Edna in the Desert

by Maddy Lederman

  “Not much,” Grandma replied and then said, “He got big,” referring to Brandon. “Come in, I got some drinks for you.”

  She walked into the house. She had not so much as glanced in Edna’s direction. Jill stiffened a little and, with Edward and Brandon, she followed Grandma inside. Edna lingered on the porch in the eerie quiet, hoping one of her parents would come scold her for being antisocial. Then she could start chipping away at the situation. Neither of them did. She searched the open desert for what Grandpa seemed so interested in.

  “Hi Grandpa,” she offered with a nervous lilt.

  Grandpa’s silence was creepy enough to make Edna feel like going inside.

  The “big room” was both a living room and a kitchen. It had a wood stove. A door off this room went to her grandparents’ bedroom. It was open a crack and dark inside, which was weird in the brightness of the day. A room on the other side of the big room was where Edna would sleep. She didn’t think it was possible, but her heart sank even further. Edna didn’t remember this room because it was actually a large pantry. It was old and dusty and not good enough for one night, much less a whole summer. Jill came in, and Edna’s horror was conveniently underscored by Brandon, who blurted out:

  “Wow, what a crap room!”

  Grandma and Grandpa’s pantry was crammed with shelves and stocked with enough cans and bulk items for the end of the world they may have been planning for. An army cot was shoved into a corner.

  “I’d rather be in jail. At least a prison cell wouldn’t be cluttered,” Edna said, in spite of the lump in her throat. She folded her arms. Brandon squealed and jumped on the cot.

  “Brandon, go to the car and get your sister’s blanket,” Jill demanded. “Speed demon!” The little boy darted off as the speed of light with sound effects.

  “Edna, do you think this is easy for Grandma?”

  “No. I think it’s a terrible imposition, and one we shouldn’t be making.”

  Brandon rushed back with Edna’s pink and orange blanket, and, ever the “speed demon,” he zipped away. Edna was sure that her colorful blanket, while not quite alive, would die in this drab environment. Edward brought in more of Edna’s clothes and some books that were secretly packed in the trunk, the whole conspiracy now revealed. He looked for a place to set things down, and not finding a good one, he put them on some empty metal drums that were rusty and would surely ruin Edna’s clothes. Jill emptied out the drawers of a sideboard and put Edna’s clothes away while Edward tried to organize the toxic pesticides, among other ancient household items, that came out of the drawers. Edna felt the environment spoke for itself, and she didn’t lift a finger to help them settle her into it.

  Moments later they all sat around the table for what Grandma called a glass of “pop.” Jill chatted away as if she had the power to smooth over this unseemly situation. Grandma showed the little interest she’d mustered as best she could. Seeing these two women, it became clear to Edna that her father loved her mother as a reaction to his own mother’s dour disposition. They were all acting normally, as if there wasn’t some kind of sick child-abuse scam in effect. Edna couldn’t process much that was said while still trying to conjure a way out of this. She caught part of a conversation: when Brandon asked Grandma where her TV was, Jill explained that Grandma didn’t have a TV. That being too horrible to imagine, the boy let it drop and answered boring questions about kindergarten that Jill asked him for the benefit of informing Grandma.

  Edna invited her father to speak with her outside so she could persuade him that depriving her of horseback-riding camp and the use of her phone (except for two hours a day) would be equally as punitive as the current plan.

  “Be right out,” he said, and he disappeared into the bathroom.

  Edna had no opportunity to present her alternative; her parents jumped into the car as if they’d just robbed a bank. They’d clearly planned to drop her and take off, avoiding an unpleasant drama. The Audi’s wheels spun out as it got up to speed. Jill looked back from inside. Edna felt some satisfaction seeing her mother’s doubt about this bizarre plot already setting in. The car drifted away across the sand, and only a cloud of dust lingered after it jumped over the horizon. They were gone.

  One final possibility occurred to Edna before she would succumb to the idea that she’d been left behind: this could be a very well-executed trick, the sadistic joke she’d imagined it must be earlier. Her parents were more than capable of such a simple prank. The threat of this punishment was a punishment in itself; there was no way they could possibly do it. A trick made much more sense, and a wave of relief washed over Edna. It was funny how serious her mother looked; she even overacted a bit. Edna was convinced that the Audi would come back over the horizon to whisk her away.

  She’d tell her parents how sorry she was about everything. She’d be more careful about provoking people like the teacher’s aide, even though he was probably mentally ill and therefore lacked an adult level of restraint. While thinking of the most diplomatic way of putting this, Edna got lost in a conversation with herself: If she could learn the difference between “strained” and “sprained,” why couldn’t he? She hadn’t done anything wrong in expecting he’d know the difference between muscles and ligaments, especially if he was teaching gym. To tell the truth, Edna had no idea what she might be sorry for, other than pointing this out a few too many times. Or ten too many times. But he shouldn’t have lost control, and there were witnesses. The school wouldn’t have fired him if there were any doubt about his guilt.

  Maybe her parents were still mad about the Mondell incident. Edna thought they’d all moved on. Ms. Mondell taught physical science, but that was no excuse for her disastrous grammar. Edna might have been wrong for correcting her every mistake, but it had nothing to do with the volcano experiment. She was sent to the principal anyway, and it was decided it would be best if she changed classes. If someone else had caused an explosion, Edna was sure Ms. Mondell would have understood it was an accident. Otherwise, there was only Mrs. Carson in Girl Scouts and that disgusting piano teacher.

  Soon Edna noticed that the Audi had not returned. She saw little point in refining her defense. She waited longer than she thought her father would before turning back, which got to be longer and longer as she desperately recalculated how far he might go to trick her. She tried to ignore her heart’s wild pounding. A flat hum set in, and then a profound bleakness seeped into Edna’s spirit. No one was coming back for her anytime soon. She was suffocating even though she could breathe. She was not alone, with Grandpa on the porch, but he made her feel like there was less than nobody there. A few specks on the distant hills looked like houses, but after lingering on them, Edna could see they were big rocks. The space was infinite, but it was just as confining as the tiniest jail cell.

  3

  EDNA VS. GRANDMA

  Edna took stock of her surroundings: Grandpa in his wooden chair, two eucalyptus trees in front of the porch, and wind. Nothing else. She’d been at this crossroads once already, namely, whether to stand out here with Grandpa or go inside. It was about to become one of her few considerations for the foreseeable future. Edna had never felt this desperate before. She was surprised that this desperate feeling did not cause the world to end. Things were still going on. Things still needed to be done.

  She had to go in and acknowledge Grandma. Waiting any longer would be uncivilized and only make things worse. She might try to act like this was going to be a fun visit, but, ambushed and defeated, Edna knew she couldn’t pull it off. With no time to think, she walked into the house without a plan and feeling vulnerable.

  Edna had a second to observe Grandma while she washed glasses and was turned away from the door. Her long, gray hair was shiny and held back in a ponytail. The energy she put into her body made her look bigger. She said, “I heard there’s been some trouble at school,” without turning around, and then:

  “Come dry these and put them away.”

  Her skin wa
s leathery from the desert. Edna approached her with an almost insulting amount of caution. Grandma handed her a dish towel and then went to the bedroom. Edna dried the glasses, and her face heated up as the new reality of being left in this dismal cabin set in. She had no idea where to put the glasses when they were dry. There were only four cabinets. Their old, wooden doors were worn out around the knobs. She opened one of them. Grandma reappeared with laundry, said, “No, top right” and went outside.

  Edna knew her grandmother wasn’t an affectionate person, but she was surprised that she’d not planned anything to welcome her, even if this “visit” was supposed to be some kind of punishment. Maybe Grandma was insulted that being at her house was considered a punishment. It wasn’t exactly a compliment.

  Edna took in her grandparents’ home. The living area was furnished with a coffee table that was finished to look like wood and two sections of a shapeless, fake leather couch in the grayest shade of pink possible. On it were crochet pillows made with yarn in a rainbow of colors. Edna found them dreadful. A plastic palm tree sat on the coffee table and another one was on a windowsill. This could be the waiting room of a free clinic in a bad neighborhood. It made no sense: Why did her grandparents live in this depressing place? And how could she stay here? She’d never make it through an hour, never mind a whole summer. Edna lost the fight to hold back her tears; this was going to be a bad cry. She rushed into the pantry, tripped over a wooden crate and scratched her leg on a rusty nail. It bled. She didn’t care. She fell onto her army cot and into a cry that went on so long her stomach hurt, and then it went on longer.

  As much as the situation warranted hours of crying, eventually Edna couldn’t anymore. She couldn’t think anymore either. It was so quiet, she couldn’t hear a sound. She wondered what Grandma was doing. After a while she was distracted by the objects in the pantry. She found an old bottle of witch hazel and put some on her cut. She studied Grandma’s shelves. Canned hash, canned ham, and Spam were at first gross and then horrific when Edna realized this would probably be her food. She hadn’t even thought of food. She wondered if Jill told Grandma what she liked to eat, but she doubted Grandma would care if she had.

  Edna decided that there was no way she could eat Spam, and if she had to she didn’t want to live anymore. She’d said “I’m going to kill myself” throughout her life, more times than she could remember, but she’d never really meant it or thought about how. She knew she couldn’t kill herself violently—she was too afraid of pain—but she might be serious about wanting to for the first time. She checked the medicine cabinet in the bathroom. It had no pills that would be lethal, only aspirin. Nanny was on tons of medication, and so was everyone at her condo. Edna was surprised her grandparents had none. She couldn’t have taken their pills anyway. It was too scary. If you didn’t die, you could end up permanently sick.

  Her grandparents’ bathroom was tiled in a soft, sky blue. At eye level, one row was decorated with surfers riding a wave. The cheery, nautical scene had nothing in common with its bleak surroundings. Edna listened to the wind rattle the windowpanes.

  She went back to her cot in the cluttered pantry. She was wishing she could just disappear and not have to exist for the summer when she remembered something from a documentary, one her mother forced her to watch so she’d be more worldly. Worldliness was important to Jill, which was ironic to Edna, since she thought her mother was extremely insulated and provincial. In an obscure Tibetan documentary, a room full of monks made themselves sweat while they sat still for hours. Eventually steam came off their bodies, even in cold temperatures. This inspired Shimmer’s version of meditation, as that was becoming a huge trend. Jill called it a “spiritual detox” and held classes in a hot yoga studio. She already had a six-month waiting list.

  In any case, Edna wondered if she could sweat enough to make herself completely evaporate. It was an edgy, forward-thinking idea. Human beings were, after all, mostly made of water. She knew thoughts could change the molecules of water as she’d seen this in a different documentary. Edna thought evaporating herself could be a painless process. No one would ever know what had become of her. It might be the perfect escape. It was certainly hot enough to try it, and she had absolutely nothing else to do.

  She sat very still on the cot and called upon all her cells to disconnect from each other, to float away, making her body a fine vapor rising upward. It was the best way she could picture it, and visualizing things helped in sports and gymnastics. She wondered if the desert being so dry might make evaporating any easier. Focusing as hard as she could for what must have been at least five minutes did not result in any part of her body evaporating, not even a little skin. She tried it for a little longer.

  It occurred to Edna that a hunger strike would be easier than mastering the complex energy that held her molecules together and would also eliminate the possible ingestion of canned meats. A hunger strike had the added benefit of letting her live beyond the summer, if she could live without food for two months, and it would make a strong statement about this terrible injustice. Political prisoners went on hunger strikes. A hunger strike sounded much better than evaporating, and she could start one at any time. Maybe she’d already started it.

  Edna thought her parents really overdid it by leaving her with books about pioneer women of the Old West and nothing else. They must have been planning this for weeks. It probably brought them together; it was disgusting. Their backstabbing trick would certainly damage Edna’s trust in them forever. She might let them think there was a chance she’d ever trust them again, but only so they’d keep trying to make it up to her with gifts. In the meantime, killing herself might be unnecessary if she could at least read. She’d get to live the rest of her life and have gifts to look forward to. Maybe things weren’t going to be so bad. Edna was impressed with her ability to conjure a positive attitude when Grandma came in and ruined it.

  “I don’t know what your parents told you—”

  “They didn’t tell me anything. Staying here was a complete surprise that I found out about five minutes before we arrived. I’m sure I was the last person to know about it. My parents are lucky I don’t report them to the police for abduction or kidnapping. In fact, I think I might.”

  Grandma noted Edna’s personality problem as it had been described to her weeks earlier.

  “You’re going to shape up this summer, Edna, and that will not include reading all day.”

  “What better thing is there to do around here?”

  Edna didn’t even close her book. Grandma was not impressed.

  “The best thing you can do for yourself, Edna, is to follow me.”

  Grandma left. Edna was in fighting mode, but there was no point in starting things off quite so badly. Still, she moved off the cot as slowly as she could with the intention of exerting some pittance of power over Grandma by making her wait a few extra seconds. Grandma didn’t seem to notice. She was seated in the big room and finishing a list when Edna came in.

  “Grandpa and I don’t like too much company. In fact I don’t think we ever had any, except your dad and you all, and some doctors.”

  This sounded really depressing. If things were about to get worse, Edna knew anything she might say would probably make it worse than that. She was in foreign territory. The new strategy was to keep quiet and observe. She could have saved herself a lot of trouble by discovering this strategy sooner, and the realization came with some regret. Instead of being here, she should be at the Grove sipping bubble tea and getting friendship bracelets. Everyone was at the mall after school was over and before they left for camp.

  “We love you as our grandchild, Edna, but that isn’t going to make it fun around here, in case you were expecting that,” Grandma informed her.

  Edna wasn’t.

  “I’m making a list of things to do, regular chores and a few side projects. I don’t care which one you start with, but you will spend your time productively, not lying around entertaining yourself
all day.”

  Edna decided against debating the nuanced meanings of productivity with Grandma. She would have jumped all over the topic with her parents.

  “It’s fine to read and watch television and be a smarty-pants, but you have to back it up with something.”

  Edna had no idea how watching television had anything to do with being smart. The summer continued its downward spiral, with slave labor added to captivity, isolation and canned meat. Maybe she could just walk out into the desert, die of thirst and skip the boring evaporation attempts or lengthy hunger strikes. She could run away at any time, but Edna wasn’t sure she had the courage to do it. Maybe she could try to do the list. Grandma didn’t wait to see Edna’s reaction to it; she went back to her laundry.

  Grandma’s handwriting was small and hard to read. Edna was sure this was intentional. The paper said: House rules: I do the cooking. Don’t bother Grandpa. Things to do: Washing and drying dishes and putting them away. Sweeping. Dusting. Mopping floor. Taking rugs out and beating them, every week. Keeping weeds away from the swamp cooler and the house. Weeding the garden. Bathroom—clean all. Clean out the garage. Paint the porch. Make a cement patio…maybe too hard. Laundry two or three times a week. Wash out cans for recycling.

  Did her parents have any idea of this program? Judging by the amount of books they brought, Edna guessed not. They needed to be told. Edna found Grandma’s phone in the kitchen area. It looked like it should be on an old movie set, like everything else in the cabin.

  Before Edna called them, she built her argument: forcing her to do these chores and hard labor out in the desert heat was a physical threat. What was the difference between this level of discomfort and a violent beating that her parents could be arrested for? And how could she emotionally evolve under such conditions, with her survival constantly at risk? If she was to really improve, she needed time for spiritual reflection, and she needed to reflect in a safe environment, not in a scary place with these creepy, old strangers. Edna would propose she be grounded for the entire summer and have a strict spiritual retreat at home instead. She could even pitch the idea as a “pray-cation,” and Jill could blog about it on Shimmer. Edna would make her mother think she thought of it herself. They could post pictures: Edna in robes like a monk, serenely reflected in their pool, in front of the waterfall they put in last year. Jill could promote her contractor in the photo’s caption. She loved to promote people and get them work. Edna suspected this was an attempt to collect favors and brandish power. Regardless, Edna was sure she could convince her mother that a “pray-cation” was the perfect solution and long overdue.