Cimarron, Denver Cereal Volume 4 (43 page)

“
A seizure? I’ve never had
a seizure before,” Sissy said.

“
You almost died.” Tears
ran down Sandy’s face. “Well, you did die in the ambulance. They
were able to get your heart started. You…”

Sandy shook her head. Her hand swiped at her
tears.

“
My heart didn’t stop!
You’re making this up,” Sissy said. “I’m not even sick!”

Overcome, Sandy began to cry into her hands.
She’d promised herself she would be the grown up, she would not
cry, but this was too hard, too painful.

“
You’re making it up,”
Sissy repeated.

Sandy raised her head to catch her sister’s
eyes. She shook her head.

“
Why did I almost die?”
Sissy’s voice was no louder than a whisper.

“
Because you haven’t been
eating,” Sandy said. “Why, Sis? Why? Why did you stop
eating?”

“
Well, I don’t know.”
Sissy’s voice was more annoyed than defensive. “After Charlie left,
Mom stopped shopping. The only thing that was in the house was
cheese. I hate cheese and the cereal ran out a couple weeks ago.
She would give me money for lunch. I always gave my lunch money to
Charlie. He really needed it. He didn’t have a home like I
did.”

“
Why didn’t you call me?”
Sandy asked. “Come by. You know where the salon is…”

“
I don’t know,” Sissy said.
“I thought you were mad at me.”

“
Why would I be mad at
you?” Sandy asked.

“
Because I didn’t help you
when Mom was so awful,” Sissy said.

Shaking her head, Sandy hugged Sissy to
her.

“
Where’s Mom?” Sissy
asked.

“
That’s a long story,”
Sandy said. “You’re on the Eating Disorders ward, Sis. They will
keep you here until you’re well. Right now, it’s still touch and
go. You have to participate in therapy and groups and…”

“
How am I going to pay for
this?” Sissy asked.

“
You have medical insurance
through Dad’s Police Union,” Sandy said. “They’re paying for most
of it.”

“
Oh,” Sissy said. “Will I
get fat?”

“
I hope so,” Sandy
said.

“
No really,” Sissy said. “I
don’t want to be fat.”

“
The therapist told me you
think this because you were starving yourself,” Sandy said. “You,
Sis, are tall and thin. You’ll probably never ever be fat. Was Dad
fat?”

“
No, but Mom
is.”

“
We don’t ever want to be
like Mom,” Sandy smiled.

“
Never like Mom,” Sissy
agreed. “Can I touch the baby?”

Sandy sighed. She took Sissy’s hand and
place it on her belly.

“
Is Charlie all right?”
Sissy asked. “He seemed really happy, happier than I’ve ever seen
him.”

“
He started rehab
yesterday,” Sandy said. “He’s not as happy as he was on
Thursday.”

“
He needs rehab,” Sissy
said. “I know you hate Mom. And I know she deserves it. She’s been
awful and is crazy. But I love Mom. She can’t make it without me. I
should be with Mom.”

“
Mom’s in a six month
treatment program,” Sandy said. “We had it all set up. Social
Services, the Police Union Rep, and Seth went to her work. They
were going to give her the option to go to rehab or get treatment
at home. You know how she can be when someone tries to make her do
something. Stubborn. Defiant.”

“
Mean.”

“
Right. The Police Union
rep told her she’d lose the stipend for you and Charlie. Anyway, I
guess it was chaos,” Sandy said.

“
Of course,” Sissy
said.

“
When you collapsed… She
was charged with reckless child endangerment. The Police Union rep
told her it was jail or treatment. She was still being stubborn.
The Police arrested her and everything.”

“
What changed her mind?”
Sissy asked.

“
You remember my friend
Heather?” Sandy asked.

“
Mom works with her mom,”
Sissy said.

“
Right,” Sandy said.
“Heather’s Mom. That’s what changed her mind. I don’t know what
Heather’s Mom said but somehow she got through to Mom. The Police
took her to the treatment place. It’s a locked facility so she
couldn’t get out for seventy-two hours.”

“
Oh,” Sissy
said.

“
Get this,” Sandy said.
“I’ve called every morning and every night to see how she’s doing.
Last night’s the first time she took my call. She wanted to know
where Charlie was and how you were doing. She told me she was sorry
for everything that happened to me. She said she’s exactly where
she needs to be right now.”

“
We’re all in treatment,”
Sissy’s eyes were luminous.

“
I hope you get better,”
Sandy nodded. “If you get better, we’ll go and visit Mom in a month
or so. If she does well there, she can stay there for up to a
year.”

“
What about the house?”
Sissy’s voice dropped to a whisper. “There are rats
there.”

Sissy held her hands out a foot apart.

“
Yuck,” Sandy said. “I
hired a service that takes care of places like that. Mom gave power
of attorney to Heather’s Mom. Heather’s Mom has helping me get
everything set up. By the time Mom is better, Charlie is better,
and you’re better, the house should be ready for you to live there,
if you want to.”

“
What about Charlie and me?
Do we have to live with the rats?” Sissy asked.

“
You’ll live with me,”
Sandy said. “I’ll take care of you. If Mom is able to be a mom
again, then you can move back with her. If you don’t want to or she
can’t be a mom again, then you’ll stay with me.”

“
What about your new
husband? And…” Sissy touched Sandy’s bulging belly.

“
We’ll live together,”
Sandy said. “Aden…”

“
The gym guy?” Sissy asked.
“You married the gym guy? Mom said he was some old guy
but…”

“
I married the gym guy,”
Sandy smiled. “Nash and Noelle are his kids.”

“
We’ll all live
together?”

“
If you want,” Sandy
nodded.

“
I do want!” Sissy moved to
get out of bed.

“
Sorry Sis,” Sandy said.
“You have to stay here for a while.”

“
For treatment?”

Sandy nodded.

“
Are you sure I need it?”
Sissy asked.

“
I am,” Sandy
said.

“
Don’t be sad, Sandy,”
Sissy said. “If Charlie gets well and I get well and Mom gets well,
we could be a real family again. Like before Dad died.”

Sandy smiled.

“
I need you to do something
for me, Sis,” Sandy said.

“
Anything,” Sissy
said.

“
I need you to work really
hard in treatment,” Sandy said. “It will seem stupid sometimes,
boring other times, and you might hate it. But this is where you
need to be right now.”

“
I’ll do it.”

“
Good,” Sandy said. “You
have to do most of it yourself.”

“
I do?”

“
I can only visit you a
couple of times a week. We’ll be here for visitation and family
therapy. The doctors and your therapist are waiting for you outside
the door. They let me come in to wake you. But you have to do the
rest alone.”

“
I can do it, Sandy. You’ll
see,” Sissy said.

Sandy stood from the bed. She gave a little
wave and walked to the door. At the door, she paused. Unable to
stop herself, she ran back to the child’s bed. Clasping the
skeleton that had become her sister, she whispered:

“
Please get well. Please
get well. Please Sis, for me, please get well.”

Crying, the sisters held each other. Sandy
felt hands on her shoulders. The therapist peeled her from Sissy.
Sandy gave Sissy another wave and walked to the door. Standing at
the door, she caught her sister’s dark eyes. Sissy waved and Sandy
went out the door. She made it all the way through the hospital to
where Aden waited for her. In his arms, she cried her heart
out.

~~~~~~~~

Thursday mid-day — 12:56 P.M.

Walking down the Art Institute corridor,
Jill looked from door to door until she found the room for her
first class on Interior Design. She’d taken an entire semester
before taking this class. She was lucky to have an Interior Design
class at all. A lot of schools don’t teach specialty classes until
the very end. She was about to turn into the class when a woman
pushed in past her and into the room.

Jill stopped. That was the awful woman who
made fun of her all of last term. The awful woman already made a
joke today about whether the secretary went with them on vacation.
Everyone laughed. At Jill. About that stupid lying woman. Now that
awful woman was in Jill’s dream class.

“
I won’t let her get to
me,” Jill repeated in her head what Megan had told her. “She will
not get to me.”

The teacher looked up when she came into the
room. A direct descendent of the painter, Salvator Rosa was one of
Denver’s top interior designers. Intimidated, Jill went toward the
back of the class. Seeing the awful woman there, she found a seat
near the middle of the class. She took out her paper, mechanical
pencil, and an eraser. No matter who was in this class, she was not
going to miss a word of what this man had to say.

“
Ok, let’s get started,”
the man said. “Most of you know who I am. Rather than take our time
with ego, you can read the catalog about me. You may call me
Sal.

“
I have a list of your
names,” Salvator said. “Over the next twelve weeks, we will get to
know each other very well. And at the end of twelve weeks, you will
know whether you have a chance of being an interior designer in
this city.

“
If you haven’t heard, I
will teach a new concept each week. Every Friday, we will hold a
contest for who creates the best room. Many of my colleagues say
you’re too new, too young to face such pressure. But working in
someone else’s home is a lot of pressure. You have to know their
taste, know what they like, and make them very, very happy or you
will never get work again. If you can’t handle a little friendly
competition now, you will never handle the pressure
later.

“
I can understand if you
would like to transfer into Mr. Donavon’s course,” he said. “You
have this week to transfer. I’d encourage anyone thinking of
transferring to do so. In this class, we will work hard. I don’t
have time for egos. I don’t have time for lazy people. And I don’t
have time for anyone who doesn’t want to be the very best they can
be.”

Jill sat up a little straighter in her
chair. She wanted to be the very best she could be. She liked to
work hard. And she didn’t think she had too big of an ego. She
glanced around the room to see how the other students were
responding. Most students seemed excited. Awful woman sneered. Jill
turned her eyes back to the teacher.

“
Who is Jillian Roper?”
Salvator asked.

Jill raised her hand. Awful woman
snickered.

“
Stand beside your chair
when I call on you,” he said.

“
I’m Jillian Roper, sir,”
Jill popped to her feet.

“
I had dinner last night at
the Biatchi mansion,” Salvator said. “I understand you and your
husband did some rehabilitation there?”

“
Yes sir.” Jill swallowed
hard.

“
Can someone get the
lights?” the teacher asked.

The room went dark. Jill moved to sit down,
but the teacher indicated she should keep standing. An image of the
room they had refurbished came on the screen.

“
Can you explain what you
did?” Salvator asked.

“
Yes sir,” Jill said. “This
room had been a formal dining room. Sometime in the last two
hundred years, this room was flooded. For whatever reason, the
water was let to stand on the wood for some time. If you had seen
this room, you would have thought it was impossible.”

“
I thought it was
impossible when they asked me,” Salvator said.

He leaned over the computer and clicked a
photo of the original condition of the room.

“
My husband, Jacob, brings
out beauty in things that are broken or destroyed,” Jill said. “He
and a crew of our guys worked for three months to restore the room
to its original condition.”

“
Mrs. Biatchi said he
rebuilt many of the features by hand,” Salvator said.

“
He’s a carpenter,” Jill
said. “He likes to recreate things in the way they were originally
built.”

The screen flashed to the room before Jill
started her work.

“
This is the blank palate
you will all work with this week,” Salvator said. “First, let’s
show you what Jillian Roper did.”

The screen flashed a photo of the whole
room. The room was a wash in Rose color. The top half of the walls
were painted a rich cream color. Pink, yellow and purple flowers in
what looked like wall paper adorned the bottom half of the walls. A
period piece crystal chandelier hung over the twelve person mission
style cherry dining room table. The table was covered in a deep
maroon table covering. The floors gleamed in a cherry wash. The
students shifted restlessly.