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Authors: Elisabeth Hyde

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BOOK: The Abortionist's Daughter
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Snowflakes collected on his shoulders, and as the wind picked up, he put his jacket on and turned up the collar. Watching him walk away, it seemed like a dramatic occasion for Megan, cinematically so, with the snow swirling down and the man heading off into the dark and the woman standing in the doorway watching him go; and she might have felt like Scarlett watching Rhett walk off into the fog, except their situations were so completely the opposite—
she
was the one who didn’t really give a damn anymore. Plus Scarlett O’Hara was such a flake with men.

She stood in the doorway until he drove off, then went back inside. Best not to try to invent all this meaning and melodrama, she told herself. You’re just a girl breaking up with a boy, no more, no less.

—————

It amazed her that he could disappear so completely. But he did, and over the next several weeks she saw him all of two times outside of their classes together. He seemed to have a new girlfriend, a mousy sophomore known for giving blow jobs. He withdrew his application to Princeton, she learned, and decided to go to the state college up north. She wrote him an e-mail saying she hoped he’d be happy up there. It was a good school, she wrote.
WHOOP-TE-DO,
he wrote back.

Things with her mother deteriorated even more after that. Diana wanted what Megan refused to give, which was access to her inner thoughts and feelings. How could she tell her mother that she’d been right to call Bill obsequious? (Megan had had to look up the word.) She just wanted to be left alone. Diana would come into her room at night, just before bed, and start talking about her own escapades in high school and college, which Megan didn’t want to hear.

In March she began to find things in her locker. Chocolates. Roses. Unsigned cards. Somehow she got on a pornographic e-mail list and found herself barraged with lewd suggestions that seemed more personal than most. She changed both her screen name and her server, and the messages stopped.

Then in April she received a thin, business-size envelope from Princeton. This came as a shock, and she wished now she’d applied to some other colleges. But with her only backup the local university, she realized she was going to be spending the next four years of her life here in this town. She could either feel sorry for herself or make good of it. Being a pragmatic sort, she opted for the latter and negotiated a written agreement with her parents that she wouldn’t be coming home every weekend and they were not to just drop in unannounced. Diana and Frank thought it was an act of maturity on her part, and signed proudly.

And so late in August Megan moved into her dorm, and Bill moved fifty miles to the north. The e-mails stopped. The flowers stopped. The chocolates stopped. Megan began a rigorous schedule that left little time for a social life; she might blow off a Saturday night with her roommate, but other than that she studied just about every evening.

It surprised her, how easy it was to start a new life.

CHAPTER FOUR

——————

AT TWO O’CLOCK
on Wednesday morning, Frank struck a match to the first cigarette since Megan was born. He’d bummed it earlier that night from one of the cops, had tucked it into his breast pocket as a kind of security blanket. But the craving had grown until it paralyzed him, and now, standing in front of the kitchen sink, he inhaled slowly and deeply, tipping his head, letting the smoke tickle the back of his throat before drawing it deep into his lungs.

He looked at the clock. Piper would be finishing up soon. He trusted Piper, but part of him worried that merely by cutting open the physical body, Piper would be able to detect what Diana was thinking at the moment of death.

I hold you responsible.

Frank drew deeply on the cigarette and recalled with grim objectivity the fury he’d felt the day before. He’d been livid, absolutely livid as he sped from his office back to the house. The fact was, he
did
blame Diana for what he’d seen online. If she hadn’t always been so permissive with Megan! Letting her wear a sundress in the middle of winter, or pierce her ears at the age of six, or stay up past midnight on New Year’s Eve—whatever Megan wanted, Diana always said it was up to her. When Megan was young, none of it had really mattered. But as Megan grew, the stakes grew, and suddenly there was his wife letting Megan make decisions that no child should make. Such as which middle school to attend, for example! Wasn’t that a decision for parents to make? That, and curfew, and your punishment for breaking curfew?
Well, Megan, what do you think the consequences should be?

And then there was the whole issue of sex. In Frank’s opinion—well, not that he was expecting Megan to remain a virgin until marriage, but sex was a big commitment, with big consequences, and teenagers by definition were not ready. And he’d always wanted to tell Megan just that. But Diana! Diana maintained that anything they said at this point was going to go in one ear and out the other, and they might as well bypass the
oh my god sex is such a big deal
route and get straight to the matter of contraceptives and HIV protection. And he’d bought into it.

In the dim light of the kitchen, Frank leaned against the center island and took another long draw on the cigarette. Diana could never face up to the fact that she was a parent, not a pal. Maybe there’d have been less animosity between mother and daughter, he thought now, if Diana had taken her parenting role more seriously.

He flicked his ashes into the sink, conscious of the police officer standing just outside the door, of the muffled voices and footsteps of the detectives out in the solarium. He knew that any recriminations he might have at this point against his wife were the stuff of fancy; he knew too that their wretched, petty disagreements were a luxury he’d be lucky to have. Yet anger at his wife continued to boil up as though she weren’t dead. What kind of a girl went and posed like that, anyway? he still wanted to demand. Someone who didn’t have enough guidance growing up, that’s who.

“I’ll go buy you a whole pack, if you want.”

Startled, he glanced up to see Megan standing in the doorway. Her hair was disheveled, and her face was so puffy and swollen that for a fleeting moment she resembled her brother, Ben. (Except for the eyes. Nobody had eyes like Ben’s, wide apart and slanted, flush with his forehead. Ben’s face had always seemed to him as flat as a piece of construction paper, and he used to imagine a troop of gods in a kindergarten class, armed with scissors and paste, cutting and folding and fringing a new race of people.)

“Never would have guessed it, Pop,” she said flatly.

Frank, embarrassed, ran the cigarette under water and dropped it into the disposal. “Did you sleep?”

She shrugged and straddled a stool at the island and tilted her head to finger-comb her curls in a manner that recalled the picture online.

“Did Piper call yet?” she asked.

“No.”

“So what happens tomorrow?”

“We make a lot of phone calls,” he said.

“Do we get Mom’s body back?”

The blunt edge of her words dug another hole in his stomach. “After they finish the autopsy,” he said.

“I guess we’re going to have a funeral,” she ventured.

“That’s usually how it works.” He intended it as a light reply, but it came out snide and sarcastic. A shadow crossed her face, and once again he felt something quicken in the bottom of his chest, in that space where dead air collects. He reminded himself there was no room for mistakes like this; it was just the two of them now. They
were
the family. He flashed on Christmases to come: not bothering to wrap their gifts, maybe a pizza or two, Diet Cokes, store-bought cookies.

How was he ever going to parent this girl all by himself? For as much as he resented Diana’s leniency, he also knew it had provided a necessary balance to his strictness. If it hadn’t been for Diana, Megan would have grown up shackled by his rules, a churchy Girl Scoutish type who would have rebelled either by shooting heroin or signing up with the Moonies and he’d never see her again.

“Didn’t she want to be cremated anyway?” said Megan. “Why do we even need a funeral home? And why is it called a home? Whose home are they talking about? Not Mom’s, that’s for sure.”

“Yes, she wanted to be cremated,” said Frank, “but we still need a funeral home for a service.”

“Well, they better not make any references to God,” said Megan. “Mom would hate that.”

“We’ll make sure,” Frank said. He didn’t point out to Megan that since Diana was an atheist, it wouldn’t much matter what they said at her funeral, as far as offending her. Gone was gone.

Just then the phone rang, and Frank picked it up before Megan could reach for it. It was Piper. He turned away from Megan.

“This is just preliminary,” Piper warned.

“And?”

“Is Megan with you?”

“Does it matter?”

There was silence on the other end.

“Look,” Piper finally said, “this is pretty difficult for both of us.”

Megan was trailing him like a puppy, parking herself directly in his gaze no matter which way he turned. Frank waved her away. Megan crossed her arms.

“Go ahead,” he told Piper.

“Well,” she said, “first of all she had a blood alcohol level of point-oh-nine. That’s legally intoxicated.”

“I know the numbers.”

“So on the one hand, I’m tempted to just say that she got a little drunk and fell and hit her head.”

“But?”

“It’s this bruise,” she said. “It’s just not the kind you’d get from a fall. There’s too much trauma. On the other hand, it doesn’t really look like it was made by some kind of blunt instrument, either,” she said. “Like I don’t think we’re talking crowbars here.”

“Gee.”

“Sorry. Do you want me to stop?”

“No,” said Frank.

“You sure?”

“Just go on,” he said.

Piper took a deep breath. “Now, the bruise looks like something that could have happened if someone threw her down with some extra force,” she said. “Have the cops found any other signs of a struggle?”

Frank thought of the shards of glass he’d swept up.

“Okay, I guess it’s a little early for that. Well, in any case, she died about six p.m.,” said Piper. “What time did you get home?”

“Eight-thirty.”

“Working late?”

“No,” said Frank.

Piper waited, but Frank didn’t feel like elaborating.

She said, “And you found her floating in the pool?”

“Right.”

“God, Frank,” she said. “I’m sorry.”

Megan was scribbling on a piece of paper, which she then handed to him. He read it and frowned. “Megan wants to know if there were traces of Valium,” he told Piper.

“No. Why? Does she have a scrip for Valium?”

“I don’t know.”

“You don’t?”

Frank bristled. “Look, Diana has been on a lot of medications,” he said. “I don’t keep track of them all.”

“Well, she didn’t take any Valium tonight,” she said. “This is all I have. Blood alcohol of point-oh-nine and severe head trauma. Look, Frank,” she said, “I need to tell you something else. I’m going to have John perform the complete autopsy and write up the report. I’ve got to be professional here,” she said. “You and I are friends. I don’t want the report thrown out for bias.”

“What, so you think I killed her?”

“No, Frank,” she said. “But I’ve been in court. I know what they can do with a written report. Let’s just take steps to make sure everything’s above board here.”

“Jesus, Piper.”

“Frank, you’re tired,” she said. “You’re tired and about as stressed as anybody can possibly be. It’s no big deal, John writing the report. It won’t say anything different from what I would say. It’s just that John’s not a good friend of yours.”

“So?”

Piper was quiet for a moment. “We go back a bit, Frank,” she reminded him.

Frank looked up. Megan was watching him closely. He scribbled the words
nothing final
on a piece of paper, then stepped out onto the deck and huddled back against the door, where the deck was barren of snow. The sky had cleared, but the air remained frigid.

“What are you saying, Piper?” he said in a low voice. “You suddenly feel like telling the whole town we slept together a couple of times?”

“It was more than a couple of times,” said Piper, “if you remember. And I wouldn’t have to tell anyone; the whole town knew. Look, Frank, I don’t think you realize something. This isn’t just some accident in a pool. And Diana’s not Marcus Welby. The press is going to be all over this tomorrow. Now, I’m your friend, but I’ve got two kids in college and I’m up for reelection next year. Do you see what I’m saying?”

She was right, but Frank felt a strong sense not only of abandonment but of accusation as well. Having once been intimate with him, Piper knew a lot of things about his relationship with Diana that most people didn’t know. And she knew
him
too: how under the right set of circumstances, his temper could flare.

“So fine,” he said. “Have John write up the report.”

“I will. And Frank?”

“What?”

“You’re going to need an attorney,” she said.

—————

The children who lived on Hill Street were crushed to learn that after fourteen hours of blizzardlike conditions, school authorities still refused to declare a snow day on that cold Wednesday morning. Particularly crushed because, having had no major snowstorms in three years, they’d spent the previous night waxing sleds and tying up phone lines as they debated the relative merits of every hill, every slope in the neighborhood. Given their high expectations, the disheartening news from the radio that morning gave them no recourse but to crawl back into bed and groan and complain until their parents (who felt quite the opposite about snow days, who hated them with a vengeance for the hole they dug into daily routines) threatened to withhold television privileges if the kids didn’t snap to it and get moving.

So the kids got up; they got dressed; they ate their breakfasts with morose faces. But then they opened their doors and saw the yellow tape stretched all around the Thompson-Duprey yard—the people who’d put a friggin’
pool
in their house and never invited anyone to try it
out
!—and their long gloomy faces lit up. A crime! In their neighborhood! Wow!

BOOK: The Abortionist's Daughter
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