by Harlow Hayes
The nurse nodded.
“I’ll give you a couple of minutes. Rosalina, they ordered a CT. Can you keep an eye on her? I’ll go check to see if they are ready.”
“I got it, Stacey. Thanks,” Rosalina said, then Stacey disappeared out the door.
“Mara, what happened? And what do you mean it has happened before? Is that why you were in the hospit—” She stopped mid-sentence. I hung my head and sobbed. I felt so low.
She came over and sat on the hospital bed next to me and brushed a piece of hair out of my face. I leaned back, unsure of what she was doing. Our relationship had only consisted of us arguing and delivering the lowest of blows, so the compassion was new and unexpected. She put her arm around me and gave me an awkward hug.
“I’m all right,” I said, sitting up to readjust myself. She quickly pulled back.
“What happened?” she asked.
“You heard what happened. I blacked out, and yes, it has happened before. It’s been happening about once every two to three weeks since my head injury.”
“What the hell, Mara? And you haven’t said anything to your doctor?”
“I have talked to him about it. What do you think all those medications are for? And don’t pretend like you didn’t see them at lunch because you looked at me as if I were some kind of crackhead when they fell out of my bag.” Rosalina straightened up. She knew she couldn’t deny it.
“Well, I don’t think that now…” Her voice was softer and sweeter than I had ever heard it. There was a knock on the door and Nurse Stacey came in with a couple of other people.
“They’re ready to do your CT scan. Rosalina, you can hang out here or you can come with if you want.” Rosalina stood up from the bed and looked at me for approval. I grabbed her hand.
“Let’s go.”
My CT scan and blood work came back normal, meaning there was nothing physically wrong with me. The attending doctor informed me that they were going to make some changes to my medicine for the time being and instructed me to follow up with my doctor, but that I was able to go home. Rosalina stayed with me the whole night and it felt good to not have that secret anymore, but I still wasn’t able to tell her the whole truth. She wasn’t quite in my circle yet, and membership was expensive. Rosalina’s parents came back to get us and dropped us off at home just as the sun was rising. Words couldn’t express how thankful I was for them and their help. When we walked into the apartment it was quiet, and I felt like I could breathe again.
“I’ll call the train station and the police about your purse. Maybe someone turned it in,” Rosalina said, standing in the doorway to my bedroom.
I curled up onto my bed and hugged my pillow. I was too tired to speak. Too tired to listen.
“Mara,” she said.
I turned to look at her.
“Are you hungry? Do you need anything else?” she asked.
“No… No, thank you,” I said.
Rosalina grabbed my door handle to pull it closed.
“Rosalina?”
“Yeah?”
“Thank you.” And I felt myself smile, and she let herself smile back.
Chapter 8
I opened my eyes and the clock read noon. I had gotten some sleep but still wasn’t feeling completely like myself. I heard voices outside of my bedroom door and the sound of someone crying. I slowly sat up in bed and uncovered myself. The house wasn’t freezing, so I assumed Rosalina was gone. I stood up and walked over to the door. When I opened it Kate and Rosalina looked at me as I emerged from the short hall and walked into the living room. They sat on the sofa with Melanie in the middle. Both had their arms rested on Melanie’s back. She was crying and shaking.
“Hey, Mara, are you feeling better?” Rosalina asked as I walked over and plopped myself on the opposite end of the sectional.
“I’m fine, much better, thanks,” I said, unsure what I had walked into.
“You hungry? I made a breakfast casserole, I just put the leftovers in the fridge,” she said.
The niceness continued. I guess Rosalina wasn’t a stone-cold bitch after all, but it sure did take her some time to warm up.
“Thanks, I’ll grab some in a little bit,” I said, curling my knees to my chest and covering them with my nightshirt.
Melanie continued to cry.
“What happened?” I asked.
Melanie raised up her head and started rambling. I didn’t understand a word she said, so I looked at Kate, hoping that she could fill in the missing pieces.
“What happened?” I asked again, eager for an answer.
“Matt broke up with her,” Kate said.
My jaw dropped. According to Melanie, Matt was the perfect boyfriend, and they were so happy. Well, obviously not that happy.
“Why? Why did he break up with her?”
“He told me that he was in love with someone else and that he was getting married in three months!” Melanie screeched, finally able to speak clearly.
“What? You didn’t say all that!” Kate shouted. “How is he getting married in three months?”
Melanie looked green. This wasn’t making any sense to me, but it didn’t have to. This was Melanie’s mess and she was just going to have to deal with it the best she could.
“It’s one of his friends. One of his stupid fucking friends. He said that they reconnected last month at church. And you know I’m not too into the church thing, so I never went.” She stopped to take a breath in between sobs. “So he told me I had to get my things out of his apartment and…” The intense crying started up again.
“Are you sure this just came out of nowhere? I mean, were there signs leading towards a breakup?” Kate asked.
“No, there weren’t any signs,” Melanie snapped. “He was talking to me about marriage, about seeing a future. I guess he was just doing that to kill time while he waited on her to say yes.”
I took her word for it, but from what I knew about Melanie, she was probably talking to him more about marriage than he was talking to her. But that didn’t matter, he was still an asshole. Kate and Rosalina tried to soothe her the best they could, but I needed to eat. I walked into the kitchen looking for that casserole. I felt bad for Melanie, but I wasn’t shocked. I knew of people that had done much worse to the people they claimed to love.
“Mara, before I forget, I found your purse.” I stood in the kitchen stuffing casserole down my throat and about choked when she said it.
“Really? Thanks!” I said, mouth full of food.
“No problem. You just have to pick it up at some police station. They wouldn’t let me do it. I wrote the address down; it should be on the counter.”
Kate looked at us, puzzled. I guess Rosalina kept what had happened last night to herself, and for that I was grateful.
The police station was the last place I wanted to go, but there was nothing I could do to avoid it.
* * *
I dug through my bag, taking account of every item. The officer standing behind the desk was irritated at my slowness, but I was going to take my time. The police station was busy and the noise of people coming and going gave me a headache. I should have let Rosalina come with me, but I had relied on her enough. I had to take care of myself now.
I signed out my bag and headed towards the exit. All I could think about was being back home in my bed, surrounded by blankets while I tuned out the world.
“Mara! Mara Goodwin,” a voice called out.
I turned around and Detective Clark stood before me. My heart fell into my stomach. She was a kind, slim woman who wore clothes that looked very 90s and hair that looked very 80s. She had been an officer for over twenty years and a detective for sexual crimes for the last nine.
“Detective Clark.” I fidgeted with my bag.
“Hi, Mara, how are you doing?” she asked, obviously happy to see me.
“I’m okay,” I said, trying not to sound too troubled. I hadn’t seen her in a couple months and I was sure that she was doing everythin
g she could, but he was still out there, and seeing her just reminded me of that.
“What brings you here?” she asked.
“I lost my bag last night but someone was kind enough to turn it in.” It was nice not to have to lie. “What about you? This isn’t your precinct, is it?”
“No, just collaborating on a case. But I won’t keep you. I just wanted to say hello,” she said. She placed her hands in her pockets. “And Mara, we are still working on your case. I will be in touch.”
“Thanks,” I said, and I walked away.
I started to burn with anger and was scared that I might send myself back to the hospital. I sat down on a bench outside the precinct to calm down and I pulled out my phone. There was a crap ton of calls from my mom because she was the type who would call multiple times if you didn’t pick up the phone the first time and several texts from Frankie. I checked those first.
Are you coming with me tomorrow? one line read.
I can’t do this without you
Mara?
I’ll be there to get you at four tomorrow… be ready
I didn’t know what the hell he was talking about until I saw the date at the top of my phone, and it was a severe blow to the gut. I was overwhelmed with sadness, with heartache, and I couldn’t shake it. This was going to be a hard day, and I still wasn’t feeling that great, but Frankie needed me, he needed his friend.
I made it back home and showered, taking longer than usual because my body couldn’t keep up with the pace that my mind was moving at. I threw on some old, loose-fitting jeans, and an extra-large T-shirt; it wasn’t sweats, so it was a step up, and I didn’t need to be too fancy to go to a cemetery. I waited in my room until Frankie texted me telling me that he was outside. When I opened my bedroom door Melanie was still on the couch, watching some show about wedding dresses with dried-up tears caked on her face. I didn’t understand why she was torturing herself with that stuff considering she worked at a bridal store.
“You look… different,” she said as she curled up on the sofa with the remote in one hand, a glass of wine in the other.
“Yeah, you’re not in sweat pants,” Kate said. She stood in the kitchen cutting up fruit.
“I’m going to hang out with Frankie.”
“Oooh, the hot guy… Have fun,” Kate said with a grin.
“Okay,” I said, irritated at what she was insinuating.
I walked toward the door but looked back at Melanie before I walked out, and it was strange to see her drained of her happiness. She was so cheerful, and to say that her happiness didn’t sometimes make my day better would be a lie. She was hurting, and it hurt me because I knew exactly how she was feeling. Unrequited love was just one of life’s great disappointments, and sadly the disappointment would always be there, staining any belief that it gets better until it actually did. Even if it did get better, it only got better to get worse again, and if you could survive the worst, better would be back, but it never lasted; the cycle would only repeat. I heard Frankie blow the horn for me to hurry up. I walked out of the door not prepared for what I could potentially encounter. This was going to be hard.
It always had been.
* * *
The sky still had light but it was that late afternoon light where night could sneak up on you if you weren’t keeping track of time. Traffic that day had been terrible so it took over an hour to get out of the city and to the cemetery. Frankie was quiet the whole drive and his eyes darkened once we pulled up along the curb. His gaze showed how wounded he was and I knew there wasn’t anything I could do to heal those wounds. Since he hadn’t said anything the whole ride out there I didn’t expect him to say much now.
He looked past me out the window, his eyes transfixed on the tombstones that seemed to stretch on for miles. I didn’t understand death very well, or how people dealt with it. I guess I understood it clinically, and how it affected others, but I wasn’t sure how it affected me. The only person that I had lost that was close to me was my grandmother, but she was sick and I didn’t want her to linger and suffer, so it was better she went. I still remember her smell. Peppermint. She used to crack them on the ground for me when I was little so that I could eat the bits and not choke on the big piece. I missed her desperately.
This must be how Frankie felt, but his wounds seemed to scab over, only to be picked open again. He took a deep breath and opened the car door, stepping out into the sunlight. He opened the back door and reached into the back seat to get the bouquets out. I trailed behind him, slowly trying to give him enough space. He stopped in front of the tombstone that displayed the names of his parents, Frank and Barbara Lauri, beloved mother and father. Then next to theirs was Frankie’s older sister, Elizabeth “Lizzy” Lauri, beloved sister.
He kneeled down to arrange the flowers and pull up some of the weeds that had grown there. I stood there silent as Frankie executed his ritual. Frankie’s mother was a kind woman from what I had been told, who was passionate about her children, her husband, and had an overall zest for life. Frankie looked like her the most. She passed away when Frankie was fifteen in a car wreck on her way home from the dentist. She was a block away from home when she was hit.
Three years later, his father died suddenly in his sleep while on a business trip. When I met Frankie, his grief appeared to be in check, but I knew that it ran much deeper, even if he didn’t. We had been coming to their graves once a year on this very day, his mother’s birthday, since the beginning of our friendship. Every year like clockwork, we would come here and Frankie would grieve, mostly in silence. He had only cried in front of me once, when we found out about Lizzy, but that was it. In the beginning I found it to be unhealthy, but that was just his way. He carried the weight even if it was too heavy; he would carry it until it broke him.
After his parents’ deaths, Frankie, his sister, and his brother inherited their father’s contracting business, and his sister managed it until she was killed two years ago, so he bought his brother’s share, inherited Lizzy’s, and let one of his money-grubbing uncles manage things while he went on to be a financial analyst for an investment company downtown. My loss wasn’t Frankie’s loss, and I knew what happened to Lizzy almost broke him. I liked her a lot and she liked me.
I had only met her a handful of times, but she was a cool breeze on a hot summer’s day. The tragedy was that the breeze never lingered when you wanted it to; it touched you, then moved on. That was how I felt about Lizzy. Her presence was fleeting but her absence severely felt. She told me once, “You’re going to be my sister one day. I’m telling you, you and Frankie are getting married and are going to have the cutest curly-haired babies you’ve ever seen.” I would laugh it off, but at the time I knew I wanted it. Now I wasn’t so sure; that future was up in the air, not yet jelled together by the universe.
I watched him breathe, pray, think, and I marveled at his vulnerability because it was so beautiful but rarely seen. This was the Frankie that I could love the rest of my life, not that other asshole. As for Frankie’s brother, he never spoke of him. I remember first meeting him my sophomore year when Frankie was moving into his apartment. He was this scrawny, lanky little teenager that needed to eat a cheeseburger. He’d called me a couple of times several months back trying to get in touch with Frankie. He was over at the Meadows Rehabilitation Center for drug and alcohol addiction. He had blown through his trust fund and Frankie cut him off financially so he didn’t have a choice—it was jail or rehab. I understood him more now, considering my own problems.
“I miss them,” Frankie said. He lowered his head. I walked over to him, squatted down, and put my arm around his waist.
“I know,” I said, resting my chin on his shoulder. He wrapped his arm around me and pulled me into his side, resting his chin on my head. We kneeled there a moment and I could feel the warmth of Frankie’s breath brush past my face. All I could do was hold Frankie tighter, hoping that my embrace would provide some form of comfort.
“You hu
ngry?” he asked.
“Yeah, a little.”
Frankie stood and pulled me up with him, holding me tight at my waist.
“Let’s head back, I want to take you somewhere nice.”
“What do you mean, somewhere nice? Where are we going?” I asked, confused by his cool, collected manner.
“I’m not telling you. Just somewhere nice, that’s all.” I pulled away from his embrace and looked up at him. The skepticism was plain on my face. He cracked a smile, the first one that I had seen all day.
“What?” he asked.
“Nothing,” I said, and I smiled back. “Let’s go.”
Our drive back to the city was filled with less tension; this time had been different from the others, and the heaviness had been lifted. Even after all of these years, Frankie still managed to surprise me. I stole glances out of the corner of my eye as he drove us back into the city.
Maybe. Just maybe, I thought.
Chapter 9
Friday nights were busy in Chicago, and the place Frankie took me to eat was packed. It was slightly upscale but not too modern like some of the more popular places in town, and it had just the right balance of edge and class, sitting right outside the north part of the loop. I ordered the salmon linguine and took in the atmosphere. I breathed a sigh of relief, knowing that the worst part of the day was over, and I welcomed the noise of the place, the business of life that surrounded me. The clinking of the glasses at the bar, the sizzling and banging of pots in the kitchen; it all calmed me, giving me a brief peace. Even the muttering of people’s voices and conversations kept me at ease. The city was so big, and at times being surrounded by so many people could be overwhelming to most, but to me that was the beauty of the place, that you could choose to blend in there or not; it was the perfect place to be lost in the crowd, and I chose to be lost. I wasn’t important or special to anyone in that room except Frankie, and I didn’t know what it would be like if it were any other way.
“Are you excited to get back to work? You know, fixing the crazy people?” Frankie said, smiling, right before he took a sip of his drink.
