Summer in the Land of Skin

by Jody Gehrman

  “Your mom saw it different. She never met Aida, but she hated her. Everything that was wrong with your dad, she blamed on her.”

  “What do you mean, ‘wrong’ with him?”

  He considers me for a moment, seeming to weigh out how much to tell me. “He was pretty up and down. One minute he’d be on top of the world, ready for anything, the next he’d be in his room with all the shades drawn. He wanted to be enlightened and he wanted to be a star—those were his trips. Sometimes he was a helium balloon, and then suddenly he was dead weight. Your mom had her hands full, you know, just keeping up with him. We all did.” He takes another swig of tea, squeezes more lemon into it, stirs the coating of sugar that’s settled at the bottom.

  I sit there, gripping my glass, feeling it sweat against my palm. I can see the past trying to rearrange itself again, shifting to make room for this new information, like a kaleidoscope twisting into a new design. I think of the words incest and molestation, such ugly, contaminated syllables. Somehow I sense they don’t apply, but then, what words do? Was Aida like a generous whore? I wish so much that he was here to answer my questions—to unravel his past for me with his own interpretations, instead of leaving me to navigate the shadowy forest of his life, with only Bender and the bread crumbs of his letters to guide me.

  The past is so slippery. It can redesign itself in seconds. And what about the people who hand it to us? They, too, can disappear on any ordinary afternoon. You can go to gymnastics on a Tuesday in July, and when you’re done, the whole universe can be rearranged, because one person decided to leave it. When they leave, they take all their stories with them.

  I look at Bender and a sense of urgency comes over me. He knew my father better than anyone. I can’t waste my time with him; he could die at any moment, and then all of his stories would vanish, too. I lick my lips and try to make my voice sound easy, not at all desperate and needy like I feel.

  “Bender, what happened with you and Dad?”

  “What do you mean?” His voice gets a defensive edge to it. I lean forward onto my elbows and speak quietly, trying not to scare him off.

  “Why did you sell him the business and move to Santa Fe?”

  He sits back in his chair and stares out at the street. In profile his face looks utterly defeated. “A lot of reasons.”

  “Name a few, then.”

  “It’s a long story,” he says. “We should get back to work. You almost done with your tea?” I look at my glass, three-quarters full, then at him. “I’ll get you a to-go cup,” he says, standing.

  “You promise you’ll tell me sometime?”

  He avoids my eyes, mumbles, “I guess so.”

  “Bender.” I wait until he looks at me. “Promise?”

  He laughs. “Medina—you’re such a hard-ass. Okay, okay, I promise.”

  Friday the thirteenth, The Skins are playing at Fanny’s. Lucy drinks too much, gets sick in the bathroom, and leaves while I’m dancing with a funny French exchange student. It’s a little past eleven when I realize she’s gone. I drive the streets looking for her, until it occurs to me that maybe she hitchhiked home.

  As I walk into Smoke Palace, the stairway emits a strong stench of urine, and I feel some kind of dread creeping into my bones. Inside the apartment, the bedroom door is closed. I knock softly, and press my ear to the door. Nothing. “Lucy?” I call. “Can I come in?” No answer. I can feel my heart pounding against the wood; it’s beating so violently, I could swear it’s audible. I think of that suite at the Motel 6, covered in blood. I never saw it, but I’ve imagined it so many times, it’s more real to me than most places. I can hear someone laughing in the apartment directly below us. “Lucy?” I call again. “I’m coming in, okay?” Still no answer. I push the door open. The first thing I see is a towel on the floor, smudged with dark red blood. It’s still wet; the blood glistens on the crumpled white terry cloth and my heart starts flopping around inside my chest crazily. “Lucy?”

  Downstairs, the laughter becomes hysterical. “You—you were so—” the woman gasps. “Your face!”

  “Luce, it’s me, Anna. Are you okay?” I come around the bed and find her curled into a fetal position on the floor, with her forehead pressed against one leg of the nightstand. Her face is hidden by the matted, sweat-damp mess of her hair. “Oh God,” I whisper. “Lucy. Jesus. What happened?” She’s wearing underwear and a huge flannel shirt, unbuttoned. Her bare breasts are exposed; I see now that her underwear, once a pale pink, are soaked in blood. I kneel beside her, and as I touch her shoulder, she starts, stares at me wild-eyed, her nostrils flaring like a horse about to bolt. “What happened?” I ask her.

  She sits up and looks around; her eyebrows furrow into a bewildered V. She searches my face, repeats my question back to me. “What happened?”

  “Come on. Let’s get you off the floor.”

  “I was peeing.” She rubs her forehead. “I was thinking about my sister.”

  I wrap one of her arms around my neck and help her onto the bed. “You’re bleeding,” I say.

  She looks down between her legs and frowns. “Uh-huh,” she says. She looks at me imploringly. “I need a cigarette.” I search the bedroom, but all I find are three empty packs. I go into the living room and discover an almost full pack in Arlan’s jacket. I return with it and hand her one. She finds some matches in the pocket of the flannel shirt. She takes a long, hungry drag and exhales with her eyes closed, then flops over onto her stomach and leans out the window. I lie down beside her. Her hair is tangled and disheveled, her eyelids puffy.

  “Bizarre,” she says, and her breath reeks of gin.

  “Did you take anything?” I ask her.

  “‘Did you take anything?’” she mimics.

  “Did you?”

  “Not nearly enough,” she says.

  “Luce, this is scaring me. There’s a towel all bloody on the floor, you’re all bloody, this is not normal.” My voice is shaking. “What happened? Do you remember?”

  “I told you. I was peeing. I was remembering this time when my sister cut my hair. It looked like shit, and I called her a miserable cunt.” She giggles. “I was only twelve. Pretty good for twelve, huh?”

  “Did you get your period?” I ask.

  She looks at me like this is the most asinine question ever, and continues with her story. “I wanted her to cut it like Erica on Days of Our Lives, but she made me look like Davy Jones. I tried to cut hers—chased her around the yard with the scissors.” She coughs, quietly at first, and then in great, hacking spasms. She has to sit up for a second to catch her breath. When she’s recovered, she lays down again and ashes her cigarette calmly. “I almost got her,” she says, her voice distant. “She was too fast, though.”

  “Did you miscarry?”

  She continues to stare out the window. “No drama, Anna,” she says. “You promised.”

  “Look,” I say, trying to steady my voice. “I’m not the one who was moaning and bleeding on the floor two minutes ago. I just want to know what’s going on.”

  “I wasn’t moaning!” she says.

  “You were, too.”

  She smiles faintly, still not looking at me. “What would you do without me? I’m a constant scandal.”

  “Are you sure you’re okay?”

  She turns to me and gestures with her cigarette. “I’m lucid enough to smoke, right? That’s good enough for me.”

  “You want some water or something?”

  “How about something a little stronger?”

  “Lucy, you didn’t do anything, did you?”

  “Like what?”

  “Like take anything or—I don’t know.”

  “Drama, drama, drama,” she sighs. I look at her skeptically, and she widens her eyes at me. “You want to search the place for coat hangers, or what?”

  “I didn’t mean that.”

  “Then what do you mean?” She grinds her cigarette into a coffee cup impatiently.

  “Just, are you sure you�
��re okay?”

  “I could use a shower,” she says, rolling onto her back and surveying her body. Her thighs are smudged here and there with rust-colored patches. “I’m pretty disgusting.”

  I get up and turn the shower on without a word. When I come back into the bedroom, Lucy has tears streaming down her face. “What?” I say.

  “You’re so great, Anna,” she says. Her lower lip trembles. She tries to light another cigarette, but her hand is shaking too hard. I take the matches from her and strike one, hold the flame up, and she starts crying harder now, so hard that she can barely get the cigarette to stay put between her quivering lips. My match goes out. She gets a tobacco leaf stuck on her upper lip and she picks it off carefully. “You’re my favorite woman,” she says. “Ever. In my whole life.”

  “You going to smoke in the shower?” I ask her.

  “Smart-ass.” She manages to hold her cigarette somewhat steadily between her lips. I light a new match and touch the flame to the tip; we both watch as the paper catches and the orange glow begins.

  I stroke Lucy’s wet hair until she falls asleep. Now that the bloody towel is in the dirty clothes basket and she’s got a tampon in, things seem more manageable. It’s two in the morning. I stare out the window with my hand moving automatically along the slick, damp slope from her forehead to the pillow and back again. It’s soothing, like petting a cat. She smiles dimly in her sleep—just the ghost of a smile, bending the edges of her mouth subtly. I’ve got her tucked under the old quilt. One bare foot sticks out and dangles over the edge of the bed, hanging at an odd angle, like it’s not attached quite right at the ankle. I see that she’s painted her toenails a silvery white, then scraped most of the polish off.

  I think about the blood, and beginnings, and how some things can’t cling long enough to reach fruition. Then I think about that word, fruition, how it has fruit inside it. I think of a line in one of my father’s letters, a woman’s body was still the strangest, darkest fruit of all, and then I start to fall asleep, lulled by the sound of Lucy’s soft breathing.

  When I awake, Arlan is standing in the doorway, his guitar in one hand. His eyes are moist and his jaw is tense. He looks at once angry and tender—it’s a strange combination. For one startled moment I believe this look is directed at me; then I see that he is transfixed by Lucy, who is dead asleep with her mouth wide open and one arm thrust out over the windowsill.

  When he notices that I am awake, he composes his face, setting his guitar gently against the wall. “I saw her hand dangling out the window when I drove up,” he says.

  “Oh yeah?” I say, not sure what this means.

  “It just looked weird,” he says. “She okay?”

  I sit up and hug my knees. It’s gotten foggy out, and the open window has turned the room very cold. “She is now.”

  He turns from where he’s setting his keys and a pile of change on the desk, being careful to make little noise. He looks at me with questions.

  “When I came in there was a lot of blood—” I hesitate. “Anyway, she’s fine.” I pause long enough to wonder if there’s a better way to do this. “She’s not pregnant anymore.”

  He looks away from me and scratches the back of his neck. He goes into the kitchen and I can hear him pouring himself a drink. He reappears briefly in the doorway long enough to whisper, “You want anything? Whiskey? Gin and tonic?”

  “Gin and tonic,” I say, getting up and following him into the living room. I sit on the couch and whisper, “Thanks,” as he hands me my drink. He’s garnished it with a slice of lime. He sits by the window and stares out at the street. I hate myself for wanting him, even now.

  There is a long silence, during which I manage to get half my drink down. He’s poured it with a generous hand. When I start to feel the very beginnings of pleasure taking root, I say, “How was the second set?”

  He looks at me blankly.

  “I don’t know,” he says, shaking his head. “It was a blur.” He tugs a pack of cigarettes from his shirt pocket, fishes one out, lights it, and as an afterthought, gestures to me with the pack. For some crazy reason, I nod and he tosses it to me, then reaches over and hands me his lighter. Our fingers don’t touch, but even coming this close to touching—the distance of his lighter—makes me feel light-headed. I put the cigarette between my lips and try to light it, but nothing happens.

  After several more tries, Arlan laughs and says, “It’s child-proof.” Then he crosses the distance between us, kneels next to me and flicks the lighter with his thumb. He brings with him the perfume of barbecued meat, cigarette smoke and whiskey, plus something all his own under that—something sweaty and powerful. The flame appears, perfect, sharp. Our eyes find each other as he touches the fire to the tip; I breathe in, feel the sudden rush of smoke inside me, and panic. I cough uncontrollably in his face. He holds up his hand to shield himself, laughing.

  “I’ve never smoked,” I say, when I can speak.

  “No kidding.” He’s still kneeling beside me.

  “I don’t know why I’m trying,” I say. He’s still very close. I stare at him idiotically, trying not to cough. From the bedroom, Lucy moans quietly in her sleep. His face becomes instantly expressionless, and he goes back to his seat by the window. We sit there, him smoking, me holding my lit cigarette limply, afraid to put it to my lips. The room begins to fill with smoke. We haven’t turned on any lights, but the street lamps are bright enough to illuminate the languorous shapes it makes, drifting in slow motion toward the ceiling.

  He finishes his drink and gets up to pour himself another. He offers to refill mine, but I’m nursing the last of mine slowly, letting the knot of ice cubes melt some, weakening its bite. Once he’s settled into his chair again, he downs half of his whiskey and looks at me. His long hair hangs about his face. “So she lost it?” he whispers.

  I nod.

  He nods.

  I concentrate on the tiny shreds of lime that find their way to my tongue as the smoke continues to wrap itself around us.

  I do not sleep that night. After several hours of watching the empty streets, I creep outside to the truck, retrieve my father’s letters, and return to the couch to read. I huddle under the blankets with a flashlight, like a kid after bedtime.

  October 23rd, 1976

  Dear Einstein,

  I’m writing from the hospital cafeteria. God, I wish you were here this fall. The air is delicious this week…it tastes like fog and morning dew, but the sky is Easter-egg blue day after day. I’ve never seen the city so beautiful. October is a gift from the gods, laid out in all of its crisp, lucid, Indian summer wonder.

  Anna Marie Medina was born at 5:45 this morning. After twenty hours of labor, Helen looks like she’s been run over repeatedly by a fleet of semis, but Anna is fresh as a flower. I’m trying to choke down this ghastly, shit-colored concoction they call coffee so I can stay awake another hour and stare at her some more.

  Did anyone ever warn us about the mystery, the sheer power of a day like this one? I guess it was implied in books and movies, songs—especially Segovia, or Beethoven’s Fifth—but nothing came close to preparing me. How can I describe the weight of her in my arms, so real, or the complexity of her face, torn between terror and peace? She is indescribably miniature. Her toes make me want to get down on my knees and kiss this old, crusty earth. I’ve never seen anything so new.

  About seventeen hours into her labor, during the excruciating, messy time the nurses refer to euphemistically as “the transition,” Helen screamed at me to make it stop. “Baby,” I whispered in her ear between contractions. “Everything’s okay. Sometimes the only way to heaven is straight through hell.” I thought she was going to rip my head off right there. “You go to hell!” She screamed. “Fuck heaven!” Thankfully, another contraction came and swept her rage up with it. Amazing how pain can take everything away but itself—it’s almost like meditation, though I’m sure Helen would laugh and then shoot me for that analogy, when for her it was
brutal beginning to end. Well, now she’s fast asleep, and I hope her dreams are soft as Anna’s skin. God knows she deserves her rest, after that.

  I won’t bore you with more parental drivel. I hope your dad is better soon, or at least finds his peace where he can. Tell him I’m thinking of him, will you? He was like a dad to me, too. I hope he knows that.

  Everything’s cool at the shop. I’ll fill you in when you get back. Any idea when that’ll be? We can talk soon. I just needed to write everything down, after this surreal day.

  Peace, brother,

  Chet

  I read this letter again and again, clinging to each word with something like gratitude. Or maybe it’s just surprise. I never imagined a piece of paper like this existed in the world. Eight by eleven, blue ink, a faint coffee stain in the upper right corner. I want to memorize every inch of it.

  When I finally do dream it’s in fits—brief scenarios featuring me trying to get blood out of everything: towels, shag carpets, underwear, ceilings.

  Arlan gets up at seven, showers and slips out the door. He’s working, though it’s Saturday—there’s a big job out on Lummi Island. Soon after, Lucy gets up, makes coffee and brings me a cup, looking well rested and a little devious. Her hair is tied back in a ponytail, and her eyes have a glint of determination. I lay on my side and pin the letters between my rib cage and the couch, trying to keep them out of view.

  “We’re going to Sequim,” she says.

  “Where’s that?”

  “The edge of the world. You look like shit, girl. What happened to you?”

  “Couldn’t sleep,” I mumble. I take a sip of coffee, rub the sleep from my eyes.

  “I’ll drive, then. But we have to go.”