Bones are Made to be Broken

by Anderson, Paul Michael

  “A bowling alley,” Lisa said. How the hell would Karen learn about a church in Harmarville in the first place? she thought. “This bowling alley have a name?”

  “Arsenal Lanes,” McCarrick said. “Closed down about two years ago. No one out in the Heroin Hills liked to bowl, I guess.”

  “Thanks, Rich.”

  “You gonna tell me what this is about—”

  “I’ll tell you the next time you beat Mitch at blackjack,” she said and cradled the phone.

  She sat a moment, then launched herself from her desk and marched down to the kitchen, saying hi to those who called out to her but not knowing who did and grabbed the Spring 1989 phonebook again. She ignored everyone on the way back to her office.

  She grabbed her phone receiver and dialed a number in the county courthouse, flipping through the book to BOWLING and finding the address.

  Doesn’t mean that Karen’s church is the same place, a voice told her and she told it to shut the hell up.

  She heard the line click open. “Andrea? Hi—it’s Lisa over at Fenelli Financial. I was wondering if you could do a favor for me and pull some land records? Do you have a minute?”

  Thursday afternoon and Karen stood beside her car as Kevin’s bus pulled up with a hiss of airbrakes and threw open its doors.

  The crossing guard walked into the center of the intersection as kids poured into the street. Karen stiffened as the Perozzi girls came galumphing—that was the word that occurred to her, the only word to describe the stomp-shuffle they did—off the bus and crossed. Halfway up 54th Street, the Perozzi brother stopped walking down to meet them and waited instead.

  (he can’t handle himself)

  This thought was an arrow across her mind. She tried mentally following it, but saw the top of Kevin’s head, last in line off the bus.

  (god kevin’s so small)

  Kevin stepped off the bus, head down, the doors swooshing shut behind him. The knee of his jeans was torn, the denim threads covering an awkwardly placed Band-Aid.

  Karen’s heart knocked hard against her chest. “Hon?”

  He looked up and, although he didn’t smile, his eyes lightened.

  “Hi, Mum,” he said.

  They started for the car. “What happened to your knee, kiddo?” She pointed.

  Kevin glanced down, but not before she saw his eyes darken. “Oh. Fell on the playground. Tripped.” He didn’t look back up.

  (lying)

  “Are you sure that’s what happened?” she asked, opening the passenger door for him, striving to keep her voice light.

  “Uh-huh,” he said, buckling his seatbelt and settling his backpack in his lap.

  She closed the door, but didn’t immediately go around to the other side. She watched him through the window. He looked at his backpack, fingers playing with the zipper of the main pocket.

  (why won’t you tell me?)

  (what could you do?)

  He glanced at her, and she went around to the other side, letting herself in. She got the Sundance started and coasted to the light.

  “Are you all right at school?” she asked.

  Immediate, but flat: “Uh-huh, Mum.”

  “No one gives you trouble.”

  “Nuh-uh.”

  She glanced at him. “Not even those Perozzi girls?” she asked.

  His head darted up and she saw his true expression for an instant: fear. It was in the widening of his eyes, the slight unhinging of his mouth.

  And then his face tightened again. “No, Mum. They don’t trouble me.”

  She opened her mouth—what eight-year-old used that turn of phrase?—when the light changed. She started up the hill of 54th Street.

  “I can’t help you if you don’t talk,” she said, turning onto Keystone Street.

  Roberts’s voice in her head:

  (no amount of talking will heal you no amount of sharing will empower you)

  “It’s okay to get hurt and say something about it,” she said, turning onto 53rd Street.

  “I’m fine, Mum,” he said in a I can deal with it tone. “There’s nothing to talk about.”

  (that’s not to say nothing’s happening)

  She pulled in front of their house.

  “If you’re sure,” she said, lingering on the last word. “Get inside and get your homework done. I’ll be home at five.”

  “Bye, Mum,” he said, taking his house key from his backpack and getting out of the car.

  She watched him let himself into the house and close the door before she drove away.

  Kevin didn’t look back once.

  You’re edging into marshy territory, ol’ kid ol’ sock, Lisa thought, elbows planted on her desk, fingers steepled against her temples. Land records, sales reports, property inspections covered her desktop blotter. All available to the public.

  You’re not really going to do this, are you?

  Lisa dry-washed her face. She tried to do what she never did—think things through.

  This is crossing a line, the voice of reason, weak from ill-use, told her. Someone with a higher paygrade looks your way, and you’re going to have trouble explaining.

  “Shit,” she muttered and pulled back in her chair. Beyond her office, the sounds of the bullpen drifted in, pepped up with the coming weekend. Only nine in the morning, but everyone out there moved like it was thirty minutes till five.

  She eyeballed the reports some more. The property once known as Arsenal Lanes had been purchased by one Darren Roberts in November of 1990. No business license, no 503-c4 application, which denoted seeking religious tax exempt status.

  Which left one option.

  Is this something Karen would want you to do? the voice of reason asked. As a friend?

  But, she’d gotten Karen to admit to cutting, had gotten her to stop cutting and harming herself.

  What if this church was just another form of cutting? she thought.

  She reached for the phone and dialed.

  Karen picked up at the other end. “Ryall Construction,” she piped. “How may I direct your call?”

  “You sound like a natural, kiddo.”

  Karen chuckled. It grated on Lisa’s ears. “I didn’t know I was auditioning. What’s up?”

  “Kevin going to his dad’s tonight?”

  A drop in temperature across the phone line. “Uh-huh.”

  “Thought we could have a girls night,” she said. “Split a bottle of wine, rent Pretty Woman from Vern’s Video, talk trash on Julia Roberts.”

  “I can’t,” Karen said, each word sounding as if pulled from her mouth. “I have … church.”

  Lisa paused to make it sound like she was thinking. “That’s that St. Jude’s place, right? In Harmarville?”

  She could hear Karen hesitate. “Uh-huh.”

  “That’s a weekly thing?”

  Now the hesitation was excruciating. “Uh-huh.”

  “Is it, like, a traditional church?” Lisa asked. “Like sermons and stuff? Most churches meet on Sunday.”

  “Um,” Karen said. “It’s, like, talking to each other. Fellowship. Dr. Roberts—”

  Lisa’s eyes snapped to her paperwork.

  “—leads us in discussions,” Karen said, “but mostly we just talk to each other.”

  “Well, that sucks,” Lisa said, forcing to keep her voice light. “For me getting drunk, not for you.” She voiced a laugh that made her wince inwardly. “Next week, then?”

  She could hear the relief in Karen’s voice. “Of course.”

  “Right, then, back to work for both of us,” Lisa said.

  They got off the phone and Lisa stared at the paperwork for an instant, thinking of Karen not cutting but looking worse. Thinking of Karen blowing off her own son until nearly midnight.

  Why aren’t you talking to me, kiddo? she thought.

  She apparently has other people to talk to, came the answer.

  Yes, but who were these people?

  She picked up the receiver again and d
ialed an extension.

  When the line picked up, she said, “Hey, Tim—I need to run a background check. Can we set that up?” She listened. “It’s kinda a rushjob. Something’s hinky about a prospect and the numbers and I want to feel it out. Just some exploring. Is that possible?”

  She listened some more. “Awesome. No—I’ll come to you.”

  Karen made an honest effort to listen to the members of the congregation speak, but everything they said passed cleanly through her, leaving no impression.

  In her head, silence filled the space.

  The silence of wounds left hidden—

  (it’s okay to get hurt and say something about it)

  (i’m fine mum)

  —and the silence of potential wounds to come.

  (nick not even glancing at her tonight as kevin slid into the passenger seat saying just a few words—”same time sunday then?”—before driving away with their son)

  Nick was exploring a custody suit—and, oh, the clench of pain in her chest at acknowledging that. Nick, who had left their son in her care when they divorced, now trying to take their son away from her. Their relationship when it came to Kevin had always been cordial; whatever existing wreckage of their marriage hadn’t gotten in the way of raising Kevin.

  She couldn’t remember the last time they’d spoken on the phone—not since last spring, at least. How much did she own that? She’d never even noticed, not until Alan Ladd had called her, of the changing in Nick’s attitudes towards her.

  Nick doubted her parenting.

  (who am i if i’m not a mother?)

  Kevin wasn’t talking. His near-outburst when they’d first heard Alan Ladd’s voice was an ancient myth, present only in her memories. He didn’t talk about school, or his weekends with his father. He watched her as he watched everything else—with a mask of reserve, as if allowing someone to see his thought-process or opinion was something he could never allow. And he was only eight.

  (that look of fear at the mention of the perozzi girls the quick peek at how he really felt but never said)

  How much of that was her fault? How much had he picked up from her not talking, from constantly pushing things under, and how much was affecting his attitude now?

  “Everything we’ve experienced informs how we act,” Roberts said, pulling her from her thoughts. He stood in the center of the circle. “Like a dog kicked so many times that it shies from all human touch, no matter the intent. This gets to the truth of ourselves and those we encounter. Sometimes all we can do is flinch, regardless of why the other person is reaching out. That’s why the idea of healing, of talking it out and seeking absolution, pervades. The Catholics have had the confessional since time immemorial, but does exposing your sins mean the sins no longer exist? Do a handful of ‘Our Fathers’ mean that we are washed clean?”

  He waved his hand at a middle-aged woman with hair the color of copper-piping. “Gloria’s story tonight made me remember that one of us is no longer here.”

  He nodded to an empty seat between Adam and a young black gentleman with burn scars on his face.

  “Elliot hasn’t been here in weeks,” Roberts said. “I don’t know why. But I can guess. Even after I tell people, ‘I can’t help you,’ they still hold out hope. They still believe absolution awaits those who share with others. Is that why Elliot came here?” He shrugged. “I can’t say, although I suspected. You all have a posture when you speak—you look down, you mumble. Sometimes you gloss over the really aching parts until I drag them out of you. Elliot looked at us, at me, as he spoke, and I never needed to coax him.”

  He surveyed each of them. “He was seeking the non-Catholic version of confession. He wanted me to offer my little speeches in a way that made him feel better. And I can’t.” He shrugged again. “I can only do what you do, give you space to do it. Only by acknowledging the pain can you help yourself be who you are but here’s the core truth: the pain has to get so bad that it’s impossible to ignore it. But it comes from yourself.”

  Roberts sat back down. “All right—who’s next?”

  The bus rolled to a stop and the crossing guard walked into the center of the street. Kids spilled out onto the sidewalk and around the Perozzi brother. It occurred to her to wonder why he wasn’t in school.

  Amidst the other children, the Perozzi girls ran up to him. The group—

  (like a fan club for the peanuts character pig pen)

  —pulled away from the other kids, but didn’t immediately leave.

  Kevin stepped off the bus, looking for and seeing her car immediately. He started for her and, looking around, saw the Perozzis. He gave them a wide berth—

  (like a dog kicked so many times)

  —as he a made a bee-line to Karen’s car.

  Karen flicked a glance at the Perozzis and caught them following his progress. The oldest of the girls spoke to the brother as they watched. Karen’s hands tightened on the steering wheel.

  Kevin came around to the passenger side and let himself in. “Hi, Mum,” he said, buckling his seatbelt.

  She forced herself to turn away, look at her son. “Hey, hon. Good day at school?”

  She didn’t miss the way his eyes cut to the Perozzi children, even if his expression never changed. “Uh-huh.”

  (why won’t you say something?)

  (the pain has to get so bad that it’s impossible to ignore it)

  “That’s the best you can hope for on a Monday,” she said, barely hearing herself, and started the car. She gripped the steering wheel so tightly the veins stood out in the back of her hand, but she didn’t ask Kevin about the Perozzis.

  (this is the place where you can be who you truly are)

  Roberts’s voice and she finds herself back in the dream field, looking up the dead hill where, an instant before, her mother had held a single glittering razorblade.

  His voice comes on the rushing, awful breeze, unhurried in spite of the wind’s force:

  (here there is no schism between who you are and who you want to be)

  “I don’t even know that that means,” she mutters. She starts up the hill. The deep bone-ache, the poison in the soil, leaches into her skin, making her grimace with every movement.

  (in the waking world you struggle between your pain and your responsibility—as a parent, as an adult, as an employee)

  (there is no struggle here)

  (here your pain can inform your responsibility)

  Her feet sink into the soft ground, her muscles groan at the effort of pushing her up. She reaches the top of the hill and, across the way, sees two things, locked within the same space and looping together, like frames of undeveloped film laid atop one another:

  In one, Kevin stands there, as he stood in the kitchen doorway when they heard Alan Ladd’s message—his face red, his hands clenched at his sides, struggling not to cry. He hitches in one breath after another.

  In the other, Kevin giving something a wide berth—the only way to differentiate between the two images, when the second Kevin steps aside the first—his flat expressionless face never changing.

  (this place served a purpose when you were younger)

  Roberts’s voice, a soft, coaxing whisper in her ears.

  (it still does whether you know it or not)

  Her eyes drift to the collapsing structure, now barely two hills away, but keep getting pulled back to Kevin—Kevin struggling not to cry, Kevin avoiding his tormentors.

  (you see it don’t you karen?)

  A sudden ache that has nothing to do with the poisoned atmosphere stabs her chest, making her gasp. The pain is her essential motherness.

  (this is your chance to not be a failure of a mother)

  (to know exactly what kind of mother you are)

  (a mother guides her child through experiences and its experiences that inform how we will act)

  It’s uncertain when she began repeating, “No, no, no,” hadn’t even noticed she’s saying anything at all until she was screaming it at the
vision, at the sky, at the structure and its mysterious presence, until her screaming brings darkness and—

  —she was crying it into her pillow.

  She opened her eyes, the cool feel of her tears soaking into the fabric startling her, cutting off the muffled chant.

  Behind her, the alarm clock continued to deet-deet-deet its wake-up call.

  Karen sat up, trying to shake the image of Kevin avoiding the Perozzis and struggling not to cry from her head.

  (you see it don’t you karen?)

  “Oh, Jesus,” she muttered, her voice thick. She heard Kevin down the hall, his light snoring.

  (what kind of a mother are you?)

  (it’s experiences that inform how we will act)

  The image lingered, until her heart slowed down, until her breathing eased. Until she sat up straighter.

  Tim had promised a rushjob on the background check, just a skim-ming of the surface, and it was due any day. By lunch on Tuesday, she quit pretending she knew what she was doing and shut down her computer, put on the outgoing message on her phone, and got the hell out of work.

  She skirted the downtown rush of traffic and turned onto the Boulevard of the Allies, which fed the Hathaway Bridge and the 376-East Parkway, only to see that the Hathaway Bridge was closed with detour signs aimed for the Parkway.

  “Fuck!” she yelled, smacking the steering wheel, and cut into the Parkway lane, ignoring the angry honking of those behind her. It took her almost an hour to, through the detour, reach the other side of the Hathaway Bridge.

  Most people in Hathaway didn’t venture south into Harmarville. When Hathaway had been a booming coal city last century, Harmarville had been the apex of prosperity. When coal left, so did the prosperity, and only despair had filled the void.

  Today’s goal, children, she thought, is to see where Karen would rather be than with her own kid.

  Lisa had memorized the old Arsenal Lanes address and found Vernazza Road easily enough. She topped a rise and, on the right, the Arsenal Lanes property—she couldn’t think of it as a church—unfolded: the squat building in the center of an ocean of cracked concrete, like a desert island you never wanted to find yourself washed up on.