Tears in a Bottle

by Sylvia Bambola

  Hours later, after Becky had risen from the floor and washed, she went back to her room and pulled out her diary from its hiding place. She had not written in it for a long time. Certainly not since the abortion.

  She tried to think of what day it was and decided it must be Tuesday, but she wasn’t altogether sure. Saturday she had gone to Solutions, then a few days at the hospital getting someone else’s blood forced into her. Did everyone think that all they had to do was fill her up and she’d start running again? Okay, so she’d been out of it for what? Two days, three? Or was it more? When Becky realized she really didn’t care what day it was, she settled on Tuesday and wrote that date in the top left corner of the page.

  Then she began twirling the pen between her fingers. But if it was Tuesday, then why were her parents home? They had been home all day. Were they worried? About her? She crinkled her eyebrows in anger. Let them worry. She didn’t care about them anymore. Why should she? They hadn’t cared about her. About how she felt or what she wanted.

  She glanced at her rag doll. It was still wrapped tightly in a towel and lay close by her side. She smiled down at it.

  “You just stay quiet, like a good little girl,” she whispered, “and let Mommy get her writing done.”

  Then Becky turned her attention to the open diary on her lap.

  Dear Diary,

  I’m scared and I don’t feel well. And I did something horrible. I killed my baby. Do you think God could ever forgive me? I don’t think I’ll ever be able to forgive myself. It was awful. I was terrified. The doctor was disgusting. He touched me and it made me sick. But that wasn’t the worse part. The worst part was when I saw my baby’s arm and hand. It was so tiny! It was so perfect! It looked just like a real arm and hand, only it wasn’t attached to anything. The doctor had torn it off my baby, then sucked it out of my body. I don’t think I’ll forget the sound of that machine as long as I live.

  I feel empty now. And sad. So terribly sad. I’d do anything to change things, to make things right. But it never will be right. And I don’t know how I’m going to live the rest of my life with that.

  While I was there, someone came, a man I think, and killed everybody. They’re calling it a massacre. Only he didn’t find me. I was in a closet with a curtain on it—they put me there because I was crying too much and they didn’t want me around the other girls—so I didn’t see what happened. I only heard shots and I was afraid, but not the same way I was afraid when I was in the other room with that machine.

  Everyone thinks I cry all the time because I’m remembering that massacre. The truth is I hardly think about it. It’s like a dream and doesn’t seem real. The other truth is that I wish the gunman had found me.

  I don’t like myself much anymore. And all I do is cry. I just can’t seem to stop crying. I’m feeling pretty useless. I don’t even care about going to college. I don’t care about anything right now. Maybe it will go away in time, this feeling. If it doesn’t, then I’ll have to make it go away. Right now, the strongest feeling I feel is hate.

  I hate myself so much.

  Becky sat propped in bed, staring at the wall in front of her. After finishing her diary entry, she had fallen asleep. She looked at the clock on her nightstand. She had been napping for almost an hour. But what was that sound—the sound that woke her? It took several minutes before she realized it was her mother vacuuming downstairs. She noticed her heart was racing and that she was drenched with perspiration. Then she noticed the rag doll. A towel hung in disarray around the doll, as if it had also had a fitful sleep. Becky pulled the towel off, then dropped the doll on the nightstand. What was Raggedy Ann doing on the bed and why was she wrapped like that?

  A timid knock on the door made Becky jump. “Who is it?”

  “Dad.”

  “Come in.” Becky watched the knob turn and her father step cautiously through the doorway. He walked as if he were on tiptoe. He wore an anxious look, and Becky followed his eyes to the rag doll sprawled across the nightstand.

  “Feeling better?”

  Becky shrugged. “I guess so.” She vaguely remembered throwing up in the bathroom. She watched her father’s face relax a bit.

  “You want to talk?”

  “About what, Dad?”

  “About…about things. I know you had an awful scare, with that madman in Solutions. It might help if you talked about it.”

  “I don’t want to talk, not to you, anyway.” She could see by his face she had hurt him.

  “Becky, I love you. All your life I’ve been looking out for you and trying to do what I thought was best, in your best interest. I’m sorry I picked Solutions. I know you trusted me and I picked a place where some nut job almost killed you. I’m real sorry about that. But you have to let your mother and me help you through this.”

  Becky turned her face to the wall. “I don’t want your help. I don’t want your help ever again. Not as long as I live!” In spite of herself, she began to weep softly.

  “I know you were frightened. I know how traumatic this has been, and it’s natural for you to blame me. I blame myself as well. I could’ve gotten you killed.”

  Becky faced her father once more. “You just don’t get it, do you? I wish that maniac had killed me. I wish I had died. I wish I was dead!”

  “You can’t mean that. You have your whole life ahead of you. You—”

  “I want my baby back!”

  Jim began backing out of the room. “I know it’s hard, but in time…in time things will get better, you’ll see.”

  “I hate you! I’ll hate you for the rest of my life for what you made me do!”

  8

  “MAGGIE, I‘M NOT BLAMING you. All I’m saying is that there’s an ugly mood in town. Nobody’s going to breathe easy until Canon Edwards is caught. People are edgy. And word has gotten out that you were the last person to see him before he left town.”

  Maggie stared at her friend. “Where did they hear that from?”

  “Well, not from me, if that’s what you’re thinking. Whatever way they found out, it’s out, and it’s not sitting well with some folks.”

  “You still think there’ll be trouble, don’t you?”

  Lieutenant Tooley scratched his scalp. “I’ve seen people get ugly over less.”

  “What about police protection?”

  “What about it?”

  Maggie laughed. “Come on, Tooley—can I have some?”

  “I’ll tell you what I told Doc Emerson. Unless someone threatens you, I can’t do one thing about it.”

  “Dr. Emerson asked for protection?”

  “Right after Canon got out of jail, the doctor came running over. He was mighty nervous, too. Wanted me to post a guard, a plainclothesman outside his clinic. Course I couldn’t do that. No provocation. But I did tell him I’d send a squad car around his place, now and again, for drive-by surveillance.”

  “Seems strange that he’d run right to you before Canon even tried anything.”

  “Come on, Maggie, the Doc had every right. You know Canon blames him for Patsy’s death.”

  Maggie shrugged. “Partially, yes, but deep down Canon blames himself. And that’s just one of the demons he’s fighting. He can’t forgive himself.”

  “Canon didn’t spend the last six years of his life in prison because he tried to blow himself up, Miss Smarty Pants. He’s got it in for Doc Emerson. First he went after his clinic, and now this…this bloody massacre. I never thought I’d see a thing like that, right here in my own backyard.”

  “I know. As mixed up as Canon is, I never thought him capable of this. But it’s gotten more jumbled in his head—Patsy, Beatrice Younger, the whole thing.”

  Lieutenant Tooley wrinkled his forehead. “Now don’t you go trying to dig up that skeleton. This department had a spotless record, until—and since, ever since we got rid of…but that’s not the issue and don’t go making it one. Your daddy must be turning over in his grave, that’s all I’ve got to say. You, the da
ughter of a cop, defending a killer.”

  “I’m not defending him, Tooley—”

  “Lieutenant Tooley to you, you turncoat.” He reached over and brushed her hair away from her eyes.

  “Doesn’t it seem a little strange that Dr. Emerson would come to you, out of the blue like that?”

  “It wasn’t out of the blue. He had a paper—a note he thought was from Canon and it made him nervous.”

  “What did the note say?”

  “Just the word liar written over it.”

  Maggie sighed. “That’s Canon, all right.”

  “So, Doc Emerson was right, wasn’t he? Said he had a feeling. Must’ve been one of those premonitions.”

  Maggie toyed with the paperweight on Lieutenant Tooley’s desk. It was a baseball carved out of stone, and on the edge was a small gold plate with the inscription: 1975 Champs.

  Tooley took it from her and placed it back on his desk. “I hate people tinkering with my stuff.”

  “I remember when you won that,” Maggie said.

  “How could you? That was twenty-five years ago. You were in diapers.”

  “I was ten. And I watched every inning.”

  Tooley shook his head. “Where has the time gone?” Then he leaned way over the desk. “And if you’re so old, why aren’t you married?”

  “I’m not so old. But if you plan on dancing at my wedding, maybe you’d better give me a little protection until this thing blows over.”

  Lieutenant Tooley laughed and showed a good set of teeth.

  “Well? Can you at least give me the same protection you gave Dr. Emerson?”

  Tooley looked away. “We’re releasing them today.”

  “What?”

  “The bodies, the seven people. The ME has finished all the autopsies, and they’re going to be released today.”

  Maggie looked at her friend sideways. “Are you all right?”

  “I never thought I’d see it get like this,” Tooley said wistfully.

  Maggie squeezed his hand. “Will you give me some coverage? Will you have someone drive by the Center a few times a day?”

  “Sure. I owe that much to your daddy.” He looked down at his baseball trophy. “I never thought I’d see the day that I’d have to protect one of our own like this. A lot has changed in twenty-five years.”

  By the time Maggie left police headquarters it had started pouring again. According to the weatherman, a wide band of rain had stalled over the Brockston area and that meant rain for the next several days, and plenty of it. She opened her umbrella and headed for the Munch & Lunch, where she was supposed to meet Kirt at noon. It was already ten past. She saw him through the window, sitting at their favorite table, and waved when she caught his eye. Within minutes, she was sitting beside him, blotting her wet face with a napkin, the dripping umbrella by her feet.

  “Have you ordered yet?”

  He shook his head. His eyes danced when they looked at her. “Did you do what you promised?”

  Maggie wrinkled her nose. It was only because of Kirt’s insistence that she had gone to Lieutenant Tooley for protection.

  “I was right, wasn’t I?”

  “As usual.”

  Kirt laughed and handed Maggie a menu. “Lieutenant Tooley still thinks there might be trouble?”

  “Yes. Said the mood of the town was ugly. Although no one blames me directly. But still, Canon did come to see me before he left. So, in a way, he stained the clinic and I guess me with it.”

  “Why don’t you take the rest of the day off? Come away with me up to the mountains. Relax a bit.”

  Maggie peeked over the top of her menu and laughed. “Impetuous man. Ever hear of appointments? Schedules? Not everyone is a recovering workaholic. You can’t stay here forever, you know.”

  Kirt placed one hand on top of hers. “If you can’t take the afternoon off, then we go to plan B.”

  “Which is?”

  “Dinner and a movie.”

  Maggie nodded. She felt the warmth of his hand as he squeezed hers. “How’s A2792? You should be there, you know, to help ramrod it through.” She saw his face tighten. “I don’t need a baby-sitter. That’s an important bill, Kirt. You’ve been working on it a long time. But if you don’t try to sway the fence-sitters, you could lose.”

  Kirt removed his hand from hers. “The turkey burger sounds good. Think I’ll get that.”

  Maggie tossed her menu on the table. “Me too. So tell me, how long will you be in town this time?”

  “Four days. Getting my rest before the big battle. A2792 goes to vote next week. This morning I convinced the last fence-sitter of the importance of our parental-consent bill. Don’t worry, Maggie, we have enough votes this time to make it illegal for underage girls to get an abortion without their parents’ permission.”

  Maggie blushed and looked away.

  “That’s the problem, Maggie. You just don’t trust me. You think I’m some schoolboy who’d jeopardize something this important? To do what? Baby-sit? Impress you?”

  Maggie shook her head. “It boggles my mind that a minor needs permission to take an aspirin at school or to get her ears pierced, but she can get an abortion without her parents knowing anything about it.”

  “Don’t change the subject. We were talking about trust. And like I was saying, I don’t run from my responsibilities. I don’t crumble when things get tough. And I know how to work things through. You can trust me, I’m not going to fall apart when things get hard.”

  The waitress appeared and took their order. When she was gone, Kirt leaned closer to Maggie.

  “Did you do the other thing that I asked? Did you pray about us?”

  Maggie nodded.

  “And?”

  “And I’m not sure. I need to pray more.”

  “But you got something from the Lord?”

  “Yes.”

  “What?”

  “I still have to pray, but the only thing I got was that Jesus sent out his disciples two by two.”

  “Well, that at least is a start in the right direction. Don’t you think?” There was a big grin on Kirt’s face. “Now, I’ve got news.”

  “By your face, I’d say it was good.”

  “I’ve been approached by some influential Republicans in our state and asked if I’d like to run for Congress.”

  Maggie flew out of her chair and hugged his neck. “You’d make a wonderful congressman!” When she saw people staring, she blushed and returned to her seat. “I’m so proud of you.” Her eyes glistened with joy. “I guess your dad will just have to take one Fergason off of Fergason, Fergason, and Fergason.”

  “Not so fast, Maggie. I said I was asked. I haven’t been elected.”

  “You will be. If you run, you’ll win. I’m sure of that.”

  “What makes you so sure?”

  “Because of who you are. Because you’re a wonderful man. I believe when people in this state get to know you, they’ll just fall in love with you.”

  “Like you have?”

  Maggie smiled, her eyes meeting his. “Yes, like I have.”

  “If I’m elected, you realize I won’t be able to visit like I do now. Not as often, anyway. We won’t get to see each other very much. How do you feel about that?”

  Maggie could feel tears fill her eyes and tried to hide them from Kirt. But he saw them and pulled two napkins from the chrome dispenser on the table and handed them to her.

  “Sorry. I don’t know what got into me.”

  “Don’t you?”

  “Well…yes…of course I do. I’m just not ready for all this.”

  “I know you’re not. I just want you to know I’ll still be around when you are.”

  Maggie entered the Life Center and saw Agnes rise from behind the receptionist’s desk and clasp her hands together the way she always did when she was worried.

  “What’s wrong?”

  “There’s someone in your office.”

  Maggie watched her receptionist’
s face pale. “What is it?”

  “I tried to keep him out, but he was wild…said he had to see you, and not to try to stop him either. He said he would wait and that…and that people like you should not be allowed to ruin other people’s lives and that someday you could get hurt too, just like you hurt others. I was going to call the police, but I didn’t know if I should…if that would make bad publicity for the Center, especially with that Canon Edwards thing and all. I hope I did—”

  “You did the right thing. It’s okay. I’ll go see him. Did he give his name?”

  Agnes shook her head. “You be careful. No telling who he is. I’ll stay by the phone, and if I hear the slightest ruckus, I’m calling the police.”

  Maggie smiled and gave Agnes a hug to reassure her, but even as she began walking down the hall toward her office, she was composing urgent prayers for help. And when she saw the large, angry man standing in front of her desk, the fervor of those prayers increased tenfold.

  “How can I help you?” she said with a forced smile as she moved across the room.

  Before she could reach her desk, the man thrust his hand inches from her face.

  “I have never…I have never intentionally hurt anybody.” His voice quivered and the hand came closer to her face. “But I could hurt you lady. It would be real easy to hurt you.”

  “I’ll call the police!” Agnes yelled in a high-pitched voice from the doorway. “You leave her alone or I’ll call the police!”

  Maggie waved Agnes away. “No need. I’m sure Mister…what did you say your name was?”

  The stranger appeared confused as he looked first from one woman to the other. Finally, the hand dropped to his side. “Mr. Taylor. Jim Taylor.”

  “I’m sure Mr. Taylor just wants to talk, Agnes. Don’t you, Mr. Taylor? Just want to talk? Perhaps you can get Mr. Taylor a cup of coffee, Agnes. How do you like it?”

  “Coffee? I don’t want…maybe…just one teaspoon sugar. Thank you.”

  Agnes shook her head, but Maggie gave her a stern look and waved her out. Then she went and sat behind her desk. “Now, how can I help you?”