Cutting Teeth: A Novel

by Julia Fierro

  the whole nine yards

  Allie

  Allie ran through the woods, branches whipping against her face, thorns tearing at her calves. She made deals with God, although she wasn’t sure if she believed in a damn God. She told who-the-fuck-ever that she’d do anything, everything, to bring Dash back. She’d be home for more family time instead of heading to her studio every weekend morning. She’d play Legos each and every time the boys asked her, no matter what. She’d give up smoking, she’d give up sleeping in, she’d give up her art, anything and everything, if whoever was in charge would make Dash appear right then and there. Please.

  She ran, dewy spiderwebs tearing against her face. The roar of the sea was like an engine at her heels, chasing her as she hurtled deeper into the woods. She felt the percussive tremor of the waves splitting against the rocks at the seawall. He had to be in the woods, he had to be in the thick blackness in front of her, which was so finite, so contained, so safe, compared to the vast shifting sea. No, she couldn’t think of her son in the water, his small body being tossed, hurled against the seafloor, his bluing skin torn by barnacles. He would have run to the woods—yes, yes, definitely—a pirate searching for buried treasure.

  He would return to the scene of her crime, she promised herself as the cicadas filled her head with a mechanical drone, the spot where she had silenced him with her open palm after he had humiliated her by voicing what she knew to be true. She wasn’t his real mother. How could she be, when there wasn’t a natural fucking maternal bone in her body? She was like one of those animals who devoured their young. Like the gerbil in her third-grade classroom who had, overnight, eaten every last one of her squirming newborn gerbil babies, sending most of the children, and even Mrs. Sealander, their teacher, into tears the next morning when they arrived to find that the tiny, hairless, pink babies had vanished, as if they had never existed. But Allie hadn’t cried. For some reason, she hadn’t even been surprised.

  The strap of one of her sandals snapped, and a twig sliced into the side of her foot. She stumbled over a root and went down, her hands sliding in front of her, her face knocking against a tree, warm blood filling her mouth.

  She thought of that small patch of smooth skin at Dash’s hairline. His beauty mark. Why hadn’t she pulled him into her arms that afternoon, why hadn’t she bent over him, her lips finding that square of hairless skin that she had always imagined would remain smooth, infantlike, even when Dash grew to be a deep-voiced, barrel-chested, hair-covered brute of a man? They should have told the boys more fairy tales, she thought, scary stories about wolves and witches and terrible things that happen to children in the woods, stories invented to make children eat their veggies, go to bed on time, not talk to strangers, and fear the woods. But Susanna had wanted to protect them, to shelter them, preserve their innocence. You’ll give them nightmares, Allie, she’d said.

  Allie screamed Dash! Dash! Mommy’s here! and then, please please, begging, the sobs choking her now, along with the snot that dripped off her lip and into her mouth. She talked to him as she ran. I’m sorry, babe, she called into the trees, into the fog that hung like a shroud. Mommy won’t be bad again. Never. I’ll be perfect. I’ll be a mommy. A good mommy. I promise. Just please, please, please come out.

  She had to pee, desperately, so she stopped and yanked down her pants, hardly bothering to squat. Some of the piss dribbled down her legs, stinging the scratches and cuts on her legs, steaming in the chilly night air.

  Her father had made her piss in her pants once. The day after her junior prom. She’d been one of the girls without a date, but she’d gone to the after-parties and sipped vodka-spiked fruit punch and made herself tongue-kiss Kyle Lucas. When she returned home late that night, she forgot to take her cigarettes out of her backpack.

  She was watching TV the next day. A show about a teenage witch. She had seen the actress on glossy magazine covers at the supermarket and liked the blond waves that floated like wings around the actress’s face. She had thought of the actress’s strawberry-colored lips while touching herself at night, climaxing into her cupped hand.

  On TV, the teenage witch was making a love potion. For the sandy-haired boy the witch was crushing on. But Allie pretended it was she the pretty witch dreamed of kissing.

  When her father ran into the room, he was a blur that took shape and spread, melting into the room. He must have started running from the kitchen where he found the pack of Camels in her backpack. It felt like fast-forward and slow motion at the same time, and all she knew was the thunk, thunk, thunk, and the hollow echo of the flimsy metal broom. She didn’t know how many times he brought the broom down on her because sound drifted away until it was as dull as the tick of a watch drowned in cotton. When the metal head of the broom broke, it sliced through her hand.

  Then he was gone. Her arms were raised above her face, but she didn’t remember bringing them there. For a moment, when there was still no pain, she noticed everything around her. The treads in the carpet where his work boots had stood. Dust streaming through the light of the lamp. Her breath wet and slow. She looked at her hand. The stretch of skin from thumb joint to wrist flapped open when she made a fist. Blood rose and dripped down her wrist and onto her jeans. With her right hand held steady, away from her body, she walked to the TV and shut it off. She picked the half-empty pack of Camels off the carpet and stuffed them into her back pocket.

  She bandaged herself and changed her pee-soaked jeans, and when she found her father in the kitchen, he was weeping, his head cradled in his arms. She comforted him, told him she was okay. It was okay. She smoothed his hair with her bandaged hand and saw the blood blooming through the gauze.

  Decades later, when Susanna asked her if she wanted babies, Allie said no. No way. Because when her dad had threatened to hang her by her ponytail from a nail in the wall, she had believed him. How could someone like her, who had believed her daddy could do such a thing, learn to love and be loved?

  off the record

  Rip

  The living room was empty.

  Rip checked the deck.

  Deserted.

  He stood looking out at the moon-dappled water, Hank’s princess dress clutched to his body.

  He returned to the driveway and saw the light on in the shed, the door open.

  Somehow, he knew Tiffany was inside. And she was. Beautiful in her green dress.

  “Oh,” she said. “It’s you. Come over here, mister. Look at the treasure I’ve found!”

  He stepped farther into the shed.

  “Shut the door!” she stage-whispered. “This is top secret.”

  He pulled the door shut.

  “There are toys everywhere!” Tiffany said, delight in her voice.

  He followed her eyes up to the shelves. There were stuffed bears and satin unicorns and a bag of soccer balls and another of toy trucks, all wrapped in thick plastic. The walls were lined with dusty paint-by-number canvases. Puppies and sunflowers and a little girl holding a basket of kittens.

  “Nicole’s dad must have kept every toy she ever had,” Tiffany said in breathy awe. “He must have loved her so much.”

  She was crying. He’d never seen her cry. She looked softer to him now, like a little girl.

  “Look,” he said, and held up the princess dress. “For Hank.”

  She smiled at him through tears, shooing them away with her fingertips. “You, Daddy Rip, are the bestest daddy in the world.”

  Her eye makeup was smudged, ringing one eye black, and she sounded drunk. But she meant what she’d said. He believed her.

  He reached out to touch her in the dimness and felt a sharp stab in his right middle finger. He’d snagged it on something jutting out from one of the sagging wooden shelves.

  “Fuck,” he said.

  “What happened?” she asked, guiding his hand with her own up toward the overhead light—a single exposed bulb.

  A tiny fishhook gleamed in his finger.

  “Uh,” he said,
starting to feel faint, as if his body were turning inside out. He’d always had a fear of blood, which Grace had teased him about before Hank was born, telling him he was going to faint in the delivery room. He hadn’t.

  “Don’t worry,” Tiffany said calmly, “I’m an expert. ’Member? My granny was a fisherman’s wife.”

  “No, please. Wait.”

  “Take a deep breath,” Tiffany said, and, fluidly, pinched the fishhook, twisted it gently, and removed it from his flesh. He closed his eyes, and yellow spots danced across his lids.

  When he opened his eyes, she had his finger up at her lips and the warmth of his blood was mingling with the warmth of her mouth, and she was sucking, his finger moving in and out of her blood-tinted lips, her tongue darting at the tip like a fish nipping at bait. She moaned, or at least he thought she did. “Oh God,” he whispered, then her hand was in his pants, and he was lifting her so she sat on a shelf, a rough wooden plank. Her dress tore as a Disney princess music box fell to the floor, leaking slow, tinny sounds.

  Together, they tugged at the straps of her dress, fingers fumbling over fingers, and he pulled her breasts free—they were his, the breasts of his dreams and his fantasies, so many long showers spent thinking of these breasts as he jerked off until the steam made the paint buckle on the bathroom walls, and the real things surprised him, their softness, their scent, their salty taste as his tongue reached for her nipples, so pale he couldn’t tell where the nipple ended and the breast began, then she was saying something, directing—from behind—and he flipped her over, and pulled her dress up and kicked her feet apart—yes! she cried—and he slid his hand between her legs and then slid his wet fingers over his dick and he was inside her with one thrust, his belt buckle hitting the cement floor with a clang, and she was saying—do it do it do it fuck me—and he had a hand on her back, and the blood from his finger was spreading into the green silk like it was tissue paper, and he tasted something sweet on his tongue like sugar water, and it wasn’t until he came with a spasm that knocked a piggy bank off the shelf, the painted clay shattering at his feet, that he realized he had breast milk on his lips.

  once upon a time

  Susanna

  “Once upon a time,” Levi repeated after her, his voice slow and dull with exhaustion.

  The baby twisted inside her when it heard its big brother speak. Levi’s head was in what little lap Susanna had left. She knew she smelled like vomit and anxious sweat and pee—she had lost control of her bladder when she’d looked out the window facing the water and seen the blue lights of the police boats sweeping the shore.

  Levi didn’t seem to mind the smell. He’d buried his head in her lap and asked for a once upon a time story.

  “Shhh,” Susanna hushed, wiping her nose on the back of her hand. “Shhh,” praying that her stampeding pulse would relent. The baby, she thought. Don’t hurt the baby.

  Too much worrying not good for mommies, Tenzin had told Susanna, her palms pressed together, her eyes brimming with concern, before taking Harper, Hank, and Wyatt back to their beds. And worrying not good for mommies’ babies either.

  “Once upon a time,” Susanna whispered, “there were two mommies.”

  “A mama and a mommy,” Levi mumbled.

  “Quiet, Lee. Please. You listen to the once upon a time story and make the pictures in your head.” She coughed up a mouthful of phlegm and the baby kicked in protest. “Yes, a mommy and a mama. And two little boys. In a big white house in the country. With green shutters. And apple trees and berry bushes. Even a tree house.”

  “With a pirate-scope!”

  “A telescope. Yes, sweetie. And a puppy. Maybe some chickens. Fresh eggs for omelets. Mama will make a garden for us, ’cause we need some spinach and chives to cook up in that omelet.”

  She stroked the back of Levi’s neck where the skin seemed impossibly soft. Don’t think of Dash’s beauty mark, she told herself. That smooth patch of skin she’d kissed a hundred times since he’d been cut out of her. Don’t you think it, Susanna, don’t you do that!

  “And a baby,” Levi said.

  She bit her lip to stop the sob from climbing out. Bit down until she felt her lip split.

  “And a baby,” she said. “You and Dash will be such good big brothers to your baby. You’ll teach him to talk, and play cars, and build Legos…”

  He interrupted her, “Nah, Mama. It a girl baby. Me and Dash, we want a girl baby.”

  Outside, a wave smacked into the deck and Susanna felt the floor tremble under her swollen feet.

  “That’s so sweet, baby,” she said and leaned over her stomach to kiss his forehead. He tasted salty and it made her think of the sea, of Dash in the sea, his little body slammed into the sandy bottom, explosions of pebbles and a storm of bubbles, and she thought she was going to vomit and sat up too quickly, Levi’s head bouncing off her lap and into her belly. The baby jerked one-two-three times. A temper tantrum, Susanna thought, and almost laughed. She’d tell Allie and Dash that when they returned. They’d like that.

  “Mommy wants a baby girl too. It’s funny.” Levi giggled. “She says she wants to dress it up. Like a dolly.”

  “She did? Mommy really said that?” The baby rolled and jabbed Susanna so low, she imagined a tiny hand reaching out her cervix.

  “Pink stuff,” Levi said, then yawned big. “Pretty pink stuff. Girl stuff.”

  “Shhh,” Susanna hushed again, this time for the baby. She rubbed her belly, and after one last ripple of movement, the baby—she, Susanna thought—quieted.

  “Once upon a time,” she began again, “there was a mommy and a mama, and two boys, and a baby girl, and they lived in a big white house in the country. With green shutters. And apple trees. And berry bushes. And a tree house.…”

  castles in the air

  Tiffany

  Tiffany could feel him dripping out of her. Leaving her.

  There was the whisper of cloth tearing. “Shit. I tore my dress. I love this fucking dress.”

  Rip was hunched over, breathing heavily, holding on to the shed wall.

  “We have to get out of here,” he said. “Where the hell is everybody?”

  “Still looking, I guess,” she said, ruffling his thick hair. “Don’t worry. They’ll find him soon. The cops are down there. There’s nothing we can do.”

  “What?” He stood. “Find who? Hank? Is it Hank?” He gripped Tiffany’s shoulders, too hard. “Tiffany, tell me what’s going on.”

  “Hank is fine, silly,” she said. “It’s Dash who’s gone missing. Just disappeared out of his bed while we were all downstairs. Poof! They’re all down there. On the beach. With the cops. Looking.”

  Rip pushed past her, threw open the door, and was gone. Part of him was still dripping down her legs. All his future babies, she thought, dying as soon as they left her warm cove and hit the cold night air.

  She stepped on something sharp on the driveway and when she lifted her foot, she stumbled and her hand reached for but then slid off the hood of a car, slick with dew. She lay on her back, the pebbles biting through the thin silk, and lifted her foot. A piece of broken pot. She yanked it free. Where were her shoes? Oh who cared? She was a sprite. A Midsummer Night’s Dream. Sprites didn’t wear shoes.

  Tiffany stood and tra-la-la-ed up to the deck, trying to regain the feeling she’d had earlier, of being a fairy fantasy in her green silk dress. As she turned the corner, the sea wind hit her, pressing the dress tight against her body and making her nipples harden. She found a cushion speckled with black mold and carried it to the chaise lounge, where she lay, her legs open to the silver blanket of sea stretching all the way to the blinking lights of Connecticut. Just like Gatsby’s light.

  Oh, how hot she’d been for Jay Gatsby. Exactly her kind of guy. He came from nothing and made himself into everything, with his rainbow of silk shirts and his library of wall-to-wall books. She’d thought of him many nights her freshman year of high school as she lay on the bathroom floor (the onl
y room in her father’s double-wide with a lock), her cheek pressed into the pilled bathroom rug that stank of mildew, her breath held so her father and stepmother wouldn’t hear as her knees knocked against the cold tile and her hips thrust into the hand she pressed tight over her white cotton panties and the circling wave of heat stirred inside her until it overflowed.

  She had tried to tell her mother about the book, during one of their two-hour-long custodial visits, she and her mother in the one-bedroom rental near the school where her mother worked as a lunch aide. What a stupid child she’d been, she thought now, remembering how she’d started to read her mother a passage from the book, how she’d prefaced it by explaining the book was meaningful to her, the kind of sharing that pervy Mr. Jones, the state-mandated social worker, urged her to do in the visits with her mother.

  “Girl,” her mother had interrupted, “I don’t got time for meaning. I got three jobs to work.”

  Tiffany’s foot was pulsing now and she imagined the blood seeping out, trickling down the leg of the lounge, then across the deck floor to the drainage holes, stuffed with sand and pebbles and dried seaweed, mingling with the sea.