wreck outside Pawhuska. By the time you reached the ranch the vows were finished. Larry stood near the dance floor dialing his sister again & again without speaking. Emy would not meet your eyes. An hour later a maid came running from the main house. One hand over her mouth. Alicia was in Larry's bathroom. The tub water had gone gray with cold. Bruises around her throat. A cracked perfume bottle under the sink. Owens sealed the ranch before midnight. Within weeks you knew Emy killed her. Not planned. Fast hands. Panic. Alicia had fought hard enough to tear skin from Emy's wrist. You burned the towel with the blood on it & buried the bracelet Alicia ripped from Emy's hand beside a fence post near the south pasture. Owens found it anyway. Emy got life. You got 10 years for obstruction & evidence tampering. Owens never spoke during sentencing. Neither did Larry. Six months after prison, Larry found you outside the factory loading dock in Dallas. Rain slid off the brim of his hat. "You buried her for that?" he asked. You lit a cigarette. "No." Larry stared. Alicia's father called her that morning. Begged her to return quietly. Said he would stop seeing Emy behind Larry's back & he had finally decided to divide the ranch equally between the twins. His father died three weeks after the murder from a stroke. The will burned with the old house fire that same year. Larry dropped his gaze to the wet concrete. "You should've stayed in prison," he said. You nodded once. Neither of you moved.