Pretending Normal

by Mary Campisi

  “It’s okay. I’ll get it for her.” There is a gentleness in his voice born of loving something that needs to be protected from others, perhaps even from itself.

  She turns to me and smiles, waving a hand in the air. “You enjoy that lemonade. Fresh squeezed. Did I tell you what my daddy used to say?” Without waiting for my response, she plows on, rolling the words over one another, pulling them long and thin, like taffy stretching. “He always said, ‘There’s nothin’ better than a glass of fresh-squeezed lemonade to put the zip back in your step.’”

  “Come on, Mother. Let’s go.” Peter drapes an arm around her shoulders, supports her wispy frame against his.

  Suzanne Donnelly glances back once more but this time it is not me she is after. Her gaze sweeps the table in the center of the room, lands on the decanter, a bright light of desperation in her eyes that sparks, fizzles, dies. Then she turns away, her diamond-studded fingers clutching her son’s waist, and hobbles out of the room.

  Chapter 11

  “So, now you know.”

  Peter doesn’t look at me as he says this. We are sitting on the back steps of his house and his gaze is pinned to the trunk of a weeping willow.

  “I’m sorry.”

  “My sister drowned in our swimming pool when she was two. My mother’s never gotten over it.”

  “Oh, my God.”

  “Mother was baking a cake for my father’s birthday. Chocolate fudge, his favorite. She ran in the house to take it out of the oven, just for a second, and she was hurrying so fast she burned herself on the grate so she grabbed an ice cube. She was in the house two minutes, three tops.”

  “I—”

  “When she got back outside, Annie was floating face down in the middle of the pool.”

  “I’m so sorry.”

  “We all died that day.”

  “What about your father?”

  “The bastard goes on with his life, publishing his papers, collecting his awards, getting his newspaper write-ups about what a brilliant psychiatrist he is when his own fucking family is drowning in neglect. How normal is it to have a mother dressed like she’s going to a party every day but never leaves the house, not even to get the mail, except when she’s had too much wine and forgets why she can’t be part of the outside world?”

  “She needs help.”

  “He’s tried everything on her—pills, therapy, electroshock. Nothing works. Except the booze, that at least keeps her from trying to slit her wrists again. So, he buys it for her and we pretend it’s perfectly normal to sit in your dead daughter’s bedroom and have a conversation with her. Pretending.” He lets out a laugh that scalds and adds, “Pretending normal, that’s what we do best.”

  I want to tell him that Frank drinks, too. I want to say this, make him realize he’s not alone. But I can’t. Not even for Peter. “I had no idea.”

  “That’s the beauty of it, right? Nobody knows. How would it look for a psychiatrist who couldn’t treat his own wife? He’s got books of reasons why she can’t go here or there and who’s going to question a doctor?”

  “How can you live this way?”

  “She’s my mother.”

  “But—”

  “You know what the alternative is? They’d lock her up in some loony bin and she’d kill herself. I’m never going to let that happen.”

  “What about Michael?” The fourteen-year old drug dealer.

  “He gets the raw deal. Michael’s too soft.”

  “He’s the reason I came here today.” There. It’s out.

  “Michael?”

  “There’s no easy way to say this…”

  “Just say it, Sara.”

  I reach into my pocket and pull out the plastic bag. “I found these in Kay’s purse. She said Michael gave them to her.”

  “What the hell was that little shit thinking?” He drags his hands over his face. “Christ.”

  “Where’d he get them?”

  “Are you serious? My old man’s a psychiatrist for Chrissake. He’s got everything in his office. Ludes, speed, you name it.”

  “What are you going to do?”

  “Beat the crap out of him.”

  “I mean, really.”

  “Beat the crap out of him,” he says again.

  And I believe him.

  ***

  I find Rudy in the alley of Minnoni’s Diner, smoking a cigarette. It is ten o’clock in the morning. His mother, Evangeline, sends me back here after she gives me the once over with her faded blue eyes, her blue-black hair piled high, her red lips twisted into a frown. Everything about her is faded and old, like a T-shirt that’s been washed too many times and then tie-dyed in an attempt to rejuvenate it. “Out back,” is all she says to me before she turns her yellowed smile to the balding man with the briefcase sitting at the counter.

  “If it isn’t Sara Polokovich,” Rudy says when he sees me. He takes a drag on his cigarette, blows out three perfect rings. “In the flesh.” He throws back his fuzzy head and howls with laughter. “You sure got our buddy all twisted up.” He leans forward, points his cigarette at me and grins. "Right where it counts.” He grabs his crotch with his free hand. ”Right where it counts, baby.”

  Pig. “I’m here about my sister.”

  “So, baby Polokovich squealed, huh?”

  “No. She came home wasted. I dug it out of her.”

  “Feisty bitch, aren’t you?” He narrows his beady eyes, takes another drag and cocks his head to one side. How can one person have so much hair? A big tangle of fuzz on his head, held in place with a faded blue and white bandana, a furry mustache and matching beard that intertwine, meld together, like a gum wrapper bracelet. And then there are his arms—muscled, hairy monsters, covered in dark brown, with hands and fingers sprouting the stuff, too. Rudy watches me watching him, his mouth opening like the entrance to a cave, baring yellow teeth, just like his mother’s. “Like what you see?”

  “Stay away from Kay,” I say, ignoring his gross remark. “Leave her alone or I’ll turn you in.”

  “You’ll turn me in?” He slaps his knee and belts out another howl. “You, Sara Polokovich, will ‘turn me in?’”

  I try not to be intimidated when he rolls off of the metal parking rail and steps toward me. “Yes, I will if you don’t stay away from her.”

  “This is funny. Really.” He throws his cigarette on the ground, stomps it with a booted foot. “It would be outright hilarious if it weren’t so goddamn pathetic.” His smile fades. “It’s only booze, baby. You give the same lecture to that city boyfriend of yours?”

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  The dark cave opens, and a horrible sound floods my ears. “Drugs, baby. Your boyfriend’s a pusher.”

  “Liar! Liar!” I yell again, so he knows that what he is saying is impossible.

  Rudy shrugs. “I run beer, sweetheart. Peter gets the drugs from his old man. I hear it’s a real candy shop.”

  “I don’t believe you.” Rudy Minnoni is a liar. He is like that, no good, looking to destroy someone else’s happiness. My skin prickles hot and cold. I take another step away from the lie. Then another and another until Rudy’s, Your boyfriend’s a pusher, fades away and all I hear is his laugh, chasing me down the alley, as I turn and run, stumble, push on, not stopping until I am outside Peter’s house, where I double over near an oak tree, heaving. Peter finds me here, sweating and chilled, clutching a handful of crushed oak leaves between my fingers.

  “Sara? For Chrissake, what’s wrong?”

  “I just saw Rudy Minnoni.”

  “That imbecile. What did he want?”

  “He said you’re a pusher. Peter, what’s he talking about?” Tell me anything, please, make me believe.

  “You know,” he says, brushing the crumpled leaves from my fingers, “people lie all the time to make themselves look better, make somebody else look worse.”

  “I know.”

  “And sometimes they lie to protect people, f
rom situations, from other people… even from themselves.”

  “Rudy was lying, wasn’t he?”

  “What do you think?”

  “Yes.” I try to break down the barrier in those blue eyes. “Yes, he was.” I say the words louder, pouring more conviction on them.

  “Rudy’s an asshole, stay away from him.” Then, “Do I look like a pusher?”

  I shake my head no.

  “Okay then.” He brushes his mouth over mine. “Let’s get out of here. How about a double dip at Benny’s?”

  “Sounds great.”

  He smiles then, that meandering curve of lips that starts a slow burn in my belly and makes him the Peter I know. “Come on”—he takes my hand—“let’s go.”

  When we reach Benny’s the parking lot is packed. “Do you want to get takeout?”

  “Sure.” After what’s just happened, I need to be alone with him, not surrounded by half of Norwood.

  “Sara?” He pulls into a parking spot and shuts off the engine. “I’ve been trying to find the right time to ask you something.” He turns to me, brushes his fingers along my cheek, “Maybe what happened a little while ago was a good thing because it made me realize how much you mean to me.” He takes my hand, presses it to his lips. “I really care about you, Sara. Very much.”

  “I feel the same way.”

  “And I’d like you to wear this.” He removes his class ring and slides it on my third finger. “A little big”—he grins—“but it looks great on you.”

  I finger the blue stone in the center of the ring. It’s from West River High School in Pittsburgh. Not Norwood. “Thank you,” I say in a voice that sounds giddy and gravelly, at the same time.

  “You’re very welcome.” He leans in, kisses me. “You’re the only girl who’s ever worn that.” I open my mouth and let his tongue fill me. “Sara,” he breathes, easing the edge of my tank top from my jean shorts. “You’re the only one who ever will.”

  I wrap my arms around his neck and press myself against him, sucking his tongue with long, even strokes. “Stop.” He pulls away, his breath heavy, filling the space between us. “You’re driving me crazy.”

  “Am I?”

  “You’re a witch, you know that?” He touches my neck. “Later,” he says in a raspy voice.

  “Later,” I repeat, my own voice low, husky.

  “I’m going to get the double dip and fries. You sit here and think nice thoughts, like what you’re going to wear to Homecoming.”

  “That’s months away, and besides, I haven’t even been asked.”

  “I asked when I gave you that,” he says, pointing to his ring.

  “Okay then.”

  “Okay then.”

  Peter disappears into Benny’s and I lean back against the seat, close my eyes, my skin still tingling. I love him.

  A buzzing inside the car startles me and I jerk my eyes open, swatting at the noise. A yellow jacket darts back and forth under Peter’s steering wheel. I flip off my sandal and start swinging, the buzzing escalating with each swat, until whap. No more buzz. I lean over Peter’s seat, searching for the bee when I catch sight of a piece of plastic sticking out from under the mat on Peter’s side.

  Will it be a Ho-Ho or a Twinkie wrapper? I reach over and tug on the plastic. It’s a little pouch like the one in Kay’s purse. My lungs clog up, my head and heart pounding hard enough to explode as I finger the black capsules through the plastic.

  Then I yank back the mat and see the faint bulge in the floor with a narrow slit running along the length of the carpet. I poke a finger inside and pull out wads of plastic—yellow pills, white pills, blue pills, green and black capsules. So many lies. Were we a lie, too? I grab a fistful of packets and am half out the door when Peter calls my name.

  “Sara? Where are you going?”

  He stands there, holding a cardboard carrier filled with a double dip and fries, and looking so innocent… no normal. But now I know he’s only pretending normal.

  “Sara!” He sets the carrier on the roof of the Chevelle and rushes toward me. “For God’s sake, what’s wrong?”

  It is impossible to blink him into focus, because my eyes are too wet. I blink again and then one more time, until I can almost make out his face, can almost hone in on those turquoise eyes. “Lies,” my voice is flat. “All lies.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “Rudy was right. You’re a pusher.” I hurl the packets at him, mindless of the cars around us. “You’re a goddamn pusher!”

  “I can explain—”

  “With another lie?”

  “Get in the car.” He opens the door, forces me in and gets in the driver’s side. But not before he scoops up the packets on the ground. “I didn’t lie to you, Sara.” His words are brittle as he meets my gaze. “You lied to yourself. You’re the one who said I wasn’t a pusher.”

  “You let me believe in you.” My world is spinning black. “Let me trust you, let me… let me care about you.”

  He bends down and grabs a packet of pills. “This,” he says, holding it in the flat of his palm, “is about business, not us. You and I, us, have nothing to do with this.”

  “You really thought it wouldn’t matter,” I whisper.

  “I thought you would think it mattered,” he says. “That’s why I wasn’t ready to tell you yet.”

  “When would you have told me?”

  He shrugs. “Later. When we were a little tighter.”

  “How could you?”

  “Grow up, Sara. This is not about us. Can’t you see?” His eyes glitter. “I’m providing a service, giving them what they want, that’s all. And my old man’s got lots of them. And they’re safe.”

  “Safe?”

  He blows out a disgusted sigh. “They’re only uppers and downers. It’s not like I’m pushing PCP or LSD.”

  “Well good for you. Maybe you should get a medal for only selling uppers and downers.”

  “I knew you’d be like this.”

  “What do you expect?” There is a scream in my lungs fighting to explode. “I find out my boyfriend’s a pusher and I should say ‘Great? No big deal?’”

  “Look, I’m still just me.”

  “No.” I try to bring his face into focus again, but the tears keep everything hazy. At least I will be spared the crispness of remembering. “Why me? You could have had anybody, and most of them wouldn’t have cared about any of this.”

  “I didn’t want just anybody, Sara. I wanted the girl no guy could seem to get.”

  “Well you can’t have me.”

  “You’re just going to walk away? You’re going to go back home and play little Suzie Homemaker to that drunken father of yours?”

  “How do you know about my father?”

  “I figured it out the second time I saw him coming out of The State Store at eleven in the morning.”

  “You shouldn’t talk, Peter. You”—I point at him, give him a smile that isn’t a smile, but a cruel twist of the lips meant to hurt the way I am hurting—“should not talk.” I hurl his ring at him, then I am out the door, running, half-hoping to hear the duel exhaust of the Chevelle idling beside me, with Peter’s voice calling my name, telling me it is all a big mistake.

  When I reach my front porch and double up against the wrought iron railing, I press my hand to the pain in my left side and suck in great gulps of air. The road behind me is empty. I make my way to the backyard, half-stumbling, half-running, to the rosebushes where I collapse on the soft lawn, belly first, grabbing tufts of grass in my hands, and let the tears come.

  Chapter 12

  Surprises come when you least expect them. That’s why they’re called surprises, right? Or maybe they’re called that because you don’t really expect them at all—they just sort of pop out when you’re looking the other way. So, it surprises me when Frank calls me into the garage one afternoon and says, “Peck O’Grady needs your help.”

  He is sitting on the edge of his stool, an old cut-
up T-shirt balled in one hand—he says they buff out the best—and looking at me like I should have anticipated the announcement.

  “What does she need?”

  “Help cleaning out the basement, and yard work. Hunt hurt her back and can’t lift anything, but don’t worry”—he snorts—“she’ll be supervising.”

  The last family I want to work for is the O’Grady’s. Nina went to their house once to collect money for the American Heart Association, and Mr. O’Grady made her stand in the doorway for ten minutes while he read every word of fine print on those bi-fold flyers you’re supposed to hand out to all donors. Like anyone other than Mr. O’Grady ever read them. And, Nina said his feet were stuffed in lamb’s wool and smelled like rotten cabbage. Gross.

  “When does she want me to start?” As if I have a choice.

  “I told her you’d be over tomorrow morning, around nine.”

  “Fine.”

  “She said come see her when you turn sixteen and she’ll teach you to drive.” When I don’t answer, he adds, “Unless you’re not interested.”

  “Oh, no,” I say. “I’m… that’s great.” I just don’t want to smell cabbage feet.

  He salutes me with his glass, and I hear the clink of ice, watch his adam’s apple move as he swallows, a long steady pull, draining the Cutty Sark to less than one third.

  “Thank you,” I manage.

  His mouth lifts at the corners and he holds out his arm. “Come here, kiddo.”

  It is odd and uncomfortable as he pulls me against his chest, his voice scratchy. “That’s my girl. Your old man will take care of you.” He smells of car paste and Cutty Sark laced with Camel’s. “You know that, don’t you?”

  I nod. “Sure.”

  “Good.” He squeezes my right arm, releases me, his hand dropping to his side. For one insane half-second, I want him to hug me to him again, tell me he loves me, like a real father would do, and that he is going to try very hard to stop screwing up. Instead, he clears his throat and I inch back farther, and farther still, until the distance between us is safe. He doesn’t seem to notice the awkwardness that brushes over us, past us, as we settle our faces back into place. “You know I’d teach you myself if I wasn’t working all day.”