Dismantled (24 page)

“I
DON’T BELIEVE THIS
,” Tess says. “Twice in one week she gets hurt on your watch.”

Is it Henry’s imagination, or does Tess seem a little drunk? Her words sound slightly slurred and she sways ever so slightly, like a snake ready to strike.

They’re all standing in the kitchen, having arrived home within five minutes of each other.

“Mom,” Emma protests, cradling her bandaged hand, “it wasn’t Dad’s fault. I—”

Henry jumps in. “She cut her hand working on the moose. I was right there with her. We put peroxide on it and wrapped it up. It’s not a very deep cut.”

The lie comes easily. He shoots Emma a warning glance:
Don’t tell the truth. This needs to be one of our secrets.

Emma lets out a little hissing sound, leans back against the counter, studying her wrapped hand.

Henry keeps thinking about the incident with the window: how when he and Winnie got to Emma outside, they could see the cut wasn’t bad, just a thin slice across her knuckles. But something else was wrong. Emma was staring down at her hand, perplexed. When, at last, she looked up at Henry, Winnie, and Mel, she asked, “What happened?” as if she had no recollection of punching the window. As if it had been someone else.

“Maybe Danner made her do it,” Mel had said, disgusted, rolling her eyes.

“I don’t want you taking Emma to the cabin anymore,” Tess says.

“Mom!”

“I think you’re overreacting,” Henry tells her. It’s a line he’s so used to hearing from her, it feels strange to be parroting it back. But here he is, perfectly sober, and she’s the one slurring her words, not being rational.

Tess shakes her head. “It’s not a safe place. I should never have agreed to it to begin with. Emma, go up to your room. I need a moment alone with your father.”

Emma stamps her foot, rolls her eyes, and groans. “You’re always sending me to my room. I’m the one who cut my dumb hand. And you can’t keep me away from the cabin! It’s not fair!”

Tess doesn’t engage Emma in the argument, just silently nods her head in the direction of the stairs. When Emma doesn’t budge, Tess lets out an exasperated breath and says, “Please, Em?”

“Fine,” Emma spits out. They hear her creep into the front hall, whisper something to the moose painting before heading upstairs.

“Do you want to tell me what’s going on up at the cabin?” she asks him once they’re alone.

“What? Nothing. I took Emma and Mel. They worked on the moose. Played with the cats. I think it’s good for Emma to be out there in the woods. If she spends more time there, she might really take an interest in art.” He feels himself stammering, as if he’s telling lies. “You should come with us. See the work Winnie has done.”

Tess shivers. “I think all of us should stay away from that place,” she says. “Emma most of all. I don’t know what’s going on between you and Winnie, and I’m not sure I want to know, but leave Emma out of it.”

“But Emma loves Winnie,” Henry says.

Winnie represents their past, the truth. He likes that when he’s with her, he remembers who he used to be. The brave Henry. The strong Henry. The artist and dreamer. And when he’s with Winnie, they talk openly about that summer, about Suz.

“Are you even listening to me?” Tess asks, then steps forward, staggering a little.

No. He wasn’t. He missed her last words.

“The picture of Suz at the grotto—did you take it?”

“No,” he says, not at all sure how the subject switched.

“Don’t you think it’s a little suspicious that Winnie showed up in town and these strange things began happening: the message in the trees, the knife being left, now the photo being taken from the grotto?”

Henry shakes his head. “She saved Emma’s life, Tess.”

“Yeah, I remember. No thanks to you. But what was she doing here? She just happened to be strolling by our pool—on private property—when Emma flipped over?”

Her face is twisted into a cartoonish scowl. Her nose looks sunburned.

“I think if you went out to the cabin with us, if you sat down and talked with Winnie—”

Tess shakes her head. “It’s not open for debate. No taking Emma to the cabin. If she’s so damned attached to Winnie, then Winnie can come here. But only when I’m around.”

“Winnie’s not a criminal,” Henry says.

Tess bites her lip, sucks in a breath. “Yes, she is. We’re all criminals, Henry. Or have you forgotten?”

S
HE BOBS AND WEAVES
. Practices her footwork. Side step, side step, back to center. Right. Left. Forward. Back.

She hears Joe, the trainer’s, voice in her head:
You have to learn the footwork first. It’s the foundation you’re going to base everything else on. If you don’t have a solid stance, you’re through.

Her fists assail the bag. She steps back, hands raised in defensive posture, then moves forward to attack again, targeting the yellow Everlast logo.

Everlast. Everlasting.

Does anything last forever? Go on and on?

Tess steps back, trying to clear her head.

Focus, damn it.

Her mind goes back to the feel of Claire’s hand on her thigh. How it made her feel heated and chilled all at once.

“I would love for you to paint me,” Claire had said. “I’m honored. I think we should get started right away! I’ll sit for you at the house. The lighting in the front room, where we drank our coffee yesterday, is perfect, don’t you think?”

Tess nodded, her mouth full of scallop. Yes, perfect. It was all perfect.

She imagined the two of them in the front room, by the windows, hummingbirds flitting outside while they sipped wine, and Tess worked at the easel, her eye moving from Claire to the canvas.

“I could pose nude if you’d like,” Claire suggested. Tess felt her face redden.

She’d sketched hundreds of naked bodies over the years—first in college, then in the weekly life-drawing sessions the art guild organized.

But this was different, wasn’t it?

Don’t think about why. Focus: the bag; the punches; the footwork.

If you don’t have a solid stance, you’re through.

Forward again, left fist raised, chin down, she goes in with a right hook. Once. Twice. Three times.

And those eyes. Those green eyes.

“Stop it,” she tells herself out loud, stepping back from the swinging bag.

What the hell is wrong with her?

She hears Claire’s voice in her head:
Passion
.

Left. Right. Left. Jab. Hook.

The sweat is dripping down her face, neck, and shoulder blades. Her hands are wet inside the giant gloves. Her arms are shaking and her knuckles and wrists are beginning to ache.

She can’t believe she told Claire so much tonight. Revealing so many secrets to a woman who is practically a stranger. But that’s just the problem, isn’t it? When she’s with Claire, Claire doesn’t feel like a stranger. She feels like someone Tess has known all along. A soul mate.

Everlast. Everlasting.

“Idiot,” Tess says, pounding the bag again, feeling what’s left of the wine leave her body through her skin. She’s purging herself.

How could she have lost control like that? Especially now, when things are getting dangerous: Spencer’s suicide, Winnie’s arrival in town, the private investigator sniffing around. At a time when she should be the most guarded, here she is spilling her guts.

Jab. Jab. Uppercut. The bag swings, the chains above it rattling.

Tomorrow she’ll be clearer. She’ll phone Claire first thing to say that the portrait is a bad idea. That she’s content to stick to safe little flower paintings. They sell well enough and that’s what matters to her now, at this stage of her life. It’s not about stretching herself as an artist or finding passion. It’s about being a grownup. Making a living. Keeping herself and her daughter safe and provided for.

This is what she’ll tell Claire. Thanks, but no thanks. A neat, tidy ending. Then she’ll just go back to life as normal. Compressed life. No rubber-band moments that you wish would stretch on forever.

She lunges at the bag again, stopped only by a searing pain in her thigh, right where Claire’s hand rested.

She’s pulled a muscle. She should have warmed up. Stretched.

“Fuck!”

Then, she does something she hasn’t let herself do in ages: she drops down on her knees and cries, sobbing and gasping as quietly as she can, her face buried in the warm leather of her boxing gloves.

“I’
M SORRY ABOUT THE
window,” Emma whispers into the phone. She’s in her room with the door closed, sitting on the edge of her bed. Out the window she sees her dad walking away from the house to his barn. His hands are deep in his pockets, his head hanging down. Her mom yelled at him again. Emma can tell. And this time it was all Emma’s fault.

“It’s okay,” Winnie says. “I taped some plastic sheeting over it. I’ll pick up a new piece of glass Monday when the hardware store opens. It’s an easy fix, really. How’s your hand?”

Emma flexes her fist inside the wrap of gauze. “Okay.”

“You really don’t remember doing it?” Winnie asks.

“No.”

The last thing Emma remembers is seeing the reflection of Francis in the window. Then everything went black.

Mel thinks maybe she got possessed. Emma laughed at this. Mel said, “Seriously, maybe it was Danner or something. Maybe Danner’s the devil.”

Emma shakes her head at the memory. Right. Danner’s the devil.

Still, it scares her. Not remembering. What if the kids at school are right and she really is a mental case? Danner could be just another symptom; maybe she has multiple personalities, like Bernice at D.J.’s General Store.

Everything you have is mine.

Maybe what that means is: I am you, and you are me.

She hears the line of a song in her head:
And we are all together.
Lyrics from some CD her dad listens to. A song about being a walrus that makes no sense at all.

“Dissociative episode,” Mel said earlier when they were riding home in the backseat of the Blazer. “A sure sign of possession.”

“Right,” Emma said, thinking that maybe it’s time for her to take a little break from Mel, who has been getting on her nerves big time these last few days.

Emma presses the phone against her ear. “You still there?” she asks.

“Yeah,” says Winnie. “You know, there’s this ancient Chinese proverb that says that once you save a person’s life, you’re responsible for it.”

Emma lets this sink in and smiles. “So what? Does that mean you’re always going to be looking out for me?”

It seems backward to Emma. Like she’s the one who owes Winnie something, not the other way around.

“It means I’ll try. It means I’m here for you. If you ever want to talk.”

Emma twirls the phone cord with her finger. Maybe Winnie thinks she’s crazy now. Troubled. That she’s a girl who
needs to talk
. At least she doesn’t think Emma’s possessed by the devil. Not yet anyway.

“My mom doesn’t want me coming out to the cabin anymore.”

There’s silence. She can hear Winnie breathe. “Did she say why?” Winnie asks.

“She says she thinks it’s dangerous.”

“Maybe she’ll change her mind,” Winnie says.

Right. If there is one thing Emma knows about her mother it’s that once she’s made a decision, it’s pretty much set in stone.

“Was my mom always so stubborn? Back when you knew her, I mean?”

Winnie chuckles. “She was always strong willed,” she says. “And she and your dad, they were both such terrific artists.”

Emma thinks of the photo she found: her dad’s arm around her mom, both of them young and happy. A Long Time Ago.

“And they loved each other, right?” Emma asks, her voice shaking a little.

“Of course,” Winnie says.

“I think they could again,” Emma tells her. “I mean, I think they still do, they just need to remember. To be reminded.”

“Emma,” Winnie says, “sometimes when two people split up, it’s for the best. I’m not saying that’s the case with your parents, I’m just saying it’s not going to do any good to make yourself crazy hoping for something that might not ever happen. Do you understand what I’m getting at?”

“Sure,” Emma says, her voice thick. She bites her lip.

“One thing I’m sure of,” Winnie says. “They love you very much. Nothing’s going to change that.”

Emma wonders how much they’ll love her if she turns out to be a total mental case. The fights they might have, arguing about who’s to blame. She’s supposed to be bringing them together, not giving them new stuff to argue over.

“You know,” Emma says, “working on Francis today got me thinking. Maybe I should try to make my own sculpture.”

“I think that’s a fantastic idea, Emma!”

It
is
a good idea, an idea she didn’t even realize she had until the words were out of her mouth, which, she guesses, is just what it means to be artistically inspired.

She’ll follow in her parents’ footsteps. Maybe if she works on a sculpture, it will help draw her parents back together. It will give them all something to talk about. A family of artists. The only problem is, Emma’s never felt very artistic. She’s more the math and science type. Art has always seemed so…so messy.

“But I don’t know the first thing about it. I mean, how do I even start? I don’t have clay or tools or anything.”

“You use what you have,” Winnie tells her. “People make sculptures from cloth, old telephones and garbage. Look around the house with an artist’s eye.”

Emma likes this: the idea that she has an artist’s eye. Something that ties her to her parents.

“No one sees the world like you do, Emma. Creating art is about sharing your own personal vision with the world. Taking something no one else can see and bringing it to life.”

After getting a few more pointers from Winnie, Emma hangs up and walks through the house gathering things: plastic trash bags, stray socks, rubber bands, an old dress of her mother’s from the box of things to go to Goodwill.

She hears her mom attacking the Everlast bag in the basement. The thud of leather gloves on the bag, the rattle of chains making angry ghost sounds. The floor shakes below her feet.

“I live in a haunted house,” she says to no one.

On the kitchen table, Emma spots the digital camera her dad gave her for her birthday. A little voice tells her,
You’ll need that too.

Mixed media, it’s called. Bringing all these elements together into a single work of art. She’s spent her whole life hearing about art from her parents. Passively absorbing the meaning of the color wheel, phrases like “mixed media.” Now it’s time to put all that sponged-up information to use. She’ll create something that will make them proud.

Emma goes into her room and lays the stuff out on her bed, and, at first, it seems like this random assortment of junk.

“Great going, super freak,” she says to herself, understanding the truth: there’s no way she could ever be an artist. She can’t believe she even thought she could pull this off. A girl who is good at numbers and being fastidious, but not much else. She’s about to stuff everything into the back of her closet when she hears a voice say,
Not so fast
.

She rearranges the things on her bed, walks around it counting by nines, moving objects from here to there, squinting so that she can barely see, like an artist’s eye is a blind eye. Then, as if by magic, the sculpture starts to take shape.

And she feels it, she truly feels it: this connection to her parents, to Winnie, to all the artists who have come before her. It’s as if she’s plugged into this art-powered party line, and now she’s being guided, inspired by some force so much bigger than herself. A force that whispers in her ear, says,
Get the scissors. Get a bucket of sand. Don’t be afraid. I’ll show you what to do.

All her life she’s heard that art is done in a trance, and when she looks up at the clock two hours later, she finally gets what it means. The sculpture is laid out on the bed, nearly complete, and here she is, covered in sand and glue, pinpricks in her fingers from numerous mishaps with a sewing needle. Emma the artist.

“Dissociative episode,” she says out loud, trembling a little as she wipes the sand from her clothes, eyeing her creation with wonder, her skin prickly, a strange new hum in her ears.