The Perfect Fraud

by Ellen LaCorte

  Claire looks confused but then says, “You mean, like a psychic?”

  “Yeah, maybe. Is that what they do?”

  “Well, some do. They’re called medical intuitives. They scan your body—well, actually, your energy—and supposedly can tell you what’s going on inside.”

  “Supposedly?”

  “I’ve only done it a couple of times, so I can’t speak to whether it’s always accurate or anything like that.”

  I practically jump out of my seat, I’m that excited.

  “Wait, what the hell? You’re a psychic?”

  Claire doesn’t answer for a long time. I’m about to ask again, but then she finally mumbles, “Yeah.”

  “Oh my God, this is awesome. Someone I know, my meditation teacher, Ricki, she’s gone to a bunch of psychics. She keeps telling me to go, but with Steph, of course, I don’t have a minute to myself. But maybe that’s what I’ll do once Steph and me are settled. Drive to Sedona. Is it close by to Phoenix? Do you have a card or something?”

  “No, sorry,” she says.

  “Here.” I grab my pen and a grocery store receipt from my purse and push them into her hand. “Write your name. Do you work in a store or out of your house or what? Write that down too, okay? Wow, I’m so excited you sat next to me.” I turn to Stephanie and say, “Hear that, sweetie? Maybe you and me will drive up and see this nice lady so we can find out what’s really going on with your tummy.” She looks at me and then turns back to stare out the window.

  The captain’s voice comes over the intercom. “Ladies and gentlemen, we are about twenty minutes from Phoenix Sky Harbor. In a moment, crew members will be coming through the cabin and collecting any trash you may still have. Thank you for flying with us and enjoy your stay.”

  “Excuse me,” I say, standing up and squeezing over Claire’s knees. “Almost there, so I guess I better use the potty. Keep an eye on Steph for me, okay?”

  19

  Claire

  Of all the seats in all the planes . . . I had to have the one next to her. To this woman named Rena. She’s a frowsy, meaty blonde in desperate need of a root touch-up, with murky hazel eyes and ruddy skin. And a mouth that won’t quit.

  It’s bad enough her kid’s in my window seat, but then Rena, in the middle seat, will not stop talking. As soon as she sees the slit of one of my slightly opened eyes, she continues the conversation as if I hadn’t been practically comatose next to her for the past four-plus hours. It seems she must tell me everything: her name, her daughter’s name, her meditation coach’s name, and her ongoing difficulties with the medical system.

  Before she can start detailing for me the size and type of the shoes in her closet at home, I find myself giving her the Mystical Haven information. Apparently, she’s always wanted to have a meeting with a psychic. Hopefully, someone who can tell her what’s wrong with her child. It’s very sad, I’m not saying it isn’t, but she seems determined to include me in all of the anguish, and right now, I’m completely anguished out. I’m almost tempted to do the bait-and-switch thing, where you give the guy you meet at the bar your phone number, but it’s actually the number for the zoo.

  The captain announces that the flight attendants will be picking up our trash. I’m beat, I want to get to our apartment, and I want to find Cal, but mostly, right at this moment, I want to be as far away from the person sitting next to me as is possible to do when you’re trapped in an aluminum box. Fortunately, Rena has to go the bathroom. Unfortunately, she asks me to watch her daughter, Stephanie, while she’s gone.

  “So, Stephanie, how old are you?” She’s got the palest blue eyes I’ve ever seen. They’re almost silver but dull and set deep in sockets surrounded by gray skin. Her blond hair hangs in droopy ringlets supported by two floppy red bows at the crown.

  “Four,” she whispers, twisting to stare fixedly out the window. I’m surprised because I would have guessed maybe three. She looks like she hasn’t slept in a month.

  “Is this your first plane ride?”

  She nods stiffly, squeezing her palms into each other and intertwining her fingers until they’re knotted together, her knuckles turning white.

  “Uh-oh, better unwrap those or they may get stuck that way,” I say, reaching over to gently lift one of her tiny pinkies. She jerks back as if I slapped her.

  “I’m sorry. I just wanted to make sure you can play with your toys. It’ll be hard to do with your fingers all scrunched up like that.”

  She giggles then, a sweet, pure sound. Her face pinks up a bit, and she finally looks at me.

  “I brought Jeffrey with me and also some LEGOs.”

  “Jeffrey? Who’s that?”

  “He’s my panda, silly.” She giggles again.

  “I bet he’s a good friend. Do you and Jeffrey play together every day?”

  It’s like a switch flipped. Her face closes in, an origami, all folds and creases. She turns back to the window and mutters something.

  Bending toward her, I say, “I’m sorry, Stephanie, I didn’t hear what you said.”

  When she looks back at me, there’s something in her face that’s hard to decipher. Fear maybe, but definitely a sadness beyond what any child should carry.

  She sighs and leans in my direction. I bend over even more until we’re close enough that she can cup her hand around my ear. She says, “Sometimes Jeffrey is very bad and he has to sleep in the cellar, on the floor.” She pauses and looks up and around us and then says, “It’s really cold and dark.”

  A whispered secret, her face a mask of resigned despair, like that of a person who’s seen too much of life.

  When my throat constricts and I feel like I’m going to cry again, I’m sure it’s just a continuation of the emotional deluge I’ve been experiencing since my father’s death. Suddenly, though, there’s liquid in my mouth, and I have to keep swallowing to clear it. It tastes like the ocean, as if I’ve been sucked under by a wave and am taking in gulps of seawater. Like my salivary glands have been opened and I’m unable to activate the shutoff valve. I swallow and swallow, but the salty liquid keeps filling my mouth.

  As we touch down, Rena rushes back, with the flight attendant close behind, hissing at her to take her seat.

  When the plane stops rolling and the lights blink on, Rena grabs her bag from the overhead compartment and tosses Stephanie a stuffed panda that’s sporting a ragged red-checked bow tie, and white ears and a belly that are mostly yellowed. I’m guessing it’s Jeffrey. Stephanie closes her eyes and hugs him tightly to her.

  I get my bag too and follow them down the aisle and off the plane. In the terminal, Rena says she’ll see me in Sedona and walks away, dragging Stephanie behind her by the arm. The little girl turns back and raises her hand in a limp wave.

  I rush to the bathroom to spit into the sink. Much to the disgust of my fellow travelers, I’m sure, I stand there and spit and spit for at least ten minutes as the salty water continues to fill my mouth.

  20

  Rena

  When Stephanie and me walk out of the terminal, I feel like I’m actually inside a fucking volcano. I heard it was hot here, but I thought that maybe since it was so early in the morning it wouldn’t be too bad. Wrong. Sweat is dripping down my back, and Stephanie’s face is all red. I take off her sweatshirt and tie it around her waist.

  The cab drops us off at our new place, which is a shithole. There’s no other word for it. It’s a really small duplex on a square of gravel. No backyard. I look both ways down the street. All the buildings look exactly the same, just separated from one another by tall concrete block walls. There’s not a tree or, really, anything alive over two feet high in sight. I’m not sure which one is supposed to be ours, so I knock on a door. No answer. I move to the other door and knock again. Stephanie is poking the spikes of a cactus on the “lawn.” She jumps back each time she gets stuck.

  A fat woman with frizzy short black hair finally answers the door. She wipes her hands down the front of her apron, whi
ch is covered with flour, and says, “Yeah?”

  “I’m Rena and, uh, I’m looking for Mrs. Lupito?”

  “You found her.”

  I point to Stephanie. She moved away from the cactus and is dragging a broken toy truck across the dust and pebbles. “That’s my daughter, and we’re renting a place from you? You and me talked last month.”

  “Oh yeah, I remember now. You were supposed to be here like three weeks ago. I almost rented the place to someone else. You shoulda called me. Good thing you got here today. By the end of this week, it wouldn’t be available no more.” Her Spanish accent is pretty thick, so I have to listen real hard to understand what she’s saying. Mrs. Lupito stares at Stephanie for a long time and then says, “She sick? She looks sickly.”

  “Yeah, really sick. That’s why we’re here. To see a stomach specialist at Sun Valley Memorial Hospital.”

  Mrs. Lupito grunts and closes the door. WTF? I’m about to knock again when she comes back out. She’s got a key attached by a chain to a five-inch-tall plastic crucifix. She says to follow her and unlocks the door next to her place into the ugliest room I’ve ever seen.

  There’s a sofa with torn plaid fabric hanging off one arm and a huge purple beanbag in the corner. The scratched coffee table is covered with water spots and dust. I touch the beanbag with my toe. There’s a hole (from a mouse?) near the bottom, and a pile of beans falls out onto the dingy shag rug. I didn’t even know anyone had that type of carpet anymore.

  It only gets worse from there. The bedroom is about the size of my closet at home. I can actually see the springs pushing up through the top of the mattress. There’s hardly any space on the floor for Stephanie’s sleeping bag.

  The bathtub is filthy, all rust-stained and soap scummy.

  “How far is the hospital from here?” I ask the landlady.

  “Walking distance,” she says as she moves toward the door. “Rent, first and last, due to me by end of today.”

  “Fine.” I shut the door behind her.

  21

  Claire

  Sun and shadow are warring over the buttes, light cresting above the ragged red edges, as I turn into our apartment complex. I assume Cal is still sleeping. My hand shakes so much the key drops to the front mat. Trying to open the door quietly, I’m rehearsing in my mind what I’ll do, which already sounds ridiculous to me, like a bad soap-opera scene. Woman dresses in slinky robe, drops robe to the floor, and slides in next to her man, who is about to have a real eye-opening good-morning surprise.

  Except the first problem is I don’t own a robe of any kind, and the second, as I soon discover, is Cal is not in the bed. I walk back outside and stuff my hand in the mail slot hanging beside the front door. It’s filled with at least a few days’ worth of bills, magazines, and restaurant flyers. It appears as if Cal has not been home for a while.

  All the words I wanted to say—how much I love him and need him—every single one becomes an extinguished firework, fizzling and hitting the ground as ash. I’m certain he’s gone, as I had anticipated he would be. I check his closet and see his clothes hanging there, but I know at some point he’ll come back for them and his CDs and his collection of ceramic owls, and then the apartment will lose all sense of its Cal-ness. How long could I honestly expect a good, sweet man like Cal to hang around waiting for someone like me?

  My shirt feels too tight; everything feels too tight. I can’t breathe.

  Walking through each room, I hunt for a farewell letter, a sticky note, anything to tell me where he’s gone, why he finally decided to walk away. Nothing—but I get it. What else could he possibly say after years of telling me how much he loved me, wanted to be with me, to marry me—shouting it into the great void of my heart and receiving not even an echo in return? It would be against all reason that he would stay, and now, beyond comprehension of why he remained for so long. I stand in the kitchen, marooned, and slip to the floor. I begin to sob, great belly-wrenching gulps that terrify me with their ferocity and my inability to control them.

  Curling on my side, I gasp for air.

  Eventually, I stand shakily, walk back into the deserted bedroom, and put on my running shoes. I need something familiar, an anchor to save me from this sensation of being unmoored.

  The trail looks empty, as I would expect, given the early hour. I stretch and begin to lumber up the slight incline. Maybe it’s from not running for the past week or so, but my legs feel leaden, my muscles stiff as an old bike tire. I trip over a fallen cactus. Vaguely, I can hear the whirl of helicopter blades and register that it’s one of the morning tours. A group of chattering quails scurries in front of me, topknots bobbing.

  My mind is struggling to find its lost stability, already grasping at alternatives for a new life, a life without Cal: I’ll move to Pennsylvania and live with my mother; I’ll go back to school and get a degree that could actually lead to a real job; I’ll be an elephant trainer; I’ll jump off the next lookout point. Images race through my brain, and in each one, there’s a huge ragged hole, a place where Cal used to be. No matter how I try, I cannot imagine a life without him. Who will tell me the sound from outside is a dog and not a coyote? Where will I bring my tired mind when my thoughts become so tangled that only Cal can help me unravel them? When will I laugh again until I’m straining for air because of a joke so stupid it could only have this effect on the two of us? I know now, down to my core, that I want a future with him. I want to see what he does, what he becomes. I want to be there on his sixtieth birthday as he blows out a fire torch of candles on his cake. The tears start again, hot and blurring my vision.

  All I want is Cal.

  And there he is.

  I’m so shocked, I stop midstride. He doesn’t see me for a second since he’s looking at his feet, a poor running technique I’ve been trying to break him of for years. Finally, he raises his gaze, and how his face lights up as he spots me only makes me cry harder. He sprints the distance between us, wraps his arms around me, and says into my hair, “Claire, I’m so sorry. It must have been horrible for you. I told you I should have gone. Why didn’t you let me go with you?”

  “Oh my God. You’re here. You didn’t leave,” I push out between sobs.

  “Leave?”

  “You were angry. I know it. We didn’t talk while I was gone, and your texts were, I don’t know, distant. I went to the apartment just now and you weren’t in bed and there was all this mail and there was no note and . . .”

  He leans back to stare at me and starts to laugh. “You know me. Until this moment, and only because you reminded me, I probably wouldn’t have checked the mail until it was falling out of the box. And why would I leave a note when I was only out for a run?” We walk back down the trail a bit, and he leads me to a stone bench to sit.

  “Didn’t you get my text that I was coming home this morning?” I gulp back sobs.

  He reaches into his shorts pocket and says, “Damn. I’m really sorry, but I must have left my phone in the car. Again. But I did call you back. Didn’t you get any of my messages?”

  I nod and say, “I tried calling you too, but I guess, with the time difference, we never connected. And texts . . . They’re so impersonal, you know?”

  He wipes a palm over both my cheeks and kisses me. I feel my joints, connective tissue, even my organs, begin to soften and unknot.

  “Yeah, I do.” Cal looks at his running shoes, which are covered in red dust. He brushes one off with the sole of the other. “To be honest, you’re right. I was mad when you left.” He hesitates, and I can see the struggle as he decides what to say next. “I don’t think it’s a surprise to either of us that things have been tense between us for a while. I know you want me to do something with my life—the whole returning to school bit. And I started to think that maybe we were never going to get married, that maybe . . . you just don’t love me as much as I love you. That I’m not the right person for you.”

  I turn his face toward mine so I can look directly into hi
s eyes.

  “Cal, I’m an idiot.”

  “Wait, let me finish. What I think made me so angry was not just that maybe you felt that way, but that I did.”

  “Huh?”

  “That I wasn’t the right person—for me. That I wasn’t doing what I really wanted, what I needed to do. I mean, helping people decide which portable camping toilet to buy is fascinating work, but . . .” He nudges a small lizard with the toe of his shoe, and it scampers off into the low brush.

  “The more I thought about it, the madder I got—at me. I’ve been taking it very easy, I know. Then . . . you left and didn’t even want me to be with you during this terrible time. I felt like a loser on all fronts.”

  “Now can I say it? I’m an idiot,” I repeat.

  He starts to laugh, and I’m so relieved to hear the sound because maybe it means I haven’t totally destroyed what I’ve trampled on for so long.

  “I’m not sure how to explain it, but . . .” I tell him about my mother, how we finally talked, truly talked, after all those years of being polarized and separate. How much it meant to me for her to tell me she was sorry about the burden I had to take on when I was a kid, how she truly loved me, and how we were able to grieve my father’s death together.

  He listens without commenting and then puts an arm around my shoulders and pulls me close. I can smell the sweat, which has an undertone of curry that tells me he probably went to Indian Paradise without me for dinner last night and that makes me start to tear up again, thinking of me not being with him for the curry chicken we both love. The possibility of us not together seems like the difference between falling off the cliff and almost falling off the cliff, like the tiniest of breezes or a small trip on a pebble could change everything. It feels that tenuous.