Owen's Daughter

by Jo-Ann Mapson

“I can’t,” she says, refusing to look at him.

  “This doesn’t have to be a setback unless you make it one,” he tells her, and reaches out his hand for her to take. “I’ll always be here for you as your counselor. You’re going to do fine. Maybe, eventually, outside this place, down the line, we can be friends.”

  “Duncan Hanes,” she says, ignoring his soft, dark hand covered with rings and silver bracelets. “Something I’ve always wondered: Did your mother name you after a cake mix and nylon stockings?”

  “Skye,” he says, and shakes his head.

  There is nothing she can say that will hurt him.

  Her first month here, she’d pegged him as a not-very-bright, New Agey Indian. After a week of her smart remarks, he gave her a toothbrush and some scouring powder and made her clean the bathroom floors. All that touchy-feely horseshit hid a holier-than-thou control freak. Every single group meeting, he picked on her. Let’s hear what Skye has to say. Come on, Skye, surely you have more of an opinion than “Whatever.” She worked her Steps, cleaned the floors, chopped onions (where she met the vanilla Jack Daniel’s chef), and everywhere she turned, there was Duncan. It isn’t until tonight that she sees what all this has led to. He’s fond of her, wants to be friends. This same man watched her vomit through her nose in detox. You can’t have a person like that for a friend. “Me and the wall are doing just fine, Duncan. Go away.”

  At nine thirty he comes back. “H.A.L.T.,” he says.

  Don’t get hungry, angry, lonely, or tired . . . The Twelve Step staircase is built of acronyms. “Thanks for ruining a perfectly good word for me,” she says.

  “You’re welcome,” he answers. “You planning to sleep in your boots?”

  “What if I am?”

  “Nothing. I love your boots. Just looks uncomfortable, is all.”

  She laughs. “After all the crap I’ve been through here, you think sleeping in boots will break my spirit?”

  He squats in front of her and she can smell his smell, which is coffee and cedar, as if somewhere else he secretly builds furniture. He places his right hand on the toe of her boot and rubs the dust off. He looks her in the eyes, and she can’t stand it. Duncan has seen her at her worst, sobbing, confessing her sins. He says, “Down the hall, room ten is empty.”

  After he’s enough steps away from her, Skye gets to her feet, feeling hollowed out, like the awful spaghetti squash they serve here. Tasteless, pointless, it’s instant compost. Nobody will eat it, not even Nola, and a dinner plate filled with only forty-two calories is like Christmas to her. She walks quietly down to room ten and stands there a moment. Tonight was supposed to be a real bed. Gracie in her arms. The doorknob feels icy on her hand. She walks to the bed nearest the window, lies down on top of the covers. The moon comes up big and silver in the night sky, but she doesn’t close the blinds because that would make it too dark. Nothing but prairie out there. Whatever desert creatures are out, they’re being stealthy about it.

  Just like every night since she landed here, she thinks about Gracie’s Marilyn Monroe hair, as fine as corn silk. Ten months ago, Skye gave Rita a long list of dos and don’ts. Eggs give Gracie a rash. Don’t ask me why, but she’s terrified of parrots. Don’t let her go anywhere without her inhalers. If two puffs don’t make her better, give her the Proair HFA. Never run out of it, or you’ll have to go to the ER. Her favorite bedtime story is Star Wars, and if you don’t make the Ewok noises, she’ll scream her head off. Don’t bother buying her a doll, she likes to cut them open. No stuffed animals. Whatever’s in them triggers her asthma. What if Gracie has decayed baby teeth from drinking Mountain Dew for breakfast? Gracie could almost put words into sentences that told a story. Will she have established F-bombs and SOBs in her vocabulary? Will it be up to Skye to eradicate all that?

  Gracie the magpie. Little Miss Chatterbox. The Queen of Questions. What is rain? How many times you jump on one foot afore you sink into the ground? Where China lives? How a car can drive up a hill and not do falling down? Where are all the candy trees? Are bears afraid of each other? Her little-girl scent, cotton candy and shampoo, a pinch of dirt. Painting each of her five tiny fingernails took only one brushstroke of polish.

  Once it is opened, behind that door are the not-so-great memories, too, like the time she forgot her sweet daughter at the Guadalupe BBQ. Gracie slept through it, but Milton never let Skye forget it. That wasn’t as bad as the car accident that followed. She was drunk, but had to drive only a few blocks to get them home. She could handle that.

  But Skye forgot to turn on the headlights. A coyote ran across the road and she instinctively swerved into the other lane. To avoid the truck that didn’t see her—the Mercedes is black—she swerved back and misjudged the distance, hitting a wall. The air bag deployed, but Gracie wasn’t buckled into her car seat and broke her wrist. Yes, it could have been worse, but wasn’t the broken wrist bad enough? The tow truck driver took the Mercedes to Lobo and Lalo, the mechanics who took care of the Mercedes. The cop put Skye in the back of his car, but the worst part was letting Gracie go with the social worker.

  Skye didn’t intend to be a bad mother. It was just all so frustrating and difficult, and the skills she needed to excel at that job versus the stuff she’d memorized in school were galaxies apart.

  From the start, she had been determined to do a better job than Mama. She made sure Gracie knew how much she loved her. But on this extra evening at Cottonwoods, part of Skye wonders if maybe the best thing she could’ve done was give her daughter up for adoption and go on to Stanford. Rocky couldn’t have put Gracie up for adoption while she was in Cottonwoods, could he? If so, she’d hunt him down and flay him alive. Cover him in salt and leave him in the desert for the birds. From there, her regrets and worries bubble up beyond her control. She wishes that she hadn’t gotten the chef fired. What if she can’t be in a relationship and stay sober? Life without sex is a terrifying thought, but it’s been nine months and she’s still here, which means it’s possible, just not much fun. If Mama gave her the money she spends on lunches each month, that would pay for Gracie’s allergy medicine and fill the Benz’s tank for a year. Would it have killed her to take Gracie? To hire her only grandchild a nanny? To cut back on her traveling for just a few months?

  Apparently so. Oh, God, she needs something to calm her down or she’ll be no good tomorrow. Duncan would offer her chamomile tea.

  Just before she falls asleep, she thinks of Daddy, gone since her twelfth birthday to God knows where. If she knew where he was, he’d help her out. Well, maybe he’d help. It depended where he was on his drinking. Her letter to him sits in some post office carton marked “Undeliverable.” She starts to doze off, drained, and those crazy images that come between waking and sleeping crowd her mind and then morph into dreams, where a person can change into a bird, drink forever, fly blind, make love, and nothing bad happens. Then, what feels like a minute later, she feels Duncan’s hand on her shoulder and hollers, “What the hell are you doing in my room?”

  Duncan helps her sit up. He waits until she’s all the way conscious before handing her the duffel bag of belongings she came in with. Then he walks her to the lobby. “Are you throwing me out in the night?” she asks, near tears, as the gravity of Rocky not showing hits her. “Do you want me to hitchhike?”

  “Skye,” he says.

  Her steps feel leaden. With each one, she has an accompanying thought: Maybe I won’t find Rocky. Maybe he won’t give me Gracie. Maybe I’ll just have a drink.

  Duncan points out the lobby windows into the darkness and says, “I believe your ride’s here.”

  As her eyes adjust to the dark, she searches the moonlit-landscaped driveway for Rocky’s silver truck. It’s not there. Instead, there is a man on a horse, ponying a flashy leopard Appaloosa alongside. Funny, how he looks so much like her Appy, Lightning. The white of his hide shines like chrome in the moonlight, and she gets a lump in her throat. She stumbles out the door and hurries forward as the rider
tips back a cowboy hat that she knows has a horsehair band held together by the first silver buckle he ever won, for calf roping, when he was eleven years old. It takes her a full minute to find her voice, to dare ask, “Daddy? That you?”

  He pats the empty saddle on Lightning just like in the old days, inviting her up.

  Chapter 2

  The day before Skye was released from rehab, Margaret Yearwood had done some waiting herself. She sat on the couch in Dr. Silverhorse’s waiting room, across from the wall-sized Storm Pattern Navajo blanket. Until that day, the rug might as well have been wallpaper. Now she could see how lovely it was, and intricate—probably museum quality. After her aunt Eleanor was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s, Margaret had sat in this exact spot so many times, holding her hand. Then, her mind had been focused on keeping Ellie calm, turning magazine pages because her aunt enjoyed looking at the pictures, even if she had no idea what the words next to them meant. Aunt Ellie had taken her final journey nearly six months ago, a blessing, really, but when Margaret couldn’t stop crying, Dr. Silverhorse had sent her to a psychiatrist, who prescribed antidepressants. The crying stopped, but in Margaret’s place was a placid cow that never wanted to do anything except watch daytime TV. She went off the pills and told herself to buck up. Now she was back, to see him for a different reason. It had taken her weeks to gather her courage and make the appointment.

  Alzheimer’s was the cruelest kind of thief. Aunt Ellie, her mother’s sister, had never married or had children. When Margaret and her sister, Norine, were kids, Ellie had sent them postcards from around the world: Africa, Iceland, Italy, Croatia, France, Ireland, Portugal, Greece, and Spain. Margaret and Nori had fought over possession of them, but in the end practical Margaret had won. In her teens she’d put together a scrapbook showcasing each postcard, including a National Geographic foldout world map on which Margaret had marked all the places her aunt had traveled.

  Eleanor had sent Margaret and her sister money for holidays, but none so traditional as Christmas. It’s Earth Day, my dears. Use this check to plant a redwood. Winter solstice is approaching. Use this money to buy yourselves cashmere pashminas. And later on, when Margaret was still married to Ray and things were starting to get wobbly: I could not let Fourth of July pass without sending you some money for fireworks, darling. Use this money to buy yourself a sexy new nightie.

  Margaret’s marriage had ended anyway, the year their son, Peter, turned fifteen. Her ex, Ray, had recently divorced his third wife. Probably she had developed a laugh line or a crow’s-foot. When Margaret heard the news, the only emotion she could muster was sympathy for the wife. Ray had to be paying more in alimony than he earned off the dividends of his films. Hollywood was a youth-oriented town, and he was now pushing sixty.

  In her sixties, Aunt Ellie had settled in Santa Fe, for the climate and the chance to practice her Spanish, she said. Retired from traveling, she’d whiled away time finishing the New York Times crossword puzzle every morning before her first cup of coffee, going to fund-raisers, and working in her garden several hours a day. Her English garden in a southwestern climate made the Santa Fe official garden tour every year. She was always grafting miniature roses and babying her redwood tree, one of two that grew in this dry, high desert town. She created little nooks for the birds to nest in out of odd china cups and those baskets strawberries come in.

  When Peter went off to Gallaudet University, Margaret had moved to Santa Fe herself, though out in Eldorado, the planned community some referred to as “the White Reservation”—she couldn’t afford the historic district like her aunt. They talked on the phone twice a day, met often for lunch, and had season tickets to concerts at the Lensic Theater. The first indication anything was wrong was her fall, nearly three years ago. Margaret drove to the hospital and met Ellie in the emergency room at Christus St. Vincent’s. The young doctor who attended her had taken Margaret aside while an RN put in an IV and prepped her for surgery.

  “Your aunt’s leg will mend in six to eight weeks,” he said, “but she shouldn’t live on her own anymore.”

  “What do you mean?” Margaret asked.

  “The stage she’s in, she’ll require professional home health care.”

  “I keep an eye on her,” Margaret told him. “I just live fifteen miles away.”

  “I’m afraid I’m not making myself clear,” the doctor said, frowning. “Breaking her leg was a blessing. It could have been much more serious. Does Alzheimer’s run in your family?”

  “Alzheimer’s?” Margaret echoed.

  “You haven’t noticed any signs that your aunt is altered?” he asked as if Ellie’s life were a hem that had been taken up.

  “Her hearing isn’t the best, and from time to time she gets confused, but I haven’t noticed any significant changes.”

  “Come with me,” he said, and pulled aside the privacy curtain. “Ellie, how are you feeling?”

  Her aunt had a smile for everyone. “I’m just dandy,” she said, her voice taking on a sarcastic edge. She pointed to the lab tech, who was organizing the vials of blood he’d taken. “Except for that vampire who’s stealing my blood.”

  The doctor smiled back. “You’re in the hospital, Ellie. Do you remember breaking your leg?”

  The smile widened, then faltered, and Margaret could see the bafflement on her aunt’s face. “Yes, you’re here to deliver my firewood. It’s about time. Don’t bring any of that, that . . .” Her words trailed off. “Pinecone! Like you did last year. It’s terrible. Spits and burns like crumbled papers.”

  “I’ll make sure I don’t,” the doctor said. “Can you tell me what year it is?”

  “Of course I can. It’s 1986.”

  It was 2007.

  “Who’s our president?”

  “Clint Eastwood. He’ll never be a Ronald McDonald.”

  “Thanks, Ellie. I’ll check in on you later.”

  “I like my firewood stocked neatly, young man,” she called after him. “Or don’t expect a tipper.”

  Back in the hallway, tears brimmed in Margaret’s eyes. How had she missed this? “What about those new drugs?” she asked the doctor. “I’ve heard they help dramatically. Can’t we try her on those?”

  He looked away before answering. For once, the ER wasn’t busy. Two male nurses were popping rubber bands at each other. “We can try, but I expect she’s too far into the disease for there to be any appreciable improvement. I’ll order a brain scan, but you need to start planning for her release.”

  “What should I do?”

  “I recommend assisted living, with a long-term facility attached.”

  “She can’t go home?”

  “Not without help.”

  “What if I move in?”

  He shrugged. “That could work for a little while, but believe me, I know dozens of folks who were sure they could handle it and couldn’t. It’s exhausting. Your aunt can’t be left alone, even to sleep. I’ll have you follow up with a neurologist. Right now, I have other patients. There will be someone taking her up to surgery any minute to pin those bones back together.”

  Later that week, while Ellie recovered in the hospital, Margaret straightened up her aunt’s house and looked after Nash, Ellie’s massive orange Maine Coon cat, quite possibly the most aloof animal that ever lived. Margaret brought along her dog, Echo II, worrying how Nash might react, but he couldn’t have cared less. He prowled around the house, crying, as if that would bring Ellie home. As Margaret gave the house an overdue cleaning, she found half a sandwich tucked under the cushion in her aunt’s favorite chair. Dirty dishes in the cupboard. Inside the broom closet, she discovered a wad of newspaper tucked behind the mop. Unfolding it, she realized they were crossword puzzles. In some, the blanks were filled in with spidery handwriting, difficult to read. Everyone’s handwriting got worse over the years. Some of that could be blamed on computers. But whatever her aunt had written in the blanks weren’t letters. It might have been shorthand, that outdated form of note t
aking, but she couldn’t prove it. As she cleaned, Margaret remembered how Aunt Ellie was unable to reach for a certain word in their phone calls over the last year or so, and not all that often, but often enough, she’d confused Margaret’s voice with that of her sister, Margaret’s mother, who had been dead for decades.

  Margaret rented out her Eldorado house and moved into her aunt’s full-time. For as long as Ellie was in the wheelchair, they did fairly well, but when Ellie began to get up and wander the house in the middle of the night, Margaret had to hire a nurse. Things muddled along until Ellie’s occasional incontinence turned into a daily occurrence. Whenever the nurse tried to change her diapers, Ellie became combative.

  After a black eye, the nurse quit, and Margaret found an assisted living situation for her aunt, spending so much money a month that Margaret wondered if she needed to put her aunt’s home on the market. But given the economic downturn, the house wouldn’t fetch anywhere near what it was worth, if it sold at all.

  Ellie lasted about two and a half years after her diagnosis before dwindling away.

  When Margaret began forgetting words, having trouble with occasional numbness in her hands and feet, and tripping, she was terrified. The Internet search she shouldn’t have done had nothing but dire predictions, and yes, those symptoms could happen to early-onset Alzheimer’s patients. Margaret was fifty. She wasn’t ready to have this happen. After insomnia settled in, she called Dr. Silverhorse, who had been Ellie’s neurologist. Like a lot of Santa Feans, he was a transplant from the East Coast. Once in Santa Fe, he’d changed his name from Silberferd to Silverhorse. He sported a long silver ponytail and a silver bola tie at his neck, but he still wore his yarmulke. “I want you to run every test there is,” she told Dr. Silverhorse. “I don’t care if my insurance balks at it. I’ll pay for it. Just run them all so I don’t have to drag this out.” And then she bit back the sob that threatened to escape her throat.

  “Oy,” Dr. Silverhorse said. “There is a saying, Margaret, about borrowing trouble. Perhaps you’ve heard of it?” But in the end, he relented. That was two weeks ago. Now she was waiting to hear her results.