Careen turned to me. “Are you sure you want to do this? You could come with me.”
“No. I’m not sure,” I said, but I had to. I had to try. “Give me a leg up.”
She hesitated. I put my leg on her knee and she pushed me up the wall. The gloves and shoes stuck to the concrete like glue. It was still a strange feeling, fun. I clambered up the wall like a gecko. I didn’t look back. I didn’t look inward either—I would see Joseph and Orry’s faces and I would change my mind.
Deshi said we had four hours once we disabled the gates. I reached the top and stopped to take a breath. Pau from this angle looked like a maze. It reminded me of one of the many toys Orry had accumulated, a circular piece of plastic with a metal ball inside. You had to tip the game back and forth to work the ball through to the end of the maze. The sense of being rattled around like that ball was strong. I fought the dizziness off, took one last look, and made my way down the other side.
Careen was right behind me. She landed soundlessly on the dirt inside and glanced my way. “Good luck,” she whispered, her breath making clouds. “I’ll meet you on the outside at four.” And then she sprinted off towards the first gate. I watched as she took a small, black disc and placed it over the locking mechanism of the gate. The camera followed her and locked onto her moving body as she pushed in and twisted it counter clockwise. A light flashed red. Red, red, red… It needed to turn green. I held my breath and we both stared at it. Red, red, red… green! Relief flooded over me. Careen nodded and slipped through the gate silently, giving me one last look of concern before she disappeared.
I should have followed but I stalled. In that moment, I felt it. Looking up at the wall that now contained me, everything felt wrong. My home was wood and stone. This place was unnatural in every way and I couldn’t shake the feeling I shouldn’t have come. Again, I had to swallow the bad feelings. I needed to get to Ring Two, and to do that, I needed to run. I tucked my gloves and booties in my pocket and got moving.
As I crept in and around the shadows, I let my eyes wander. So this was Ring Eight. Being sixteen when I left, I never got to see it. It was narrow, barely any space between this wall and the wall for Ring Seven. The houses were squashed together. They were tiny and even more basic than my old home. They couldn’t have been any bigger than our old lounge room.
I couldn’t help myself. Most of the lights were off but one or two homes still had a candle burning. I stepped lightly up the path. Being naturally stompy, it took every bit of my concentration to be stealthy. My toes cramped in my shoes, my legs bandied minutely. The Pau Brasil tree was holding its breath for me as I snuck up to the dirt-crusted window. I sighed softly. My heart ached for the trees. At home, there were no Pau Brasil trees, because it was not native. It belonged somewhere else, in another country, another world that gave up on its people long ago. I sympathized with the tree right then, feeling as out of place as it did.
Through the window an old man sat, smoking on an old dining chair like he was part of it. He was thin, thin to the point of looking close to death. He was an unwashed bag of bones, his pants held up by a piece of string. I thought of Addy, the way everyone looked to her for advice, her importance in the community. This man was a waste of space and the Superiors would not waste their time or resources on him.
There was nothing else in the room, save a pile of papers on the floor and an old stove. The old man coughed, the thin cigarette dropping from his lips, and startled himself to a more aware state. He didn’t look my way, or if he did, he didn’t notice me. His eyes were vacant and chilling in their despair. Joseph was right. It was beyond sad… a bunch of old people, waiting to die. My hate for the Superiors dug deeper. A ravine, carved out by a river of blood. I crept back along the path and kept moving. Silently, stealthily.
Footfalls light. Cool air pressing down on my lungs. Run. Run. Slip through the gates. Quietly. No creaks. Everything controlled, muscles tense. Don’t trip, and for God’s sake, don’t make any noise. This was a mistake. No. Just keep moving. It was too late to change my mind now.
I arrived at Ring Two and scanned the streets for a marker. I walked through one row of houses and couldn’t find anything familiar. When I moved to the next set of houses, I covered my mouth to stop from laughing. The house was the same as our old house, the same color, the same garden. And there they were, mother’s hideous purple-and-yellow curtains hanging in the lounge-room window.
A wave of hopelessness hit me hard. What was I going to do? I had practiced the speech in my head but now it sounded stupid. There was too much to say and not enough time. What details could I provide to her that would make her come with me without question? Fear compressed me. What was I thinking, coming here?
I turned around, ready to abandon my mission. But then I heard it. The soft cry of a baby. I instinctually moved towards the familiar sound. A light turned on at the side of the house. Like a moth, I was drawn to it. And at the same time, I almost didn’t want to look. This was where it had all started—this was the baby that sent me away, sent my life down an unimaginable path. I owed it everything and blamed it for everything.
I took off my bag, peeled myself from the wall of the house like old tape, and willed myself to look. Inside, my mother was holding the baby, patting its back gently, and humming. From all the pink, I figured it was a girl. I had a little sister. A crown of shiny, black hair capped the baby’s head. Mother lulled it to sleep, stroking its hair and smiling as she lay the child down in her crib. I felt a pang of jealousy, like a hand had reached out and slapped me. Mother looked content. She was happy. Without me.
This was a mistake, I knew now. I don’t know what I was expecting. If she’d treated the baby with the same mollified disinterest she did me—that would not be any better than this. Maybe this was for the best. At least now I knew she was safe and the baby was safe. I should have just turned around and left, but this little ball of anger was spinning inside me, chipping away at the sensible side, leaving a girl, raw, stripped of what she thought she knew. She wasn’t incapable of caring for a child; she just couldn’t take care of me.
I tapped lightly on the window with the back of my finger, trying hard not to smash it through. She looked up and registered immediately. Her eyes horrified. Her mouth wide open in shock. Thankfully, she didn’t scream. She shut her eyes for what seemed like forever. Trying to calm herself or maybe hoping she’d imagined me. When she opened them again and I was still there, she motioned for me to go to the back door with a sharp flick of her hand. Then she backed quietly out of the baby’s room.
I was excited and fearful as I tiptoed quickly to the back and hid in the shadows of the corner of the house, waiting for her to come out. Hope still clawed at my ankles.
Paulo must have been inside sleeping. I certainly didn’t want to see him.
I heard the latch, and saw one foot step out onto the mat, bare, thin, and pointed just like my own. The anger melted and I felt the overwhelming urge to run to her. To hug her. I wanted to tell her about all the horrible things that had happened to me and all the wonderful things I’d seen. I wanted to sit in her lap and have her comfort me like that night so long ago, when Paulo’s brother and wife had been captured. I wanted the mother I’d never had.
She stuck her head out carefully, looking from side to side like she was testing the air to see if it was breathable. I moved into the light slightly and motioned for her to come to me. She moved like a mouse, timid and scurrily.
“Rosa, what are you doing here?” she whispered in a tone that could only be explained as absolute horror. Her head bobbed around, looking back and forth nervously. She reached out and put her hands on my elbows, pinching them, the barest of contact. She was cold. Shaky.
“I have a sister,” I blurted out, shell-shocked. “Look, Mother, there’s no time to explain everything but I’ve come from the outside, from beyond the Woodlands. I want you to come with me. You and the baby. It’s better there. It’s so much better than livin
g in Pau with him.” I angled my head towards the house.
She faced me silently. Her eyes looked off to the distance, tracking an invisible object just over my shoulder. She put her hand to my face, tucked a strand of loose hair behind my ear, and cupped my cheek. Even now, after all that had happened, she still couldn’t look me in the eye.
We stood at even height; it was like gazing in an ageing mirror. I waited for her to say something but she just took a step back and shook her head. No. My heart started to tear open and blood poured around it, drowning me. Straightening her nightdress and looking at her feet, she put distance between us. There was always distance between us.
“I can’t,” was all she said, and then she turned around and went back inside, locking the door behind her.
The rejection sounded and felt like fabric ripping, tearing at me, jagged and messy, the ripping sound deafening only in my ears. I was such an idiot. I stood there for a long time slack and drained, the moon highlighting the lack of color in my face. I was stripped down. Bare. She didn’t want me. I stood there, hands at my side, willing myself not to cry.
I stood there for too long.
Strong hands clamped down on my shoulders and jolted me back to awareness. Memories of blood-stained lips, hearts cut out, slick, black hair, and cruelty pummeled my already beaten-up brain.
“Rosa.” His voice was laced with that familiar, controlled anger. “You should not have come here.”
I turned around slowly. Smiling defiantly. “Nice to see you too, Paulo.”
Paulo swung me around so his arm was about my neck. He had me in a headlock and dragged me inside. I struggled, but in a muted way because I didn’t want to make any noise. If Paulo or a neighbor called the police, that would be it. I would be dead.
He threw me into a chair, the old, wooden legs teetering until all four were back on the ground. “Don’t move,” he hissed, his voice aching to yell at me.
I could have run, but fear the authorities would be right behind me had me trapped. His eyes bore down on me—they were furious, hateful, and perhaps—could it be?—frightened. He rubbed his chin and went to the sink, spitting. Mother walked in. Her face fell and she burst into tears.
The kitchen looked identical to our old one, everything scrubbed clean. The only difference was a stack of sterilized bottles leaning against each other on the dish rack.
“What are you doing here?” Paulo asked and then he paused, swiping the air angrily like he could knock my presence out of the air. “No, don’t tell me. I don’t want to know. Whatever idiocy you are caught up in, I will not be party to it.”
I thought about it. The less I said, the better. Even though it was tempting to drag him into it, Paulo would report everything, and I had to think about Careen and Pietre.
Falling back into bad habits, I laughed and said innocently, batting my eyes, “Why? Aren’t you pleased to see me?”
He slammed his fist down on the table and I jumped. Take this seriously, I told myself. You have to get out.
“I thought I was finally free of you. Pleased? No, I am not pleased.” Every word was tainted black, lashing around his face like the lick of a whip.
“Well, I’ll leave then. I can see I’m not welcome.” I started to stand, but he was too quick. Before I could move, he had his hands on my shoulders, holding me down. I squirmed under his touch, his fingers pressing hard into my collarbones.
“Paulo, no,” my mother pleaded quietly. “We should let her go. She’s done no harm.”
He considered it for a second, his head cocked to the side, counseling himself. There was a tiny ray of hope. But then his eyes changed, they hardened. Hope was squashed like a bug.
“No, we need to call the police. She shouldn’t be here.”
Releasing me, he walked straight to the phone hanging on the wall over the kitchen counter, picking up the handset. It was an old phone, ceramic and heavy, with a reel dial. He put his finger in the first hole and pulled the number. I watched as it revolved its way back into place.
He forgot. I was not afraid of him.
I sprung from my chair and wrenched the handset from his fingers, pulling it as hard as I could. It stretched and strained and then the phone flung from the wall, taking plaster and paint with it. It took him a second to respond, his face suspended in disbelief, but when he did, it was like all our fights were wound up into this one action. He pulled his arm back and slammed me hard with the back of his hand. I flew through the air like a scrap, clipping my temple on the corner of the kitchen table and crumpling to the floor. But I pulled myself back up, bracing myself. The world was spinning, but I wasn’t going to go down so easy.
My mother was wringing her hands, standing by, watching him hurt me. Help me, I thought. For once! Don’t be afraid of him. Help ME!
Paulo gripped the phone. The numbers spun in front of my eyes even though they were still. All the control, all the stifling stiffness, was gone. He shrugged it off like a shroud, revealing the cruel twist of a man beneath. He was going to kill me. I could see it in his eyes—they were a swirl of empty black, ominous, terrifying.
He kicked me in the stomach hard and I fell backwards to the floor again, my head half-hidden under the chair. He clapped the chair out of the way. Telephone raised, ready to strike. He had me pinned.
I had the ridiculous thought that this was a very bizarre way to go, beaten to death with a telephone. My mind conjured up the vision of my death plaque. Here lies Rosa Bianca. Killed by a telephone. If only they hadn’t put her on hold for so long... A laughed slipped out between my lips. Of all the stupid things to do. His eyes were dancing. He licked the corner of his mouth. He would relish this. The humor was instantly eroded and all I could feel was a numb, stepped-on panic.
I couldn’t scream—they would hear me. And I would never let him see me cry. I closed my eyes, flashes of Joseph circling me with his big, strong arms, our son laughing and watching light dance against the timber walls, green hills and trees. Trees everywhere. I’m so sorry.
The dull bang of metal hitting flesh, and mostly bone, disturbed us both. We looked up to see my mother’s small, brown face, her eyes tired but defiant. Just there in the corner of those eyes, I could see me. I gasped as a small trickle of blood worked its way from her eyebrow down her cheek.
She raised the kitchen pan in her hand and struck herself in the face, hard. It would be comical if it weren’t so frightening. She looked at Paulo, her eyes stony. Then she ran for the front door, unlocking it shakily, her hands struggling to grip the key.
She turned to me, and said, “Run, Rosa,” and then she walked out the door screaming, “Help! Help! He’s beaten me. He’s going to hurt my baby!”
Lights were going on. People were stirring. Soon there would be sirens.
Paulo let go like my skin was on fire. The situation was turning on him and he cowered away from me, eyebrows knotted. A chunk of slick, black hair snaked down his forehead. I saw him for what he was, a small, petty man who had no heart and therefore should have no place in mine. I felt a small amount of pity for him. Very small. His life was over.
“You know, it didn’t have to be this way, Paulo,” I said as I stood unsteadily. I carefully took two steps backwards, holding his gaze, and then I bolted out the back door. The flimsy screen slammed several times. Creak, bang, creak, bang.
I heard him mutter, low and desperate, “I know.”
I ran down the side, picked up my bag without breaking stride, and turned away from my old life for good. Goodbye, Mother.
Why do we go around in circles? Wasn’t I just here? Nothing changes. Nothing ever changes.
I ran. Tears streamed down my face. I failed. I couldn’t save either of them. I hadn’t even asked my sister’s name. I ran through the list of things I’d wanted to say. You’re a grandmother. I’m safe. I’m working hard. I love you. I miss you. I need you. All of it sitting in my stomach, scrawled on a crumpled-up piece of paper, the ink seeping into my veins.
/> Could I let it go? She didn’t want me. So maybe I could stop worrying about her now. I shook my head, answering my own question. No. It wouldn’t be that easy.
The night air was piercing, like it was part acid cloud. My puffy eyes made it hard to focus, hard to see the dark shapes I needed to follow. I tightened my hair and wiped my nose with my sleeve, a streak of snot pulling across my face and hardening there. I was at the gate to Ring Three now. I crept up to it and carefully wrapped my fingers around the iron, remembering rust stains on my school jacket, a life that didn’t belong to me now, and probably never really did. I breathed a sigh of relief when it opened easily.
Following the curved line of the concrete wall for a while, I then made my way into the street and snuck past several houses. I kept my eye out for my old house but I couldn’t find it without the purple-and-yellow curtains. They all looked exactly the same.
I stole down a street, hugging the unsheltered curb, feeling more and more like I shouldn’t be here and how I couldn’t wait to be home. A mechanical creaking stopped me in my tracks. It sounded like a giant door pulling open, then glass shattering and muffled voices. I froze. There were very few places to hide. I padded into the front lawn of one of the houses and tried to mold into the shape of the Pau Brasil tree, noticing the lined-up bins on the curb in front of every house. What day was it? Wednesday. Bin collection.
“Damn it,” I muttered under my breath.
It was getting closer, inching its way towards me. I watched as a giant, mechanical arm lifted bins to the opening and shook. A man followed the truck, picking up the different recyclables and emptying them into compartments in the base of the truck, below the mouth meant for garbage. I’d never seen it done before. It was so early, 3AM. What an awful, bottom-of-the-rung job.
A man sidled up to the boxes, picked them up awkwardly, and bouncily walked to the truck, whistling as he went. The driver stuck his head out the window and yelled at the man intermittently, or maybe it was a boy. He was short and thin. He moved like he wasn’t collecting garbage. This boy was taking a stroll through a flowered field, sweeping his hands across the blooms, and looking up at the sky. It was clear he wasn’t taking what he was doing very seriously. The man in the truck yelled at him over and over, his hairy arm gesticulating and banging the door. But the boy seemed unperturbed, walking out of sight, snapping his hand together like a talking mouth, wobbling his head and imitating the driver. I tried not to laugh, covering my mouth with my hand. The tears were drying up now.
The Wall (The Woodlands) Page 28