Nora’s relationship with Charlie had become strained, but she found herself hoping that it was Charlie calling anyway. She didn’t get to see him alone, much less talk to him anymore. He was the same, but because she had to watch him deliver himself to Esther, she wasn’t. And the handful of times she’d been invited for dinner, Esther had been condescendingly generous (“Red really looks good on you, Nora. You should wear it more often”), as if the sharp, awe-inspiring Esther she’d hatefully respected had been swallowed by a love-riddled, empty-headed, falsely gracious woman.
She would tell Charlie—if it was Charlie—that she was busy and find a way to hang up.
“Nora,” Charlie said when she answered, and then, “I tried you at home first but figured you’d still be working.” His voice made her involuntarily want to regain their closeness; he was speaking in a low, urgent tone, almost whispering, and even though it implied instant intimacy, it made her uneasy.
“I got in a valuable delivery,” she said, glancing at the Hefty garbage bags. “Actually, I’m kind of excited about it.”
“Listen,” he said, “something horrible has happened.”
She felt a clutching at her chest, imagining death, seeing it as a black color for an instant.
“It’s Eric, Esther’s brother. Remember her brother?”
She’d seen Eric two days earlier. Usually she slipped him dollar bills, but she had not wanted to get out of her car and had driven past him. She heard a jingle, signaling a door opening and closing—a late-night customer at the liquor store. Clothing for Change was located in a mini-mall; Donut King, H&R Block, and Fiesta Tacos were closed, but High Time Liquor stayed open all night.
“I know who he is,” she said.
“God,” Charlie said, and she imagined him sitting on his couch, wearing his jeans that were softly faded at his knees. “He’s in big trouble, Nora. And Esther won’t even talk about it. I can’t believe this, but it looks like he tried to rob the Bank of Newport over by the beach—you know the one, off of Marguerite. I guess he did rob it, in a way. They’ve got him on videotape and everything, and it’s just so sad because he did it with his finger. He was wearing this jacket—I guess Esther gave him the jacket—and he put his hand in one of the pockets with his forefinger sticking out, and he handed this teller a note that he’d scribbled on the back of a deposit slip, and it said he had a gun and to give him cash. And I guess it looked like a gun, just his finger, pointed, hidden.”
“God,” she said.
“I know,” Charlie said. “Here’s the thing, though: He took the cash—it wasn’t even that much, around $400—and he went and bought heroin. They found all the paraphernalia under a lifeguard stand, according to the police report. And he ordered a pizza and a couple of Coronas. Then he got sick, maybe from the heroin—I don’t now—most of it in one of those blue trash bins. Scared a mom and her kid; she reported him.”
The phone receiver was cradled between her neck and shoulder; she was looking distractedly at her own forefinger, pointed in the pocket of her sweat jacket, a skinny gun. “That’s awful,” she said.
“Yeah. And then he must’ve felt bad, probably because the teller was so young and he’d made her cry, because he walked all the way over to the police station and turned himself in. He’d used only about $60, and he handed over the rest of the cash. That’s the only thing he’s got going for him, the fact that he turned himself in, but it doesn’t look like it’s going to make a difference.”
“I’m sorry.”
“I know. Me, too. He’s in big trouble. We’re talking federal offense, ten to fifteen years. That is, if they don’t get him on Prop 184—you know, three strikes. Apparently he’s had some minor scrapes with the law: one possession, back when he was seventeen or something, and a shoplifting a few years back. But everyone’s so gung-ho right now.”
She was well acquainted with Proposition 184; her parolee clients had mourned its recent passing, an unmistakable majority: 72 percent in favor.
“God,” she said. “How’s Esther?”
“She won’t talk to me. She’s here. Well, she’s in my bed. That’s why I’m calling. It’s like she’s a mannequin or something. She’s just so cold, Nora. She won’t leave my bed. Even her body, it’s cold, like she just got out of a really cold shower. I think maybe she’s having a nervous breakdown or something. I don’t know what to do.”
BEFORE NORA LEFT for Charlie’s, she unfolded and read the first page of two pieces of yellow lined paper that she’d tucked safely in a side pocket of her purse, on which she’d written, as honestly as possible, in a stream-of-consciousness burst, her feelings about Charlie.
We were very close. We are very close. I feel like he manipulates me. But I let myself be manipulated! I swear he flirts with me, etc., and then denies it. He says things, how much he admires me, etc., etc., all the time. But he makes me feel insecure, the way he looks at me. He’s definitely not attracted to me. I mean, really. I can tell. Oftentimes, I feel really bad about myself, as if my insides don’t matter at all. I think I fell for him a little bit and I think he fell for me a little bit? I try to control him. I hate him. No I don’t. That’s not true. I love him, that’s the whole problem. He’s an idiot. Then he started dating Esther. Stupid and pretty. All about his ego. Ego-boosting. He invites me to dinner just to show her off. To brag about her. Is he trying to make me jealous? I know she’s pretty. Does he want to rub it in? He stopped calling. We don’t jog anymore. He’s always with Esther. When he needs something, he calls. I feel like he uses me. He’s a kiss-ass. He’s there for me only when convenient. But it’s my fault for having all my emotions tied up in him. I relied on him. I fell for him. I told him too much, probably. I let him know too much about me. But I didn’t tell him the most important things. And now I’m glad. If I had, it would only be worse. I don’t stand up for myself. I let him say things. I’m selfish. I want him to myself. Now I’m jealous of his girlfriend. And it hurts me that he’s with her because she’s pretty and not that smart. She’s not equal with him. He can’t be with me because I’m as smart as he is—and equal or better than him (better, honestly).
She knew that it was more of the same on the next piece of paper, so she ripped up the sheets and threw the remains in the wastebasket. Then she got down on her knees, eyes closed, hands holding on to the rim of her sofa. “Oh my God” was all she could come up with.
“Oh my God, oh my God.”
She was out of practice, years since she’d tried earnestly to communicate with God, but she hoped her confusion was an authentic prayer. And something about offering herself up, with all her ugliness, was the closest she could come to an honest entreaty.
She prayed because she didn’t want to experience a perverse pleasure from Esther’s misfortune, and her heart was leaning and expanding in that direction; she prayed because her resentment and jealousy weren’t as intense, and even this was somehow disingenuous; she prayed because she preferred Esther as a failure; she prayed because crisis made her come alive in a way that was voyeuristic and opportunistic; she prayed because she knew that Charlie would probably not be up to the challenge that Esther presented, and this satisfied her.
But it was useless; the idea of a vengeful, Armageddon-obsessed deity continually interrupted her thoughts.
WHEN NORA ARRIVED at Charlie’s, she knocked on his door, and it was like he was standing right next to it, waiting, because he opened it immediately. “Thanks for coming,” he said, his face rubbery with emotion. “I don’t know what to do.”
They went inside, and the corners of his mouth thickened as he looked at Esther, slumped in his bed. When his attention returned to Nora—his eyes dark and serious—she felt as if he were thinking about something he couldn’t share. And then he told her that he needed “to get some fresh air, maybe take a walk” and he looked so agonized that Nora was glad when he left.
By the time she was looking at Esther in his bed, she was unexpectedly calm, knowing that she
would place Nana’s afghan, which she’d brought with her, over Esther’s sleeping body.
Then she came closer and saw that Esther’s eyes were open, and her body recoiled because Esther appeared to be concentrating, but in a vaguely detached manner, on the blistery plaster of the wall. Her mouth was also open, but just barely, and her knees were tucked in so that her arms were clasped around them, as if forced into a fetal position by a lock her arms made. She wore a navy-colored halter dress, a braided tie at the front, and the jerseylike material was gathered between her knees so that her calves were visible. She was barefoot, and, sadly, her toenails were painted an optimistic sherbet color. The bedside pelican lamp was on, and the light shone full on her hair and face. Despite everything, she looked beautiful, and Nora experienced a familiar tug of jealousy.
Beside the lamp were a glass of water and two Valiums that Charlie had procured from a sympathetic neighbor.
Nora spread the afghan over Esther, and for a long moment, nothing happened. But then Esther sat up from the bed, using her hands to balance, with caution and timidity, and the afghan slipped off her lap, falling to the floor. She seemed to be attempting to make sense, but taking in Nora’s presence only partly. She blinked, as if she’d been asleep with her eyes open and was blinking awake. Her skin was very pale, and she sat motionless, hands linked together in her lap, a strand of hair caught in the saliva at her lips.
“Esther,” Nora said. A few minutes passed, and she tried again. “Esther.”
For a long time, Esther stared, as if unable to come to. Then finally she mumbled something, but Nora could hear only the words “him” and “money.” But then she spoke loudly, looking at the wall: “I didn’t bring him money.” She swiped the hair from her mouth. “I was too busy, too happy. It’s my fault.” Anguish broke over her face, and she turned and stared at Nora. Her expression terrified Nora, made her woozy.
“It’s not your fault,” Nora said. “He’s a drug addict.”
Esther stared at her.
“He’s a drug addict,” Nora repeated, making her voice rational and authoritative. She reached for the Valiums and the glass of water, and then handed the pills to Esther.
Mechanically, Esther drank the water, swallowed the pills, and handed the glass back; then she lay in the bed, turning away from Nora. Nora would have taken this as an indication that her presence was not wanted, had the movement not been accompanied by a faint but distinct “Please stay.”
When Nora was certain that Esther was asleep, breath rhythmic, she lay in the bed next to Esther and went over the situation in the mental privacy that Esther’s slumber provided.
After much contemplation, a consensus welled up inside her. She understood that none of what had happened and what was happening and what would happen had anything to do with her; it was as if she had glimpsed a space or a void, a vastness in relation to her insignificance, and whatever power she had imagined she had, even in her emotions, didn’t matter; like the ocean, the space didn’t care, and it would continue existing in a forceful way nonetheless.
Her sense of self obliterated, in a way that was neither comfortable nor uncomfortable but left her vapory, aware of a deeper nobody-self. And, most surprising, she wasn’t disappointed, settling into the relief of her nothingness.
10
“THAT’S TWO HUNDRED dollars and forty-two cents,” Esther said, removing the tags from a silk-and-wool tuxedo dress, folding it inside pale silver tissue paper and closing the tissue with a heart-shaped sticker. She placed the tissue bundle gently in a gold-and-black True Romance bag. (Debbie was at one of her frequent and mysterious gynecological appointments and wouldn’t be back until well after lunch.) A vase of pink tulips and mini–calla lilies was at the corner of the counter—she’d read the card earlier:
I am a warm cotton towel
When you are soaked to the bone
To be wrapped around you
And give you warmth.
And then she’d ripped it up, knowing that it was from Sean.
Two nights before, Esther had woken to find Nora sleeping with her in Charlie’s bed. She’d tried to seal off her grief, but then, for a long time, the weeping wouldn’t stop, as if by being permissive, her grief had acquired a supernatural force. All snot and trembling and heaves. Allow yourself to let go, she had thought, and see what happens. It was as if she had been witnessing her emotional pain reflected in Nora’s compassion. And she’d felt insane for a brief period, possibly an hour, repeating things, whimpering—“I don’t need anybody” and “I’ll go away” and the slightly varied “I’ll go far away.”
Nora, to her credit, had waited her out; there had been a nightmare, and more comforting, but when she’d awakened, she’d found that she was alone in the bed—a dingy old blanket wound between her legs.
This morning, she’d showered and readied for work, wearing her halter dress (although she kept makeup at Charlie’s, she hadn’t brought any clothes). Her eyes were puffy from crying. Determined to get Eric out of jail but not knowing how, she believed that the first step was to show up to her job. Charlie had slept on the couch, and when he’d told her, propped at his elbow, wary and pale, that she should call in sick to work, she’d wanted to tell him that by following her routine, she was clinging to the periphery of normalcy; that if she let this part of her go, all that held her together, the fabric of her, might fall away, and there’d be nothing left.
She’d been taught to put on a formidable front, having grown accustomed to the sight and smell and reality of misfortune. She soothed her swollen eyes with a hand towel soaked with cold water, the way her father had taught her. Again. And again. Left eye, right eye. And as she did so, she remembered his doing the same for her.
She’d been pushed from behind on the school playground, second grade, her arms flailed out—no way to stop the fall. She’d scraped her palms. In the nurse’s station, even after her hands had been bandaged, she had been unable to stop crying, and her father had been called.
As soon as he arrived, the tears gained momentum. He sat on the cot next to her, waited. He wet a paper towel with cold water from the sink, and when she was done crying, he pressed it gently against each of her eyes. Again. And again. Left eye, right eye. He told her to take deep breaths. He took the breaths with her. “You’re lucky,” he said. “You’re young; your face snaps back.” He showed her how to pinch her cheeks—“Now it looks like you’ve been running.”
Esther hadn’t rung the sale in, and the woman glanced at the blank digital window of the cash register for the amount. She steadied her large, nautical white-leather purse on the register stand, opening it and fishing for its matching wallet. “I’m sorry,” she said. “How much? I didn’t hear you.” She wore silver pants of a metallic material and a sailor-collared blouse. On the cusp of middle age, she had a centimeter of silvery roots at her part. In keeping with the nautical theme, she wore diamond-encrusted earrings designed as anchors.
“Cash or credit?” Esther asked, pretending to recalculate on a solar-paneled calculator.
“Cash,” the woman said, wallet parted. Despite her showy appearance, her eyes carried an apologetic note. Briefly, Esther imagined holding the woman, the way Nora had held her two nights before.
“Two hundred and forty dollars and forty-two cents,” she said, concentrating on a space between the woman’s cheek and her anchor earring. She felt pinpricks at her forehead; her palms went damp.
The woman gave her the exact amount, in cash and coins, and Esther opened the register and placed the money in the correct slots. Two twenties: hers. A small, comforting certainty.
Her hands were a little shaky as she passed the woman the shopping bag. “It’s a lovely dress,” she said, but the woman only frowned.
She waited before ringing the correct amount of the tuxedo dress into the cash register—2-0-0.4-2. The drawer opened with a ring, but she didn’t take the cash—just knowing the twenties were waiting for her was good enough.
She waited until two customers—both idlers and possible shoplifters themselves—left the store. Once, she imagined she saw Debbie lurking near the entrance, and she waited some more. The music had stopped a while ago, but she hadn’t gone to the back room to start the CD player. Debbie was on a Counting Crows kick—the only CD in the player was August and Everything After.
A crystal heart decorating the window created a freckle of rainbow sunlight on the oyster-colored carpet, and she watched it shimmying there. Then she closed her eyes, leaned into the counter. And she was walking on the pier with Eric—it wasn’t raining, but there was a weightless drizzle, like moving through a cloud. Her father wasn’t there in her memory, but she knew that he must have been, since they were kids and he wouldn’t have let them go alone.
Below the pier were the surfers in their dark wetsuits, reminding her of seals, their heads turned in the same direction, vying for the next wave, moving up and down with the swells.
Near them on the pier, a man with no arms was reeling a fish from the ocean with his toes, spinning the line, pulling the fish out, even unhooking it.
“What should I do?” the man asked, enjoying their attention. The fish flapped on the wood next to his bucket. “Throw it back!” Eric said. She joined: “Throw it back! Throw it back!”
The man took the fish between his bare feet and flipped it over the pier, tossing it like a ball. They ran to the edge, watched the black fleck fall. Once it hit the water, it turned silver, and then it slipped away, disappeared.
She opened her eyes, wondering what it was like—freedom—imagining it as oblivion. A deadening exhaustion coursed through her, and she wanted to curl up on the floor, right next to the freckles of sunlight, and sleep.
On impulse, she rang the drawer open and fingered her twenties, pulling them from their slot; she closed the register and knelt down to get her wallet from her purse underneath the counter.
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