Mothers and Other Liars

by Amy Bourret

  Margaret tries again. “Remember when you decided to test nail polish colors on Mrs. Cornwallis while she snoozed under the heat lamp?”

  They all join in the “remember whens.” Remember when Lark was so smart…remember when Lark was so funny…remember when?

  Ruby wants to etch each moment on her own brain, tattoo it on her skin. Yet Lark will have to pack all those memories into a trunk in the attic of her mind to make room for the new memories she’ll make in her new life.

  Throughout the dinner, Lark sits at the head of the long burled-wood table, stony, detached. Candlelight dances on the cut-crystal goblets. Sinatra and Cole and Cline sing Lark’s favorite songs, a CD burned by Molly, a taste inherited from Ruby. And Lark just sits there.

  Finally, Ruby stands, thanks everyone. She steps behind Lark, starts toward the door.

  “Hold on there.” Chaz kneels in front of Lark, blocking their way. He reaches into his pocket, pulls out a dainty necklace, clasps it around Lark’s neck. “This guy’ll watch over you, while you’re away from us.”

  Lark picks up the small pendant hanging from the chain. It gleams in the candlelight. Chaz’s Saint Christopher medal. He must have gone out today to replace his own thick gold rope with this Lark-sized chain.

  “But who will protect you?” Lark asks.

  Chaz tucks the medallion under Lark’s shirt, lays a hand across her breastbone. “I’ll use my magic policeman badge.”

  Ruby is sure Lark’s half-smirk is more to keep her composure than to say she doesn’t believe in magic. So she whisks Lark through the line of hugs and kisses and out the room, before either of them can break down. And then she walks her daughter out of the Ms’ house like she has done so many times over the past decade, this time for the last time.

  They walk to the Jeep under a bright full moon, so bright that the stars are all but obscured. Ruby’s grandmother used to say something about faith, that the stars are always brighter on a moonless night, as if God gives you one when he takes away the other, all that doors-closing, windows-opening crap. Tonight Ruby has no faith. The saying that night is always darkest before dawn doesn’t take into account that this time, dawn will take away her daughter.

  THIRTY-FOUR

  Ruby sits on the bed while Lark packs the purple duffel bag she has used for sleepovers and school activities. Ruby didn’t realize until just this morning that neither she nor Lark own a real suitcase; they haven’t ever gone anywhere. That trip to the California beach that they always talked about will never happen. Their life has run out of time.

  A mournful Clyde lies between them. Ruby wishes that Lark would tear into her, pound the pillow, cry, anything. She had thought the screaming banshee hurling “I hate you’s” was bad, as if Lark wanted to be so nasty that Ruby wouldn’t miss her. But this quiet is unbearable. Acceptance is supposed to be the last stage of grief, not resignation, something that should never shadow the face of a child.

  “I’ll see you soon. John is working with the people in Texas to set up a visit.”

  “What ever.” Even distraught, even just while packing, Lark’s movements are graceful, balletic. She is like a colt, all elbows and knees, still waiting for that growth spurt that will bring height and proportion. Her little-girl towhead is darkening to grown-up blond, even in the summer sun. A growth spurt likely is not far behind. The reality that Ruby will not be with Lark to see her grow is too enormous to digest; just this little sliver tears her stomach into shreds.

  “I’ll take good care of Clyde,” Ruby says.

  Lark swallows, hard.

  How many times do I have to break her heart? Ruby thinks.

  Yesterday, Ruby wondered what to send with Lark, what to pack. What was the protocol for this kind of thing? Should she make a list for the Tinsdales, so they know that Lark likes her sandwiches sliced in rectangles not triangles, that she likes her hair brushed for her, even though she pretends she’s insulted by the act? All those little details that Ruby doesn’t even have to think about. Lark’s preferences, that she is scared of heights, the tickle spot at the base of her spine. They are all part of who she is.

  But then John called with further instructions. No pets and no truckloads of “stuff.” The Tinsdales want Tyler Rose to start fresh in the life she should have had all along. Tyler Rose Tinsdale. How ironic that they, too, went for the alliteration, and how utterly precious. Ruby can just picture a little rosebud in place of the dot over the i.

  Lark smoothes the flap of the duffel, zips it shut. She walks out of the room, leadenly, Clyde moping behind her. Ruby listens to their progress, down the short hall, across the living area, and out to the back porch. The screen door bangs its own opinion about this situation.

  Alone in the room, Ruby pulls out the new cell phone and charger and the treasures she hid under the bed this morning: an envelope addressed to Lark and a small framed photo of the two of them up on Chamisa Trail. Ruby crafted the frame in the dead hours of last night, stealing across the yard in the waning moonlight to the shed, wanting something of her own hands for Lark to take away. She unzips the duffel bag and slips the tokens inside.

  She sits there for a moment, staring into the suitcase at the spare, neatly folded pile of this life that Lark will take with her. Then she stands, walks down the hall to her own room, and opens the bureau drawer. From under the sweaters, she pulls out the stuffed giraffe.

  The other treasures are meant to be a tie between Ruby and Lark. But maybe this, an abused-with-love giraffe, neck floppy from where Lark’s tiny hand squeezed the stuffing out of it, will be a bridge between Lark and Mrs. Tinsdale, between her old and new life. She returns to Lark’s room and tucks the giraffe beside Lark’s rolls of socks.

  THIRTY-FIVE

  Ruby has vowed to hold herself together, for Lark. Chaz called again this morning, wanting to be here with her. She rejected even her lawyer’s presence. She needs to do this alone.

  She walks into the living room as Lark and Clyde come in from the backyard. The look that passes between mother and daughter conveys more than words ever could. Yet it doesn’t convey enough.

  As Mrs. Levy’s bird clock coos nine, Ruby hears the crunch of gravel. She and Lark stand in the center of the living area, side cleaved to side, hands melded into one, as the shadows fall across the porch. I can’t do this, Ruby thinks. The room swirls around her head. Panic and bile clog her throat. No, she tells herself. She cannot fall apart.

  Clyde growls at the doorbell, steps protectively in front of Lark. Ruby feels like she is watching someone else from far away, a mother shaking her hand loose from a daughter’s grip, walking to the door. One man—young, tall, lean—steps in and grabs Clyde’s collar, drags him toward the kitchen. Another man—older, red mustache, a doughnut belly protruding over his belt—picks up Lark’s duffel and stands sentry at the door. And a young woman, with smooth coffee skin and eyes that haven’t seen enough to be cynical, kneels in front of Lark, speaks to her, hand on shoulder, then hustles her out the door.

  Ruby doesn’t know that she is following them until she feels the yank on her elbow, tethering her to the porch. She watches as the young woman opens the back door of an unmarked sedan, motions for Lark to climb inside. Lark turns back toward Ruby, eyes white like a corralled wild horse. Lark’s mouth opens, forms one silent word, “Mama!” Then she disappears behind the shutting door.

  Lark doesn’t shout to Ruby, only mouths the one word. Car doors slamming, engine revving, tires spewing gravel as the car churns down the driveway, none of it makes a noise. Then Chaz is beside her, holding her, bracing her head against his shoulder. And Ruby realizes that the world has not gone silent. She just can’t hear anything over her own primal scream.

  THIRTY-SIX

  The handcuff bites Ruby’s wrist as she walks with the red-mustached marshal through the federal building, from the U.S. attorney’s office to the courtroom. She concentrates on putting up a barrier between her right wrist and his left, not wanting her nervous
ness to be conducted through the metal of the manacle. The marshal has been kind; he apologized when he handcuffed her, spouted off a much-worn sentence about his procedural mandate, post-9/11 and all.

  John walks a few steps ahead. The halls are fairly empty this Friday afternoon, a few groups of people here and there, office clerks on break, gossiping. They all stop their conversations, turn to watch as Ruby passes. Ruby tries to hold her head up as she walks; she doesn’t want to look like one of those dodgy criminals doing the perp walk on TV. Yet she keeps catching herself watching the heels of John’s loafers slap against the wooden floor.

  Margaret recommended John to her. His wife was a longtime client, and he had helped Margaret out when that Tennessee salon challenged the name of her salon, said they had the rights to Curl-up and Dye. Still, Ruby studies those shoes. Shoes tell a lot about a person, and, though she knows none of this is his fault, after yesterday Ruby hasn’t quite decided to trust his particular pair.

  The courtroom is tiny, windowless; it looks like a classroom, with none of the To Kill a Mockingbird grandeur Ruby expected. And it is empty. Chaz, the Ms, Antoinette, they all wanted to come. Ruby couldn’t bear having them here, though, to witness her walk of shame.

  The deputy and Ruby follow John to a table. The marshal unlocks her handcuff, walks to the back of the room. She rubs her wrist; it burns like the “Indian bracelets” her grandfather used to give her, twisting her skin in his thick palms when they were horsing around.

  This morning, Ruby was still screaming into Chaz’s shoulder when this marshal tried to pull her away.

  “Come on, ma’am,” he said. “I have to take you now.”

  Chaz had waited beside the house all morning, to be there if Ruby changed her mind, to be there when she needed him. And she had.

  “Give us a minute.” Chaz walked Ruby into the house. Then he stepped back out to the porch. Ruby stood in the living room, her fingers ensnared in her hair, as words volleyed between Chaz and the marshal. Warrant. Custody. Interdepartmental cooperation.

  “Frank, you have my word, and my badge,” Chaz said.

  “One hour, Chaz,” the marshal replied, “One hour and twelve points on the next fed-city basketball game.”

  Then Chaz was back inside the house, untangling her fingers from her hair, pulling her arms around him. He sat her on the sofa, called the Ms over. Margaret tried to joke as she helped Ruby dress, cleaning her up, saying it was bad for business if Ruby had bad hair for her mug shots. Molly practically forced a cup of soup and toast into Ruby, after Ruby’s own hand shook too much to handle a spoon. Then Chaz drove her to the court house, and she met up with John on the steps.

  John took her to the federal marshal’s office, where she signed papers, was fingerprinted, photographed. The process was surreal, dehumanizing, even under these ideal circumstances. At least she didn’t have some prison matron sticking a gloved hand up her rear. Not yet anyway.

  And now here she is in the courtroom. The white blouse with the Peter Pan collar that she hasn’t worn since her high school senior-class photograph is ironed crisp with lavender linen water. Together with the navy skirt and pumps that Antoinette lent her, the outfit is a bit “Catholic schoolgirl gone bad.” And if anyone notices the safety pin that holds the skirt together over her thickened waist, it would be “Catholic schoolgirl gone really bad.”

  The prosecutor, a heavyset woman who looks like she was born in a business suit, enters, settles at the other small table. She will represent the United States at this hearing, standing in for the Texas guy. Ruby still can’t get her head around the idea that it is the entire country that she is up against; she keeps imagining all those faces, all those citizens chasing after her with burning brooms.

  John motions Ruby to stand as the judge climbs the one step to his riser and sits without any pomp. He looks like Ruby’s high school biology teacher, as if he should be dissecting frogs not crimes. Not a judge, John told her, but a magistrate, though Ruby doesn’t really understand the difference. This man in a robe still holds her fate in his formaldehyde-soaked hands.

  They are here for an extradition hearing. A more involved probable cause hearing has been scheduled in the Texas court in two weeks. John prepared her for what to expect from this straightforward proceeding, told her not to worry. Yet remembering his assurances doesn’t ease the overwhelming sense that she is going to pee in her pants.

  John nudges her to make her responses: yes, she understands that she is here under a federal warrant for kidnapping; yes, she waives any objection to extradition to Texas. The prosecutor requests the minimal bail to which the Texas guy finally agreed. John already helped Ruby line up the bond with a lien against her house. Still, he advised her to come today without jewelry or valuables. Just in case.

  The judge signs a stack of papers, hands them to the bailiff. “We’re off the record.” He shakes his teacher finger at Ruby. “Watch yourself, young lady. You won’t have the home court advantage, and I mean that literally and metaphorically, when you appear in Dallas.” Ruby is almost surprised that he doesn’t ask her about late homework or hand out a quiz.

  She follows John out of the courtroom, heads for the ladies’ room a few doors down. Everything went smoothly; everything went as John said it would. But even so she throws up every bite of her lunch.

  THIRTY-SEVEN

  With John at her side, Ruby walks outside of the cool, dark court house and into the blaring sun. And a media maelstrom. The sidewalk is clogged with stiff-haired people, each reaching out a microphone as if straining to touch the sleeve of a matinee idol. Their too-white teeth gnash in their too-big mouths while they jostle one another for position. Behind them stands a circle of cameras, like stanchions fortifying their troops.

  John motions her toward the shield of a broad stone column. He steps out onto the walkway and holds up his hands like a TV evangelist. “My client will not be making any statement at this time,” he says simply, confidently. Back behind the column, he takes her hand. “Ready?” As if she could ever be ready for this.

  They step over a shin-high chain barrier and take quick, determined strides across the court house lawn, hand in hand, toward the side parking lot. Ruby’s instinct is to run, flee, but John’s hand steadies her. “Just keep looking forward, keep calm,” he says.

  Two reporters leave the sidewalk in pursuit, as if in a race to see who mows her down first. A chubby man huffs up beside John, shirt-tails flapping and chinos sagging below his bouncing belly. On Ruby’s side, a blonde, coiffed hair bobbed at her chin, approaches with mincing steps, legs constrained by a tight scarlet suit. Stiletto-heeled Barbie shoes churn up divots in her wake. “Ms. Leander,” she calls, “what do you want to say to the parents of the child you stole?” The voice is barfly-rough, a surprise from such a perky, petite body. “Ruby, what do you have to say?”

  Ruby just hums the daffy song and concentrates on John’s sure grip of her hand. He weaves her through the scattering of cars left at day’s end in the government lot toward an old white Land Cruiser, a spiderweb of cracked windshield sparkling in the sun. John yanks open the passenger door, helps Ruby inside. Before she can buckle her seat belt, he is climbing in the driver’s seat, tossing his briefcase in the back.

  “Good thing I drove today.” The engine spurts to life. “I usually just walk over from my office, but I ran an errand before court.”

  In the side mirror, Ruby watches the little red reporter pat her helmet hair in place. “Well,” she says, with fake cheer, “My grandmother always said life is an adventure or it is nothing at all.” Of course the old bird’s definition of adventure was trying a new hybrid of tomato plant.

  THIRTY-EIGHT

  John drives a circuitous route to Ruby’s house. He checks the rearview mirror, trying to spot any cars tailing them. Mrs. Levy transferred the house to Ruby through a trust, so it may take the media awhile to locate the address, but they will find it, in this world of computer search engines. Ruby grips
the strap above the door as John takes corners as if he were drag racing. Nausea roils in her stomach, yet this is no morning sickness that will pass after a few saltines.

  They are all there when John drops off Ruby at her house. The Ms, Chaz, Antoinette. And Clyde. The dog leaps off the front porch, barrels down the drive to greet her, almost knocks her on her can. He jumps up, puts his front paws on her shoulders, gives a quick lick to every inch of exposed skin, then races back up to the porch ahead of her, barking, “She is home, she is home.” When he reaches the porch, Clyde spins around on his heels and looks beyond Ruby. The confusion and disappointment register on his face; his other human is not home.

  The Ms grab Ruby in a two-sided hug; Margaret pats Ruby’s cheek with pruney fingers—she hasn’t been away from the salon for long. Chaz elbows Margaret aside, jokes, “Hey, you’ve got your own girl.” He squeezes Ruby, lifts her until her feet dangle and the shoes she borrowed from Antoinette fall to the porch. He sets her back on her feet, gives her a loud, smacking kiss. His lips taste of beer and worry.

  Ruby steps toward the door, then turns back. She can’t do it, can’t go inside that Larkless house. Chaz breaks her fall as she crumples to the porch, pulling him down with her. She lays her head in his lap as if she were a child. In the corner of the porch ceiling, Louie, Lark’s “pet” bat, hangs upside down, undisturbed by the commotion, sleeping until the prime hunting hours. She wonders if he misses Lark, too.

  She doesn’t know how long she lies there. At some point the Ms and Antoinette leave, whispering good-byes and promises to call later. With Clyde whimpering beside them, Ruby stays there in Chaz’s lap. Her legs fall asleep. Her back muscles tighten into knots of wood. The bat takes off for his night’s adventures. And still she can’t bear to go inside.