by Dan Noble
“Look, forget all of that. It’s in the past. What I need from you is to tell me what you know about the book realm. About Mother.”
“What you did to your mother.” He drops his head in his hands. His back is heaving. I can tell he’s crying even though no sound is coming out.
“What I did?” I feel like a traitor discussing her with him. I’m ashamed. Look at my life now, I always say. It’s everything she could never work out. Or it was. But now those words sound awful, childish. Incorrect. Fuck. I feel disoriented, unsure of what’s real.
“It’s love. Love is what makes it strong. People in love can go in and out of the book world like crazy,” I say. “And that’s why you broke her heart.”
“And yours,” he says.
“I’m fine.”
“I can see that. Millie, you need help. You are delusional.”
“You are too ordinary, too banal to understand any of this. Just look at your choice of wife! That does not make me delusional. That’s just the kind of thing unbelievers say. Please! Ask Kennedy; he knows all about it.”
“Don’t you say a bad thing about Tennessee. You have no idea what she’s put up with! She’s not sophisticated, she’s not educated. She’s not nearly as beautiful as your mother. All of that is true. Of course, it is. But she lives in the now, in the world that really exists, just adjusts along with every change. Doesn’t fight it. And she lives in it with me.
“Is it thrilling? No. But it’s helping the world, not hurting it. And it’s pleasant, too. Tennessee was a nurse for fifteen years! She knows about doing the right thing. Your mother, for all her intelligence, genius really, and intuition, well, she was never aware of anyone else. I know you felt it. That’s why you’ve done all of this. But she loved you. Believe me. She loved you more than anyone. But not enough.”
“But you see, Dad, you were tricked.”
He runs his fingers through his thinning hair, gives the old forehead a few rubs.
“I was so in love with your mother, and you know, she wanted to leave all that behind. Though she didn’t know how, she wanted to have a normal life with me. And I know that’s what you want, too. It’s what I want for you. But without Kennedy, it isn’t going to work. You have to think of Rose.”
My stomach drops at the similarity. Mother and me. Perhaps we aren’t so different after all?
“In Australia, on our honeymoon, she tried to suck me in. And I wanted so badly to believe her. Then Dr. P showed up and she gave me her song and dance about him. And I nearly killed him. I should have gotten out then.”
“How could Pinocchio have been there?”
“Who?”
“Pinocchio, like the story.”
“That’s not his name. You must be remembering wrong. Anyway, I don’t know the details really. They were both researching books, the effects they have on us. But in quite different ways. She hated the guy. It was so messed up. It was always so messed up. But Emily, she was the antidote to life’s futility. She had the ‘something more’ I’d always been searching for.”
“But you couldn’t deal with it.”
He shakes his head. “Turns out there isn’t anything more. There’s just this. We’re kidding ourselves if we think anything else.”
“That’s just the kind of thing I’d expect you to say. And so you were gone, but you still had to deal with me. So, when Kennedy gave you an out, one that you could tell yourself was the right thing to do, you took it.”
He’s silent.
Now it’s my turn to shake my head.
I stand up. “All the lies and secrets are out. So, now’s your chance. Is there anything else I should know?”
I think of Officer Lou. And just as I do, my father mentions him.
“That young cop. He asked a lot of questions. You could tell he was intrigued by the books, the romantic ideal of a novelist, the philosophy, the whole thing. Would’ve fit in perfectly with the crowd at your mother’s god-awful parties. But I think he suspected something was off with you.”
A cold shiver runs up my arms.
He looks at me so sincerely, so deeply, that I wonder for a moment whether all his comments about Mother might unite us against a common foe. I hate him for that, for the fact I can still care about being united with him. It’s too late now for any of that.
He grabs for my hand across the table. I flinch, but allow it. His fingers are warm. “Your mother is dead, Millie. You killed her.”
“What are you talking about?” Even as I say it, the images bombard me. All this time, I’ve been convincing myself I didn’t do it, when I did. How will I ever live with myself if I’m a murderer? What will my daughter think of me?”
“No. No!”
“Yes, Millie. I’m afraid it’s true. She was missing. But Kennedy found her body. And he buried her for you. It was not the right thing to do.”
“That isn’t true! Why wouldn’t you turn me in? Why would Kennedy do that for me?”
“Because we love you! I don’t know. You suffered enough, Millie. Both of us know you have no clue what’s happening when you have those episodes. It was done. She wasn’t coming back. But it was wrong. I see that now. You’re a danger to yourself, to Rose. Without Kennedy, I can’t see how you’ll survive.
“I have her copy of Crusoe here, in the boys’ room. She put it in the boxes she gave me after the divorce. I spent plenty of hours trying to tease out the meaning in that gesture. But then, the way you killed her. So brutal, the way you used to run around maniacally with stones in your hand.”
I try to quieten the swallow I need in order to breathe.
“I had to tell you, Millie. I’m worried. Terrified.”
“So terrified you never even came around. I’m fine. I was fine. But now my husband is dying. And I—I, umm—” I can’t stop the sobs, they’re long and horrifying. It’s true. What he’s saying is the truth and deep down, I’ve always known it. The question is, what do I do now? My father is weak. She was right about that. He was probably jubilant the day Kennedy advised him to leave it to him. Free at last.
Tennessee appears and he goes mum.
“Going already?”
“I’ve got to.”
She seems relieved. I don’t know if she’s stood at a distance or heard everything. She looks unfazed, either way. I can’t ever hurt her, but it doesn’t seem so important anymore.
She smiles, her dumpling face glowing healthy, which sends Arthur’s lips curling too—if only for a second. “It’s probably for the best,” she says. “This hasn’t been very nice.”
“The truth shall set you free,” I say.
“Rose!” I yell. “We have to go.”
I stomp down the hallway toward the children’s voices and repeat myself, louder this time.
“No! I don’t want to! I’m having so much fun with my uncles.”
I stand at the doorway.
“Where did you hear that word?” I say.
“From Grandma Tennessee.”
I’ve never seen such a neat children’s room. It looks as if the toys are scrubbed daily. The giant Mister Potato Head, the primary colored drum set, the intricate setup of anachronistic soldiers, horses, and light armored vehicles. On a tall pine IKEA style bookcase, there are games and stuffed toys, all manner of poseable ‘guys’ those two must lose hours on, but there are no books. I’m wrong. There’s one book. It’s Crusoe. My Crusoe. I walk over to the shelf and take it, daring someone to stop me.
“Boys!” It’s Tennessee herself; she plants herself in front of them, like she’s protecting them from me. My breath goes sharp, painful.
“I want to stay here!” Rose is agitated now. “They have video games. How come we don’t have video games. This is so much fun! Please, don’t make me go. I want to stay here! Please don’t make me go!” She’s kicking her feet, and when that doesn’t work she throws herself on the floor. I have to lean over to pick her up. She squirms, and finally I grab her, but then she escapes again. I go to pul
l her by the sleeve and pinch to pull her to me.
“Ouch!” I must have squeezed through to her skin. Oh, I am a terrible mother. And in front of these two. I could not imagine anything worse. It’s the opposite that’s true. I’m the sensible one, the enlightened one. It’s you two who are the Philistines!
“Let’s go,” I say, finally lifting her under the arms, while her legs kick at me and she continues to scream, piercing, incredibly loud wails.
My father doesn’t stop me.
I can’t remember the drive home. But somehow I make it and park the car at the top of the driveway, with the book in my lap, wondering where it will all go next.
While my life tangles into an intricate mess, which I feel tightening further in on me, I wonder, if that was my instinct—to steal the life my father had decided to plant—where was that taking me? He stole my life from me, so I stole his plant. Pointless. No wonder things had gone so terribly wrong after that. I am a murderer. No symbols necessary there.
Back home, in Mother’s garden, however, my shaky hands know precisely what to do. I provide the antidote to my father’s clean perfection. On my way home, I must have stopped at the roadside sale I saw driving to his house, because I’ve got four potted plants—I musn’t have been able to resist the red-markered exclamation on the drive home: Last Day! Even with the murdering on my mind—and I seem to know precisely where to plant them. Even before I pull them from their pots they look so natural in their various sizes and shapes, so meant to be here.
Dig this here, secure the roots, deeper, higher, a little to the left. When I’m done planting, I can’t explain what made me commit to these choices, pair one hairy leaf with a slim, delicate bud. It’s as if I went to sleep and something else took over. Clip-clop. The horse. The stone. The blood. All of it now grounded in with the beautiful plants. It’s as if I’m immersed in the story and turning the pages to see how it plays out. Or even better, writing them as I go. It’s more terrifying than wonderful. But in select moments, it’s more than wonderful; it’s ethereal.
Now the plants are my father’s Cypress. How odd! I straighten it slightly at the root ball, pat at the dirt above it, when I realize it must go a little bit to the left. That’s where it belongs. I start to dig a few inches from the plant, and only inches down, I see her ring finger. I’d recognize Mother’s ring anywhere, its inlaid diamonds around the band. Art Deco, she’d called it.
32
KENNEDY
When I get home, Millie is in the yard. She looks like she’s performing a frantic pantomime of someone planting a tree. She’s going through all the motions, but she doesn’t even have a shovel in her hand. She’s just pretending she does. She’s speaking that gibberish again, and it’s clear she’s having another one of her episodes.
It’s quite confronting. And where is Rose during all this? Yelling and stamping to be let out of her room, while again she’s been barricaded inside. I go and deal with that while I watch, mesmerized, at Millie out the window. What am I going to do?
The scariest part of the whole thing is where she’s doing the imaginary digging. It’s alongside the rhododendron, where I buried Emily. Somewhere in that mind, she must know.
Right before my eyes, I see her discover the hand. I should have buried it deeper, but the body was our connection to the real, and I was afraid to let that go forever. Besides, once the police were done over here, I wanted to keep her close by, where I could keep an eye on her, control the narrative. So why the veggie patch? Renewal. Millie didn’t have a monopoly on symbols.
33
MILLIE
Oh god, oh god, oh god. I really did kill Mother. Not just in a book. She’s dead. Buried in our yard. But how had the police not discovered the body? All it would take would be a metal detector to find the ring. All the sounds around me are hollow, like I’m hearing them from down a deep hole. All my desires, all my concerns. What are they, if I’m a murderer?
It smells too much like her. The scent is too powerful. I run to the toilet and vomit until everything in my stomach must be gone. A few times after that. The tiles are cool, so I lay back for a minute, holding the hollow baby bump. Mother, yes, I hated you. But I loved you. Could I really have killed you?
Maybe it was a hallucination, seeing your hand like that. All this stress, all the negative energy. Maybe a bit of what’s been said about me is true. I think of that Motherhood book I was reading. The baby will be born in kind. I’d worry for this child if there were going to be one. I don’t know what I’m doing to Rose. My beautiful, lovely, Rose.
Where is Rose? I remember leaving her right there on the couch when I went out to do my digging. I’m mother of the year, I remember thinking, as I draped her with Mother’s afghan, getting a stale whiff of Mother. Still, isn’t it odd that Rose never complains when I leave her to do these things? Why is she so often conveniently out of the way when I need her to be?
I flash to a future where my own daughter hates me, where that is my hand, my ring, buried in the garden. Is that a real possible future? Is it like my family at the ice cream shop? I want to scream. Sitting up, still scented with my vomit, I do so, bring the hand towel to my mouth expressly for the purpose. I must get this out. Somehow. The puking didn’t work. I’m too tightly wound to cry. I scream into the towel over and over. My throat feels torn after, and this is slightly comforting. It’s something I’m sure of.
Could she have been buried here all this time? Kennedy’s cucumbers sprouting up alongside her? It’s all so macabre like some kind of true crime horror. I couldn’t be a murderer, of my own mother no less. All this time, it’s this reassurance that’s got me through. But I don’t think I can do it anymore. I brush my teeth and sip some tap water, hold the glass up to my forehead. I must go back out there. I must see again, make sure it’s real.
I make myself put one foot in the other, down all the stairs, across the kitchen. I close Mom in the kitchen with a bone, but she’s barking right away. I can’t have her waking up Rose, so go back in to bring her out with me, tie her to the tree on her leash. Down on hands and knees, I brace myself to push the dirt that I’d mounded over her fingers back to the side. I find tears pouring down my face after all. Maybe I don’t know myself. After all this time, could I just be a deluded murderer?
As if he knew what I was about to do, Kennedy comes out of nowhere.
“Don’t do this,” he says.
“What? Do what?”
He doesn’t answer, instead, leads me upstairs, to our bed. Why do I go? The same reason I did not check to see I’d tucked Rose on the couch.
I lay down, and his body partly covers mine. He has always comforted me, so this is not as strange as it may seem. Feeling around, I trace the dip of his pelvic bone. Becoming deeply aroused in a way I recognize as the desperation of everything about to change, I kiss below his earlobe, feel the sensations of our connection as intensely as I had that very first time—on his family boat, too fast, too much—and before I know it, he has me pinned down and thrusts so hard and so deep, looking so far into me, this man who knows I’m a murderer and loves and protects me anyway, but keeps secrets, too many secrets, and now feels like a perfect stranger. I should be turned off, but I’m not.
What do you know? I think while I look up at him lost inside me. In his lack of concern over Mother’s dead body in the garden, he was suddenly terrifying, a stranger. Still, I can’t help but come before he does. I watch him as he gives in and I feel his hot liquid inside and see the relief on his face. I loved him, still do. This is how the fiction has been able to propagate.
“Did you plant the garden to bring this all to a head? Did you know I’d really killed her all along?”
“Yes.”
“No. No! No! No! No! This is so fucked up! Can it really all end this way? Mother murdered, at my hand, my husband, my life, a lie, my daughter. My daughter?”
I look up to him. I feel my hands trembling, the halos around everything. It’s happening. My husban
d looks perfect. It makes perfect sense. Love is the power that propels Readers through, but loneliness, the misery of it is creative gold. I’m so fuzzy. My brain is struggling to make connections but can’t. Like it’s being physically restrained. And then the familiar blackness.
My arms and legs are splayed, and I feel myself land gently, slowly with a pffff onto the duvet. My gaze lingers on Kennedy’s bare shoulder blade hulking from beneath the cover, the bit of his neck that meets his dark hairline, the fine peach fuzz of his earlobe. It’s no longer possible to give into this narrative that pretends things would continue on in kind.
I find myself, during the sleepless portions of the night, focusing on Mother’s communication, from the time she wasn’t speaking. She made baby noises—kicks, grunts, slight voice bumps, which I translated painstakingly. Those baby noises are called vegetative and they are all about survival. Rose did the same thing once upon a time, and I took great comfort in reading about what it all meant in the baby books. There was a lovely echo of significance in the duality. But now, I realize it wasn’t the same at all. Rose’s communiques were natural, each noise and gesture a unique calling out for something specific she could only get from the mother she trusted and needed for everything. But with Mother, none of it was for me, telling myself anything else was all bullshit and I knew it. She did it for her—research. All that came first.
For once, I do bring myself to check on Rose, who fell asleep in front of the television earlier. According to Kennedy I locked her in her room again. But I don’t believe him anymore.
34
MILLIE
With Kennedy home from work the next day, it’s like normalcy has completely left our home. He doesn’t trust me with Rose. I barely need an excuse to leave the house, which I’m grateful for because I need to convince Pinocchio to help me.