by Reiss, CD
Could I get in the car before someone passed close enough to see my sticky, bloody clothes? I looked from Mom to Dad as they killed each other with their stare.
“I need satisfaction,” Mom growled.
“Get it somewhere else,” he said before he looked at me. “Princess, we have a deal. I won’t hurt him.”
“You won’t get him fired from the club?”
“Oh, for the love of…” Mom threw her hands up. “Now I can’t go to the club?”
“I won’t go anymore,” I said. “I don’t like tennis anyway. I just won’t see him. Ever. Never again. Just… no charges. No lawyers. Promise.”
Dad answered before Mom could object. “That’s a fair deal.”
Mom covered her face with her hands. While she was blinded by her humiliation and frustration, I caught my father’s eye.
“Thank you,” I mouthed silently.
He pointed at the car.
I got in.
Chapter 16
CATHERINE - present
It was down to me. My decision. Stay? Go?
Chris’s letter had woken me from a deep sleep, and my letter back had stunned me into a fugue. My decisions were my own from now on.
Stay or go?
Not for him. Not to wait, or to pretend to myself I wasn’t waiting.
Just what did I need? What did the people I loved need?
Which master did I serve?
A half dozen little elves came to the house, armed with brooms and buckets. I knew them as Juanita, Mrs. Boden, Pat, Sally and Trudy Crenshaw, and Dina Marcus. I was shooed out of my kitchen and left to go around the outside of the house so I wouldn’t step on wet floors. I wasn’t allowed down the hall where the suite was because another half dozen elves were fixing it. Harper was holed up in her room on the third floor. Taylor dragged his dirty, dusty self up there with plates of sandwiches and came right down after dropping them off.
“Is she eating?” I asked.
“Shoo,” he said, then kissed my cheek before trotting down the hall to the dusty suite.
The house was packed with people who loved me, but none of them knew what I was going through.
I still didn’t know if I was staying or going.
Counting the days, I waited until I could be reasonably sure Chris had gotten the letter. Then I did nothing. He’d gotten it by Wednesday, for sure. Done is done. I had nothing else to say to him. That part of my life was over now. It ended not with a bang or a light, but with an exhale.
Wednesday, the evening before my birthday, I was in my old room, the one that faced the front of the house. Everything was quiet and dark. This was about the time I’d let the sadness creep in and I’d cry myself to sleep. I hadn’t cried in a week, but I’d slept well.
I didn’t know how to feel about anything.
On Thursday, voices from across the house and clopping footsteps along the hall told me people had arrived to work on the suite. I knew how I felt about that at least. Whether I stayed or went, I was glad to see the room taken care of.
I crossed my bedroom naked after my shower. My closet was open because I’d been looking for things to wear to my party later. A full-length mirror hung inside the door and I caught a glimpse of myself.
Most of my friends from school were in town. At nearly thirty, their bodies had been through childbirth at an early age, recovered, and done it again. My body had barely been touched.
My hands slid along my curves. My breasts, belly, hips, round and tight with disuse. All this skin was meant to be touched. It was designed to feel, to receive, to sense and interpret. My breasts were meant for children and the touch of a lover. They remained high and tight from neglect. Hardening under my fingertips, they were ready, and I was too.
I sat on the bed in front of the mirror.
This was me.
I spread my legs.
Still me. The little pink split had a function. I slid my finger there and felt the wetness that reminded me that it was ready. It worked. It could do what it was built for.
Moving my fingers along the liquid folds of skin, I quietly brought myself to orgasm without thinking of Chris until it was over.
“I’m sorry,” I whispered into the sheets.
I didn’t apologize to the Chris of today or even five years before, but to the sixteen-year-old boy who’d loved me. I’d let him go. I hadn’t chased him. Hadn’t fought for him. Hadn’t looked for him or asked his mother what happened to him. And now I was releasing him with regret. But I was releasing him.
I washed my hands and dressed.
When I opened the door, I gasped. Reggie was in the hall with his fist up as if he was about to knock.
“Oh, sorry!” he said. “I was just—”
“It’s fine.”
“I wanted to tell you something.” The paint splatter on his overalls was multicolored from years of spills and hard work.
“Okay.”
Behind Reggie, Taylor carried a can of paint in each hand.
“Don’t look,” Taylor said to me before tapping Reggie in the behind with a can. “Come on, lazy ass. Let’s get this done.”
“I’m coming, Cali-boy.” Reggie turned back to me. “Private.”
I didn’t have a place for him to sit in my room, so we went to the front porch. I sat on the swing, and he leaned on the railing. The hardware store delivery truck was just pulling away.
“What’s all that?” I pointed at a stack of four moldy boxes in the corner of the porch.
“Found ‘em in the crawlspace over the ceiling. You should check inside. See if there’s anything you want.”
I couldn’t imagine anything of real or personal value in those collapsed, water-damaged, mold-covered boxes. They probably had mushrooms growing in them. I wrinkled my nose and sat back on the porch swing.
Reggie looked at the floorboards, rocking a little as if he was telling himself to get on with it. I folded my hands in my lap and waited.
“You know, I been looking at that ceiling for two days now. I musta been outta my mind.”
“Why?”
“Painting roses on a tin ceiling? God, Catherine, nobody does that. You can paint it a flat color… but flowers? I bet that’s the only tin ceiling mural in the United States.”
“You should be famous.”
“Hell, yeah. I’ve been telling myself that a long time now.” He ran his fingers through his hair. “You know I… ah… well I remember when your father asked for it. You were sixteen and I was engaged to Carla the cheating bitch. But you, girl? You broke my heart. Like…” He squeezed his fingertips to his chest and exploded them like a starfish.
“It was a rough time.”
After Chris left, my parents started the process of splitting up while living in the same house. Everyone knew it. There weren’t many secrets in Barrington.
“You sure could peel the paint off with your crying.” Reggie shook his head slowly with a smile. “Shit, I thought them flowers wouldn’t survive with all your wailing.”
I laughed to myself.
Seeing I wasn’t hurt, he continued. “I thought to ask you to a job site, you know, save us some work with the scrapers.” He laughed with me. “Thought we could even go international with it.”
“Oh, Reggie, do you remember when I asked you to hide flying monkeys in it?”
“I thought you’d gone crazy. But your dad said to just do it.”
“I loved them. I put the bed right under them so I could see them when I went to sleep.”
“I’m glad. I’m really glad you got comfort from it. And I’m sorry you had to wait so long to get that room fixed up.”
“I’m sorry I never asked.”
“Thing is…” He looked away, then at me. “It was always something. You were real young. Then I got married.” He ran through the list more quickly. “Then the factory closed and I was out of work. Then I got divorced. Then your father died. Then your mother left and you spent the next seven years taking care of
everyone in this place like it’s your job. It’s the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen. I never got to tell you how I felt about you, and now Chris fucking Carmichael is coming back and I got a sliver of a window to tell you.”
“You don’t have to,” I said. Chris wasn’t coming, which put the burden on me to refuse Reggie. He was a good man, but I couldn’t lead him on. I didn’t feel for him what I’d felt for Chris, and I wanted nothing less.
“I want to. I have to.”
“Reggie, don’t.”
“I love you. I’ve always loved you and I don’t care if you know it. I don’t care if Chris comes back on a white horse and sweeps you off your feet or whatever. I’ll be okay with that. But if he doesn’t, I want you to know that you and me? We can talk if you want.” He took a deep breath as if he’d needed to get that off his chest.
He and I didn’t have anything to talk about. At least, not what he wanted to talk about. If he wanted to talk about how to get over waiting for someone who was never coming, maybe we’d have something to say to each other.
“Okay,” I said, not ready to tell him there would be no Chris. No knight riding in on a white stallion. No fairy tale ending. That was my problem. Not his.
“Okay.” He snapped his fingers as punctuation. “Now that we got that out of the way, I better go make sure they don’t try to paint over my ceiling.”
“Thank you. For everything.”
“I ain’t even done yet.” He tapped the doorjamb twice and went inside.
Chapter 17
catherine - sixteenTH SUMMER
I showered and then stayed in my room. I crouched on the floor with my knees to my chin and cried as they fought downstairs. Their voices came up the walls and into my room. I couldn’t hear most of it. Phrases and words. The sun set and the room went dark. My throat was dry and my eyes throbbed.
Harper knocked and peeked around the door, letting in a shaft of light. “Hi.” She stepped all the way in. “I came to say good night.”
“Good night.”
“What are they fighting about?”
“Me.”
She sat on the bed, folding her nightgown between her knees. “Did you do something?”
“Yeah.”
“What?”
“I can’t say.”
“Okay.” She extended the last bit of the word as a launching pad into a run-on sentence. “Because I know you know everything, but it really sounds like they’re mad at each other when she’s calling him things I can’t repeat and he’s like—‘well, after what you did, you have no business blah blah’ and she’s like ‘your forgiveness is worse than revenge,’ so there’s that.”
I put my head against the wall. “I don’t know what they’re mad about anymore.”
“Yeah. Well. Do you want me to stay in here with you? Keep you company?”
I did. I wanted my sister’s warm body kicking me all night. It would be worth it to prove I wasn’t too filthy to love. But Mom didn’t like when we curled up together, and it wasn’t a good night to displease her.
“I think you’d better not. I’ll be okay.”
She kissed my cheek. “I love you.”
“I love you too. Close the door on the way out, okay?”
She left me in the dark. Exactly where I wanted to be. On the floor, in the dark. When I got tired, I laid my cheek on my knees. I could have gotten into bed, but I didn’t feel worthy of a comfortable pillow and clean sheets.
A cracking noise woke me.
I was on the floor under the window. The arguing downstairs was gone, replaced by crickets and the gurgling of the river. My neck hurt.
Pock. The sound came again.
It was the wall outside. I got up to my knees and looked out.
Pock.
A swoosh of yellow curved across my vision. I followed it down to the boy who caught it.
“Chris!” I didn’t shout. I barely whispered, but his name echoed through me. I opened the window.
“You’re there!” he said.
“What are you doing here?”
“I need to talk to you.”
I couldn’t see him well. I couldn’t tell if he’d been roughed up or if he was upset. “Are you all right?”
Before he answered, I heard a noise in the hall. The squeak of a floorboard. Then another. I put the window down and jumped into bed, forcing myself to breathe slowly even though my heart was pounding and my lungs demanded more air, faster.
Someone came into the room and closed the door. The moonlight behind my eyes went dark as whomever it was blocked the window. Were they facing me? Or Chris?
I opened one eye.
Daddy stood over me.
“You’re awake,” he said, sitting on the edge of the bed. The mattress tilted from his weight. “How are you doing?”
“I’m okay.” I rolled onto my back and pushed myself up, making an effort to not look at the window. “I’m really sorry about it. Today.”
“Are you?” He smelled freshly showered. His hair was slicked back and his fingernails hadn’t seen a day’s work.
“I wasn’t trying to embarrass you guys.”
He sighed. “Look. Catherine. I want to ask you something, and I want you to be completely honest with me.”
“Okay.”
“Did you consent?”
I swallowed. If I said yes, I was a slut. If I said no, a rapist was waiting under my window. “I did.”
He didn’t seem shocked or scandalized. Didn’t even seem bothered. “Did he hurt you in any way?”
His manner comforted me. Daddy was the kind of guy people liked just because they did, and I was no different than they were. I wanted to be honest. I wanted to please him. Mostly, I wanted to give him the answer that would get him to leave before Chris got impatient and threw things at the window again.
“I think just the normal hurt for the first time.”
“Are you sure?”
“Pretty sure. It’s not like I have a lot of experience. Or him either.”
“It was his first time?”
“Yes.”
Daddy tapped his fingertips together, elbows on his knees, looking between his feet. “I promised you I wouldn’t hurt him.”
I swallowed a lump of fear, going rigid with it rather than leap in front of the window to shield Chris. “You did.”
“I’m glad I don’t have to break that promise.”
The fear went away and was replaced by curiosity.
Daddy turned on the bed until he faced me all the way. “I would have broken it if he’d forced you. I would have poisoned every part of his life. But how can I? You’re old enough. You’re the same age. You both agreed. The only misery here is the misery we’re causing you.”
I must have looked as if I saw Santa coming down the chimney, because that was how I felt. If he was admitting we hadn’t done anything wrong, then he had to let Chris be my boyfriend.
“And,” he continued, putting his hand on my arm as if to steady himself, “and we’re going to continue to make you miserable, but in a different way.”
“What kind of way?”
“The way parents do. We know what’s best for you.”
My heart sank. That last sentence was never spoken before good news.
“Your mother has a point. That boy is not right for you. He’ll bring you nothing but heartache.”
“Dad—”
“Wait. Listen to me. I want things to go smoothly for you in life. We’ve made sure you have an easy time of it. There are a thousand ways you can screw it up and we’re here to point them out. Keep you from doing them. This is one of those ways. I’ve seen enough of the world to know that it’s hard when you don’t stick to your own kind.”
“He is our kind.”
He shook his head. “No, I’m sorry to say he’s not.”
“Daddy, please.”
“Here’s what your mother and I agreed to. We’ve spoken to his mother, and she’s on board as well. You stay awa
y from each other and everything’s going to be all right. But if you don’t, you’ll spend your senior year at St. Thomas School.”
“Where is that?”
“In Austin.”
“What? That’s forever away!”
“And I can’t speak for whether or not he’ll be able to continue to work at the club if you two are caught together again.”
“You’ll get him fired?”
“I’m sure it won’t come to that.” He stood. “I know you hate this. If you knew what your mother wanted to do, you’d be thanking me. Maybe someday you will.”
I didn’t answer. Didn’t even look at him. I just stared at the triangles my bent knees made under the covers. When I was little and Daddy had his knees bent like that, I’d slide down them. I couldn’t believe there had ever been a moment in my life when I wasn’t this mad at him.
He stood there a long time. “Your mother and I are going to switch the rooms around.”
I looked up at him, then at the window. Did he know Chris was downstairs? Had I already ruined everything? I needed to see him. Make sure he was all right.
“Since I work late,” he continued, “we’re taking separate rooms. Maybe you’d like the big suite? It has its own bathroom. I think at your age it’s appropriate.”
“Sure.”
He leaned down and kissed my forehead. I crossed my arms so he didn’t think I wasn’t mad.
“You’ll feel better about it in no time. And you can paint the suite any color you want.”
“Thanks.”
“I love you, Princess.”
“I love you too, Daddy.”
My arms were still crossed when he closed the door behind him. After the click, I leapt out of bed and opened the window.
Chris came out of the bushes.
I was about to call down to him. Tell him everything down the height of the house and the space across the front yard, but as he stepped forward, he was drowned in yellow light.
The porch lights. Someone had turned them on.
If he was seen there, it was all over.
He didn’t need to be told. He jumped behind the bushes, and a second later, my father stepped out from under the porch roof, walking toward where Chris hid. I held my breath. I could see his hiding space clearly from the second floor, but had no idea what Daddy could see, or if he’d known all along that Chris was down there.