Hold Me Close

by Megan Hart

  “Someone else is doing that one.” Polly dragged her fork through the casserole, separating the chicken from the rest of it and pushing it to the side.

  Heath tipped the beer bottle against his lips, then swallowed. “You’re not going to eat that?”

  “I think I might become vegan.” Polly shrugged.

  That was news to Effie. “You realize that means no cheeseburgers, right?”

  Polly laughed. “Duh!”

  “And you’ll have to actually eat vegetables,” Effie added as Polly pushed the broccoli to the side, as well.

  “Yes, Mother,” Polly said with a sigh. “I know.”

  Heath poked his fork into a piece of chicken on Polly’s plate. “More for me.”

  Polly eyed them both. “So, you’re okay with it? If I become vegan?”

  “If that’s what you want,” Effie said. “I think it’s going to be harder than you think it will be, but okay.”

  Polly looked faintly surprised, then frowned. “Sam’s mom told her she wasn’t allowed. She said that Sam could do whatever she wanted when she grew up, but while she still lived at home she had to eat what her mom made for dinner.”

  Effie had never forced Polly to eat anything she didn’t want to, never made her clean her plate. Eating and food were complicated issues for Effie, and she wasn’t about to make them so for her daughter. She gave Heath a look.

  “Well, Polly, I can’t promise you I’ll make all kinds of elaborate meals for you—”

  “You don’t anyway,” Polly pointed out.

  Effie made a face. “Thanks, kid.”

  Polly laughed again, and this time it sounded more natural. “I can find recipes on the internet.”

  “I can help you cook some vegan meals.” Heath stabbed another bite of Polly’s discarded chicken and chewed slowly, and that was that.

  “Where do you think that’s coming from?” Heath asked when they’d finished eating and Polly had gone to her room to do her homework.

  Effie looked at him from the sink, where she was washing the casserole pan. “Wanting to be vegan? Who knows. It’s trendy?”

  “She’s growing up.” Heath leaned against the counter next to her, close enough that she’d knock him with her elbow if she wasn’t careful.

  Effie blew a palm of soap suds at him, keeping things light. “That’s what they do.”

  “Yeah. I guess so.”

  She faced him. “What’s up with you?”

  “Nothing.” Heath shrugged and ran a hand through his hair to get it off his eyes. His phone rang from his pocket, but instead of answering it, he pressed the button to send it right to voice mail.

  Effie kept her voice casual. “Your girlfriend won’t be happy if you don’t answer her calls.”

  “She’s not my girlfriend.”

  “Of course not.” Effie rinsed the pan and set it on the dish rack, then washed her hands and dried them before looking at him again. She touched the fading bruise on his cheek.

  Heath closed his eyes at the touch, which was not quite a caress. He turned his face to let his lips press her palm in not quite a kiss. Effie took her hand away.

  “Let’s cut your hair,” she said.

  Seated in front of her in a kitchen chair, a towel clipped around his neck, Heath shook his head until his hair fell over his eyes. Effie dragged her fingers through the thick, silky darkness. She scratched his scalp lightly, and he let out a sigh. She finger-combed it, letting the length tickle her fingers. Heath had gorgeous hair, and it seemed a shame to cut it, but he also couldn’t go around looking like a sheepdog.

  She took her time, trimming a bit here and there. Humming under her breath, she drew the hair to the tips of her fingers and let it fall over his face to judge the length. Trimmed some more. Caught up in what she was doing, she didn’t notice him staring at her at first, but when her gaze snagged on his, she paused.

  “Kiss me,” he mouthed.

  Heat flooded her, but with a small smile, Effie shook her head. Heath’s eyes glittered. She was standing between his spread knees, the scissors in one hand and his hair in the other. He let his hands run up the backs of her denim-clad thighs to anchor her hips and inch her a step closer.

  “Kiss me,” he said in a low voice.

  “No. Sit still.”

  Heath closed his eyes and gave Effie a sleepyish smile. She put her knuckles beneath his chin to tip his head back, then stroked her fingers through his hair, once, twice, again. She watched his smile thin, but he didn’t open his eyes.

  She wanted to kiss him, of course. Wanted to do more than that. Simply touching him this way, when he was acquiescent under her caress yet on the constant edge of a plea, made Effie feel as though she were slowly treading water but waiting for the inevitable moment when she knew she was going to drown.

  Instead, she focused on finishing the haircut. Brushing the hair from his shoulders and catching as much of it as she could in the towel, Effie stepped back. “All done.”

  Heath opened his eyes and scrubbed both hands along his scalp. “Thanks.”

  “You don’t want to look at it?”

  “I’m sure you did a great job.” He stood, looming over her. Stray hairs clung to his face here and there, and he held out the collar of his shirt to shake it. “Itches. I need a shower. Then dessert? You want to watch a couple episodes of Runner with me?”

  Over time, they’d slowly been working their way through the entire ten seasons of the show, although they’d seen them all already. Effie shook the towel over the garbage can. “I have a project to finish. But I bet Polly will watch with you. Make sure she’s finished with her homework first.”

  “Of course.” Heath snagged her by the belt loop to pull her a few steps closer. He would kiss her now, she thought, but he only passed his thumb over her lower lip for a second before letting her go.

  Twenty minutes later, the familiar sounds of Runner’s opening theme song hummed through the wall as Effie stood in front of her easel. She’d bought this house because of the glassed-in back porch, which was too hot in the summer and too cold in the winter, but had amazing light all day long. It didn’t matter much now, since the sun had set, but she’d rigged up a pair of strong work lights.

  This piece would probably be better painted in the dark.

  She stood in front of a canvas still mostly blank. She’d stroked a few tentative lines over the surface. Letting her fingers get a feel for the image. At this point, the picture was still all in her head. It had taken her a few weeks to get started, for the idea to move from concept to actual planning. This piece would be different from the ones she put up for sale at her Craftsy store or the ones people paid her to create based on their own specifications. This one was going to be all Effie.

  She’d thought she would sketch an outline first, but now she picked up several tubes of paint instead. Black, crimson, shades of blue. The faintest, palest pink. She squeezed out liberal amounts onto her wooden palette and took up a brush. She began to paint.

  * * *

  Happy little trees.

  People could make fun of Bob Ross all they wanted, but Effie has spent hours with his soft drone and those landscapes. The TV in the basement gets only one station, PBS. It’s almost worse than having no television at all, but Daddy gave it to them as a “reward” for good behavior, and Effie wouldn’t complain about it, not even to Heath. Especially not to him, when he’s been the one to suffer for the reward.

  She’s always loved drawing and painting and art, but she’s learned more about technique in the past few months of The Joy of Painting than she had in the years of taking classes with Madame Clay. Yesterday, Effie painted a pretty landscape with trees and mountains and a lake. Then she painted crossbars, like a window, so they could hang it on the wall and pretend they had a view. Her p
erspective is all off. If her painting was truly what they could see from their window, the water of the lake would be lapping at their toes. She doesn’t care. She’d give anything to stand on a sandy shore with warm water teasing her to dive into it.

  Today, Effie wants to finish the landscape she started last week, but she woke up feeling sick to her stomach. It’s the drugs. Sometimes there are too many. Daddy’s going to kill them one day. Maybe that’s what he’s going for.

  Effie wants to be still and quiet in the dark and sleep until all of this goes away. She could sleep through the music, that same song over and over, the one about sailing. She can’t sleep through the bright lights, though, and he always turns those on just before he visits.

  Daddy. That’s what he insists they call him. He calls them Brother and Sister. He’s a small man with round glasses and a balding head, a belly a little too big for his pants that hangs out under his too-tight belt. But he’s stronger than he looks, Effie knows, because the time she did try to jump past him and head for the door, he was on her before she could get more than a few feet. He’d backhanded her, sending her reeling. Worse, he’d punched Heath in the face over and over until Effie begged him to stop, and then Daddy promised her that if she tried another stunt like that, he would make sure Heath gets worse than a knuckle sandwich.

  Effie believes him. It helped her understand why Heath is so reluctant to try to escape, too. The burden of knowing that your actions will hurt someone else. He’s still convinced someone will find them. Effie is losing hope.

  “Good morning, children,” Daddy always greets them. “Wakey wakey, eggs and bakey!”

  Sometimes there are plates of eggs and bacon, the smell so good it makes her mouth squirt saliva. Sometimes there is fresh fruit cut into artful shapes like flowers or panda bears. When he’s angry, there’s plain, cold oatmeal or undercooked noodles made bitter with the dust of pills and other things. Sometimes for days and days there’s nothing at all, and that’s all right, because it’s easier to deal with hunger when there isn’t a plate of steaming, fluffy scrambled eggs sprinkled with cheese in front of her.

  Still, there’s only so long either of them can go without eating something, and last night Effie had broken down and gobbled the entire plate of pasta with butter. Heath only picked at it, watching her with a concerned expression. There’d also been garlic bread, and he’d passed on that entirely, but Effie had been ravenous, incapable of resisting once she’d taken a few bites.

  Effie has learned the hard way to believe Heath when he told her not to eat what Daddy brings them.

  She regrets it now. Her stomach aches, her guts cramp. She’s been up half the night with the shit-shivers and had almost thrown up several times. She managed to keep herself from it only because the thought of the stink it would leave for days or weeks in the basement was too much to handle.

  Today when the song starts and the lights come on, Effie pulls the shabby, stinking blankets up over her head and rolls onto her side with a groan. There’s no way she’s getting up, no way to put a smile on her face the way Daddy demands. Not even for the promise of being allowed to go upstairs, an event Daddy assures them both over and over will happen “one day.” When they’ve both been good enough. When he knows he can trust them. Effie knows better than to believe him. The only way either she or Heath is going to go upstairs, she thinks, is if one of them is dead.

  “Effie,” Heath says now. “Get up. He’s coming. C’mon.”

  “I’m sick.”

  “You shouldn’t have eaten the garlic bread,” Heath says.

  Effie whips the blankets off her face and scowls. “Gee, thanks, Captain Obvious.”

  Overhead, the creaking floors tell them Daddy’s heading for the basement door. Then the wooden steps and the door at the bottom that leads into their living space. The rooms she and Heath share have been soundproofed so thoroughly they can’t hear anything else outside it, but sure enough, in a few minutes, the door opens. Heath shakes his head and moves away from her to stand. Effie curls into a ball.

  “Wakey wakey...” Daddy begins. “Well, now, Sister. What’s going on? Why aren’t you up and at ’em, Adam Ant?”

  “She’s sick,” Heath offers.

  Daddy moves closer to the bed. “Is that so? What’s wrong?”

  “My stomach hurts.” Effie presses her hands to her belly.

  Daddy looks as if he’s pleased but trying to hide it. “Ah. Well. You’d better let me take a look.”

  Effie does not want this man to touch her, and she tenses when he sits on the edge of the bed. She’s ready for him to get freaky. That’s what perverts do, right? Touch young girls inappropriately? But Daddy simply probes her belly with soft fingers and then puts the back of his hand to her forehead.

  “Chicken soup,” he declares and slaps both his knees at the same time. “That’s the ticket.”

  “I’m not hungry.”

  “It will make you feel better.” Daddy stands and turns to look at Heath. “And you. How are you feeling?”

  Heath shrugs. “Fine.”

  “Fine, what?”

  “Fine, Daddy.” The word grinds out of Heath’s mouth as if the taste of it is making him sicker than the garlic bread made Effie.

  Daddy frowns, as though maybe he was hoping for a different answer. “I’ll be back.”

  When he’s gone and locked the door behind him, Effie sits. Everything hurts, aching, throbbing. Her head pounds. She makes fists and rams them into the sagging mattress over and over.

  “What does he want?” she cries. “What is the matter with him? Why does he keep us down here? Why does he feed us things to make us sick, Heath, why?”

  Everything spins. She’s going to throw up, she knows it, but she can’t force herself to walk, much less run, to the toilet. Gagging, Effie spits into an empty bowl, but nothing comes up. She swipes at the snot dripping from her nose, not caring how gross that is. She stands and tries to overturn the table. She wants to break things, but the cramping in her guts doubles her over.

  Heath takes her by the arm, and he’s too strong for her to shake off. He holds her still until she stops struggling. For a second, Effie thinks he’s going to hug her, but then he lets her go.

  “He makes us sick so he can take care of us. Make us better. So we’re grateful to him,” Heath says in a low voice.

  Effie sits on the edge of the bed. Her eyes feel wide and wild. Her throat feels tight, as if she can’t breathe. She’s frantic and desperate and yet overcome with a lethargy so strong it’s all she can do not to fall back onto the bed.

  “Why?” she says again, softly this time.

  “Because he’s crazy.”

  Before she can ask Heath more questions, her stomach cramps again. This time she does get up to rush to the toilet. Heath must’ve filled the tank with water to flush sometime during the night; she’d be more embarrassed about the mess and stink if she didn’t feel as if she was going to die.

  Daddy has left the bright overhead lights on, something he usually turns off when he leaves. Effie’s grateful for them now, though, because they shine into the bathroom enough that she can see what she’s doing. Though her belly is cramping as if she has diarrhea, nothing comes out. When she wipes, though, the paper comes away covered in dark red fluid. Effie stares at it, uncertain at first. Then she starts to cry.

  All of her friends have been getting periods for over a year. Mom told her it would happen any day and had taken her to the store to pick up pads and tampons that Effie has dutifully carried in her purse, waiting for this moment. Now here she is on a broken toilet in a crazy stranger’s basement, getting her period for the first time, and all she can do is weep.

  “Effie?”

  “Go away!” Embarrassed, cringing, Effie tries to clean herself up, but there’s too much blood and not enough toi
let paper.

  Heath peeks around the door frame. “Are you okay?”

  “No.” With a shaky breath, Effie pushes her knees together. “I need help.”

  “With what?”

  She doesn’t want to say it. Not to this or any other boy, but what choice does she have? “I got my period.”

  “Oh.” Heath doesn’t sound embarrassed or even curious. He sounds sympathetic. “Shit.”

  Effie cries again, though she hates the tears. “I don’t have anything!”

  “I’ll ask Daddy for something when he comes back.”

  “He won’t have anything,” Effie says. “Will he?”

  Heath moves a little closer. “He’ll have to, won’t he? He can’t expect you to just...not have something. I mean, girls need stuff. He should know that.”

  “He’s crazy, though.” Effie sniffles. A slow, rolling cramp ripples through her.

  “He likes to take care of us so we’re grateful,” Heath reminded her.

  The floor creaked above them. That freaking song was still playing. Effie wants to cover her ears, but she doesn’t. It wouldn’t block out the song, anyway.

  Outside in the other room, the door opens. “Sister, I brought your soup... What’s going on in there?”

  Heath straightens. “She needs some, um...girl supplies.”

  Effie can’t see much over Heath’s shoulder, just the top of Daddy’s balding head. He sounds surprised, though. “What?”

  “Tampons!” Effie screams suddenly. “I’m on the rag, it’s the curse, I’m on my dot. Aunt Flo came to town!”

  “Oh, my goodness,” Daddy says.

  “She needs things,” Heath tells him.

  There’s silence. Effie hears the door close. She gives in to tears again, her face in her hands. This is awful, all of it, but particularly this. It’s worse than when Robin Sanders got her period for the first time when she was wearing white pants and had to tie a sweatshirt around her waist for the rest of the day. Worse than any story about getting your first period that Effie’s ever heard, and girls in school passed around those horror tales like trading cards.