Fire & Water

by Betsy Graziani Fasbinder

  When I was three, Tully gave me a jack-in-the-box. A tinny version of “Pop Goes the Weasel” plunked as I turned the toy’s crank. My family hovered, awaiting the moment of my delighted surprise. When the lid popped open and out came the clown, I screamed and burst into tears. Tully cranked it again, thinking that because I knew what to expect I’d enjoy it, but I was terrified every time anyone brought it near me. Tully felt so badly that he made great theater of throwing the toy into the dumpster behind the bar and covering it with garbage.

  In the weeks of waiting for Jake to reemerge from the hospital I often thought about that jack-in-the-box. It was not the atonal music or the pop of the lid that frightened me. It was the anticipation—the pluck of every note, each turn of the crank, bracing myself for the shock of it.

  It was a wintry weeknight a week before Christmas. We’d returned from New York ten weeks before, and Jake had been in the hospital in Vermont ever since. Ryan was just beginning to resemble her old self again.

  The pub was filled with regulars. Dumpling and Sausage, Dad’s fattest cats ever, sashayed across the bar, one following the other. Holiday lights hung outside and the pub was trimmed with red poinsettias. Outside, the night roared with wind and driving rain. As new customers entered, an icy gust blasted into the bar, inciting a chorus of, “Close that door!” Nat King Cole sang of chestnuts and Christmas cards. Aromas of cinnamon and apple rose from the Crock-Pot where mulled cider brewed.

  My dad greeted me as soon as I came in from the hospital, his face creased with worry. “Burt called this afternoon. He tried to reach you at the hospital.”

  “I’ve been in surgery all day.”

  “Jake discharged himself last night.”

  My knees weakened under my weight.

  “Chin up, love.” I could see that he was tempering his own fears to calm me. “We’re all in this together now. You and Ryan are safe and sound. Go have a look at the decorating your daughter has done, why don’t you, Kitten?”

  I worked my way to the storage room to find Alice and Ryan unpacking the last of the holiday boxes. Just as I had when I was small, Ryan stood on the balcony of the storage loft, a bird’s perch that afforded a full view of the entire bar. She wore a Santa hat and a garland necklace.

  Just as I’d wiggled my way past the boxes to help Alice, another chorus of “Close the door!” rose from the crowd.

  My blood turned to ice when I looked over and saw Ryan’s frozen face. She stared, transfixed, at the front of the bar. As I scrambled through the clutter, I watched Ryan thaw. Her brow crinkled and she tipped her head to one side, as if evaluating what she saw. Just as I neared her, I could almost see an electrical charge pulse through her, reanimating her muscles and limbs. “Daddy!” Ryan’s shrill scream sliced the room.

  Ryan ran, her lean body weaving around the pool table and the sagging sofas, past the dart game and the clusters of patrons, past the jukebox, until she launched herself at Jake in a desperate embrace. He pulled off her Santa hat and showered her with kisses.

  Every muscle in my body prepared to protect my daughter, ready kick and punch until Jake lay motionless at my feet. When I reached them, Jake gazed at me in silence through the veil of Ryan’s curls.

  “I missed you so much,” he said. He spoke to both of us.

  Jake wore new glasses and his face was freshly shaved. The shoulders of his jacket were soaked and his hair hung in ringlets, glistening with rainwater. He’d gained some weight, and his face bore the boyish softness it had when we’d first met.

  Gone was the wild, fire-flecked look of threat I’d seen as he’d boarded the helicopter. In seconds, Tully, Alice, and Dad surrounded Jake. My motley army of defenders. Dad stepped up to Jake and with a firm grab of his forearm pulled Jake aside. Jake towered over my father, but he leaned down to listen as he spoke. Jake nodded and Dad released his grip, patted him on the back, and stepped aside. Jake returned to Ryan.

  Alice reached for Ryan’s hand and smoothly pulled her from Jake’s side. I exhaled. Alice’s eyes were kind, but her lips were set in a straight, bothered line. “Come now, sweetheart. Let’s let your daddy get out of that wet coat and go fetch him something to drink.” Alice then reached Jake and embraced him and kissed his cheek. “What’ll it be, Jake? Hot cider is good on a cold, wet day.”

  Jake stammered. “Sounds great, Alice. Thank you.”

  “I’ll get it,” Ryan chirped. “Go sit at the family table and I’ll bring it. Just like a real waitress.” Ryan scurried off to the end of the bar, where Dr. Schwartz sat nursing a brandy. He offered a reassuring pat to her head.

  The rest of us stood, not quite knowing what to do. Finally, Tully extended his hand to Jake. “Good to see you.”

  Soon, it was only I who had said nothing. Jake turned to me. “You look wonderful, Kat.”

  I broke my gaze from his as if it was a solar eclipse I’d already looked at for too long. Jake, Ryan, and I sat in the family booth where Ryan chattered, regaling Jake with all of her pent-up stories of schoolmates, teachers, the tricks Welby could do. Her smile was overstretched, her voice extra exuberant. I tugged at small hangnails with my front teeth until all my fingertips smarted. Jake listened while Ryan’s words twirled around us. The others left us alone at the table, but my father peered at us. Tully paced the room like a nervous guard dog. Alice popped over repeatedly under the guise of offering food and beverage.

  “Plenty of fish and chips, Jake. And a good lamb stew. Can I fix you a plate?”

  “No. Thanks, Alice. I’m good.”

  In a few minutes she’d be back, refilling Jake’s cider or warming my coffee.

  The evening wore on. Ryan’s chatter was a whirlwind, a vast contrast to the wordless child of a few weeks before. Anxiety was a near-visible glow emanating from her. Her superficial babbling was a performance she was delivering for an audience of one. With her every word, I felt her longing. She was searching for the daddy she’d been missing—finding him here, now, in this familiar place, so different from the terrifying figure he’d been when she’d seen him last. She needed to face this wizard as she had in so many trays of sand. She needed to recognize that her loving daddy and the frightening wizard were co-inhabitants of the same form.

  Jake sat calmly, listening, with creases at the corners of his eyes. His squint gave him the appearance of looking past Ryan’s performance, trying to see the happy and confident daughter he knew.

  Time was a concertina, expanding and collapsing all at once. I looked at my watch. “Ryan, it’s nearly midnight. You’ve got school tomorrow.”

  “Please, not yet,” she begged, but her weary eyes told me that the “happy girl” show had exhausted her.

  “Mommy’s right,” Jake said. “It’s very late and I need to get going.” He looked back at me with unspeakable grief in his eyes.

  Ryan’s face wilted. “You’re not staying?”

  Jake never broke his gaze from Ryan’s. “I’m sorry, I can’t.” He moved so that Ryan’s face was only inches from his own. “I can’t stay with you and Mommy anymore, Ryan. I never want to scare you again—the way I did. I’m really sorry about that.”

  Ryan’s voice was muffled and soft. “You’re not scary right now, and I know you didn’t mean it.”

  “I would never hurt you on purpose. But I can’t always trust myself to—”

  “But you’re okay now. You’re better now. I can see you’re better.”

  “I am better right now. And nothing makes me happier than seeing you… and Mommy. But I can’t count on myself to stay this way. I have a sickness, Ryan. In my mind.” Jake looked up at me, his eyes cool green. “When I’m well it’s easy to forget that I can get sick again. It tricks me and everyone else. So I can’t live with you anymore, even though I want to more than anything. My sickness makes me dangerous sometimes. I never, ever want to hurt you or Mommy.”

  Ryan’s chatter was quieted and she spoke between sniffs. “Are you going away forever?”

  “I
’m doing a project. Then I’ll be gone for a while.”

  I expected Ryan to fly into a fit of rage, but the most surprising look came over her face. I didn’t recognize it at first, and it seemed foreign to her. It was the look of utter relief.

  Ryan nodded. She wrapped her arms around Jake’s neck then kissed his cheek. Jake loosened, then tightened, his hold around her before finally releasing her from his embrace.

  Alice appeared at our table and took Ryan’s hand. “How’s about you and I go have a cup of chamomile tea to call the old sandman?”

  Ryan nodded. She labored to take each heavy step away from the table.

  “Sleep well, my darling,” Jake said. “I love you.”

  Just before she turned away, Ryan looked back at Jake. “I love you more, Daddy.”

  Jake watched her until she disappeared up the stairs. Then his lips turned downward and creases of pain appeared across his brow. Squelched sobs escaped his throat. The sounds of a wounded animal.

  Frank Sinatra’s voice floated from the jukebox. At last it seemed that Jake and I were alone—or as alone as we could be under the circumstances.

  Jake sniffed and pressed the heels of his hands to his eyes.

  “I wish you’d called,” I whispered. “It would have been nice to prepare her.”

  “I wasn’t sure I’d actually come in,” he said. “I walked around outside for an hour.” He swiped his nose with his sleeve. “She’s a stranger—” His voice caught and the rest of the sentence was pinched. “All of that babbling. She’s so nervous around me.”

  My resolve to berate him melted away. He was already doing that to himself. “She’ll settle down.”

  “I just want her to be okay, Kat.” He looked toward the steamy window, his ghostly image reflecting back. “Thanks for packing the boxes for me. I went to the storage unit this afternoon.”

  My heart dropped to my belly.

  Sinatra’s voice filled our silence. Please have snow and mistletoe.

  “It means a lot to me that you would—” I looked into the darkness outside the window.

  He reached across the table for my hands. It was the first time he’d touched me since we’d last made love months ago. But this time there was no electric charge of passion, only the throbbing ache of resignation.

  “I’ll be fine.” Jake’s body was limp with defeat.

  From the jukebox the melancholy song continued. Christmas Eve will find me. Where the love light gleams.

  Aching, I pulled my hands away and stirred my cold coffee, reminding myself of the distance I needed to maintain. “So you’re doing a project? Burt didn’t say anything about it.” Saying Burt’s name to Jake felt newly odd on my lips.

  Jake removed his glasses, wiping them with his shirttail. “It’s something I’m doing independently. Nothing, really. It doesn’t matter.”

  We sat with no words to rescue us from the residue of what we’d lived through together. Jake stood. “I should get going. You’ve got work tomorrow.”

  “Actually,” I said, pulling myself from the booth and standing beside him. “I took tomorrow off to bring cider and cookies to Ryan’s class holiday party.”

  A smile broke across Jake’s lips. “Dr. Room Mom, huh?”

  “Just plain old Room Mom.”

  “Nice.”

  On his way out, Jake stepped toward my dad and extended his hand. “Thank you, Angus, for welcoming me tonight. And thanks for taking such good care of my girls. Would you extend my appreciation to Alice? And Dr. Schwartz and Tully, of course.”

  “So you’re off, then?” Dad asked, shaking Jake’s hand.

  “I think that’s best.”

  Dad pulled Jake into a firm embrace and patted his back. “You take good care of yourself now, son.”

  “I’m going to step outside with Jake for a minute, Dad. I’ll be right back.”

  Dad gave me a look that told me he’d be waiting for me, right where he sat.

  As we stepped out the door, Sinatra’s voice followed us: I’ll be home for Christmas—if only in my dreams.

  The storm had quieted. Silent rain fell. Jake and I stood in the shelter of the entryway, surrounded by holiday lights. He pulled me to his chest in a hungry embrace. After a while he allowed a small space to creep between us. Clouds of breath hung before his face. “I thought the love we have would be enough, Kat. Honest to God I did.”

  I shivered from the chill and Jake pulled my sweater around me.

  “You’re a great mom,” he whispered.

  “I make mistakes every day.”

  Cars passed on Lincoln Avenue, tossing rooster tails of water from their tires. Headlights sliced through the darkness, splashing light onto us as they passed. “What did my dad say to you?”

  Jake’s laughter rang out into the night, full and hearty. I couldn’t help but laugh with him. He donned an exaggerated version of my father’s brogue. “I love you like a son, Jacob. But make so much as a move to harm the ones I love and the sole of my boot will be across your throat before your heart has a chance to pound its next beat.”

  “And Tully,” he added. “I thought that scrawny little guy was going to clock me for sure. He can deliver some serious stink-eye.”

  The sound of my own laugh surprised me. “Alice deployed a hydration strategy. Maybe she thought you couldn’t do any damage with an over-full bladder.”

  The sparkle of our laughter faded. We stood with only crackling silence between us, broken by the sounds of traffic and rain. “Good-bye” was a poison I could not inflict. Jake leaned toward me, then stopped with his mouth just millimeters from mine. Only when I moved toward him did he kiss me. Our tears mingled, flavoring the sweetness of the kiss with their salt.

  His fingers traced the line of my jaw. When he pulled away, it felt that a piece of my own flesh had been torn. He stood for a moment, just outside of the alcove where I could hear the raindrops plopping onto his shoulders. The streetlight lit him from behind, denying me the details of his face.

  I watched until he was swallowed by the night.

  Rain

  The overnight rain cleared, leaving behind a biting chill and a cloudless sky. The towers of the Golden Gate Bridge stood like powerful shoulders against the moody wind that shook my car and snapped the scarves of tourists as they posed for pictures along the railing.

  Jake’s surprise visit the night before had left me feeling raw. I wanted Dr. Gross to help Ryan to manage it all. I wished she could help me manage it, too. Even in Friday, holiday traffic, I was glad to be on the way to her office. “How you doing, Noodle?” I asked as we crossed the bridge. In my rearview mirror Ryan’s reflection shrugged and stared, expressionless, into the distance.

  I gripped the wheel tighter against the wind that tugged at the car. “It was a nice party in your class. Your friends seemed to like Alice’s cider.”

  Another shrug.

  “How about we have supper at Pacific Café on the way home? You always like the crab there.”

  “Sure. Whatever.” Ryan’s voice contained no petulance, only sorrow.

  * * *

  Wordlessly, Ryan designed a scene in the tray of sand. She scooped sand, moving it until it formed mountains separated by a canyon. She selected the small paper rabbit from the cigar box she’d brought that contained the gifts Jake had sent to her from the hospital. She placed the rabbit atop the highest of the hills. On the hill next to the rabbit she placed four figures: a jester, Glinda the Good Witch, a bear, and an armored knight. At the canyon’s edge, she erected a fortress of seashells and stones. Then she placed a second, larger rabbit next to the small one. She added the warrior princess to the scene, a sentry at the river’s bank.

  The wizard remained on the shelf. I wondered if he would be forgotten today.

  In a single, decisive movement, Ryan snatched the wizard. With a jerk she snapped the scepter held in his left hand and broke the crystal ball from his right. The muscles in my jaw tightened and I held my breath, startled
by her silent violence. She replaced the wizard on the shelf next, but with his face turned to the wall. Then she dropped the scepter and sphere into a hole she’d dug and smoothed sand over the top. Lastly, she adorned the hill with a circle of colored stones. She stood to the side.

  “So the wizard isn’t in your tray today,” Dr. Gross observed softly.

  “No,” Ryan said. “He lost his magic powers.”

  “And the rabbit has some company on her hill.”

  Ryan nodded. “She likes it better when she’s not alone.”

  Ryan’s face smoothed and her breathing deepened into a calm rise and fall. Her brows lifted. She looked up at me. “It’s done, Mommy. I’m hungry. Can we go to Pacific Café now?”

  * * *

  We drove along Bridgeway in Sausalito. It was only six-thirty, but winter had already dropped its dark curtain on the day. Tourists with their shoulders scrunched to their ears bustled on the sidewalks, ducking into art galleries and trinket shops trimmed in holiday lights. We snaked toward the bridge behind a slow trail of cars.

  “How come it’s so slow?” Ryan asked from the back seat.

  “Friday night, I guess. Holiday traffic. And this crazy wind makes everybody nervous driving.”

  “How long till we get to Pacific Café? I’m starving.”

  “I don’t know, baby.”

  I wanted to talk to her about the sand tray, to let her know that I would always protect her. But I resisted interpreting the scene she’d created, as Dr. Gross had advised.

  After only a block, the traffic came to a halt. I turned the radio to KGO for a traffic report. “… worst disaster in Golden Gate Bridge history…”

  “What happened, Mommy?”

  “Shh. I don’t know yet.” Just then my pager went off, buzzing at my hip. I squinted, reading Mary K’s telephone number. I turned off the radio and pulled my cell phone from my purse, fumbling to dial.

  “Are you okay?” she asked. Her voice was shrill. “Is Ryan with you?”

  “Fine. We’re just trying to leave Sausalito. Traffic’s miserable.”

  “So you haven’t heard?”