The Tides (27 page)

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either had said to the other, 'We need to talk.' Neither had suggested or agreed to the walk to this peculiar space. But here they were, and secrets wove them together, braided them apart.

Rebecca remembered a place not at all like this, a leafy and piney wood, and it must have been a rainy day instead of a sunny one because needles of stormy light, wands of cloud had hung down among the trees. A place not at all like this place, a time not at all like this time, but something was causing her to remember.

She realized what it was: the presence of secrets, something, someone secret. Waiting for someone secret in a wood. Someone who never came.

'How are things with Kurt?'

It was a strange thing to ask under the circumstances. It was also so unlike her mother to ask such a thing that Rebecca's mind went blank and her mouth wordlessly opened and shut. Her father had greeted Kurt, the few times he'd been in his company, alternately like a long-lost relative whose identity he couldn't quite pinpoint but who was indisputably somebody important, and like a complete stranger with no significance whatsoever. Her mother, unfailingly polite to Kurt's face, had hardly ever mentioned him otherwise. Maybe she didn't approve of their living together, but that was sheer speculation; actually Rebecca had no idea what her mother's moral stance on that or any other subject might be.

What could be the import of such a query now? Was it small talk, a conversational gambit intended to divert from the numerous difficult topics at hand? Or was it leading somewhere?

'Fine,' she could say, and leave it at that. Or she could add some detail that pretended to be revealing but really

obfuscated: 'We don't see each other very often, we're both so busy,' or 'He fenced-in the back yard last weekend so now he can get the dog he's been wanting.'

'Not good,' she found herself confessing. 'It's not a very close relationship. We don't seem to have
—
I don't know, to have found each other.' Suddenly, surprisingly, the barrenness of it struck her, brought tears to her eyes.

'You shouldn't settle for that,' her mother declared. 'There's more to life than that.'

'Mom,' Rebecca dared to ask, 'have you been happy with Dad?'

The answer was emphatic. 'Yes. Very.'

'But what about Faye?' There. The name was said. Whether or not her mother had meant to be leading up to Faye, they were in her presence now.

'More than once over the years she did her best to come between us,' Billie said in a rush, and Rebecca sat back, hugging herself, trying to be ready for whatever onslaught was to come, 'but we were stronger than she was. Stronger than she expected. Now Marshall's
losing himself, and she sees her chance. I should have known.'

'I thought you said she was dead.'

'Nobody knows what happened to her. At least, I don't know. Maybe your father knows. Knew. We heard rumors that she was dead. He said she was dead.'

'Rumors from whom?'

'From people who knew her. People whose lives she ruined, or tried to. People who still loved her. Not very many people ever could stop loving Faye.'

'How did she die?'

'We heard more than one story, but they all had something to do with those ridiculous scarves of hers. The end got caught in the wheels of a carnival ride and strangled
her. A man, or a woman ' Billie snorted 'she'd jilted stuffed it down her throat. Some underworld character she was involved with soaked it in something and held it over her nose and mouth till she suffocated.'

'Wow,' was all Rebecca could think to say.

Below them, under the lip of the dry lake-bowl where neither of them could yet see it, a glitter crept toward them. There was no substance to it, no core around which its sparkles and colors were organized, but it had speed and energy, vivacity and magnetism, and it knew what it wanted.

'You said she was evil,' Rebecca said, carefully advancing the discussion. 'That's not just because Dad loved her before he loved you.' Speaking of her parents' love caused her discomfort, and she hastened ahead. 'You had other reasons?'

'Yes.'

Rebecca waited. When it became clear that her mother wasn't going to elaborate, she took another risk. 'If you could tell me something about her, maybe we could figure out why Dad's so afraid of her now.'

'I know why he's afraid. I'm afraid, too. Faye always was somebody worth being afraid of.'

'Tell me.'

'She always went for weakness,' Billie said. 'She'd make friends with somebody when they were down and out in one way or another, convince them she was the best thing that ever happened to them and they'd just love her, they'd do anything for her, and she'd just kind of take them over, use them up, and then when she got bored she'd leave them.'

'Did she do that to you?'

Her mother stiffened. 'Me? No. Before she met your
father, and even after she was with him, she tried to be my friend, but I saw right through her. She never got anywhere with me. Not really.'

Remembering the story about her mother rescuing Faye in the wood, Rebecca wondered about this. But she let it go.

'But I saw what she did to other people. I kept my distance.'

Rebecca craved detail, yearned to fully imagine this Faye. 'Give me an example.'

Her mother hesitated, then seemed to make a decision. 'There was this girl we worked with. Her husband beat her. Everybody suspected it, we saw the bruises, but she'd never talk about it, she was so afraid of him
—
ashamed, I don't know. I don't understand women like that. Faye got on her good side, persuaded her to confide in her, and then Faye went and got the husband in bed and told him everything the girl'd said. He killed her.'

Rebecca breathed, 'Jesus.'

Billie nodded. 'I'll always believe Faye knew exactly what she was doing. She acted shocked and horrified, cried and carried on, but I saw the look in her eyes.'

'Why would she do that?'

'For fun.'

'That's hard to believe.'

'And because she didn't have a life of her own. She didn't know who she was if she wasn't stealing pieces of other people's lives. That's what made her so appealing. It's what made her so dangerous, too.'

'Was Dad like that? Weak and vulnerable?' Sadly, it wasn't hard to imagine.

Billie nodded again. 'I guess he was a broken man. From the war, you know.'

Rebecca didn't know exactly what that meant and couldn't bring herself to ask.

'He sees her,' Billie said resentfully. 'He says she's come back, and she tells him awful things. Sometimes he thinks I'm her.' This last was particularly offensive, and obviously she could scarcely bring herself to say it. Rebecca recognized the maternal sacrifice; in some way she didn't comprehend, her mother was telling her these things for her own good.

'More and more he doesn't know who I am either. Maybe he thinks I'm Faye, too.' This time it was Rebecca who laughed ruefully and Billie who winced.

'But I don't look a thing like her!' her mother protested. 'She was smaller and prettier than I ever was. She was the kind of girl who made men and women turn their heads. Real nice to look at, if you didn't know what was under the surface. Like a pretty flower with poison in its heart.'

She ought to say something complimentary about her mother's appearance. It wouldn't have been hard, for Billie Emig was a pleasant-looking woman; people might not turn their heads to stare at her, but they certainly didn't turn away, either. Instead, Rebecca was driven to ask, almost meekly, 'What did she look like?' But that wasn't sufficiently to the point, and she gathered her courage. 'Could he think
—
do I look anything like her?'

Her mother's long silence gave her the answer, but she waited for the description that finally came. 'She had blonde curly hair - sometimes, when it wasn't red or black or silver. Marshall told me once he thought blonde was her natural color. She was small. She had big blue eyes. She always looked younger than she probably was, although she kept her age a secret, like a lot of other things.'

Rebecca's next question followed of its own accord; all she had to do was stay out of the way. 'Was she my mother, Mom?'

Billie sat very still. Rebecca heard traffic noise, her own heartbeat, a peculiar sizzling like the sound of Fourth of July sparklers setting something afire. 'She gave birth to you. I am your mother.'

'She died when I was little,' Rebecca breathed. 'Didn't she? I remember her. I remember waiting for her to come back. She couldn't come back, because she died. It wasn't her fault.' Sorrow for the woman who had died swept her, then a fiercer sorrow for the little girl waiting.

'She could have come back.' Billie told her grimly. 'She didn't die, not then. You might as well know everything. We were afraid she'd come back and steal you or hurt you, but she didn't. She was a selfish, headstrong, evil person, Becky, and she just flat-out left you. I wanted you. I wanted to be your mother, and I was. I am.'

There was another silence. Several times Rebecca tried to speak, but instead ran her tongue around the inside of her mouth and swallowed, taking in the bitter taste of sweet-smelling roses. At last she managed to croak, 'Am I like her?' hoping and dreading that she would be told yes.

'I don't think Faye had a self,' Billie answered slowly. 'Do you have a self, Rebecca? Do you know who you are? You're the only one who can answer that.'

Something shot across the plane of the lake bowl as if on a glossy quivering membrane of surface tension, straight for Rebecca.

Her mother didn't see it, didn't feel its seduction or its threat, didn't recognize Rebecca's choking as anything other than sobs. But she got to her daughter before Faye did, and wrapped her in her sturdy arms.

'My name is Myra Larsen and I am suffering! My name is Myra Larsen and I am suffering! Ohh! Listen to me, girlie, and you might learn something!'

Whispering, stiff as she could make herself in a chair in Myra's old room, which was still unoccupied because of The Tides' low census, Naomi Murphy reached out with one hand clawed like Myra's, then with the other, doing her best to feel the hands mittened, warm and itchy. She whispered, whispered the holy words.

'I am Joan of Arc and they are burning me at the stake! I am Joan of Arc and they are burning me at the stake! Ohh! Yes, yes, it hurts!' Nothing hurt, but Naomi had the glorious sense of being on the very brink of suffering.

Being able to shift position in the uncomfortable chair gave her to understand that she had too much freedom of movement. Not at all unsure of her footing although she wished to be, wished to collapse, she walked down the shiny, acrid-smelling corridor to the clean-linen closet, from which she took one white sheet. No one asked her about it, for she had done this before, fetched a sheet for the purpose of restraining someone, though always someone else. Excitement made her weak for a passing moment, but she held onto a shelf until the weakness waned and was replaced by strength, the promise of transcendent strength.

Back to the empty room and the imprisoning chair, Naomi folded the sheet into a strip narrow enough to go under her arms and across her chest, wide enough to bind her in place. It was too bulky to be reliable, and she wished she had a real Posey vest restraint, but they were in short supply, and the aides said sheets worked fine, never mind that sometimes the Health Department would write you up for using them.

Unable to get the sheet secured behind the chair, Naomi settled for tying it in front, but it wasn't good enough. The knot was right there under her hands and she could loosen it whenever she wanted. Almost, she gave in to despair.

Her chant this time was just slightly audible. 'My name is Myra Larsen and I don't belong here! Sit down and listen, girlie, and you might learn something! Ohh!' The pressure of the sheet over her breasts did cause a little pain, but not very much, not nearly enough. 'Ohh!'

It was lunchtime, first shift, and all the residents from this wing, the intermediate unit, were in the dining room. Staff were at the other end getting people ready for the second shift, or picking up trays for the feeders and others who couldn't leave their rooms.

Abby, unwillingly, was in Alex Booth's room, with the door closed behind her as he had instructed. She was standing all the way across the room from him, with her hands behind her back, and his head thrashed on his flat pillow as he tried to find an angle from which he could see her. 'Abby, Abby, I've got to get out of this place. So do you. Something's going on around here. It's not safe.'

'Where can you go?'
Where, she almost added, can I go?

'Come home with me.'

She was afraid of him. She was afraid of herself with him. If she ran out of this room right now, he'd have no way to make her come back. 'What are you talking about?'

'Ordinarily I would require my wife's agreement. As it happens, she and the girls are in Texas, staying with her mother. Indefinitely. I think they've left me.'

'You didn't tell me.'

'You've been avoiding me.'

Abby leaned her head
back against the wall and burst
into tears. 'I'm sorry, Alex! I don't know what happened! I'm sorry! I didn't mean to hurt you! I'm so sorry.'

He didn't say it was all right, he understood, although he did, fully, understand. He didn't tell her he hadn't been hurt, although he hadn't. He didn't urge her not to cry. He said, 'I haven't told anyone about that, Abby. I haven't notified the authorities.'

It was a measure of his own agitation, which he had no physical means of relieving or expressing, that he couldn't tell whether or not she'd taken his point. He couldn't afford to lose his bearings like that.

He waited only until her weeping had quieted enough that he could be heard over it. 'I have a proposition for you,' he said then, and Abby had no choice but to listen. He spoke quickly. He had given this a good deal of thought. 'Room and board for you and the girls, plus a salary we'll negotiate but certainly more than you're making here. In return, you take care of all my physical needs
—
you know what they areas well as other personal services such as correspondence, driving the van, and so on.'

Abby seized on something to object to. 'I don't know how to drive a van.'

'It isn't hard,' he said gently, reprovingly. 'I'll teach you. Oh, and you'll do all the cooking and housework.'

'Kind of like a wife.' She laughed nervously through the still-falling tears and pushed herself away from the wall to go forward, not close enough to touch him but into his field of vision.

He regarded her steadily. 'In some ways. Not in all. Some things cannot be paid for.'

She blushed. 'What will Jenny say?'

'I told you. Jenny is in Texas
. Indefinitely.'

'But what about when she finds out another woman is in her house?'

'Let me take care of that. What do you think of my offer?'

'I have to think about it.'

'But, Abby, do you have an objection?' He knew she didn't.

'I just need time to think about it.'

He pressed. 'We don't have much time. I don't think either one of us has much time.'

'I don't know what you're talking about,' she said feebly, but it seemed to her that somehow she did, and that scared her even more.

'Abby,' he said again, quietly, 'we need each other.'

No one was aware of Naomi in Myra Larsen's old room, in Myra Larsen's chair, assuming as much of Myra Larsen's aspect as she could fix in her mind. Naomi didn't intend to be heard, certainly did not want to be rescued. When behind her lids her vision began to fill with fuzzy pink and lavender swirls, and a carefree little song came into her ears, she thought perhaps she was losing or alt
e
ring consciousness. But then, clearly, she felt hands untying the sheet, and she squirmed in protest.

'Wait,' a pretty voice crooned. 'Let me help you. I know how.'

'My name is Esther Rosen and they are taking me to the camps! My name is Esther Rosen and they are taking me to the camps! Ohh!'

The sheet had been passed under Naomi's arms, between her legs, and behind her back, where it had been pulled up snug and knotted tight. It hurt. It hurt. The fetid aroma of too many roses
—
fake, rotting
—
made her swoon. In her
ears, in her face, somebody was giggling, a cruel and threatening sound.

'Ohh! Ohh! Sit down here by me, girlie, and you might learn something! Ohh!' Her cries were still quiet and tentative. Petra, though, was attracted by them.

Petra hadn't eaten anything for lunch because it was all poisoned, she could smell the poison and see it in the mashed potatoes and chicken and jello, they couldn't fool her. They were trying to get rid of the red ants in her rectum. If the red ants died she would die, too. Without red ants nesting in her rectum, Petra would be nobody.

She wandered into the room where Naomi was, and stopped, shifting the weight of her wiry body from one foot to the other, talking to herself, repeating without even any need for embellishment the story she had settled upon for herself. The story was about red ants in her rectum, and Naomi didn't fit into it. Petra needed a cigarette, so she left.

'I am Myra Larsen and I don't belong here! Ohh!'

It didn't hurt enough. Nothing hurt enough.

A pretty painted fingernail, long and perfectly curved, came into Naomi's eye. She yelped and her head jerked
—
of its own accord, its own instinct, involuntary, not because Naomi herself was trying to avoid suffering
—
but it was held firmly in place. The nail scratched, drew blood and tears.

Pouting crimson lips parted around pearly teeth, and the teeth bit down on Naomi's bared clawed hand. She cried out.

A weight lowered onto her, round knee in her belly, sharp little ringed fists grinding into the hollows of her shoulders. A forehead knocked into hers again and again. 'Ohh!' Naomi wailed, and there was an answering wail,

'Ohh! Ooohh!'
playful, mocking, goading.

Now the sheet was being tugged from behind, twisting and tightening as if ratcheted. Naomi's arms were pulled wide at the sockets. Her thighs were spread. Still the sheet was tightened, a hard strip now, sharpened by the pressure. It sawed up under her skirt and through her underwear into her vaginal fissure. She screamed.

Scraping trays, Shirley looked up. Myra Larsen, she thought tiredly. Doesn't she ever quit? And then remembered with a start that Myra Larsen was dead. 'Who is that?' she remarked to the orderly beside her, but he was from the pool and he wouldn't know. Shirley thought about going to check it out, but it wasn't her group and she had this whole stack of trays to scrape before she could go on break. Besides, nursing-home patients were always making noises that from anybody else would mean something. Especially at The Tides. Especially lately.

'I am Naomi Mu
rphy! I am Naomi Murphy! Oohh!'