One afternoon when she returned to her room, a wheelie suitcase sat on the floor. She recognized the color and pattern as being her own. Someone had packed the bag for her. It could only have been Joel. He was back home and getting on with his life. She wondered what it was like for him. How he answered questions about the scar on his neck. What he told people about his homicidal wife. Whether he slept at night or lay wide awake, listening to the rats.
A day later ... or was it two ... she was sitting at one of the many round tables in the dayroom, reading a romance novel. The same piece of lined yellow paper, or one very much like it, lay at her elbow. It was folded like one of those paper saltcellars she played with as a little girl, the kind with colors written on the outer flaps, numbers scrawled across the inner flaps, and fortunes buried in the folds. Only a handful of those fortunes had ever come true for Kendra, but now they lay as dust at her feet.
A patient strolled by and palmed the saltcellar. Kendra pushed herself up from the table and reported to the dispensary. They gave her something for her headache. She returned to her room, watched the video camera watch her, and waited for the absent clock to tick.
Two days later, Gerald came for her. Since the freight elevator was out of order, they were forced to take a public elevator down to the lobby. Upon arrival, a tsunami of people, voices, and activity assailed her senses. She’d been living like a contemplative nun, walls of gray enclosing her and complacency a habit. She’d forgotten what the real world was like. It was something close to nirvana.
Everything swirled like white lightning in a blender. The brightness of incoming sunlight assaulted her. She blinked to get her bearings. A balmy scene framed itself outside the plate glass windows. Spherical patterns of cobblestones paved the open-air plaza. The fountain sprayed wind-blown ribbons and rainbows. A curved roadway looped in from the main street, providing a convenient place for drop-offs and pickups. Several cars were parked along the curb, motors running. A female driver sat at the wheel of a VW. She leaned over and pushed open the passenger door. Partly cloudy skies and apprehension shaded her eyes.
Gerald tugged at Kendra’s sleeve. “We’ll be late.” She obediently followed him. He should have shepherded her more closely. He should have taken her elbow. He had grown slack. He had begun to trust. He shouldn’t have. By the time he realized she had slipped out the revolving doors and hop into the VW, it was too late.
Chapter 36
AS SOON AS Kendra dived into the passenger seat, the VW took off. Gerald pounded out of the hospital doors and sprinted after—shouting and gesticulating—but eventually put on the brakes when the tires of the VW squealed onto Ontario Street and sped west.
Jody laughed herself silly, but Kendra felt nothing, not even a sense of relief. “Like, you okay?” Jody backhanded her across the arm.
“Lay off.”
“They got you doped up good. What’re you on? Clozaril? Prozac? Xanax? All of the above?”
“Nothing. I refused medication.”
Jody looked at her with awe. Her eyes lowered to the burgeoning baby bump. She touched Kendra’s nearest hand. “Poor kid. Poor mom.”
Kendra washed her eyes over the girl. She wore a tank top too tight for her lean frame, but Jody was better to look at than the bud of a tea rose on the brink of blossoming.
The shift of time and place proved too much for Kendra. She blinked to assimilate the blinding brilliance of daylight and the tempo at which people, buildings, and cars whizzed past. “How ... how did you put the freight elevator out of commission?”
“Sandy’s cool. She won’t tell.”
“You ... you’re fucking pleased with yourself.”
Jody slapped the steering wheel. “I’d spring you again, just for kicks.”
Scenery raced by at the speed of sound. She recognized landmarks like old friends. She thought her memories had been the product of a vivid imagination: descriptive prose from a futuristic novel or picture postcards of never-seen lands. She could almost reach out and touch reality. “Where are we going?”
“Bucktown.”
“Friend’s apartment?”
“Mine.”
“Finally moved out of your parents’ house?”
“Threatened to tell the neighbors where I’d been.” To indicate cash money, she rubbed her fingers together. “No room for scandal on Cherry Lane.”
The walkup was one of many in the tree-lined neighborhood. Kendra was winded by the time she climbed to the third storey.
“No great shakes, but it’s home.” Jody had packed up her childhood and transported it to the one-bedroom apartment.
“It’s you.” Kendra stooped to pet two tabbies.
“Lucy and Desi. Strays. Like me.”
Kendra hugged herself. “I ... I have to scrub that place away.”
“Sure, sweetie.”
The bathroom was equipped with a claw-foot tub. A tropical shower curtain ran around three sides. Jody cranked the spigots. “Like what happened to your hair?”
“It’s the newest style.”
“Joel?”
“How’d you guess?”
“I know, sweetie, I know.” She helped her off with her clothes.
Kendra climbed into the bathwater and wrapped her arms around bent knees. Even though steam rose from the tub and sunshine poured through the window, she was shivering. Jody shampooed her hair while Kendra counted out her sobbing breaths to a hundred and one. The heated vapors coiled. Leaky tap water plop-plop-plopped into the tub. Wall joists cracked. Bathwater lapped. Suds fizzled. Each sound took a syncopated turn, hummed like a tuning fork, and yielded to melodic chamber music. She coasted in a swimmy sensation and nearly fell asleep inside the soothing envelope. Cranking her head sideways, she said to Jody, “You look good. Relaxed. Happy.”
“Don’t make me laugh.”
Jody ran the washcloth over her bowed spine. The massaging action uncurled Kendra. She sat back and lowered her head onto an inflatable pillow.
“Think you can handle things by yourself? Have to go to work.”
“When’d you get a job?”
“Two months now. Checking groceries. The benefits are good.”
Kendra washed her face with dripping hands.
“My brother’s a hairdresser,” Jody said. “A good one. He also does tattoos.”
“What do I need a tattoo for?”
She inclined her head. “What don’t you need a tattoo for?”
“You’re taking a chance. I’m a wanted criminal.”
“A wanted nutcase. There’s a difference.”
“I’ll leave as soon as I can get myself together.”
“Not a chance.”
“Just repeat after me: Whatever you say, Kendra.”
“Well shit, she’s got a mind of her own.” Jody helped her dry off, then led her by the hand to the bedroom and turned down crisp percale sheets. Kendra settled like a kitten on a cushion. Jody sat beside her. Her face grew serious. “I know what you’re thinking. You have to stop protecting the bastard.”
“He’s worth it,” Kendra said.
“A load of crap, after what he’s done to you.”
“I can’t help it. A part of me still loves him.”
Jody got up and threw open the window. An artist could have drawn a pencil line around her profile and known everything about her. The wispy hair brought out high cheekbones and a rebellious jaw. The translucent skin was as delicate as ever. And the rainbow eyes could hypnotize if Kendra let them.
“What’s going on in your life? Other than an apartment and a job?”
“I stay in the now, minute by minute. I tried to off myself again, but my heart wasn’t in it. Called Tommy at three in the morning. He sat with me over the toilet. We talked. Well, he talked. Until dawn. How’s that for romantic? I think we split up. Anyway, he hasn’t called for three weeks.”
“I’m sorry.”
“He’s very emotional for a guy. I’m double trouble for a girl. Being apart w
orks out perfectly.” She stretched out beside Kendra. “When’s the baby due?”
“Winter.”
“Keeping it?”
Kendra nodded.
“Is it Joel’s?”
“He thinks it’s ... that someone else is the father.”
“Do you love the other guy?”
Kendra shook her head.
The window overlooked a small back yard. A gentle breeze ruffled lacy curtains. Cicadas sang a late-summer mass while a red maple tree danced to the rhythm. Kendra didn’t hear Jody leave but eventually became aware of being alone. Unused to the absence of voices and the ever-present thrum of institutional engines, she was unable to sleep. For hours, she watched the maple tree turn fiery in the descent of day. Every so often, as if to celebrate life, a single leaf disengaged and floated to the ground.
Chapter 37
IN HER UNCEASING travels, Kendra took to wearing an ankle-length trench coat, its lapels flapping in the wind and the belt dangling like costume jewelry. She picked it up at a resale shop along with other retro clothes that blended with her new persona of escaped mental patient on the loose.
Summer took an early bow and autumn nipped at her heels, but Kendra was never cold. In the Loop and on north Michigan Avenue, she scattered pigeons before her, nothing to slow her pace, not even flashers or muggers who somehow sensed her unpredictability and kept a wide berth.
Jody’s hairdresser brother evened out the tufts of her hair, cut a spiked look, and tipped the ends blonde. She chose a butterfly tattoo for her shoulder. When she looked in the mirror afterwards, she still felt the same. Kendra wasn’t about to disappear with a new hairdo and body art.
She didn’t need much money, just enough for transit tokens and coffee. She begged in the streets and scrounged coins off passersby. Sometimes she crashed at the Bucktown apartment; showered; knocked back a beer or two with Jody’s friends; and slept like the dead. The rest of the time, she rode the el to the South Side, then back to the North Side, and around again, commuting endless loops while gawking through day-smudged or night-blackened windows. Hypnotic mindlessness became a healing tonic.
She visited Hunter’s old haunts. Different panhandlers staked out the lampposts.
Kendra found her own lamppost on LaSalle Street and timed her surveillance to a lawyer’s predictable schedule. Joel geared up to his usual twelve-hour workday. He hid the scars of insanity beneath starched shirt collars. The once enchanting smile was tinged with his personal mark of madness. Tina Ambrose abandoned the redheaded look and went back to basic brown. She and Joel took long lunches at a string of hotels, each establishment seedier than the last.
The need for discretion no longer necessary, he also spent many evenings at Juliana Santana’s condominium. Kendra wasn’t jealous anymore. Women like them were everywhere, not so much competition as opportunists. She understood now how dangerous men attracted likeminded women. Twice she had fallen victim herself.
She met Patty Burns by chance under the Marshall Field clock on State Street. “My God, Kendra, is it you?”
Despite Kendra’s reluctance, Patty dragged her friend upstairs to the Walnut Room. The wood paneling and white tablecloths were too refined for a homeless person, and the chandeliers made it impossible to disappear. Kendra used restraint and nail biting to keep from screaming her way out like a madcap.
“I tried to get in to see you,” Patty said. “At the hospital. They told me I had to be on an official list. Joel refused to take my calls, so I barged into his hospital room one evening. You’ll be happy to know he looked like shit, but he was as tightlipped as a nun’s cunt.” Without taking a breath, she smiled up at the waitress and ordered two Caesar salads.
“There wasn’t any list,” Kendra said after the waitress departed.
“No one? You were in this alone? I can’t believe ...” Amazement brought out the freckles on her powdery cheeks. She sucked in her lips, terrified to pry further, but did anyway. “What did he do to you that you turned him into a turkey roast?”
“He did it to himself.”
Patty blinked several times in thought. “He couldn’t. He wouldn’t. The bastard. He was trying to make you look like ... and he did ... didn’t he? You’re no sicker than ...”
“But I am.”
“Well shit, who wouldn’t be, when the man you love ...” She covered Kendra’s hand with her own. “Of course you love him. He’s a lovable guy, even if he flipped out.”
The physical contact was too much for Kendra to bear. Her invisibility was lifting. She’d become a pane of clear glass through which her broken and bleeding heart was plain to see. She reclaimed her hand. “Is the cavalry searching for me?”
“From what I gather, the hospital doesn’t want a scandal, especially where the Swain name is involved. Jordan put a clamp on the newspapers. It happens every day, mental patients wandering off.”
Patty again reached across the table, but Kendra shied away from the overture. Sympathy was a dangerous commodity. It gave a person hope.
“God knows what you’ve been through.” Tears filled her eyes, but Patty was never one for dwelling on depressing subjects. Blinking back wetness, she proceeded to gossip about old friends ... engagements, weddings, divorces, accidents, illnesses, career changes. On the personal front, she had a new love in her life, a systems analyst with an ex-wife and two sons. “Imagine me with a built-in family. Can you stand it?” Once again, she focused on her friend, concern in her gaze.
The arrival of lunch cut through the strain. The waitress returned with the peppermill. Sprinkles drowned the greens like lava streaking down the sides of an active volcano. Kendra became lost in the geometric shapes and intense colors set against the bone china. She had come to believe there was meaning in everything, including the abstract design of a lunch plate; or the chance encounter of an old friend; or the repetition of bad memories. In her solitary travels, she was trying to figure things out. Make sense of her life. Find the kernel of where it all began. Sort out the clues left in the carnage of her marriage. And reason out the events as they happened; why they happened when they did; and what it all meant. If there were truth to be gleaned, she would find. And use it. And recapture the meaning of her life ... and of Joel’s ...if there had been any meaning at all.
The sound of Patty’s voice jolted her out of her reverie. “If I’d known you were coming in for a crackup ....” Losing her appetite, she put down her fork. “You should have said something. I could’ve helped.”
“No one could help. It was a private game. Joel saw to it.” Kendra had been mired in the trivial. She had focused on the women in Joel’s life, when they were nothing more than pawns on a chessboard, protecting the king and undermining the queen.
Patty picked up the fork again but let it hover above her salad. “I’m going to choke on this if I don’t fess up.”
“To what?”
“The night I introduced you to Joel ... God, how long ago was that ... he cornered me in the kitchen. Pumped me about you. And like the big blab I am ... well, the more I told him, the more interested he became. Looking back, it wasn’t just a guy-girl thing. You fit a profile, some ideal he had in mind, a list of credentials. I thought it was because Kendra McSweeney was such a fantastic person that he saw you the way I saw you.” Her eyes slanted down toward Kendra’s tummy, hidden beneath the folds of the tablecloth. “When’s it due?”
“February.”
They parted after a hug and a promise. “You’ll call. And I don’t mean maybe. Saturday, okay?”
Kendra said, “Okay,” but didn’t mean it.
After they parted outside, Kendra paused to look into one of the many storefront picture windows. The department store was gearing up for the Christmas season, and a team was setting up a traditional holiday display harkening back to times that were more genteel. She remembered Emily bringing her downtown when she was about four or five. After oohing and aahing over the same quaint vignettes and animated figures being
set up now, they went inside to visit Santa Claus. He smelled funny and touched Kendra in a way that made her uncomfortable.
She shifted her focus from the picturesque holiday scene—and the conflicting memories it conjured—to her own reflection in the plate glass window. The image was so vivid and so startling, she was forced to turn around and see if there was another Kendra standing just behind her. But no, she was quite alone, only the eyes of strangers returning her stare while dozens of other pedestrians meandered past them.
That afternoon she took the el train out to Evanston.
When Birdie saw her standing on the porch, she rushed into the drizzle and pressed Kendra against her immense heart. “My God, my God, we’ve been worried sick. Where on earth have you been?” To make sure she wasn’t an apparition, Birdie ran her hands over Kendra’s face and arms. “You’re staying with us. I won’t take no for an answer.”
Kendra let her eyes caress the pink tower of the Queen Anne. As a child, she would climb into the bare room beneath the dome where Emily stored a lifetime of memories. There were treasures galore for a child’s active imagination. A trunk of old clothes. A collection of cut glass vases and perfume bottles. A china tea set. A pair of porcelain elephants. Albums plastered with black-and-white photos. Collectible dolls. Feather boas. Strings of beads. Ball gowns. High-heeled shoes. Fur stoles. And more. Kendra played for hours among the trumpery and frippery, turning them into props of make-believe.
“They’ll be looking for me.”
“My dear, no one cares about a runaway wife.”
“No one but Joel.”
“Veni, vide, vici. He came, he saw, he left.”
“He won’t give up. He intends to commit Emily.”
“The papers have come.”
“Then I’m too late.”
“He can’t touch me. Or your mother. Or for that matter, you. I have money of my own. And influential friends. Friends Jordan Swain can’t corrupt. He’s not governor yet, nor is he likely to be.” As if to protect the small life growing inside Kendra, Birdie tentatively reached out and spread her fingers over her tummy.
Trick of the Mind Page 26
