Between

by Angie Abdou

  She winds her fingers into Ligaya’s thick black hair, freshly

  brushed smooth for bed. She exhales hot boozy breath on the shal-

  low dip in Ligaya’s throat, flicks a hint of tongue at her earlobe. Her

  full weight bears down on Ligaya now, and she feels Ligaya’s nipples

  harden, rising sharply to her own bare skin.

  Vero is a guest here, in Ligaya’s room, but she no longer feels

  apologetic. Ligaya’s flesh invites her in, welcomes her, she knows it

  does.

  This is how Vero would have liked to have been with Danielle—

  alone in a room with no audience. But with Ligaya, it is better. Their

  meeting has history behind it. History brings weight and meaning

  and depth. What is a sexual encounter without weight and mean-

  ing? No more than a back scratch. Danielle was a back scratch. Back

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  scratch as performance art. Ligaya and Vero: they have built to this.

  It was inevitable. Vero tells herself so again.

  Finally, Vero lets herself taste the plastic-strawberry flavour of

  Ligaya’s plump lips and then—there it is—the flick of Ligaya’s tongue

  meeting her own.

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  CHAPTER TWENTY

  Vero does not know how late it is when Shane returns. She hears

  him on the stairs, his hesitant descent pounding through her post-

  wine headache. She holds her hand to her temples and pulls her body

  away from Ligaya’s, keeping her eyes closed, squeezed tight. No, not

  this. He’s looking for me now. Now?

  Vero left the light on in the staircase. Shane has followed it to the

  bottom of the stairs, where Vero has left Ligaya’s door a crack open,

  and the trail of her clothes wends its way from the doorway to the

  bed. Vero swallows, her mouth parched. She cannot open her eyes,

  does not want to see the outline of his body in Ligaya’s doorway. His

  nylon jacket rustles between his arms and torso when he steps into

  the bedroom. Shane’s jeans creak as he kneels at the foot of the bed.

  Vero braces herself for his attack, feels his words as a punch to the

  face before he speaks them.

  Slut! Whore! Cheat!

  She flinches, preparing for the sting of them.

  But she gets nothing except silence.

  When Shane finally does speak, his voice is low and chesty. His

  words hurt more than the ones she anticipated.

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  “I’m sorry,” he says. “I should have known better.”

  Vero’s whole body unclenches, her head relaxing into Ligaya’s

  pillow. He should be sorry. It was his idea. Have sex with a woman!

  He’d practically begged her. Girls gone wild. Everyone’s doing it. But

  just as quickly, Vero’s relief is gone, the blame back in her own lap.

  Shane is not a puppeteer. Vero is not made of socks and buttons. The

  momentary reprieve of relief is swallowed by regret—What was she

  thinking? And then, as quickly as Vero feels regret, anger shoves it

  off: She is a grown woman. She can take responsibility for her own

  actions. How dare Shane try to take that from her?

  Even her emotions are fickle and unstable.

  “You have nothing to be sorry for.” Vero throws on the lights,

  wishes them off again as soon as she sees Ligaya, her back pressed

  into the cold outside wall.

  Ligaya’s eyes are wide and unblinking, her body so still she could

  be dead but for the subtle move of the golden cross at the dip of her

  throat, rising and falling with each timid breath. Ligaya’s vulnerability

  reminds Vero of her own nakedness. She wants to grab the blanket to

  cover herself, but that would leave Ligaya exposed.

  Vero has to get out of here, can look at neither of them. She grabs

  her clothes from the floor and strides for the stairs, anger fuelling her

  movements. She dons this anger like a shield, taking the steps two at

  a time, and then three. She pulls her sweatshirt over her head as she

  runs.

  Shane follows.

  Neither of them says a thing to Ligaya as they leave, the bedroom

  door wide open behind them.

  ◊◊◊

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  Ligaya squeezes her eyes shut. If she does not open them—if she

  refuses—this day will never start. She cannot turn time back, but

  maybe, with an act of sheer will, she can stop it from moving forward.

  She cannot imagine what’s on the other side of this chasm. Even in

  the Philippines, on the bus, a full-day plane ride in front of her, she

  could at least imagine the other side.

  Finally, she slides her legs over the edge of her single bed. She is

  naked. Ligaya never sleeps naked. She pulls the sheet tightly around

  her body and holds her head in her hands.

  Of course, the faces she sees are the ones she least wants to come to

  her now. Nanay. Tatay. Pedro. Uncle Andres.

  Well, fuck them.

  It is Vero’s word. A word that is everywhere here in North America,

  no ruder than shoot or darn. But the word has never passed Ligaya’s

  lips before. She forces it out now, needs to.

  “Fuck them. Fuck them. Fuck them.” The words mean nothing to

  her. They release none of her frustration and despair. She tries again in

  a harsher, louder voice, not caring who hears her. “Putang ina! ”

  She hears the hysteria in her voice. For the first time since her

  arrival, she is truly angry. Her family has sent her to this new place

  with its new rules. They are not here, and she will not let them judge

  her from that old place by the old rules. Rules they didn’t follow

  anyway. Not in dark private rooms. Putang ina.

  She says it again and pounds her hand into the wall. The room is

  too small, the ceiling too low. She wants to rip the screen from the

  window, force her head and shoulders out into the cool morning air.

  There is a low hum in her body. Shame. She recognizes that.

  But she recognizes something else too. Underneath the shame.

  Satisfaction. Satiation.

  She was thirsty, and she drank.

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  A woman needs to drink.

  She thinks this thought again—if she repeats it, says it over and

  over, maybe she can feel its calm, its inevitability. She can be resolute.

  I was thirsty, I drank.

  But her breathing is too fast. The faster she breathes, the less air

  she has. She gets down on her knees. One hand against her chest, she

  feels its shallow rise and fall; her other hand pulls the box of pictures

  from her bottom drawer. She will summon her home, her former self,

  her other life. The palm trees out back, the tilapia swimming through

  the living room in the monsoon, the chickens fluttering up to the

  roof.

  We survive, her father had said, the family table filled with chicken

  and rice. But that—the chicken, the fish, the children eating
rice with

  their hands—that was life. That was living. This—this room in some-

  one else’s basement, these people she must face today in “the land of

  opportunity”— this is survival.

  She fumbles through her box of memories, the faces a blur through

  her tears. She rips the picture of Pedro. Rips him in half and then in

  half again, and then in half again. Tears him until he is tiny bits, and

  then she does the same with her mother. Then her father. Tears them

  all. Lets the minuscule bits of them fall to the floor. Only Nene and

  Totoy she saves, taping them up carefully at the head of her bed.

  She dresses with precision this morning. A long formal black skirt.

  A white flowing blouse. She has not yet worn these clothes in her

  new home. They are not practical, not for taking care of children, but

  today the children will not be her focus. She looks at herself in the

  square mirror propped at a slant on top of her dresser. With her but-

  tons done up to her neck, she looks like she is ready for church in the

  Philippines or in Hong Kong. She undoes two of the buttons. Today,

  she will wear makeup—not like she and Cheska wear it on weekends,

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  pasted on and deliberately playful, childlike. Today, Ligaya will apply

  the makeup with the subtle hand of a grown woman getting ready for

  work, for a business meeting in an office building. A high tower on a

  busy street that speaks of wealth and success and opportunity. A city

  in the movies. There is no such street here in Sprucedale.

  ◊◊◊

  It is nearly lunch by the time Ligaya works up the courage to face

  Shane. He has been holed up in his gah-raj-mahal all morning. That

  is not the place Ligaya would choose to speak with him. But she has

  made herself sick with worrying about this conversation that needs

  to happen.

  Ligaya opens the door and steps through. She pauses up in the

  mezzanine, remembering the first time she saw this space. She’d

  imagined it as a party hall in her home town, Pedro leaning over

  the railing from up here in the mezzanine, watching her dance in

  the space below. Ligaya barely recognizes herself in the woman who

  had that fantasy. She takes a deep breath and forces herself down the

  stairs.

  Shane is surprised to see her. She sees it in the rise of his white eye-

  brows, so high they disappear beneath the fringe of his hair. It is not

  the good kind of surprise. He has the look Pedro wore when Ligaya

  first told him she was with child, with Nene.

  I am not ready for this.

  Shane has the face of a street cat about to be clutched around its

  tiny waist. The panic in his eyes is at odds with the calm in his voice.

  “Hello, LiLi. Come in.”

  Ligaya cannot tell what he has been doing out here. Working on

  his bikes, she supposes. The green one is upside down and he spins the

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  tire, watches it go around and around. When he finally turns his eyes

  to her, they cannot find a place to rest. Eventually, he chooses a spot

  over her right shoulder. Maybe he catches a glimpse of her right ear.

  She supposes this is how she has looked at him over the past year. It

  is annoying, she can see that now. She forces herself to meet his eyes.

  To try to catch them with her own.

  Be brave, my girl. For some reason, this is her father’s voice that

  comes to her now. Be brave.

  “Shane,” Ligaya’s heart pounds so forcefully against her breast bone

  she is sure Shane can see it—the fast punching from the inside. She

  wants to hold her hand over the spot, hide her fear from him. “I want

  to meet with you and Vero today. A family meeting. Today.” Ligaya

  fears that she sounds too forceful, like Pedro in a bad temper, growl-

  ing at Totoy for some misstep. “Please,” she adds.

  Shane does not seem surprised by her assertion. Ligaya wonders

  what she had expected, what she had feared. He simply looks back to

  his bike and spins the tire. The click, click, click of the free wheel fills the

  silence in the massive room. When the clicking slows, Shane speaks

  without turning to her. “Yes. We do need that. Good idea.”

  There’s nothing for Ligaya to do now but turn and walk up the

  stairs to the mezzanine where she can go back into the house and

  leave Shane to his bicycles. But at the top of the stairs, she stops with

  a hand on the door knob. She speaks down over the mezzanine rail-

  ing. “We will have this meeting at three o’clock then. In your office.”

  There.

  Now Ligaya goes, holding her hand over the hard thudding

  beneath her breastbone.

  ◊◊◊

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  When Vero steps into the garage, she assumes Shane has gone away

  again. She’s hoping to spend some time crouched amongst the bikes

  in this cool space where Ligaya never comes, but she realizes her mis-

  take as soon as she steps down the stairs from the mezzanine into a

  cloud of heavy, sweet smoke. Shane’s there. His elbows rest on his

  bike-maintenance stand, his posture stooped. His shoulders slouch

  forward like he hasn’t the strength to hold them up. His chest col-

  lapses in on itself. Like FrenchMan.

  Shane has removed the picture of Vero that he had taped above

  his bike bench after their trip. He’d scrawled My Pin-Up Girl under

  the photo of her dressed in her Jamaica clothes, standing confidently,

  hands on hips, shoulders thrust back. He has replaced Vero’s photo

  with a picture of Lance Armstrong leaning into his handlebars,

  expression fierce. Unity is strength, knowledge is power, and attitude is

  everything is written in black block capitals against a lemon-yellow

  background.

  “Family meeting,” Shane says without turning around. He’s hold-

  ing his breath, keeping that marijuana in his lungs as long as he can.

  Vero waits for him to exhale loudly and watches his shoulders folding

  in further with the release of breath. “In my office in fifteen.”

  “Okay.” It’s all Vero can say.

  “Vero.” Shane does not turn around, does not unfold his shoul-

  ders. “I was going to say sorry. For disappearing. Before I came home

  and…Before everything. I get tired too.”

  “I know,” she says softly, to the back of his head. It is not enough—

  this I know—it’s nothing of what she feels, of what she needs to say,

  but she hasn’t yet found a place to start.

  When Vero goes up the stairs and opens the door to the house,

  Shane stops her again with his words. “It’s not because of you I took

  your picture down. It’s the rest of it. Hedonism. The clothes, the…”

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  Without waiting for him to finish, Vero closes the door gently

  behind her.

  ◊◊◊

  Vero assumes Shane has called this meeting, but when she steps into

  the offi
ce, nobody sits behind his desk. His chair is pulled out in

  front of the desk and Ligaya perches there, stiff and awkward, freshly

  painted nails gripping the leather arms. She’s not in the loose cotton

  clothes she wears to care for the children, but has dressed in a long

  skirt and a white, pressed blouse. She’s lined her eyes and wears a hint

  of blusher. Vero looks away, tries to ignore the stirring in her own

  body, the tingling energy that could be desire or shame. Or both.

  Shane perches on the windowsill in the nook, his arms across his

  chest. A reluctant child. Vero settles on the edge of the rocking chair

  next to him without meeting his eyes.

  Post-married.

  She must swallow her laughter. Vero has brought them all here,

  with her flirtation with madness. How could she not have known this

  would happen?

  Or not this exactly. But something like it.

  Someone needs to apologize today. Someone needs to forgive.

  Someone needs to express gratitude. I am sorry. I forgive you. Please.

  Thank you. You’re welcome. These words all fall short. To utter any of

  them now would diminish the situation. Vero holds her breath and

  counts to ten. Shane and Ligaya watch her, matching expressions of

  alarm and impatience. It is a child’s trick. She parts her lips, sipping

  at the air.

  “Where are Eliot and Jamal?” She has to say something. It’s all she

  can think of.

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  “Vince and Adele have them. Through the weekend. I figured we

  needed the time.”

  “Excellent. Drunkle Vinny can teach them how to bong beer.”

  “And you’re in a position to judge? You want to talk about fit and

  unfit caregivers?” Anger distorts Shane’s voice. He sounds like he

  has a wet dishcloth lodged in his throat. Vero attempts to work up

  some anger of her own, but Shane speaks again, too soon, his words

  clear. “I’m sorry.”

  Let’s just start over. It’s what Eliot would say. Vero wishes such a

  simple sentiment could work for her. For all of them.

  “I can forget this.” Ligaya interrupts them, her voice filled with

  calmness and patience, her features soft and stern at the same time,

  a combination Vero has seen her use on the children. “I forget very

  many things.” Ligaya’s smile is so sad that Vero must look away,

  again. “Forgetting is what I do. For now.”