All We Know of Love (9 page)

The other two “left-behind” kids had already been picked up — first, Daniel Sou, and about five minutes later, Patrick Murphy went home. My stomach started to growl as the light outside the window went from yellow to orange to deep purple. Mrs. Bennett finished typing.

“Maybe we should call your dad.” She smiled at me, searching her files for my emergency cards.

My dad? It sounded serious. You never call the dad unless it’s serious. I had only a vague idea where my dad was, anyway. He left in the morning, dressed in a tie, and he came home just after dinner, when my day was over. Sometimes he packed a suitcase for an overnight business trip and left before I even got out of bed. I barely noticed the nights my father traveled and didn’t come home.

Call my daddy?

I started to cry.

Mrs. Bennett stood up right away. “No, no, Natty. It’s OK.” She banged her knee trying to get to my side of the counter. And that’s when my mother showed up.

She didn’t have an excuse like the other moms. “I couldn’t find my keys.” “I got mixed up with my car pool,” not even “I forgot.”

She just walked in the office, her face blank, and said, “Is Natty OK?”

W
hen the girl kicks the vending machine for the second time, the suitcase in her hand comes undone, spilling its contents, mostly makeup, onto the floor — lipsticks and mascara wands threatening to roll away.

“Oh, no,” she cries, but she doesn’t move. She’s young, I notice. Middle school — fourth, maybe fifth grade. I get the distinct feeling she is by herself; the way she doesn’t look around for help, knows it’s not coming.

“Don’t worry,” I say, bending down. As soon as I begin gathering her things, she gets down on the floor beside me, as if she were waiting to be told what to do. I see a loose retainer nestled among her shirts and jeans and underwear, a notebook marked
PRIVATE
, and a couple of framed photos.

“Are you alone?” I ask her.

She closes the suitcase. I snap the clasp shut and we both stand. She looks at me a minute, and I recognize the face of someone who is searching for a reasonable lie.

“Don’t answer that,” I say, holding up my hand, and just then, as if my gesture had something to do with it, a loud clap of thunder makes its way from the outside world into the bus terminal. It nearly shakes the room. I notice that the low hum of human voices from the waiting area stops momentarily and then swells even louder in reaction.

“Weather,” I say to the girl, as if this means something. I feel like taking her hand.

“Yeah,” she says.

“Wanna go check the schedule?”

It’s funny because I feel better already; just talking to someone fills up that space, even if it’s temporary. We walk together toward the rows of green molded plastic seats in the waiting area. At the end of each row of five, a metal ashtray is attached to the armrest.

“I’m Natalie,” I tell her.

She seems to hesitate a moment and then says, “I’m Claire.”

The TV monitor in the sitting area tells us that my bus leaves in an hour, at three fifteen, and Claire’s not for thirty-five minutes. Without saying so, we take seats together. If someone happened to walk by and wonder, we’d just look like two sisters, two friends, in a bus station.

We could be coming from somewhere, could be going anywhere, and nobody would know one way or the other.

“Well, looks like we have a wait,” I say.

“Yeah, we do.” She looks at me and kind of smiles.

I can tell this girl is not going to ask me where I’m going, or why, or to see whom. First, because she’s too young to pretend to care, but also because she doesn’t want me to reciprocate. She won’t ask, because she doesn’t want to have to tell.

I’ve heard of people who can identify types of perfume right down to the brand name and country of origin. I’ve heard of people who can distinguish different regional accents to the exact city and neighborhood and street corner.

Me?

I can feel guilt the way a hound dog can sniff out a bone he buried in the backyard years before.

She happened to be in the bathtub when her sister, Lily, finally died.

Claire slid down against the cold porcelain, and she listened to her mother crying. She watched the water deepen and nearly cover the pale skin of her body, imagining her belly an island, somewhere far, far away. Outside the door, her mother wailed. Claire could hear her father’s voice, weak but comforting, thick with tears. He was walking up and down in the hall, in and out of Lily’s bedroom.

Lily’s bedroom: metal hospital bed, a bureau top completely covered with medicine bottles, paper cups, gauze, tape. And a smell like bitter chemicals and fresh laundry, and disinfectant, and her sickness. Didn’t everything smell of Lily’s sickness?

But Lily’s toys were lonely, Claire thought.

Some had never been taken from their boxes because Lily was too weak to open them. She would die soon, but people still brought her presents when they came. When the visitor left, sometimes her mother would offer the gift to Claire.

“Would you like this doll?”

“No way — that’s for babies. I’m not a stupid baby.”

And then it was too late to take it back. Claire could tell, by the face her mother made, how she disapproved.

What a horrible and insensitive girl. How could I love this child? How could anyone really love a child like this?

“Lily’s at peace now,” Claire’s father was saying. “It’s OK. It’s going to be OK now.” His voice was headed down the stairs. To call the doctor? The ambulance? A hearse? Is that how they take dead bodies out of the house? But Claire’s mother stayed in Lily’s room.

Claire wondered how long it would be before someone remembered she was in here. The bathroom door was shut tight. Was it locked? Hot steam still clung to the air. It completely coated the mirror above the sink. Silently, her knees lowered into the water and her feet rose up on either side of the faucet.

A noise came from outside, from Lily’s room — a feral, frightening sound, until Claire realized it was only her mother. Claire imagined her mother’s body crumpled on the floor, as she had seen her so many times. But her hands, her hands would be up on the bed, holding on to Lily, even though Lily was gone.

Claire wondered what would happen if her mother cried forever, as it seemed she had ever since Lily was born and had started dying right away. Would tears fill the house, flood through the halls, and spill out of the windows until they all floated away?

She heard her father’s footsteps running back up the stairs. Clomping. Clomping. Heavy and loud.

“Let her go now. Let her go. It’s been so long. So long.”

But Claire’s mother continued to wail.

Maybe if Claire turned on the water, the pipes would sputter, the boiler would crank on. Water would rush from the faucet and hit the surface, loudly and with urgency. Claire started to lean forward, but instead she stood, completely upright, the water now only covering her ankles and dripping from every surface of her body, her skin wet and beginning to pucker with goose bumps.

Claire turned and looked at herself in the mirror, but she couldn’t see anything. It was too foggy, too steamy, as if it was all underwater. She could only make out a shadow of herself in the glass while beads of water formed. While the air slowly cleared.

It would only be a matter of time now. What little heat was left in the room would rise up and disappear. The swirling water would be completely drained. It would be quiet again, except for the noises from outside the door.

She put her hands up to cover her ears. And that’s when Claire decided to run away. To see if anyone would notice she was gone. To see if her father would come and try to find her. And convince her she deserved to be alive.

For a second I think that the boy working behind the counter here in Baltimore is the same one from the Stamford bus station back home, like I had come all this way just to end up right where I started.

I am going to buy Claire something to eat, and then I’m going to find someone to help. She is definitely alone, but she hasn’t told me that. And she is definitely angry, but she hasn’t said that either. If there is some kind of security office here, I’ve got to find it and let them know.

“Uh, excuse me?” I call out so I can get waited on.

Is that the same kid? It couldn’t be, could it? The way this boy’s jeans are drooping, his faded T-shirt, and the shape of his hair from the back seem familiar. It’s the weirdest feeling, something from the
Twilight Zone.

Déjà vu.

But when he turns around, I see it is a different person. There is no similarity at all. How weird. Why would I be thinking of that boy, anyway?

I buy one of just about everything they have: little bags of snacks, chocolate bars, and those crackers with the yellow goo cheese you can spread with a tiny red plastic stick. And a bunch of different drinks. It’s actually pretty cheap down here. Claire carries the stuff back to our seats while I count out my money and pay.

“Thanks,” I say, stuffing my change back into my bag. I should count it because this guy doesn’t look like he can add or subtract, but neither can I, so what’s the difference?

I decide what I need is a good sugar rush.

But Claire is eating all the candy. She leaves the pretzels and peanut-butter crackers. She seems to prefer soda over water. It’s OK. I bought a lot.

I do notice, though, that she doesn’t say thank you. I thought mothers were supposed to teach their kids to say thank you.

“I have a cell phone, if you want to call anyone,” I say casually. I hold it out to her.

“I’m fine,” Claire answers.

I take the opportunity to check my calls and then I shut it off again. I need to conserve my nationwide accessibility. My reception bars are disappearing one by one.

Claire keeps her suitcase upright between her legs, with her feet like bookends. We can hear the rain outside and the thunder moving away. I am trying to be pleasant; for some reason I feel responsible for this kid I don’t even know. But she is not making it easy.

“What grade are you in?” I ask her, figuring school is a safe topic.

She just shrugs her shoulders, her mouth full of Starbursts. You’d think someone this needy and this hungry would be a little friendlier. A little nicer.

Then again, of all people, I should understand how easy it is to be mean.
Easier
in fact.

Leave being kind and selfless to the people who can afford it. To the people who have experienced it for themselves. Do unto others is a very nice saying, but it doesn’t really take certain things into account. Basically, how do you know what to do unto others when nobody’s done it unto you?

But when Claire goes into the bathroom, I somehow find the Maryland Transit Authority Security Department.

The first thing that changed when my mother took off was dinner. There wasn’t any for a while. Just nothing. I was in sixth grade.

I would get home off the bus and my dad would be there already, because, I suppose, he thought he needed to be. Before that time, when my mom was still around, he used to work really late. Now he made sure to be home, but it was in body only. We never talked about what happened. It was almost as if she never existed.