The Night Child

by Anna Quinn

  Nora looks at Fiona’s innocent face, at the pink candy heart in her small hand, at the words kiss me, and at once something is wrong—nausea rises in her throat. She cups her hand over her mouth, jumps up, runs to the bathroom, and vomits.

  “Mommy?”

  Nora flushes the toilet, grabs a towel from the rack, sits on the edge of the tub, and wipes her face. Fiona stands in the doorway looking as if she might cry.

  “Mommy, are you okay?”

  “Yes, yes, of course I am honey,” she says, struggling to talk. “I think I just ate something bad for lunch, that’s all. I’ll be all right. Now could you brush your teeth please, and I’ll be right there to tuck you in.”

  The phone rings. She walks to the bedroom to answer it. It’s John.

  “Nora—God. I’m so sorry to tell you this,” he says.

  She already knows. “Elizabeth?” she says faintly, sits down soft on the bed.

  “Two hours ago. Cut her wrists,” he says, his voice choking up. “No note.” The suffering large in his throat.

  The phone cold in her hand. No, Elizabeth. Not this. She closes her eyes. Of course there wouldn’t be a note. Elizabeth had already left plenty of fucking notes.

  “Fuck,” she says into the phone. John says something, but she can’t hear him through the aching.

  “Mommy, are you coming?” shouts Fiona. Nora whispers goodbye to John and hangs up the phone and stands up slowly, walks slowly to Fiona’s room. Fiona is still playing with the candy hearts.

  “Mommy,” Fiona giggles, jumping up and down on her bed, pushing a candy heart into Nora’s face, “you still haven’t done what the heart says!” And she begins to chant loudly in a singsong voice, “Kiss me! Kiss me! Kiss me!”

  Something ugly and huge pushes and thrashes inside Nora’s head and fury forces its way out and the enormous hand of it slaps the heart from Fiona’s tiny hand and the heart flies across the room, hits the closet, and drops to the floor. The fury can see that the heart is still alive—the kiss me gapes mockingly. The fury leaps at it. Dares it to continue gaping, but the kiss me doesn’t stop and the abominable feet of the fury pounds the cursed heart to pieces, again and again and again, using all its strength to kill it, to smash it to dust, to death, to silence. Such strength, but there! The fury has done it. The fury has won.

  Dead silence now.

  A soft whimper from the bed.

  Nora blinks, blinks, blinks. Heart thudding. Oh, God. Oh, God. Oh, God. Something’s happened. Pink dust by her feet. What the hell happened? She remembers the fury rising, but nothing more. Margaret? Oh, God.

  Nora turns to see Fiona on the bed, stuffing all the candy hearts back into the box as fast as she can, tears streaming down her face.

  “Oh, Fiona.”

  Fiona shoves the box of hearts into her nightstand drawer, climbs back into bed, and pulls the covers over herself so that not even her head shows. Muffled sobs build up and spill out, pool in a pink liquid around Nora’s feet.

  Nora feels small and evil. The lump of her daughter hiding under the blanket cuts her deep.

  “Oh, Fiona,” she says softly and climbs into the bed, uncovering her and taking her in her arms. “I’m so sorry, sweetheart, I’m so sorry.” Fiona pushes herself into Nora then, thumb in her mouth, sucking hard, cradled in Nora’s arms until she falls, finally, asleep.

  Nora arrives at the bottom of the stairs just as Paul comes in the door, alcohol on his breath. She’d heard his keys fighting the lock.

  “Whoa. You don’t look so good,” he says.

  “Damn you,” she whispers and walks into the kitchen.

  Paul shrugs off his coat, hangs it in the closet. “Hey, sorry I’m late. But you got my message, right? That work was a barn burner?”

  “Really?” she says, with an exhausted edge, pouring herself a glass of red wine. She sits at the table and stares at the glass. Paul pours himself a glass of Jameson and sits across from her.

  “What’s wrong?” he says.

  She sips in silence for a moment. “You weren’t working late,” she says looking at him, tapping her index fingernail unconsciously on the thin stem of her glass. “You weren’t working late,” she says again, even though she should have said, “Something horrible happened when you were gone.” She keeps on tap-tap-tap-tap-tap-tap-tap-tap-tap-tapping until he speaks and then she stops tapping.

  “What are you talking about?”

  “You were with Elisa.” She needs to be careful now. She begins tapping again. Stares at Paul. She taps for a minute or two. His eyes, weighted with guilt, light fires inside her. “You’re fucking her,” she says.

  His face reddens. He drains his glass, gets up from the table, and goes to the cupboard. He takes the Jameson down again and pours himself another glass. “And what if I am?” he says, finally. “What the hell do you care? We haven’t had sex in months! Do you realize that? Do you? And even then, it was like fucking a corpse. You go all rigid the second I put my hands on you.” He rakes his fingers through his hair, paces around the kitchen. “Jesus, this is not what a marriage is supposed to be like. I want more than this, Nora.”

  She blinks through swimming eyes at the raised lettering on her glass: the kalaloch lodge. Paul had stolen this glass at Thanksgiving, smuggled it from the dining room under his tweed jacket, given it to her as memory of the weekend. He’s right. She shouldn’t care he’s fucking Elisa. He deserves better than this. “I’m going to bed,” she says, standing up, wiping her eyes.

  “Admit it!” he says, flinging the words like stones. “You hate sex! You dress like a boy! You always have! You’re so thin you look like a boy! And since all your ‘therapy’”—he makes quotation marks with his fingers around the word “therapy”—“it’s … it’s like you’re not even here! You’re a zombie! Shit, Nora, what do you expect me to do? Be a monk for the rest of my life?”

  She’s silent for a long time, then turns from him and walks heavily up the stairs to the bathroom. She closes the door and locks it securely behind her.

  She removes her clothes, slowly, her body trembling. She doesn’t remember the last time she’d looked at herself without clothes. Now completely naked, her breathing shallow, in the mirror: her body, the straight and narrow of it, hardly there hips and flat, not-quite breasts looking blank, transparent as clear glass. If not for the curls of blonde hair between her stick legs, a boy’s body.

  There is a knock at the door. She wraps herself in a towel, opens it, tears welling up in her eyes. She will apologize. Ask for help.

  “Nora,” he says, his mouth tight as a leather strap, “I’m, I’m—” and when she thinks he is going to apologize, say she doesn’t look like a boy, he says, “I’m going out.”

  Once he’s gone, Nora walks to the bedroom and covers her naked body with a flannel nightgown. In bed, she tries not to think about Elizabeth and Paul and the things he said and how she hates her body, hates sex and always has. And now, in her mind, here is Elizabeth, Oh, God, no, Elizabeth. God, I’m so sorry. And now, her mind is in high school, down in Bobby Baker’s basement and everyone is touching and rubbing and Bobby is touching her, his clammy hands under her sweater grabbing her breasts and she lets him and she feels nothing. And now here is another boy tearing off her Levi’s and fucking her, saying fucking her is like fucking a corpse and her wishing she’d die. And how for years after that, until Paul, she’d kept her distance from men. And now, Paul is fucking Elisa. And Elizabeth is dead. She reaches in her nightstand drawer for a sleeping pill. She swallows it and floats away.

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  February 2, 1997

  Nora rolls over in bed, looks at the alarm clock. 7:00 a.m., which means 9:00 a.m. in Chicago. James will be awake. She needs to hear her brother’s voice.

  “You did what?” he says when she tells him about the school meeting, how she’d punched a paren
t in the stomach. Usually, she can tell him most anything, but today she can’t bring herself to tell him more than this. She cannot tell him about the hallucinations and the heart of dust (she’s ashamed) and the fights with Paul and that she suspects he’s having an affair. James doesn’t like Paul and will only tell her to leave him and he’ll get all wired up and right now she only has the energy to tell him one other thing.

  “James, a student of mine—Elizabeth—do you remember her? I’ve talked about her?”

  “Vaguely.”

  “She died. She’s dead.”

  “God.”

  “She’s fifteen and she killed herself.”

  “Nora.”

  “And I knew, I knew her father was molesting her, I knew it, and … and … I didn’t do anything. I didn’t do anything, I—”

  “Nora—”

  She whispers into the phone, “James, I miss you. Will you come here? Can you come here?”

  “Nora. I’ve got something to tell you.” His voice choked with feeling. “You might not want me to come after I tell you.”

  “James, what?”

  Silence.

  “I’ve … I’ve seen dad. He’s … he’s in a nursing home in Rochester.”

  Silence.

  An exploding within her. The fury rises up, huge and violent until there is hardly space to breathe and all she can think about is crashing through the bedroom window and killing the beast once and for all, cutting it to pieces, every artery, every vein, the rotten meat dripping and smelling of blood, but now David’s voice in her mind, “You’re in charge. You’re in charge.” She won’t let the fury take over. She won’t, she won’t, she won’t, she won’t.

  “Nora, are you there? Talk to me!”

  She hangs up the phone and grabs the railings of her headboard. She is in charge. “Stop!” she yells. “Stop!” And to her shock, the fury abates slightly, the throbbing dulling ever so slightly, though it is still there, coiled, ready to spring. The alarm clock rings. Brrrring! Brrrrring! Brrrring! Oh, God. School. Time to get Fiona to school.

  She watches herself then, watches herself stand up, so calm and cool, watches herself dress, watches herself wake Fiona, dress and feed Fiona, and when the phone rings and she hears James pleading on the machine, “Nora, please call me back,” she watches herself wink at her daughter, hears herself tell Fiona she’ll call James back later, that now it’s time to walk to school.

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  February 2, 1997

  The walk to school with Fiona grounds her a bit—the cold air with its salty bite fusing with traffic exhaust and cigarette smoke from pedestrians huddled together at bus stops. Holding her daughter’s small, light hand, the removed feeling of watching herself, the suspension between realities begins to dissipate, but the genesis of it—this terror about her father still in her chest—Be careful not to scare yourself, David keeps telling her. Still. What should she tell herself? Look what happened with Fiona! Look what happened when James called!

  “Mommy, shout out the chimes with me!” The cathedral bells of St. John’s ring in the distance, and Fiona calls out, “One o’clock! Two o’clock! Three o’clock, Four o’clock! Shout it with me, Mommy!”

  Nora wills herself to count, wills herself to stay present. They shout out, “Five o’clock, six o’clock, seven o’clock, eight o’clock!” This is who I am, she thinks. A mother with her daughter, walking to school, singing to the bells. Everything will be all right.

  They arrive at Lowell Elementary School. Red-cheeked children run around the lawn near the entrance, all boots and mittens and hats leaping on crusted piles of dirty snow, making snowballs that fall apart as soon as they throw them. Mothers and fathers, grandparents and neighbors cluster on the sidewalk, keeping an eye on their children and gossiping until the bell rings. As Nora and Fiona get close, heads spin. Stare. A few parents greet Nora awkwardly but turn quickly away. Karen Matthews glares at Nora in such a way that heat slides across Nora’s face like another skin, slides down her neck, and pools in the space between her breasts. Matthews is the volunteer coordinator for the school district and knows everything about everyone. Of course she knows about Nora’s leave of absence. Even though Bill Guenther didn’t press charges and it’s been kept out of the paper, Capitol Hill is a tight community. They all know by now.

  The bell rings. Phil Johnson walks by her, holding his son’s hand. He whispers in her ear, “Guenther’s an asshole. Good for you.”

  “Come say hi to Ms. Monica,” Fiona says, tugging on Nora’s hand. “You haven’t seen her in forever! And also, guess what?”

  “What, honey?”

  “She’s having a baby!”

  “She is?” Nora has missed things. She’d stopped walking Fiona to school weeks ago when Paul insisted he wanted the extra time with Fiona, insisted she get more rest.

  Once they are in the kindergarten classroom, Fiona runs to hang up her coat and put away her lunch box. A very pregnant Monica in a flowery flannel dress walks over to Nora, takes her hand, and squeezes. “Nora, it’s been ages. How are you?”

  Monica knows. Nora can see it in her eyes.

  “I’ve been better,” she says. And for a moment, considers saying more, considers saying, “I’m losing my mind and the world is such a fucked-up place,” but Monica is young, and hope and innocence are growing inside her.

  Monica lowers her voice, tucks a bunch of her long brown hair behind an ear. “I’m … umm … sorry about what happened.” Her cheeks flush pink, and she nervously runs her hand across her round belly. “That must have been terrible.”

  Nora nods, turns to watch Fiona, who is carrying a red bucket of chalk over to a small easel in the corner.

  “And then that girl—the girl who killed herself? God. Did you know her?”

  “Yes,” Nora says in a low voice, keeping her eyes focused on her daughter. “A beautiful girl, gone.” She turns back to the young woman, looks in her wide, green eyes. “Don’t think of these things now, honey,” she says. “You’re having a baby, a perfect miracle.” She reaches out to touch the pregnant belly but quickly stops, her hand hanging there like a frozen bird, but Monica takes her hand then and places it firmly on herself, startling Nora into a panic—she doesn’t want to dirty it, the child, she doesn’t want to dirty the child, jerks the hand away again and Monica’s eyes are hurt and confused, but now Fiona is here, grabbing her other hand, “Mommy, come see the bug house!” and Nora saying to Monica, “Forgive me,” and here’s the bug house and then the bell and finally she can get out of here, but on the way home the words “Dad’s here” close in and she has to run, she has to run, she has to run.

  The clank and bang of the ferry terminals and the waves slamming against pilings and gulls squawking so tortuously loud she covers her ears and the street’s already crowded with tourists, all of them staring at her, pity plastered across their faces, and she runs faster until she sees up ahead the old man who squats near the Starbucks doorway each day, the one with the opaque eyes who strums quiet on his guitar, a bottle of vodka lying at his side like a dazed girlfriend. When Nora is near him, she stops and leans against the brick wall, slides her hands from her ears, and allows the music to absorb her, the mauve notes and delicate arcs and spirals soften and ease her mind, and slowly she becomes more herself. The music hypnotic, carrying her back to her grandfather.

  Sundays, her grandfather played his accordion on the sidewalk in front of Paddy Mac’s Bar, a hand-rolled smoke dangling from his mouth, the limestone waters of Loch Measca in the background. “La Castagnari,” he’d say in an Italian accent to tourists asking about the accordion, and he would show them how with a single button he made one note on the draw and another on the pull. And she would sit on the bench, watching, his hands yellowed and weathered from years of tilling and pulling and coaxing impotent Irish dirt to render, to yield something into his hands.
His fingers skittering over buttons, notes flying fast over the loch, the bogs, the way he compressed and expanded the bellows, allowing its breath, its vibrations made sounds inside her body. Sometimes he’d lay the accordion on her lap. His huge hands guiding her small ones through leather straps, pressing her fingers on the buttons. “What do you feel?” he’d ask, and she’d shrug she didn’t know. “Do you feel green like tangled ivy or yellow as the hawthorn blossom or black like the raven?” he’d ask and wink at her and make her laugh. And when she’d tell him her color, he’d show her the buttons that created the color, and she’d play feelings she couldn’t even imagine.

  A teenager yells to the old man, “Rock it, dude!” and startles Nora, but no matter, she is slightly better now. As she walks away, she floats a dollar into the old man’s guitar case, and he gives her a wink, and she smiles back. Along the boardwalk a young woman with a diamond in her nose and bleached white hair spiking wildly out of her head sells white freesias and red anemones from a little cart. Nora chooses the red anemones.

  “They’re beautiful, yes?” the woman says.

  “Resurrection,” Nora whispers.

  “Huh?” the woman says, plucking the flowers from their metal pails with her long fingers, the word luck tattooed across her knuckles, silver rings covering half of each finger.

  Quietly and slowly, because she still feels disturbed from all the emotions of the morning but is determined to work her way back to normal, Nora tells her the story of Adonis and Aphrodite, how the two young lovers had gone hunting and how a wild boar gored Adonis to death, and Aphrodite sprinkled nectar on his wounds, and crimson anemones sprung up where each drop of his blood had fallen.

  The woman wraps the dripping anemones carefully in newspaper and passes them to Nora, her black eyes kind and attentive. “Thank you,” she says. “Take care.”