When My Heart Joins the Thousand

by A. J. Steiger

  “Listen to me.” He frames my face between his hands. His palms are warm on my cheeks. “What happened is not your fault. Not even a little. And I’ll say that as many times as it takes for you to believe it.”

  It seems impossible, what he’s saying. It seems like a logical fallacy. My mind won’t accept it. “If I had never picked up your phone in the park, if I’d never sent you that email, you wouldn’t have gone through all this suffering.” My voice wavers. “You wouldn’t be sitting in this chair, now, with half your body in bandages.”

  “You’re right,” he says. “I wouldn’t be here. I’d be lying next to my mother in the cemetery.”

  At first, the words don’t sink in. Don’t register. Slowly I raise my head. “What.”

  “After you sent me that email, I changed my mind.”

  It takes me a moment to find my voice. “Why,” I whisper. “Why didn’t you tell me.”

  “I didn’t want you here out of pity. I needed to know that this was real.”

  I can’t help it. I kiss him. I feel his soft intake of breath—he tenses briefly, then relaxes into it.

  He smiles, tears in his eyes. “I wouldn’t give up a single minute of the time I’ve spent with you. Not even the difficult parts.”

  I close my eyes and exhale a shuddering breath. My face is still anchored between his hands. “I don’t deserve you.”

  “Stop telling yourself that.” His voice is harsh, almost angry, but beneath that, there’s a husky throatiness, as if he’s close to tears. “I’m not a saint, whatever you think. You deserve to be loved. You deserve to be happy. So please . . .” His grip gentles, and his eyes soften. “Please stop punishing yourself.”

  I can’t speak.

  I was so sure that when I told him, he’d be horrified. He’d see me for the monster I was, a creature so detestable that my own mother tried to destroy me. Deep down, a part of me always believed that she was right—that I was better off dead. That my life could never be anything but a mistake. “I’ll always be like this, you know.”

  “Good. Because I want you exactly the way you are.”

  Two tears slip from my eyes and down my cheeks.

  He holds his arms out to me, and I collapse. My hands fist in his shirt. My face presses against his neck, and the sobs pour out—ugly, raw, animal sounds. I can’t stop. It’s frightening. It hurts, like I’m splitting open and all my insides are pouring out.

  He cradles my head against his shoulder and rocks me back and forth.

  I cry for a long time. When it’s over, I am exhausted, weakened and empty. But it’s a clean sort of emptiness. I feel new, like a baby opening her eyes for the first time, looking upon the world in all its strangeness and beauty.

  “We didn’t have the best luck with family, did we,” I say, my voice faint and hoarse.

  He lets out a choked laugh. “No.”

  “If we ever have children,” I say, “let’s do better.”

  That night, we share his bed for the first time since I moved in. He clings to me in the darkness. “You’ll stay?”

  I take his hand in mine and hold it against my cheek. “I’ll stay.”

  His hair shines in the lamplight. On impulse, I touch it. It’s short, bristly yet soft, like fur; there’s something comforting about the texture. Slowly I slide my fingers through it. His breath catches.

  “Is that bad,” I ask.

  “No. It feels nice.”

  I touch the back of his neck, where the skin is warm and velvety, and he shivers. When I start to slide my fingers under the collar of his shirt, he tenses, so I pull back and resume combing my fingers through his hair, a slow, steady movement.

  I missed this. I missed touching him. His warmth, his scent. The sensation awakens something restless in me, and I want more.

  I rest my hand on his thigh.

  “Alvie . . .” He gulps

  “What’s wrong.”

  “It’s not that I don’t want to,” he says. “I do. Believe me. It’s just . . . my legs are still in braces. I can barely move my lower body. I mean . . .” He clears his throat. “That part of me is okay, but still. It’ll be a while before I’m in any shape for this kind of thing.”

  “Even if we can’t do it the usual way, we can still do something. When I did my research—”

  “Research?”

  Oh, right. I never told him. “I watched a lot of pornography to prepare myself. For the first time, I mean.”

  “Uh.” He won’t look directly at me.

  “I saw a lot of different positions and methods,” I continue.

  “Alvie.” His voice sounds a little strained.

  “What.”

  “I want our first time to be special.” He takes my hand in his. “I really want to do this right. I want to be prepared, and I don’t want to be stuck in braces when it happens.”

  The words frustrate me.

  When I first propositioned Stanley, I just wanted to prove to myself that I could do it. I didn’t even care if I enjoyed it; I just wanted to feel connected to another human being, if only for one night. But it’s not like that anymore. I want him. I want to touch him, to feel his skin against mine.

  But I remember what he said about his mother—how afterward, he couldn’t even get undressed in front of a doctor.

  “I just need a little more time,” he whispers.

  Stanley has been patient with me. I can be patient, too.

  I touch his chest and say, “When you’re ready.”

  He relaxes, and I know I’ve made the right choice not to push. Still, the frustration remains. We’ve revealed so much to each other. This is the last barrier between us.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN

  The lake looks the way I remember it—smooth, glassy blue, like a mirror. I pull into the small lot next to the beach.

  “You really want to do this?” Stanley asks.

  “Yes.”

  Early-morning sunlight smudges the clouds with pink as I walk across the damp sand. My legs tremble, and sweat pools in the small of my back, despite the crisp, cool air. I face the water. Waves lick the shore.

  My mother’s body was pulled out of the lake during the investigation, years ago. I learned later that she was cremated, in accordance with the wishes of some estranged relatives I never even met. There is no casket, no headstone. Though she’s not here anymore, this lake is the closest thing to a grave she will ever have.

  I crouch and place a hand on the smooth, water-polished sand. It’s warm, like a living thing. Waves lap over my fingers. Carefully, with one fingertip, I write a name in the sand: CASSIE ELEANOR FITZ.

  To me, she was always Mama. I never found out who she was outside of that. I’ll never have the chance.

  I think back to the days before all the trouble started, when we were just mother and daughter. I am three, maybe four years old. Mama and I are making cookies together. I’m fascinated by the sticky dough, and I keep putting my hands in it and playing with it like clay, getting it on my face and in my hair, and the whole time, Mama is laughing. Later, she wipes my face clean, still beaming. She kisses me on the head and says, “Do you have any idea how perfect you are?”

  I’m sure there were difficulties, even back then. I’m sure that I threw tantrums, climbed on furniture, and hid under the bed. But we were happy.

  I will always wonder how I could have changed things, if I’d made different choices—if I’d just told her that I’d been taking vitamins instead of antipsychotics, if I hadn’t gotten myself expelled, if I’d been able to hug her more often, if I’d found the words to make her understand that it wasn’t her obligation to fix me, because it’s okay to be imperfect.

  Or maybe if I’d seen the truth before it was too late—that my mother was the one who needed help. She’d been wounded inside for a long time, maybe even since before I was born, and she had no one to turn to. What if I had recognized that and told someone that she was depressed—that she’d been drowning long before she drove us
both into the lake?

  Maybe I could have saved her. Maybe not. We were both children, in a way, stumbling through the dark woods, confused and uncertain, clinging to each other for warmth. Maybe we just lost our way.

  I trail my fingers through the shallow water, and a faint ache spreads through my chest, but the tide of anguish I expected doesn’t come. I came here to find closure, to say whatever words I need to say to express everything inside me. But in the end, there are only two words.

  “Good-bye, Mama.”

  The waves gently lap away the name in the sand.

  Whatever alternate possibilities exist, they are not my world. This is. I look at the blue sky, the sun shining in rays through the clouds, sparkling on the lake. Gulls wheel in the air, brilliant white. The sand is warm under my feet, and I am alive. I stand and walk away from the lake, toward the edge of the beach.

  Stanley waits in the car. The sunlight turns his hair a brighter gold.

  We drive back. I’m behind the wheel. His hand finds mine and squeezes, then slips away.

  “It took a lot of courage to tell me the truth, didn’t it?” he asks.

  I shrug. “You’ve been honest with me.”

  Outside, the telephone poles glide past. A murder of crows flies high overhead, black dots against the clear sky.

  His hand drifts to his chest, fingers clenching on his shirt. “I still haven’t . . .”

  “We have time.”

  I want to make him understand that the scars don’t matter, the pain and fear doesn’t matter, because he is my life mate and I know that in every cell of my body. Nothing will ever turn me away from him. I want to find words to tell him, but no matter how many times I reach for them, the words are never there. There must be another way. I think and think.

  And something clicks.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT

  I’ve never visited a tattoo parlor before. I look at the reclining leather chair, the sample art on the walls, and fidget, crossing my arms over my chest. I feel terribly out of place.

  I’ve prepared myself for this mentally, or at least, I thought I had. Now that I’m actually here, the reality is sinking in, and adrenaline prickles under my scalp. Will I even be able to endure something like this? I have a high tolerance for pain, but pain administered by another person? That’s another matter. I imagine sitting there for hours, watching the needle penetrate my skin over and over, fighting the overpowering urge to flee. And of course, I’ll be shirtless the entire time.

  Already, I want to run. But I’ve made up my mind. This is something I need to do.

  The tattoo artist is tall and skinny, with a goatee and arms covered in lines of Sanskrit. He cocks an eyebrow at me as I sit in the chair. “You eighteen?” he asks.

  I’m prepared for this. I’m not eighteen yet, not quite, but I’ve obtained the necessary paperwork to prove that I’m a legal adult. I show him.

  “Okay,” he says, but he’s frowning. “You already got ink, or no?”

  I stare blankly.

  “This your first tattoo?” he clarifies.

  “Yes.”

  “And you’ve thought it through.”

  “Yes.”

  He squints at me and says, “You sure you don’t need someone’s permission for this? Because I don’t want to get in trouble.”

  I’m getting impatient. I wonder if he interrogates all his customers; it seems like a funny way to do business. “There’s another tattoo parlor ten miles from here, and three more within a forty-mile radius. If you’re going to give me a difficult time, I don’t have a problem going to someone else.”

  He blows air through one corner of his mouth and crosses his scrawny arms over his chest. “Well, it’s your skin,” he says. “So, you know what you want?”

  I pull a piece of paper from my pocket, unfold it, and show him. He takes the paper from me and studies it a moment, his forehead creased. Then he nods. “Where?”

  I point at the center of my chest, between my breasts: the place just over my heart. “Here.”

  By the time I get home, I’m starting to wonder if the tattoo was a bad idea, after all. I’ve never even asked Stanley what he thinks about tattoos, because these things never occur to me until after the fact.

  When I enter the kitchen, he’s sitting on a tall stool in front of the stove, stirring a pot of spaghetti sauce. The aroma of tomatoes, oregano, and garlic bread fills the air. He looks over his shoulder at me and smiles. “Hey. Dinner’s almost ready.” He glances at the clock. “I was hoping to have it done before you got back, but . . .”

  “It’s okay.” I told him I’d be home at eight, since I didn’t know how long the process would take. I walk over, lay a hand on his shoulder, and kiss his temple.

  It’s strange, how natural these gestures now feel.

  His face turns toward me, and our lips meet. There’s a faint taste of sauce on his tongue; he must have been sampling it.

  As we sit down to eat, I keep expecting him to ask me why I was gone for so long, but he doesn’t.

  “So, how was work?” he says.

  I tell him about Kitt, the three-legged fox, and Dewey the crow, who can tie a piece of red twine in a knot using his beak. I tell him about the hexagonal tiles on the cobblestone paths in the wooded area behind the shelter, about the koi pond with the little bubbling fountain. I was worried the fountain would bother me, but the sound of water doesn’t seem to affect me as much as it used to.

  “You’re going to be wonderful there,” he says.

  “Thank you.” I twirl my fork in my spaghetti, conscious of the sore spot on my chest. His tablecloth is off-white and green checkered. I find myself counting the rows of green squares, doing math in my head to estimate the total number of squares on the table. The tablecloth is rough-woven, the fibers thick and visible, a complicated crosshatch of strands overlapping and blending together. It’s easy to see them as a seamless whole, when I let my eyes drift out of focus, but nothing is ever seamless or simple if you study it closely.

  “Is anything on your mind?” he asks.

  I stand. “Come with me.”

  His brow furrows. He starts to pick up his plate, but I say, “We’ll take care of that later.” I walk toward the bedroom. He follows me slowly. He’s graduated from wheelchair to crutches, but he still struggles getting from place to place.

  Once we’re inside, I shut the door and face him. He’s sitting on the edge of the bed, crutches resting beside him, and I’m reminded of that first night in the motel room.

  I’m still wearing my work shirt. Now, I start to unbutton it.

  His eyes widen. “What—”

  “I got something for you today.” My shirt drops to the floor. I undo the clasp of my bra, and it falls. “Don’t touch it. It’s new.” Carefully, I peel off the bandage covering the tattoo.

  It took a very long time, and it was agony. Not because of the physical pain, which was bearable. Forcing myself to be still for so long—putting myself at someone else’s mercy—went against everything in my nature. I remember sitting, rigid as a board, fingers digging into the arm of the chair, shaking so hard my teeth rattled. The tattoo artist kept smirking at me, as if my discomfort was the most hilarious thing he’d ever seen, and more than once I had to forcibly choke down the urge to kick him. But the result is worth it.

  A carnation blossoms on my skin, bright red petals inked over my heart. It’s identical to the one Stanley gave me—the one I broke. It’s still tender, the skin around it faintly pink, but it’s not bleeding.

  Stanley’s eyes widen. Slowly, he reaches out, but his fingers stop an inch from the flower.

  I fidget and tug my braid, resisting the urge to avert my gaze and start studying the carpet. I feel exposed in a way that has nothing to do with my naked skin.

  My heartbeats echo through the silence as I wait for him to say something. At last, he clasps my hand against his cheek, then turns his face and kisses the palm. “It’s beautiful,” he whispers.
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  The tension runs out of me, leaving me weak and shaky with relief. The last thing I want is for him to look at me when I’m naked and think, If only she didn’t have that stupid red blob between her tits.

  He starts to reach toward it again, then stops. “Does it hurt?”

  “A little.”

  He lightly touches the skin just left of the carnation. The touch is as soft and tentative as the brush of a moth’s wing.

  His gaze meets mine. “Can you . . . can you turn off the lights for a minute?” He smiles, though I can see the lines of tension around his eyes and mouth. “It’s easier for me to get undressed with the lights off.”

  For a moment, everything inside me goes still. There’s a little leap in my chest, a breathless tremor of anticipation. I flip off the light switch.

  The rustle of cloth breaks the silence. He’s taking off his shirt. The darkness is thick, tangible; it presses in on me like black fur, and no matter how I strain my eyes against it, I can’t see anything.

  His fingers curl around my wrist, and he pulls my hand to his chest. I feel the roughness of scars against my fingertips. He’s tense, his breathing heavy and rapid as I slide my fingertips lower, feeling the ripples and hard lines of scar tissue. My hands glide over his shoulders, and I trace the length of a long scar running from the base of his neck to the middle of his back. I remember him telling me about how he broke his scapula, how they had to open him and reset the bone surgically; months of agony and immobility, compressed into a line of raised flesh. I trail my fingers lower down his back, and there is another scar. And then another. I touch his arms, and there are more. Eight, nine, ten, eleven.

  I quickly lose track.

  “I want to turn on the lights,” I say.

  There’s a faint click in his throat as he swallows. “It’s okay. Go ahead.”

  Instead of the light switch, I turn on the lamp. He’s naked, except for his boxers. The lamp’s soft amber glow casts pools of shadow in the hollows of his clavicles and between his ribs, emphasizing the thinness of his body. The scars are like a bas-relief sculpture carved on his skin, overlapping lines, some faded and almost invisible, others fresh and bright pink. There are dimples of scar tissue where surgical pins pierced his flesh—rows of them, marching alongside the straight lines of past incisions.