by Ani Katz
Do you want us to read your cards, baby girl? Kit asked brightly, brandishing the old battered box with the evil eye. We haven’t done them since last spring.
Ava looked up and nodded, relieved.
It’s good to do it at least twice a year, Deedee said. Helps keep your clarity.
I wish your mommy would let us read hers, Kit sighed, passing the deck to Ava. She hasn’t wanted to in years.
Why not? Ava asked, taking the cards in her small hands, trying to rearrange them.
I walked away before I could hear my sisters’ response. I didn’t want to listen to any more of their made-up stories.
* * *
—
The faucet in the upstairs bathroom had been leaking for a long time. A rusty comet of a blemish marked the ceramic bowl of the sink, the track corroded by the inexorable drip of hard water. I thought I could probably repair the leak myself, but I knew it would be impossible to find a wrench without turning the house upside down. I’d have to come back and do it another day.
They still counted on me to fix everything in this house. The sheer scope of the upkeep could be overwhelming at times, but I tried to limit myself to small acts of restoration—things that absolutely needed to be done, or things that would be noticed and appreciated. It was a comfort to think of my mother and sisters living securely in a house that I maintained. I took care of them, and I always would.
I wandered around the rest of the upstairs, checking on what else needed to be done. Burned-out bulbs in the hallways, a broken window sash in the twins’ room. I noticed they had pushed their beds together, their restless bodies imprinted in the disheveled sheets. I tried not to think about what kind of unnatural games they played in there at night.
Though parts of the mural had faded and chipped away over the years, the remains of Evie the angel still languished on the wall, looking down on me with blank eyes.
There was an unmistakable, rainy forest smell of decaying wood throughout the top floor. The walls must have been rotting, their ruin still hidden behind the brocade wallpaper. When I opened the door to the spare room I could hear scrabblings in the eaves, the sounds of some creature trying to get out.
Downstairs, her tarot reading over, Ava was swaddled in an afghan on the living room couch, her heavy-lidded eyes fixed on the television, staring at the screen with a look of ennui—my cold and jaded Princess Turandot.
It had been a long and tiring day for her. I would take her home soon.
I found my sisters at the kitchen table, both of them bowed over a magazine spread of an actress and her newborn, their cheeks nearly touching, Deedee massaging the back of Kit’s neck as Kit traced lopsided circles on Deedee’s knee with her forefinger. They’d been talking quietly, but they fell silent and moved away from each other when I entered the room. It felt as though they were holding their breath.
Why are you telling her this stuff? I asked.
They looked up at me, their eyes wide and guileless.
What stuff?
Why are you lying to her?
Lying?
All that stuff about you wanting to leave home.
We’re not lying, Thomas.
You never wanted to leave home, I insisted. And you certainly never said anything to me about it. Never.
Yeah we did, Kit said. You just don’t remember.
Or you don’t want to remember, Deedee added.
You think I’m going to trust your version over mine? Just because you wish you’d done things differently doesn’t mean things actually happened that way. And you have no right to blame anything on me.
Well it doesn’t matter now, does it? Kit snapped. It’s just water under the fucking bridge, isn’t it?
I have no idea what you’re talking about, I said.
Just say we’re crazy, Deedee sneered. Just say it. We know that’s what you’re thinking. You’ve always thought it.
Their brains had been addled by years of isolation and junk, their memories distorted by their disappointment. They were just like Evie, telling lie upon lie to make things sound better than they really were. Even worse, for some reason they had cast me as the villain in their fabricated drama. In their minds, I was the older brother who had refused to help, when in fact all I had ever done was provide for them and do everything in my power to give them a better life. How could they not see that?
I just give you money, that’s all, I said, hurt by their ingratitude. A quarter of each paycheck, out the window. All for you.
A quarter? Deedee sighed. Please, Thomas. It barely covers what we need.
You think it’s easy? I said. You think the money just magically appears in my account? I work for a living. That’s money for my wife and daughter.
Such a martyr, Kit said. We see you’re really suffering.
Yeah, is that a twenty-fifteen Mercedes? Deedee asked, rolling her eyes. How embarrassing for you.
Stop it.
If we didn’t clean and babysit for the Cohens we probably wouldn’t be able to keep the lights on.
They were being cruel now, taking out their misery on me, strafing me with it.
I’m taking my daughter home, and I don’t have to bring her back here again.
You wouldn’t do that.
Watch me. I’ll do whatever I have to do.
But Ava wasn’t in the living room anymore. I searched the house for her, calling her name—not urgently, not anxiously, just calling for her. On the second floor I saw that the door to my mother’s room was ajar, a stripe of late-afternoon sun leaking through the narrow gap, etching a path of light on the worn oriental rug. I knocked softly.
Come in, someone whispered.
Ava sat balanced on the foot of the bed, her sneakered feet dangling. My mother lay on her back, the blank mask of her face nestled in her heap of mismatched pillows, her thin and sinewy arms rigid at her sides. The medication helped with the tremors, but it couldn’t hide the fact that she’d become a dry and quivering husk of herself—a mumbling, shuffling wraith, forever in danger of falling.
It’s late, I said. We have to go home.
My mother’s lips moved, and Ava bent to listen to her silent words.
She wants us to stay a little longer.
I nodded and sat down in the old wingback chair wedged in the corner. My mother closed her eyes, and we listened to her breathe, the sound both hard and weak. I picked up a section of the Times and began to page through it, my eyes skimming over last week’s movie reviews.
Suddenly my mother’s breathing changed, an abrupt pause in the labored in and out. She opened her eyes and looked at Ava, whispered something else I couldn’t hear.
No, it’s okay, Ava said. We don’t mind.
My mother nodded and dozed again. I exchanged a look with Ava, sharing a sad half smile. Other children would have been frightened to be around someone so sick, but her grandmother’s illness never bothered her. She was too good, too loving to be afraid.
And that was why I could never actually follow through on my empty threats to my sisters—after all that my mother had suffered, I could never keep her one and only grandchild away from her.
We sat there for a while longer, until finally I nodded to Ava and we left my mother to sleep undisturbed.
* * *
—
Driving home on the parkway, Ava nodding off beside me, I listened to the end of a story on NPR about growth-attenuation therapy for severely disabled children.
Unable to care for themselves, entirely dependent on their parents, these children would only become more of a burden as their bodies grew and developed. As they aged, it would become harder to hold them, harder to move them. And so these children were given doses of estrogen to close their growth plates, hysterectomies to sterilize them. Their breast buds were removed and their puberty was halted. Their p
arents would be left with a smaller, more manageable child—a child who would stay a child forever.
She’s going to be a baby for all her life, one mother said, unrepentant. I need to be able to hold her for all of mine.
I’m just trying my best, she added.
Her voice faded into the trills of dueling marimbas, the story subsumed by an interlude of African jazz. Then the news: another stabbing at a train station in Paris, wildfires in the Pacific Northwest, late-season hurricanes pummeling the Gulf Coast, sixty-year sentences for inauguration protestors, the settlement of a lawsuit over cancer-causing weed killer.
I changed the station and was pleased and relieved to find myself wandering the haunting, atonal landscape of Alban Berg’s Lulu with the German soprano Marlis Petersen (a two-decade veteran of the title role, she was rightfully considered the essential Lulu—there would never again be another like her). The star-crossed, despoiled heroine had just escaped from prison; I listened as we climbed through the groves of our neighborhood, the houses growing larger with each gentle bend and hill, sun flashing through the gaps in the yellowing oaks. I glanced over at my daughter and watched for a moment as the shadows from the overhanging trees shifted over her placid face, as Lulu interrupted her lover’s heartfelt serenade to ask if this was the sofa where his father had bled to death at her hand.
It wasn’t until I pulled into our driveway and saw Miriam’s car that I remembered our phones had been off all day.
* * *
—
Don’t get upset, I said.
Miriam was pacing around the kitchen, her knuckles pressed to her mouth as she tried to stifle her sobs. Ava was in her room. I had wanted to talk to my wife about our daughter’s digital indiscretions, but she refused to calm down and listen to me.
I had no idea where you were! she kept crying. I couldn’t reach either of you for hours!
I know, I know, I’m sorry, I sighed. I already said I was sorry. Why are you being so hysterical?
We were supposed to be there in time for dinner. And now the traffic—we’ll never—
Look, just calm down, I said. I’ll call Josh and Sadie and tell them something came up. We’ll leave first thing in the morning. It’s not a big deal! Can you just calm down?
You can’t do things like this!
Things like what?
You can’t just take our daughter places and not tell me! When I finally called the school and they told me you’d picked her up I just—I just—
You didn’t just assume that she was safe with me?
I didn’t know what to think!
I can’t believe you, I said. I can’t believe what you’re saying.
They told me there had been an incident, that she had done something online.
Yes, we have to talk about it, I said. I have everything saved to show you. But you need to calm down first.
No, I want you to tell me now! Show me now!
We can’t do anything until you calm down.
She was hunched over the sink now, bracing herself against the counter with both hands, trying to catch her breath.
I’m going to order dinner, I said. Chinese okay with you?
She didn’t answer. Her back to me, she stared out the window at the fading patches of light in the backyard grass, into the dark wall of pines that shielded us from our neighbors. I could see that the psoriasis on the nape of her neck had gotten worse, raw red scales spreading like blight over the knots of her spine.
Chinese it is, I said.
* * *
—
After dinner and an hour of television—some continuing saga about a family of rich girls shopping and crying in Morocco—we put Ava to bed. Miriam went in first; I heard her moving around the room, putting things away, speaking to our daughter in French, which she did very rarely. She knew I didn’t like being left out of the conversation like that.
Then it was my turn to enter the dimly lit periwinkle cove of Ava’s room, her cozy shrine to girlhood. She was safe in there, surrounded by her pindot wallpaper, her black-and-white prints of cobblestoned Parisian alleys, her glow-in-the-dark constellation stickers, her bookshelves crowded with framed family photographs and miniature ceramic kittens and the small army of her soccer trophies—little golden kickers, frozen mid-stride, their ponytails like flags flying behind them. She was sitting up in her narrow bed, her small hands hidden in the folds of her white comforter, her menagerie of stuffed animals huddled at her feet.
Is Mommy mad at me?
No, she’s not mad at you.
She’s upset though.
What do you mean? I asked, a catch in my voice. What did she say?
Ava ignored me for a moment, pitching forward to gather up a stuffed black lamb she had always been partial to.
I don’t know, she said, hugging the lamb by its neck. She didn’t really say anything—I can just tell she’s upset.
She’s fine, I said, bending to kiss my daughter’s forehead. Don’t worry about her.
When I came back downstairs Miriam was sitting at the kitchen island looking at my laptop screen, her face wet with tears. She didn’t look up. I poured myself a few fingers of scotch and leaned against the counter, watching my wife cringe as she enlarged each image.
So, you see.
She was silent.
You see this kind of thing can’t continue.
She sighed heavily, resting her chin in her hand.
Then what do we do? she asked finally.
No internet, I said. We take away her laptop and phone. She’s lost those privileges.
No internet at all?
None.
But she needs it for school, Miriam said. For research.
She’ll use one of our computers, and we’ll monitor it.
For how long?
I shrugged.
Until we can trust her again.
I just think—I mean—
What?
I know this is bad, she said. But I wonder if there’s anything else we can do. You know, talk to her about things.
Talk to her? You think this is a problem that can be solved by talking?
She must be acting out like this for a reason, Miriam said. Girls start going through so much when they’re this age—it can be very hard for them. Don’t you want to understand why she would do something like this?
No, not particularly, I said. I just want it to stop.
If all we do is punish her, the only thing she’ll learn from this experience is that she can’t trust us.
I don’t fucking care what she learns! Don’t you want her to be safe? She can’t learn anything if she’s been abducted by some predator who comes to collect his child prostitute!
Thomas, stop.
What?
You’re being irrational.
I’m being irrational? I am? I’m surprised you don’t seem to care about our daughter’s safety. Our eleven-year-old daughter!
I just think we should talk to her.
I already talked to her. There’s nothing else to talk about, I said. End of story.
Thomas—
I said end of story!
She stared at me for a long beat, panting slightly—at first I thought she was gathering her strength for another assault, but as the seconds passed I realized she was merely exhausted from her exertions. Surrendering.
Fine, she said at last. Story over.
I know this is for the best, I said. We’re making the right choice.
I thought you said end of story! she jeered at me with sudden venom. Why are you writing an epilogue?
Oh, fuck off, I said, throwing up my hands.
I went out for a walk. Our neighborhood was quiet at night, not a trace of human activity in its winding avenues and ample lawns, just the fitful sounds of the breez
e and the long chirps of late-season crickets. I missed the old sodium streetlights, the way they warmed your path, the way their jaundiced halos bloomed in the canopies of the trees. The new blue LED bulbs made the streets look like a film set, blasting corners with a harsh, disinfectant glare.
I walked down the middle of the road. I could see inside some of my neighbors’ houses, their windows glowing in the darkness like dioramas of model homes: a teenage girl and her father washing dishes, a trio of children eating ice cream at a kitchen counter, a husband and wife side by side on a long sofa, light from a television flickering on their faces.
The events of the day weighed heavily on me. It had hurt me to see Miriam so upset; it seemed I could go nowhere and do nothing without my best intentions being ignored or misinterpreted, the women in my family chafing against my efforts to protect and provide for them.
Was I wrong? Was I being myopic, reactionary?
Miriam was also a provider. She gave us love and emotional support, and brought order to the household. Our family certainly wouldn’t function without her.
Then again, the girls couldn’t survive without me. Sure, I could be one of those parents who approached the dangers of growing up with a sense of nuance. I could do as Dr. Hanover had said and always begin by listening. I could be permissive like my sisters, wistfully romanticizing life’s potential. I could allow my daughter to make and learn from her own mistakes.
But none of it would matter at all if I couldn’t protect her.
As often happened in times of stress, my thoughts drifted to work. The AiOn account was important, prestigious; securing it would be an enormous accomplishment. The brand had a long and illustrious history of innovative, iconic ads; their campaigns were always models of aesthetic clarity and emotional storytelling. They’d specifically asked our agency to develop a pitch for their new smartphone campaign because they admired our other work; the creative brief generated by our account manager had emphasized that AiOn wanted a powerful, moving story about what it means to be connected in today’s world.
As I walked on I began to sense the genesis of a new idea the way I usually did, visualizing moments like film clips in my mind, the vivid beginnings of a story. I saw husbands and wives, parents and children, brief but evocative scenes cohering around crucial questions and universal concerns. What does it mean to be in touch? Why do we need to be connected? Moment by moment, I could see the pitch beginning to take shape. It would be poignant and compelling, a story suited to the realities of the present. People would talk about it for years.