by Tabitha King
“What’s that?” Sarah said, examining her nails to underline her utter boredom.
“Children should be seen and not heard,” Marguerite said. “It means you don’t know shit from Shinola.”
Sarah’s mouth dropped open. She had never heard her grandmother use a rude word. Marguerite had been known to wash out the mouths of excessively daring children for that offense, until Liv found out about it and stopped it.
Pat shot a worried glance at Sarah. “I’ve got to go soon if I’m going to make my plane, Sarah, but we’re going to talk about this a lot more. I’ll call you from L.A. tomorrow. After school tomorrow. Three o’clock, all right?”
Sarah sulked. “I have basketball practice.”
“When are you home, then?”
“Four-thirty.”
“Good. I’ll call at four-thirty.”
Sarah nodded.
He looked at the cup of coffee. Drinking it would probably interfere with sleeping on the plane. He knocked back most of it anyway. “I have to go,” he said.
“Have a good flight,” Marguerite said.
Pat kissed Sarah’s cheek. “Be good, sweetheart,” he said. There was a note of pleading in his voice.
“Sure,” she said sullenly.
“She’ll be good,” Marguerite said confidently.
Pat backed into the hall, grabbed his suitcase, an overcoat and muffler, and hurried out.
Sarah and Marguerite sat alone in the kitchen, on opposite sides of the table, staring at each other. Pat’s car started in the driveway, and then was gone. It was very quiet, the only sound in the house the metronome of the grandmother clock in the front hall. Marguerite sipped her coffee. At last Sarah’s eyelashes fluttered slowly, and then Sarah stared at the top of the table. Marguerite grunted.
“Sarah,” she said.
Sarah did not look up. Silent tears wet her cheeks.
“Sarah,” Marguerite repeated. “Your parents are going to divorce over my dead body. There’s no chance in hell you’re ever going to live in that glass house in California. You’re going to spend the next five years right here, so get used to it. Cheer up. It won’t be so bad. So you’ll have to postpone making a horse’s ass of yourself until you’re eighteen and you go off to college. That’s not too late. Believe me.”
Sarah wiped her eyes with the back of her hand. “Why are you so mean?” Sarah whispered.
“I’m not mean,” Marguerite said. “I’m just telling the truth. You know what you don’t like about me?”
Sarah looked up and snuffled.
“We’re two of a kind.”
“Hah,” Sarah said, fishing a tissue out of the box on the table. She blew her nose. “You and my mother, you’re two of a kind.”
Marguerite blinked. “Your mother? Hah to you, Miss Smartypants.” She leaned across the table and thumped her knuckles on it. “Your mother is all Doe. You’ll never win against her.”
“Why not?” Sarah challenged her.
“I never won anything from him, that’s why.” Marguerite got up and poured herself another cup of coffee. “You ought to tell your father that when you talk to him. Tell him changing one of those two is like trying to hold onto a handful of snow. They just melt away on you. And you think you’ve lost them. Then you realize you’re hip-deep in them, and they’re down the back of your neck and inside your boots and they’re going to bury you. They’re going to bury you.” She stared out the window at the cold sky. “Did you know, Sarah, that every snowflake is supposed to be unique?”
“That’s what my mother says,” Sarah said.
“Remember when she did all the snowflake Christmas ornaments? She showed me a library book she had once, the first photographs of snowflakes ever taken, by some fellow in Vermont. They made me shiver just to look at them,” Marguerite hugged herself.
She turned around at the sound of Sarah sobbing. Great heaving, sucking sobs, her face in her hands, with their wildly colored nails. Marguerite went to her and put her hands on Sarah’s shoulders. “Poor baby,” she said, and kissed the top of Sarah’s head.
The ride to the jetport wasn’t long enough to be soothing. Pat kept punching the radio buttons, switching stations, looking for the right song, the one piece of rock ‘n’ roll that would speak to him and take him out of himself. It was one of those periods when he was almost certain rock ‘n’ roll had finally and truly died. He suffered through Metal Health’s “Lick It Up” on BLM out of Lewiston, and then the astrological forecast from the Cosmic Muffin, who hadn’t been funny since he went into syndication. Jay Jay followed, on the Weatherdeck, reporting that the weather was lookin’ bad, folks, heavy snow, possibly a blizzard in the mountains tonight. Pat punched the button, and found David Bowie singing “White Christmas” with Bing Crosby. At the next stoplight, he fumbled frantically in the glove box for a tape, and shoved one into the slot without even looking to see what it was. It was “Born to Add,” the Sesame Street rock parody they had listened to last coming home from the Mall the day after Thanksgiving. He couldn’t help laughing. The sound of Bruce Stringbean evoked the image of the Mall Santa Claus, with his glossy white beard stained orange with the dye from Travis’ regurgitated orange pop, swearing and screaming. And as always, it brought to mind Sarah’s adoration of the real Bruce. He arrived at the jetport with his children on his mind.
I’ll call Liv from L.A., Pat told himself, hurrying past the telephones, though there was time. Too much time, really.
He had fled his wife’s kitchen, where things were subtly wrong, cupboards rearranged, and surfaces too bare, as if she had died and Marguerite had come in to exorcise Liv’s presence, to demonstrate to Liv’s soul that her kitchen was no longer hers, or to cleanse the kitchen from the contamination of the dead. He had fled Marguerite, across the table, with her cup of coffee, and her mother-in-law’s bright and knowing eyes that said I know you’re fucking my little girl, sonny, and don’t think just because you made an honest woman of her I’m ever going to unload this shotgun, because you’re still fucking her, the shotgun not a real one, of course, although both Marguerite and Doe, the amiable bearlike Doe, were perfectly capable of taking up a real one and blowing him away. Sorrowfully and solemnly and soberly and with proper gravity, on grounds of personal honor. And he had fled Sarah with her woman’s tits and ass and her petulant blind stubborn adolescent stupidity.
Between the tiny orange cushions of her Walkman headset, there seemed to be nothing going on in her head but rock ‘n’ roll lyrics. He didn’t know how to tell her that for him they were a sweet, nostalgic, romantic dream of a youth that never had been and wasn’t now. It had never occurred to him she would really believe in them, all those lies about love and rebellion and dying young and leaving a beautiful corpse. Was there anybody so young and stupid they didn’t know there is no such thing as a beautiful corpse? He had fled the baby laxative he had left in his desk drawer with the sieve and the razor and the polished slice of stone that he could not explain to Sarah, even if she would unstop her ears and hear him.
How did he say Look kid you had to have been there. The government does lie, like the gang of mad bastards it is, it lies about everything on principle but it’s not because it doesn’t want anyone to have any fun, it’s because it wants to keep the prices UP, and when fun’s illegal, someone’s got to make money off it, cheap fun is un-American, and the government likes it that way, sweetheart, you’re absolutely right about that. But the thing is, that doesn’t make it A-okay for thirteen-year-olds, or lots of people. Just okay for me. And I know how that sounds, kid, but see, I’ve smoked dope since nineteen sixty-eight, not every day, or even every week, of course, but now and then, and I know goddamn well it does less damage to me than booze, which I drink every day, every single goddamn day, two martinis before dinner, wine or beer with dinner, a few beers or six after dinner, once in a while a snifter of brandy or a little cognac, and I don’t miss the brain cells at all, because there’s billions of the little bastards
, most of them just layabouts collecting welfare anyway, and I love getting mellow, and I love getting kited on coke, it feels like it’s bringing those deceased brain cells right the fuck back to life and making new ones, and all it costs me is money, Kleenex, a little sleep, and a mild case of diarrhea now and then from the baby laxative or whatever else the stuff’s being cut with, but you have to understand, Sarah, I’m a grown man, thirty-five years old, I work eighteen hours a day, I fly to L.A. and it takes three days to get over the jet lag and then I fly east and there’s another three days of jet lag; I do that over and over again, and I can’t afford to be slow, I have to produce wherever I am, and besides, I know what I’m doing, Sarah. A man has a lot to cope with, Sarah. Earning a living, raising a family, keeping a wife. And I’m losing my wife, your mother.
The thought of Liv so desolated him that he forgot about Sarah and sank miserably into a molded plastic seat in the new terminal. Everything around him was white or brightly colored—purple, like his chair, or red, or yellow—and new and modern, with expanses of glass that a man seemed always to be cleaning, and the people waiting with him—for arriving passengers, or to leave, to flee, like Pat himself—were cheerful in anticipation of whatever the next few minutes would bring. The carpet underfoot was tough, low pile stuff in a muddy tweed that had looked worn and dirty since the day it was laid and always would. The ashtrays were shiny chrome cans with lids that opened inward and clacked shut like hostile mouths. There was a row of coin-operated TVs that adults fed quarters to distract bored and restless children. The children watched long enough to see they had been cheated, and then abandoned, leaving the TVs to show their few minutes of grainy, ghosted, rolling images to no one. He had seen carpets and ashtrays and TVs like them in dozens of airports. His dreams were full of them.
He wished he had called Liv last night or this morning, or from the convenient bank of telephones he had cruised past on the way in. Even as he looked at his wristwatch, there was an unintelligible announcement that he knew was his boarding call: People around him were gathering their belongings and queuing up at the security gate. Now it really was too late to call.
Standing in line, with the strap of his carryon biting into his shoulder, he looked out the windows and at the sky. It was white and low with more snow. The forecast said anytime now, and through the night. The runways were broad charcoaled roads stenciled on the ivory snow. Light wind off Casco Bay, the thin warmth of the short winter days, the exposed site of the airport, had all combined to diminish the accumulation to sheer, gleaming crust, broken by long brown grass. At LAX, the grass would be brown, too. Not just now, most of the year, it seemed. And the sky would be brown, too, with smog. It would be humid and muggy there, and he would not need his overcoat.
He wished Liv was with him, standing in this line, holding hands, watching her tote bag trundle down the conveyor belt through the X-ray machine. Joking about whether carryon shoulder was a permanent deformity. There wouldn’t be time to call her when he changed planes in New York, but he would call her as soon as he was on the ground in L.A. He would tell her he missed her and ask her right out if she missed him. Maybe she did. Maybe all they needed was to say that and everything would be all right.
He found his seat on the plane and strapped himself in. A few flakes drifted by outside the little window that always looked to him just like the one in the cat’s carrier cage. A flight attendant was smiling and welcoming people onto the plane. Pat released his belt buckle and stood up.
“Excuse me,” he said to the lift-tagged coed coming down the aisle. She smiled uncertainly and let him pass. He excused his way back to the flight attendant, who awaited him with raised eyebrows and helpful professional smile.
“I’m getting off,” he said.
The professional smile crumpled. “Oh,” she said. “Oh.”
He rummaged into the closet and retrieved his carryon.
“Is there something wrong?” the attendant asked anxiously.
“Yes,” he said. “But I’m going to fix it.”
She covered her mouth with one hand and took a step backward. “Oh,” she said. She couldn’t tell him she was glad he had flown Delta when he hadn’t. Professional training took over. She recovered her poise and called after him. “Have a nice day.”
Marguerite had her feet up, watching TV, when he came in.
He was surprised how much the look of astonishment on her face pleased him.
“Where’s Sarah?” he asked.
Marguerite gestured toward the stairway. “In her room, lying down.”
He went up the stairs two at a time.
There was no answer to his light knock on her door. She probably thought he was Marguerite, so she was playing possum. He tried the door and found it unlocked.
The curtains were drawn as if in a sick room. Sarah was curled up on her bed, a damp cloth folded over her eyes.
“Sarah,” he said.
She sat bolt upright, catching the cloth one-handed as it fell from her eyes. Her mouth fell open.
“Daddy!”
One hand around her waist, he set her to her feet.
“Come on,” he said, “we’re going to Nodd’s Ridge.”
“What?” she said.
“Come on,” he repeated. “I’m going to put this family back together.”
Moving so fast she had no time to react, he grabbed her hand and shoulder and hustled her downstairs.
Marguerite stood at the bottom of the stairs, her eyes bright and curious and a little frightened.
“We’re going to Nodd’s Ridge,” he said.
Marguerite clapped her hands. “About time,” she said.
He threw open the closet door, hooked out Sarah’s jacket and tossed it at her.
“Wait a minute,” Marguerite said. “You can’t go out like that.”
He and Sarah, the one thing on their minds interrupted, stopped and stared at her.
Marguerite flicked a hand impatiently in the direction of the door. “It’s snowing,” she said. “Dress for it. Snowsuits. Boots. Mittens. Cover your heads.”
“Right,” Pat said.
Dragging a pair of old wooden sleds behind them, Liv and Travis stomped a path to the studio. The Poor bounded along behind them, light enough to be able to walk on the surface of the snow.
Travis grabbed the leg of her ski pants.
“Look, Liv,” he commanded, and sank to his haunches, pointing out a new track in the snow.
They had seen the paw prints of squirrels and coons already. This new print was much larger, and familiar.
“Dog,” said Liv, touching it. “A big dog.” Maybe a coyote.
“I thought there was nobody here but us,” Travis said.
“Well, it could be somebody’s dog off their leash,” Liv said. “Or a stray or a runaway.”
“Oh,” said Travis.
That seemed to be enough for him. But Liv looked around as they straightened up, noting that the dog tracks, if that was what they were, seemed to skirt their house and head into the woods. That was fine by her. Any dog could be dangerous, unleashed, or stray, or gone wild. At least there was only one. Sometimes the wild dogs gathered into packs to hunt. And then there were the coyotes, which the farmers and hunters hated so much. Liv made a mental note to keep The Poor indoors more, and especially at night, to keep her out of harm’s way.
They went on toward the studio, Liv watching for any more signs of the large dog, but they found only more squirrel tracks and some bird prints that Liv thought might be one of the ground-dwelling game birds, pheasant or woodcock or whatever.
The studio was forlorn and cold. Liv turned on the heat and swept up the usual die-off of flies near the windows.
“Give it a day,” she told Travis, “and we can work out here.”
Travis climbed off the stool he had been sitting on. “Don’t forget the water, Liv.”
“Right,” she said. “The water.”
It had been shut off and the pipes
drained months ago by Walter.
Travis tried the faucets. “Dry,” he said.
“Yup,” Liv agreed. “I’ll have to call Walter to fix them. Maybe he’ll come out today and do it. Then we can still work tomorrow. And if he can’t come today, we’ll just carry a pail over from the house.”
“Now we can go sliding?” Travis asked.
“Ayuh,” Liv said. “Right now. Over the hill to Miss Alden’s house.”
They set off through the woods. First it was uphill, and then the land fell naturally toward the boundaries of Miss Alden’s property. Stopping to take a breather, Liv leaned against a tree trunk, and then slipped behind it.
“I’ve got you now,” she growled at Travis, and jumping out from behind the tree, fired her forefinger at him. “Ptu-ptu-ptu-ee. Die, Commie dog!”
Travis flopped onto the snow clutching his chest. “Aargh,” he screamed. He rolled over and fired back. “Ka-pow. Ka-pow.”
Liv flopped into the snow, too, rolled onto her back, and stared at the sky. Snowflakes fell onto her lashes and she blinked. She opened her mouth and let them fall on her tongue. She moved her arms and legs in arcs to make an angel.
Travis crept up next to her. “Good angel, Liv,” he said. “We playing commando or what?”
She laughed and sat up. “I’ll give you a head start, okay? Just don’t go too far.”
“Gotcha,” Travis said, and disappeared into the brush.
Liv gathered up the sleds’ dragropes and set off along the path, moving as quietly as she could, looking and listening for him. Once she saw a flash of boot heel under a bush, and several times heard a distinct giggle. She arrived at the orange-flagged pine that was one of the markers along the property line. There she looked around rather anxiously.
“Travis!” she shouted. “I give up. Show yourself.”
But there was only the soughing of the wind among the trees. The snow was falling steadily now. Liv shivered and stomped around the tree.
“Goddamn it, Travis,” she muttered. “This isn’t funny.”