Breathing Water (28 page)
When I got to the front yard I saw Alice sitting, rocking on the front step. The hem of her nightgown and her feet were covered with mud. Her eyes were wide and startled, her hair tangled.
“Daddy,” the voice said.
My shoulders ached.
“Daddy's killing Mommy.”
And then I was carrying Alice, her small body curled against mine, pressed against mine. Devin came running outside after me.
“What's happening?”
“We need to go to Maggie,” I cried.
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Alice lay curled in the backseat of the car as Devin and I went into Maggie's house. Inside, it was quiet and still. Nothing looked any different than it had earlier today. Nothing was out of place. There was a half-full glass of lemonade on her kitchen table, a pizza box on the counter. In the living room, the TV was on with the sound turned down. Blue light fluttered on the walls like moths.
In the bathroom, Maggie was lying on the floor, her arms draped across the rim of the toilet. Blood was pouring from cuts above her eyes and her mouth. Vomit stained her blouse. Devin picked her up and cradled her in his arms like a child.
“Alice?” she asked, her voice gurgling with too much liquid inside.
“She's with us. He didn't get her,” I whispered into the red tangles of her hair.
This is not happening not happening not happening,
I thought as we walked through her still house and out onto the porch into this still night.
This is not happening again,
I thought.
I thought as we walked through her still house and out onto the porch into this still night.
This is not happening again,
I thought.
And later in the bright artificial light of the emergency room, with Alice's head on my lap and Devin's arm across my shoulders I wanted to scream. I wanted to make the sounds that Alice made that woke me from my dream. I wanted to shatter the air with my voice. I wanted to pierce the strange stillness and white of this night. I wanted to find Bugs and kill him with my bare hands, break his eardrums with a song I have never dared to sing.
Maggie's bones were broken. The bones that held her face together (her smile suspended, her eyes wide) were fractured into slivers. Her wrists. The bones of her fingers. He broke her and then walked away into the night.
“Welcome to hell,” she said when I came into the room hiding behind flowers.
“Maggie,” I said, and set the flowers in the blue plastic pitcher of water on the nightstand. I sat down in the chair next to the bed and reached for her. But everything was blue or broken.
“How's Alice?” she asked, pulling the thin white sheet up to her chin.
“She's okay,” I said.“She's at your mom's. Devin and I brought her some Cherry Garcia.”
“Is she talking?” Beyond the blue of her bruises, I could almost see her. I could almost see hope. But the purple and blue were so distracting I couldn't look long enough to find it.
“Not yet.” I smiled.
Maggie turned her head and looked out the window. Her profile looked strange and swollen. Her head was an odd mix of color. The fire of her hair and the blue, blue water of that new face. But for all that blue, the trembling of her shoulders was the only evidence of tears.
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The girl at the bank was the same one who let me into the safe deposit box before. I watched the back of her heels as we walked down into the basement. Two small runs like scars traveled up the back of her small calves. Her perfume smelled like the perfume counter at the J. C. Penney, or like the scent of a fashion magazine. Indecisive and thick.
“Just buzz when you're ready,” she said. She stopped at the foot of the stairs and turned to look at me. “You mind if I ask what you got in there? I mean, we're not supposed to ask, but sometimes I would just love to know what some people keep locked up. Sounds stupid, huh?” Then she shook her hand dismissively. “Forget it. I'm sorry.”
“Home,” I said.
“Excuse me?” she asked.
“Gold,” I said.
“Wow,” she said, her eyes widening. “Like bars of gold?”
“Um-hum.” I nodded.
I took the coins and savings bonds and put them in my pocket. I unrolled the blue prints and wound my fingers along the staircase banister.
I took the stairs two at a time upstairs to the bank lobby. My blood was running quickly, my heart thudding, reminding me of the walls of my chest. The girl who helped me smiled from behind the marble and glass wall.
“I'd like to make a withdrawal,” I said.
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Gussy brought the last of Grampa's fish that night. “Well, this is it,” she said. “That darned fish is finally gone.”
“Have you heard from those people at all? The Kings?” I asked, opening the oven door and peering in at the fish sizzling under the broiler.
“Not yet,” she said. “Soon, I'd think, if they're interested.”
“I don't like them.”
“I know you don't, honey, but it's not likely we're going to be able to find somebody that you do like.”
“What does that mean?” I asked.
“I mean, you love this old place. There isn't gonna be a single person you'd want living here.” Gussy poured two glasses of milk and set them on the table.
“That's not true,” I said.
“It is true. And it's okay. But it's time for me to sell this place. It belonged to your grampa, and now he's gone. I can't hold on to it, Effie. I have to let it go.”
I stood up then and went to the porch. I opened Grampa's desk and pulled out the cigar box. I carried it to the kitchen and set it next to Gussy's plate.
“What is this?” she asked, raising her eyebrow. “It's not my birthday for another month.”
“Open it,” I said. My palms were damp. I put them in my lap and touched the dampness to my shorts.
She opened the lid slowly and looked at me.
“I want to buy the camp. There's a lot of money in there. Enough to make a down payment, the bank says.”
Gussy's hand flew up to her chest.
“If you would rather rent to me,” I said, “I can pay rent and for all the utilities and for the property taxes.”
Gussy sat quietly staring at the cracked cover of the cigar box.
“I know that Mom and Dad were hoping I'd spend Grampa's money on school. But I don't think I'm going to go back to school anytime soon.”
Gussy looked up from the box and into my eyes. “You are absolutely sure that you want to be here?”
“It's home,” I said to Gussy, my throat thick with relief.
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We ate dinner quietly. The phone ringing startled me.
“Effie?” My mother's voice was high-pitched and excited on the other end.
“Um-hum,” I said, holding on to the last bit of lemony fish before I swallowed it.
“I've got some good news!” she said. “Colette just called. She and Yari are getting married!”
“Did you tell her?” my father asked excitedly in the background.
“Yes, yes. What do you think?” she said.
“That's great,” I said to her. “Colette's engaged,” I said to Gussy.
“That's wonderful,” she said, standing up from the table, wiping her hands on a napkin.
“Is Gussy there with you?” my mother asked.
“Uh-huh, hold on,” I said and handed Gussy the phone.
Gussy smiled as my mother told her all of the details of Yari's proposal. Something to do with hiding the ring in her toe shoe.
“We have to have a party,” Gussy said then, reaching for the calendar hanging on the wall. “For the engagement. Let's have it here over Labor Day weekend. Talk to Colette and call me at home tomorrow,” Gussy said. “Tell her I love her.”
After Gussy left, I ran the dirty plates under hot water. Labor Day would be Devin's last day at Gormlaith. After Labor Day he would return to New York, and I would be alone. I filled the sink with water so hot I could barely touch it and let the steam and heat bring tears. When the water had cooled and all of the dishes were clean, I picked the bones out of the sink and laid them inside the small nest next to the robin's egg.
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Devin's house smelled of tomatoes and carrots, zucchini and beets. We spent all weekend harvesting the overgrown garden, picking the ripe vegetables, salvaging the ones that had already started to turn back into earth. We worked so we didn't have to speak. There were no words for what happened between us. For what happened to Maggie. We brought the truck into town and bought glass jars, large pots, and the other things the library book said we needed to preserve the generosity of his garden.
His kitchen was thick with steam, the pressure canner rocking on the small stove, the glass jars tinkling inside. In the living room we spread newspaper across the coffee table, and Devin set the basket of beans in front of me. I began by carefully cutting the sharp tips from each bean and then finally gave up on tidiness and started to snap the ends off in efficient crisp rhythms.
“Okay, give me what you've got,” he said, emerging from the steamy kitchen, his sleeves rolled up to his elbows.
“Here you go,” I said, passing him the basket of ready beans.
“I have no idea what I'm doing,” he said.
“How do they look?”
“Like vegetables in jars. Hot vegetables in jars.”
“Sounds like you're doing it right,” I said and started snapping the next pile of beans.
“What time do you want to get to Maggie?” he asked.
“Three or so,” I said.“I'm going to get Alice at Maggie's mom's first.”
“Maggie like beets?”
“Maybe.” I laughed.
Maggie was going to leave the hospital today. We offered to give her a ride home. Her car still wasn't fixed, and she couldn't have driven anyway because of her wrists. Devin and I were going to stay with her that night. She said she wasn't scared, that he wouldn't be back, but she didn't argue when we insisted. Alice hadn't seen her yet, but now that the bruises were fading, we suggested that Alice come home now too.
After I finished the last of the beans, I went to the kitchen and watched Devin fill the jars with the colors of his garden, watched him carefully seal the lids with the pink rubber seals, and lower the glasses into the water. His concentration was perfect, his hands sure and steady. The counter was covered with the finished jars. All of the colors of the spectrum. Tomatoes, carrots, wax beans, zucchini, beets, like a harvested rainbow. It smelled like the garden in here. Like the earth.
“It smells good,” I said. “Like summertime.”
“You sure you don't mind keeping these for me?” he asked, securing the lid of the metal contraption on the stove.
“Not at all,” I said.
“You made the right decision,” he said. “About the camp.”
“I know.” I smiled.
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Maggie's mother lived out by the fish hatchery at the farm where Maggie grew up. Her father was born on this farm, back when farmers could actually make a profit here. Now they barely sustain themselves on this shrinking piece of land. The winter before they had sold fifty acres to a couple from Connecticut. Skiers who wanted to build a summer home near the mountain.
Alice was sitting on top of a tractor in the driveway eating a Popsicle. Her lips were stained purple, and her little white T-shirt was dotted with Popsicle drippings. Maggie's mom was sitting on the porch, trying to comb a burr out of her German shepherd's fur. Jezebel had just had puppies. Her teats were pink and hanging from her body like eager fingers.
“Hi, Effie,” Maggie's mom said loudly, waving the bright pink comb at me.
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