Rosie (20 page)

“Master?”

“Sing ye well?”

“Very well.”

“Hey down.”

“Ho down.”

“Derry derry down, among the leaves so-o green-oh.”

Singing, she could block the picture of the penis. “Well, I-i-i've got rings on my fingers, bells on my toes, elephants to ride upon, my little Irish rose”: walking and singing in the warm forest took her mind off Mr. Thackery, but each time it flashed through her mind, her stomach fluttered. “Listen,” she said suddenly, and they stopped, as did time: somewhere close by, up on the hillside behind them, came a distant crashing, the crackling of twigs and leaves, too fast to run from, and they stood gripping each other's hand, wide-eyed and unblinking, as the cracklings approached, whipped around expecting a werewolf or tiger, and screamed bloody murder at a terrified fawn, which turned and bolted back up the hillside.

They giggled hysterically for several minutes, then set off again, still holding hands.

“Rosie?”

“Yeah?”

“Nothing.”

“What.”

“Your dad's supposed to let you see it in the shower when you're very little, and then as you get older he wants you to see that it's just this natural thing, so you don't scream when you see your husband's.”

“Mama never told me that.”

“That's because your father's dead.”

“I don't even want to talk about it.”

“But you're not supposed to tell anybody, because it's totally private.”

“Well, just shut up about it, because I'm not going to tell.”

“You promise?”

“Yes.”

“You swear to God? ... Rosie?”

“Yes, I swear to God; now just shut up about it.”

“We should go back,” said Sharon. “We've walked for so long.”

“Just a few minutes longer.”

“Okay.” After a minute of silence, Rosie began singing:

“It's starting to get cold.”

“Okay. Let's go back.”

“Boy, are we going to get it from your
mother.”

“Oh, boy.” A vision of her mother, loud and furious, filled her head. Cruella de Vil. She was in for a bare-bottomed spanking, there was no doubt of it. Unless James was there. She hated for James to know about the theft, but her mother didn't act so mad when someone else was around. She could sneak upstairs to her room and hide, but if James was there the punishment wouldn't be so bad, her mother wouldn't act so disappointed and tight. “You want to spend the night?”

“I don't know.”

“Mama won't be so mad if you're there.”

“But I don't know if I can.”

“Well, you can call from my house.”

“What if
your
mother says no?”

“I don't know. We've gotta walk faster.”

“I'm getting the shivers.”

“Me too.”

They walked along with a sense of rising panic: the forest was getting dark; it was later than they'd thought. Elizabeth was waiting for them. What was Mr. Thackery doing right now? They held hands and walked as fast as they could.

An owl, birds, ominous cracklings. What if a man stepped out from behind a tree? “One hundred bottles of beer on the wall, one hundred bottles of beer....” Their teeth chattered as loudly as red plastic wind-up dentures clacking across a table. When they reached the great old cypress, they broke into a run.

By the time they reached Willow, they were on their last legs, and walked toward the Ferguson house with side aches, skinny brown legs trembling with cold and fear and exhaustion, holding hands, all but limping. They stopped at the white lattice gate to take deep breaths. Rosie crossed herself, and then they stepped into the front yard of the Ferguson house.

By a quarter till seven Elizabeth was half out of her mind with worry, and had called the Thackery house a dozen times, but each time the line was busy. She gulped down a shot of whiskey to quell the mounting panic, dialed again, hung up, and sank into a chair at the kitchen table. The girls were hurt, or dead, or lost: she felt so sure of this that she took it to be a premonition rather than an active lack of faith. The thought of James made her hold onto her stomach with both hands. She got up, dialed, and slammed down the phone again. That gossipy airhead!

Hunched over the kitchen table, she wrote out a list of their forts—the lagoon, the railroad yard, the old Murphy house, the dunes on the beach—and their classmates, with the intensity of a myopic amphetamine freak doing scrimshaw. For the police. Oh, God, don't let them be dead. If only they are safe—I will give up anything else.

In the meantime, she poured herself another whiskey and dialed Sharon's number again. But the line was still busy.

She leaned in the direction of the front door and cocked her head. Thinking she heard footsteps, she walked to the front of
the house. No one was there; she stood at the opened door and gazed out in a trance. Please let the girls come home. Maybe she was dreaming, would awake to find James beside her.... Across the street, a green-trimmed window on the lower level of the Haas house opened and an orange cat flew out onto the lawn. The window slammed shut, and Elizabeth's phone rang, just once. She looked toward the phone on the teak stand in the hall, puzzled. An auditory hallucination? I am losing my head, she thought.

She went toward the kitchen for another glass of scotch. She had a genuine reason to drink (although a week ago, the dog Leon's tenth birthday had seemed a good excuse). Please, she prayed, to no one in particular, let the girls be safe. There
are
no atheists in foxholes, she reflected, and then the phone rang. She had taken three fast steps toward the kitchen when the front door opened. She spun around, lurched to the hallway, and rushed toward the two girls who stood inside the door.

She gaped at their beautiful faces, but the relief was instantly forgotten and she wanted to slap them both silly, wanted Sharon to leave so she could attack her daughter. The phone continued to ring, but no one moved. Sharon held her breath, while Rosie looked back at her mother with an air of casual defiance, which made Elizabeth want to wrench her daughter's arm out of its socket.

It was clear to Rosie that her mother had gone crazy; they clenched their fists and jaws identically, facing off.

The phone stopped ringing.

“I better call my mother,” Sharon said, squirming.

“She has to stay over tonight.”

“No.”

“It's okay, Ros—”

“Mama? She really has to.” There was an eerie look in Rosie's eyes, new to Elizabeth, sad and tempered and mature. What on earth has Rosie seen? Death or sex or violence?

“Rosie?”

“Mama?”

“What's going on here?”

Rosie looked skyward for help. Elizabeth looked over at Sharon, who was staring down at her feet and sucking on a baby finger. Slowly, she raised her gaze to Elizabeth's face. After a moment, Elizabeth heaved a sigh.

“Okay. Go call your mother. Tell her you're going to spend the night, and we've been trying to reach her for the last hour. But the line's been busy.”

“Thank you.”

“Thank you.”

Sharon walked to the kitchen. Rosie's shoulders sagged.

“Do you know that it's almost seven?”

“Yeah.”

“Do you know what sort of turmoil you caused me and Sybil?”

“ .”

“Where were you?”

“On the trail.”

“Goddamn it! What do you have to say for yourself?”

“I'm sorry.”

“Sorry isn't good enough.”

“I'm
really
sorry.”

“You're becoming untrustworthy!”

“ !”

Sharon had just hung up in the kitchen when Elizabeth stormed in. She got the whiskey out of the cupboard, poured some into a glass, and went to the refrigerator for ice cubes, seeming not to have noticed Sharon.

“Elizabeth?”

“Oh. Yeah?” Elizabeth turned toward her, taking a sip.

“Mommy says it's all right if I stay.”

“Good. Why don't you go play with Rosie until dinner?”

Sharon all but tiptoed out the door.

Wobbling somewhat, she sat in a chair, stooped over the kitchen table, holding her glass as if to keep it from floating away. The kids had come home. Teardrops speckled the table-cloth.

Rosie was sitting on the bottom stair, pigeon-toed, hugging her knees to her chest. Sharon sat with her back against the front door, Indian-style.

“Mama was just angry because she was worried about us.”

“Mine too.”

“How come she let you spend the night?”

“Search me.”

Rosie stuck her nose into the air, sniffing. “I smell bacon.”

“Me too.”

Visions of Mr. Thackery wafted through Rosie's mind, and she shivered, on the stairs. She had to tell, had to tell; why had she sworn to God? If you swore something to God and then broke your promise, you went straight to hell when you died: Satan with a long red tail and pitchfork, standing unharmed in the flames. Did the devil really exist, or was he like Santa Claus? If she went to hell, she'd never see her father again, but if she never told anyone, she'd be crazy with the secret for the rest of her life. Like King Midas's barber. She heard her name being called, turned slowly toward Sharon. “What?”

“I said, your mother wants us.”

Rosie stood.

Elizabeth had made grilled cheese sandwiches with bacon and avocado, which she set on plates at the kitchen table, in front of two glasses of milk. She kept them company while they ate, but took nothing for dinner but whiskey.

“I want you girls to go to bed early.”

“Okay.”

“Tomorrow we need to have a serious talk.”

“We'll pay back the money.”

Elizabeth didn't say anything for a minute. Then she nodded. “Okay. But let's talk about it tomorrow.” Tending to the girls helped take her mind off her dreadful anger, let her forget about James for seconds at a time. She needed them to need her. She didn't know how she would survive the next twelve hours, not to speak of the next few weeks. Or months. Tomorrow would
never come, tomorrow never came: by tomorrow, tomorrow morning would have become “today,” this morning, and today was insufferable. And she was getting quite drunk, with little decrease in wired unhappiness.

“Is James coming over tonight?”

“No.” She shook her head, and her stomach was pitching and wormy.

“God, it's almost nine.”

“Can we have some ice cream, Mama?”

“Sure. Why don't you two get your pajamas on, and I'll bring you each a bowl to eat in bed.”

“Okay. Will you read us the book?”

“For a while.”

“Oh, Mama, thanks.”

Washing the dishes, sipping on scotch, Elizabeth felt calmer. The hell with James. The main problem wasn't the loss of the man, it was the sickening obsessive anger: she must station a bouncer at the door to her brain, kick James out the second he entered her consciousness. She dropped her head and shook it.

“‘It's Mrs. Which, Charles Wallace said.'” Elizabeth sat hunched over on Rosie's bed, where the girls lay in Rosie's nightgowns. She wore a worn, sky-blue chamois shirt over a thin, lacy white nightgown from Greece, which she had bought even before she married Andrew. She had begun to slur, but only every so often. Her eyes were bloodshot and sad.

“‘There was a faint gust of wind, the leaves shivered in it, the patterns of moonlight shifted, and in a circle of silver something shimmered, quivered, and the voice said, “I ddo nott thinkk I willl matterrialize completely. I ffindd itt verry ttirinngg, andd wee hhave mmuch ttoo ddoo.”'”

“One more chapter!”

“Nnoo.”

“Pllease.” Rosie already felt nostalgia for this evening, for grilled cheese and bacon, for Sharon beside her and ice cream in bed, her mother's reading voice, and
A Wrinkle in Time;
like
she felt at the last few pages of a perfect book which had no sequel. Had she, earlier today, really seen a dick? What if the police asked her to swear on a stack of Bibles? Was she positive?

No.

After listening to their prayers and kissing them good night, Elizabeth went downstairs. She stood in the living room, stroking her nose as she watched the fire. There were two Elizabeths, one in the lacy white nightdress and sky-blue chamois shirt, black-haired and sad, lit by the golden-red fire, and one who watched this woman. She clutched her stomach with suddenly clammy hands and grimaced. Jolts of sexual jealousy flashed through her, stroboscopic slides of James played in her mind, worms and acid hit her stomach, and turning away from the flames, she set off for the kitchen.

Half an hour later she went to call Rae. It would be an hour later in New Mexico, ten thirty or so. Rae, I'm having a crisis. I don't think I can survive the night. My soul has been thoroughly fucked with, by James, and by, uh, being such a heavy drinker. I mean, close to twenty years' worth, and on top of this, James makes love with other women—Rae, I can't cope. You see, he said he wanted to marry me. I was the love of his life! Fucking A! And I finally decide that he's everything I wanted in a man, and I call to tell him I love him, finally—he's been telling me for weeks, but I've been hedgy and suspicious-and a woman answers the phone! At midnight!

But no one answered the phone. Elizabeth let it ring and ring—thank
God
you were home, Rae, I was losing my
mind
—and ring.

Now what? She would never fall asleep. She had never felt so close to the precipice, would go mad, like her mother, tonight. She took a scotch to the living room to wait in front of the fire for the great, possibly silent blowout.

She held in her hand the trump card, which she had carried since her teens. If all else failed, she could play the breakdown. She would be committed to an institution. She could let out all
the screams and the black slime of thirty-eight years; once she got started, it would really be something. She smiled.

But then there would be a cleanup. And she would knit back together, slowly, cleanly, a well-set bone. Rosie would stay with Rae until Elizabeth was well. Finding herself no longer afraid to play the trump made her calm enough so that she didn't have to. Not yet.

She got up and went to the stereo and put on a song from
Blood on the Tracks,
“Idiot Wind,” and its scathing, vituperative lyrics gave her the strength of anger, of spite and revenge. Her face came back to life. You're an
id
-iot, James, you're an
id
-iot, James; God, I hope you rot, never sell your book, and mourn the loss of Rosie and me until you die, fat, bald, and alone.

She got up and played the song again.

God save him from her wrath. Sneering with dignity, she rehearsed what she would say if she ever talked to him again. You're malicious, James, and shallow. There is, in your eyes and heart, the glint of a child playing dodge ball, about to nail a friend's ankle: you're an insecure, pathetic shit, James. You are not a good man.

You see, when men act in deceitful, retrograde ways, women sometimes stoop to that level and act just as badly. And I don't want to catch what you have.

It's the worst thing, James, to be a hypocrite. I wouldn't be in your shoes for anything.

The end of love negated all the memories of fun and loving. Conversations lost their value, passion lost all meaning. She had been duped, like Rae had been duped by Brian all those times. There would be nothing to show for her friendship with James except hatred, and much greater caution. It hurt more than anything had before. She hugged herself and began to cry.

Poor Elizabeth. She saw Rosie at the beach on a hot black Fourth of July, the year after Andrew died. When the fireworks above the bay had stopped, someone gave her a sparkler and lit it, and Rosie cut flashing red swirls in the black air, joyously absorbed, until it began to sputter and went out, and Rosie stood holding a piece of burnt wire, on which she then burned a finger. Elizabeth cried and, after a while, felt better.

But then, at midnight, she heard a knock at the door and lifted her head slowly off her chest. She looked like a child roused from sleep, grumpy and bleary, lips swollen into a pout.

Go away.

Knock knock.
“Elizabeth?” James. Oh, God, oh, no. Go away. “Elizabeth?” She sat very still. “It's me. Let me in.”

The knocking continued. She couldn't let him see her like this, it would diminish his sense of loss. Slowly, with cold dignity, she rose and staggered, with her head held high, to the door.

“Go away.” She pushed in the button to lock it.

“What's going on here? I knew you'd be mad, but—I've driven all the way from the city.”

“Yer an idiot, James.” She stared at the swirling wood grain of the closed door, and she swayed.

“I can explain everything.”

“I doubt it.” She stood hugging herself.

“I've been sick.”

She sneered. “My heart bleeds.”

“That doesn't make sense. Are you drunk? Oh, wait, did you say your heart
bleeds?
Oh, never mind. Please let me in.”

Elizabeth studied the closed door between them, took several steps backward, and sat clumsily down on the bottom stair. She waited for his next move but heard nothing. Had he left? No, she was sure of it. Still she waited, and there was only silence. It was a trick. If she opened the door, he would leap out at her and push his way in. He would trick her into forgiving him, and she would end up back in love, and he would betray her again somewhere down the road. Was he still on the porch? Had he ever been there? She shook her head to clear it. Finally she stood, wobbling, turned the doorknob, pulled it open an inch, and peered around. It had not been a trick, he was not on the doormat. The stars were glittering dots of gold in the black sky, and James sprang at the door from out of the shadows. She cried out, and he pushed his way inside.