Tin Lily (7 page)

The shop owner comes out of her office, muttering under her breath. She smiles at me and at Cheetah asleep in my lap. “Doing okay?”

I nod, but keep staring at her. The question is big in me, pushing to get out.

“You sure?” she asks, her voice all laughter and light.

“Did you hear the door?” I point to the bell that jingles when someone comes in for all their new and used book needs.

She looks around. “I didn’t, but I was on the phone. Was someone bothering you? Sometimes we get unusual folk in here.”

I shake my head right away and focus on Cheetah. “No, it’s okay. I just thought I heard the bell, but then I didn’t see anyone.”

“Ah. Happens now and then if the wind kicks up,” she says. “Or…” She grins at me, grins big and her eyes sparkle. “Sometimes there’s a ghost likes to wander these dusty cases. What do you think about that?”

A ghost. “I think you’re right,” I say.

I put Cheetah back on his perch and stand up, brushing orange and white fur off my clothes. Fine, silky hairs float in the sunshine streaming through the front windows.

“Are you okay?” The store lady’s come over without me noticing and is standing a few feet away.

I look into the woman’s kind eyes and hope she doesn’t see how empty I am. “Cheetah is a great cat.”

She reaches into the window and pats the orange tabby on the head. He’s too busy getting ready for a snooze to notice her. “He’s a special boy. Been here, oh ’bout, five years now.”

“He lives in the store?”

“Along with three others.” She cocks a thumb over her shoulder toward the books piled up on tables and in bookcases. “All sleeping the afternoon away if today’s no different than any other. Think they’d snooze right through an earthquake if it was up to them.” She laughs and shakes her head. Her hair tumbles around her, a silver waterfall shining in the overhead lights. Her face is transformed by her smile and I remember Mom again, how her smile was like that—all light and happiness before Hank started installing rain gutters, and then again after we left, how it lit her entire being right up and anyone standing near her.

Margie’s heading down one of the aisles toward the front of the store. “Please don’t tell my aunt about the ghost, okay?” I roll my eyes. “She had a bad experience and ghosts scare her.” The tremble in my voice is gone, replaced by a casualness I don’t feel. I see I’m going to become a good liar.

The shop owner stares at me for another few seconds while Margie walks and reads and doesn’t pay attention to where she’s going. “Sure thing.” She doesn’t say anything else, but I see she’ll keep her word.

“Thank you.”

I meet Margie at the front counter.

“How you doing, Lilybeans?”

“Fine,” I say. “You ready to go?”

“Anytime you are.” She looks at my empty hands. “Didn’t find anything?”

“Not this time.”

The shop lady doesn’t mention ghosts or my weirdness to Margie and I nod at her again before we go—a silent thank you for a silent gift. We leave after I give Cheetah a good-bye pat. He’s wearing a sulky expression when we walk past the front window.

Hank’s expression isn’t sulky where he’s standing across the street with his cup of steaming coffee. Hank’s expression is stony. Decided. He raises his hand not holding the coffee, thumb and index finger in an L, taking a pretend picture.

See you later.

It’s Thursday and today’s focus is easy: get to Dr. Pratchett’s by one o’clock. Margie’s at work now. She’ll honk out front when she picks me up. I’ll have to listen and be ready.

All morning I read in a chair Margie’s got arranged next to the patio doors. It’s big enough for two people or for one to fold her legs up, cozy like. The sun warms it every day it’s not cloudy. Today it’s sunny and the chair is toasty. I’m drowsy from the warmth and from not sleeping too well at night. I keep reading, though. I’m getting to the end of
The Stand
, to the big showdown.

A bell dings softly in the apartment. I’ve drowsed off, my book on the floor now, pages folded, mashed under the weight of a thousand brethren. I pick it up and put it on the table next to me, then blink hard to clear my foggy brain. Margie’s set an alarm for me to get ready for Dr. Pratchett’s. I have thirty minutes until she’s supposed to honk. Margie said this morning it might be a good idea I pull a brush through my hair before I go.

The bell is a timer on the oven. I click it off and head back to the blue and white bedroom.

I stop too fast in the hallway, feet skidding on the hardwood floor. Hank’s on the bed where Mom sat cross-legged to braid my hair. Everything in me jumps and I want to grab him and make him move from where Mom sat. He’s busy infecting this place with his whiskey and paint, his mints, busy polluting the air and twisting memories.

We stare at each other and pretty soon the bees start up, buzzing their broken pattern in my brain. Hank’s eyes are glassy with their flat light, his gaze steady on me. He doesn’t blink, doesn’t move, just sits cross-legged like he did at the bookstore, only now he’s wearing his flannel again and his jeans with their dark stains.

“What do you want?”

He doesn’t say anything.

I’m watching my feet now, how they shuffle back and forth, how they don’t want to run from Hank-the-murderer. They’re content right where they are, my feet. I think they know more than my head, so I listen to them instead of the bees starting to knock around inside my skull.
Buzz-buzz-buzz
, making me believe the quiet place will be better than Hank sitting in this blue and white bedroom. This room where Mom and I, we talked about the way things were at home, how Hank had already driven away everyone we knew.

“What ever happened to your friend Heather?”

I
’
m relaxed, sleepy from how good Mom
’
s fingers feel braiding my hair, so I don
’
t think before I speak. “Dad told her she was too fat to be my friend.”

Mom
’
s fingers still and then pull too hard.

“Ouch!”

She
’
s gentle again, apologizing for all the yanking. “And Tara?”

I don’
t say anything, don
’
t want to get my hair pulled again.

“Tell me, Lilybeans.”

“Dad said she was too lazy.”

“Wasn
’
t she on the girl
’
s basketball team?”

“And volleyball and soccer.”

“Why didn
’
t you tell me any of this?”

I shrug, not wanting to put more stress on Mom than she already has. She
’
s finishing up the braid, though, and pretty soon she
’
ll be turning me around so she can see what
’
s in my eyes. I might as well tell her and get it all out. “Because you had enough with him changing so much, saying all those things about you. Yelling like you were on the moon.”

Mom finishes my hair without saying anything else and pulls me up to sit next to her on the blue and white bed. “From now on, you tell me everything, okay? Everything.”

I nod.

She tucks a stray hair behind my ear and kisses my cheek. “I
’
m sorry this last year has been so hard.”

I run my fingers along the silky bedspread. I was never a super chatty kid, but in the last year, I haven
’
t been able to string ten words together at a time. All my friends have been driven away by Hank
’
s drinking and his meanness. Mom and me, our lives about school and work and home and nothing else. Hank with his suffocating control, his crazy belief we were doing bad things. Mom and me, our lives about nothing but Hank
’
s growing rage.

With Hank sitting on the blue and white bed and these memories about Mom, the bees get so loud I can’t ignore them anymore. I go where it’s quiet.

*   *   *

The cell phone Margie gave me is playing a tune from where I left it in the living room. Hank’s gone, vanished from the bedroom. I’m still in the hall, my smart feet tired from standing. I get to the cell phone and pick it up in time.

“Hello?” I say.

“Hi, Lily. Are you okay?” Margie says.

“I’m okay.”

“This is my third time trying you. Whatcha up to?”

“Looking out the window. Waiting for your honk.”

“How are you? Did you eat?”

“I fell asleep.”

“Sleep is good, but you have to eat too.”

“I know. I’m sorry.”

“It’s okay. We’ll get you something on the way home. I’m a few minutes away.”

“Okay.”

“See you in a bit.”

“Okay.”

I don’t mention Hank with his whiskey smell, his being in the blue and white bedroom and then disappearing, not leaving so much as a wrinkle on the bedspread. A not-Hank after all is what I think. A not-Hank with his silence, his clothes that show what he did to Mom, his smelling like he did that night. I think about him at the bookstore, in the blue and white bedroom, wonder if they’re all not-Hanks and I’m maybe closer to the loony bin than I thought.

We get to Dr. Pratchett’s office on time. “Remember, Lilybeans, fifteenth floor, number 1504. It’s on that post-it in your pocket too. Tell Dr. Pratchett hello from me, okay?”

“Okay, Aunt Margie. See you in awhile.”

I get out of Margie’s car where the bus stop is. There’s no bus now—just us. I walk across the field of concrete. Thin clouds make everything gray now, dim the sky, the trees.

I find the elevator and ride up by myself. Fifteenth floor, number 1504. I open a door, see there’s another door too, into the therapy office I guess. I’m sitting in a chair in the waiting room, waiting. None of the magazines look good, so I just sit and try to figure out my next focus.
Finish
The Stand. It’s a good one and reminds me of Margie’s toasty chair.

A few minutes or a few hours later, the knob to the inner office twists. A man who has to duck through the doorway comes into the waiting room. He’s got dark and light gray hair, all mixed up like concrete that’s dry in some spots, wet in others. He wears his glasses pulled down on his nose. “Lily?” he says over them.

I nod and stand up.

“It’s nice to meet you,” he says and holds out a hand for me to shake. I do. “I’m Dr. Pratchett. Would you like to come in?”

“Okay.”

He leads the way into a dimly-lit office full of expensive furniture. There’s a lot of leather in here, including the top of his desk. It smells nice—spicy, like Christmas. He has enormous bookshelves and I walk right over to them, trail my fingers down the spines of books I’ve never heard of. Some look like first editions and I drop my hand to my side. “Sorry,” I say.

“No need. Go ahead and touch anything you like. Are you a reader?”

I glance over my shoulder at Dr. Pratchett where he’s leaning against his desk. “You could say that.”

He nods. He’s got a moustache I’m just noticing. It matches his hair—dry and wet concrete. “Today I thought we could get to know each other a little, make sure you feel comfortable working with me.”

“Okay.”

“If you decide you’d like to see someone else, I have some referrals ready for you. Sound good?”

“Yes.”

“One more thing, Lily. Whether you decide to work with me or someone else, Margie will be privy to everything we discuss here if she decides she wants to know. Sometimes, parents or guardians don’t ask, but sometimes they do. How do you feel about that?”

I turn back to the books and keep going. “Fine,” I say. I tell myself to remember Dr. Pratchett’s words, to not mention Hank at the airport, Hank in the bookstore, Hank in the blue and white bedroom—the not-Hanks that will get me sent to the loony bin or to Mack and Darcy’s.

Dr. Pratchett’s got bookcases on every wall. I speed up my investigation, skipping over big sections. “What’s this one about?” I ask. The spine is stamped
DSM-5
.

“That one helps me decide how I can best help people.”

“It helps you diagnose,” I say.

Dr. Pratchett looks surprised. “Yes.”

“Helps you label people.”

“Well…” He shifts to lean against his other leg.

“Have you labeled me?” I ask.

“No, Lily. I don’t know you.” He laughs at his own joke.

“I heard Margie on the phone.”

“With me?”

“Yes.”

“Do you have questions about what was said?”

“Dissociation?”

Dr. Pratchett nods. “Do you know what that is?”

“No.”

“Margie said you go very quiet sometimes.”

“Inside.”

“Inside?”

I tap my chest. “In here it’s hollow. There’s room for me.”

Dr. Pratchett’s head tips. “Can you tell me more about that?”

I shrug and turn back to the books—old friends I’ve never met before.

“Do you think about anything when you go inside?”

“It’s quiet. Nothing to think about.”

“Does it scare you when it happens?”

“No.”

“It doesn’t scare you to lose time?”

“No. It scares Margie.”

“Yes.”

“I don’t want to scare her.”

“You love her very much.”

I tap my chest again. “No room.”

“For love?”

Nod.

“What is there room for, Lily?”

Shrug.

“Is there room for memories?”

“Sometimes.”

“What happens when the memories surface?”

“The hollow gets bigger.”

Dr. Pratchett thinks on this awhile. “When you go quiet and you don’t think about anything, are you aware?”

“No.”

“So you don’t know you’ve been gone until you come out?”