by Anne Lamott
“Leon?” he said, stroking his fur. “You okay?”
Rosie ran to James, who looked up at her in terror.
“You gotta be more careful,” he said slowly.
She squatted beside him and they both started crying, but bravely. She stroked Leon’s head, with fingernails painted pink by Rae, then turned to James. “You think he’s dead?”
James nodded, scratching behind Leon’s ear.
Elizabeth’s mouth was agape. Rae stood beside her.
“Rae? Am I dreaming?”
Rae shook her head.
“Are you positive?”
Rae nodded.
Elizabeth stared like a ravenous zombie at the man whose dog it was, at the girl whose life it might have been, at the dead dog. It was a dream, it had to be.
“Maybe we should take him to the vet,” said Rosie.
James shook his head.
“How come?”
“Because he’s definitely dead.” He wiped at his eyes. Rosie wiped at hers. He watched her.
“God,” he said, and closed his eyes for a minute. “We got off easy.”
Rae and James carried Leon to the back yard to bury him. Elizabeth and Rosie trudged slowly behind, Elizabeth more badly shaken than ever before, too shaken even to scream at Rosie about running into traffic. Either this was a dream, or it had been a dream yesterday when she’d run over the dog.
They buried Leon in a corner of the garden, beside a bush of American beauties, each person taking a turn with the shovel. James and Elizabeth lowered Leon into the hole, while Rosie stood holding the shovel like the farmer in “American Gothic,” and Rae dabbed at her red nose with a Kleenex.
“Okay. Let’s cover him up.”
“Wait,” said Rosie, handing him the shovel, and dashed off to the front of the house. The grown-ups stood looking into the hole.
“I wonder what she’s up to,” said Elizabeth.
James looked wistfully at his dog and exhaled in that rare way of his, the faraway tropical wind from deep inside.
James thought it was his fault. He’d left that gate open.
Elizabeth thought it was her fault. She had killed a dog the day before and kept on going.
Rae felt guilty too, out of habit; it was as much second nature by now as her generosity.
And Rosie knew that it was her fault.
“I wonder where your daughter is,” said James.
James made a bull horn of his hands. “I owe You one,” he called to the sky.
Rosie walked purposefully toward them, with what turned out to be a balsa-wood tombstone, on which she had written, in black magic marker, Here Lies Leon. R.I.P.
“Good thinking,” said James. “Thanks.”
She jammed the bottom into the dirt at the end of the grave, where Leon’s head was, and patted dirt firmly against it as if potting a sprig cutting. Dirt got underneath her pink nails and on her face when she stopped to push blue-black curls off her furrowed forehead. When she got it just right, she stood, put her hands in the pockets of the red bermuda shorts, and nodded. James threw a shovel of dirt on top of Leon. Rosie watched the body disappear, spellbound.
Elizabeth turned and walked several steps away, trying to collect her thoughts. She licked the corners of her mouth. Looking up she saw, in a windowpane, clear reflections of her family, graveside, framed in black, beside a bush of American beauties; and the image almost undid her.
Hang on, old girl. The worst must be over.
James left for the beach on foot after his dog was buried. Rosie and Rae and Elizabeth went into the kitchen. While Elizabeth made coffee and cocoa, Rosie and Rae sat at the table. Rosie whispered something to Rae, who nodded.
“Mama? We’ve got something to tell you.”
“Well, go ahead.”
“I think you better sit down,” said Rae.
“No, go ahead.”
“I’m serious. You really better sit down.”
Elizabeth came over from the stove and sat down. “Okay. Now tell me.”
Rosie and Rae looked at each other.
“Elizabeth, it’s a horrible thing to have to hit you with, after what just happened, but it really can’t wait.”
“Okay. I can take it.”
“There’s no way to prepare you for this. But a couple of weeks ago, Mr. Thackery exposed himself to Rosie. In his study. He rubbed his prick on her arm.”
Elizabeth’s face, arrested and expectant, slowly dilated. She straightened her head, and an invisible hand on her chest seemed to push her backward in her chair, and her face contracted and she gripped the table, digging her nails into the wood.
“What?”
Rae and Rosie nodded.
She looked at Rosie, tilted her head, half squinted.
Rosie nodded.
“That goddamn son of a bitch! That fucking scumbag! Rosie! Jesus! How come you didn’t tell me? Goddamn.” Elizabeth scratched her head, gripped a mass of hair tightly, looked at the table, and then up at Rosie.
“I swore to God I wouldn’t. To Sharon.”
“He apparently shows it to Sharon routinely. He told Rosie that all fathers do it.”
“He said Sharon likes to touch it, but I’m positive she doesn’t.”
“Tell me exactly what happened.”
Rosie told her every detail she could remember.
“That bastard.”
“And he said I’d be in trouble if I told anyone. But then Sharon came home and she could tell what had happened.”
“Poor Sharon, goddammit. The sweetest person in the world. Poor you, baby, what a shitty thing for a man to do.” She looked at Rae. “Well, I guess the thing to do is call the cops.”
“No, not yet. Rosie and I called the Child Protection Agency. They said the cops don’t have to be notified yet.”
“Listen, any man that shows his cock to my daughter—”
“Wait, wait. Think about it. Do you want Rosie on the witness stand?”
“No. Of course not.”
“The social worker said we should tell Mrs. Thackery—we didn’t use names—and insist that she confront her husband and insist that he seek psychiatric help. There’s a program available for child abusers: family counseling, rehabilatative treatment for him, therapy for Sharon and Sybil.”
“Am I dreaming this?”
“That’s what I thought when it was happening,” said Rosie.
“I wonder if Sybil knows?”
“The social worker said it’s likely; or it may be that she knew only subconsciously and turned a blind eye to it.”
“God! To stand by while your husband molests your child.”
“The man at the agency said that more than four out of every ten girls are sexually abused by a male member of the family by the time the girls are eighteen. And that’s a conservative estimate.”
“It should be grounds for capital punishment.”
“Yeah, but. It’s a deep sickness. The man said Mr. Thackery will be relieved that it’s finally out, that it’s over.”
“What if he doesn’t agree to therapy?”
“Then we call the cops. And we tell the Thackerys that we’re going to call the cops if they don’t go get help.”
Elizabeth tapped a fingernail against her beer glass and gave Rosie a long sideways look.
“You okay, baby?” Rosie nodded. “Jesus. What a secret. When did you tell Rae?”
“Last night.”
“I’m glad you told her, sweetheart. You did the right thing. Come here.”
Rosie got up and went to her mother, who pulled Rosie into her lap.
“What do you think we ought to do, Rosie?”
“What Rae said.”
“Tell Mrs. Thackery?” Rosie nodded. “Okay.”
“Today?”
“Yeah.”
Rosie inhaled loudly. “Okay. He’s gone on business, anyhow.”
“Good. I’m so sorry this happened to you.”
“Yeah. But think about Sharon.�
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“Yeah. Your telling us was a huge favor to her. It’s going to radically, for the better, change her life. But things might be weird between you in the beginning—because she’s going to have a lot of guilt for and about her dad; she’ll feel all this twisted-up loyalty, and also that she was doing a sick thing all these years. But she needs, A: protection from him, and B: counseling. And he desperately needs help. He’s a sick, sick man.”
Elizabeth nuzzled the top of Rosie’s head, and Rae watched them together. Their eyes were downcast, blue and hazel, dark lashes and brows, arched swanlike necks; they were one black-haired unit.
“It never rains, does it, Rae.”
“No.”
“You don’t think he’ll hurt Sharon or his wife, do you?”
“No,” said Rosie. “He’s mostly really nice.”
“And we’re all positive that this isn’t a dream?”
“No, Mama.”
“Okay, then. I guess. I should get up. And call.”
“Are you going to tell her over the phone?”
“No. I’m just going to tell her I’m coming over to talk.”
“I’ll go with you, Mama.”
“I think I should go alone.”
“No, Mama. I should go with you.”
“Okay. But I want to be alone with Sybil.” She dialed, and Rosie came to stand miserably at her side, like her pet hunch-backed midget, burrowed against Elizabeth, staring at the floor. Now she wasn’t positive it had really happened at all. Maybe it had been a dream. She bit a dirty pink fingernail, as if testing the authenticity of a gold coin. It hurt.
“No one’s home.”
Phew.
“Do you have any idea what their plans are today?”
“No.”
“Well, let’s wait around here for a while and try again.”
“You’re going to go crazy waiting around here. Why don’t you two walk over and wait for them? You could tape a note to the door, for Sybil to call you.”
Elizabeth looked at Rosie. “You want to do that? Leave a note?” Rosie shrugged.
“Okay.”
Elizabeth left a note to James on his typewriter, took a sheet of paper, a pen, and some Scotch tape from his desk, put them in the pocket of her jacket.
“Ready?” she asked Rosie.
Rosie shrugged again. “Yeah.”
“Call me as soon as you get home,” said Rae.
“Yeah, I will. Wish us well.”
Mrs. Thackery’s car was not parked in front of the house when the Fergusons arrived, but on the off chance that it was in the shop, they walked up to the front door.
Rosie pushed the doorbell and stood furiously wiping the soles of her sneakers on the sisal welcome mat. Elizabeth reached down and rubbed the warm downy base of her daughter’s neck. They took simultaneous deep breaths and stood waiting, turned to look at each other and then back at the closed door. Rosie knocked, but no one came.
They sat down to wait in two wrought-iron cafe chairs at a wrought-iron table in the garden, underneath a beige umbrella. Elizabeth savored the smell of wet, bright-green grass, studied the fruit trees in the garden, heavy with lemons, pears, figs, and apples. Sunlight made everything golden.
Rosie kicked off her shoes and went off to climb in a tree. After a minute, Elizabeth looked over at one of the world’s oldest banyan trees, expecting to find Rosie in its low, thick branches, but found her, instead, three quarters of the way up the trunk of an aged pepper tree, shinnying up the dark gnarled bark like a baby gorilla. Elizabeth gasped involuntarily.
“Be careful, sweetheart—there aren’t many branches.” Get the hell down off of that tree, you’re going to fall and break your neck. She heard her mother’s fearful voice, marveled again that anyone lived to adulthood. “Honest, baby. I can’t take much more today. Come and sit here with me.”
Half an hour later, Mrs. Thackery’s station wagon appeared at the curb. The Fergusons looked at each other and stood.
The two women, virtual strangers until now, sat side by side at the kitchen table. Elizabeth had the sense that Sybil knew why she had come, just as Sharon had: the initial defiance on their faces, and fear fluttering just below the surface.
Elizabeth took a deep breath and put her elbows on the table, interweaving her fingers as in prayer, took a sudden breath and raised her brows, as if about to jump into a frigid lake, and turned to Sybil.
“I’m sick about this. It must be the hardest thing you’ll ever have to hear.” Black button eyes, frightened and helpless like a child’s. “But: several weeks ago your husband exposed himself to Rosie. In his study.”
“She knows she’s not to come into the house when I’m not here.”
“Well, Sybil, that’s not the point. The point is-that your husband exposed himself to my child and routinely makes Sharon touch his genitals.” Elizabeth shook her head.
“My husband is a very fine man,” said Sybil, beginning to cry.
“Maybe in some ways. But he’s sick. He’s hurting your daughter. Sharon needs to be protected from her father’s abuse.”
“I’ve tried to protect her. I’d die for her.”
“Of course you have, of course you would.” Sybil looked urgently, beseechingly, at her. “But it isn’t enough. He’s done—and will continue to do—ugly, sick things to your child, to our Sharon. And now he’s done it to Rosie, and I’m not going to sit by and let it happen again—to either of them.”
Sybil held her belly, as if she had cramps, and wept.
Elizabeth reached out and massaged her shoulders. “It’s a nasty business, but it’s not the end of the world. I’ve already called the Child Protection Agency. He’s got to turn himself in to them.”
“What if he refuses?”
“Then I’m going to notify them, and a social worker will confront him, and if he still refuses and denies it, the police will be brought in.”
“He’s not a criminal!”
“Yes, as a matter of fact, he is.”
“He’d never hurt her.”
“Sybil! How can you say that? He is hurting her! He’s a huge, male grown-up who takes sexual advantage of his own child!”
Sybil nodded her head, and tears streamed into the lap of her dress. Elizabeth got up and found a box of Kleenex.
“There’s a chance he’s going to be transferred. We may be moving.”
“It doesn’t change things.”
“Palo Alto. He’s been promoted.”
“Well, Sybil. What you’ve got to do is, get in touch with the Child Protection Agency here, get your husband involved in therapy, and then, when you move, continue treatment in Palo Alto. Because if you don’t call them, I will. And if he refuses treatment, the police will be called. I don’t want to see the girls on the witness stand.”
“I don’t either.”
Sybil stopped crying.
“I tried to leave him once,” she said. “Before we moved to Bayview. He said he’d kill himself. I thought that—he had stopped doing it.” Elizabeth listened quietly.
“That’s why Sharon needs you to step in,” she said.
Sybil dabbed at her nose. “Don’t tell Rosie yet—that we may be moving. Sharon doesn’t know.”
“Okay.”
“It was good of you to—look after Sharon like this.”
“Well, I love her, you know. She’s one of the kindest, most gentle people I’ve ever known. You’ve done a beautiful job raising her. Sybil, do it as soon as you can. Everything is going to be all right. Starting now. Painful and hard but all right.”
Rosie and Sharon were sitting outside on the bottom step of the house, hunched over, with their heads jammed between their knees, drawing in the dirt with sticks. Neither of them looked up. “Sharon?”
Sharon looked up, with her mother’s black button eyes. Elizabeth sat down beside her. “I know your dad’s a wonderful man, but he needs help. And so we’re going to make sure he gets it. Okay? That’s a girl.”
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nbsp; “They won’t arrest him, will they?”
“No. Not if he agrees to get help.”
“You know what Sharon said? She said, ‘Why’d you have to go and open your big mouth?’”
“What did you say?”
“I said, Because what he was doing was wrong.”
“Good girl.”
They were on the way home, holding hands on the sidewalk.
“God,” said Rosie mournfully. “You’re a great mother.”
CHAPTER 21
James, the crafty ambassador, approached Elizabeth in the kitchen several days later, at the stove, where she stood navigating a garlic sausage flotilla through boiling water with a wooden fork, listening to the radio.
“I don’t know,” he said, pressing his face between her shoulder blades. “I for one am just getting very sick of drinking.”
“Yeah?”
“I’m ready to quit.” He stepped away, and she turned to look at him.
“But you don’t even drink that much.”
“I don’t drink as much as you—but I drink too much. I think my work would be better.”
Elizabeth turned back toward the stove.
“Why don’t we just—you know— quit?”
“Right now?”
“Why not?”
“I’ve already had several glasses of wine.”
“If you quit right now, you won’t have a hangover tomorrow.”
“There’s no point tonight, James. Really. I mean, maybe tomorrow.”
“I don’t understand.”
“Well, James, it’s like when you’re going to start what may be a long-term diet: you decide you’re going to start tomorrow, you swear to yourself, and you spend the entire day gorging, because you’ll be going without for so long. It’s a tradition.”
James sat down at the table, mulling this over. “Okay,” he said. “Tomorrow, then.”
Elizabeth stared down into the pot with unfocused eyes. After a minute, she shrugged her shoulders. “Okay.”
“Great! Good!”
Elizabeth nodded, turned to him, and grinned. “Okay, yes, tomorrow.” She raised her glass and toasted: “Tomorrow.” Then she sat down beside him. “It’ll be great to quit.”