The doctors have informed us that Darcy is in a coma, which sounds more severe than it really is, they said.
“We have every reason to believe that she will recover,” they said. “That she will wake up in the next twenty-four to forty-eight hours, and we’ll take it from there.”
“Take it from there—what does that mean?” I asked one of them, the one who looked the oldest, the most experienced, the one who might have the answers.
“It means that sometimes there are lingering effects from hypothermia—memory loss and such—that we can’t predict until she wakes,” he said, and I felt my insides crumble at the idea that Darcy might not return to us the same way she went. “There was also severe frostbite,” the doctor added, as if this was an afterthought. “Her fingers and toes sustained some damage, her toes more so. When she wakes up, we’ll see if she has the full span of movement. She may need therapy to regain it all. Stay here in the rehab wing for a while.”
I let out a little scream, an anguished cry, because of all the things to strip Darcy of, her hands, her lifeblood, would be the cruelest. Luanne shushed me and told me not to worry, that she sees things like this all the time, but I couldn’t tell if she was just being her usual clueless self or if, for once, I should actually take heed and believe her.
My dad smushes me into a taxi, and soon after I’ve made it home, Tyler shows up with a duffel bag. I’ve already changed into my pajamas, and I let him in wordlessly, then pad upstairs to the bedroom, so drained that my legs nearly give way halfway up the steps. I sink under my sheets, hoping that sleep will heed my call.
The door creaks open just as I am slipping away, and the mattress shakes beside me. I turn to find Tyler in my bed—our bed—as though he didn’t vacate it three, nearly four, months ago, and really, many months before that.
“Hey,” he says. “Is this okay?”
I press my lips together to form something of a smile, though I have no idea if it’s okay, no idea what to think at all. But my husband is back, and he wants to sleep in our bed, so I accept it and try not to think too much. I am so very, very tired, but he moves on top of me, and then kisses me, tenderly, softly, like he has missed me as much as I’ve missed him, so I muster some strength to kiss him in return. His lips come toward me faster, more desperately, and soon, the movements come naturally. We’ve been doing this, after all, since we were nearly children.
Afterward, Tyler rolls over and slips quickly into a steady, sound slumber. But me, no. I can’t sleep, though all logic dictates that I should, that with my husband back beside me and the two of us tucked so securely in our bed, just like the old days, that surely, sleep should beckon. But it doesn’t. So I just stare at the ceiling, listening to the rise and fall of Tyler’s breath, waiting for morning, waiting for tomorrow, waiting for what it will bring.
twenty-six
There is good news and bad news the next morning at the hospital when Tyler drops me off. He’ll join me after making a rash of calls to the UW, explaining the circumstances, working out the details, details that we haven’t discussed, but he’ll assess them first with his bosses, then assess them with me. “Fine,” I tell him when he suggests this tactic. “Whatever works,” I say, closing the car door in the hospital’s drop-off zone, already flushing the conversation, ready to move on to something more critical. The good news is that Darcy is showing signs of waking up; the bad news is that Ashley’s mother is slipping away.
I check in on Darcy but am quickly scooted out of the room by a hovering nurse, so I meander the halls until I find my father, staring into the glass to Valerie’s room, Ashley crumpled on the floor by the vending machines. Just as I knew I would, though I’m still never quite sure how these visions will unfold. Only that they will. I overhear Ashley asking, “How is she?” just as I approach and watch my father’s limp shoulders flop, his face turning toward her, an empty voice answering, “They don’t know everything yet.” Darcy, he was talking about Darcy.
Machines blare suddenly from inside the room, and Ashley bolts up and through the door, letting it slam behind her. My father, as I’d seen him do once before, slaps his hands up against the window in a naked display of grief.
The beeping stops as quickly as it started, and I move toward my dad, rubbing his back as a way of hello. He turns and clutches me so tightly that I am nearly smothered, his shirt scented with sweaty fatigue, his breath the odor of the hospital’s egg sandwich.
“I’ll go sit with your sister for a while,” he says, releasing me. It’s obvious that he doesn’t know what to do with himself, that if he goes home, he may drink himself into an unconscious stupor, so he stays here and tries to make himself useful. I agree that he should go sit with her, even though I know the nurses will probably turn him away at her door, but I want a moment with Ashley.
She emerges from her mother’s room—the doctors have taken over, trying to give her mom a few more days, though the hours are growing shorter—and falls into me, a hug of sorts, really more of a cry to be held up.
“So you figured it out,” she says after a moment, pushing back and reaching my eyes. “Figured out what I meant.”
“I did,” I say. “Though it took me too long. I should have gotten there sooner.”
“You were never the fastest learner,” she says, ribbing me, which feels both so inappropriate given the circumstances and so utterly Ashley that I can’t help but laugh. To know that despite everything, despite all of this, she can still shovel it out at me. She pauses, more words on her tongue. “And the rest of it? Did you figure that out too?”
“What rest of it?” I ask. “Isn’t this it?” What the hell else could there be?
She shrugs. “There’s always a little more.”
“Stop being so damn cryptic,” I snap, my raw edges breaking through.
“Fine,” she huffs. “I’ll help.” She turns to gaze at her mother, all wires and tubes and machines now. “Don’t you ever wonder why we stopped being friends?”
“You asked me this before,” I say. “At the diner. It’s because you went all weird, and I became a cheerleader.” I try not to think back on that time, even though for the better part of my adulthood, it was the only time I wanted to think of. But now, no, not now. Not when I’ve discovered how easily it can all shatter, like the glass frame against my fireplace.
“That’s not why,” she scoffs, and then reconsiders. “Though there’s that too. I never did like cheerleaders.” She smiles. “Look, this is for you to figure out. I was pissed at you back then for not getting it, but I’m not pissed now. Because I know that you didn’t know. That you didn’t want to see it back then because it was so much easier. I get that. I wish in some ways that I hadn’t seen it either.”
“Honestly, Ashley,” I interrupt. “I’m so tired. Can you just enlighten me?”
She starts to say something, but then a voice calls my name from down the hallway. I spin around and see my father, then turn back toward Ashley, and something clicks into focus. But before I can even fathom what is sliding into place, my father shouts for me again.
“Tilly, come on,” he cries. “Darcy’s awake. She’s asking for you.”
Darcy and I start sobbing simultaneously when I enter her room. Her hands are bandaged, wrapped tight to ward off the damage, and her limbs are ensconced in blankets. I wonder if she’ll ever warm up, ever be the same, but those questions won’t be answered for some time now.
“I’m sorry,” I say to her, sitting at her bedside, between my sputtered gasps, between my tears. I don’t know if she can ever forgive me for this. Less important, or perhaps more important, I don’t know if I can ever forgive myself for this.
“I’m sorry too,” she says, and it’s clear that she doesn’t hold me responsible, though of course, how could she know that I could have seen this coming, that if I’d thought harder, been less selfish, maybe I could have stopped it?
We sit there in comforting quiet, kept company by the beating monitors, t
he drip of the IV, two sisters, taking care of each other, maybe what we should have been doing from the start. Darcy’s eyes droop, and I study her face. She’s no longer a child now. The layer of baby fat has long since dripped off her, the smooth luster of adolescent skin somewhat dulled. But she is still breathtaking; her cheekbones are sharp protrusions, her hair with its sheeny gloss despite purple dye and a diet of pizza and Coke.
Her lashes flutter, and she looks up at me.
“What?” she says, self-conscious but happy to be admired all the same. The perfect contradiction, as always. That, at least, hasn’t changed.
“Nothing.” I shake my head. “I’m just thinking about everything. Everything we’ve been through, you know?”
“I do.”
My dad raps on the window and gives a little wave, a flimsy peace offering that I hope she’ll latch onto. I watch her watch him, gauging her reaction.
“Can you forgive him?” I ask. “He wants that so badly.”
“Why are you so easy on him?” she says, with no rancor, only depletion. “Why do you always give him another chance?”
“I guess I believe in second chances.” I shrug.
“He’s had more than that,” she says succinctly.
“Can I ask you one more thing?” I’m not sure what I’m asking, even though I think I sort of know. She nods, looking sleepy. “What did you mean the other day in the kitchen—his secrets? You meant the hidden bottles, that stuff, right?”
She sighs, a long, exhausted, purging sigh.
“Tilly,” she says. “I’m tired. And I love you. So let it go for now.”
“I can’t,” I answer quietly, thinking of my father in the hallway, of his hands against the glass of Valerie’s room, of some strange unspoken tie that binds him to Ashley and her mother, of Ashley’s request that I understand it all too.
“It’s years old,” she murmurs, fading fast. “Years behind us now. Before Mom died.” Her lips quiver, and she’s asleep.
I look up to find my dad frozen in the doorway, his face a veil of worry, of guilt, of disquiet. I hadn’t even noticed him slip closer.
He dislodges the phlegm from his throat. “What was that about?”
“You tell me,” I say, then reconsider. “You know what? Don’t. I don’t want to hear an excuse. I want to hear what Darcy knows about before Mom died. What she knows about you and Valerie Simmons.”
His mouth drops open, as does mine. I hadn’t even realized I’d made a connection, but somehow, even without attempting to master the jigsaw puzzle of my life, my instinct had taken the reins.
“It’s n-not what you’re thinking,” he stammers.
“How do you even know what I’m thinking?” I stand now, firmer on my feet, firmer with myself. Trust me, trust yourself. Yes, this time, now, I will.
“I just … I just …” My dad’s words refuse to excuse him this time.
“When was this? How long was this for?” My unchecked rage has returned, the rage that slapped Tyler, that accused my father of failing us, that chucked that photo clear into the fireplace. Those feel like warm-up acts.
I already know when it happened, of course: it was in the sixth grade, and Ashley must have uncovered it, left me a trail of breadcrumbs to stumble upon it myself, to stand by her and share the burden of the gruesomeness of her discovery that our parents were unfaithful not just to their spouses but to their families, and instead, I kicked the breadcrumbs aside, shuffling past them in my bare feet as I ran through the grass, happy and greedy and oblivious all at once. It’s no wonder she hated me. I’d hate me too.
“Not long,” he offers timidly, exposing his earlier excuse, betraying his guilt. “It was a mistake.” His hands are open, begging me not to judge him.
“And Darcy knew? Darcy knew?” I am shouting in a furious whisper, trying not to wake her but wanting wholeheartedly to throttle him, strike him down right here in the ICU.
His shoulders start to shake, then his torso, and soon, his whole body is a mess of spasmodic, wracking fits of anguished tears coursing free. I don’t care. I don’t give one shit. I watch him tremble, and I vow that this is it. I will not excuse him for another moment of my life, I will not protect him, I will not offer counsel, I will not care if he returns home tonight and swallows two gallons of vodka and chokes on his own vomit.
He tries to reply but is drowned by his guttural moans. It’s just as well, because right then, right when it cannot get any worse, Ashley appears behind him, her eyes swollen and pink, and says, “She’s gone.”
Another daughter left to face the world alone.
twenty-seven
Valerie Simmons is buried in the same cemetery as my mother, on a quiet day in the first week of November, the sky a cast of gray steel, the air cold enough to bite. The snow still hugs the ground, squishing below us as we plod solemnly to her plot. Ashley is holding up better than I anticipated, or perhaps just better than I did when I buried my own mom, but she is stronger than I am, this I understand now, so maybe it’s no surprise.
She knows that I know her secret from so many years ago; she saw this washed across my face, and of course, across my father’s face, when she told us the melancholy news of her mother’s passing, but we haven’t spoken of it. With all that has happened, it seems almost beside the point.
Tyler and I, along with Susanna and Luanne, attend the funeral. I spot my father on the periphery of the small huddle of mourners but don’t move toward him to start rebuilding our bridge. There are only so many times I can lay myself down, I tell Tyler in the SUV afterward, and he nods, his eyes on the road, and I wonder if he’s agreeing with me or mentally checking sports scores.
This isn’t just the day that we have all gathered to bury Ashley’s mom. As if fate is mocking me with gallows humor, it’s also my wedding anniversary. Tyler reminded me two days ago, pulling out an old album, laughing over our Halloween-themed rehearsal dinner. He went as Joe DiMaggio; I went as Marilyn Monroe. How odd, I thought, as we flipped through the pages, the plastic crinkling, the photos yellowed around the edges, that we already were concealing ourselves before we even married.
“We should go out to dinner,” he said, though his voice turned upward and it was more of a question. “Um, to celebrate.”
“Okay,” I said, wiping down the kitchen counters. “Okay, yes, let’s.” It all felt so long ago, that rehearsal dinner, the toast my father made with nonalcoholic wine, how much I missed my mother as Luanne and Susanna pressed my dress and adorned the bun at the nape of my neck with baby rosebuds. Only that part—the pangs for my mom, I thought, squeezing out the sponge, the brown water sliding down the kitchen sink drain—didn’t feel like so long ago at all.
We shower quickly after the funeral and then take our time to dress, each avoiding eyeing the other’s state of half nakedness. Tyler finishes first and waits for me on the downstairs couch, reminding me of how he used to wait for me back in high school. I’d walk down the stairs, and his whole being would illuminate. Of course mine did too, though now, with everything, it’s easy to forget that.
Tonight, I come down, and he rises, and I try to convince myself that it’s possible to regain that glow, like turning on a flash of a camera, and bam, that shadow of darkness is gone.
He kisses my hand. “You look beautiful.”
“Do I?” I ask, matting the wrinkles in a navy dress I haven’t worn since last year’s graduation ceremony. It’s out of season, but I didn’t have anything else clean.
We eat, as we have every anniversary for the past nine years, at Bella Donna’s, CJ’s father’s restaurant, which is as close to Italy as I’ve ever been. The tablecloths are made of real silk, the music softly lilting from the stereo an opera that Darcy would likely recognize. The air swims with the scent of fresh, doughy pasta. Hank Johnson greets me warmly at the door, sliding my down coat off my shoulders, squeezing both of my cheeks with his hands.
“Thank you for doing everything that you have for her,” h
e says.
“She did it herself.” I smile. “Though you know this means she has a shot at Wesleyan.”
“I know,” he answers, showing us to our table, pulling out my chair. “Of course, I don’t want to see her go, but I also don’t want to see her not go.” His shoulders rise, then fall. “Welcome to life.”
“It’s nice being here with you,” Tyler says after Hank is gone. “I’m glad that we’re doing this, glad that we’re celebrating.”
“Me too.” I nod and scan the menu, ignoring the obvious: that I’d forgotten about our anniversary until he reminded me, and that if he hadn’t, the day would have passed much like any other, except that I began it by burying an old friend’s mother.
“I didn’t realize how close you and Ashley had become,” he says, after he orders his usual chicken cacciatore, and I, breaking from tradition, opt for the salmon.
“We used to be best friends, remember?” I say.
“Sort of,” he says, his eyes squinting. “I sort of remember.” He falls silent, and I do too. We’ve grown unaccustomed to this, the meandering small talk that adds up to something substantial in a marriage. We’ve forged a partnership this past week built on crisis—How is Darcy’s recovery? How is Ashley holding up?—and now, with no red lights glaring, no alarm bells blaring, as we both shift in our seats, sipping a wine that I wouldn’t have ordered for myself but Tyler went ahead and did it anyway, we’re left with, well, not so much. It doesn’t feel like so much, I think, pressing the cabernet down my throat, feeling its burn as it goes.
“How’s your fish?” Tyler asks after it arrives.
“Not as good as I thought it would be,” I say. “I just wanted to try something new, though. But I don’t think I’d order it again.”
“Well,” he answers, cutting his chicken and popping it in his mouth. “You tried.”
Well, I think, I did.
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