by Karen Dionne
“That’s not what I’m talking about,” Peter says, and my heart sinks. I know exactly what he’s thinking. It’s all I’ve been thinking about, too. Whenever there’s trouble, it seems as though our daughter is always at the center.
“Diana says she was watching television all afternoon.”
“And you believe her?”
I can’t answer. I want to believe, but our daughter lies so easily, so convincingly. After the paramedics took over and I went into the house—ostensibly to change out of my dripping clothes, but more important, to change my daughter’s—and I asked her how she got so wet, Diana claimed that she had been playing swimming pool with her Barbies in her bathroom. But when I looked in, expecting to find a pile of wet towels and water all over the floor, the tub and sink were dry.
“Mommy? Daddy? Are you going to tuck me in bed?”
We turn around at the same time. Diana is standing at the top of the stairs, all blue eyes and chubby cheeks and golden curls, wearing a pair of Disney princess pajamas that are far too small for her, but are the only pair she’ll put on without a fight. A sick feeling washes over me. After today, how can I look at my daughter the same way again?
“Your turn,” Peter says.
I’m pretty sure it’s not, but I don’t have it in me to argue. Diana’s nighttime routine is exhausting. We try to make a game out of placing the water glass on her nightstand just so and filling it with precisely the right amount, and tucking the bedcovers around her tight, but not too tight, and reading her favorite bedtime story three times in its entirety even though we all know this particular fairy tale by heart. The last thing I want to do is play her game tonight.
I disentangle myself from the sofa. Diana doesn’t smile when she sees me coming toward her, doesn’t run down the stairs to meet me or hold out her arms in anticipation of a kiss or a hug as I imagine other children do. All she does is stand at the top with her arms folded across her chest and wait for me to come to her.
As I start up the stairs to go to my daughter, suddenly, I am afraid.
FIVE
I got what I wanted.
Peter, Diana, and I are driving north on I-75 at this very moment on our way to our new wilderness home. I don’t even want to think about the amount of work it took to get us to this point: convincing his grandparents to let us live at the lodge year-round, finding a therapist for Diana within a hundred miles of our new home who had room for her in his schedule, renting the house, boxing up our household goods and putting them into storage, loading the U-Haul we’re pulling with our clothes and books and toys and other can’t-do-withouts—all in a little over a month. I should be ecstatic that we’re on the road at last. Instead, I’m exhausted.
It doesn’t help that Peter has barely spoken since we pulled out of the driveway. I know he’s upset. “One more step down the ladder,” he joked grimly when he tossed the university’s termination letter on our dining room table and walked away. We both knew there was only the slightest possibility that they would keep him on after he put in a request for a sabbatical and canceled his classes. But seeing their decision in black and white must have stung. I know he’ll forget all about it once he gets caught up in his research and realizes how much he’s missed working in the field. I just wish he knew it, too.
Diana has been passed out behind us in the middle seat practically since we left, thanks to an old prescription for sedatives I found when I was cleaning out the medicine cabinet. I have another dose with me in case I need it after she wakes up. I realize that drugging my child in exchange for a few hours of peace and quiet probably makes me seem like a terrible parent. But Diana is so easily bored, and boredom for her inevitably leads to rage; I guarantee the best outcome for all of us would be if she slept the entire nine hours. Maybe if we made this drive more than once a year, she’d be a better traveler. We skipped Christmas the year she was born because no parent in their right mind would bring a six-week-old baby to a remote wilderness cabin. We also missed the Christmas Diana was six because she’d been suspended for biting one of her classmates and we were trying withholding a reward to get her to modify her behavior. It didn’t work.
Neither have any of the other methods we’ve tried. We’ve read all the books: The Defiant Child, Parenting the Strong-Willed Child, Raising Your Spirited Child—all promoting different parenting strategies that seem to work just long enough to get our hopes up before everything goes back to the way it was. I keep telling Peter that we need to accept our daughter for who she is, and that whatever idealized version he’s carrying in his head of what he thinks a little girl should be is not our reality. Diana was never a sapling that could be shaped and bent; she was born a tree, roots planted firmly in the earth, thick trunk, sturdy branches. Intractable, immovable. Asking her to change would be like asking a rock to get up and walk. Her therapist thinks Diana has some form of antisocial personality disorder because of her out-of-control rages and her complete lack of remorse. But what eight-year-old isn’t impulsive and self-centered? I have to believe that things will get better as she gets older. Meanwhile, I am not going to let anyone slap a label on my daughter that will define her for the rest of her life.
“We should stop for gas before we cross the Bridge,” I whisper as quietly as I can after we pass a sign that says we will arrive at the Mackinac Bridge in thirty miles. There’s no need to specify which bridge I’m talking about; everyone in Michigan calls the Mackinac Bridge “the Bridge,” as if the state had only one, and no wonder: the five-mile-long suspension bridge that connects Michigan’s Upper and Lower Peninsulas is truly spectacular, even more impressive than the Golden Gate, arching two hundred feet above the Straits of Mackinac, the longest two-tower suspension bridge in the Western Hemisphere. “Diana will be upset if she misses it. And I could really use a bathroom.”
“Whatever you want.”
I bite back a sigh. This has been essentially the sum total of our conversation for the entire drive. “Where would you like to stop for lunch?” “Wherever you want.” “Would you like me to take a turn driving?” “Whatever you want.” “Okay if I turn on the radio?” “Whatever you want.” I never would have guessed that Peter could turn so passive-aggressive. I’ll admit, I may have pushed too hard for this move. (A man convinced against his will is of the same opinion still, my mother used to say.) But it’s not my fault a child died in our swimming pool. I just can’t stay in a place where my family is vulnerable. The police ruled the Yang boy’s death an accident, and it looks as though we’re not going to be charged, but Peter’s lawyer friend says we’re balanced on a knife edge. Anything untoward, even something as minor as a traffic ticket, could lead them to reopen the investigation. As long as that possibility is hanging over us, hiding out at a hunting lodge in the middle of four thousand wilderness acres sounds just about perfect to me.
Diana stirs at the sound of our voices. She blinks herself awake and pushes against her seatbelt as though it were a straitjacket.
“Hi there, sleepyhead,” I say. “Did you have a good nap?”
“I haveta go potty.”
“There’s a rest area up ahead.” Peter points to a big blue highway sign in the distance.
“I haveta go now.” Diana gets that look that warns she’s about to explode.
“Maybe we should pull over,” I suggest.
“She can wait,” Peter says firmly, clearly determined to be the adult in the room, though I notice he’s pressing harder on the gas pedal. “Two minutes, tops.”
I unbuckle my seatbelt and twist around to reach between the seats and pat her knee. There was a time when we thought our daughter might be autistic, but the fact that she can tolerate being touched ruled that out.
“Just a little longer, sweetheart. We’re almost there.”
To my surprise, Diana stops struggling and relaxes. I give it a few more seconds, then sit back and refasten my seatbelt and sha
re a score-one-for-the-parents look with Peter. Moments later I hear the sound of trickling water.
“Oh, Diana, honey. What did you do?”
“Did she?”
“She did.”
“Oh my God. I can’t believe you let her do that.”
“I let her? I let her? You’re the one who wouldn’t pull over.”
“I wasn’t about to have my eight-year-old daughter dropping her pants in plain sight of the highway. She’s not a toddler.”
I choke back my retort and dig through the snack cooler for napkins and paper towels to soak up the mess. Diana smiles smugly, as if she knew her actions would provoke an argument and Peter and I are doing exactly as she wanted. Not for the first time, I wonder how our daughter has managed to wrest control of our family. I have no doubt that she wet herself deliberately to punish us, but for what? Making her endure a long car ride so we can bring her to a place where she can be happy?
We ride in silence. Peter pulls into the rest area and parks. I get out and slide open the rear passenger door. The back seat reeks. Urine darkens her jeans. The seat is soaked, as is the carpet on the floor.
I hand the towels to Peter. “Wait here with Daddy,” I tell Diana as I go around to the back of the U-Haul to look for a change of clothes. “Don’t move.”
Of course, she takes off like a shot, running up the sidewalk toward the bathrooms without an ounce of shame over the fact that her entire rear end is sopping wet.
“Diana! Get back here!” Peter shouts.
“Wait for Mommy!” I call.
She stops in the middle of the path and cocks her head, then spreads her arms wide and twirls, a butterfly in a sky full of unicorns and rainbows. A grandmother walking toward her car grins at Diana’s obvious delight, then notices Diana’s backside and smiles ruefully in sympathy. I shrug my shoulders and force a smile in return; two mothers commiserating over the trials and tribulations of raising children. As if there could be anything remotely charming about an eight-year-old who deliberately wet herself.
Peter strides toward our daughter, truly angry. I grab the first items of clothing I can find and hurry after him. Neither Peter nor I have ever hit our daughter and I don’t expect him to now, but if any of the dozen people watching our little drama decide that we are being in the least way abusive, it wouldn’t take much for someone to call the police.
“It’s okay,” I hiss when I catch up to him. I put my hand on his arm. “People are watching. Just let me get her cleaned up and we can get out of here.”
He takes a deep breath, then looks down at me and shakes off my hand. “Whatever you want.”
He turns and heads for the bathrooms. I take Diana by the hand and follow. It’s all I can do not to cry. I feel like I’m being punished for something I didn’t do. All I want is to get Diana away from the people who don’t understand her, so that no one can hurt her, and so she can’t hurt them. Later, when she is older and has settled down and has hopefully grown a conscience, we can go back to civilization if Peter wants to. For now, I am absolutely convinced that our self-imposed exile is the right thing to do. A wild child living in the woods. What could be more appropriate?
* * *
—
It’s dark when we finally arrive. At least, I think we’re nearly there. It’s hard to tell for sure because there’s no sign marking the turnoff from the highway. Not even a mailbox. Peter’s great-grandfather’s secret Shangri-La is difficult to access in the summer, almost impossible in the winter; a four-mile drive down a narrow dirt road cut through a gap in the cliffs the only way in or out. We thought we got an early enough start this morning that we would arrive while it was still light out, but thanks to Diana’s multiple demands for bathroom breaks during the second half of the trip, which we knew were most likely faked, but which after her earlier stunt we didn’t dare deny, here we are. In hindsight, I should have given her that second dose of sedative when we stopped for supper, but after the near disaster at the rest area, I just didn’t have the heart to travel any farther down the bad-parenting road.
Peter has been driving slower than I could walk for the past ten minutes trying to spot the turnoff. It’s maddening to have to go this slow when we know we’re so close. But after fourteen hours on the road, the last thing we want to do is drive past it.
“Is that it?” I point to what looks like it could be an opening in the brush fifty or so feet ahead. Or it could be a rock, or a shadow. We’ve made this mistake twice already.
“Maybe.” Peter swings wide into the opposite lane so he can angle the minivan’s headlights toward where I’m pointing. The first time he did this, I was sure that an unsuspecting driver was going to appear over a hilltop in front of us or come up on us from behind and smash into us. Then I realized that at one o’clock in the morning on this remote stretch of county road there is exactly zero traffic.
“Are we there yet?” Diana asks for perhaps the hundredth time.
“Almost,” I respond as I have for the other ninety-nine. “Do you see anything?” I ask Peter.
“Nothing.”
He pulls back into the right-hand lane and keeps going. I rub the condensation from my window with my shirtsleeve, then roll down the window and squint into the darkness. A wall of trees slides past in an unbroken line. It’s hard to believe that somewhere in this dense climax forest of pine and mixed hardwoods is our new home. All we have to do is find it.
“This is it,” Peter says at last, and I can hear the relief in his voice. “I’m sure of it. I recognize that big white pine. The access road is just past it.”
Sure enough, when he pulls into the opposite lane and angles the headlights one more time, two faint tracks lead from the highway up and over a small rise. Anyone who didn’t know better would think this was just another anonymous logging road, and a barely used road at that. No one would have any idea that anything of any consequence waits at the end. Which I suppose is the point.
“We’re here!” I announce excitedly for Diana’s benefit, then laugh when all three of us heave a simultaneous sigh.
Peter jockeys the trailer around until we are exactly perpendicular to the highway. “Ready?”
I check to see that Diana hasn’t unbuckled herself again, then grip the edge of my seat. “Ready. Hold on!” I call over my shoulder.
Peter guns the engine and the minivan leaps forward. We hit the shoulder in a spray of gravel. The hill isn’t terribly tall, but it’s steep, the ruts deep and sandy, the hump in the middle covered with dried grasses that scrape against the undercarriage as we plow forward.
Halfway up, we lose momentum. The tires spin. Peter hunches over the steering wheel as if willpower alone could keep us moving. I can’t help leaning forward as well. Even Diana rocks back and forth.
“Make her stop!” Peter barks.
“Diana! Sit still! Daddy’s trying to drive.”
We slow even more. It’s so dark, with no point of reference I honestly can’t tell if we’re still moving. If we get stuck, if the trailer pulls us backward and we slew sideways and end up in the ditch, there’s no way we’re getting out without a tow. Assuming we can flag down one of the nonexistent cars traversing the highway and convince the imaginary driver to help us.
And then, miraculously, the road levels out and we crest the top. A few moments later the trailer does as well. Just as I am about to congratulate my husband on his most excellent off-road driving skills, the trees swallow us up and we careen blindly down the other side.
“Slow down!” I can’t help yelling, though Peter is already jamming on the brakes as the trailer pushes us faster and faster down the hill. The minivan slams into an unseen pothole and bottoms out. Branches scrape the sides and lash my face. Quickly, I roll up my window.
When we come to a stop at the bottom, I have no idea if we’re on the road at all. Peter peels his fingers from the
steering wheel and takes a deep breath. His hands are shaking. So are mine.
“Again!” Diana squeals. “Do it again!”
We can only shake our heads. Clearly, our daughter’s utter fearlessness and oversized sense of adventure are going to serve her well here. More than ever, I am convinced that moving to the lodge is the right thing to do. I’ve been calling this move “Our Grand Adventure” ever since our plan was conceived, which Diana thinks is funny and Peter thinks is overblown, but this really is going to be an adventure. Our friends think we’re crazy to leave the comforts of civilization and move to a remote wilderness cabin. But conditions aren’t going to be nearly as challenging as everyone seems to think. While it’s true there’s no phone line at the lodge, we can drive out to the highway and on to the nearest pay phone when we need to make a call. And we won’t be entirely without electricity; we’ll generate our own twice a day, morning and evening, just as Peter’s family does at Christmas, which means we can cook on a regular stove and use a refrigerator and washer and dryer. We’ll also have running water and indoor toilets thanks to the gravity-feed water tower and the pumphouse by the lake. And while for all practical purposes we won’t have central heat—I know from personal experience that in the dead of winter, the ancient oil-fired furnace in the basement can’t begin to compete with the size of the rooms—we can layer on extra clothes and use kerosene space heaters as needed.