Unlovely (44 page)

Tom had already dialed and was speaking
into the phone. The other café patrons looked on in horror.

Claudia jumped up, dropping her purse
from her lap to the floor. Mark was still holding on to her wrists.

"Let go!" she shrieked at him,
terror giving her strength. "Let go of me! I don't need an ambulance! Just
leave me alone!"

She wrenched her wrists away with a
quick snap and took a step backward as Mark glanced to a nearby table for a
fresh napkin to staunch the blood. Claudia seized the opportunity to bolt.

In the moment it took for Mark's mind to
register that she had run off, Claudia was out the door. Mark hurried after,
followed closely by Tom, but the remaining patrons stayed put and looked at one
another in confusion. One of customers had the presence of mind to walk over to
the table near the wall and retrieve Claudia's purse, which had been abandoned
on the floor. He glanced inside and saw lying there, atop a pile of gore-soaked
tissues and resting on a tin of
Altoids
, a bloody
pair of manicure scissors.

Claudia made it into her car, locked the doors, grabbed
the steering wheel and rested her forehead on it. She was very, very cold and
shivering violently. She gagged.

What a disaster.

Claudia lifted her forehead and looked
at the back of her hands. They were smeared with red, her knuckles were dark
and the wrinkles in them white. It was like looking at a photo negative. The thought
occurred to her that she should put a towel on the wheel before driving so that
she wouldn't stain the leather – where was a towel? Why didn't she keep a towel
in the glove box? –
but
then she decided the blood
would wash off with a little effort. The immediate problem was the pain. Her
hands hurt horribly. Why was she holding on to the steering wheel so tightly?
After all, she wasn't driving.

Now what? Now what should she do? Where
should she go? She couldn't drive any distance. She didn't want to go to her
parents' house. She couldn't stay here, though. Not one
more
minute
.

Someone was banging on the passenger
side window. Who was it? She couldn't see who it was. It was all very blurry.
Was that Mark? Why would Mark be banging on the window like that? He seemed
angry. She wouldn't open the door, if that's what he wanted. He looked so mad,
crazy.

She had to get away. Claudia realized
she'd left her purse behind. Shit! No – okay – the key was in her pocket! She
could go. She blinked hard to try to clear her vision. Key out of the pocket,
into the ignition.

Who was banging on her window now? Who
was that? What did he want? What did all these people want with her? Why
couldn't they just leave her alone? Why didn't they mind their own business?

Mark was pounding on the passenger
window even harder now. Was he trying to break it? Why would he want to break
into her car?

Turn the key, put the car in reverse,
nose into the road.

Claudia pulled out quickly. She hoped
she didn't run over anyone. It didn't feel like she had. No bump – she was
going to get away. It didn't matter where.

Claudia turned off of Normal onto
Merrifield Street, just because the intersection happened to appear when she felt
ready to turn. She was relieved to get away from the chaos back there, but a
new problem presented itself: Claudia didn't know this town at all. She didn't
know where the roads led, and she was so cold and tired that it was hard to
think straight.

Claudia took a right turn onto a road
that wound through campus. Why did her hands hurt? They really hurt a lot. The
speed limit was posted at 15 miles per hour, so she took care to slow down.
Must obey the traffic laws. She seemed to be lead-footed today; she'd certainly
gotten here from Jameson fast. That was weird, because she was normally very
conscientious about traffic laws.

How could she get off the campus? This
place was a maze. Where was she? Where was she going? For the life of her she
couldn't recall at the moment. How stupid to drive around like this and not
even know where she was heading. To her mom and dad's? To Melanie's? No, not to
Melanie's.
Fulko
might be there and they hadn't
parted on the best of terms. If there's one thing she didn't need, it was a
scene.

The thought struck her that if she could
just get to Mark, everything would be all right. Mark would take care of her.

Where did he live? Farm-something. Farm
Road? Farm Street? Wait – wasn't he back at the coffee shop? Why had she left him
at the coffee shop? Maybe she should go back. Wouldn't he be angry that she
left without him? Well, there was nothing else to do. She might as well face
the music. He would forgive her. He was in love with her. She would head back,
if she could just figure out how to get off this campus.

But by now Mark would have left the
coffee shop, right? He might even be home already. He would go straight there.
He was probably expecting her at his house right now, and here she was,
wandering around.

Okay. There's the plan. That's what she
should do. She should go to Mark's house. And even better, his wife might be
there, and she and Mark could talk to Susan and explain everything. She was
probably a nice woman. He married her, after all. A reasonable woman. She would
listen to reason.

Why did her hands hurt so
bad
? They really hurt.

A car was traveling closely behind
Claudia's. Did the driver want to pass? Was that it? No passing here. Double
lines. No – it's Mark! How lucky! Just in time! Always just in time. He was
gesturing at her. He wanted her to pull over. He must have realized she didn't
know the way to his house and he wanted to give her directions. What should she
do? Claudia had a terrible feeling in her gut that she had to keep driving. She
couldn't stop or there would be trouble. She wanted to stop, but she was
scared.

Mark looked so concerned. He was saying
something. He was yelling; he was unhappy with her. The last thing she wanted
was to make him unhappy. She would have to stop. She would stop.

Claudia pulled into the library lot and
parked the car. Mark parked behind her and leaped out. He was knocking on her
window.

"Open the door! Please,
Claudia!" His hair looked funny, all mussed up.

"Just tell me your address,
Mark!" she yelled through the closed window.

Mark walked to stand in front of her
car, pulling a phone out of his pocket and raising one finger, asking her to
wait. He was talking on the phone, but he kept his eyes on her. Who could he be
calling? Whom. Whom could he be
calling.
That was odd,
to pull Claudia over and then call someone. Maybe he was calling Susan.

Claudia began to feel panic welling up
in her stomach, spread to her spine and crawl up her neck. This was bad.
Something was off here. What was he doing? She didn't feel safe. She had to get
out of here, but how? She couldn't back up – Mark's car was there. She couldn't
go forward and run Mark over.

Mark finished the call and walked back
around to the driver's side. Seeing his face so close again calmed her. Claudia
cracked open the window an inch, then put her hands back on the wheel, wincing.

"Do you want to give me directions
to your house? Is that why you stopped me? You don't have to. I can find it. I
have a map. Just give me the address." Her teeth were chattering. How
could Mark be comfortable out there in short sleeves? It was so cold today.

"Why don't you come on out of the
car, Claudia?"

"No, I can't." Claudia gritted
her teeth with impatience. Didn't he understand they couldn't simply hang
around here shouting at each other? What was that sound? Was it a siren? There
must be a fire. Was the coffee shop on fire? How awful! It was such a nice
place.

"I want to help you. Your hands
must hurt. Don't they hurt? Don't you want to let me help you?" Mark was
pointing at her hands on the steering wheel. "Look at your hands, Claudia.
You're injured. You need to see a doctor."

How did he know how her hands hurt? How
could he tell? Claudia pulled her hands off the wheel and turned them to look
at the palms. They were red. There was skin, loose skin. She could see into
them – she could see the inside of her hands.

All of that red. Blood. It was blood.

Claudia began to scream the high-pitched
wail of a trapped animal.

"Claudia, sweetheart. Claudia, open
the door. Please open the door," Mark pleaded above the horrible noise.
"I can help you. Please let me help you. Let me make it better. I swear
you won't hurt anymore. I swear it."

Claudia kept screaming, staring at her
hands. Mark ran back to his car and grabbed a mitten and a
LifeHammer
from the glove box. He dashed back up to the rear passenger side of Claudia's
car, pulling on the mitten.

"Look out!" Mark shouted
through the glass, hoping that Claudia would listen and respond. She didn't. He
struck the tool sharply against the window, shattering it, and pushed enough
glass aside to reach around to unlock the front door. Flinging it open, he
climbed in and grabbed Claudia by the shoulders, twisting her in the seat. She
clutched at him, and then shocked by the pain of it, began to sob. Mark held
her tightly, a human straitjacket, while Claudia's shredded hands were
suspended stiffly behind him.

"Don't look at them anymore. Don't
look at your hands. You're going to be all right. I promise. We're going to
make it better. Poor Claudia. Poor baby."

Clean and white.

Cold. Shivering. A nurse with warm
cotton blankets. Better.

Dark. Nice.

Mom and Dad. Whispers. I love you, too.
I have to sleep. Do I have to speak? Can you just understand me, please? You know
I love you. I'm too tired.

Dark. So good to sleep.

Light.

Claudia felt very fragile, like a
hollowed-out egg. The driving force that had sustained her was gone. She was
empty. She looked down at her hands, resting on her blankets. There were going
to be scars. Would people ask her about them for the rest of her life? She
didn't much care right now. Let them ask. Let them look at her and think she
was a freak.

Just sleep.

Several days later Claudia sat on the edge of her bed,
a small suitcase packed beside her, waiting to be officially discharged. Tony
was bringing the car around and her mother was busy back in
Mapleville
,
preparing for her daughter's homecoming. It would be brief stop at 410 Smith
Street, a matter of days, because Claudia had another stay ahead of her in a
mental hospital downstate. She would be in residence for about a month.

Claudia weighed slightly more than she
did when they brought her in, although she was still emaciated, just a little
over one hundred pounds. She had such high sugar levels when she was first
admitted that the doctors initially thought she suffered from diabetes. Soon
they realized that all they were seeing in her urine sample was the nutrition
from the IV bag. She had obviously eaten nothing substantial for some time.

Next the doctors suspected anorexia, but
a discussion with Claudia convinced them that was probably not the issue. She
was diagnosed as profoundly depressed and anxious.

Claudia continued to sit on the bed,
ready to go and staring at the door, waiting for her father's face to appear.
What was she going to do now? She had a year off of teaching, some money tucked
away, but no plans. She was going to have to move back in with her parents.

Living with them again was going to be
humiliating. Her mother would drive her crazy, hovering all the time.

Drive her crazy. That's ironic.

The first stop, though, before life in
the bosom of her family, was Woodside. Melanie had found it. She said it wasn't
at all what Claudia was imagining, which of course was pretty grim. Melanie
assured her that there wouldn't be crazy people wandering around in pajamas. At
this point, Claudia didn't even care if there were. Maybe that was her tribe
now. She was one of the crazy people.

Everything was flat. She didn't want to
die. She didn't want to live. She didn't want to experience the moment she was
in. She just felt nothing.

Claudia was on a mood stabilizer for the
time being, but in a week or so she'd be switched off of it to something else.
The doctors told Claudia that they would run all sorts of tests on her when she
got to the mental hospital: cognitive tests, MRI's, sleep studies. Claudia
couldn't imagine how taking a pill or talking to a counselor could make the
least difference in her life right now, but she didn't care enough to fight it,
either.

Mark. Mark felt miles and miles away.
He'd sent flowers, but they had died. Sylvia just threw the vase away. There
was a note with the flowers wishing her well. A nurse said he'd come by once to
check on her, but all concerned agreed that it probably wasn't in Claudia's
best interest to see him.