Dirty

by Megan Hart

  Marcy had convinced me to go out to lunch with her and take advantage of the last bright days to eat outside. Now I couldn’t escape her, and not even the four coats of mascara she wore on each eye could keep her from peering right inside me.

  “When did you go to Aruba?”

  “I haven’t, yet, but I’m going there on my honeymoon.”

  I drank more coffee, though by this point I was so wide-eyed from caffeine I wouldn’t have been surprised had my lashes met my hairline. Then it registered, what she’d said, and I looked to her left hand at the new diamond ring she wore. I put down my cup with a thunk.

  “Marcy! You’re engaged?”

  She beamed. “Yep.”

  She told me how Wayne had gotten down on one knee and proposed. Our food came and she talked as we ate, her fork waving animatedly and earning her bemused looks from the table next to us. I sat and listened and nodded, her pure, giddy joy infectious.

  Finally, with cheesecake clinging to the tines of her fork, she paused for air. “This is my last cheesecake until after the wedding. I want to lose at least ten pounds. But, Elle. How are you doing, honey?”

  I studied my own, half-eaten dessert. “I’m all right. Thanks for the card and the plant.”

  She smiled. “Wayne thought you might like the plant better than flowers.”

  “I did. You can tell him so.” I poked a hole in my cake. “It was very thoughtful of both of you. I really appreciate it.”

  “Sure.” She chewed, swallowed, sipped her coffee.

  I felt the weight of her eyes on me but didn’t look up. Marcy, however, was not to be deterred by something so simple a social-avoidance technique like avoiding eye contact.

  “You know you can talk to me, if you want. About anything.”

  I nodded. “Thanks, Marcy, but my dad was sick for a while. It wasn’t a surprise.”

  Her concern hadn’t made me look up, but the aggravated sigh she gave now did.

  “I wasn’t talking about your dad.”

  “You weren’t?”

  She shook her head and popped the last piece of cheesecake between her lips. “Nope.”

  I sat for a moment, staring, then forked a bite of cake into my mouth. Sweet sugar, gooey chocolate…my mouth applauded.

  “I saw Dan downtown last weekend.” Marcy wiped her fingers on her napkin.

  I made a noncommittal noise. Marcy pinned me with her bright-blue gaze, her spangled shadow glittering. She wore a new shade of lipstick, today, her mouth pursed. I braced myself for the lecture.

  “He said you two broke up. That you wouldn’t answer his calls.”

  I meant to laugh, I really did, but the sound came out somewhat strangled. “Broke up?”

  “Did you?”

  “We weren’t—”

  “Elle.” Marcy put her hand over mine, and I put down my fork. “What happened?”

  “I don’t want to talk about it.” I looked into her eyes.

  She squeezed my fingers. “Okay.”

  “I mean, even if I had anything to say about it, which I don’t, really.” It wasn’t often that my mouth outraced my mind, but it did that day. The more I said, the more I felt I had to say. To explain. To deny, postulate, consider. To justify.

  Marcy sat and listened, silent for once.

  “He wasn’t my boyfriend. We were just having a good time. It wasn’t serious. I don’t get serious. I told him right up front, that it wasn’t going to be a relationship. I don’t do that. I told him that. He said it was all right.” Words, like raindrops on a windowpane, sliding down, dividing, branching out, always one more showing up when it seemed they’d all disappeared. “It’s not my fault he misunderstood, I was honest with him. I was always honest, right from the start. He knew. I knew. We both knew. And now it’s over, but really, can something be over that never started?”

  “You tell me,” Marcy said gently, sitting back in her chair and looking as calm as though someone verbally drenched her every day.

  “Yes,” I said firmly. “I mean…no.”

  She smiled. “Elle. Honey. Sweetie-pie. What’s so wrong with being happy?”

  I didn’t have an answer for that at first. The cake sat in my stomach like a rock. I finished my coffee, even though it was cold.

  “I’m afraid,” I whispered at last, ashamed.

  “We’re all afraid, honey.”

  I looked up at her with a heavy, heavy sigh. “Even you?”

  She nodded. “Even me.”

  That made me feel better, a little, and I smiled. She smiled back. She reached for my hand again, linking her fingers through mine.

  “Look at those two old guys over there,” she said. “They’re anxiously awaiting some girl-on-girl action.”

  She won a laugh from me. I didn’t let go of her hand. “Except in their version, there’ll be pudding involved.”

  “Oooh, pudding,” Marcy said. “I could get into that.”

  We shared another smile, and something in me eased. I reached for my fork again. We signaled for the check.

  “Listen, I can’t pretend to be the queen of good advice, here. I’ve had more boyfriends than I can count, and I’m not so sure that’s any better than not having any. But I do know this. When you find someone who makes you smile and laugh, when you find someone who makes you feel safe…you shouldn’t let that person go just because you’re afraid.”

  “Is Wayne that person for you?”

  She nodded, and every line of her expression softened with joy. “Yep.”

  “And you’re not afraid of it ending?”

  “Sure I am. But I’d rather have something this good for a little while than have nothing forever.”

  I finished my dessert and wiped my mouth. “Thanks for the advice, but I think it’s over. Dan, I mean.”

  “He’s a good man, Elle. Won’t you give him another chance?”

  Her assumption that I was the one who had the right to give him anything surprised me. “There’s nothing to give. He didn’t do anything wrong. He’s not the one who…he didn’t—”

  While only moments before, my mouth had spewed word after word, now my lips moved but nothing came out. I was wordless. I couldn’t think of what I meant to say.

  Marcy, heaven bless her, didn’t need me to say anything.

  “You could just call him, you know. Talk to him. Work it out.”

  For a moment, the thought of doing that lifted my spirits, but it passed as soon as it came. “No. I don’t think so.”

  “Oh, Elle.” She seemed disappointed in me, and that stung more than I expected it to. “How come?”

  “Because,” I said after another long pause. “I don’t have enough of myself to give to anyone else. And until I do, Dan deserves better than someone with only half to give him.”

  She studied me, then nodded slowly. “Did you kill someone?”

  “What?” My cheeks bloomed with heat and I coughed. “Jesus, Marcy!”

  “Did you?” She asked calmly. “Because I can’t really think of anything else that would be so bad you couldn’t forgive yourself for it.”

  I gaped, my mouth working but nothing coming out for a second. “What if I said yes?”

  “Did you?”

  “Maybe I did!” I cried. “Yes.”

  “Did you?” She asked again, frighteningly perceptive. “Shot them? Stuck a knife in their guts? Poison?”

  My voice sounded flat and faraway. “No. I just didn’t pick up the phone and call an ambulance when I knew I should.”

  “That’s not killing someone,” she shot back. “That’s letting someone die. There’s a difference.”

  I blinked, wishing for a drink to wash away the taste of sugar and coffee and anger. “There was still blood on my hands.”

  Her steely gaze gave me no release. “Nobody likes a martyr, Elle.”

  My body reacted faster than my thoughts could catch up. I pushed my chair back and stood so fast my hand knocked my mug to the floor. It broke with a solid
“thunk,” and a splash of coffee colored the brick.

  We stared at each other across the table, me with heaving chest and pounding heart and Marcy looking as cool as spring water. She took a slow, deliberate sip of her coffee. I clenched my sweating hands into fists.

  “Why are you taking his side?” I asked her finally, my voice shaking. “You’re supposed to be my friend!”

  “I wouldn’t be much of a friend if I didn’t try to help you. Would I?”

  “You think this is helping me?”

  She nodded. “Yes, Elle. I do.”

  “You don’t know anything about me,” I told her. “Not a damn thing.”

  “Whose fault is that?” she shot back.

  My mind couldn’t seem to decide between anger and despair, and both filled me. I backed away from her, my hands up like I was pushing her away. Marcy didn’t move.

  “Falling in love doesn’t make everything else magically disappear, Marcy. Finding your knight in shining armor is a fairy tale. It doesn’t change anything, and you’re fooling yourself if it does. You go ahead and live in your rainbow-glitter sunshine and marshmallow fantasies. I’m happy for you. I’m happy that you found Wayne and he filled up all those places inside of you that needed filling. Good for you. I hope you live happily ever after. But it’s just a dream, it’s not real. Love doesn’t make everything all better like a fucking fairy wand, Marcy, it doesn’t change things just like POOF, there you go, hey, I love you, now let’s run hand in hand through a field of fucking flowers!”

  The venom in my voice burned my throat. Marcy flinched, her cheeks turning pink in an uncharacteristic show of discomfort. She blinked rapidly, and I should have been ashamed to see that she had tears in her eyes.

  “And so what if it does? What if falling in love does make everything else seem better? Is that a crime? Is it a sin to let someone else help you out a little, once in a while? But no, you have to be a damn martyr and carry it all on your own shoulders, all the time! You just keep on hating yourself so everyone else will too, okay? Keep on being miserable because you’re too afraid to let go of it! Jesus H. Christ,” she cried. “Don’t you want to be happy?”

  “Yes! I want to be happy! But don’t try to hand me Dan on a platter and try to convince me that he’s the magic key! Okay? Him or any other man. It doesn’t work that way. True love isn’t going to transform me, Marcy. Not everyone works the way you do.”

  “I’m only trying to help you,” she said.

  “I know you are.” I took a deep breath. “And I appreciate it. But this is my thing, okay? It has nothing to do with Dan. It’s not something that he did or didn’t do. It’s not about him. It’s something I have to work through on my own.”

  “You don’t have to do it on your own. You’ve got friends. People who love you. Whatever it is, Elle.”

  I knew she was right. I knew she would listen, offer advice, hold my hand. I knew she would do what she could; but what it all came down to was that in the end I needed to rid myself of the infection inside me. Cut it out, if I had to. Tear off the scab, open it to the air, get it clean.

  “I’ll see you back at the office.”

  She nodded. “Fine.”

  There were things to say that would make this better, but I couldn’t make myself say them. I’ve never been good at building, only breaking. I left her at the café, and later that day I saw her giggling over her ring with Lisa Lewis in the copy room. They both stopped and looked up when I came in, and Marcy smiled at me as if we barely knew each other.

  Chapter 19

  Marcy was wrong. I was not a martyr. At least, I didn’t think so. I did not want to parade my pain for all to see, to bolster myself with pity, to beat my breast and bemoan my sorry state. That was my mother’s agenda, not mine.

  It was why I never spoke to anyone about what had happened in our house the years of my life between fifteen and eighteen, when Andrew died. I didn’t want anyone, ever, to be able to excuse me because of my past. I did not excuse myself because of it. Bad things happen all the time. Worse than what I endured. Everything in my past was a piece of my self puzzle, the punctuation in the sentence of my being. Without it I would not have become the woman I am today. I’d be someone else. Someone I might not recognize.She was right, however, about pushing people away. I knew it. I had for a long time. So I pondered getting “someone” the way my brother had, and I decided, instead, to go to church. God didn’t reach down his hand and pull me off my knees. I’d abandoned religion for a reason. I didn’t believe God could solve my problems any more than therapy could or booze or drugs. Or sex. There was much for me to carry, and I had to let it go.

  St. Paul’s was larger than St. Mary’s and a more modern church, advertising “folk Mass” and “contemporary worship” on the billboard in front. They did offer confession, however, and while I’d never believed it should be up to a man to decide if I’m worthy of forgiveness, the act of confession preyed on my mind so persistently that I at last decided to go.

  Father Hennessy had a nice voice. A little rough, but quiet. He sounded kind and interested, at least, not bored, though I’d waited until the church was empty before I entered the confessional, and he was probably tired of listening at that point.

  “Bless me, Father, for I have sinned. It’s been a long time since my last confession.”

  I spoke for a long time.

  “Are you able to forgive yourself?” he asked at last. “Because you know I can forgive you and the good Lord can, but if you don’t forgive yourself it’s no use.”

  I nodded, my fingers aching from being clutched together so tightly. “Yes, Father, I know.”

  “Have you sought professional services?”

  “Not recently, Father.”

  “But you’ve had counseling.”

  I laughed, low. “When it happened, yes.”

  “And you didn’t find it helpful?”

  “They could give me medication, Father, but…” My voice trailed off.

  “Ah.” He seemed to understand. “You know you’re not at fault, don’t you?”

  “I know. I do know.”

  “And yet you can’t let go of the guilt?”

  “I can’t seem to, no.”

  We shared silence for a moment before he spoke again. “Like our Lord, you’ve been pierced with thorns and nails. You can take them out, but each leaves behind a hole. And you, child, have so many holes you’re afraid that’s all you’ll be. Nothing but holes. Am I right?”

  I put my forehead on my hands and whispered a reply. “Yes.”

  “When they pulled our Lord from the cross, he had holes, too. But he rose again with his Father’s love, and you can too.”

  Hot tears leaked over my fingers, but a strangled laugh escaped me. “You’re comparing me to the son of God?”

  “We’re all children of God,” the priest said. “Every one of us. Our Lord Christ died for our sins so you don’t have to. Do you understand?”

  I envied those who could accept that answer, who could let the light shine in and let the blood of their Savior wash it all away. It seemed like another fairy story to me, but I didn’t tell the priest that. He believed it, even if I could not.

  “I’m tired, Father, of feeling this way.”

  “Then let our Lord take it away for you.”

  He sounded so sincere. Genuine. Again, I wished I could do as he said. Open my heart. Believe in something that would make all the rest seem bearable.

  “I’m sorry, Father, I just can’t.”

  He sighed. “It’s all right.”

  He sounded despondent, and I thought maybe the Church business wasn’t as satisfying as it had been years ago when Catholics didn’t question, they just prayed.

  “I’m sorry, Father. I want to believe you.”

  He laughed. “The fact you’re here says that. And if you don’t believe, don’t worry. God believes in you. He won’t let you fall away from him so easily.”

  I’d never heard a pr
iest laugh in the confessional before. “It’s not that I don’t know where to place the blame. Or that I think it’s my fault. I know it’s not.”

  “But you’re full of holes.”

  “Yes.”

  “And you’re looking for something to fill them.”

  I wiped my face with my hands, feeling my tears on my fingertips. “Yes. I guess I am.”

  “It’s my job to tell you to find it in the Church,” the priest said. “I hope you’ll at least consider it.”

  I liked Father Hennessy, who had a sense of humor. “If anyone could convince me, Father, I think it would be you.”

  “Ah, that makes me feel better. Are you ready to finish your confession?”

  “Yes.” I paused. “Go easy on me, Father, I’m out of practice.”

  He laughed again. “Say one Act of Contrition, my child.”

  “It’s been a long time. I’m not sure I remember the words.”

  “Then I will say them with you,” said Father Hennessy, and he did.

  There could be no point in continuing this way. I didn’t like it, didn’t want it, couldn’t stand it. So this is what I did.I went to visit my mother.

  Since my father’s death she’d redecorated the den. The big television still squatted in the corner like Shelob waiting for a tasty hobbit to devour, but all other signs of my father’s habitation of the space had disappeared. She’d replaced his chair with a love seat and stripped the striped wallpaper for a cheery yellow paint.

  She showed me around the room, but didn’t actually let me sit in it. She took me to the kitchen, made us both coffee and pulled an apple pie from the freezer. I recognized it as one left from the wake and didn’t want any.

  “I’ve got some boxes for you.” She lit a cigarette and held it between her French-manicured fingertips. “If you don’t take them, I’m giving them to the thrift store.”

  “What’s in them?”

  She shrugged. “Bunch of junk.”

  I stirred sweetener in my coffee in lieu of the sugar she didn’t keep. “What makes you think I want a bunch of junk?”