Grime (5 page)

I pull over to the side of the road and put
it in park. Gwen keeps staring out the window. She wipes under her
eye with her knuckle. “I’m sorry,” I say again, with all the
sincerity I can muster.

“What did we ever do to you, Mitch? Why do
you hate us so much?”

“I don’t hate you. It’s just -”

“Just what?” She shoots daggers at me from
the corner of her eyes. “What exactly is it that makes it so
fucking unbearable for you to be around us? That made you want to
abandon us?”

I roll my eyes. “Jesus, Gwen. Dial back the
drama a bit, will you? Abandon you? I was sixteen. I moved out. I
was a miserable kid and I wanted to live my own life.”

“And you didn’t want us to have any part in
it anymore.”

“Gwen, it’s not like we were the fucking
Brady Bunch. We’ve all gone our own ways. None of us were all that
close. And I’m here now. I came to this thing, didn’t I? I came to
help. I showed up. Don’t I get any credit for that?”

She tilts her head at stares at me for a
minute with her brow furrowed. The look on her face is like she’s
probing me, looking for weaknesses. “You know, you’re the only
reason any of us are here.”

“What does that mean?”

“It means Val and Jamie wanted to hire a
cleaning service, and I talked them out of it. I told them I had
this idea, that maybe if I told you we were doing it ourselves
you’d come out, and then we could all see you. They both said I was
nuts, and that it wasn’t even worth trying, that there was no way
you would ever come back here. But I was confident. I told them, if
anybody can talk him into it, I can. I was always Mitch’s favorite.
We all know that. He always liked me best. I can win him over. And
then I texted you. And you didn’t even have my number in your
fucking phone.”

I watch a pair of headlights approaching.
“Why would I? It’s not like we ever talk.”

“I had yours.”

“Congratulations, Gwen. You win. You’re a
less shitty person than I am.”

She shakes her head. “You are exactly like
him. Do you know that? You are exactly the same. Twenty years and
two thousand miles and you still turned into Dad.”

“I may have turned into someone just like
him, but at least I don’t keep marrying guys just like him.”

She’s out of the car so fast I don’t even
register it until the door slams shut. I take a deep breath and
count to ten before killing the engine and getting out myself.
She’s already a fair ways down the sidewalk. Damn, she walks
fast.

I don’t say anything, but she must hear me
jogging up behind her because she starts growling back at me as I
approach. “How fucking dare you. You don’t even know him.”

“You’re right. I don’t know him. So tell me
about him, Gwen. Tell me, does he hit you like the last husband? Or
does he hit you more like the one before that?”

She stops abruptly and wheels around to face
me. “Ethan has never laid a hand on me.”

“I’m pretty sure that’s what you said about
the first asshole you married, the last time I saw you. Those exact
words. Only you said them under a layer of makeup three inches
thick to hide the bruise he’d left on your face that morning.”

“What do you even care?” she asks, her voice
like a blade of ice. “What am I to you, exactly? Who do you even
see when you look at me?” A car blows past, whipping her hair into
her eyes, but she doesn’t move to brush it away. She doesn’t even
flinch.

This is it. This is when the flash of memory
comes. This is the exact same face she had when I was getting in
the backseat of the cab to the airport all those years ago. Her
mascara was even running down her face in the same way.

She always wears so much mascara.

We just stare at each other for… I don’t
know. Seconds? Hours? Then she turns and walks one way and I turn
and walk the other.

I’m done. I am finished with this shit. I get
back in the car and pull out without looking, almost side-swiping a
little blue Geo who lays on their pitiful horn that sounds like a
squeezed pigeon in retaliation. I don’t care. I overtake them and
speed off to my hotel.

As soon as I’m inside my room I strip off all
my clothes. God, I’m filthy. In the mirrored cabinet door I can see
the demarcation of dirt around my neck and arms, sharp lines where
edges of my shirt hid my skin, the dust sticking to my sweat like a
feculent farmer’s tan. I get in the tiny shower and watch the water
swirl around my feet, little spirals of black fading to grey then
fading to nothing as the hot water runs and runs over me.

Hotel soap never makes you feel clean.

There’s a little market and liquor store
across the street from my hotel. When I’m done showering I dress
and head out the door. The sun’s gone down. The parking lot is
practically empty. Just a couple of cars parked close to the
entrance.

I jaywalk to the market. It's lit with those
vaguely green fluorescents that every dingy liquor store and only
dingy liquor stores seem to have. I buy some chips and a candy bar
and a small bottle of Maker's from the bored cashier and go back to
the hotel.

Halfway across the parking lot I get swept by
a pair of headlights attached to an engine with a strange whiny
rumble. I squint over my shoulder and see a little old red sports
car pulling into the lot.

Shit.

Do I run? Do I run upstairs and lock myself
in my room? Am I that big a coward?

"Hey Mitchell," Ethan calls as he gets out of
the car. I stand my ground in the parking lot, halfway between the
street and the hotel entrance.

"Don't fucking call me that."

He puts his hands up in an apologetic way but
continues walking toward me at a steady pace. "Sorry, sorry. Mitch.
We gotta talk, buddy."

"I have nothing to say to you."

"No, maybe not, but I think you have
something to say to Gwen." He stops a few yards away. The orange
streetlamps are casting harsh shadows across his face. I can't see
his eyes, hooded by his Cro-Magnon brow. They're just black, like
he's wearing one of those supervillain masks. "You left her crying
on the side of the road."

"In a suburb, a half mile from the house.
With her cell phone. It's not like I dropped her in some barren
desert."

"That's not really the point, man." He puts
his hands in his pockets. Was he always this much taller than
me?

"Is she okay?"

"Yeah, she's okay."

"Well then, leave me the fuck alone." I turn
and start walking toward the hotel, but Ethan calls after me.

"You know, I used to be like you."

I stop and look back. "What's that supposed
to be, a cautionary tale?"

"Sure, if that's what you wanna call it." He
nods his head and smiles a bit. "Yeah, that's good. A cautionary
tale. You have a way with words, Mitch. Anybody ever tell you
that?"

He speaks slowly. Steadily. Like he’s wrapped
in a stoner’s calm. In this dark empty parking lot on this long
terrible day, my little sister's redneck ex-con boyfriend is
practically a zen master. I just can’t get a handle on this
guy.

"I used to be angry," he explained. "So
fucking angry. Got me in trouble. Your sister, she set me straight.
Your family is good people. They don’t deserve what you’re giving
them."

"You don't know anything about me and my
family."

"I know one thing. Maybe just the one, but I
know it."

"What's that?"

"You're pissed off at the wrong person for
the wrong reasons, man."

A pickup truck with a noisy diesel engine
approaches and comes to a stop just short of where we're standing.
Jamie stays behind the wheel, but Gwen climbs down out of the
passenger seat. She's cleaned up her face a bit, but she still
looks a mess. She walks around the front bumper and stands
silhouetted by the headlights.

"Gwen, I'm sorry," I say, and I mean it.
"That was a dick move, and I'm sorry."

Ethan looks over at her with concern. "Baby,
you okay?"

She doesn't answer him. I can't really see
her face in the glare, but I can tell she's looking at me. "You
left your phone at the house."

I automatically feel for the edge of the case
in my pocket, but it isn't there. Gwen holds it up, showing me. I
reach out for it but she pulls it back.

"It kept buzzing. All the way over here. Just
bzzzz, bzzzz, bzzzz. Text messages. And because I was curious, and
really pissed at you, I started reading them. And then I kept on
reading."

My gut feels like I've swallowed a
cannonball. "Gwen, give me my phone." I take a step toward her, but
she backs away.

"You know what the most interesting part of
all these texts is? The name at the top of the screen. You know
why? Because it isn't Ben."

I lunge forward to grab the phone, but she
throws it on the ground and swings her fist at me. It hits me in
the collarbone, then she punches again and hits me in the
chest.

"How dare you! How fucking dare you!" I put
my arms up to cover my face as my sister keeps swinging at me.
Ethan grabs her in a bear hug, pinning her arms down. She fights
against his hold and keeps yelling at me. "How dare you say that
kind of shit to me? How dare you act all superior to Jamie when she
opened up to you? How dare you pass judgment on any of us, when
you're just a fucking cheat!"

Ethan is holding her tight and muttering in
her ear, just loud enough that I can hear. "It's alright, baby.
It's alright. Calm down. It's alright."

I bend down and pick up the phone. The
headlights show a fine crack like a bolt of lightning across the
screen.

Gwen stops struggling and he loosens his
grip, but keeps one arm around her waist, ready to stop her if she
comes toward me again. She clenches at his sleeve and breathes
heavily.

"You know what the real shit of it is?" she
says, her voice trembling. "All that time, all those years I spent,
we all spent, thinking that we wanted a fuckwad like you in our
lives. Thinking that we were the ones missing out. Wasting so much
time thinking you mattered. Thinking that you were this great empty
hole in our family. Always wondering, what did we do? How can we
fix this? What do we need to change to make him want to be a part
of us again? To make him give a shit? To make our brother give a
single shit? Well, fuck you. Our family is just fine without you.
So go back to California, Mitch. Go back to your sad little life.
Break up with Ben, or don't. Keep fucking this other guy behind his
back, or don't. I don't care. I just... I can't care."

She turns and walks to Ethan's car, tangling
herself up in his arms for a moment. He looks back at me, offering
me a sympathetic smile.

The truck shifts and the engine rumbles as
Jamie backs up. I watch her tail lights, then I watch Ethan's tail
lights, then I watch the tail lights of about a dozen other cars
that drive past, then I go back to my room and watch the bottle of
Maker's for a while.

A little after one o'clock I'm in my rental
car, cruising down silent, empty streets. I don't have to use the
GPS this time.

When I get to the house Val's car is still
parked at the curb in front. The trailer, half full of junk, sits
in the drive. Light streams through the gaps in the curtains and
the slightly ajar front door, cutting sharp glowing blades across
the yard.

I can hear the generator going in the garage.
The door is mostly shut, so the sound is muffled, but I hope it
isn't disturbing the neighbors. The power cords snake out of it,
across the overgrown bushes, over the porch, and through the front
door.

There’s a cat on the porch. Just sitting,
watching me. It looks mean, and not particularly healthy. I wonder
if it was his, if it’s the owner of the disgusting litter box. God,
was that this morning? Have I only been here a day? The cat doesn’t
meow, doesn’t even flinch as I walk past it, just stares up at me
with yellow eyes.

The living room is completely empty. Nothing
left on the walls, nothing left on the floor. No boxes, no trash.
Just a bundle of pumpkin orange extension cords draped across that
sloth fur carpet. One branches off to the kitchen, which is also
empty except for one of the work lights hanging on a six-foot stand
by its hook, radiating so much heat I can feel it from across the
room.

The rest of the cords trail down the hallway.
The bathroom, the closet, my old room, the girls' old room, the
den. All cleared out, except for a couple of lights.

Everything's gone.

The last lamp is in my father's bedroom. It's
still half full of stuff. Sitting on the mattress, staring straight
at me, is a cardboard box with my name scrawled across it in black
marker.

Val's emptying dresser drawers, sorting
clothes. She sees me, then looks pointedly at the box.

"Left that for you."

“What is it?”

“He had one for each of us. In the closet. I
thought you might want to see it.”

"How'd you know I'd come back?"

"Didn't." She straightens up, pressing her
hands into the small of her back. "Hoped you would, though."

I sit on the mattress and peel open the lid.
Val goes right back to work.

There's not much inside. Not nearly enough to
fill the empty space. Maybe he always thought he’d have more to put
in it someday. Or maybe he just didn't have a smaller box. Who the
fuck knows.

Xerox copies of old report cards. A couple of
school photos. A third-grade geography workbook. At the bottom, a
padded manila envelope. I bend the tabs back and pull out the
contents. Letters, dozens of them, addressed in my mother's
handwriting to my father and his DOC number, with my name on the
return in a child's careful pen.

I open a few. They're all the same. "Dear
Daddy, how are you? I am fine. I miss you. Come home soon. Love
Mitch". Stick figure drawings, little animals and monsters and
flowers and cars. I check the dates on the postmarks. Even after
the divorce was finalized my mom still had me write him every week.
I'd forgotten about that.