I’m a slow learner, but I’m like that dopey blue fish in the movie. Just keep swimming. Keep ‘er moving.
Tonight, when Forty came so close, the porchlight shining on his face, his entire body stiff and indestructible and hostile, I was scared for a second. Then I saw his eyes.
He’s got secret-decoder brown eyes. Always has. Everything shows if you know the code. Lust. Anger. Hurt. I have no idea if I put the bad shit there. Probably not. He’s been places since high school. He got injured overseas, so badly he got a medical discharge. How much damage could I have done him at seventeen years old?
Still, seeing that hurt made me feel like garbage. I feel that way a lot, and usually, I indulge it a second, and I shake it off.
But you know? I’m kind of sick of always waiting for that “I’m crap” feeling to come back. How do you get rid of it, though, if age and wisdom and distance don’t help?
Ugh. I can’t sit still on a couch anymore.
I hop to my feet. “I’m gonna see what’s in the fridge. You want anything?”
“I’m good.” Lou’s already lost in his show again. For how complicated his life can get, he’s a simple guy. All he wants is a cold beer, dumb TV, and someone else to clean the house. That’s my job in exchange for crashing here rent-free.
I head for the kitchen, but in the hall, the stairs catch my eye. I don’t go up there except to clean.
I need to keep moving. Put a load in the dishwasher. Take out the trash. Shove the garbage feeling deep, deep down, distract myself with something shiny.
I pause with my hand on the bannister knob. My palm’s sweaty.
There are a hundred things I could be doing. Places I could be. But here I am, back here in Petty’s Mill. In this house. At the bottom of these stairs.
I made the choices, took the exit off the interstate to come here. I could have run anywhere. But I drove myself here.
My stomach turns, and a sour sweat breaks out behind my knees and under my boobs. I should go back to Lou, watch TV, get blitzed on cheap domestics.
Shit, no, I should get in my car and keep going, head south and see how far I can go before I run out of gas money. I could get to the Carolinas, Florida maybe. Spring comes earlier there. I could sleep in my car until I find a job.
I might have this far, but I don’t have to walk up these stairs. But I do. I traipse down the hall to the bedroom at the end. My bare feet pad soundlessly from tread-to-tread, slow step-by-step along the carpet.
I can keep carrying the past, widening my arms as it gains weight year after year, keep moving fast enough that the load never becomes quite unbearable.
Or I could open this door.
While my brain’s been churning, I passed Lou’s room and the master suite, and I arrived at my old room at the end of the hall. My heart is thudding against my ribs.
I haven’t gone in this room since I’ve been home.
If Lou noticed, he didn’t say anything. There’s a lot we don’t put into words with each other. A lot we leave in the dark. Denial ain’t just a river in Egypt; it’s a way of life with the Ellis family.
I stand outside the flimsy door without a lock, cracking my knuckles, finger by finger. I pick at the remnants of a sticker at eye level. The torso of a unicorn and half a sparkly rainbow.
I’m not good at standing in one place, so I twist the knob, and ease the door open.
A whiff of stale vanilla hits me first, and my stomach churns. That was my signature scent back in the day. I had the body wash, the lotion, the essential oil.
I flick the switch, but nothing happens. The overhead bulb’s burned out. I can see by the hall light, though, that nothing much has been touched. I cross to the nightstand and turn on the lamp.
Nausea washes through me. I brace myself against a sudden weakness in my legs and a seizing in my chest.
Yeah. Nothing’s changed.
Half-empty perfume bottles, an earring tree, and a basket of hair styling supplies are crowded on my dresser. A drawer is open, the arm of a sweater hanging over the side. My collection of solar-powered dancing figurines is still lined up along the windowsills. Hula girls. Flowers. They’re motionless in the dark. Someone made my bed.
They made my bed, but they didn’t shut that drawer.
Another wave of queasiness turns my legs to jelly, and I sink to the floor, cross-legged. The carpet’s pristine. When I left, I didn’t bother to straighten up, let alone vacuum. I threw what I could into the bags I could find, and I ran.
Someone picked up my dirty clothes and books and the random crap I left on the floor. Then, they vacuumed and left everything else the way it was.
A biology textbook and Beowulf are stacked on my desk. Guess I owe Petty’s Mill High School a fine. There’s a coffee mug. A tin can filled with Sharpie markers. But no desk chair.
I broke the chair over my stepfather’s back the last time he snuck into my bedroom in the middle of the night. Lou was sleeping over at a friend’s house. My mom had polished off a bottle of Merlot and passed out on the sofa.
It was a Saturday night, and I was at home. Forty was gone. He’d dumped me, and I was persona non grata at the Steel Bones clubhouse. The few girlfriends I had outside of the club were busy, probably bored with me crying over my own stupid mistakes.
I knew he’d come. He was an opportunist.
I’d kept my clothes on, and I’d piled a whole bunch of shit in front of my door. Not the dresser or desk. Nothing that could wake my mother. ‘Cause the absolute worst thing would be if someone saw, right?
But I heaped up enough so that there’d be an obstacle. Advance warning if I happened to fall asleep.
A full laundry basket. The trash can. A pile of shoes.
After I left for Pyle, someone tucked the trash can back under the desk. Someone emptied the laundry basket. I took the shoes with me when I left.
He’d muscled right through my sad little blockade. He said he wanted to talk. He was worried about me.
Here’s the thing that people don’t understand. Hell, it’s the thing that I didn’t understand until I was twenty-five or twenty-six. When these things happen, you have a choice.
People who don’t understand say I’d never let that happen to me! I’d fight. I’d tell someone. I’d scream. I’d kick him in the balls!
But the choice isn’t between telling and not telling. Fighting or not fighting. It’s between making it real or keeping it a bad dream.
If I made it real, I’d lose another father. Like when I was six, and my real dad disappeared, and I had nightmares for months about being chased by a monster while all the people around me turned to wax statues. My mom would be broken again like she was before she met Ed Ellis. She’d hide in bed all day, chain smoke, and she wouldn’t take her blood pressure meds or go to the grocery store.
If I made it real, Lou would lose his father, too. Just like me.
And I was tough. I handled it when my dad left. I kept Mom alive. Hid the bottles. Flushed pills. But Lou’s not me; he doesn’t have my dumb resilience. If I told, what would happen to Lou, my brave brother fighting so hard to be okay with himself and the world? If I told, would Lou love me anymore?
And I would never tell Forty. Not if you tortured me. He’d look at me different. He’d be disgusted. He’d want to love me, but he wouldn’t be able to anymore.