Healing Waters (30 page)

“You're her legal guardian, then, now that her mother is incapacitated?”

I struggled to swallow. This was why I despised these people so much, no matter how warm and fuzzy this one tried to be.

“No, I'm not,” I said. “But as her aunt, I am not—”

Schmacker put her hand up. “Don't worry. I'm not going to try to usurp your authority. How about a compromise?”

How about no?

But I said, “What would that be?”

She held up the paper. “I will leave this list with you, and sometime, when you and Bethany are just chatting, you might ask her about some of the people on it. Who was nice, who wasn't. Who liked Mommy, who didn't. Make it a game.”

I shook my head. “I can already tell you that Bethany will be no help whatsoever. They sheltered her from everything that went on.”

Agent Schmacker gave me a long look before, still holding the paper, she put her fingers in the corners of her mouth and produced a high-pitched whistle. J. Edgar twisted in midair and made a beeline for her, with Bethany and James-Lawson behind him.

“Children are aware of a lot more than we think,” she said to me. “I'd appreciate anything you can find out.”

Which would be nada.

J. Edgar jumped into her arms and snuffled at her face.

“Does he have to go now?” Bethany said.

“He does. We have work to do.”

“Oh.” Bethany twisted the bottom of her shirt in her fingers. “Will you ever bring him back?”

“Would you like for me to bring him back?”

She nodded hungrily. James-Lawson chimed in with his “Me too.”

I glared at Schmacker.
Oh, I'll get you, my pretty. And your little
dog too.

“Then he'll be back to visit,” she said.

She touched Bethany and James-Lawson each lightly on the head, pressed the list into my hand, and went toward her car with the panting J. Edgar pug.

Bethany ran to the driveway and waved until they were out of sight, and it shook me to the core of all the stuff I had crammed inside myself.

She truly was afraid to take a step without asking somebody's permission. She was defeated by the slightest hint that she'd said something wrong. It took small beings like a four-year-old boy and a homely animal to make her at ease enough to smile, beings who wouldn't tell her to go away, be quiet, eat a cookie and be happy with that. J. Edgar and James-Lawson had achieved what no one else in her little life had: they had made her believe that there wasn't always someone else more important than she was.

When Agent Schmaker's car disappeared around the corner, Bethany trudged back to James-Lawson and me. The glow left her face, and I couldn't let it go.

“You know,” I said, “we have other animal friends right here.”

James-Lawson took a survey of the lawn. “Where?”

“Right there,” I said.

I pointed to a blue heron that stood skinny-knee deep near the bank. I had actually taken an immediate dislike to the bird the first time I saw him, since he was thin and graceful, but he might serve me well at the moment. If he did, I would thank him later.

“What's his name?” James-Lawson said.

“He hasn't told me,” I said. “We've only just met. Why don't you two give him one?”

“We can do that?” Bethany said.

“Of course.”

“May we name him J. Edgar?”

I hated to squelch this burst of creativity, but I wanted to keep Agent Schmacker off her radar.

“Do you think J. Edgar would want to share his name?” I said. Bethany shook her head and looked faintly frustrated.

“Okay,” I said. “What about Harry? Harry the Heron?”

It wasn't terribly inspired, but the dimples returned, and James-Lawson ran toward the river, hand already outstretched. I could have predicted that he'd say, “Nice to meet you, Harry the Heron,” which he did.

Harry beat his wings against the air and lifted himself easily out of reach of the small boy who would have shaken his claw if he'd allowed it.

“Hey, Mama—that's Harry the Heron.”

I turned to see James-Lawson jumping into Wesley's arms. Bethany looked on as if she were watching a display she'd never been privy to before. I wanted to hold her, but so far I'd felt the invisible shield that said,
I don't want anybody touching me. It hurts
when they let go.

James-Lawson finished informing his mother of everything we had said, done, and eaten in her absence—punctuating himself with ‘You know whats?' and then grabbing Bethany's hand and pulling her to the stack of rocks they'd collected.

“You're good with him,” Wesley said to me.

“He's good with
me
,” I said. “He pretty much tells me what needs to happen, and I'm happy to oblige.”

“That's what you do, isn't it?” Her eyes were pouring their oil into mine. “Let's sit for a minute.”

I followed her to the chairs Sullivan and I had left on the lawn. I didn't hesitate to sit in one now that I knew I would fit into it without a shoehorn. Besides, once again I knew I couldn't argue with this woman, even if she was about to call me on something. I could see it in her lips.

“I'm not letting James-Lawson do anything he shouldn't,” I said.

“Oh, I know that. But you're letting your sister get away with everything.”

“Excuse me?”

“This is probably going to make you mad, but it's got to be said. You are at that woman's beck and call. I'm talking about ‘Lucia, take care of me while I refuse to take care of myself.' ” Her voice rose in pitch. “‘Lucia, take care of my baby, because I won't do that either.' ‘Oh, and Lucia, honey, could you do everything Marnie can't do because I'm drivin' her to drink?' ”

To my own utter surprise I laughed out loud.

“I'm not trying to be funny.”

“No,” I said. “It's just that I thought that same thing not a day ago. I feel like a waitress for Sonia's life.”

“Girl, from what I can see, you are a waitress for everybody's life.” She waved her hand. “But that is not my business. Sonia is my business, and if you keep doing everything for her, she is never going to recover.”

Lucia Marie—don't you listen to this.

But I did, because Wesley Kane's voice spoke with more power than my mother's tape, and that was a first.

“I know you are crazy in love with that child.” Wesley nodded toward Bethany. “But you catering to Sonia's every whim is not helping either one of them. Now I am not going to tell you how to run the rest of your life . . .”

Though she clearly would have been glad to, and I might have let her.

“. . . But I will tell you that you have to stop doing the hydrotherapy on Sonia's face. She can do that herself now. The same goes for the medication, taking care of her mask, and her mouth prosthesis.”

“Which I can't convince her she has to wear.”

Wesley pulled her chin in. “Do you hear yourself?
You
have to convince her to wear the thing that is going to keep her mouth from turning into this?”

She pulled her lips sideways and looked like the figure in the
Scream
painting. I wanted to laugh again. I also wanted to cry.

“I've left her a list of the things she has to do for her self-care,” she said, “and if you want to help your sister—and that precious baby girl—you won't do any of the things that are on it.”

I could feel the slats of the chair pressing into my back. “I won't know what to do with myself,” I said.

“If I were you, staying in this beautiful place”—Wesley pointed her chin toward the river the children were tossing their stones into—“I'd be in there swimming every day.”

“I love to swim, and I would if I owned a bathing suit—and there were no neighbors—and I didn't have stick women all over the place.”

Had I actually just said that? Out loud?

Apparently so, because Wesley's face contorted. “Whatchoo talkin' 'bout, girl?”

The professional voice was gone. I got the feeling we were suddenly two sisters in the 'hood or something.

“I'm talking about this body,” I said.

“What about it?”

I just looked at her.

“It's not like you have your own zip code,” she said. “You got some junk in the trunk, but—”

“Junk in the trunk?”

She leaned forward and patted her backside. “I have some too. That wouldn't keep me out of that water. You white women kill me, all wanting to look like death on a cracker.”

I could only laugh until tears stung my eyes.

“That's it,” she said. “Tomorrow I am bringing you a swimming suit.”

I opened my mouth to protest, but she put her hand practically in it.

“I don't want to hear about what size you wear and don't wear or any of that. You just going to put it on and go in the water with those children and have a ball.”

“Only if you'll bring one for yourself and get in with us,” I said.

I waited for the
That would be unprofessional
, but she smiled her magnificent smile.

“I thought you were never going to ask,” she said.

CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

S
ully experienced some serious déjà vu when he walked into the San Antonio Taco Company, known in his divinity school days as SATCO. The customer still had to walk down a narrow corridor and check off his choice of future heartburn on a printed form to be handed to the cashier. Sully picked the bottled water and leaned against a post, more to stem the tide of memories than to look for a table.

They used to come here a lot, he and Lynn and their divinity school friends, not for the food or the atmosphere, but for the price. How many late nights and Saturday afternoons had they spent here, feeding themselves soggy tacos and unspeakable guacamole and debating things like free will vs. the sovereignty of God?

There were three tracks in the divinity school—for ministers, academics, and seekers—and all three had been represented in the group. Sully bristled at the memory that he had been the academic.

He found a corner table and sank into a red plastic chair. His eyes went to an object hanging from the ceiling over the cash register, a replica of a handgun with a sign that read,
WE DON'T CALL
911
. . . A whole chunk of conversation dropped into his mind.

“I don't get that,” Lynn had said the first night they went in there after the thing went up.

“That's because you're the kind of person who doesn't need to get it.”

Who had said that? Anna—or that guy she ended up marrying? What was his name? He'd called himself a recovering Catholic.

“Why don't I need to get it?” Lynn said.

“Because, darlin',” he himself said, “you're not going to come in here and try to hold the place up or take out somebody eating an enchilada.”

Everyone else chimed in.

“They're saying you don't get a chance at a trial.”

“Or an ambulance.”

“They just shoot you.”

Sully recalled Lynn blushing up to the roots of her hair. “Oh,” she'd said. “Du-uh.”

“What duh?” He was sure Anna had said it. “The fact that you don't get it is what I love about you. You're so innocent.”

Lynn laughed then—the bell of a laugh he'd loved so much. “Good,” she'd said. “I thought I was just being stupid. As usual.”

Sully scraped at the wrapper on his water bottle. He couldn't remember what he'd said then. He hoped he'd taken her in his arms and assured her she was far from stupid. He truly hoped so.

“No—no bucket today,” a familiar voice said.

Sully looked toward the counter, and there she was. The San Antonio Taco Company had changed less than Anna Thatcher-Dickinson had. The only thing he recognized about her was the signature out-of-control hair, thick and poodle curly and barely kept in line by several devices that looked to Sully like chopsticks. Some gray shot through the dark brown now.

Her face, however, made her look as if she'd exchanged her former self for a new one. She used to travel everywhere on a ten-speed bike and eat only food that had never had a face, all of which had left her as bright eyed as the Energizer Bunny. Either the diet or the mode of transportation had evidently gone by the wayside over the last thirteen years, because her eyes sagged as she navigated the tables to get to him, and her mouth had settled into a discontented line.

“Sully,” she said when she finally reached him. “I would have known you anywhere. Why have I aged and you haven't? There's no justice.”

Sully grinned as he accepted her hug. That was why he and Lynn had liked her so much. She always saved people the trouble of being diplomatic.

“Have you ordered?”

At the shake of his head, she waved him off.

“That's okay, I probably got enough for both of us and a small third world country.”

She then gave a thumbnail sketch of the last decade of her life, which revealed that whatever she'd been looking for as a “seeker” at Vanderbilt Divinity School still had not been found. She was interrupted by the announcement that her order was ready. She started right in on the chalupas without missing a beat in her monologue.

“What about you? You said over the phone you wanted to talk about Lynn.” She dabbed sour cream from her chin. “Are you writing your memoirs or something? I've read some of your books, by the way. Not bad.”

“Thanks.”

She pointed to the Spanish rice, but he shook his head.

“I just have a couple of questions,” he said. “Just to button some things up.”

How cheesy did that sound? Why didn't he at least pretend to want to give her a personal update? He was really bad at this.

“So, like what?” she said.