Girl in the Arena

by Lise Haines

I shake my head back and forth, tears run from my eyes and over his hand that he gently removes now. I turn around and face him. We both whisper now.

  —They? Not you?

  —If you learn that Tommy’s body has disappeared into an unmarked plot, long before it’s sold off, you’ll know there are more than party-liners around here. But it might not be safe for you to come here again.

  I nod in agreement.

  —I’ll do what I can to get your contract through, though I wish you could see some other choice. I almost died when my daughter married her gladiator.

  Then I ask him to give me a moment.

  I touch the case and tell Tommy that I don’t want him to worry about Thad.

  After a while LeRoy takes out his handkerchief and wipes my fingerprints away. He tells me we are to take the stairs down to the ninth floor. From there we will both take the elevator down to the street and then he’ll travel back up to the office. He tells me where I need to walk to catch a taxi and wishes me Godspeed.

  *

  It’s good that I take the last train back. It’s dark and quiet now and I’ll get home to Thad soon. At the speed of the Acela, I get out the superheroes catalog. It’s so much easier to think of oneself in a comic book.

  The costumes are broken down into eight basic types: graphic, patriotic, virile, paradoxical, armored, aerodynamic, mutant, and postmodern. Although some might consider me paradoxical, or even a little armored, I think postmodern will suit my time in the arena. Adorned with skulls, hellfire, and other symbols of mortality, they embody… the postmodern body of both fiction and fashion and the darker terrors of our contemporary world.

  I don’t know what comes after postmodern, which is already turning old when five-year-old girls can go into local department stores and buy tights with skull and crossbones all over them. Maybe the next phase is to crank up the particle accelerators, rev up the nuclear reactors, peel the ozone away, spew oil from the offshore platforms, take Russia or China on. But I would like to imagine something else. I don’t know. Something.

  CHAPTER 29

  Thad waits for the first pancake off Julie’s griddle, his jaw tipped open. She’s made it the size of his face and plans to decorate it with Thad’s basic features.

  I see he’s wearing a new gladiator costume. The work is so good it looks almost like one of Tommy’s outfits. His wooden sword and shield, painted bronze, rest next to his chair as if he’s going into battle as soon as breakfast is over. They’ve even purchased a new pair of sandals for him with the right number of straps. I know there’s no discouraging Julie in this kind of gift, and God help me if I try and take it away from Thad now.

  —Would you like tiny marshmallows or little bits of butter for the mouth? Julie asks.

  Thad furrows his brow. —Lyn’s going to lose everyone, he says in his point-blank way.

  —He really missed you. I think that’s all it is, Julie says, but she looks away, clearly worried.

  Just once I wish my Thad would say I’m going to win something or take a pleasant trip or meet an interesting stranger.

  Now Julie steps away from the stove long enough to kiss me on the forehead. Then Mark leans into me with that look like I need a distraction. One eye on his computer, he starts to whisper to me about just how bad things have gotten in Myanmar, about the things they do to albinos in Tanzania.

  —I was only gone for a day, and I read those articles online, and I’m really getting this, that the world is going to hell.

  —Sorry, he says, rubbing his goatee.

  —I’m just tired, I say.

  Lloyd, who’s probably only caught a little of our conversation, begins to shake his head, his eyes fixed on the sports section. —A lot can happen in a day, he says vaguely, more to himself than us.

  I want to tell him that it already has. I got the call last night from LeRoy as soon as I got in. Caesar’s is sending signed copies of the contract today.

  —Jesus, since when did the army get into Ultimate Fighting? Lloyd says, smacking the paper.

  —Since they figured they could make a buck airing it on primetime, Mark says.

  —No shit.

  —Lloyd, Julie scolds, nodding toward Thad.

  —Sorry. Cute pancake, Thaddy, he says. —Looks just like you.

  —I’m the most famous person you’ll ever meet.

  In a low tone I say, —Tommy used to compare ultimate fighting to cockfighting.

  Lloyd folds the newspaper back. —Listen to this from some Major Crigger.

  —Crigger or Trigger? Mark asks.

  —I quote: The Ultimate Fighting Championship provides a great venue to get the Army name into the minds of millions of young Americans.

  —Why don’t they just brand us at birth? I say.

  —Right on the frontal lobe, where my sense of humor is, Mark says.

  During the conversation Thad has picked up the uncapped maple syrup bottle. He holds it in front of his right eye at a slight angle until his T-shirt is spattered syrup. I realize how much he loves the amber view but I know in time he’ll drop the bottle. I gently nudge it away from him, saying, —My turn.

  Then I look through the glass at him and say, —You’re my favorite person, Thad.

  He watches Julie set his starkly happy pancake on his placemat, and I know he’s hungry. But when I get up to wash my sticky hands at the sink, he jumps up and moves to the floor next to my legs, as if he’s there to catch the tiny drops of water that splash against the stainless steel. He hums to himself while I wet some paper towels and crouch next to him, washing the syrup off his hands and face and T-shirt.

  —I’m sorry I had to go to New York, I say. —I missed you.

  —Let’s go home and see Mom now, Thad says.

  Lloyd gives me a sympathetic look.

  —Julie would feel very sad if you didn’t eat your pancake. And I have to talk with Mark a little. Then we’ll go home.

  I signal Mark to meet me in his bedroom, then I lead Thad back to the table, where I cut up his pancake for him. He watches, tapping his index fingers against his thumbs as if one hand is talking to the other hand. Once he starts eating, Julie tells me to go on.

  Sometimes Mark’s room is barricaded, but rarely on purpose. It’s just that the dirty clothes and dishes and cereal boxes and things end up by the door like he’s planning on taking this stuff out to the kitchen eventually. But he gets caught up with the computer a lot and he trains every day, and I don’t think he realizes he’s creating burial mounds. I have to lean my weight against the door to gain entry. Once I do, I slump down at the bench press, close to Mark’s desk, where he’s already signed on.

  He offers me a Coke out of his mini fridge but as I told Julie, I’m just not thirsty, not really hungry. He forces it into my hand, saying I look too thin.

  —He doesn’t understand that Allison’s dead, I say. —And he still hasn’t figured out what happened to Tommy and he was right there in the stadium when he died. He saw everything, but nothing sunk in.

  —Maybe it’s better if he can’t remember?

  —Maybe. But then he asks for them and I can’t produce them, and then he runs and hides under his train table for hours.

  He gives me one of his long, considered looks, like he’s about to doctor me.

  —I’m worried about you.

  —Me? I’m okay.

  But I can never bullshit Mark. He pulls up the latest photos circulating the Internet. There I am, running down Fifth Avenue.

  —I do look rabid.

  I tell him about the kids who dogged me. And then I tell him that I need his help. Mark puts his hands around one of my knees.

  —Anything, babe, he says.

  I tell him about LeRoy, and outline the business about the contract. He drops his hands and tips back in his desk chair. He says, —I’m going in for you. You get that, don’t you? I’m taking this fight.

  —I appreciate that. More than you know. But I have someone else in mind.

&nb
sp; —That stings.

  —No, listen. Do you remember that woman in Sacramento who projected her avatar into the courtroom where her divorce proceedings were taking place, because she was too nervous to personally attend?

  —That woman’s going to fight for you?

  —You know, she rigged the avatar to a Living machine.

  —Shit, you can’t be serious.

  —If she could that, why can’t I put my alter ego into the arena?

  Mark cracks up.

  —Didn’t they catch her? he asks.

  —Only after it was in action for ten full minutes.

  —And wasn’t her avatar a troll? Okay, but the thing is, I’m not sure if we can get your alter ego to lose a limb or bleed if she’s hit—without making her look really stupid—like a gushing fire hydrant. And what if she goes crazy and tries to take one of your arms off? But hey, I’ll bring my computer over tonight and we’ll see what we can do. What the hell.

  —I’ve already started to build someone. I’ll tweak around with her, see if I can lose the wings and spear.

  —Spears are good. Keep the spear.

  —It’s going right through the center of her chest.

  —Yeah, well, lose the spear. And look for a current face shot of yours that we can patch in.

  —Just so you know, I’m fighting if this doesn’t work—and you’re not responsible for anything.

  —I told you I’m going in for you.

  —No, I’m serious. Just help Julie with Thad if I go down. And loan me your electric razor. This stubble is driving me crazy.

  —I love your bald self.

  *

  The paparazzi’s in my hair, though I have none. If I did I’d be pulling it out, strand by strand. After Thad tucks his share of pancakes away, Julie checks my stitches and says they’re dissolving nicely, and encourages Lloyd to see us home. Lloyd explains that he decided to camp at our house while we were gone, and he caught one of the photographers trying to break in. Lloyd made the man strip and he hosed him down with the garden hose. That’s when he decided to send tag teams from his trainees over to the house to keep guard—one by the back entry, one by the front—round the clock, in eight-hour shifts. They love Lloyd, otherwise there’s no way they’d stand around in the heat, glaring down the paparazzi all day.

  The van is swarmed. We can’t even pull round to the back.

  After Lloyd leaves his van in the middle of the road, he and Mark clear a route to the front door. When we’re almost inside, I let this slip to one of the female reporters:

  —Caesar’s will be making a big announcement within the next forty-eight hours.

  Of course Lloyd wants to know the second we make it into the house what the big announcement is. So after I get Thad settled upstairs, I spell it out for him. Not the part about my alter ego. With Lloyd, you either fight or you don’t fight. He’d rather we all burn in hell than send artificial life into the arena. But then Lloyd’s a pretty straightforward guy. And there’s no way I’d bring up the thing about Tommy’s corpse. God knows how freaked he’d get about that. So I stick to the essentials, and tell him that I’ve settled on my fate: No to the wedding, Yes to combat.

  Lloyd hugs me and once he’s out the door, I turn on the TV, where I watch him get through the crush of people until he can pull away. Our house is being broadcast round the clock. Helicopters chop the air.

  *

  I make up a stack of sandwiches, all with the crusts trimmed off the way Thad likes, and then I realize we’ve got these guards now. Today they are Slade and Dave, and I better call them in for lunch. They both like the intensely caffeinated beverages that Tommy liked, and we still have some in the fridge. Dave keeps asking me things, like do I always cut the crusts off the bread, and can he see where Tommy worked out, and after a while I leave them in the kitchen, telling them to help themselves if there’s anything else they want. I take the rest of the sandwiches upstairs for Thad on a tray, garnished with chips and carrot sticks, anchored with a cup of orange juice. He’s up in Allison’s room of course, curled at the end of her bed. He’s been waiting for me to turn the TV on. I remind him that Allison’s bathroom is being renovated so if he has to go he should give himself enough time to make it down to my bathroom.

  Then I announce, —Today is ANIME MARATHON DAY!

  We will, I explain, be tuned in for hours. He seems very content with this idea, once I get my laptop and bring that onto the bed to work.

  My alter ego, Eos, has wings, a short lace-up top, leggings, a small skirt, rabbit slippers, and yes, a spear through her chest. My goal is to make her battle-ready. The clothes are the easy fix. I make a new skirt using a wide leather belt from which I hang other smaller strips of leather. It sits on my hips and hits where a short tennis skirt would fall. When I walk, the strips of leather swing back and forth against my thighs. At the bottom of each strip I attach a silver coin with a peace symbol stamped into it.

  I go for bronze chest armor shaped with strong pecs and well-defined breasts and the word egalite over my breastbone, in a circular pattern. I create pads for the legs and sword arm that I think are fairly authentic but have a titanium lining. The belly is exposed, because that’s regulation, so I spend some time working on my abs and though I consider a belly button ring, I decide they’re overused and could be an easy target in competition. I’ve seen what happens when a ring is suddenly ripped out.

  I’m tempted to leave the bunny slippers, but I’m afraid people won’t get my sense of humor. Sandals are never worn in the arena. Tommy preferred Nikes, but I’ve decided to go barefoot since it will be an evening match and the sand will be fairly cool by then.

  When I walk, I move in an almost fluid way but I’m concerned that my eyes are too scary so I go for sunglasses, for now anyway. I select the mirrored type, hoping Uber will have a narcissistic moment and forget about me.

  I have to call him. But I keep putting it off because I don’t know how to tell him yet. He’s left lots of messages on my phone, most of them pretty nice but the last one a little despondent.

  It’s hard to know how to approach him. Maybe a couple of years ago, I would have taken this up with Sam and Callie, and we would have sat around like complete idiots, trying to strategize. And they probably would have given me plenty of bad advice, so I’m better off with my own sense of cluelessness.

  When I first created my avatar, the makeup streamed down her face. I don’t cry a lot so maybe I wanted to express something I tend to stuff. But Tommy said, You have to be tough to decipher when you fight.

  It’s not hard to make her bald, but it’s putting the T in the back of her skull that takes forever. In between, I run up and down stairs getting beverages for Thad, watering the security force, checking on the paparazzi, dawdling by the library.

  Thad sits up for a while and I fluff a bunch of pillows behind his back. He asks to see what I’m doing.

  I turn my computer around so it faces him.

  —There’s a spear in your chest, he says.

  —Oh, yeah. It’s just a decoration.

  —I want a decoration.

  —Later, I say. —Later we’ll make you your very own avatar. And I’ll make some wings for you. And you understand that real spears don’t belong in our chests, right, Thaddy? It’s always very important that we take good care of our real bodies.

  —Our real bodies, he says, and curls up.

  —And after that, we’ll go on the treadmill down in the basement for a while. I’ll let you do all of the walking.

  —I’ll do all of the walking, he says, slowly drifting.

  I’m down to the wings and spear now. Those wings took me three days to perfect. I know that sounds lame, but I got lost in the beauty of engineering. I threaded each strand like tatting a fine French lace. So I have to unravel them strand by strand.

  I think Thad’s on his seventh anime show when I lift that last feather from my back.

  The spear looks dangerously close to the heart bu
t it’s actually running through the breastbone—lodged firmly there. I can run, fly, use a hover board or jet pack, and that spear remains fixed in place. I do not bleed. If I went into a state of convoluted metaphor, I could try and make something out of this idea that I’m walking around with a spear through my chest. Or I could keep it simple: it’s just a form of adornment, like scarification or piercing. It’s something you get up to in another state of mind. I realize the afternoon is getting late, and I should clean up and get ready for the changing of the guards, dinner, and Mark. I’ll work on the spear tomorrow.

  Thad snores lightly now. He’ll nap for a couple of hours. I slip the remote from his open hand, putting a wrap on the marathon. I get up to stretch and go over to Allison’s garden windows that look down to the backyard and out along the treetops and neighboring homes. I often found her standing by the windows like this, taking in the view, sometimes shaking her head as if she couldn’t believe this was something she owned. I wonder if she stood here and considered the way the light slips through the trees the night she suicided. But then I realize her mind was too dark to see more than a foot in front of her.

  CHAPTER 30

  I flick on the kitchen lights.

  —Uber. Jesus. What are you doing here?

  —I knocked but no one answered, he says. —Should I come back later?

  —No it’s okay. I just… wasn’t expecting you.

  —These are for you, he says, handing me an armful of sunflowers.

  I set them on the counter and go over to the cabinet where the vases are kept. I fill a large blue vase at the sink, staring at the swirl of water, trying to avoid his look. He’s gone to an eye patch now, the stitch marks visible across his check in four even rows. Upstairs with the AC going it’s easy to forget the heat and humidity, but here with so many windows and doors onto the yard, it just pools. Uber wears a pair of shorts and a T-shirt, looking like a guy ready to grill or knock a birdie around a badminton net. I watch a bead of sweat leave one of his temples and travel down his cheek until he wipes it clear.

  I set the flower arrangement on the table and flick on the oscillating fan.