“What happened to you?”
He sits up and fingers his belt buckle. There is no bulge under it, though. It’s an empty gesture. A trying.
When we first moved to Shady Pines I used to turn to Ray at night, thinking if he thought I wanted his sweat and hands and pain, it would be over sooner, that he’d let me go earlier each night, that maybe he would give me grace.
Grace is my favorite church word. A state of being. Something you can pray for. Something God can grant. Something you can obtain. Perfection is out of reach. But grace—grace you can reach for.
“Nothing,” he says. “Well, my parents. Disappointed, you know, ’cause I’m not smart or anything, not good at stuff. I’m like my real dad, who up and ran away.”
“But your sister’s perfect.”
“Your face,” he says, blinking like he’s asleep and trying to wake up. “You—you look funny when you talk about her. Like you want to eat her, or something. Swallow her up whole.” He shakes his head, closes his eyes.
Will he go to sleep? If he does, I could—could I leave now?
I wait one breath, two, twenty. Then whisper his name. “Jake?”
“Want to enjoy this,” he says, sullen fly buzz back in his voice. “Not think about things. And you … you don’t like me at all, do you?”
“No,” I say, and watch his eyes fly open, mouth drop into a little round O I could twist my fingers into, knotting his lips before squeezing his jaw. Bending him back, forcing him down. He would do it, I think.
He would break.
I lean over, put my mouth on his. Bite his lip, feel the flesh, soft and tender, caught between my teeth. Hear his startled, slow yelp.
Watch him wipe his mouth when I pull away, no hand raised, no words, no voice. He’s just still. Silent.
Just like I sit with Ray. Just like I am when Ray reaches for me.
“Be here tomorrow,” I say, and leave. I don’t even stop to look at Annabel before I go, just walk to the bus, the taste of his broken mouth in mine.
Now I know why Ray does not care about food, why he eats the same meals over and over, why all the things that cramp my stomach with want mean nothing to him. I am all filled up, head to toe crammed with having Jake sitting there watching me. Those wide drugged eyes, and what was behind them.
Fear.
39
RAY KNOWS WHEN I GET HOME. OF course he knows, senses I have seen what he understands and watches me walk toward him, grinning wide. You did it, Alice, he says, you found out when she’s coming back and it’s tomorrow, no question in his voice, fact, Ray owns the world, he makes what he wants happen, and I nod yes.
He says, Come here. He says, You’re my pretty girl. You’re my forever girl. My girl. My Alice.
He pinches the stub of my left breast hard, then grabs the right and hauls me in, face changing, smile shifting into his real one, all gums and teeth. Ready to tear.
He says, Do you see what time it is? He says, Do you know how long I’ve been here, waiting?
I look at the cable box. 5:02 it says in red, 5:02, and I am supposed to be home before then, I should always be home when Ray gets there, should always be waiting for him and he says—
He says, Do you think you can do this without me, you think you can have some kind of—pause—spit hot on my face—fun? You think some boy is fun?
Shaking me now, my head and neck go SNAP back and forth.
You think you were having fun?
No Ray no I swear I just—
You just what—? Watching my face, thumb tracing my lips, pressing hard.
He won’t be a problem I got him to come tomorrow and he will and Annabel will be there, she’s all better, he said so, she’ll be there waiting and she’s so pretty you’ll like her Ray you’ll love her I’ll hold her down, hold her hands while you show her how to behave.
“And that’s all?” Fingers in my hair, tearing, pushing me down onto the floor.
“That’s all, he’s nothing, you know it, I know you know it.”
Teeth snapping by my neck. Whisper, I do. I know everything.
Now everything is familiar. He says, You need me. You love me. Say it. Say it.
Say it, I have said it, I will say it now. I talk until my voice dries up. Words are just letters, A-L-I-C-E, and I know the ones he wants to hear.
Ray sits me on his lap and gives me sips of water after, crackers and a tiny piece of cheese, a special dinner, the cheese coming from his own food, a sandwich he bought, a large roll with meat oozing out the sides.
Mine, he says, but I’ll share it with you. Soft kisses on my tender skin and I look at the ceiling so my flesh won’t creep away from him.
He says, Kissing it better, you see? Making you all better. Aren’t you better?
I nod. Stare at the ceiling and think that soon Annabel will be here. Soon I will not be alone.
40
ONCE UPON A TIME, THERE WAS A little girl. She took long showers every night, swimming in the water rushing over her and washing her hair till it squeaked when she ran her hands down it, parents sighing why do you have to be so clean?
It was like she knew, in a way. Like that water was grace and soon she would not be able to find it. Soon nothing would make her more than what she was.
Nothing would make her whole.
41
RAY IS READY IN THE MORNING. HE wakes me up early, before the sun is even up, taking me by the hand—circle around the wrist, his fingers overlap my bones easily—to the shower.
“Today’s the day,” he says. “I want you to look special for our little girl.”
He does not want me shaving the hair on my legs or under my arms, other Alice tried something, I think. Ray once talked about red water and Alice’s hurt wrists in his sleep, anger waking him up and sending him crush-crashing into me.
Sometimes I think if I could meet other Alice I would hold her head under water myself.
He hands me a cream to use and I stare at its bright label as I smear it on me; strange, strong odor, flowers and something that makes the inside of my nose burn. He would wax me all over but it costs a lot, and Ray believes in saving. Plus my stinging legs and armpits, when smooth, will still never equal the tenderness of the stripped skin between my legs, so what would there be for him to savor?
He does not like to see me with the cream on, does not like the smell or the reminder that my pink nightgown used to drag along the floor, leaving a trail behind me. Now its end rests almost at my knees, and the lace trim that once ran around the collar is worn down, rubbed away by washing and Ray’s hands tracing over it. Tracing over me.
He packs while I wait for more bits of me to fall off, and when I am done I wash the smell off and pick up the shampoo after he pounds on the door and says, “And wash your hair too!”
When I am done he checks my hair to make sure it is clean enough, and then has me sit and comb it while he shaves. He talks about the money, which he’s already gotten out and packed, the maps he’s bought, the places we might go. Nevada. New Mexico. Arizona. Somewhere big enough for him to get a job.
Somewhere that will never notice us, our newness when we come in, our wrongness as we walk around. He tells me what he will do to Annabel and how I will hold her hands and maybe even help him, turning around to hold my hand, stroke my fingers. Shaving cream on his face, a little cut on his throat.
“You’ll smell like her,” he says, eyes gone far away. “We all will.”
I pull the comb through my hair. Ray makes sure I use conditioner so it won’t tangle. He says he wouldn’t like to cause me any pain.
His mother cut knots out of his hair, scissors leaving tiny silver scars on his scalp. He showed them to me after we came here, after he found me walking down the road toward the highway, thumb out like I wanted a ride.
Two days after we moved into Shady Pines, and I thought, I can’t live here. I can’t.
He drove me all the way to 623 Daisy Lane when he found me, stopped the truck—b
rand new, I bought it just for you he said, you were supposed to wait for your surprise and you didn’t, now get in. He drove right by the house and told me what he’d do to the people inside.
Then we drove home. He pulled over, Exit 56, I remember the sign, nothing but trees and a closed gas station, and got me out of the truck. Into the woods. Smash crash into the trees, dirt grit bugs twigs in my face, my mouth, my head slamming into the ground over and over again.
His hands in my hair.
His voice. You won’t leave me. You won’t leave me. You won’t leave me. Say it.
I won’t leave you.
Not ever?
Not ever.
Back to Shady Pines, and I thought, I can live here. I thought, and then, after a while, I just started watching TV. It made the days pass faster.
Easier.
42
RAY CALLS IN TO WORK, SORRY, FAMILY emergency, sick brother out in Pennsylvania, not in Philly, he wishes, but out west, near Pittsburgh. He practices before he calls, makes me listen.
“Do I sound okay?”
I nod. He calls and then, when he’s done, shows me Annabel’s new clothes again, ones we had to buy at the thrift store two towns away. (Birthday gift for my cousin, I was supposed to say if anyone asked. No one did. The man in front of us bought six faded ladies’ bras and an old television set, wood-paneled with a huge number pad worn down from someone pushing in channels.)
We bought old clothes, jeans with pink trim on the pockets, elastic waist and boxy shape. Nothing like the jeans I’ve seen shopping with Ray lately, the kind that curl in at the waist and push out at the hips, no more girls’ section for me, salespeople saying, “Oh, they do grow up so fast now, don’t they?” and Ray’s mouth twitching, then buying me boy’s jeans. Narrowing his eyes at home as I hold my breath and tug them into place.
Smiling as they slip over my hips. Still in kids’ clothes, little girl playing at being a boy.
Come over here and let me see. Let me see my little Alice.
Ray went a little crazy with the shirts, tiny tanks and tees, blouses with lace and shiny white buttons shaped like pearls. Skirts too, little ones with flippy bottoms, flounces for him to toss up.
New underpants bought at the big store where we buy toilet paper and the cleaner I use to mop the floor, white only, no lace, no trim, smaller than mine. Smaller than mine, Ray noticed, and no dinner for me that night.
Sneakers with pink shoelaces, we bought those too. Ray was sure he knew her size.
“I’m good at guessing,” he said. “I’m good at knowing what will be just right. Who will be.” A smile for a little girl, red-haired, freckled, looking at sandals near us.
Girl smiled back. Ray went over to look at shoes with her, oh I have a little girl about your age, no she isn’t here she’s home sick, hold out your leg so I can see the shoe, yes I think I like that, I do. Come on, Alice.
Pulling over on the way home, empty construction site, abandoned office building. So eager it is over in seconds.
“I wish all little girls could be like that,” Ray said. “Stay like they are forever. Never grow up into what they all become.”
Pointing at a woman struggling with the hands of two little girls at the bus stop, angry-faced and exhausted-looking, quick smack one, two, on the back of the girls’ heads.
“Who could hurt a child like that?” he says. “Someone should report her. I hope someone does. Children should be loved. They are love.”
43
AFTER THE WOODS, AFTER I TRIED TO hold out my hand for a way back to 623 Daisy Lane, Ray carried me to the truck. “See this?” he said, and parted his hair with his fingers, showed me long silvery lines on his scalp. “My mother did that. Cut me when my hair got dirty, cut me trying to get the tangles out. If I’d done a better job, she wouldn’t have had to do it.”
He drew my hand, paper limp and smeared with dirt, to his head. “I don’t want to be like her,” he said. “I won’t be like her. But I will have to punish someone if you can’t be good. And you want to be good, don’t you?”
Oh yes I said yes I will be good please let’s just go home don’t take me back there again I want to go home with you now.
He smiled. Ray’s smile is wide and sunny, happy.
Rotten, dead inside, underneath.
When I smile, I think it looks like his.
44
AS I’M WATCHING THE MORNING TALK shows, Ray is mapping out roads, maps open all across the kitchen table, and I realize I will not see this apartment again. Goodbye singing refrigerator.
Nothing else is worth thinking about, and I go back to watching people yell at each other. Today men who didn’t know they were dating men who were pretending to be women are screaming they were tricked, they aren’t like that—that way, they keep saying, I’m not that way.
I wonder what TV will be like in the desert, if the channels will be in the same place or if I will have to learn everything again.
Annabel will cry a lot. She will say she is Lucy. She will want to go outside. She will talk about her parents. Her brother.
Maybe I will tell her that I know him. That he hated having to pick her up. That he used to have me do something Ray will teach her how to do. That everyone will think he’s the reason why she’s gone.
I will have her bring me water. I will eat her food. Help her stay little for longer than I did. Take her to the pool and let her swim.
If she tried to sink, to bury herself in the water, would I let her?
No. I would drag her out. Make her breathe. Take her back to Ray. And then, one night, when he is with her, I will run. I will run and I will—
I forgot. I forgot my plan. A strange rusty noise comes out of my mouth, sharp like a knife. Ray looks up, eyes narrowed, and I point at the TV.
“Shouldn’t watch that trash,” he says. “It’s not funny, other people’s pain.”
I nod. Yes, Ray. Yes.
I laughed? Is that what that sound was?
I feel so light inside. Like I could float away.
I forgot my plan but I have a plan. I will leave Jake to get in trouble and Ray will have Annabel and 623 Daisy Lane is …
I will find it. I will buy a map if I need to. Gas and a map and a package or three of those snack cakes with the filling that oozes out of the sides.
Ray touches my face. “Going to the park,” he says. “See you soon.”
I nod, and he pinches my jaw.
Yes, I say. Yes. See you soon.
He smears a thumb over my neck, pushing pressure, but then kisses my forehead and leaves. Off to wait for Annabel. Come into the park, come into his waiting arms.
Alone, I stand up, and the room tilts crazily. I see my breakfast yogurt still sitting on the table. Last night’s is there too. A note, written in Ray’s long, slow scrawl, says he is proud of me. Says I look beautiful. Next to it is exact change for the bus.
Nothing is in the fridge. It’s empty, cleaned out, and I think of the tiny piece of cheese, my special dinner, and how far I have to go today. All I have to do.
I have to eat.
I go down to the laundry room, the walls closing in and out and in and out, and go through the pile sitting on top of the third washer. I find matches, a quarter, and bits of fuzz. I lean my head against the dryer. Warm ka-thunk ka-thunk against my head.
The only other pile of clothes is one that belongs to the old man who lives under the stairs across from the laundry room. He only ever eats soup and talks endlessly about how poor he is to Ray, who is always in a bad mood after he runs into him.
His clothes smell like unwashed old man, like Ray sometimes does in the morning, and my stomach does a little churning flip as the walls close in and then go back out again.
There is fifty dollars in the old man’s pants, tucked into the pocket. Wrapped around it is a grocery list. Types of soup and toilet paper.
I clutch the money in my hand. I walk upstairs. I walk outside.
I walk across t
he street to the fast-food restaurant Ray sometimes brings food home from, burgers and fries that he eats while telling me about his day or after I have told him how much I missed him. (Show me, he always says. Better show me. My knees are always bruised.)
I order a #2 meal, a two-patty burger with cheese and lettuce and a secret sauce. The container of fries is larger than my hand, and my soda is tall, icy cold in a paper cup.
I eat slowly, because I know I have to at first. But not for long, it doesn’t take long, not like in those movies I sometimes watch when the soaps are bad, ones where women cut or starve themselves and eventually learn to be strong, but the first steps are so hard, their unbroken skin making them sick, a normal meal making them vomit.
I am so hollow there is nothing inside to be pushed out. I eat slowly for half the burger, meat cheese bread exploding on my tongue, then faster, faster.
I want more food but I can wait. Ray will not find the money. Ray will not find me. He will have Annabel and I will go to 623 Daisy Lane and make them leave, tell them I’m sorry but they aren’t safe, I tried, I did, but I don’t want to do it anymore, don’t want to be Alice, living dead girl, anymore.
I will eat in the car on the way there; buy things I see people eating when Ray and I stop to buy gas on the way home from the grocery store every Saturday. Hot dogs and oozy snack cakes and tiny pizzas in a cardboard box. Chips with a well of bright yellow cheese sauce.
I dream, eyes open, all the way to the park.
Annabel is gone when I get there, and on the swings, where she should be sitting, is Ray.
And he is talking to Barbara.
45
I WANT TO RUN BUT I CAN’T, I CAN’T. I tried and it didn’t work, it never works, every day I am an open sore, a walking scream, and it doesn’t matter.
No one sees me.
I want to run, but I know there is nowhere I can go.
46
BARBARA SEES ME AND WAVES. MOTIONS me over. I go, feet moving, always moving to where Ray is. He is watching, smiling easily, and I know I must be careful. I must do what he wants.
Living Dead Girl Page 6