“How could you?” she wailed, sending sparks up my spine.
“Leave it alone, Ma,” Daryl said, walking behind the kitchen bar and rummaging in the cabinet underneath.
“But you promised me. You promised.” I watched as her face caved in and rage was replaced with despair. She began to sob and her shoulders shook as she cried into her hands.
“Stop it, Ma.” He was still rattling around in the cabinet. I looked over at Lavi, who was staring down at the counter twisting a french fry between her fingers. Lavi’s mother whimpered and suddenly Daryl snapped up from his crouched position. “Did you hear what I said, Ma? I said stop it!”
He pounded his fist onto the counter; it landed on a packet of ketchup and the thick, red sauce sprayed all over the white kitchen cabinets. The loud splat it made when it hit echoed through the room and I watched as the thickest part oozed down, leaving behind a pink watery trail. Lavi startled me by reaching for my wrist. She led me to the sliding glass doors and pushed me out. “Go home, Matilda,” she whispered.
I pictured her in that house. I could hear the shrieks coming from inside and then I promised myself that someday, I would do exactly as she said I would find Franny, and I would go home.
But thinking about home made me sad. My favorite places to cry were in the shower or in the dark, but because my mother spent a lot of time in the bathroom, I started sneaking out at night to sit on the back porch. Even though the dark terrified me, I enjoyed the freedom I felt when I wasn’t surrounded by walls, so I sat in the white chair with a flashlight in my hand and I cried.
I missed Franny.
I missed watching her listen to the sound cereal made when it mixed with milk and the way she would spell in her head without realizing that her lips were moving and giving all her secrets away. I thought about her toothbrush sitting in its cup and I wondered if she remembered to make her bed and then I thought about the way her face must have looked when she realized she was alone. I wrote her letters every week, but I didn’t say much. Mostly I wrote so she wouldn’t forget me. Maybe I wrote so she would forgive me. I sat in the white plastic chair with my arms crossed and tucked into my armpits, hoping the rhythm of the crickets would distract me from all of it.
The chill in the air felt good and the sky was clear with stars pulsing above me like millions of blinking white Christmas lights. Then I heard the sound of the sliding glass door opening on the other side of the porch. I twisted my wrist into a shard of moonlight and read my watch. 2:30 a.m. Who would be up on Lavi’s side of the porch at this time of night? I heard the muted sound of ice cubes hitting each other. Whoever it was sat at the edge of the porch and then I saw shoes: army boots going halfway up the shin with laces spilling out on either side. I was pretty certain he didn’t realize I was there, and for a moment I contemplated sneaking back inside. But I didn’t. Instead, I stood up and crossed to his side so that I faced him directly.
If he was startled, he didn’t let on. He acted as if it was completely normal to see me in the pitchblack hours of the morning and looked up and grinned. “Hello, Mytilda.” He drew out the “a” in my name, making it sound like I was his possession.
“Hey, Daryl.” I wrapped the blanket tighter around myself.
The light was on in the living room and it streamed onto the porch, making the setting feel unnatural, as if it was a scene from a play. He held the glass in his hand and swirled it around, amused by the ice cubes chasing each other. “Do you like milk?”
“No.”
“I like it with lots of ice cubes. I like it so cold that it hurts when it goes down.” He continued to swirl the glass and stared into it as if it were about to reveal some deep hidden truth. “You and Lavi have become pretty good buddies.”
I didn’t want to sit beside him so I leaned up against the divider.
“She tells me it’s just you and your mom. So where’s your dad?” He drew himself away from his glass and turned to look at me.
“I don’t have a dad. It’s just me and my mom.”
“Your mom’s a real looker. Can’t imagine why it is she couldn’t keep your dad around.” He snickered.
I felt my cheeks turn red. I wanted to ask where his father was. Why it was that I heard screams coming from his house. I wanted to tell him that he didn’t scare me. I wanted to take that glass and smash it into his face. But I said nothing.
“Matilda, what are you doing out here at this time of night? Get inside right now.”
My mother was standing behind me with her hands on her hips. She wore a silk lavender robe that tied at her waist and stopped above her knees. When she tilted her head, a piece of hair fell in a perfect wave against her check. Her face still held the sweetness of sleep and the softness took me by surprise.
Daryl seemed to be enjoying himself because suddenly his eyes were open wide and he licked his mouth. His lower lip hung down like a fat pink worm. “Hey there, Miss Wolley.”
She looked down at him and I recognized her expression. It was the one she got when someone tried to cut her off on line at the bank. “From now on, if you want to speak with my daughter you can do so at a more reasonable hour.”
She waved at him. Maybe he thought she was waving goodbye. To me it looked like she was shooing at a gnat that was annoying her. He waved back and smiled.
She took me by the elbow and led me back to our side of the porch. She didn’t let go until we were safely inside and then pulled me towards her and whispered in my ear. Her words came out in soft little puffs that made the hairs on the back of my neck stand up.
“Stay. Away. From. That. Boy.”
I went upstairs and got into bed. I fell asleep quickly that night, and the last thought I remembered having was that maybe Daryl wasn’t that bad after all.
In fact, maybe, he was absolutely perfect.
We didn’t speak much after that night. Maybe she felt badly about it or maybe she was just tired of making macaroni and cheese—or cooking for two, in general. Whatever the reason, when she came home from work a few days later, she insisted that we dress up and go out for a nice dinner.
I wore a black t-shirt and jeans with a hole in the knee, chosen specifically because I knew it was an outfit she hated. I waited outside while she got ready, amusing myself by staring into the bark of an enormous oak tree. It was only when I got close enough that I realized it was crawling with angry and determined black ants. From a distance, it looked like any other tree.
She finally came outside smelling of peaches and looking like a flamenco dancer with her hair smoothed and tied behind her neck. We got into the car and drove in silence but I could tell she was distracted, as if she wasn’t seeing the road ahead. I stuck my finger into the hole in my pants and wiggled it around.
The restaurant was at the top of a hill and it felt like we were driving through a mountain of trees to get there. For a second, I wondered if maybe she had actually picked a place I might like—but then I got a better look. It was a steak house with its name burned in big black letters across the entrance. It was supposed to look like a log cabin, but instead of real wood, the logs were plastic. Inside, strands of white Christmas lights weaved around two fake Ficus trees, the leaves of which were covered in dust. All it did was remind me of the stars in the sky and how much I would have rather been outside and alone. We were seated at a table beside the only redeeming aspect of the restaurant—a working fireplace crackling and spitting orange sparks that drowned out the country music seeping from the speakers embedded in the wooden paneled walls. She looked over the menu, nodding her head every few minutes.
The waitress came over. She wore a light brown suede skirt with beaded fringe that dangled above her knee and clinked together every time she moved. Pinned to her chest was a big cowboy hat that read DEBI.
“What can I get you ladies?”
“I’ll have the Pioneer Prime Rib and a large Bug Juice.”
She scribbled in her note pad and I wondered if she thought the names of the meals were as s
tupid as I did. They both turned to me.
“I’ll just have a burger, thanks,” I said and flipped closed the menu.
“One Pioneer Prime and one Bronco Billy coming right up.” She took our menus and walked away, tugging down her skirt and waving to the bartender as she passed.
“I know things have been hard for you, Matilda, but let’s try and have a nice night, okay?”
I was about to tell her how hard things had been for me. I was about to tell her that I hated what she had done and I hated where we lived and I hated steak houses. I felt it all well up inside me, but then suddenly we were interrupted.
“Terrrryyyy!” a male voice crooned. He walked to our table and put his hand on my mother’s shoulder. The other he kept in his pocket to jingle his keys.
She smiled warmly. “Hello, Professor Royal.”
“Terry, I had no idea that you would be here tonight.”
So now she was Terry. Never in my memory had anyone called my mother Terry.
“Yes, I remembered your recommendation and thought I would bring my daughter.” She motioned across the table to me.
A woman suddenly materialized beside him and extended her hand. “Let me introduce myself. Mrs. Dorothy Royal. Nice to meet you.” The spidery veins looked terribly familiar.
“Nice to meet you, too, Mrs. Royal.” My mother shook the tips of her fingers. Professor Royal folded both hands behind his back, which made his belly jut out and hit the side of our table.
“Hello, Matilda,” Mrs. Royal said.
“You know my daughter?” my mother asked.
“Yes, she came into my shop a few weeks ago with her friend.”
A memory I would have preferred to forget.
“I haven’t seen you since, Matilda. Please know you are always welcome.”
She dipped the spectacles on her nose in my direction and for a second I thought that maybe she could see me sinking deeper into my seat. Or worse—she had xray vision and knew exactly where the little box of purple stationery was hidden.
“She mentioned your shop. It sounds lovely. We will have to come together some time.” She raised her glass to the Royals and I watched as the bug juice came dangerously close to spilling.
“Have a wonderful evening, Terry,” Professor Royal said as he led Mrs. Royal to their table.
Debi came over with our meals. I piled as much of the fixings onto my hamburger as I could; when I finished, I could barely fit the sandwich into my mouth. My mother held her fork in her hand daintily, as though it were a feather. A slice of onion slipped out from the bun and slapped on to the table loudly. She looked up, but didn’t say a word. I couldn’t help myself. “So now you’re Terry?”
She smiled and shook her head. “He’s just someone I work with, Matilda.”
“I see that, Mom. I just didn’t know that now you are Terry. It would be nice if you let me in on these kinds of things every once in a while.” A pickle escaped from my hamburger and I finally put it back on the plate and gave up on the possibility of being able to eat the monstrosity I had created.
She was quiet for a few minutes. “Matilda, I have and always will take care of you. And that is all you need to know.” Then she sliced into a piece of steak that was so rare, it almost looked blue.
“What about Franny? Do you always take care of her, too?”
The sound of her knife as it scraped against the plate screeched in my ear.
“C’mon, Terry. Did it just get too hard? Is that why you left her behind like a pair of old shoes?”
She stared down at her plate and for a second it looked as if she closed her eyes. “You don’t understand,” she whispered.
“I’m pretty sure I do.” I pushed my seat away from the table and stood by the coat rack, waiting for her to finish and pay the bill. I wished I had the courage to walk all the way home in the black night air, but I didn’t really know where I was so I waited as she ate every last bite on her plate. For a moment, as we drove home, the silhouette of her face against the dark night looked soft and I wanted to say something to fix it, but just as I was about to speak, her lips pursed and her knuckles hardened around the steering wheel and I realized that I had just run headfirst into another one of my mother’s very well kept secrets.
Therese
Therese fumbled with the key.
She could hear the television and then the loud crashing sound of metal, which was followed by a ringing noise. She imagined the object that had fallen was spinning on the floor, growing slower, sloppier, and quieter with every rotation. When she finally pushed the door open, she found Tim on his knees collecting popcorn that had landed like shrapnel all over the living room floor. Therese put her bags down and joined him, but he would not look at her, instead whispering quietly that he had told his mother about the baby. It was the sound of apology in his voice that made her cringe.
Barbara was standing now, her arm raised and pointed at Therese, “Don’t think it ends here.” She stormed into her bedroom, her weight sloshing back and forth from the force of her exit. Therese looked back at Tim. The red marks on his face were in the perfect shape of a hand. She reached out, but he pushed her away so she left him alone.
Barbara kept to herself for days, and the house felt different without her at its center. Therese and Tim developed a routine. Every night she sat on the kitchen counter, legs dangling, while he did the dishes. She liked watching him cook and was amazed that he never used a recipe; he made up the steps as he went along, mixing ground meat and adding water and breadcrumbs until it reached the consistency he liked. His big hands became delicate as they rolled perfectly round little meatballs the size of golf balls. The house smelled of onions and tomatoes and basil and sometimes she would forget that it wasn’t just the two of them.
She tried to help him clean up afterward, but when she joined him his movements became awkward. So she left him to his chores and returned to the counter to watch. Sometimes he brought her fresh fruit from the store, which she ate while he cleaned.
“How long have you been cooking?” Her teeth slid across the shiny skin of her apple and then embedded into the white flesh.
“As long as I can remember. It’s never been something my mother was good at and it comes pretty easily to me.”
A stray fork fell to the bottom of the sink, creating the sharp tinny noise of metal on metal.
“You are good to her.”
“She’s given up everything for me. It’s the least I can do.”
Therese crunched loudly into her fruit. “Has it always been just the two of you? Where’s your dad?”
“We don’t talk about him.” Suddenly he spun around and pointed a soapy finger in her direction. “I mean it, Therese. Don’t go sticking your nose where it doesn’t belong! You leave Mama out of this. Don’t start asking her all your questions.”
“Okay, okay!” she shouted, lifting her hands into the air as though he had just pulled a gun on her. He turned back to the sink and shifted his focus back to washing the dishes. She stood to leave, the mangled remains of her apple lying brown and limp on the kitchen counter.
He hadn’t told her very much about his mother, but she was good at sensing things, and her instincts told her that whatever was between them was heavily unbalanced. There were no pictures of Tim as a child; in fact, she had yet to see evidence that he had even been one. Sometimes at night while he slept, she could hear him murmur, but when she touched him he would pull away.
His secrets consumed her.
The next day at work, she was so busy thinking about Tim and his mother that when the shock came, it took her by surprise. Its intensity ripped down her arms, forcing her to knock over the cup of pens she kept on her desk. She shifted onto the edge of her seat, stretched out her legs, and tried to kick the pens that had fallen closer with her foot. When that failed, she got down on her knees and crawled underneath the desk to use her fingers to search along the floor. She was so involved she didn’t realize someone was standing
in front of her desk waiting for her to reemerge.
It was intriguing to experience someone from the feet up. The edge of the desk cut off her view so that she could only see the woman below the knees. Therese edged in closer, examining the uneven hem of the woman’s skirt. The material was a long, billowing silk that seemed to float as though a breeze was coming up from the planks of the floor. The shoes were pink with pale ribbon laced up the ankle. “Are you okay under there?” The sound of the voice matched the gracefulness of the feet.
Therese pushed back and emerged from beneath the desk.
Was she real? Therese shook off a compelling desire to touch her.
“Therese, can you get Professor Dugan the C12 forms? Human Resources asked her to fill them out,” said Maryann, the secretary seated behind her.
Therese moved carefully and began looking for the papers, never completely turning her back, fearing the woman would disappear. Her hair looked like it should have been on a doll’s head instead of a person with curls of yellow satin ribbon too perfect to be real.
It took longer than it should have to locate the papers, partially because she could not take her eyes off their visitor. When she finally handed them over, she gave in to her curiosity and used her other hand to tug hard on a tendril that looked especially flawless.
“Ouch!” Professor Dugan shouted, rubbing her scalp with the pad of her thumb.
“Sorry. Just making sure you’re real.”
“Maybe next time you could ask?” Professor Dugan continued to rub the back of her neck, but this time she smiled.
“There is just something about you . . .”
The woman was silent.
“We’re going to be good friends,” Therese said as mild sparks danced up and down her forearms.
“We are?”
“Yes,” nodded Therese, finally certain of herself. “Very good friends.”
The woman’s eyes lit up. “Then you should probably know my name. It’s Leah. Leah Dugan.” She turned to leave and as she did, she winked and waved her pen in the air as if it were a magic wand.
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