Lifeline

by Gerry Boyle

  “Nice guy, Jeffrey. What did Marcia do?”

  “She did what she always does. She was here in, like, five minutes. She took Adrianna home and Jeff was passed out on the bed. I got to clean up.”

  Donna opened the cupboard above the stove and started to sort through packages.

  “Would you like a cookie or something? I mean, I don’t really have—”

  “No, thanks.”

  The water started to hiss, and there we were. Donna’s hair looked damp, as if she’d just had a shower. She didn’t have makeup on and she looked prettier that way, with a spray of freckles across the bridge of her nose. Her shirt was sleeveless like the one she’d worn to court, except it was rose instead of turquoise.

  She smiled awkwardly.

  “I feel sort of silly, calling you and you come over here like it’s this urgent thing or whatever.”

  “That’s okay.”

  “ ’Cause it isn’t. I mean, this is gonna sound funny, but I just wanted to talk to you about all this stuff that’s going on. You’re a reporter and you see this kind of thing, all kinds of things, I suppose. I mean, I just . . . I don’t know what I’m trying to say.”

  “I think I understand,” I said.

  “Do you? I mean, I thought you could . . . Listen, the water’s boiling. I’ll get this and we can sit down or whatever. Do you have time? I mean—”

  “Sure,” I said.

  So we took our coffee and went to the living room, which was the room with the table and clothes. There were an old couch and a big chair with a tapestry sort of thing tossed over it. I sat on the couch beside a pile of clothes. Donna moved a stack of clothes and sat in the chair. From the couch, I could see through a door to the bedroom. The bed had a mirrored headboard. I looked away again.

  “Jeff got sprung, huh?” I said.

  “Yeah, it was really strange. Lenny, the cop I know, he said he couldn’t believe it. I mean, this guy is dangerous. You know that. And he’s out in, like, four hours. Three hundred bucks. What kind of bail is that for somebody who’s threatening to kill people?”

  “Not much of one.”

  “I guess. I mean, this Tate knew he’d tried to punch you out. And this protection order is like nothing to him. Might as well be written on toilet paper.”

  “Has he been here since he got out?”

  “No, but I didn’t expect him right away,” Donna said.

  She sipped her coffee.

  “I know this guy and there’s, like, a pattern to it. He goes on these binges. It’s at the tail end of the binge that he comes after me. It’s like he’s been working his way up to, you know, whatever it is that’s boiling inside him. Since he’s been into the coke it’s been worse, ’cause he keeps drinking but he doesn’t get tired, you know?”

  “So he has more energy to come here and beat you up?”

  “Or smash the place. In fairness to him, it’s more often that he smashes the place.”

  “Fairness to him?” I said. “Donna, what are you doing with this guy? Normal people don’t do this kind of thing. You don’t have to put up with this.”

  “I know. I mean, Marcia’s been telling me to get counseling, get away from him. And what it’s done to Adrianna.”

  “How did you end up with him, if you don’t mind my asking? And your husband? Why these guys?”

  Donna gave a little snort and looked away.

  “I don’t know. I’ve thought about that. Part of me can’t believe I’m telling you all this, but you’re easy to talk to. And you seem to care.”

  “I do.”

  “I believe you. So I don’t know. This isn’t for the paper, is it?”

  “No. I’m not working today. Do you work?”

  “No. I get support and AFDC. Donnie wouldn’t let me work. He said I’d screw around behind his back. Jeff wouldn’t take care of Adrianna, so I couldn’t work then, either.”

  “He didn’t have a job?”

  “Well, sometimes. He used to drive a wrecker, but he kept losing his license. Now he’s a junker—when he works at all, I mean.”

  “Junker?”

  “Yeah. He goes around with this buddy of his and picks up old cars and stuff and brings them to Augusta. They melt them down or something. For the metal.”

  “You could work now?”

  “I’m gonna as soon as all this is settled. All this Jeff stuff, I mean. You know where I’d like to work?”

  “Where?”

  “A greenhouse. You know. Plants and flowers and stuff. I’ve always loved plants.”

  I looked around the room. There weren’t any.

  “Yeah, I know,” Donna said.

  “Don’t tell me. Jeff smashed them.”

  “Every single one. I’m gonna get some more. Sometime.”

  Donna crossed her legs and leaned forward.

  “You don’t know my sister that well, but the two of us—I’m the screw-up, you know? I mean, she was my big sister and she did everything right. We didn’t have much. My mother stitched shirts piecework, so we didn’t have this la-di-da background. And Marcia goes to college. Gets a scholarship. Marcia marries a guy with a trade. He’s a millwright. She’s sort of like an accountant, but not really a CPA or whatever it is. Works at home on this computer and everything. Does people’s taxes and stuff, and here I am, like, this loser. So I guess I kind of rebelled. I figured, I can’t beat her anyway. I’m not gonna try.”

  “So you got married?”

  “I partied a lot. I don’t drink much anymore. Once in a while I get into it. When I kind of lose it. So I got pregnant in high school. Married Donnie and it was, like, a disaster right from the start. Donnie looked down on me, you know? I mean, when I was pregnant it was like it was my fault or something. And then he started just cutting me down all the time. Still does. We fight over support for my daughter. Well, it wasn’t all the time at first.”

  “Why’d you stay with him then?”

  “Same reason I stayed with Jeff. I figured I could fix it. Make him love me, you know? And I didn’t want everybody to know—my mother was alive when I was married to Donnie—I didn’t want everybody to know I screwed this one up too.”

  “Did your mother die recently?”

  “Ma died . . . it’ll be three years in August.”

  “So she knew Adrianna?”

  “A little. The last few months she was all drugged up, so she didn’t know much. My father, he split when I was a baby. Your folks alive?”

  “No,” I said. “They’ve been gone twelve, thirteen years.”

  “Did you like ’em?”

  “Very much.”

  “They liked their son the reporter?”

  “Yeah. But my dad died when I was just getting into it. My mother lived longer, so she knew.”

  “That’s good. That she knew, I mean. Brothers and sisters?”

  “Nope.”

  “Were you a rich kid?”

  I paused.

  “No. My dad studied beetles. In a museum, mostly. Taught in a college in New York.”

  “Nice guy?”

  “Very nice. Quiet. Never said much when I screwed up.”

  “I can’t picture that,” Donna said, looking at me closely.

  “Yeah, well, I was pretty wild for a time. I worked hard to make up for it later. Worked night and day for ten years.”

  Donna looked puzzled.

  “But he was dead?”

  “I thought if I did well enough, somehow he’d know anyway,” I said. “Like you not telling your mother, I guess.”

  “I didn’t tell anybody,” Donna said. “As long as I didn’t do anything about it, it was my secret.”

  “Like being a prisoner, wasn’t it?”

  “Yup. But I had Adrianna in there with me. That kept me going.”

  She leaned forward and I could see that her chest was thin too, with her breastbone tight against her skin, the skin very white on the slope of her breasts.

  “Could you excuse me for a secon
d, Jack?” Donna said.

  She got up and went toward the kitchen, then took a left. I heard the door close. The bathroom.

  I got up and looked around. The only books in sight were for children. There was a rack of movie videotapes by the television. I glanced at the titles, which were mostly Disney, then took a couple of steps into a little hall, almost an alcove.

  There was a metal footlocker set on two red milk crates. Propped on top of the footlocker was small piece of plywood. Tacked to the plywood was a piece of paper. The piece of paper was a painting. A watercolor portrait of Adrianna.

  It wasn’t bad. Odd, but not bad.

  The painting was done in a primitive sort of style, sort of flat. But the eyes were deeper and the expression was real and childlike. The whole thing had sort of a faint fuchsia tint.

  I looked behind me and listened, then reached behind the board. There were other paintings stacked there. Another Adrianna. One of the living room. One of the street, seen from the living-room window. All of them had the same lavender cast. I was flipping through them again when there was a knock on the door.

  Then two more knocks. No Donna. Three more. Still no Donna. I thought for a second, then walked through the room and opened the door.

  There was a guy standing there. Light gray cowboy boots and jeans. A cream-colored short-sleeved shirt and a bad blue tie. A phony tan and a nasty scowl.

  “Hi,” I said.

  “Who the hell are you?”

  “Who the hell’s asking?”

  “None of your goddamn business.”

  “Likewise, I’m sure,” I said.

  He started to say something, then caught himself. I stood there with my hand on the door.

  “Where’s Donna?”

  “Who wants to know?”

  “Her goddamn ex-husband,” the guy said. “Now get the bitch.”

  “You really ought to get something for that misogyny before it spreads. Maybe an ointment or something—”

  “What? Listen. I don’t know who you are, pal, but tell her to get out of the sack, ’cause I got something important to talk to her about.”

  “But she already has a vacuum cleaner,” I said. I gave him my best grin.

  “What the—I don’t have time for games. I got business to attend to. Consider yourself lucky.”

  “If you’re leaving, I already do.”

  He gave me his best threatening look. I smiled.

  “Tell Donna to call me. Today, numb nuts. That bitch isn’t gonna bleed me dry for one little kid. Tell her to call me.”

  “No.”

  “What?”

  I shut the door. There was a moment of silence and then the sound of his boots tip-tapping down the stairs.

  As I turned away from the door, Donna came into the room. She had makeup on, and when she moved by me, I could smell perfume.

  “Who was that?” she said.

  “Your ex-husband. I don’t think he liked me.”

  “Donnie doesn’t like anybody. Except himself. Did he want me to call him?”

  “Yeah, but I wouldn’t. He isn’t a nice person. What’s he do?”

  “He sells cars. I guess he’s pretty good at it, ’cause he makes good money. Drives this Jeep that sells for, like, thirty thousand bucks.”

  She went to the front window and knelt on the couch and looked out.

  “There it goes.”

  She turned and slid off the couch.

  “And he bitches about me buying Adrianna Nikes. Donnie’s worse than Jeff in some ways. He’s sneakier. And he looks good to somebody who doesn’t know him, you know? I used to think that nobody would believe me if I told them what he was really like.”

  Donna sat down in the chair. She crossed her legs. Her shorts seemed shorter. I stood.

  “I didn’t know you painted,” I said. “I saw them over there. While I was waiting.”

  Donna blushed.

  “I didn’t mean to be nosy.”

  “Oh, no. I mean, that’s okay. I just . . . I don’t know. It’s kind of silly, I guess.”

  “No, it isn’t. They’re very nice. The one of Adrianna was very good. You have your own style.”

  “Yeah, right,” Donna said, looking away.

  “Have you painted for a long time?”

  “No, I mean, I don’t know what you mean by long. A few months. I’ve done lots of them, but most of them are gone.”

  “Where’d they go?”

  “Jeff and Donnie. They hated it. Donnie just sort of made me feel silly, but Jeff used to rip them up when he went nuts.”

  “Why didn’t they like them?”

  Donna sniffed.

  “Because they were mine,” she said. “That’s all. It was something that was mine.”

  “And they didn’t want you to have anything that was yours?”

  “Nope. But I kept painting. Me and Adrianna would get out our paints and paper. That’s how I started, with Adrianna. She had her little paint set. You know the ones with the little squares. We’d share. Coloring, she calls it. We’d watch this guy on TV who has this art show. Mr. Mike. It’s for grown-ups, but she—”

  Donna caught herself.

  “You don’t want to hear all this,” she said.

  “Sure I do. I liked them. They’re good. They have this purplish mood to them.”

  She grinned.

  “Oh, God, I can’t believe you noticed that.”

  “Oh?”

  “The purple, I mean,” Donna said. “I just tried to do what he said on the TV, you know? He mixes the colors and stuff. I didn’t have all the fancy paints and stuff, but I’d try to do what he said. So I went along and everything came out kind of purplish, but I figured, hey, what do I know about painting? Then one day we had a bad day and Jeff smacked the TV or something and it went all haywire and so I had to adjust everything again. And I start doing all the buttons and I get it so it looks pretty good and when the show comes on, guess what?”

  “What?” I said.

  “No purple,” Donna said. “It was the television.”

  She laughed, and it was a pretty girlish little laugh. She even gave her knee a little slap. I grinned and went to sit on the couch. When I did, a stack of clothes tumbled onto the floor. When I moved to pick them up, Donna came over to help. I was crouched on the floor and Donna knelt beside me, very close. When the clothes were picked up, she sat on the couch. I stood again.

  “You don’t have to do this,” I said.

  “What?”

  She looked up at me, open and vulnerable and childlike.

  “This. It’s not what you need. It’s not what your daughter needs.”

  Donna didn’t say anything.

  “You need to stand alone for a while. You don’t need somebody else. You need to get rid of these guys. Not need any guy at all.”

  The anticipation slowly drained from her face.

  “I mean it, Donna. I was wrong to come here. I think you’re attractive. I feel, I don’t know. It’s just wrong for you. It’s absolutely the worst thing for you. And for me.”

  Behind the makeup, she sagged.

  “Your girlfriend. The woman on the phone. That’s a permanent thing, huh?”

  “They should all be permanent things,” I said. “That’s the idea. Mate for life. Like wild geese.”

  “So what’s so great about her? Is she gorgeous or something?”

  “Yeah, but that’s not really it.”

  “So what is it?”

  “She’s honest,” I said.

  “With you?”

  “And with herself. She’s brutally honest with herself.”

  Donna got up from the couch, then stood there in the middle of the room as if she weren’t sure where to go. She turned toward the window.

  “Oh, God, that old hag is watching me again. Get a life, will ya?”

  Donna turned back. With tears in her eyes.

  “Yeah, well, some of us aren’t so lucky, Jack. I see these women and their husbands an
d they’re sending them flowers and having anniversaries and their pictures in the paper and you can just tell by looking at them that they’re so together and then I think, ‘Why can’t I have that?’ What’s wrong with me? Why should I take it in the face every time I try, you know? Why should I have . . . Why should I have complete shit for luck?”

  Her voice cracked.

  “But you have to make your luck sometimes,” I said gently. “Don’t put yourself at the mercy of these people. Don’t let anybody get you in that position again. You don’t need these people. You don’t deserve them. You deserve better, and your daughter deserves better too.”

  She looked at me. Her face was hard, her eyes shining with tears.

  “I thought you might be better, Jack.”

  “I’m not better,” I said. “I’m just different.”

  She looked at me and the tears spilled from her right eye. At that moment the phone rang, jarring as a fire horn. I grabbed it.

  “Yeah.”

  “Who is this?”

  “Shut up,” I said.

  “Get Donna.”

  “No.”

  “Listen. You tell that worthless slut that she’s got the IRS on me now. If she thinks she’s gonna ruin me, she’s wrong. I work hard for what I’ve got and she isn’t gonna take it away. If she doesn’t understand that, I’ll make her understand. You got that, numb nuts?”

  I sighed.

  “I hate people like you,” I said, and I hung up.

  13

  I felt like hell and deserved worse. I sat in the truck for a minute and watched the rain. To be brutally honest with myself, I’d been intrigued by her. Her funny mix of toughness and innocence. Her naïveté and forwardness. It wasn’t fair to play games with Donna. It wasn’t fair to Roxanne.

  God, what had I been thinking?

  I turned the key and started the truck. A boy had come out and picked up the bat and crossed the street in front of me. As I waited for him to saunter past, a fancy Ford pickup approached. Marcia was in the driver’s seat, Adrianna beside her.

  Adrianna waved and smiled. Marcia glared and pointed her finger at me. I nodded and drove away.

  I’d let Donna explain this one.