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How to Love

Page 25

by Katie Cotugno


  “What happened?” she asked once, around lunchtime. I shrugged into the pillows on the bed.

  I felt better by dinner, thought of calling him, decided against it.

  I sat awake in bed till the sun came up.

  *

  The morning after that, I got sick again. Then a day of nothing.

  Then again the day after that.

  (That was when I started to freak.)

  *

  I drove all the way to a Walgreens in Pompano Beach to buy a pregnancy test, went over to Shelby’s to take it. I curled my arms around my knees on the carpet-covered lid of the toilet. Shelby sat cross-legged on the floor.

  “Just look at it for me, okay?” I told her, watching the second hand creep along the face of my watch—slowly, slowly. I couldn’t get over the notion that this absolutely could not be happening to me. I almost wasn’t even nervous, that’s how sure I was that it wasn’t real. We’d been careful, hadn’t we? I’d made sure we were careful. “Just … look.”

  “I’m looking,” she said, peering at the stick and frowning. She was wearing denim cutoffs and a T-shirt with the Mario Bros. on it. “But it’s not—it’s not doing anything yet.”

  “How is it not doing anything?” I demanded, leaning forward to grab it out of her hand. “It’s got to be—”

  Shelby pulled it back, looked more closely; she glanced again at the picture on the back of the box. “Reena,” she said then, and she looked so sorry. I closed my eyes so I wouldn’t have to see.

  47

  After

  There are complications following my father’s surgery, bleeding that requires a second operation. We spend a week’s worth of days and nights in that waiting room, Cade and Soledad and I, taking shifts, going home for showers, making dinners out of Diet Coke and Fritos from the vending machines. Shelby’s mom leaves casseroles on our doorstep. Lydia brings changes of clothes. Hannah comes down with a summer cold that keeps us up nights and turns me, for all intents and purposes, into an extra from a movie about the zombie apocalypse; Sawyer turns up at the hospital to take her off my hands for twenty-four hours, hands me a Tupperware container full of risotto I can tell he’s made himself.

  “I owed you dinner,” he tells me, hitching the baby up on his hip.

  “You owe me more than dinner,” I tell him, but there’s no real heat behind it. I grab his free hand, squeeze a little in spite of myself. “Thanks.”

  Sawyer smiles. “You’re welcome.”

  We don’t talk much, my family. Cade paces. I read magazines. Soledad prays. She’s stopped eating almost entirely; I think of Jesus in the desert, fighting his demons for forty days.

  “About the thing,” she says suddenly, one night when I come to relieve her. She’s watching Leno with heavy-lidded eyes. “I shouldn’t have said that to you. I shouldn’t have told you to think. I know you think.”

  “It’s fine.” I shrug. “It doesn’t matter.”

  “It does, though.”

  “Yeah,” I say eventually. “I guess it does.” I hold up a bag of takeout and think of how Cade and I used to beat the crap out of each other as kids and then move on a minute later as soon as something more important came up, like nothing had even happened. Maybe that’s just how families work. “I brought you food. Drive-thru was the only place open.”

  “Thanks, sweetheart.” She sighs. “Sawyer has the baby?”

  “Mm-hmm.”

  “He doesn’t do a bad job with her,” she says. “I have to hand him that.”

  I think of Seattle, of rainy woods and coffee on cloudy mornings. I think of the desert and hot, arid air. I think of the middle of this country, the endless rolling green of it, and I want so badly, badly, badly to get out of this place.

  “Yeah,” I tell her. “You really do.”

  *

  On the way home the next morning, I stop by Target and pick up a road atlas of the continental United States.

  Just to see.

  *

  Hannah and I are splitting a PBJ in the kitchen when the bell rings—not once, but five or six times in a row, incessant. I pad barefoot through the living room with the baby on my hip and fling it open: There’s Shelby on the other side of the door, wearing a Ms. Pac-Man T-shirt and a scowl, holding a big glass tray of marbled brownies. “I made these,” she says curtly, thrusting them at me. “Eat them or don’t.”

  I reach my free hand out like a reflex, barely catching the tray before it crashes to the tiles. With everything that’s been going on around here, our paths haven’t crossed in a couple of weeks. “Thanks,” I tell her, a little shocked; then, trying for a smile: “Did you poison them?”

  Shelby’s eyes narrow. “I should have,” she huffs. She squares her shoulders, muscles past me into the house. “I told you I wasn’t going to be shitty as long as you weren’t shitty,” she announces, flouncing onto the couch. “Well, you were shitty. But I’m gonna be cool.”

  I blink, not totally understanding, resting the tray of brownies on top of the TV. “Really?”

  “Yes, really.” She still looks annoyed, but she holds her arms out for the baby, waits for me to hand her over and cuddles her in the crook of her freckly arm. Hannah babbles her giddy pleasure—she loves Shelby, always has. Shelby traces her thumb over Hannah’s downy ear. “I feel like maybe you haven’t had a whole lot of breaks. So I’m giving you one.”

  Right away I feel a lump rise up in my throat. My hands flutter sort of helplessly at my sides. “You always give me breaks,” I manage, voice cracking a little bit—and I don’t deserve her, I don’t, somebody as fierce as Shelby to help me fight my wars. “You’re my best friend.”

  Shelby cocks her head to the side, wrinkles up the edges of her mouth like maybe she’s worried I’m going to get her started, too. “Oh, stop it,” she orders gruffly, but then: “You’re my best friend, too.”

  Well, that does it. I’m crying for real when I sit down on the sofa, everything so painfully close to the surface all the time. “I’m sorry,” I tell her, almost too far gone to get the words out. “I didn’t mean to mess with your brother. I didn’t mean to screw everything up.”

  Shelby slides an arm around my shoulders so she’s holding me and Hannah both. “I know,” she tells me, her ginger temple bumping softly against mine. “I’m sorry, too. I should have come over here right away, when your dad got sick. That was really shitty of me.”

  “I thought you were going to hate me forever,” I tell her, and realize that it’s true: I thought for sure our friendship had gone the way of mine and Allie’s, that I’d lost her for good and would never be able to find a way back. I’m so hugely relieved that she’s here.

  Shelby smiles. “I could never hate you, dummy,” she tells me. “I love you too much for that.” She sighs a little, squeezes. Waits for me to quiet down. “Shh, Reena. You’re okay.” She says it again a minute later, just quiet: “You’re okay,” she promises softly, and there’s something in her voice to make me believe.

  48

  Before

  I sat on the floor of Shelby’s bathroom for a long time, forehead on the edge of the tub, not talking. The porcelain felt cold and clean against my skin. Shelby leaned her back on the door, cross-legged and patient, dragging the edge of the cardboard box beneath her nail. I could hear her mother moving around in the kitchen, making dinner and singing along to the radio, the sound of life spinning on.

  I was pregnant.

  Me.

  “Jesus Christ, Shelby,” I finally whispered, bracing my hands on the tub and looking up. My head, as I lifted it, felt heavy enough to snap off my neck entirely. I wished for a swamp to swallow me. I wished for my mom. “What am I going to do?”

  I had to tell Soledad.

  I had to tell my father.

  I had to tell—

  Oh God.

  I splashed some water on my face and drove south down 95, toward Sawyer and the crumbling stucco house. It was past twilight, palm trees silhouetted gra
y and graceful against the darkening sky. I sped. I sped a lot, actually, and also I was crying again, and when I made the left turn onto Powerline Road I came within centimeters of smashing into a canary-yellow pickup truck and very nearly killed myself.

  I very nearly killed myself and my kid.

  The blaring horn faded in the distance and I pulled over as soon as I could, two hands shaking on the wheel. I thought of Allie and near misses, wondered why on earth things happen the way they do. I missed her more than I ever had, if that was possible. My breath came in crazy gulping sobs.

  “Congratulations,” I said suddenly, talking to her like she was sitting in the passenger seat beside me, feet up on the dashboard and singing along to the radio, her head thrown back to laugh loud and hard. I’d never done that before, not in all the months she’d been gone. “You were right. I couldn’t handle it. I can’t handle it, and it just—it would have been great of you to stick the hell around and help me out.”

  Cars whizzed by on the avenue. Allie didn’t reply.

  Finally I pulled it together enough to make it the rest of the way to Sawyer’s, gliding silently up to the curb across the street. I shut off the engine and got out, flip-flops sinking into the dry, brittle grass. The remains of two broken beer bottles were scattered on the pavement, green and sharp.

  I had a long stare at the low, sprawling house: It looked worse than I’d remembered, dirty aluminum awnings over the windows and a weird rusty stain creeping up the exterior near the door. A random orange traffic cone sat overturned on the lawn. I’d thought it was some exotic clubhouse, romantically shabby. Now it just looked bleak.

  The windows were dark but Sawyer’s Jeep was in the driveway, and I was talking myself into crossing and ringing the bell when the front door opened and there he was: slouching and feline, angry and sad. I hardly even recognized his face. He’d lost a startling amount of weight, I realized. I hadn’t noticed that before. His shoulders jutted oddly beneath his T-shirt, fiberglass or shale.

  Actually, I thought as I stood there: They looked sort of oddly like wings.

  He didn’t see me. He wasn’t looking. He was holding a backpack, some ridiculous old camping number I happened to know was his father’s, because my father had one, too. They’d bought them together when they were teenagers, back when they used to do things like camp.

  Sawyer crossed the lawn, threw the pack in the backseat of his Jeep and slid into the driver’s seat. I stood there and watched him, struck dumb. I didn’t know where he was going. I didn’t know how long he’d be gone. I waited as the engine turned over, loud and cranky—Reena in the background, watching as usual. The taillights glowed like two red coals.

  Wait, I almost shouted, but didn’t, and that would be my burden to bear. Instead, I stood on the curb and I watched him disappear, lights fading in the distance like waking up from a dream.

  I stood there for a long time, feet rooted to the sidewalk, and in my head the stillness began to make a sick kind of sense. I wasn’t going anywhere, I realized numbly—not college, not Chicago, not off into the sunset to see the great wide world. This was it. Sawyer was gone—gone gone, I knew already, the way you know you’re hungry or that it’s about to rain—and I was going to have to stay in Broward. I was going to have to do this—whatever this was—on my own.

  I was crying again, silent and stupid, right there on the curb like the worst kind of fool. All that careful planning, all those maps and magazines, those nights I’d dreamed myself to sleep. The places I was going to explore, the stories I was going to write when I got there—and for what? I looked down at the damp, cracked pavement, felt the boundaries of my life constricting around me. The air was heavy and oppressive, pushing against the surface of my skin.

  At long last, I pulled it together, wiped my eyes and scrubbed my palms against my jeans. I took a deep breath and headed for the only destination that made sense at this particular juncture:

  I got back in the car and drove toward home.

  49

  After

  My father gets released in the middle of August, twenty pounds lighter and considerably worse for wear. He spends most days in the living room or at physical therapy, groggy or annoyed, but he is alive, and that is good enough for now. We settle into a new routine, all of us Monteros, full of medicines and lists. I start cooking dinner. Silence descends like a shroud. A few times a week, Sawyer’s Jeep rumbles to the curb and he takes Hannah to the park or the zoo for a couple of hours.

  “How are you?” he always asks, when I bring her outside.

  “Fine,” I always tell him, and watch him disappear down the road.

  During the day I am a dutiful daughter. I weed the garden. I salt the soup. At night I read my atlas like a Bible, imagining my escape.

  It goes on like this for a while, a steady drone and the hum of the central air, until one afternoon when I come downstairs after putting Hannah down for a nap and find my dad sitting on the couch, flipping the channels. “Do you need anything?” I ask automatically. “You hungry?”

  “I’m all right,” he says. Then, clicking the TV off: “Come here for a minute, daughter of mine.”

  I feel the nerves stir in my stomach—a warm prickly rush of guilt and anxiety, though I know there was a time when I felt safer with my father than with anyone else on earth. “What’s up?” I ask, trying not to sound afraid. My hands move in front of me like butterflies. My toes curl down against the rug.

  “Sit down,” he tells me, and I do, perching on the edge of the sofa beside him, feet still planted on the carpet like at any second I might jump up and bolt.

  “I want to talk to you about that night at dinner,” he says.

  “I’m sorry,” I say immediately, trying to avoid the inevitable lecture: If he’s going to lay into me again, I’d rather just take the blame right off the bat and be done with it, preempt the whole affair. My textbooks are piled on the desk in my bedroom. I’ve got finals starting next week. “I shouldn’t have lost my temper like that.”

  “It’s not that,” he says, which is surprising. He shakes his head, sighs a little. “I owe you an apology.”

  “It’s just been a really difficult—” I stop. “You do?”

  “I do.” There’s something stilted about his speech, like he’s been practicing. I wait. “You were right, Reena,” he begins after a moment, “about what you said at the table. I didn’t protect you after—” He breaks off, tries again. “Once the baby came. I was angry. You know that. I said rotten things to you, and I’m ashamed of myself for that. I’m sorry.” He swallows. “This isn’t the life I imagined for you.”

  I shrug, hands still twisting in my lap. I tuck them between my knees to still them. “It’s not the life I imagined for me, either.”

  “I know. But as your dad, I think it felt—it felt like a personal failure to me, to see you lose Northwestern. A baby at sixteen—it’s not the way I raised you. I’m sorry if that’s difficult for you to hear, but it’s true.”

  My cheeks feel hot. “I know.”

  “But that’s not an excuse.” My father sighs again; he looks so old lately, his face gone slightly slack. “I did a terrible job once you told me you were pregnant. I did a miserable, piss-poor job. You probably needed your parents more than you’d ever needed your parents in your entire life, and what did I do? I walked away.”

  I start to deny it, an absurd reflex. It’s bizarre to hear him talk this way. Finally I nod. “Yeah,” I tell him, which is about all I can manage. “It’s been hard.”

  “But look at you,” he says. “You’ve handled yourself with a lot of grace. You’re responsible. You took up your cross. You do a good job with Hannah. You might think I don’t notice that, but I do.”

  I feel my eyes start to well up, that familiar clog in my throat. I feel like I’ve been on the verge of crying for the last two years. “Thanks.”

  “I know a lot of people have left you in your life,” he tells me, and that’s when the tea
rs start for real. He gets a little closer, puts a heavy hand on my back. “Your mother, and Allie. Sawyer. And me, too.” His arm slides down around my shoulder, pulls me close; he smells like laundry detergent and limes. “But what I want to tell you, sweetheart, is that that’s not going to happen again, all right? I’m not going anywhere. No matter what happens, what you do or where you go—you’re not going to lose me again.”

  Well, that rips it. All of a sudden it’s like he’s given me permission to let go of everything I’ve been holding on to so tightly—the guilt and fear I’ve walked around with since the night of his heart attack, the huge anger that’s burrowed in behind my ribs. I rest my head on his shoulder and let myself a cry a little, leave a wet splotch on his shirt the way I haven’t since I was a little girl. My father pets through my hair. I know this won’t fix everything between us—I know we have many, many miles to walk—but it feels, at the very least, like a start.

  “There’s something else,” he tells me, once I’ve pulled it together a little bit, hiccups instead of sobs. His hand is still on my back, familiar after all this time. “It’s about Sawyer.”

  “Honestly?” I groan. “There’s nothing going on between me and Sawyer.”

  “It’s not that.” My father shakes his head. “Although whatever decision you make about him is just that—it’s your decision.” He clears his throat again, straightens up. “There’s something I never told you about Sawyer, about the time right before he left.”

  I feel my eyebrows shoot up; I can only imagine. “What?”

  My father reaches for the glass of water on the table, takes a long sip before he goes on. “He came here, to the house. Looking for you.”

  “Wait,” I say, blinking. “Before he left for good?”

  He nods. “This was when things between us weren’t so friendly, and I didn’t invite him in, but his car was full of all kinds of nonsense, like he was going on a trip.” He sets the water glass back down on the table. “I didn’t know then that he was leaving, but I also never told you he came by.”

 

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