Such a Pretty Girl

by Laura Wiess

  “Crap,” I mutter and pull back out of sight. Will she notice the raised, crooked blind breaking the symmetry of all our windows as she approaches the front of the building? Of course she will.

  I bite my lip, glance at the bedroom door. The lock is standard and flimsy. Once she parks and comes in, I’ll have only seconds to raise the window, bust through the screen, and climb out before she asks my father why my blind is hanging at such an odd angle. Only seconds to bolt in broad daylight from the front of my building to the back of Andy’s and get inside. I pray his mother hasn’t had milk for breakfast as she’s lactose-intolerant and becomes bathroom-bound whenever she dips into dairy.

  I spot my watch on the nightstand, crawl across the bed, snag it, and slip it onto my wrist. The knife bangs against my thigh and I realize I’ll need it to slice through the screen. I open the blade just as I hear the muffled thunk of a car door slamming outside my window.

  Her keys jingle.

  My heart booms.

  The front door opens.

  I wrench up the window as the front door closes behind her. My hair swings in front of my eyes and I jam it behind my ears. The scent of fresh coffee fills the air. I plunge the knife into the screen and yank downward, surprised at how little resistance the mesh gives. The slicing makes a harsh, zipping sound.

  “Chirp?” my father calls from the kitchen. “Get a move on. The bagels are here and they’re still hot.”

  I jam my leg through the gash, wincing as the rigid frame bruises my groin, and bend myself in two trying to get out. My head collides with the metal frame and stars dance in front of my eyes. I wiggle through the jagged tear, clutch the sash, and drag my other leg through.

  “Chirp?” Out in the hallway.

  The drop is seven feet and I’m five foot six. The lawn slopes away from the building and I stumble backward as I touch down, then sit hard. I scramble up and cast a panicked glance at ancient, wide-eyed Grandma Calvinetti and one of her twin grandsons sitting on her front porch across from us.

  She crosses herself and covers his eyes.

  I take off around the blind side of my building, down the lawn in four lightning strides, across the court, behind Andy’s building, and up his back steps.

  I rap the glass and press up against the door. If my father comes out our back door instead of the front he’ll spot me immediately and it’ll all be over. Feverishly, I wonder how much time the lock will buy me and know it won’t be much. Minutes? Seconds? My father is already suspicious; how long will he wait to break into my room when I don’t respond?

  The answer comes almost immediately.

  “What the…?” His astonished voice floats out of my bedroom window and through the morning air.

  “What is it, Charles?” my mother says. “Oh my…someone broke in?”

  “Not in, you idi—” My father stops and then, “Meredith? Meredith?”

  His voice is much clearer now and I imagine him poking his head out of the torn screen, scanning the area, searching for me.

  “Charles, what are you doing?” my mother asks. “I thought you said Meredith was taking a shower. Where are you going?”

  “Out to find her,” he says, his voice fading.

  I shrink closer to the door, hammering again with my knuckles. Come on, Ms. Mues. Come on. Come on. I cup my hands around my eyes and peer in through the crack in the curtains. The kitchen is empty.

  Of course it is. She’s in her room packing for Iowa or in the bathroom imprisoned by cramps or—

  A shadow cuts through the kitchen.

  I straighten as Ms. Mues shuffles toward the door. Cast a nervous glance over my shoulder.

  The curtains twitch apart. She peers out, her nonprescription glasses magnifying her perfect 20/20-vision eyes into giant boiled eggs, and her moon face creases in a smile.

  “Well, good morning, Mer—” she begins, opening the door.

  “Shh,” I hiss, plowing straight into her and rudely herding her backward into her own kitchen. I ease the door closed behind me, hearing, as I do, the sharp, angry crack of my front door slamming. “My father’s after me.” My composure takes a header and I’m caught in a full-body tremor. “He…he…he…”

  “Not in here,” she says, wrapping her great arm around my quaking shoulders, sweeping me out of the kitchen and away from the windows. “We’ll go into Andy’s room, honey, and you can tell us both exactly what’s going on.”

  We are halfway down the hallway when the knocking begins.

  Chapter Nine

  He didn’t see me come in here, I know he didn’t,” I babble. “I didn’t tell him about you guys, I swear. He must be going door to door.”

  “I see.” Her face pales, but her composure doesn’t falter. “Well, I’m not as ready for this as I wanted to be, but with any luck he’ll never even know it’s me.” She nods and squeezes my shoulder. “Don’t you worry, honey. I’ll take care of it.”

  “Yes. Okay.” I can’t stop shivering even though her bulky body and unflappable attitude comforts me in a way I’m just beginning to understand.

  Andy and his mother are not “that fat slob Jesus freak and her crippled kid,” as my mother so ignorantly calls them whenever she’s forced to acknowledge their existence. One of the many things my mother doesn’t realize is that Ms. Paula Mues is actually Mrs. Paula Beecher, the same widow my father cheated on her with so many years ago. She doesn’t realize it because Paula Beecher was a slim, doe-eyed brunette in blue jeans and T-shirts, a technical engineer who’d done a stint in the army and backpacked the Appalachian Trail.

  I’ve seen Ms. Mues’s old pictures, so I know how completely the extra weight, gray-streaked hair, and black-framed magnifying glasses have altered her appearance. Ever since learning about Andy’s molestation at my father’s hands, Ms. Mues has devoted her life to atoning for the tragedy and somehow smiting her enemy, which is why she changed her looks, went back to her maiden name, and followed us to Cambridge Oaks.

  When it comes to my father, Paula Mues and forgiveness have completely parted company.

  The knocking continues.

  “You go on into Andy’s room and don’t come out no matter what you hear,” she says. “And don’t let him come out, either.”

  “What’re you gonna do?” I ask, pawing her arm.

  She chooses the largest ceramic Jesus hanging on the wall and reverently removes it. “I’ve been waiting a long time for Him to reveal His plan to me and now I’ll go forth to do His will. I am a soldier in my Lord’s Army.”

  “Wait! What if he recognizes you?” I say in a hoarse whisper.

  “He won’t,” she says, glancing down at herself with a faintly bitter smile. “I’m as good as invisible to him. The bigger I am the more he won’t see me, honey. You know how your father is.”

  Yes I do, which is why I didn’t brush my hair or shower for his homecoming. Physical imperfections have always offended him, but apparently my bad hygiene wasn’t repellent enough. Perhaps Ms. Mues’s full-blown adulthood will be.

  Be careful, I want to say, but she’s already shuffling back into the kitchen, Jesus cradled in the crook of her arm and a litany of prayer pouring from her lips.

  “I’m coming,” she calls serenely as the pounding intensifies.

  “Mer?” Andy says. “Is that you?”

  Oh God. “Shhh!” I whip into his bedroom doorway, collide with his wheelchair, and sink to the floor in a silent howl, rocking and clutching the fast-rising knot on my shin. A half-second later I press a finger to my lips and mouth, My father!

  Andy pales. He grips his wheels as if to roll forward, but retreats instead.

  “Good morning.” Ms. Mues’s voice goes southern and singsongs back from the kitchen. “How can I help another child of God?”

  “Huh? Oh, well, uh, I’m looking for my daughter and I thought maybe you might have seen her,” my father says, and stiff distaste flavors his words. “She pitched a fit and took off on me. She’s, uh, fifteen, long
brown hair, stands about so high…?” Pause. “She lives in the end unit right over there.”

  At the first sound of my father’s voice, Andy jerks as if he’s been slapped. Sweat blooms on his forehead. “He used to call me Buddy,” he whispers. “Oh, fuck me, I think I’m gonna puke.”

  I thrust the wastebasket up into his arms and turn away as he heaves into it.

  Andy was five when his father died, seven when my father stepped up to the plate and became the new man in his life. For close to a year Andy had an almost-dad to lean against and look up to. But during the last month of my father and Ms. Mues’s relationship, Andy began fighting in school, getting in trouble, and wetting his bed. His moods swung from anxious and clingy to sullen and raging, and—

  “That little lost lamb of God?” Ms. Mues carols. “Of course I’ve seen her.”

  I stiffen and back slowly away from the bedroom doorway.

  “I see her on her way to school every morning at seven-thirty when I open my curtains and praise Jesus for giving me another glorious day to sing His praises.”

  “No, that’s not what I—” my father says.

  “Poor sweet baby, she trudges along like she carries the weight of the world on her shoulders and I just know if she gave herself to Jesus her pain would be lifted. I’ve offered to save her, but—”

  “Okay no, well, I mean, uh, thanks anyway,” my father interrupts.

  “Wait, don’t leave. No one is lost who seeketh the Lord! Tell me, brother, have you been saved?” Ms. Mues’s voice rises. “Would you like to pray with me?”

  Silence.

  Finally, the door closes and the lock snaps shut.

  “Works every time,” Ms. Mues says, but her voice trembles beneath the triumph. “Thank you, Jesus, for giving me the strength to face my enemy. In your name, amen.” She lurches into sight at the head of the hallway, a tactically superior nuclear submarine disguised as a lumbering tugboat. “It’s all right now, honey. He’s checking next door, but the Eisners are in Bermuda. I think half the building is away on vacation. Come have coffee. I’ll close the blinds. We won’t have an audience.”

  I glance at Andy, who sits slumped with the soiled wastebasket cradled in his arms. “You okay?”

  “Yeah,” he says, rubbing his forehead and avoiding my eyes. “I just…I….” He looks smaller, weaker. Fragile. “How can you take it?”

  I shake my head.

  We sit at the table and I recount the events of the past twenty-four hours.

  When I’m done, Ms. Mues sighs and removes her thick glasses. Her eyes shrink back to normal size and bring sad beauty to her face.

  “He’s an abomination,” she says, glancing at Andy, who hasn’t spoken yet.

  “But a smart one,” I say. “He only messes with me when no one else is around. He hasn’t reformed, he’s just gotten sneakier.” I stop, feeling an absurd pang of conscience at my disloyalty. I have every reason to hate him—his betrayal colors all that I am, have been, and will be—but it’s hard to shake the lessons learned before the souring, not the least of which is “blood is thicker than water.”

  Stupid, I know. But there all the same.

  “So much for those empathy classes and the psychological evaluation,” Ms. Mues says, rubbing her forehead. “And the parole board’s not winning any prizes, either. This was a terrible, violent crime. They all were.” She glances at Andy, at the bottle wedged between his thighs, and pain sweeps her face. “Why do these people keep getting out? Why aren’t they sentenced to life without parole or put in a mental hospital? I don’t understand this world. What’s the point of obsessing over cholesterol or bike helmets or even cigarettes when the biggest threats to our children are being released back into society every day? Yes, maybe some of them have reformed, but what about the ones who haven’t? Doesn’t anyone realize that one touch, one time will destroy a child’s life ten times faster than a pack-a-day habit?”

  It’s not really a question, so I don’t bother to answer.

  Instead, I remember my mother’s delight when the call came announcing my father’s release date….

  “Why, that’s wonderful!” she says, cradling the phone and beaming at me across the kitchen. Outside the Calvinetti twins argue over an iPod. “I’ll take the day off. Really? Oh, I see.” Her expression clouds, then clears again. “No, I’m sure we can work around it. Anything to make this happen. Thank you for calling!”

  I stare at my spoon, watch the tomato soup vibrate off it in spurting splashes. It’s all right, though; I’m no longer hungry.

  She hangs up and laughs with delight. “Your father’s coming home early!”

  I set the spoon down on my napkin. The puree stains the white tissue. I move the spoon into the bowl and crumple the napkin. It’s hard to breathe.

  “That was the attorney. He said the doctors are very pleased with your father’s progress and that his behavior has been exemplary—”

  “Well, that’s stupid.” My reaction is rude and raw. “Of course he’s been a model prisoner, Mom. There aren’t any kids to molest in prison.”

  “There’s so much to do to get ready,” she says, as if I haven’t spoken. “He’ll need new clothes and a job, a place to live—”

  I straighten. “Not here?”

  “Well, no, the attorney says that’s one of the rules of his release,” she says, avoiding my gaze. “He can’t live with us just yet. He’s on some sort of parole or whatever, with a lot of guidelines. I don’t know what they are yet, except…” Her face darkens. “He has to register down at the police department because of his…situation.”

  “Good,” I say and the rest tumbles out fast and faster. “Because that’s exactly what he SHOULD have to do, and you know what? I hope they put his picture online so that everybody will know he’s a child molester because that’s what he is, Mom, just like all those other gross old guys in chat rooms trying to—”

  “Stop it!” She turns on me, fierce. “Don’t you ever talk that way about your father! He had a breakdown, do you hear me? He didn’t understand what he was doing. We were stressed, I was going to school and working full-time and you know how affectionate your father is, you know how much he loves being the center of attention. He wasn’t trying to hurt anyone, he was trying to show you love and maybe get a little in return. He was lonely, Meredith, that’s all. Lonely and needy and he made a mistake.”

  “Is that what you really think?” I say, aghast.

  “It’s true. It was a mistake.”

  “Wrong.” I lunge forward, white-knuckling the edge of the table. “Rape is not a mistake! He did it on purpose, over and over again because he wanted to, because he got off on it—”

  “Meredith!” She cuts me off, furious. “Why do you do that? Why do you always have to make things ugly? If I’m willing to forgive and forget, why can’t you? My God, there are thousands of kids out there who’d love to have a father—”

  “Well, they can have mine, because I don’t want him and I’m not gonna have anything to do with him no matter WHERE he lives.” I shove my chair from the table. The tomato soup sloshes out of the bowl and drenches the place mat. “I hate him and I hope he dies!”

  She snatches the place mat and runs it to the sink. “Don’t ever say that again. He’s paid his dues—”

  “Three years?” My panic expands. “Mom, people get more jail time for shoplifting! He was supposed to be locked up for nine years so by the time he got out I would have been legal and gone.”

  “Oh, I see,” my mother says with a grim sort of triumph. “You want your father to rot in prison and me to be alone for another six years just so you can have your own way. Well, guess what? The world doesn’t always revolve around you.”

  My head is spinning. “He molested five kids and those are only the ones who got up the nerve to tell. Who knows how many others are out there?”

  “This conversation is over,” she says, walking away.

  I follow her. “How can you even lo
ok at him? How can you kiss him? Do you know where his mouth has been?” The nightmares in my brain are roaring.

  “Done.” Her features are smoothed and straightened. She’s re-made herself and anything I say will bounce off her now, the way a quarter bounces off a tight sheet. “Your father and I have been together for twenty-seven years—”

  “Yeah, I know, since you were twelve and he was sixteen,” I say. “Didn’t you ever think it was weird that a sixteen-year-old guy would want to be with a middle school girl? Doesn’t that seem a little sick to you, Mom?”

  Dull red stains her face and she looks like she hates me. “No sicker than you always being Daddy’s little girl and hogging him all for yourself, so you know what, Meredith? Excuse me if I’m not as sympathetic as you think I should be.” Her jaw tightens. “I’ve always wondered why, if what he was doing to you was so horrible, you didn’t tell on him sooner…”

  Stricken, I put out a hand to stop her. “Mom, I—”

  “No, now it’s my turn. I hate what happened, and maybe you want to dwell on it for the rest of your life, but I don’t. As far as I’m concerned, it’s done. If you can forgive and forget, fine. If not, then when you’re eighteen, go. We’ll survive. We were together before you showed up and we’ll be together after you leave. I am not throwing away my marriage just because something that shouldn’t have happened did. The best thing to do is get over it and move on.” Her face lights up. “And now we can because he’s finally coming home!”

  It’s then I realize that if it comes down to making a choice between my father and me, she will choose him….

  I watch Andy’s mother, who is watching Andy disappear into himself.

  She will choose him.

  Oh God, I want so badly to believe that Ms. Mues shelters me because she cares and not because I’m a source of inside information on the enemy. I long to trust her completely, but right now I don’t. I hate it when I get like this.