Then I fell down onto my knees in front of the toilet and just waited, feeling my face get hot. But then, after all that, nothing seemed to happen. It was like the evil I’d swallowed decided to stay inside and kill me.
She turned off the water and looked around from behind the shower curtain, so I could see just her head. She was holding the curtain to cover the rest of her, and it was a nice solid curtain that you couldn’t see through, so there was nothing weird or indecent about the situation.
“Something you ate?” she asked me.
“I don’t know. I’m sorry. It just sort of came over me. I’ll get back out with the baby in a minute.”
I couldn’t believe I’d left Etta alone, even for a second, even just in the next room, after everything I went through trying to get Brooke to go take a shower and let me look after her. I mean, it was like pulling teeth trying to get her to just go into the bathroom and shut herself in and trust me for a split second.
She tossed her head in the direction of the open bathroom door, so I looked there. The baby was standing in the doorway, holding the edge of the door to steady herself, and giving me this look like she was worried about me.
“I’m okay, Etta,” I said. “I just got to feeling a little sick.”
“Sick?” she asked.
And her face was so sad with hurting for me, and her voice was so sweet and soft, I just fell in love with her all over again. I remember thinking how lucky I was that I ever got to see her again after that terrible night. I really hadn’t seen any of this coming. I mean, who would?
I just froze there on my knees for a while with everybody staring at me. Well, both of them, which is only two—I’m not sure if that qualifies as an everybody or not. I was really aware of how I felt, not even in terms of my belly, but more that I was clean, and my hair was brushed, and I was wearing the brand-new jeans and sweatshirt Brooke had bought me the night before, and I felt like a real person. But I don’t mean that like I thought I hadn’t been a real person before. I’m not quite sure how to explain what I mean. I guess I mean I felt like I could go anywhere and meet anybody and they wouldn’t look at me funny, and they would treat me like a real person just like everybody else.
And while I was noticing all that I also started noticing that I probably wasn’t going to throw up. I wasn’t exactly feeling great down there, but it seemed like the moment had passed.
“Sorry,” I said, and got up off my knees. “False alarm, I guess.”
The baby looked super relieved and Brooke turned the water on and went back to taking her shower, and I left the bathroom and closed the door to give her some privacy.
Like I would have all along if I’d figured I had any choice about the thing.
When you’re going from LA to Utah, where I used to live, it’s mostly California and Nevada all the way through. But then there’s this one little tiny piece of Arizona. It’s just a little corner, and when you get to Mesquite you know you’re about to hit it, and then you better not blink, because it’s going to be over fast. I mean, not literally, because really it might be thirty or forty miles, but I’m just saying it’s not much when you think about how you’re driving through a whole state. And then you’re about to cross the state line into Utah, right at that southwest corner, and the very first city that comes up is St. George, and that’s where I grew up, and that’s where my parents still lived.
And that’s where we were going.
So we passed through Mesquite and I started to feel sick to my stomach again, because I knew we were really close to there, and that’s when I think it dawned on me that it wasn’t about something I ate.
“Could you pull over?” I asked. “I think I might need to throw up again.”
Except it wasn’t a very good way to describe the thing, because I hadn’t thrown up before, but I guess I was trying to say I felt like I needed to again.
We were on the I-15, which is a pretty big highway, and people go really fast on it. The speed limit is 70, but then people go even faster than that. There was a pretty good, pretty wide shoulder, but I guess it was only for emergencies, so I was waiting to see if she would think this was emergency enough.
“Sick?” Etta asked from the back seat.
I was riding up front with Brooke because I was all nervous and frazzled and I didn’t want the baby to pick it up from me.
“A little,” I said to her.
And while Etta and I were talking about that, Brooke pulled over onto the shoulder.
I opened the door of that crazy half-yellow car and just sat there, sideways, my feet out and resting on the dirt, leaning forward. But nothing happened. But I still sat there for a long time, hearing and feeling the cars and trucks race past us. They made this sort of sucking wind that pulled our parked car over and kind of rocked it as it settled back again.
Finally I gave up and put my legs back in and closed the door. I shook my head at Brooke and she drove on. I liked her in that moment, because I thought she was going to dredge it all up in words and go into how I was probably just sick from stress, but she didn’t. She kept her mouth shut and left me alone, and, let me tell you, that’s a good quality in a person.
We crossed the state line into Arizona, and then I opened my mouth and said something that I’d had no idea I was about to say. I think it was because I was starting to trust her more, but I can’t say so for a fact. I just know I surprised myself with this next thing that came out of me.
“There was a girl,” I said.
I sat for what felt like a long time, feeling my face burn hot and watching Arizona rush by the window, and she didn’t say anything. I thought it was weird that she didn’t say anything, like she was pretending she never heard me, but looking back I think she was just waiting to see if I wanted to say any more on my own.
Just when I thought the whole thing would drop forever and she would never admit she’d heard me, she all of a sudden said, “Okay. And . . .”
“I’m telling you my long story,” I said.
“Ah,” she said. “Got it.”
“She was just sort of . . . she was different about it. About . . . you know . . . things. I just wanted to be who we were and I didn’t figure it was anybody’s business but ours, but she wasn’t like that. She was into this whole ‘living out loud’ thing. She wanted to be out and proud and right in everybody’s face and I was too ashamed to tell her that my parents were the way they were. I knew it would be bad when I told them. I actually didn’t know it would be that bad. I mean, it’s weird looking back, but the whole getting thrown out onto the street thing really never occurred to me, and now I don’t know why not. It actually occurred to me that they might have somebody kidnap me and take me to one of those conversion camps, but I never thought of this. But I knew it was a terrible, terrible idea to tell them. But . . . you know how it is when you love somebody. Right? I mean, I don’t know you very well, but I’m guessing you do because I figure just about everybody does. But then, I don’t really know all that much, or all that many people, so I don’t know why I’m talking about it like I’m some big expert or something.”
We drove in silence for another few seconds, and again I think maybe she was just giving me the space to say more if I wanted to. I stole a look over at her face and it looked kind of soft, and also like I’d made her really sad with what I said.
“Yeah,” she said. “I know how it is when you love somebody.”
We drove without talking for another minute. I felt pretty done, talking-wise. Hell, I was mostly surprised I’d even said that much.
“Why did you leave Utah?” she asked me after a bit.
“Well, Bodhi wanted to go to LA, and there was winter coming on, and it gets pretty cold where we were. I mean, not like winter winter like where it snows, but it gets down around freezing at night.”
“I guess I meant . . .” But then she trailed off and I thought she’d never tell me what she meant. “I’m just surprised you left if you had someone th
ere.”
“Oh, no,” I said. “I didn’t have her. She dropped me right away after that whole mess came down the way it did.”
“Oh,” she said. “That’s . . .”
I could tell she had an opinion on the situation but she wasn’t quite sure how to say it in a nice way, so I did it for her.
“I know,” I said. “It sucks. It was really bad. She didn’t turn out to be anything like who I thought she was. I thought she loved me, but I was just being really stupid. I look back and I can’t believe how stupid I was being.”
Some of the feelings around that whole thing tried to come up, but I was careful not to let them. You can’t just let them have their way, those kinds of feelings, because they knock you down and then they’re in control, and it’s all over and you might never get up again. You have to be strong and keep them back behind the wall where they belong.
“What was her name?” she asked me.
I was really surprised that she would ask me that, because I had no idea why she would want to know. I guess she was trying to understand the whole thing, or she wanted it to feel more real to her, but I figured she would’ve wanted exactly the opposite.
“Gail,” I said.
It burned coming out. It made my face burn and my arms and legs tingle and my throat get tight, like I was trying to keep it from getting out into the world. I wished I hadn’t said it at all. You can’t just let those feelings have their way.
“First love tends to be a disaster,” she said.
“Really? I thought it was just me.”
“Definitely not just you.”
We didn’t talk for a few miles, and I knew the Utah state line was coming up pretty soon, and it made me feel all queasy again. I made up my mind that I wouldn’t ask her to stop this time. I just kept my finger on the power button for the window, so I could get it down really fast if I all of a sudden needed to.
“Okay,” she said, and it made me jump. I wasn’t expecting anything in the way of words. “You told me your long story. So I guess I might as well tell you mine. My husband was dead set against having kids.”
“Oh,” I said. I thought about it for a minute, and then I added, “That’s really not a very long story.”
“Right,” she said. “It’s not. I know.”
“Well, long or short, you told it, anyway.”
I thought she was done, but then she started up again.
“I should have looked it right in the eye. Asked for a divorce so I could move on to a marriage with someone who wanted what I wanted. Or even so I could have children on my own, like I more or less ended up doing anyway. I shouldn’t have stayed and stayed and stayed and somehow convinced myself that something would change. Looking back, any fool could see that nothing would ever change. But you know how it is when you love somebody.”
I could feel myself smile a little when she said that, and wow, I really hadn’t seen any smiles coming.
“I really do know how that is,” I said.
“I just thought you might want to know that you’re not the only person who looks back and thinks they were very stupid about love. I just thought it might do you some good to know that.”
“Thanks,” I said. “It totally does.”
It totally did—I wasn’t just saying that. And it was the second time it had happened to me. That lady cop had been nice enough to tell me that grown-ups mess up and make mistakes just like me, and now Brooke was nice enough to say it, too. When you hear something a couple of different times in a couple of different places, you start thinking there must be something to it.
“What was his name?” I asked her.
“Why?”
“I don’t know. Why did you ask me my person’s name?”
She never exactly answered that one. She just said, “David. His name was David.”
“That’s a nice name.”
“I used to think so, too. Now I just get a little sick to my stomach every time I hear it.”
“Oh,” I said. “So you know exactly how I feel.”
But the funny thing was, after that I took my finger off the power button for the window, because I wasn’t feeling so queasy anymore.
I felt like it was nice that she was talking to me and I really didn’t want her to stop, so I started asking questions that I thought maybe I shouldn’t ask. But I did anyway, maybe because I was a little nervous. I tend to talk when I get nervous.
“So why did you move in with your mother? Since your mother is so . . . you know . . .”
She sighed, but I didn’t really get a feeling like she minded my asking. More like thinking about the whole thing just made her sigh.
“I guess I figured I didn’t have any other choice.”
“You didn’t have friends?”
“Well . . . once upon a time I did, of course. But I just sort of . . . After I got married I stopped paying attention to those friendships. I guess part of me didn’t realize how much you can’t just stop taking care of them and expect them to keep being there. I guess I made the mistake of letting David fill all those roles after we got married. And then, after I had Etta, I let Etta be my whole world. And when I left David, I started paying the price for it. I thought about asking my friend Caroline if I could stay with her. She was somebody I’d known since high school. But I felt guilty about ignoring her. And . . . I don’t know. In the end I just couldn’t bring myself to ask.”
I watched the scenery go by for a minute, even though it wasn’t much to look at.
Then I asked her, “Why is she so terrible?”
“Caroline’s not terrible.”
“No. Your mother.”
“Oh. A lot of ways, I guess. She’s loud and controlling, and she just criticizes everything I—”
“No, that’s how. That’s how she’s terrible. I wanted to know why.”
That just sat there in the car for a minute, and it was weird, because I could sort of almost literally feel it sitting there. I guess it was a thing she didn’t know quite what to do with.
“How would I know?” she said at last. “Why is anybody the way they are?”
“You’ve known her all your life.”
“And she’s been this way as long as I’ve known her.”
“You don’t know anything about how her life was when she was growing up?”
I could see her hands flexing and relaxing on the steering wheel. Flexing and letting go. So I guess the conversation was making her a little uneasy.
“I do and I don’t,” she said. Her voice sounded kind of tight and squashed, like somebody was sitting on it. “To hear her tell it, her childhood was all just fine. But I knew my grandparents, and it couldn’t possibly have been. They were terrible, terrible people. Angry and critical and abusive. Really bad.”
“So being a terrible person sort of . . . runs in the family.”
That was the first time I thought I saw her get mad at anything I was saying.
“And what is that supposed to mean?”
“I didn’t mean it like . . . I didn’t mean you were terrible. Not at all. I guess I just meant, like . . . now you know what your big job is in life. It’s like life has given you this huge challenge to make sure that what was running in your family stops with you and doesn’t go on any more than it has. You know. Like, to Etta.”
She never said anything back to that. After that we were just quiet for a really long time. But I felt like I could see her thinking about it.
“I’m starting to think this was a really bad idea,” I said.
We were pulling into St. George, and the red rock hills all around the town looked so weirdly familiar to me. Part of me had missed them like crazy, just for their actual beauty, but another part of me had them all mixed up with every bad thing that had ever happened to me here, which was pretty much my whole entire life. The good news was, I wasn’t feeling queasy anymore, but the bad news was how I was halfway into a full-on panic attack.
“We drove all this way,” s
he said. “You’re honestly not suggesting we go back without my even talking to her. Are you?”
“I don’t know,” I said, and I closed my eyes so I wouldn’t see those red rock hills. “I don’t know what I’m suggesting.”
“You don’t have to go to the door. Like I said.”
“But I’ll be right outside in the car, and what if she sees me there? She told me never to come back, ever, and what if she calls the police on me or something?”
“She can’t call the police on you for sitting in a car at the curb.”
“Why can’t she?”
“Because it’s not her property.”
“Oh. Okay. Get off at this exit.”
It wasn’t okay, nothing was okay, but I had to take a break from talking about how okay everything wasn’t, so I could tell her where to get off the interstate.
“You want to be somewhere else while I talk to her?”
“Yes, please,” I said, and actually started to breathe again. Not that I hadn’t been breathing—I mean, enough to keep me alive and all—but when she said that, I started breathing in enough air to break up the panic a little.
“The library?”
“Maybe the coffee place,” I said.
“But first we have to go by the house so you can show me where it is.”
“Couldn’t I just draw you a little map or something?”
“I’d really appreciate it if you would go by with me and point out the house. It’s going to be hard enough to go up and knock on a stranger’s door without worrying that it’ll be the wrong house and the wrong stranger.”
“Okay,” I said. “Fine. But you can see it from the end of the block, so just promise you won’t take me very close.”
She pulled up into a loading zone in front of the coffee place and I got scared again. Because it was really near my house and my school, and everybody I knew showed up here pretty much every day, and I wasn’t sure why I picked the place or how I thought I could get in or get out without running into everybody I knew.
But I didn’t figure I had a right to say all that, because I had picked the place, and after I’d pointed out the house she’d been nice enough to drive me somewhere that wasn’t right where my mom could see me from the front door.
Brave Girl, Quiet Girl: A Novel Page 19