by Lacey Dailey
His agonized whisper and the way he hugs it to his chest is almost too much to handle. “Dad.”
Slow moving tears inch down his cheeks and stain the article below his chin.
“Where did you get this?” He’s staring down at me now, blinking and trying to find my face behind the tears welled up in his eyes.
“I printed it at the school’s library. I searched your father’s name in an article database.”
“But why?”
“I thought I could find her that way, and I did.”
But I almost wish I hadn’t.
“That’s her, Rumor. In that photo with your dad. That’s your mother.”
His stance is restless as he stands there, head bowed and chest pumping. Twitching fingers toy with the top of the paper, pieces damp from his tears are sticking to the pad of his fingers. With a noise that’s somewhere between a sob and a deep breath, he pulls the article back from his chest and comes eye to eye with his mother.
He frowns. “This isn’t my mom. This is Allison.” He looks past Reggie, into the living room. I track his gaze to a mantle, and there lies a photo of his mother, rose behind her ear and eyes a carbon copy of his. “This is Reggie’s daughter.”
Rumor descends one step. With refusal to set down the article, he gives Reggie his attention. “My father was friends with your daughter?”
The smile on Reggie’s thin lips is fragile. “Ah, son, your daddy was much more than friends with Alise. The way he loved her was reckless. Sometimes it made me want to kick his ass. Mostly, I was just grateful she got to experience something so special.”
“But—" He sways on his feet, rubbing at his chest with his nub and pressing down. “That would mean that—" He draws back, crashing into the banister. The article slips from his fingers and he points a finger at Reggie. “Holy shit.”
Reggie nods, a fist to his mouth as he scans Rumor, allowing himself the opportunity to be vulnerable. “You look just like her, kid.”
It’s as though Rumor was just given a pair of brand new eyes. He gazes at Reggie like he’s meeting him for the first time all over again.
And in some way, he is.
No longer just a co-worker, or an old man he does chores for.
Reggie is family.
His family.
And suddenly I’m intruding. Stumbling backward, I trip over my backpack and tumble into the door. My elbow cracks against the wooden frame, and the sharp noise captures Rumor’s attention.
His eyes, murky and spinning with questions, flick to me. My hand on the doorknob has him jumping off the step. “Are you leaving? Don’t leave. I need you to stay.”
I drop my hand.
He stares at it for another beat, ensuring I’ll stay put, and then he starts to pace. One foot in front of the other, he makes a circle in the space between the kitchen and the living room, his brain whirling. “So, Reggie’s my grandfather, and Allison’s my mother.”
“Yes,” I say, though I’m not sure he was asking.
“But if Allison’s my mother, then that means my mother is—" Smothering a sob, he looks at me with lost eyes and a quiver in his cheekbones. The shock slips away, and realization sets in. The black and white visions he had of Allison are replaced with color. “Dead. That means my mother is dead.”
Boom.
The tears choke him but still, he doesn't weep. He just stands there, eyes moving from me to Reggie, to that picture of his mother with the rose in her hair, as he pieces together his puzzle.
He doesn’t like his result, so he messes up the pieces and builds it again. He ends up with the same result every time and I know because the tears grow bigger as they fall down his face.
When he looks at me, broken and confused, a hot tear rolls down my cheek.
“I don’t want her to be gone,” he says, and the last traces of my control vanish.
I rush him, arms outstretched, but he halts my movements with the palm of his hand. He licks a tear off his top lip and asks what I was hoping he wouldn’t. “Why didn’t you tell me when we were upstairs?”
“I—"
“And how did you know she was related to Reggie?”
“They have the same last name. I didn’t... I didn’t tell you right away because I wasn’t positive she was related. It could’ve been a coincidence.” I wrap my arms around myself. “I had to be sure, Rumor. I didn’t know she was gone until after I talked to him.”
“Wait.” His voice is sharp and it cuts right through me. “Is tonight not the first night you talked to Reggie?”
I shake my head and drop my chin, unable to meet his eyes.
“Alma, when exactly did you print out that photo?”
“Twenty-seven days ago.”
“Twenty-sev––" A curse rips from his mouth. “Twenty-seven days ago?!”
I sweep my head up, and the fury in his eyes suffocates me and holds me prisoner in my spot, close enough to feel his wrath but too far away to hold him. “I should’ve told you, I know. But after I learned she was dead, I didn’t know how to say the words.”
A grunt comes out his nose. “How about how you just did? Give me the damn paper and tell me she’s gone.”
“It wasn’t that easy, Rumor. You wanted to meet her so badly, and I didn’t know how to take this from you. I was trying to—"
“So, you killed her then?”
I jerk. “What?”
“Did you kill her, Alma? Are you the reason my mom is dead?”
“No. Of course not, I—"
“So, you didn’t take her from me.” His interruption is steady but laced in his words is venom. “You aren’t the reason she’s dead, so what exactly was so hard about telling me?”
“Rumor.” Reggie takes an unsteady step forward, and I didn’t think it was possible, but the skin on his face seems to be sagging more than it was a few minutes ago. “She’s been beating herself up for weeks, trying to come up with the best way to break it to you. She cares about you, son.”
Rumor doesn’t even look in Reggie’s direction as he speaks. The words bounce and fall right off his back.
“That’s why you’ve been acting so weird.” He shoots me with a sour look, scoffing. “All that bullshit about being worried for the future had nothing to do with you. It was about me.”
“Yes, but I—"
“You lied to me.” His face pales with anger, and that I can handle. Barely. What wrecks me completely, tears my insides out and exposes them for all to see, are the tears of hurt. Of disappointment. Of betrayal.
Tears not for his mom. But for me. Because of me.
“You lied to me, Alma. Every night we lied awake together, I held your damn hand and talked about what I thought she’d be like! You looked me in the eye inside of Mo and told me nothing was wrong! Just today, upstairs in a goddamn room that belonged to her, you let me talk about her knowing she was dead.”
The flash of loneliness in his eyes stabs me right in the gut. My own eyes become a faucet, and out of them comes tears, one after another soaking my cheeks, my neck, and the collar of my shirt.
“She’s dead, Alma! She was dead then. She’s dead now, and it sucks all the same.”
“I didn’t know how to hurt you.”
“Hurt me?” His nostrils flare, and he lets out a nasty laugh. “Oh, that’s nice, Alma. You didn’t want to hurt me so you spent the last month treating me like a moron.”
“I would never say—"
“You listened to me talk about her, excited and hopeful and scared! I rambled on and on and on about what it would be like to meet her.” He bares his teeth at me, a vein in his neck pulsing with each word he spits. “You looked me in the eyes and lied straight to my face. Your silence gave me hope, Alma, and it was all bullshit.”
His accusing voice punctures the air as though it’s a balloon, and when it pops, the sound is deafening.
“How could you do that to me?” he asks, and his heartbreak quells some of the anger. He’s staring at me, almost begging with his eye
s, begging me to tell him none of this is true. “How could you let me believe in something that wasn’t true? How could you be so cruel?”
I grasp at my chest, because God, the heart inside hurt. “I wasn’t trying to be cruel to you, or inject you with false hope. I just... this isn’t the ending I wanted for you. I was trying to come up with a way to make this better.”
“You can’t make this better!” His shout makes me flinch. With a fist to his chest, he steps forward, voice raised and hair wild. “I’m not one of your stupid treasures! You didn’t find me, okay? I came to you, looking for something and you kept it from me. It was fun to pretend but this is real life, Alma! I’m not a freaking object. You don’t get to set me aside until you’re ready to draft a story for me!”
“That is not what I was doing.”
“No? Because that’s exactly what it sounds like to me. You placated me, fed me a bunch of shit to evade me from the truth because it wasn’t what you wanted.”
He tilts his chin up and wipes his cool eyes with the back of his hand. “You live in a fantasyland of clueless parents, treasures, and dumb twinkle lights over your bed. I live in the real world where there is pain and death and liars!”
I sniff, my arms heavy and limp at my sides. I pray for the strength to reach for him and for the strength to stay breathing when he pushes me away. “Rumor—"
“Get out.”
You said you would stay.
“You... you said you needed me to stay.”
“Yeah, well, that was before I knew that your kindness is a facade. Under all that crap about treasures and butterfly kisses and stupid ass violins, you’re mean. You’re mean, Alma Underwood, and I don’t need you to stay. I need you to go away.”
“Rumor, just calm down for a minute, yeah?” Reggie’s hand is on his shoulder now, rubbing, trying to coax Rumor toward the living room. “You’re just upset. You don’t really want her to leave.”
Rumor’s eyes don’t leave mine as he stumbles backward, away from me. “Yeah. I do. I want her to leave, this house and my life.
So I do.
With one last look at him, I leave. The emptiness in my chest is confirmation he has my heart, and I hope he keeps it.
I hope it’s enough.
26
Allison
Rumor
Up then down.
Up then down.
Up then down.
Up until the moment the door clicked shut behind her, I thought of a rollercoaster as a euphemism for my life.
I was wrong.
My life isn’t a rollercoaster but rather one of those rides that spins really fast and pins you to the steel wall. It’s uncomfortable, and you can’t breathe, and your legs feel like jello when you try to step off the ride. It leaves you dizzy, with a throbbing in your temples and an ache in your gut that doesn’t let you forget the ride’s aggression.
I want to fall to my knees and beg whoever is up there to make it stop. I can’t handle it anymore–– the lies, the questions, the false hope. The pain is crushing. It hurts as though there’s a war waging inside my body, and my only source of peace just walked out the door.
Peace is a traitor.
“Rumor.”
It’s the fifth time he calls my name, and it’s the fifth time I ignore him.
My grandfather.
I’m astonished the world hasn’t cracked beneath my feet with how quickly it’s been changing. Everything looks the same, the stars haven’t dropped from the sky, and the sun still rises each morning but it’s different. I can no longer count on the world to comfort me when I open my eyes. My safety net of familiarity is gone.
From the time it took for the sun and the moon to trade places, my world as I knew it had vanished.
And so far, this new one sucks.
“Rumor. Royce. Rawlings.”
His breath is hot on my neck, saturating the collar of my shirt, and did he just–– "Did you just middle name me?”
Spinning on my heels, I come toe to toe with him, and it pisses me off he’s so damn tall. Craning my neck causes the tears on my face to re-route, and I have to slap my hand over the droplets to stop them from running into my ears. My hair sticks to my skin when I try to brush it back, the adhesive a mixture of sweat and snot.
“I told you to get it cut,” he says.
Unbelievable. “I like my hair like this.”
“You’re welcome then. You get your hair from me.”
“Says who?”
“Science.”
“You expect me to call you grandpa now or some shit?” I widen my stance, staring right into his old eyes. “Because I don’t have a grandpa. He died when I was a kid. Where the hell were you?”
The tremble in my chin is fierce, and I gnaw on my lip to stop it. My head bobs on its own accord, and I think it’s just an action––something to rid my body of energy.
Reggie’s entire face frowns. One by one the wrinkles slope downward, and he starts rubbing at his chin, tugging on the loose skin. He nudges his head toward the sofa. “Let’s sit.”
“No.”
When I’m asked to sit, people die.
“Rumor.” My name is a sigh. “I have a bum knee and a cane that’s all the way across the room. I will stand here all night with you if that’s what you need but I’m warning you now that you better pick me up off this carpet in the morning.”
Fuzzy eyebrows raise, disappearing behind his hairline and I interpret the action for what it is. A challenge.
With a slow roll of my head, I gesture toward the sofa with both arms. His hand pats my shoulder when he passes me, and I stay behind him, walking at turtle pace in case the old fart collapses. It isn’t until he’s settled in his recliner, rocking slowly, that I drop to the floor.
“The couch is comfier.”
“I like the carpet.” I press my hand into it, letting the soft microfiber ooze between my fingers.
The action grounds me. The strands may be small but I’m slipping and it gives me something to hold on to. Something to keep me present.
“You want a pillow or something, kid?”
“I’m fine.”
“I learned from Alma that when teenagers say they’re fine, it means they are minutes away from destruction.”
“Can we not talk about Alma right now?”
Or ever again...
The recliner groans and he should probably think about getting a new one before he finds himself flipped over. “How close are you to destruction, Rumor?”
“Hell if I know.” And it’s the truth. The tears are a steady drip, running into my hairline. I’ve lost feeling in my palms, and I have this idea that if I lay here, staring at Reggie’s popcorn ceiling for the rest of time, I’ll be okay. “I think I stopped feeling.”
“You’re numb.”
“I like numb. Numb is good.”
Numb is not anger.
Numb is not sadness.
Numb is not pain.
“You won’t be numb forever, Rumor. At some point, you’ll have to feel, and I want you to know that I’ll be here. When you start to feel, and you think you can’t take anymore, I’ll be here.”
I sniff, and because I’m laying down, the snot slides down my throat. I gag at the taste.
My eyelashes are wet when they meet my cheeks. The darkness that’s waiting for me isn’t much different than what’s in the light.
It’s them.
First Dad.
And now my mother.
Dad’s wearing trousers and one of the pressed shirts he wore to work. He skips the tie and leaves the top button undone because he’s the boss and can do what he wants. I’ve got half a bagel in my mouth when he rushes into the kitchen, tucking his shirt into his pants. He’s late. Which is normal. After he fills up a travel mug with coffee, he kisses the top of my head and tells me that drugs are for nerds. When the door shuts, I think I’m alone. But not a minute later he rushes back inside and sweeps his keys off the counter with a goofy gr
in on his face. The door shuts and I’m alone again. For real this time. Forever.
My mother is a blur. I see her face and the curve of her nose. Her smile is lopsided, and there’s a damn rose behind her ear. I imagine she slides it free and bends at the waist, handing it to a little boy with only one hand. He looks over his shoulder to make sure his dad is watching but when he turns back, she’s evaporated. And the boy is all alone.
“Why didn’t she want me?”
The creaking of the chair is silenced. “Rumor, we don’t have to do this right now.”
“I want to.” While I’m still numb.
“She did want you. Allison loved you. She passed when you—"
“Were a baby, I know.” An eager tear slips from between my lashes and races down my skin. “What happened to her?”
The silence lasts for a long time, and I study the darkness my eyelids project, waiting for either of them to come back.
“She drowned in a lake not too far from here.”
My eyes fly open. “What?”
“You’d been with us for five weeks at that point. Your father woke up to you crying and an empty bed. Park rangers found her just as the sun started to come through the clouds.”
Oh my God.
“But… why was she out in the dark if she couldn’t swim?”
“She knew how to swim, Rumor, she just didn’t. Not that night.”
“Why wouldn’t she swim?”
“Because she wanted to drown.”
Low in my gut, a bomb goes off. Bones rattle and muscles strain against the blow. I vibrate and the speed of my teardrops increase. Grasping for the carpet, I panic as it slides between my sweaty fingers.
Don’t let me slip.
I don’t want to slip.
“Breathe, Rumor!”
His reminder has me wrapping my hand around my neck, expelling an exhale that resembles a wheeze.
“She did it to herself?”
“My only proof is her actions in the days leading up to her death. She battled depression, son. And I think, maybe, in the end, the depression won.”
“But you said…” In the days leading up to her death. “Is it my fault?”
I slam my eyes shut as if it will shield me from an answer.
