Of course, she told herself, she was nervous and upset. Of course she was. She knew that. That could make her skip. She also told herself she should stop at the next CVS or Rexall and pick up a home pregnancy test. But she kept driving.
Because if she was pregnant, what in the world would she do?
23
Consisting of milk, cookies, and vomit
Michelle stopped on her way back from dropping Jada at her car in the bank parking lot and did a quick grocery run—just for some skim milk, dog treats for Pookie, a head of lettuce, and a few vegetables because Frank liked them fresh. Everything looked picked over and tired. She put some produce in a bag, then stopped at a pyramid of apples, choosing one near the top. She knew they were waxed, and hated for Jenna to eat them, but her daughter loved apples. As Michelle was about to add another to the bag, she noticed that the skin which looked so red, so perfect, collapsed under the pressure of her fingers like a puffball mushroom collapsing. She realized she hadn’t had time either to bake or stop at the bakery, so she threw a bag of Oreos onto the checkout counter as a guilty afterthought. She should at least have gotten Fig Newtons, but she weakened because the kids loved these.
She drove a little faster than she should have on the way home, but that was justified because it allowed her to pull into the driveway before the kids were dropped off by the bus. She’d just gotten placemats out and put some Oreos on Frankie Junior’s favorite plate—the one with pictures of Peter Rabbit that he’d had since he was a baby—when the children walked in the door. Pookie went nuts, wagging not only his tail but his entire butt and doing a little dance of welcome. All of a sudden Michelle was so glad to see them that she felt like doing a dance. Instead she hugged Jenna a little more tightly than she meant to.
“Mo-o-m!” Jenna said, dragging out the syllable in the new pre-teen voice of annoyance she’d recently developed. She pushed Michelle away, but she did it with good humor. “I got a B on my spelling test,” she added to show there were no hard feelings.
Michelle stopped the automatic question (“Why not an A?”) that her own mother would have asked and instead gave her daughter a big smile. “That’s great,” she said while she helped Frankie take his turtleneck off. “I know you studied hard for it. Good girl. Daddy will be proud.”
Jenna nodded. “If I hadn’t messed up ‘neighbor,’ I would have gotten an A-. Shouldn’t neighbor be spelled N-A-B-O-R-E?” she asked, aggrieved.
“If the world was fair, but it isn’t,” Michelle said, then straightened Frankie’s dark, dark hair. “How was school for you, sweetie?” she asked her son.
“My snack was good,” Frankie shrugged, then made straight for the kitchen table and climbed into his chair. That was positive for now. Obviously, things had calmed down and his pants had been dry. “Oreos! Two snacks! This is a good day,” he said, already reaching for the cookies.
Michelle had to smile and felt such gratitude that it made the troubles she and Frank had gone through, at least for the moment, seem small. She had her children, she had her marriage, and whatever it took, they would get through their legal problems. For a moment she thought of Jada, probably alone now in her kitchen, and then she couldn’t help but push the dark thought away. She’d think about it later, call her later, maybe invite her over.
“Can I have juice instead of milk?” Jenna asked as she took her seat at the table.
Michelle shook her head. “Juice after homework, if you want it. Right now you need the calcium.” She poured out the glass of milk, as well as a cup for Frankie. Then, remembering herself for the first time in about a week, she found her packet of vitamins, took three Rolaids, and began to swallow them all down with the skim milk.
“You know what happened that was terrible?” Jenna asked, and Michelle nearly choked on the last mouthful. Had there been another emotional atrocity on the school bus or in the classroom? Things seemed to have really calmed down for the kids. Thank God, people forgot things quickly: there was always a new scandal in the paper, and Frank, as he predicted, hadn’t been charged with anything. But that important legal distinction didn’t prevent cruelty to her kids. “What?” she asked her daughter. What fresh hell was this?
“Mrs. Blackwell gave us so much math homework and almost all of it is word problems for the weekend.” Jenna looked up at her mother. “Do you hate word problems?”
“I really do,” Michelle said with more enthusiasm than usual. She kept the smile of relief to herself. “But your daddy is good at them,” she reminded her daughter.
Jenna nodded, then dawdled over the cookies as she always did, separating them and licking off the cream before she ate them. Frankie grabbed and crunched down more than his share until Michelle stopped him.
“Can I play with Kevon today?” he asked.
Michelle shook her head. She couldn’t explain about Kevon’s disappearance now. She thought again of Jada, all alone, and put the thought away. “Uh-uh,” she told her son, “but you can watch whatever video you want, and then play with Daddy. He’s home early.”
At least he should be. His truck had been parked outside. Where was Frank, she wondered? Usually you couldn’t be in the house with him without knowing his whereabouts—whether you wanted to or not. He was always playing music or nailing something together or watching a ball game at top volume or yelling on the phone.
She turned to her daughter. “Jenna, stop playing with those cookies and eat them. I want to see you at that table with your math in front of you when I get back down here.” Then she took Frankie by the hand and led him into the family room. Macy’s had already delivered the new couch, and with the books back on the shelves along with the two lamps she’d picked up at the lighting store near the bank, the room actually looked good again. She made a mental note to stop tomorrow at Pier I and get some throw pillows in cheerful colors—maybe blue and yellow, she thought—because the kids loved to lounge on them and all the old ones had been destroyed. So had Pookie’s wicker dog bed. She’d get one of those, too. She hoped Bruzeman got back every cent and more for them when they sued.
“Okay,” she explained to Frankie, “you get to be the first to sit on the nice new couch and you can watch one video—whatever you want—before dinner.” Frankie grinned up at her, made his selection, and she popped in Fern Gully. Then she went down the hall to search for Frank, Pookie padding along behind her.
He wasn’t in the shop he’d built himself at the back of the two-car garage. Then, when she first put her head into his office, she thought that he wasn’t in there because the room was dark and quiet. But as she was about to turn away and close the door, she heard a rustle and jumped. She turned back. This room had also been savaged by the cops, and they hadn’t really fixed it yet except to right the furniture and clean up the broken bits and torn papers.
Pookie made his welcome noise as he approached a darker part of the darkness. Now, in the light she let in from the hall, Michelle could see the dog was greeting Frank, who was sitting in the dark at his desk, absolutely still in the torn and battered office chair—the one thing the cops hadn’t ripped up any worse than it had been torn before. Frank had always liked it just as it was. He’d taken it from his old bedroom at his mother’s house and carted it to their first apartment, then to the duplex they’d lived in, and finally to their own home.
Seeing him there, sitting in it in the darkness, one hand clutching the worn plastic arms, the other absently stroking the dog, filled Michelle with a sick feeling. He’d been so strong through all of this. Was he finally feeling the terrible strain? Despite her obvious presence in the doorway, he didn’t even turn to acknowledge her. As she adjusted to the dimness, Michelle could see that her husband’s eyes were open, so he wasn’t sleeping.
“Frank?” she whispered, not because she was afraid the children could hear her—the office was down a long hall behind the dining room, close to the garage entrance—but because she was afraid to speak any louder to him. He seemed in some kind
of daze, some faraway state. “Frank?” she whispered again.
Very, very slowly he swiveled the chair away and then toward her again. But his eyes didn’t follow the movement. For a crazy moment she thought of the Jesus picture that used to hang in her mother’s living room, wherever they lived at the time. The eyes followed her wherever she went, making sure, as her mother warned her, that she dusted even under the furniture and behind the books. But this was the opposite. Frank’s body and face were directly in front of her, but his eyes had stayed focused somewhere beyond the window, though the shade was closed.
Michelle was frightened, and as usual, her fear froze her. She was afraid to either close the door and be alone in the darkness with Frank or turn on the light and reveal anything more to herself. But even across the room she could feel her husband’s pain, as palpable as the new couch their son was sitting on upstairs.
“What is it, Frank?” she forced herself to ask. “Are you okay?” She thought of Jenna and Frankie, looking forward to their evening with Daddy. It didn’t look as if he was up to it. Exhausted as she was from her afternoon with Jada, she would comfort him if he had to, finally, break down over this. And she’d cover with the kids.
“What is it Frank?” she repeated, her voice gentle.
“An indictment’s going to be handed down,” Frank said, his own voice low and dead. Michelle wasn’t sure for a moment what he meant.
“They’ve indicted the police?” she asked.
“Not the police! They’ve indicted me,” Frank said fiercely, as if she were an idiot. “They’ve indicted me, Michelle.”
She couldn’t help it—she took a step or two backward until she was leaning against the bookshelves. “But for what?” she asked. “And how could they indict you? I mean …” Her brain was spinning.
“I don’t know. There was some kind of secret grand jury. Believe it or not, it’s legal, Bruzeman says there was probably some kind of investigation going on for months. The prosecutor must have convinced the judge that they had substantial proof and a need for confidentiality. It’s been convened this whole last week.”
“But didn’t anybody, didn’t Bruzeman know? Our assemblymen? Your county friends? Anyone? I mean—”
“If they knew, they didn’t say,” Frank admitted, his voice harsh with anger. “What were all those lunches, those campaign contributions for? Bruzeman—” Frank tried to calm himself and ran his hand through his thick hair. “I have to trust him. He’s the best in Westchester. As long as I can pay him, he’s trustworthy. But I …” He stopped again and this time Michelle heard the panic in his voice. Which panicked her.
“What does this all mean?” she asked.
“Nothing. It means nothing.”
“Don’t tell me that, Frank. Don’t say it means nothing. An indictment—it must mean something.” Her wide mouth trembled. “I’m not a child, Frank. Don’t treat me like one. Don’t protect me. Were you trying to pay someone off to get the thing to go away? Are you trying to find out what the DA thinks he’s got?”
“We tried both,” Frank admitted.
“So what happened? You told me they had nothing. You told me there would be no indictment. But there is. So what’s going on?”
There was silence between them for a little while. Michelle could feel the blood surging in her head and hear it inside her ears. She didn’t think she took a breath until he answered.
“The indictment will be handed down soon, maybe Monday,” he said. “I’m going to be accused of being some kind of mastermind of a cocaine and amphetamine distribution ring.”
Michelle gasped then, so loudly Frank heard her and looked away.
“Bruzeman found out about it just in time to warn us, but not in time to prevent it.” Frank shook his head. He looked at her again. “I’m innocent, Michelle. You know that.”
“But—” She stopped. It was best to say nothing, but she couldn’t in the end. “But Frank, you promised me this wouldn’t go any further. It’s been a mistake, hasn’t it?”
He swiveled the chair toward her. “Of course, it’s been a mistake,” he said. “Do you think I’m some kind of a drug dealer?” he asked. “Would I be spending my days freezing my ass off on roofs with bozos working for me?” He stuck his arms out in the room between them. “Would my goddamn hands be chapped and cracked and bleeding if I was dealing drugs instead of fixing shingles?” He dropped his arms and turned away, lowering his voice. “I can’t believe you’d ask me that,” he almost moaned. “Did they find anything here? Am I driving a new Mercedes, or an eight-year-old Chevy van? Do we have a million dollars in a bank account you haven’t told me about? I can’t believe you’d ask me,” he repeated, his voice low.
Tears rose in Michelle’s eyes. She couldn’t believe any of this. It was all a mistake, all wrong, and yet it could ruin them. How could she—how could they—be picked out of the universe and be tortured in this way?
“How can all this be happening?” she said out loud. “How could they have a secret grand jury? I never heard of that. How could …” She wanted to ask how he could turn so ugly on her, but it was stupid to even bring it up. He was beside himself, and she was … well, she wasn’t even sure what she was, except suddenly very sick to her stomach. The vitamins and the skim milk were churning.
It took another ten seconds for her to know that she wouldn’t be able to keep them down. She ran to the door, out into the tiny hall, and managed to get into Frank’s shop where she heaved painfully once or twice before she vomited onto the cement floor, as close to the drain as she could get. She gasped and heaved again, and then yet again, holding her long hair up, away from what she was spewing. She felt Frank’s hand on her back. She couldn’t move or speak, even to acknowledge his presence. Instead she stayed crouched in her position, ready for a dry heave. But none came.
Slowly she straightened herself, wiped her wide mouth with one hand and her watery eyes with the other. She hoped the children hadn’t heard. She turned to look at her husband. “My God, Frank, what are we going to do?” she asked, and she knew her voice sounded younger, more childish than Jenna’s.
He put a hand on each of her shoulders. This time he looked at her directly, his deep brown eyes melting with pain and sorrow. “I’m not guilty, Michelle. You know that, don’t you?” She nodded, trying to pull some air into her sensitive nostrils. “So we just fight it,” he said. “We stick together, we try to protect each other and the kids, and we fight it. An indictment isn’t a conviction. I don’t know why they’re out to get me. But I swear to you, they won’t.”
He put his arms around her. She averted her head so he wouldn’t smell her sour breath. “What will it cost?” she whispered. She thought of the ten thousand dollars that Bruzeman had asked for from Jada. How much had Frank already had to give that slimy little …? “What will it cost, Frank?” she asked.
“Don’t worry about it,” he said. “I can take care of that end. You just take care of the children.” He pulled himself away from her enough so he could look her in the face again. “You just take care of Frankie and Jenna and me, baby. Can you do that?”
Although she wasn’t sure if she could, Michelle nodded. He grabbed her and held her tight against his chest. Michelle stretched her long arms around his back and tried to hold him as she nodded, her sharp chin on his shoulder. They stood there, in the slight chill of the shop, while the sour smell from the drain slowly filled the room.
“We’ll beat this,” he said. “I promise you we will. And I’ll protect you.” His voice broke a little, and more than anything else, that felt heartbreaking to Michelle. “Just stick with me now,” he begged. “Please, Mich, stick with me now.”
24
Wherein Jada’s body is cleansed but her spirit is broken
Jada sat in the full bath, the hot water still trickling in. She was a shower kind of girl, in and out quickly, but in what now seemed like the only safe spot in the whole, empty house, the only solace she could find was in thi
s ceramic corner of the bathroom. It was only here, in the tub, that her hands stopped trembling, though her mind continued to race.
She supposed her behavior was bizarre; she’d probably taken four—or was it five?—baths today. But she felt drawn to the tub; she would sit in it, keeping the water as hot as she could bear, until her lethargy lightened when anxiety descended and wouldn’t let her sit still any longer. So she’d get up, towel off, dress again, and attempt some minor household task—which she’d leave unfinished—or flip on the TV, only to find herself, an hour or so later, drawn back up to the bathroom, once again turning on the taps and filling the tub.
Luckily, she hadn’t been in the tub when her mother called last night for their ritual once-a-week long-distance call. Hearing her mother’s warm voice, Jada found comfort, but she had spared both her parents any of the details of what was going on. When Mama had asked to speak to the children, Jada had said they were playing at the neighbors. Lying felt low, but she knew Jesus would forgive her. The one thing Jada didn’t have to worry about was her mother asking about Clinton—the story with him never changed.
Jada loved her mother but didn’t want to worry her. She also didn’t want to admit just how very right her mother had been. Yet, hanging up, she was swept by regret that she hadn’t been able to be honest with her. Her mama only wanted the best for her, Jada knew. How could she be so proud, so pigheaded, as to not confide in her blood family? Pride was her downfall.
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