Hand Me Down (15 page)

“I could never let her go,” I whisper.

“I’m sure everything is fine,” Mom repeats, clearing her throat. “Now, did Tammy book a flight for you?” she says, her voice
brighter. “I’d really like you to come visit, but with the party, I can’t afford to bring you here.”

“Terrance still doesn’t have a job?”

She says, “I sang with him and his friends last night.” She hums a little tune. “It was awesome,” she says all slow and breathy like a starstruck teen. I’m just about to ask if she’s been drinking when the live music jumps in volume and Terrance yells, “Babe, Noah is crying.”

Mom says, “Where’s Noah at?” I cringe at her use of Terrance’s poor grammar, and don’t hear the rest of their exchange over the vibrations. “Gotta go,” she says clearly into the phone, loud enough to beat the speakers. I want to ask about Jaime again but Mom says, “Don’t worry. Love you. See you soon,” and hangs up. It’s fine, I guess, because I would have had to scream for her to hear me, and I’m tired of putting in the effort when she doesn’t listen anyway.

My bathroom at Tammy’s is
white and gold: gold faucets and fixtures, gold-rimmed glass shower doors. White tiles line the floor and the counter is a silvery-white marble laced with strands of gold swirl. Tammy bought me a countertop organizer to hold Q tips and ChapStick and makeup that I use every day, but by the time I leave in the morning it’s all out, covering the gold swirls. Now as I wait for the phone to ring and Jaime to tell me she’s not dead, I put my deodorant and toothpaste back in the drawer, toss tissues with my glossy lip print and mascara smudges, and set my moisturizer and zit cream in the organizer.

At home I kept my stuff in my room. Jaime would steal
anything I left in the bathroom: eye shadows and compacts, perfume, my silver spider necklace. Once she asked to borrow my favorite beaded bracelet after I caught her wearing it out the door. I’d strung together little silver spheres and shiny triangular black beads that turned purple, blue, and yellow when rotated in the light. It took three hours sitting cross-legged on the floor of my room to get it perfect and Jaime lost it. She cried when she told me it was gone but I hit her anyway. She said, “I’m sorry,” and put her hand up to block her face, and I shoved her shoulders hard against the wall, left her crying in the hallway, and didn’t speak to her for days. I never apologized.

I hear Tammy’s voice through the vent in the white tiles. If the heater isn’t on, which with Sam around it hardly is, I can listen to whatever is happening downstairs. I sit on the green toilet lid cover as Tammy says, “If Liz leaves for the week, we can go to Moab.”

“Or,” Sam says and she makes a little “oh” noise. He’s probably grabbed her ass like he does sometimes when he thinks I’m not watching. Tammy always blushes. “We could have the house to ourselves,” he says. “No emotional teenagers.”

She sighs. “What happened?”

“She threw the phone.”

“At you?”

“At the couch.”

“Was it Linda?”

Sam pounds something, a pan, a bowl. “How should I know? She practically pushed me out of the way and ran upstairs.”

Tammy says, “Is she okay?” and my heart swells that she would think of my well-being first.

“Why wouldn’t she be? She runs this house.”

“Don’t start,” she says.

Sam says, “I don’t want her here this summer.”

“Are you even going to be here this summer?”

“That’s not the point.”

“Stop,” Tammy says. “She’s important to me.”

They are so quiet I can hear sizzling. Probably pork chops.

“How long?” Sam says after a few minutes.

“As long as she needs me,” she says.

“You are not her mother.”

“That’s right,” she snaps. “Thanks to you I am not a mother.”

“You’re a beautiful, intelligent, successful woman,” Sam says. “Why does this keep coming up?”

“What makes you think it ever leaves?”

“How many years has it been, Tammy? Isn’t it enough—”

“I like having her here.”

Sam sighs. “What about how I feel?”

“It’s always about how you feel,” Tammy whispers.

“Don’t you care about our life together?” he says.

“My life is here even when you’re not,” she says. The heater kicks on, and the rest of their conversation is lost in a warm blast of air from the vent.

Later, I’m sitting on the
bathroom floor and crying when Tammy knocks on the door. “Are you okay?” she says.

“It’s warmer in the bathroom,” I say. In this small space filled up with hot air from the vent I don’t even need a blanket. The
green bath mats are cushy and cleaner than the carpet at Mom’s house.

“Can I come in?” she says and opens the door. “Liz,” she says when she sees me, “get off the floor.” She helps me stand, brushes off the butt of my flannel pants. She shoos me into my room. “What are you doing?”

I crawl under my blankets. “I was cleaning.”

“What’s wrong?” she says and sits next to me on the bed. I tuck my covers under my legs. She says, “Did you talk to your mom?”

I tell her about Jaime and Mom, and Tammy promises to fly to Sacramento herself and check on Jaime if we don’t hear from her in a few days.

“Thanks,” I say and hug her. “I’m really worried,” I whisper in her ear.

She squeezes me tighter. “Now you know how I felt all those years your mother was with your dad,” she says.

“You worried about us?”

“Yes,” she says, letting go of me, her eyes fixed on a spot in space. “Your father was a dangerous man.”

“He still is,” I say. “That’s why I need to make sure Jaime is okay.”

Tammy shakes her head, her short, brown hair barely moving. “You’d feel it in your gut if something was really wrong,” she says. She puts her hands on her abs.

“My gut always feels like there’s something wrong,” I say.

Tammy grasps my shoulders and looks at me, her shiny blue irises like I imagine mine will look in twenty years when I’m too old to cry so much. “You have to train your body to make peace with the constant wrongs,” she says. “The mistakes, the regrets, the
continuing reminders, you have to let them breathe or you’ll go crazy.” Her fingers tighten around my arms as she speaks, and I wonder how many regrets and reminders she still lives with.

I nod. “I’ll try,” I say and her fingers relax.

“Good.” Tammy clears her throat and lets go of me with a weak half-smile. “Sam and I may be going to Moab the week you’re at your mom’s,” she says. “You do still want to go, right?”

“I guess.” I want to see Jaime and Noah.

Sam yells, “Soup’s on!”

I say, “I’m not really hungry.”

She stands up. “There are always going to be things in your life that you can’t change,” she says, her long fingers weaving together like she’s tying and untying a knot. “You’re going to have to learn to deal with problems, face them wearing all your armor,” she says. “Wasting away under the blankets doesn’t punish them.” She reaches out and lifts my chin between her thumb and forefinger. “You’re stronger than that, little girl,” she says softly and walks across the landing to her room.

I wonder if she’s crying but she flushes the toilet and runs the water in her bathroom, the same gold and white as mine but twice as big. Then she’s at the edge of my bed, pulling the covers off my feet.

She says, “You’d be warmer if you ate.”

“I don’t want to be fat,” I say. “I’d rather wear a hat in the house than look like my mother.”

“I’ll have to tell Sam you’re taking his hat advice,” Tammy says. “He’ll be so proud.” I narrow my eyes at her and sink into the bed. She laughs. “Just kidding,” she says and yanks the whole pile of blankets off. She offers me her hands. “Now, get up.”

We drove the sunset-orange Pinto
up through Petaluma to Deborah’s house the morning after Dad crashed it. Pink light shone at the horizon when Deborah answered the door in her robe and slippers. Mom said, “I’m so sorry to barge in like this.”

“Nonsense, you’re family,” Deborah said, rubbing her eyes. “My brother is a fool.”

“You should see the car,” Mom said. “Thank God it still drove.”

Deborah said, ushering us in, “Thank God he didn’t have the girls.”

For months Mom read self-help books about codependence and breaking the cycle of abuse. At Deborah’s insistence, she went to three Al Anon meetings a week and came back repeating slogans like,
Easy Does It, Courage to Change
, and
Let Go and Let God
.

Deborah taped butcher paper to the wall for the three of us kids to draw on. Jaime and I shared a bed and played with Ashley’s expensive toys. She had a motorized car, an interactive computer word game, more books than I could count, and dozens of dolls. Deborah got Mom a job as a receptionist at a clinic and we were saving up money to get our own place. After a few months Mom’s skin looked less gray, and Jaime didn’t need me to sing to her so she could fall asleep.

One rainy afternoon Jaime and I were playing in the clinic’s waiting area and Dad walked in. His orange hair was wet, his brown leather jacket spotted dark at the shoulders. He wore jeans and flip-flops and he said, “Hey, girls. Did you miss your daddy?”

“Dad!” Jaime said and flew into his arms, but I knew why Mom
went to those meetings and I stayed where I was, LEGO block still in hand, poised above our growing spaceship. Mom was in the other room and all I had to do was call for her and she’d be here in a second, hair waving behind her as she stampeded over our father like Superwoman, but I just stared at him, smiling with our dimples in his cheeks, his blue eyes like falling into clear sky. He came over and hugged me and he didn’t have the stale metallic scent that came with the sharp voice and yelling.

He grinned at us, turning his head from side to side to look at his daughters cradled in each of his arms. “Let’s go have some fun,” he said.

“We can’t get in a car with you,” I said.

“No problemo,” he said. “We’ll walk. I saw a park down the street.”

“It’s raining,” Jaime said.

Dad said, “It just makes the slides faster,” and he ran down the block. Jaime’s face radiated hope as she waited for my nod and then she chased after him, laughing. I grabbed our coats from the donated plaid couch, abandoned our LEGO alien cruiser, and hoped Mom would understand.

She found us at the park a few hours later, just as the sun was glowing at the horizon. We had swung on swings and kicked up puddles, slid down wet slides into mud pits like quicksand. “Help, Dad, please,” we cried. “Save us before the pirates come.” He lifted us out and our feet made a sucking sound as they popped free from the sludge that made us all laugh and we scrambled onto the plastic ship.

“Scrub the deck, you scabbers,” Dad said.

“Head east!” I called. “Hoist the flags!”

“Watch out for toothy, there,” Dad said. “He’s the captain’s favorite fish.”

“Land ahoy!” Jaime called. “Mom’s here.”

“Land ho,” Dad said.

“Elizabeth? Jaime?” Mom was running now. “Girls? Are you all right?”

Dad jumped off the playground platform and said, “They’re fine, Linda.”

“David, I’ve called the police,” she said. “Girls, come here.”

“We’re okay, Mom,” I said.

“You’re filthy,” she said. “It’s winter. David, what were you thinking?”

“I brought our coats,” I said.

Mom said, “You need help, David.” She took little steps back and pushed us behind her. Under all the brown on Jaime’s face, her lips looked blue. I shivered and pulled Jaime close.

“They’re my kids, too,” he said. “I miss them.”

Mom said, “I won’t let you hurt them.” We kept backing up.

He looked down at us. “You girls know Daddy would never hurt you, right?” He smiled but it was strained. He glared at Mom. “Why are you trying to scare them?”

“Liz, get Jaime in the car,” Mom said. I put my arm around Jaime’s shoulders and opened the car door, but we both stood and watched our parents.

“That’s my car,” Dad said, stuffing his hands into his jeans pockets. “You stole it.”

“Do you want to talk about all my things you stole?” Mom said, her voice rising. “Or trashed or sold or destroyed?”

“Hey, come on,” Dad said. “I just wanted to see my daughters.” His blue eyes shone in the darkening afternoon light.

Mom said, “Girls, get in the car, now.”

Dad’s eyebrows creased. Tears slipped out of his squinted eyes. “Please, Linda,” he said. “Can’t I at least hug them good-bye?”

Dad begged with his eyes. Mom rolled hers and said, “Fine.”

He kneeled and opened his arms. Jaime darted into him as fast as she could. Dad kissed her head and squeezed her until she groaned. “Daddy bear hug,” he said. “The biggest of them all.”

She wrapped her short arms around his neck and said, “Baby bear hug.”

He loosened his grip on Jaime to let me into the embrace. His pungent Old Spice scent was strong, and as he held us he repeated, “I love you, girls. Don’t you forget that. Daddy loves you so much.”

“We love you, too, Dad,” Jaime said.

“All right, that’s enough,” Mom said. One hot tear dripped off Dad’s chin and landed on my cheek before he let us go.

Mom shut us into the backseat and got in the orange car whose bumper still faced skyward and whose tires still made a scraping sound when they turned right.

“You can’t do this, you bi—” Dad said, standing up and balling his hands into fists.

She started the engine. “Good-bye, David.”

“No, wait,” he said and pressed his palms to the glass window. “No, please, I’m sorry,” he said. Mom didn’t look at him. Jaime
cried as I buckled her seat belt. He moved to our window and peered in. He smiled at us. “I’ll see you girls again soon,” he said. Mom rolled forward. “This isn’t fair.” He pounded his pale fist on the hood as we moved out of his reach. “I’ll find you again!”

I imagined my dad still standing there on the wet grass, rain clearing spots in the mud on his jacket and on his face long after we had rushed back to Deborah’s, showered, packed our few belongings, and were driving again in the dark on unlit, two-lane country roads.

Jaime doesn’t call the next
day and I turn down an invitation from Dean to go to the mall after school so I can sit by Tammy’s white cordless phone picking at my cuticles and thinking of all the ways Dad could hurt my sister. All the ways he already has. I peel squishy strips of flesh from around my nails and watch as red liquid fills the gullies left by the missing skin. I suck the blood from my fingers and remember four-year-old Jaime on the bank of a dark green river with a grimy silver fishhook stuck through the rose-colored sole of her foot. The damp air smelled like wet metal, mud, and rotting plants. The sky was dark sapphire in between cotton puffs of light gray clouds tumbling in the wind. Our dad held Jaime’s small heel in one hand and gripped the hook with the other. His blue eyes narrowed and he said, “This is going to sting.”