Accidental Happiness (37 page)

“Angel.” I put my hands on her shoulders, could feel the bandages just under her shirt. Bandages that still taped the wounds I’d inflicted that first night. “Angel, listen. Do you trust me? Do you trust Derek?”

She stared past me at nothing, listened to her mother’s sounds. Didn’t respond.

“Angel,” I said again, trying to add authority to my shaky tone. She turned and focused on my face. “I know that you’ve felt like it was your job to look after her. But now it can be my job. Ben knew she was sick. He would have helped make her better. He would want me to do it now. But you have to trust me because it’s going to look like I’m fighting against her; doing something that she doesn’t want. You have to trust me, Angel. I promise I’ll do my best to help her.” She turned away. “
Look at me!
Ben loved you, Angel. He did and so do I. That’s the truth. But I can’t help you, and I can’t help her, if you don’t trust me. Do you?”

Reese’s sounds were escalating. I hated to think of what Derek was facing.

Angel nodded; tears streamed down her face.

“You’ll let me help your mom?”

“Yes.” Her sound came out small, just barely a word, then she reached up and grabbed me around the neck. She pulled with both arms, even her injured one showing surprising strength. It was a violent hold so tight that I thought we might both fall. She gripped my shirt, my skin, as if someone would try to pull her away. She held on the way Elise would have held on if I’d turned and gone to her when she called to me. If I’d tried, even for one second, to save her.

“Mommy,” Angel sobbed as Reese screamed, “Get the fuck out!” at Derek.

I found my center of balance, reached around the child, and pulled her up. She wrapped her small legs around my waist, buried her face in my neck as I carried her back toward the sounds of her frantic mother. “I’m going to put you in my car, and then I’m going to help Derek, okay? Your mom’s going to be fine.”

Her response was in her body, pressed tight against my chest.

“It’s going to be okay, Angel.” I said it over and over, hoping to God I was telling her the truth. “Don’t worry. It’s going to be okay.”

And as we moved toward the motel, I couldn’t shake the feeling that the fierce little girl Ben had claimed was somehow saving me.

41

Reese

T
he room looked familiar. But then, maybe they all looked alike. Hospital clinics, like schools, seem to spring from one generic blueprint.

She remembered the roller coaster, then walking back from the Pavilion with Angel and arriving at the room exhausted. The rest wasn’t that clear. Waking up. Angel gone. She saw Derek, but heard the rest of them too. Maybe the same ones from the mountains. The ones who came for Angel. Derek said something, talked as if the others weren’t talking loudly and all at once. Was he with them? Maybe they weren’t the same as the crowd from the mountains. The singsong voices sounded like something else. Like the gathering at the television preacher’s revival. The chanting. Words that had syllables but didn’t mean anything. Had they come back? Did they know about Angel?

“Reese?” A doctor stood in front of her. She’d seen him before. He’d talked to her, but she couldn’t remember what he’d said. “We’ve been in touch with Dr. Harris in Boone,” he told her. “We’ve started some preliminary treatment to make you feel better. The protocol of drugs he had you slated to follow up there can be picked up by your doctors in Charleston. In a day or so we’ll be able to transfer you there with your family. Do you understand?”

“Where’s Angel?”

“She’s been here sitting with you. You’ve been pretty groggy from the sedation. She went to get some lunch with your friend who brought you in here.”

She felt in pieces: That seemed to be the only way to describe it, as if parts of her brain had been scattered everywhere. Putting thoughts together seemed such a difficult task. But she didn’t feel the overwhelming fear, the terror, that she’d felt before. Maybe that meant the danger had passed. A good sign.

“Where’s Angel?” Before the doctor answered, she remembered he’d already told her. With Gina. She felt so tired. Too tired to do battle with the world anymore. Too tired to run away and reinvent her life with Angel yet another time. Maybe she’d give in. Maybe she had no choice but to give in.

“Hey there, sleepy.”

Reese opened her eyes. How long had she been asleep? She was in a different room. It looked dark outside.

“How are you feeling?” Gina stood by her bed. Angel was with her on some kind of stool.

“Tired,” Reese said.

“That’s just the medicine,” Gina told her. “It’ll start to go away.”

The medicine. That’s why she had to leave Ben. That nurse and the others with her, the ones who stayed in the other room, they’d wanted to give her medicine too. Medicine that made her numb. Made her forget herself. Had Gina been there back then? One of them, maybe? She couldn’t remember. She didn’t think so. Sometimes she worried that Ben knew all about it. What they were doing. Other times, she was sure he didn’t. But they wouldn’t leave, so she had to. They wanted to use her illness, her weakness, to control her. She’d left and then she had Angel. She’d made a life with Angel.

“Don’t want medicine,” she managed.

“Reese.” Gina spoke again. “You need medicine. We’ve got to get you back looking after Angel. You can’t get better without help.”

Help. Ben’s words too. Needed to get her help. The hateful nurse had been help. Later, when she had taken Angel to Ben, all but given Angel to him, he started using that word again. Help. Only
that
time he said she needed help with her mind. She wasn’t fucking crazy, she told him. She knew what that kind of help would do. It would take her out of the picture entirely, leave him free to let Angel forget her.

“Reese?”

So tired. So fucking tired. Maybe it was time to give up. She’d fought so long. It was time.

“Mommy?”

“Angel, baby.” Reese lifted her arm. It weighed more than her entire body should weigh. Angel took her hand. “Just need to sleep, baby doll.”

Gina might plot against her. But Ben’s widow wouldn’t hurt Angel. Just like Ben, she’d look after Angel. It was time to be done with it. Time to let go.

“So sleepy . . .”

“You rest, Reese,” Gina said. “Angel’s fine. Everything’s going to be okay.”

Her eyes were closed, but she could feel Angel beside her on the bed. She could smell her soap and shampoo skin. Someone had made sure she took a bath.

“Love you, baby,” she said, but she wasn’t sure she’d actually spoken.

Angel pressed against her and she gave in, let sleep take her on toward easy rest.

42

Gina

I
sat on the bow of
River Rose.
Georgie barked from below, wanted to be out in the afternoon air. An early fall-like day, a preview, of sorts. The heat would return, but knowing that the season would change seemed vital. I’d been away from the boat, away from the marina, forever, it seemed, although it had only been a couple of weeks. I moved in with Angel at the cottage. Taking her to school, lounging around in the evenings with Derek. It felt okay, being the person taking care of her. But I wasn’t a mother. And while I still wasn’t sure I would ever want to be one, I also knew that my time spent with Angel improved me.

The wind had picked up, and I wished I had time to sail. My old life, the one with Ben and even the one after him, would have offered no resistance to such whims. For the first time in memory I couldn’t choose my day without regard for anything else. Even work had been at my own discretion. And I realized that if Reese progressed the way they expected her to, part of me would miss plotting my days around school bells and homework projects.

“Hey, Gina.” Charlie came out onto the fingerdock. “You heard from Reese?”

“I’m taking Angel over to see her this afternoon. We haven’t been since she was admitted. They told us she needed isolated time for the early treatment.”

“It’s fucked up, huh? I mean, all that shit going on and she seemed so regular. I mean, regular in an
out there
kind of way. But a lot of people are out there.”

I couldn’t believe Charlie was the older cousin. He had a year on Derek, but seemed to be seventeen at best.

“Yeah,” I said. “It’s pretty freaky, all right.”

He stood for a second looking out toward the mouth of the inlet, then looked back down at me.

“Good news?” he asked.

“What do you mean?”

He pointed to the envelopes in my hand, three of them.

I had to deal with all of them somehow. The original settlement check and a second one that had just arrived. Those would be easy. Reese and Angel would need the money. Truth be told, it wouldn’t be so bad to ease my financial concerns for a while either. It wouldn’t bring Ben back, but it couldn’t make him any more
gone.

The other envelope posed more of a problem. The DNA results. I’d forgotten about the hair samples, taking them to the lab the day I found out that Ben had met Angel. I knew what I wanted to do, but one other person would have to weigh in. That could come later. In the immediate future, I had to go by the bank, then pick up Angel at school and go to the hospital. For nearly two weeks the doctors had been treating Reese. They’d asked that all family and friends stay away, give the therapy and the meds a chance to begin healing her mind. I felt nervous, seeing her again. I wondered what a
healed
Reese would be like.

“Hey, Gina?” Charlie still stood there. I’d lost myself, forgotten about him.

“I’m sorry,” I said. “I’m a little out of it.”

“Well, you and Reese will have something in common, then.” He grinned, but looked uneasy all the same.

“If Derek comes by after work,” I said, “tell him to call my cell. He doesn’t know I’m going to the hospital and he’s not answering his cell.”

“Okay,” Charlie said, giving an awkward wave and taking off down the docks.

I sat for a minute more, enjoying the air, the predictable instability of a boat in water—the only place it truly belonged.

“Can Clara come over and spend the night?” Angel asked when I met her out in front of the school. “Her mom is right there. Can we ask her?”

Such a kid thing. Begging for a friend to come over. In the absence of Reese’s problems, Angel had found an effortless path to childhood. She didn’t have to learn; she simply had to
be.

I walked over and introduced myself to the mother. She assumed I was Angel’s mother, and I let her. It wasn’t right, but there’d be plenty of time to explain.

“I’ll call you when we get back and you can bring her over,” I said. “Probably around dinnertime. I’ll get pizza for the girls.”

It was settled. My night planned. A slumber party. I hoped Derek wouldn’t mind.

On the drive to the hospital, Angel didn’t say much. She fidgeted with the seat belt.

“This is all going to be okay,” I told her. “This is the hardest part. But your mom’s going to be pretty nervous too, so . . . cut her some slack, okay?”

She nodded, looked out the back window at the drawbridge rising behind us to let a tall-masted sloop through.

“Clara is a vegetarian,” she said. “We can get veggie pizza, okay?”

The self-absorption was new and, I had to tell myself, okay. It was a trait that Elise had taken to extremes. But Angel wasn’t Elise. Angel was simply trying to enjoy the freedom of being a child for the first time in her life.

“Veggie it is,” I said.

They had a room where Angel could wait and watch television. I would go in and talk with Reese first, then they’d bring her daughter. I couldn’t help but think that making it a large production—Angel’s entrance—couldn’t be the best for anyone. But I sent her off to watch
Princess Bride,
wished I could just go with her.

Reese sat on the floor, legs crossed Indian style. In front of her lay a large sketch pad. She hunched over, drawing something with a pencil. She wore Capri pants and a fitted white T-shirt, and it struck me as odd. I’d never seen her in clothes like that before.

“Hey,” I said.

She looked up, her expression both pleasant and embarrassed. It would take some measure of
sanity
to feel embarrassed. I took it as a good sign.

“How’s Angel?” She sounded anxious, eager.

“She’s waiting in the TV room. She’s good. This is weird for all of us.”

She nodded, stood up, and dusted the back of her pants as if she’d been on the ground and not a spotless braided rug. I followed her to the window, to a small table with two chairs. Her bed sat in the corner, neatly made, covered with a quilt.

“This place is homey,” I told her, making conversation.

She nodded, sat down in one of the chairs. “I’m sorry,” she said before I had to fill in with something else trite and meaningless. “I put you through hell. You, Angel, everybody.”

“It’s an illness,” I said. “You can’t be blamed for it.” I thought of Elise. I
had
blamed her. That was certainly something to live with. “How are you feeling?”

“Strange.”

“Why?” Maybe the meds hadn’t done all that we’d hoped. “The doctors say you’re so much better.”

“I am better. Don’t worry. Crazy Reese is not putting on an act. Although,” she paused, leaned forward, “how would you know?”

I felt my pulse click into higher gear, and I must have shown a certain concern because she leaned forward, put her hand on my arm. “No, no . . . for God’s sake, lighten up. I just meant that it’s strange to know, really
know,
that all those things were just in my head. It’s pretty horrifying, really.”

I wondered if they’d filled her in on what she’d done in the mountains. That she’d left Angel alone for all those days. If they were kind, they hadn’t told her. Some things a mother should never know.

“Are they . . . ?” I couldn’t think of the right word. What do imaginary people do? “Are the voices
gone
?”

“Not entirely,” she said. “I still feel the tingling, the numbness in my fingers, my legs. When I wake up, just before I’m entirely conscious, I still hear things. Sometimes, when I’m fully awake even, it’s still so clear. But it’s not as bad, and I know—there’s a part of me that
can
know, and understand—that they’re not real. They were never good things,” she added. “Not like that guy in the movie who missed his buddies, you know, the roommate and the kid?”

“A Beautiful Mind.”

“Yeah, that one. I don’t miss anybody. Well, Janet maybe. But I’m glad to let the rest of them go to hell where they belong.”

A maid came in, took the trash, and left some towels. Just like at a hotel. Outside the window, people took advantage of the cooler day to play Frisbee, sit and sun themselves. Reese looked pale. I wondered if she’d been outside, done anything that made her feel halfway normal. Or had all her time been spent sorting through her thoughts and memories and trying to catalog them into groups of what was real and what wasn’t?

“This problem I have,” she said. “It’s pretty weird if what they say is true. But at least I’m not sick. Well, not sick like I thought I was.” She smiled, but it came with effort. “It really is all true, isn’t it?” She looked at me for independent confirmation, the permission to trust her doctors.

“Yeah,” I said. “It is.”

She wiped her eye with the back of her hand. Smudged the tears that were building across the side of her face.

“How did Angel stay so calm?” she asked. “With all that shit I was pulling? It kills me to think of everything I told her, all the times I dragged her away because—”

“Reese. Angel’s okay. She’s a great kid. You dragged her through a lot, but you also loved her. That counts for more than you realize. She’s all right. I think she’s relieved not to be sorting it all out anymore. That was pretty exhausting. But she’s not damaged in ways that will hurt her forever. I really believe that.”

“This problem,” she said again, couldn’t seem to call it anything else. “I didn’t know.”

“I know that,” I said.

“I thought that—”

“It’s okay, Reese. It’s really okay. No one thinks it’s your fault, and those papers you left . . .”

She looked up, waited.

“That was a hard thing for you to do,” I said. “I know it was. But your mother instincts overrode the illness. I admire that, Reese, honest to God, I do.”

“And what did you do with them? The papers.”

“They’re filed with a lawyer. I signed them. I’ll look after Angel as long as you need me to.”

She let out a long breath, looked away, out the window. “Thank you.” She still didn’t turn toward me.

“I’m not her mother, Reese. I won’t try to be.” I didn’t know how to reassure her. “I think there’s a muscle, a parenting muscle.” She did look at me, finally. “I think it has to start developing when you’re little. Playing dolls or looking after puppies. I don’t know. But something that happens with the expectation of being a parent someday. I’m doing okay with Angel. I love Angel. But I don’t have the parent muscle. I’m not sure I ever will. I’m just . . . What was it that you said in your note?”

“A safety net.”

“Yeah, that’s it. I can do that. But you’ve got the mom job in a lock. I’m not trying to take that place. I’ll just be there, the safety net, in case I’m needed.”

“Well, you caught her this time,” Reese said. “And I’m grateful.”

Reese showing gratitude. The moment embarrassed us both, so we fell silent, stared at the room around us. Finally, she spoke again.

“Gina?” Her voice went thin and very small. “I don’t know how I’m going to pay for this.” She looked around. “I’ve been in a lot of county clinics, and this isn’t a no-insurance kind of place. The meals are too decent, for starters.”

I’d never had a chance to tell her. To explain about the money.

“There was a settlement. After Ben died.” Just thinking about those raw days in the lawyers’ offices, sitting across from men who talked like it was a business deal. I guess to them, it was. “They settled for a bundle to keep it all out of court. I don’t know if I could have gone through a trial or not. Hell, I could barely sit in on the meetings. But I’ve gotten a couple of really large checks and more will come.”

“And?”

“There’s enough for all of us. I can pay for your treatment and never even feel it, Reese.”

“Gina, I—”

“Don’t argue with me,” I said. “I’ve sat down with the hospital and worked it out. It’s all settled.”

“I’m not arguing,” she said. “I was going to say that I’m sorry you went through all that. I’m not sure it’s worth any kind of money to have to sit through all that, especially after you’ve just buried somebody like Ben. But thank you. If I was a better person, I’d turn you down, but nobody’s worried about too much moral fiber in my diet. Have you told Angel? She worries about money. Something an eight-year-old with a decent mother wouldn’t be doing.”

“I’ve told her. She just wants her mom back home.”

“How do you know?”

I knew. But how did I know?

“The room beside hers at the cottage.”

“What about it?” Reese asked.

“She tells me we have to keep that nice because it’s your room.”

She smiled at me, half bought it. So did I. So did Angel. Truth was, none of us knew when Reese would get out. The family thing—weird and dysfunctional by nature—was a work in progress.

“Angel is an amazing kid,” I said. “She’s taught me to feel things I didn’t think were possible.”

“So have you come to grips with all that stuff about your sister?” she asked.

“How much did Ben tell you about that?”

“Some,” she said. “Some of it I figured out when he was talking with you on the phone.”

I thought of Angel and Reese, in the room with Ben when he called me one of those times he saw them. It still stung, felt like a betrayal, but if I pulled back, saw the larger picture . . . If I saw Ben with Angel the way I’d been with her these last weeks, I had to forgive. I just had to.