Red Lightning (5 page)

I watch him pulling out of the driveway, the tires snapping gravel, and I want to shout something after him. Something along the lines of: Guess what, I'm in so much pain that I can't believe my body is still here. Guess what? I've come here to at least pretend to be human, I can do that, and I can at least put up a show. Guess what?
I've come here to have one more burst of flame, of wildfire, of life, one more rage-against-the-night, and tenderness is the last whisper of a breeze on the embers.

When he's out of sight, I sink down till my knees touch gravel, and I bash my forehead into the rocks. I never thought a person could end up so alone.

Chapter Four

Sleep. I wake in a not-enough-air panic, naked body sweat-covered.
My throat is too tight, and so I gasp, stumble up. Stand, hunched over and breathing, and then sink back down to the floor, my knees giving way to the gravity that sucks at them. I sleep again. Wake again. Regard my naked body again. That bruise, and that one? That purple one, that yellow one. Where did I get them? Where am I? Where are my clothes? Oh, they're outside, and I'm inside a strange Earthship, colors glinting in on me, on the bright colors of a mostly red rug. I reach up to touch the pulse on my forehead, feel out the bump. I feel my hairline dripping water and grease, I feel the slide of a bit of blood where my forehead hit gravel. My tongue feels out the gaping hole in my mouth and presses against the nerve-jangly ache. I sink back down and regard the colors around me.

Sleep.

Wake.

When I open my eyes to the bright red softness I am on, sunlight is pouring in from the window.
Sunlight out of water
, my brain sings, and my eyes are not so sore, the sequencing of thoughts has
been turned on, my self is in my body. I sit up, slowly, and regard my feet. I must have left my tennis shoes outside, too, but I don't remember taking them off, how I managed to unstick them from my bloody heels. I stare at my feet now, swollen, streaked with dried blood, the circles of skin that mark the edges of blister. I ask them:
Will you carry me? Please?

They comply and hold my weight, walk me down a hallway. My fingers trace the wall for balance. I find a bathroom, step inside the shower, stand in the heat until the sting of cuts and scrapes blooms and then fades. I find shampoo and try to untangle my hair, then soap my body and soap again.

I stand naked in front of a large mirror. I am too tired to be surprised, although not too tired to make note of that fact. My jutted ribs, the lack of fat on my ass, the scrapes on my side, the rise of hipbones, the raised welts of some rash, the bruise that runs down one thigh. I peer closer. My scraped cheek, the swell beneath it, the bump and blooming bit of blood on my forehead. My eyes, seeking myself. My pupils, tiny black holes adjusting themselves ever so slightly, the brown iris around, the blink of long eyelashes.
Hey, Tess, do you see anything? Anything beautiful left in there?

I wince and step back quickly. In a drawer I find scissors, and I cut my tangled hair into a bob and work with it until the brush runs through. The slices of hair fall in wet, scraggly tangles with one clean-cut edge. I find a pair of Libby's clean underwear and sweatpants and a tank top and a T-shirt, and I pull them on.

Back in the bathroom, I sit on the toilet seat and rub lotion into my desert skin. I rub ointment into my feet, rub a swath on my crotch in the hope it might help the ache that is thrumming there. I find a pad of Libby's and stick it in my underwear to catch the blood that keeps seeping. I stand to gingerly brush my teeth, lift my lip so that I can see the raw tissue, see there is a pocket of pus, and swish my mouth
out with peroxide and water. I look at myself again. Think:
Morality is something we can smell on people, and you still stink
.

*

All life starts in the kitchen, but I cannot find any alcohol in any of
the cupboards to start my endeavor. I turn on the radio in search of distraction or news, but it's not the right time of day, and there's only country-western. I crack my neck to try to work out The Antsy and The Nervous. I offer myself a banana and a cracker and some kind of fizzy iced tea that I find in a jar in the fridge. I offer it all carefully to my body. I offer myself ibuprofen from a bottle I find in the bathroom, Percocets I find tucked in the back of their nightstand, underneath some pillowcases and reading glasses.

Now I barefoot-wander the house, into the strange nooks and crannies, the sunroom, the tomatoes and basil growing out of hydroponic plastic bottles. My feet pad over the hard smooth gray floor, wander into rooms of jeweled sunlight made by different-colored wine bottles. There is a pattern to the colors of this house, and it takes me a moment to place it. North-facing walls are all a purple blue, the west walls are sage, east are peach, south are yellow. I remember this, something about the best way to capture sunlight, make every angle pleasing to the eyes.

I end up in front of the mirror again to doublecheck Tess is there. The room is well lit with a bright burning series of bulbs, and it is clean and only has a small clutter of knickknacks-of-selfcare, and beyond that is a woman in a mirror.

                
The eyes of Tess are so darkbrown liquid shiny and still they are there.

                
Tess remembers her eighteen-year-old self,

                
fine dark hair whipping around her face

                
as she leans out the truck's window and sing-songs
goodbye, Libby, goodbye, take care of that baby, I'm driving off with mine
,

                
smiling at herself in the rearview mirror,

                
smile with a dimple, beautiful teeth, dark alive eyes, gorgeous hope,

                
as if that man and that truck were going to take her great places,

                
as if she herself were special

                
and was called into this world for great glory.

Gut-punched with a memory? I didn't think it could punch so hard. But it can. I hold my stomach, cradling the hipbones with my palms, as if inside were a baby.
Hold steady, kid. Three days to make it right
.

*

The wheat flour is in a large glass container. Eggs, butter, baking
soda, cinnamon, but no such thing as sugar. Only honey. I drink water and eat crackers and murmur to myself:

Of course there is no sugar in this house
,

of course I will have to guess how much honey
,

of course that will ruin whatever it is I'm making
,

of course there's no alcohol
,

of course
.

I stir the liquid gold into the batter and think:
The people who make it in the world are those who can
of course
it
.

Of course life is harder than you thought. Of course babies die, unbirthed in their mother's pelvic bones. Of course pirates come, of course people get lost at sea. Of course Libby's house is clean and clutter free, Libby who was always tempering the mess as a kid, the catshit and black widows and flies and toilet smell and overflowing trash and cigarettes and Kay's empty beer bottles everywhere and even Kay's
vomit. Of course I let Libby do all that because even though I noticed it all too, and I hated it, I let Libby be the one who kept trying to bring back order and beauty.

I stir until my arm aches. How come people never speak of this? How much the body can hurt? The mindwhir? How much work it takes to make this life of clean countertops, mail stacked neatly in one pile? The effort of love?

From here, stirring, I can turn and see the main room of the house. One soft green couch in a living room, one tidy computer station, one dining room table covered in a bright Mexican tablecloth. Fossils and rocks lined up on the windowsills. Walls occasionally adorned with what must be Amber's earlier-kid artwork. A lemon tree growing in the corner. Plastic boxes stacked in the pantry: LIP BALM SUPPLIES, HONEY EQUIPMENT, SOAP SUPPLIES. There are sprigs of lavender about, bunches of dried wildflowers. Near my feet on the gray smooth floor are metal dogfood bowls that are clean, lined up side-by-side, and if ever there was a sign of you-have-your-shit-together, it's the state of the dogbowls.

I put the batter into a pan, put the pan into the heated oven, find a broom, and gather up the bits of flour and cracker that have scattered. Heartsweeper. Sweeping up my own heart, sweeping up my own body, sweeping up the dusty corners and irregularities.
May I audition for the part
, some song goes.
Of sweeping up your dusty heart? I know your darkest corners fairly well
. I find the trash and let the fine bits of bonewhite fall into the bin.

With the broom, I go to the bathroom and sweep up my tangles of cut hair. They look like long grapevines, twisted into various formations. With dustpan in one hand and broom in the other, I stand and look in the mirror again, startled by my short haircut and how it hangs now that it is dry, the bit of color that has come into my cheeks. I lift my mouth in a small smile just to give it a try.
Feral gone domestic
. I cross
my arms to hug myself, fingers touching shirt but stroking curved bone, and regard, gingerly, this person in front of me.

*

The breeze shifts my hair back and forth across my face, making it
lift and dance. I've never had hair short enough to be flung about in such a way. The sensation is new. Small, yes, but new, and all any of us has ever hoped for, I think, is to be amazed.

The cake is baking, the kitchen has been tidied, so I close my eyes and lean back against the house. I tilt my head to the sun, the red coloring the back of my eyelids. It smells of dried grasses, like rotting apples, like yellow leaves on the cottonwoods, and, somewhere in the far distance, the sultry sting of a fire. Someone burning out a ditch, no doubt, or getting rid of trash in the burn barrel. My tongue feels out the gap of missing tooth, and the gap feels like wet tissue with bone underneath, which I guess is exactly what it is, a hole that seems to go forever—my tongue can't even find the end of it. The teeth to either side seem surprised, suddenly, to find themselves alone, without their companion; the sides feel new and unexposed, not yet hardened to life. The pus pocket feels the size of an eraser, tough enough to resist the push of my tongue. I assume it will open, the infection will clear. I stab it with a fingernail to see if I can pop it open, but the sting is too great. I scan the rest of my body. My crotch itches: yeast infection for sure. Blood that won't quite stop on top of that. I cough my old cough, and my ribs ache in response. The skin on my cheekbone tightens and dries. The bump on my forehead throbs. My skin is starting to feel sunburned. And my heart keeps beating. Ouch-ouch-ouch drumbeat. But also a here-you-are. Here-you-are.

I open my eyes and pick up a pebble and throw it across the yard, and this makes me look at my silver thumb ring. Slade gave it to me,
his version of a wedding band, since that's all I would accept. The sun catches it and sends a sharp slice of light into my eye, so I look the other way, toward the donkeys who are standing nose-to-nose. Blink away the tears. I opened my heart exactly twice. To Slade and to Alejandra. This sense of my heart squeezing itself is the emotion called
regret
.

Next to me is a bike leaning up against the house. Amber's, must be. I wish I missed her. I wish I had missed her in the last ten years, and I wish I missed her now. But I don't know her, and there's nothing
to
miss. I have none of that knowledge. How, for instance, Libby must have got her to this almost-big-bike stage. How years ago, Libby must have run alongside a smaller bike, yelling encouragement, judging the moment of that release, and how some smaller version of Amber, thin-straight-hair-ponytail flying, gained momentum, wobbling, wobbling, then holding steady and smiling. It's only when you've seen something like that that you can feel a hearttwist.

But that is what I am here for. To tell Amber that my departure was never her fault. Thank Libby and Ed. Say goodbye to Kay, I suppose. Write a note to Slade. And to Alejandra. To witness some details, and let them witness a few of mine. Also, I wouldn't mind sleeping out under the stars one last time. I wouldn't mind trying to share a few things about myself. I twist a bit of my hair and gaze off into the distance at the mountains. I wouldn't mind trying to be brave for a few days and trying to sweep up a bit of the mess.

*

Ed drives up in the green Harvester, leans out his window, and
regards me. “You doing okay?”

I nod.

“I'm having a bit of trouble with some farm work, actually. I wanted to pull in and double-check on you, but if you're fine, I gotta go.”

I nod again, but because he is waiting for more, and deserves it, I say, “I showered and I slept and I ate some and I'm resting. I threw away my clothes in the burn barrel and cleaned up my mess. I was hoping to see Amber when she's off school. In your presence, of course. I'll be polite and kind. I'll leave if she wants me to.”

Something soft crosses his face. “You look better,” he says. “A lot better. I'll be back in a half hour when Amber gets off the bus. Okay? I'll call Libby and tell her you're still around.” He puts the truck into drive and pulls slowly out, glancing in his rearview mirror at me as he goes.