Come Back (13 page)

We carve our destinies blindfolded, with sharp knives.

I wake up and see the ugly brown carpet and Lupe sleeping across from me. Shit. I’m still here. Then I hear Mariah Carey being sung in the hall.

“Dream lover come rescue me…”

“Sunny, SHUT UP,” a sleepy voice yells.

A Czech voice calls out, “Who is talking, no talking, you have Cat 2. Self-correct?”

Damn, they’re serious about this silence thing.

“Good morning, girls!” Great, it’s that bitch, “Miss” Zuza. “Everybody up!”

At this, Lupe leaps out of bed. I turn to go back to sleep but she rolls me back over and tells me that we have thirty minutes to shower, dress, and clean the rooms and bathrooms, spotless, daily.

“I’ll do the bathroom, you clean the carpet. We only get the vacuum on Sundays, so you have to use your hands.”

Twenty minutes later, I’m dressed and on my hands and knees picking up lint. In the Czech Republic.

“Line up!”

I step out of the room to line up but Lupe yanks me back.

“We have to ask permission to cross.”

What? If they’re the ones telling us to line up, why the hell do we have to ask to do it? I’ve never heard of anything so ridiculous. Except for not being able to talk, walk, eat, sleep, or pee without permission. Except for this whole fucking place.

I get in line in front of Lupe. I feel her chest brush up against my back.

“Get off me!”

Zuza explains that your toes must touch the person’s heels in front of you. Okay, right, play along some more. We count off and walk to the lobby. Zuza peeks inside a door as if checking for enemy gunfire. Sure enough, danger lurks within.

“Girls! Face the wall, the boys are crossing out!”

I saw them do this yesterday but I didn’t know it was because the opposite sex was about to pass!

“Mia, your nose must touch the wall so I know you’re not peeking.”

I roll my eyes and do it. My nose bumps the wall and I feel a chalky substance rub off onto it. I touch it and realize it’s paint. Paint soft enough to scratch off. Snortably soft.

Just before I head out for breakfast, Paul calls to tell me my American Express card number was stolen at the airport in Atlanta, I can’t use it. I call Morava to make sure she’s still there and then head for downtown Brno to find an ATM. Wearing a hat.

Brno hasn’t been spiffed up the way Prague has, but it’s charming nonetheless, with old fountains and outdoor cafés. All of which play American
sheet
. There’s even live
sheet
. On a platform in the main plaza, a band in cowboy gear plays Willie Nelson’s “You Were Always on My Mind.” In Czech, with a twang.

My ATM card won’t work anywhere and no one in the banks I’ve tried speaks English. I can’t find anyone that does. So far, the best thing about this place is that there are churches on every street I can duck into when I start to cry about leaving Mia or get too light-headed from hunger.

Growing up, I’d been to church with my paternal aunts far more than temple. Latin mass was enthralling and fantastic to a girl who lived in books—the ritual and incense, the graceful, cryptic gestures of priests in sparkling robes. I never tired of watching the sad, drooping Jesus on the cross, amazed and impressed that someone in such bad shape could have such a big following. I wanted to hold his hand, be a comfort.

All I want to do in these churches now is drink from the holy water basin when no one’s looking. I can’t believe this is happening to me. It’s the twentieth century and I’m about to plotz in the gutter from thirst and starvation like some medieval peasant. I don’t even have Czech coins to call Morava and beg for a spare potato to be left at the end of the driveway, where Mia can’t see me and be set back.

Group therapy is the first time we can legally speak. A Czech lady named Tyna joins the circle.

“Hi, girls. Who wants to talk today?”

Unfuckingbelievable! Something here is voluntary. Four hands go up and she chooses a tense, pug-nosed girl. Even though she raised her hand to talk, she’s silent.

“Last time in group you did the same thing, it’s very nonworking,” Tyna says.

Non-what?

The girl sighs. “I’ve had stuff come up about my rape this week.”

Christ, I don’t want to hear this, I just found out this girl’s name a day ago. I go over to Zuza and ask if I can go to the bathroom.

“We just came from there. There’s another bathroom break in an hour.”

Bitch. I distract myself by checking out the rest of the girls. It’s hard to know who might have stuff because we’re not allowed to talk and I can’t tell by looks because they all look like matching nerds. They act like it, too, that’s the scary thing. Because, either these girls weren’t that bad to begin with, or they were and this brainwashing crap works. The girl finally stops talking.

“Feedback?” Tyna asks the group.

“I experience you as playing the victim, which still just gives your power away to him.”

“My experience of you is that you use your rape to stay stuck, so you don’t have to take on anything that scares you or is challenging.”

This is so messed up. She opens up and her friends shove everything she said down her throat! Of course she’s a victim, dumbasses, she got raped. One thing’s for sure, I won’t have any trouble maintaining the silence rule here.

When I stagger back to the Santon, I find that Paul’s arranged for me to get some cash and I have my first meal in almost two days. I call Morava, and Zuza reports that Mia is quiet and cooperative, which makes me regret eating dinner because my stomach pitches. Fortunately, before I can say anything, Zuza continues, half amused.

“But I see her studying the windows and doors. I saw her studying the signs on the way here, too. Girls who are runners all do the same thing.”

Brendan was right, they’ve seen it all. But, I still want that genius of a tracking dog there, ASAP.

I decide to spend my remaining few days sightseeing the area. As I dress in the morning, I find myself chatting with God about Mia, about my day, nonchalantly, without thinking. And it feels good.

I have no idea if it is theologically correct, but God’s just going to have to settle for me chattering at Him like we’ve met for coffee in Starbucks.

Yesterday’s grief and tears seem to have settled into a kind of numb peace, an acceptance perhaps. I know that somewhere I’m sad, still stricken I think, but in yesterday’s body, the one that cried. Today, my body feels hushed and tender.

As I walk along the ancient ramparts of a ruined castle overlooking the city, my body feels memories as well. It remembers you now, Mia, as a vague ache across my arms, my chest and throat. The places you pressed against as I held you. Something done so often leaves a trace, an imprint that remains forever. Your cells rubbed off into mine and throb now like a phantom limb pain.

My prayer tonight, my last night near my daughter, is that Glenn will find the precious Mia that lies curled inside the dark cocoon she’s spun around herself. That she will carve away from this stony Mia all that is not really her, the way Michelangelo released David from the marble by taking away all that was not David.

I still think that she is mine to fix, to save, by sheer force of will or by proxy. I still can’t see that it isn’t possible, that our paths have already been separated forever.

“I honestly don’t know how you could send your own fucking kid here…Dude! All they feed us is bread because it’s cheap. I could kill somebody for a piece of lettuce…Get me out, I’m dying! If I’m not out before next summer, I’ll burn the place down, NO JOKE!…If I come back and my books or other things of mine have been thrown out, I’ll fucking kill you both…”

“I’m sure the food was much better in the back of that van!” Paul hoots as he reads her first letter. “And I guess she’s just going to have to ‘fucking kill both of us’ when she sees her bedroom.”

Yesterday, we threw out nearly everything in her room. The disgusting clothes, her Johnny Rotten books, bottles of Death Cola.

I check the parent manual, which gives examples of kids’ typical letters as they go through the Denial phase, the Guilt Trip phase, the Anger phase. Mia managed to hit all three in one letter. She’s so hateful and resolute I wouldn’t be surprised if she just waited out her time till she’s eighteen. Which would make this a pretty expensive babysitting service.

Mothering is a physical act, a dance of a thousand gestures performed and perfected over years. Hugging, hair brushing, oatmeal stirring, back-scratching, bed jumping, good-night snuggling, clock watching, carpooling. On autopilot, I keep starting to do things that are as outdated now as carding wool. My arms and hands are like dodo wings, vestigial appendages.

Even my voice has decided it’s useless without Mia, because I can’t sing anymore. Nothing comes out but hoarse, off-key noise. It’s a minor loss given all that’s happened, but it was a bond between us, another now broken, and it saddens me terribly.

My existence was structured around Mia. Her needs beat the rhythm
of my days. There are only two real necessities in my life now. One is writing, which I do until dinnertime or I fall asleep having forgotten to eat.

The second is calling about Mr. Sniffy, das wunderdog.

I hate to keep calling day staff, who never seem to take calls anyway, so I call the night staff every afternoon. None of them speak even leetle of English. The first few days, I twist my tongue around
“německý ovčácký pes šňupat je tam ano?”
After polite chuckles and what can only have been, “Hey, Ivan, listen to this lunatic asking about shepherd of smell there dog is yes,” I’ve simplified things. I say, “Madame Fontaine,” bark a couple of times, make loud sniffing sounds, then say,
“Ano?”
(Yes?)

Each student has a case manager, who is the liaison between you and the school. Ours is Tyna, and each month we’re to have one scheduled call with her and get three emails from her. Kids can write home as often as they like; parents can both write and email as often as they want. Paul sends emails, but half of them don’t go through.

The few short emails I’ve sent have bounced back, and I haven’t written more. What’s there to say that hasn’t already fallen on deaf ears? Besides, if I’m honest, I need a break from the Sturm und Drang. If I’m really, really honest, I suspect my short, and now nonexistent, emails are a way of punishing her.

The school recommends faxing Mia’s letters to us back to Morava. It keeps staff and parents on the same page, making it harder for kids to manipulate. A few months ago, I would have had issues with doing this. Not anymore. Let her throw a tantrum.

Apparently, she has. Tyna has emailed us that Mia’s just lost all her points. She does well, gains points, then screws up and loses them. The manual tells parents not to focus on points and levels, they’re not always an indication of growth, but I ride hers like a roller coaster.

After a couple of weeks, I finally get Glenn on the phone. The first thing I ask isn’t about Mia, it’s about the dog. She says he was there for a few days but left again.

“What, is he going for a PhD?” I say, exasperated.

“No, the UN borrowed him to help find survivors in the Kenya embassy bombing. He saved eighteen people,” she says proudly.

“Oh,” I say, feeling stupid.

“Claire, relax. Your daughter is fine, she’s learning every day. Now that I’m back, I’ll spend some one on one time with her. You know, it’s a big
turning point for these kids to realize the world doesn’t revolve around them. When was the last time you and your husband did anything fun? You need to get a life.”

The realization that I can’t run from here has officially tipped the life scale from pretty fucking awful to sheer hell. We do a head count every time we change rooms, so slipping away unnoticed is impossible. Plus, this place rewards people for ratting, so it’s not just the staff I’d have to watch for. Which means I have a pen, paper, and thirty minutes during letter-writing time to convince my parents to take me home.

Dinner is Stephen Covey, fries, and something square that’s been fried beyond recognition. I get up to get a glass of water.

“Mia!” Zuza barks. “What are you doing?”

Shit, I forgot.

“I was just getting more water.”

“You cannot get up without permission, this you know by now. Self-correct?”

This is such bullshit. Consequences are divided into five categories, Cat 1–Cat 5; the higher the category, the more points you lose, some can drop you entire levels. Anytime you’re consequented, you have the choice to self-correct, which basically means putting your tail between your legs in the name of saving points by filling out a form saying what you did wrong and what you’ll do in the future to correct the situation. If you refuse, the consequence becomes staff corrected and you lose extra points. I could give a shit, I already lost all my points this morning.

“There’s nothing to correct! I’m thirsty and I was getting more water.”

“Fine, staff corrected.”

I swallow a few choice words, sit down, and start scheming. Making my mom feel guilty or sorry for me won’t work, she’s too mad, and she’s been here so she knows they don’t torture us. Logic’s the way to go, get her to see that this place is inappropriate and ineffective, a waste of retirement funds. I’ll stress the poor education, lack of nutritional food, and absence of a real shrink. But I have to do it nicely, that’s the hard part.

Tyna reports by email:

Mia’s also written asking us to send her Harley T-shirt “to sleep in. They allow that, I asked!” She’s assuming we’re as dumb as we used to be. If she escapes, a Harley shirt won’t stand out on the streets. We buy her the ugliest, most old-fashioned flowered nightgown we can find. Even if they left a door wide open, her pride wouldn’t let her run in it.

By now, the other girls have noticed I have a package and come crowding around me. We’re all part of a “family,” who have named themselves the Band-Aids. As they explained in unison, the purpose of the Band-Aid family is “a group of sisters banding together to aid in creating present and future greatness.” This place reaches new peaks of gayness daily.

We’re on silence but from their big grins and wide eyes you can tell they’re dying to know what I got. Teenage girls grinning like idiots over a heinous nightgown is frightening. They all blend together into one smiling blob. No one’s distinct, it’s like one corny personality with fourteen faces, like any individuality they might have had vanished with their voice.

It could be the silence, not being able to speak most of the time does things to you. It’s driving me nuts. I think about everything from how much it sucks here to what Ruza the cook does in her time off, to what Melanie’s doing right now, to if pygmies in jungles are happier than people in big cities. People say quiet is peaceful. They’re wrong. It’s the loudest place on earth.

Grief is a noisy thing. It is loud and stupid in hospital hallways and funeral parlors, in pajamas barefoot in the street. It repels others, helpless against your helplessness, your embarrassing lack of control. Grief is a refusal.

Sorrow, however, sorrow minds its manners. Sorrow has weight, grace. It confers a certain dignity; it implies wisdom. Sorrow is an acceptance. One our friends are no doubt relieved we’ve come to, and not just because Mia’s safe. We cannot have been easy companions this last six months.

It’s summer and they flood us with invitations, to parties and dinners, to picnics in the mountains, to the Hollywood Bowl. We’ve suddenly ac
quired a dark glamour. Inevitably, at one point someone says, oh, you’re the couple!
That
couple, the Hopkins girl living in a van?…shooting up?…ran away
four times, kidnapped?
…
that
school? What an unbelievable story, how did you manage, and oh, how they admire us. Our strength, our courage! I’m given qualities I don’t have and feel stripped of those I do. No one ever does the usual commiseration thing, the I-know-what-you’re-going-through thing, my kid this or my kid that. Nobody’s kid holds a candle to Mia.

We cross into the dining room and Ruza beams at us from behind her counter. A pretty Gypsy with long black hair that occasionally wanders into someone’s meal, she’s my favorite of the two cooks. The other, Jenka, a middle-aged woman with dirty blond hair, is as somber as Ruza is cheerful and boisterous.

I grab the bowl slid out to me and stare at the watery gray-brown liquid. Behind me I hear Sunny’s now familiar whisper of
“Kakao, Kakao, tac, tac.” “Tak”
is a word you learn very quickly if you ever plan on filling up—more. I could cry hearing Ruza tap out extra cocoa powder into Sunny’s oatmeal. When everyone has been served and stands silently behind their chairs, Zuza gives a hand signal and we take our seats and begin eating.

From breakfast on, the day crawls by. It’s the same schedule day in and day out. Wake-up; shower; cleaning; class; fitness; breakfast; class; PE; class; lunch; class; group; class; spelling or music, depending on the day; dinner; class; letter-writing; shutdown. When time’s no longer your own, you think about it in new ways. Here, everything revolves around food and mail. 2 p.m. isn’t 2 p.m., it’s two hours until mail time and three hours until dinner.

Like clockwork, Tyna walks with a large stack off axes and envelopes. Immediately, the mood changes as girls wait anxiously for their name to be called.

Mail is like a sentencing here, dividing the room into haves and have-nots. With no communication from the outside world, no magazines, newspapers, TV, or radio, mail is the only proof we have that we’re not floating in some third dimension while back on earth Madonna’s become president. It’s also our only form of communication with our parents, whom most of the kids really miss.

As usual, my name’s not called. I’ve only gotten three emails since I’ve been here, short, angry ones from Paul, making sure I know I’m here until I graduate.

PE here is a total joke. The girls vote between games like Mother May I and Red Light Green Light, then giggle like a bunch of third graders while spinning around to see if anyone frozen moved out of turn.

Today, a miracle happens and a girl named Roxanne suggests soccer. With long, thick, poker-straight golden hair, a sparkling smile, and a peppy attitude, she could have stepped out of a Pantene commercial. She’s one of the more vocal girls—by vocal I mean she’s constantly making facial expressions and hand gestures behind staff’s back. You sort of have to change your definitions of things here.

Katrina dribbles the ball my way. For someone who’s barely post-anorexic, she’s fast. She has dark hair, deep olive skin, and a cute crooked smile; her thinness makes her big eyes even bigger.

I pass the ball to Sunny, who makes it about a foot before Roxanne charges and she runs away squealing. If anyone else did that I’d think they were a complete idiot, but Sunny cracks me up.

Her personality seems to have formed to fit her face. Round with high cheekbones, she has such smiling half-moons for eyes it’s hard to believe she’s Irish and not Asian. Sunny’s obsessed with nature and anything female and has her head permanently stuck in a yellow submarine where everything is fluffy and fabulous. She used to be a really big cutter and even when she shared about that in group yesterday, she was laughing.

“I’d just make a little slash here and another there. Oh, how silly! And with a Lady Bic, too, isn’t that just faaabulous!”

She got the feedback that she was smiling things off, but I liked that she saw the irony in self-mutilating with a pink razor with butterflies on it. At least she keeps it light. After Lupe, we needed it! She was crying so hard it took her five minutes just to stop shaking and form sentences. She was in a gang back home and had a boyfriend who used to beat the living shit out of her and force her to have sex with his friends. She was gang-raped and, still, she stayed. She acts so tough it’s hard to imagine her letting someone do that to her.

I didn’t even notice I was doing it. I was finishing a homework assignment in class when suddenly there’s a bushel of armpit hair in my face and my paper is taken away. All because I was doodling.

“But I’m doing my homework, this whole page is done.”

“You were not focusing on your work if you were drawing all over the page,” the teacher, Miss Suska, says. “Begin again and you have Cat 1 correction for being off task. Self-correct?”

“Fuck you, you hairy bitch! How is recopying a perfectly good page of work learning anything? If you had even half a brain, you wouldn’t ask me to waste my time doing mindless shit!”