“There you are.” The voice came from the side of the house, hesitant and hopeful, but my nerves pulled as tight as the nylon rope when I rappelled off the cliff. It wasn’t Daddy after all.
It was Graham.
Chapter Forty-Three
I didn’t want to talk to Graham. I didn’t want his counseling advice. I didn’t want his questions. I didn’t want his hugs and kisses.
“You ran off again.” His voice held a hint of a reprimand, but his facial expression added a question mark. “Twice in one day.”
It seemed like a week ago I had watched Nina being publicly humiliated. It seemed like a year. Was it really just this morning?
“Sorry,” I said. He waited for an explanation, but surely he knew that walking away from me in the middle of a difficult conversation to run after another woman wouldn’t have a positive effect on our relationship . . . or my mental health.
My mental health. I sighed, so exhausted from thinking about my mental health. So tired of trying to get better.
“Can we walk a while?”
Why was he even there when he had clients scheduled? “Did you have a cancellation?”
He took a few steps. “You could say that.”
“What does that mean?” I followed him.
“It means I canceled a few appointments so I could come talk to you.”
Was I supposed to feel bad about that? We were walking toward the cliff where Daddy and I rappelled, and I remembered Graham saying he’d like to try it together sometime. Now I thought we probably never would.
“What did you want to talk about?” I asked.
He turned away from me so that he was looking over the edge of the canyon. “I’ve been thinking about those scars on your legs, and I’m worried about you.”
“I’m fine now.”
“But that was only a few weeks ago, Cecily. You need to work through some of your emotional pain, and I’m not helping. I was wrong to try to date you. You’re not ready.”
I inhaled deeply to rid myself of a drowning feeling. “What are you saying?”
“I’m saying we shouldn’t be dating. Not now.”
My pride curled into a tight ball.
Even though I had been considering breaking things off with him, more than considering it, I was planning it . . . even then, his words cut deeper than any shard of glass ever could. He didn’t want me after all. “It’s because of Mirinda, isn’t it?”
He spun on his heel. “No. Why on earth would you say that?”
“She calls and texts. She manipulates you in order to be alone with you every Thursday night. She touches you. Not that her hugs mean anything, she presses her body against every man she knows.”
“Cecily.” He stared at me like he hadn’t truly seen me before. “You don’t even know her.”
“I was married to her brother for seven years. I think I know her.”
“You know what Brett told you about her.”
“We really don’t need to talk about this,” I said.
“So you’re saying you want to take a break too?”
“I’m saying I agree with you. We never should’ve gotten together in the first place.”
He stared at me with hard eyes, but then he blinked and softened, nodding as though accepting a sentence for a crime he’d committed. “Okay,” he mumbled. “You’re right.” He took two steps away from me, heading back toward the house, but then he stopped and turned around.
He glanced at the anchor, then into the canyon depths. “You’ll be all right?”
“I’m not going to cut myself, if that’s what you mean.”
“You’ll call me if you get to that point?”
I would call Shanty or Nina or Daddy. I had any number of people in my life who could help me and would do it without leading me on. I pointed my face into the wind so that my hair swept out of my eyes. “No, Graham. I won’t call you.”
I wouldn’t even think about him.
Or would I? Would I let his memory shout negative thoughts at me? When I looked in the mirror, would I see Mirinda standing next to me? Would I continue to compare my body with hers and others like hers, and tell myself it was no wonder Graham had rejected me? I shivered.
After a few long moments, dry grass crunched beneath Graham’s feet as he walked away.
I stood motionless until I heard his truck leaving, and then I trudged back to the house. I wanted to look in the mirror and remind myself, once and for all, who I was. Not Brett’s pitiful wife, not Graham’s damaged girlfriend, not society’s reject. But the mirror wasn’t a safe place for me because of those stinking grooves of mine. I might listen to the lies, I might spiral into a dark place, I might act on my negative thoughts.
Instead of hurting myself, I did the only other thing that came naturally to me. I sat down at the piano. I intended to play a soft melody, a lullaby, but that was not the music that worked its way from my heart to my fingertips. Instead, I produced Prokofiev’s Piano Concerto no. 3, frantic and aggressive, and the muscles beneath my barbed wire tattoo flexed and quivered. Frustration welled inside me as I pounded on the instrument, my hands traveling up and down the keys in a frenzy. I played faster and faster, wishing I had never come back to Canyon, wishing I had never talked to Graham Harper, wishing I could disappear along with my reflection.
Chapter Forty-Four
Group text from Shanty: I’ve found a way we can vent our frustrations. Can I pick you up after lunch?
Nina: i guess so
Cecily: Whatever it is, I’m in. Been a l-o-n-g week, and I really really need to vent.
Shanty: Anything in particular? Or just everything?
Cecily: Nothing monumental. Graham and I have decided to take a break for a while.
Nina: not monumental? thats GINORMOUS
Shanty: I have just what you need.
For five days, I went through the motions of my new and improved life while toxic feelings surged from my insides—emotions that reminded me of my life with Brett, back when I acted like everything was fine. I felt the same now. Empty. Hollow. Fraudulent.
But I couldn’t fake it at work and neither could Graham.
He stayed in his office between appointments, and I left every day for lunch when the last client walked out the door, casually chatting with them as we walked to our cars, so as not to leave a spare moment alone with Graham. But it was hell. Thursday night was the worst of all—I hid in the break room, knowing he was with Mirinda.
When Shanty texted me on Saturday, I didn’t care what she had in mind—I was willing to try. Now I stood in the middle of Rudy’s Pick-a-Part with her and Nina. We were surrounded by dead cars, so a more appropriate name might have been Rudy’s Auto Cemetery, or maybe even Wrecking Yard. I’d seen it on the edge of Amarillo for years and driven past it without a thought other than what an eyesore it was. Now I looked around me at the rusted cars and felt strangely at home.
Nina carried a Walmart bag, twisting it around two fingers and then letting it spin free. She cleared her throat. “Um . . . why are we here?”
She stood a few steps behind me, and I stood a few steps behind Shanty, and Shanty stood with her hands on her hips, staring at an old Chevy as though she despised the poor car.
“What we’re doing here”—Shanty spun to face us—“is releasing some of our pent-up anger. Dr. Harper is always telling me to let my emotions go, and right now I’m feeling RAGE.” Her face reddened, but then she smiled sweetly. “And I need a safe place to vent it.”
A man in coveralls walked toward us, and scruffy was too high-class a word to describe him. He carried two three-foot sledgehammers, and as he sauntered toward us, Nina made a low whining sound.
Instinctively, I stepped toward her. “Shanty?”
Shanty’s eyes widened, but not in fear of the man—in surprise at our reaction. “You guys, that’s only Earl Ray, Al’s cousin. He said we could come here. It was his idea. He’s as fed up with Al as I am.” Her eyebrows scrunched. �
��The Espinosas don’t hold to cheating on their women.”
“Yo, Shanty.” Earl Ray had a nasally voice and a deep accent, and the combination made me like him. He tossed one sledgehammer on the ground where it thumped against the earth, then handed the other one to Shanty. He nodded at Nina and me. “Ladies.”
Shanty held the hammer in two hands like a shotgun. “Earl Ray, this is Cecily and Nina. They’re not exactly in the same shape I’m in, but we’ve all gotten ourselves into a bit of a tizzy the past few days.”
He motioned to the Chevy. “Old Blue here ought to do just fine for you.” He grinned. “If you need me, I’ll be in the trailer.”
I watched him saunter away, and I began to understand.
Shanty turned to Nina. “You bring the spray paint?”
Nina opened the Walmart bag and pulled out two cans, one red and one black.
Shanty reached for the black, changed her mind, and grabbed the other one. “Blood red,” she said. “That’ll do just fine.” She stomped to the hood of the Chevy, shaking the can noisily as she went, then she paused a moment, having trouble removing the cap. She growled until it finally broke free. Then, leaning over the hood of the car, she painted a large capital A followed by an L. Then she stood back and surveyed her handiwork and carefully set the paint can on the gravel at her feet. She hoisted the sledgehammer to her shoulder, but then seemed to have second thoughts and lowered it to the ground again. This time when she painted on the hood, she used neat cursive lettering, adding the word cockroach beneath her husband’s name.
The sun felt warm on my scalp, and a bead of sweat slid down my side. I wasn’t sure what I was about to witness, but already, I could feel that it might be the best therapy I’d had in years.
When Shanty slammed the hammer into the center of the A, she howled like a rabid animal, and her anger continued with the second and third hits, until AL was obliterated, and cockroach was dented beyond recognition, but then her rage softened and she was crying, and with every hit, a sob wrenched through her body, until finally, once the hood was nothing more than a pulverized hunk of tin foil, she stopped for breath.
She looked at Nina, who was still holding the black spray paint, and tilted her head toward the back of the car. Then Shanty let the sledgehammer drop to the ground, and she slumped, exhausted and spent, against the hood. She gave AL one last slap with the palm of her hand as though she were spanking one of her children.
Nina covered the back of the car with her own graffiti. Her head was tilted to the side like she was creating a studied piece of artwork, but her expression was cold and calculating, as though she were planning a murder.
Hesitantly, I reached for the red paint and stepped to the driver’s side. The front and rear doors were both intact and perfectly smooth with windows removed. Suddenly I had the ridiculous sense that I had just been given tickets to the fair, where scary carnies and dangerous rides would give me a thrill of power, the feeling that I could risk everything and still survive.
As Nina began to pound the car—with surprising force for someone so small—I wrote a bold B on the driver’s door. I didn’t write the rest of Brett’s name, only sprayed over it two more times until the paint ran down the sides of the car like a fresh wound. Shanty had been right. Blood red would do just fine. I almost reached for a sledgehammer, but I stopped myself, realizing I wasn’t finished. I added a G next to Brett. Even though Graham hadn’t treated me like Brett had—Graham was better than that—the good doctor had hurt me. Or maybe hurt was the wrong word. He had disappointed me. Even more than Brett had, because I had expected more from Graham. I stared at the two letters while Nina pounded the rear end of the car and Shanty added more graffiti to the hood.
Then I added one more letter.
If this was meant to be a purging session, then I wanted to be sure and get it all out at once. I wasn’t holding anything back, and when I slammed the hammer against the door the first time, it surprised me that I dented the last letter first. The B had been my target, but I’d never been a very good aim. The paint wasn’t yet dry, and the hammer smeared a streak all the way down the door, but when I reared back again, the hammer hit the B dead center, and I felt an overwhelming sense of satisfaction.
Hurriedly, I sprayed a smiley face above the B. Brett had always smiled at me, even when he was saying horrible things. Even when he was looking at pictures on his phone, standing over me as I hid beneath the covers, waiting until he was ready. Even then, he had smiled. A soft, gentle smile of anticipation before he tossed the phone to the floor, leaving the room in darkness so he wouldn’t have to see my body. Now, I envisioned a three-dimensional image above my smiley and pounded it with the iron hammer three, four, five times—screaming with each exertion until I stalled, exhausted, my face burning from anger.
My body was not repulsive.
And if I had to beat this stupid car all day long, until it was a flattened pile of metal and fiberglass, I would do it. I would pound that B until it was unrecognizable. I would pound all three of them . . . for making me feel less than I should have. For lying to me.
“No more lies!” I shouted the words and Shanty howled her approval.
“We’re not putting up with it anymore.” She had the other hammer now, working on whatever else she had painted.
“No! More! LIES!” I hit the door with each yell, but I felt my anger seeping through my pores, running down my sides with the sweat, to puddle on the ground at my feet. And with each yell, my rage turned into sadness, and my sadness turned into self-pity, and my self-pity turned into a thick shadow that sent me falling to the ground.
Nina and Shanty left me alone, partly because they knew I needed the space and partly because they were dealing with their own demons. And I cried. I sobbed. I howled and whimpered. But I did not hurt myself.
Afterward, I stared at the sand and pebbles on the ground in front of me, and I rested, breathing deeply and thoroughly. My anger had evaporated, and in its place lay a bundle of raw emotions I hadn’t noticed before. Until now, they had been buried beneath the rage and injustice, but now, as I sat crumpled in the gravel lot of a wrecking yard, I discovered the root of my problems.
Venting my anger had opened my eyes to the reality of my pain, and my pile of life’s puzzle pieces had taken on a clarity I hadn’t expected. All this time, I had only been holding one puzzle piece tightly in the palm of my hand, and not even attempting to fit it in with the rest. That puzzle piece was self-image. Of course. I had been holding it so long that it was warped and bent and might never lay flat alongside the other pieces.
Lifting my head, I looked at the dented M in front of me. It represented Mirinda, and every other woman I had ever compared myself to. Other than that first misplaced hit, I had only deliberately hit that letter a handful of times. The B, on the other hand, I had pounded into oblivion.
But I stared at the G between them. Other than being pressed back due to the damage to the other letters, Graham’s letter hadn’t taken a direct hit at all, and at first I thought I needed to fix that. As though I had missed an opportunity to vent and I might not ever get another one, but then, after I studied it for a while, I realized I was done. All my anger had been released, and I held no animosity toward Dr. Graham Harper. I had no strength left in me to pick up the hammer, much less slam it into the capital G.
Instead, I swiped my palm across it, wishing I could erase the paint, regretting I had ever painted it in the first place. And hoping I would someday be able to forget him.
Chapter Forty-Five
Group text from Shanty: Think thyself happy if thou hast one true friend; never think of finding another.—Thomas Fuller
Cecily: And I’ve got TWO!
Nina: shanty suddenly I’m hearing thy voice with a british accent rofl
Shanty: Hey, can y’all meet Sunday night instead of Monday this week? Al’s got a thing.
Nina: sure no prob let’s meet at MO i like it there
Cecily: How�
��s 9 pm?
Dad could tell something was different with me. I knew he could tell, and he could tell I knew, but I didn’t mention my split with Graham, and he didn’t ask. That wasn’t our way. If Mom had been there, she would have boldly asked what was up, and pestered me until I told her all about Graham, and the reunion, and Mirinda. I would’ve told her about Shanty’s marriage troubles and Nina’s bikini disaster.
And Mom would have talked me through it. She would have understood how excruciating it felt going to the office every day with Graham. And how I couldn’t believe Mirinda had showed up for her appointment on Thursday night. And Mom would’ve enjoyed hearing about Brett getting punched in the jaw at the reunion.
Now I just had Dad, but Dad was enough.
It was Sunday afternoon, and he and I had just rappelled into the canyon.
“You ready to say goodbye to this place?” he asked.
A pinprick of irritation itched at me. “Well, no.”
“Yeah, me neither.” He fiddled with the rappelling gear, but then shoved it away. “You want to walk down to the campsite?”
“You mean like . . . a farewell walk?”
He sighed.
“Okay,” I added quickly. “You know I do.”
I followed him deeper into the canyon, and as the ground sloped downward, my mood tilted. This could well be one of the last times I hiked on our property. Anger festered inside me, but I had run out of people to be angry at. Dad was only doing what he had to do in order to pay off his debts. Mom had accumulated the debts in the first place, but it wasn’t as if she had any control over her cancer and all the medical bills it caused. Michael was buying the place, but I couldn’t blame him for doing so. Even though Mirinda’s attitude was snooty, she literally had nothing to do with its sale; she didn’t have two dimes to rub together.
Dad stopped at the campsite, and I noticed the two votive candles on the ground next to the picnic table. My heart felt numb.
Looking Glass Lies Page 21