The Good Goodbye (25 page)

A nurse comes in to check the monitors. She doesn’t cheerfully say hello when I greet her, which alarms me. “Is Arden okay?” I ask, and she nods tightly. “No change.” But she doesn’t linger by Arden’s bed the way she had the afternoon before. Maybe she’s had a fight with her husband, maybe her back is hurting her, but I can’t help but wonder if somehow she’s heard the suspicions circling my daughter.

I pull my phone from my bag and press the buttons. The phone rings, but my mother doesn’t answer. She must be driving the boys somewhere. Or maybe they’re at the park. My mother’s a big one for fresh air. Maybe she thinks this will stave off the chicken pox. I had Skyped with them that morning, before school. The boys had been all motion, eager to show me their homework, a scrape on Henry’s knee, a cardinal perched on the bird feeder they had given Theo for Father’s Day. But they’re not there now. I leave a message. “Hi, Mom. Just wanted to know if you’ve heard how Christine’s operation went.” Two little girls with dark curly hair, attached chest to chest, their arms wrapped around each other. A complicated surgery, Christine said, but not as complicated as some. I wonder how the girls will feel when they’re no longer connected. “Call when you have a chance.”

The door slides open. It’s Theo. “Any luck?” I whisper, and he shakes his head. “My mom’s on the line.” He comes into the room. “She wants to say hello. That okay?”

I hesitate. Sugar can be overbearing. But Theo’s already extending the phone and I slide my own phone into my pocket and speak into his.

“Hi, Sugar.” I let myself out of Arden’s room.

“Now, listen. I’m going to tell you what I told Theo. You kids need a good lawyer.”

Her voice is strong, purposeful. She’s used to getting her way, being heard and listened to. George may be the successful businessman but Sugar’s the one really in charge. Vince had been the one to introduce me to his parents. Sugar had held both my hands in hers and studied my face before hugging me hello. I’ve always wondered what she’d been thinking.

“I know. We’re on it.” I walk down the hallway to the family lounge. Someone’s been in here, leaving behind a paper cup on the table and a crumpled blanket tossed across the back of the couch.

“No, not someone through the Bishop School. You don’t want everyone knowing your business. You need to be able to speak your mind.”

We need to be able to afford it. “Speak our mind about what?”

“You don’t know what a police investigation could turn up.”

“Arden didn’t do it, Sugar.”

“Well, of course she didn’t!” she exclaims, sounding surprised. I’m relieved at this support from an unexpected source. “But you don’t want everything bared for public consumption. She called us, you know.”

I stop walking. “Arden? When?”

“Oh, just before we left on our trip. She wanted to thank us for her birthday present. It was all right to send the girls money this year, wasn’t it? That’s all they asked for.”

An oblique reference to the fact that we had so little of it. “It’s fine. Of course it’s fine. Thank you.”

“George and I will send them more for Christmas, too. They’re in college now; they have expenses.”

Will Arden be home for Christmas?
I’ll have to come up with a vegetarian substitute for turkey, something special that she’ll love. I rest my forehead against the cold glass, look down onto the rain-soaked parking lot below. People hasten to and from their cars, umbrellas whipped by wind, folded newspapers gripped between two hands to form a waterproof shelf. They seem so far away. Arden had fallen even farther. “What did she say?”

“What did who say?”

“Arden. What did she tell you? How did she sound?” Sugar’s a talker. She probably didn’t let Arden get in a word edgewise. Still, I need to know. Had Arden sounded happy? Had she sounded okay? I need to know I hadn’t overlooked something that would explain how
this
happened.

“Let me see. I asked her how classes were going and she said fine. I asked if there were any boys on the horizon and she told me no one special. I hope you’re not worried about that, Natalie. Some girls are just late bloomers.”

But there had been a boy. Had Arden fallen in love with Hunter? Would she really have pursued her best friend’s boyfriend? Arden’s always been a private person, even as a child. It’s a quality I’ve always understood and respected. But maybe I should have pushed a little. Maybe she’d been waiting for me to ask.

“It was a quick conversation. She had to get to class. I was packing to get ready for our trip. But, Natalie, she sounded fine. She really did.”

I very much want to believe this.

“George and I will be home in a few days. We’ll head directly to the hospital. Call me if you need anything in the meantime. I’ll keep my phone by my bed.”

“Thank you.”

“I do wish we were there, Natalie. I truly do. It’s such a terrible time for all of you. This split between you and Vince isn’t helping things. Don’t you think it’s time you forgave him?”

Again. “I’m not thinking about Vince right now.”

“It’s not just him I’m worried about, honey.”

“Vince thinks Arden set the fire. He thinks she tried to kill Rory.”

I’m glad I’ve said this, put the shocking words out there. Let Sugar see who her son really is. Even Theo has doubts. I’m the only one holding fast. The scene below me blurs, tiny headlights flaring on, and a car slowly pulling away.

“He’s just upset, Natalie. He doesn’t know what he’s saying.”

It’s exactly what Theo said. “We’re all upset. Stop making excuses for him.” I have never spoken to my mother-in-law so sharply. I’ve crossed a line, slammed a door shut I can never reopen. My mother would be horrified.

There’s silence. Sugar’s sorting her words. “All I’m saying is you need to pull together,” she says, at last. “You need to be prepared. You don’t know what’s coming.”

—

It’s the middle of the night. I sit beside Arden’s bed. The machines blink. Christine’s reassured me over and over.
There’s no timetable. Every case is different. We should know something in the next day or so.
Through the curtain, I see the shadowy shape of someone walking past. It looks like Vince. Probably going out to sneak a cigarette.

I’ve tried everything I can to save my restaurant—firing people who’d worked hard and were my friends, begging suppliers for credit extensions and loan officers for a break, coming in early and staying late, all in a desperate attempt to keep the slippery sliding mud from pushing past me and taking my restaurant with it. But the mud had come, knocking me to my knees.

I had been so focused. I had let things go unremarked. When I didn’t hear from Arden, I should have called her. I should have asked her how things were going, but I thought we could talk later. I always thought there would be a later.

The nurse comes in to take another reading. A short woman with gray curls. I close my cookbook and set it aside. “How is it?”

It’s a moment before she answers, a split second that stretches to eternity. “Twenty-two.”

That damned number. It’s concrete. It’s lead. Arden’s not as resolute as Rory. She sometimes takes the path of least resistance. “Could we get her a fresh sheet?” I ask. “And maybe some new socks?”

I lift the end of the sheet to reveal my daughter’s legs, bulky compression boots around her calves, and gently tug a sock free. The nurse’s flashlight sweeps past and my daughter’s pale foot is revealed to me, each toe swollen, and the gentle sheen of silver polish. A sophisticated shade. Not like the bright colors Arden loved before she went off to college.

The flashlight moves on and we are left once again in darkness.

Arden

“WHO’S CHELSEA LEE?”

I wake with a gasp. It’s Uncle Vince talking. He sounds close.
Why do you think I’m Rory, Uncle Vince?
Maybe there’s something wrong with my face. I try to touch my cheek. But my arm lies stiff, throbbing.

“I think she’s one of Rory’s professors,” Aunt Gabrielle answers.

“Nice of her to send flowers,” Uncle Vince says.

People send flowers for funerals. But I’m not dead. I’m burning alive, smoke rising up.

“I saw that pink-haired girl again,” Aunt Gabrielle says. “She was standing by the elevator. I think she was looking for Rory’s room. I don’t know why. I told her the girls can’t have visitors.”

D.D. leans close and whispers,
You fucking bitch.

“She’s young. She doesn’t understand.”

Uncle Vince says it in the way that means he doesn’t want to be having this conversation but doesn’t know how to stop it from happening. It’s like that all the time between him and Rory.
Daddy,
she’ll say when she wants something, and he’ll pretend he’s listening.
Hmm?
He’ll smile at her, but not really. It never deters her. She just goes right around to face him.
Daddy, Daddy, Daddy. I have a question.

But if I say
Daddy?
to my dad, he immediately stops to look at me. I’m careful what I let him see. When all that crap was going on in eighth grade, he knew. I caught him standing in his office doorway and watching.
I’m fine,
I told him whenever he asked. Because here’s the thing: I couldn’t stand to see the sadness collect in his eyes.

“Gabby? I called you Friday night, but you never answered. Where were you?”

“Did you? I suppose I didn’t hear my phone.”

“You heard it when the hospital called.”

“Yes, thank God.”

My leg is on
fire.
I can’t catch my breath. I need to stay awake, but the pain rolls in.

I’m in my bed at home. Something fierce lies curled in my belly, trying to claw its way out. The overhead light snaps on.

Arden?
My mom bends over me. I moan, roll around, clutching my stomach. I stumble to the bathroom while she calls the doctor, her voice low and clear. She’s scared, too. When I see the blood, I’m embarrassed.
Mom
.
It’s okay.

Someone’s screaming.
Is it me?

Henry howls from the basement. The animal cry makes the hair on the back of my neck stand straight up. Dad rushes him to the hospital while I watch Oliver, the two of us pretending to play Crazy Eights. I’m tucking him into bed when he whispers,
I didn’t mean to.
His mouth crumples like he’s going to cry.
Mean to what?
I whisper back. But he turns his face to the wall.

Where is Rory? Why isn’t she telling everyone who I am? Is it Rory screaming?

But Rory doesn’t scream. Rory doesn’t even cry. She’s never broken her arm and she’s never had her period. It’s her thinness that keeps it away. When I found that out, I tried starving myself, too, but I couldn’t make it one day before sneaking down to the pantry in the dark to eat handfuls of crackers straight from the box. Still, Rory knows pain, too. It’s just a different kind.

—

The man next to me on the Metro keeps trying to look down the top of my dress. He reeks of B.O. I turn my shoulder to him and watch cement walls zoom past. I’m dragging by the time I get to Zorba’s and my arm’s itching like it’s on fire. The things you think are cool when you’re little are not the things that really are cool when you’re grown-up. I’m surprised Rory never changed her mind about getting a tattoo, but I’m glad I went through with it. I’m glad I made her happy.

The screen door bangs shut behind me, stirring up dust motes that spin around in the weak sunshine. The wooden table and chairs are battered, and the place reeks of mildew and stale grease. How did I ever think this place was so sick?

Toby’s by the soda dispenser. The place is empty except for him. “Hey.” He presses his paper cup against the lever. Dark soda fizzes in. He’s got his black messenger bag slung across his chest and he’s broken out in angry zits across his forehead and chin.

“Hey. How’s school going?”

“College apps suck, man. How many stupid essays do I got to write?”

“Can’t your coach help you?”

Toby’s parents own a spa clinic in Alexandria. He gets good grades but doesn’t play a sport, so he’s screwed. He’s been working with a college prep coach since eighth grade. “She says I have to do it on my own.” He sucks on his straw, shrugs. “I might buy some essays online.”

“They’ll find out.”

“There are sites.”

I should tell Rory that. I pull out my wallet and he frowns, jerks his chin to a booth. I’m dismayed. I don’t want to sit. I want to get this over with. He slides onto the bench. I sit down opposite, wincing at the sticky surface beneath my bare thighs. He nods and I glance to see Ed’s gone into the kitchen. Ed has to know what’s going on. He’d be an idiot to think people would want to hang with Toby for any other reason. I push across a folded sheaf of bills and Toby quickly thumbs through them. “You sure this is all you want? Won’t last you long, the way you’re burning through them.”

Like it’s any of his business. The sixty bucks I’d paid the tattoo artist meant six pills I couldn’t buy. “I’m sure.”

He flops open the flap on his messenger bag. “Look, I hate to give away business, but coke’s a lot cheaper, you know. Or, hey. Go to the doctor. Tell him you can’t concentrate. You know what to say.”

Coke’s for addicts and my family doctor will just raise his thick white eyebrows at me and tell me the only way he’ll give me a prescription is if I go to therapy, too. But really, I’m afraid. I’m terrified of all the ways things could go wrong. This is what I know, meeting Toby for a soda at a crappy pizza place. This is safe. “It’s illegal,” I say, lamely.

“Dude.” He tosses me the small white bottle. “Calm down.”

—

The house is lit up when I get home, all the windows glowing. I unlock the door and step into the front hall. It smells just the same as always, of wood and leather and lemons and rosemary and melting butter. It almost looks the same, too, the tumble of small blue sneakers by the front door and clogs and loafers, the glass lamp filled with seashells turned on in the living room, shining a big circle across the pale green carpet. There’s something missing. I can’t figure out what. I drop my bag on the floor.