by Scott Hale
Gemma rolled over, held Scram above her face. Voice deep like an adult’s, she said, “How can I grow up when they keep tearing things down?” She dropped Scram on her head and growled. “Show’s how much they care.”
Her ears picked up a sound outside. She bounced off the bed, went to the window. As nightfall set in, the storm had begun to subside. She could see further than she had been able to before. Coming out of town, down the old road, was her mother’s truck, high-beams blazing. Her mom had left to pick up pizza two hours ago. Gemma was hungry, but she had hoped her mom would’ve been gone a little longer. Because dinner was the bad hour, the black hour. The hour when her mom and dad got to let out all their anger on one another, until the rest of the night was sufficiently terrible.
Gemma thought back to her sand castle, and the king and queen she let drown inside it. Morbid notions came easily to her now. She always figured that was just part of “growing up.”
TRENT GEMMA CAMILLA
About the time Camilla pulled into the driveway, Jasper was coming out the front door, doing his damndest to carry out his disappearing act. Trent’s brother always managed to be gone before she came home. It was smart, but still pissed her off all the same.
She killed the engine and grabbed the two large pizzas off the passenger’s side seat. Stepping out of the truck, rain now a drizzle, she said, “Don’t want to stay for dinner?”
Jasper laughed, shoved his hands into his coat. “No, better get going before the storm picks up again.”
“Can I ask you for a favor?” She kicked the door shut behind her. “I bought this beautiful grandfather clock from Gethin today. Idiot didn’t know what he had. But I need help loading it into the truck tomorrow morning. Do you mind?”
He laughed uncomfortably. “Oh, uh, I don’t know. Honestly, I don’t want to be around here for when you tell him that.”
“I’m going to tell him tonight.”
“Uh.”
“Please?” She flashed him a smile, the one that she knew made him feel like they were on the same side.
“Yeah, alright.” Jasper started to say something, but stopped himself.
“What?” Camilla asked, catching on.
“Uh—” he went past her, toward his car, further down the driveway, “—why don’t you wait until later tonight? Don’t tell him at dinner. You all should eat in peace, for once.”
Camilla cocked her head. “It’s my house, too, and my money. He wants me to be open with him? Then that means telling him things he doesn’t want to hear.”
“Yeah, but you like starting shit with Trent.”
“What?”
“Come on,” he said, unlocking his car. “You do. Everything you do that you know will drive him crazy, you rub in his face. I’m not saying he’s right or you’re wrong or whatever. I’m just saying take a break from the fighting for one night.” He sat down in the car and, as he pulled the door shut, shouted, “For Gemma’s sake.”
Camilla waved him off, called him an asshole, and went inside the house. She stopped at the threshold, a knot of rage tightening in her temple. Muddy footprints marred the hardwood floor. They ran from the front of the house, up the staircase, into, undoubtedly, Gemma’s room. To her left, the living room, and slung over the loveseat, a wet towel with a bunch of oceanic gunk all over it. Further back, Trent was banging around in the kitchen, setting the table she had asked him to set hours ago. She squeezed the sides of the pizza boxes, causing them to crumple.
“That’s nice,” she said, her voice elevated to that piercing pitch all moms seem to possess. “Come home and the place is a freaking mess.”
She growled and went into the kitchen. Lo and behold, Trent was there, at the sink, with a beer, waiting for her.
His eyes went to the pizza boxes. “You were gone awhile.”
Camilla set the pizzas on the counter. She was practically bursting at the seams to tell him of her purchase. Looking out the window above the sink, she saw a few slivers of light coming through the clouds. The last they would have until the night was done with them.
“Must have had a lot of orders,” Trent persisted. The forty-two-year-old was starting to sound like their daughter.
“Gemma,” Camilla shouted as she started divvying up the pieces to the plates on the table. “Gemma. Dinner.”
Then: “I went shopping. Got caught in the storm.” Pizza hanging as limply as her jaw, she said, “Do you want a play-by-play, Trent?”
“What did you buy?” He finished off his beer, started towards the fridge for another one.
Camilla rolled her eyes, said, “Are you kidding me? You were listening? I can’t have a moment’s rest around here. Gemma!”
Stomp, stomp, stomp. Gemma stomped down the stairs and wandered into the kitchen. It made Camilla sad to look at her. Her daughter’s pajamas were baggy, but she was still so skinny. She had to make sure she ate a lot tonight. Lord knows Trent couldn’t keep up on those things.
“Mm, smells good,” Gemma said. She dropped into a chair and devoured the pizza on her plate.
I got to let that go, Camilla thought, watching her daughter go to the box for another slice. She’s going to be fine.
She turned around to find Trent on his cell phone, tapping through an app. In the window, she saw a reflection of the screen. It was their banking account—two thousand, five hundred dollars shorter than it had been an hour ago.
“What the hell did you buy?” Trent growled. He flipped the phone around for her to see what she’d already seen in the window. “What the fuck is this?”
Camilla clenched her jaw. The tendons in her neck tightened. A million mutilating words ran through her mind. She could literally feel her eyes changing color as the heat in her skull swelled into a blistering ball of rage. Smiling, she tried to shake it off, tried to let it go. But after years and years of letting things go, she found she couldn’t anymore. Everything he said, every accusation he made got under her skin and made her feel filthy inside. The only thing he could do right anymore was shut his fucking mouth.
Camilla looked at Gemma. Her daughter had gone stiff, and her face had lost its color. She knew what was coming. They both did.
TRENT GEMMA CAMILLA
Before he could stop himself, he was already in Camilla’s face, blocking her from getting around him.
“What the fuck did you buy?” His wild eyes never left hers.
“None of your god damn business.” She ripped a chair out from the table and sat down. “I bought it with my money. My money.”
Trent couldn’t help but laugh. He leaned in like a gargoyle over her shoulder. “Your money? Your money? It’s our bank account. It’s our money. My money that I earned!”
“Get back,” she said, jerking her hand upward. She stared at her pizza, like she was tempted to let this all go. Then said, “You haven’t worked in how long? Your money? Go to hell, Trent.”
She’s doing this on purpose.
Trent leaned back, looked at Gemma, though at this point, she hardly registered to him.
She’s going to destroy me. She’s going to make sure she leaves me with nothing. Everything I’ve done, and she’s going to blow it on bullshit.
“So what did you buy, huh?” He went in again, hands gripping the back of her chair. “What did you buy?”
Camilla scooted the chair away, ignored him as she went to the sink for no reason in particular.
Trent, practically nipping at her heels, barked, “What did you buy? What did you blow all our money on this time, Camilla? Huh? What?”
“Get. Away.” She whipped around, stuck her finger into his chest. “You drunk asshole. Get away from me.”
He ignored her and said, “You’ve been spending a lot of time with Gethin. Is that him? Is that the guy you screwed?”
“Jesus Christ, Trent.” Camilla screeched and pushed past him to the table. “I bought a fucking grandfather clock. Something I can fix up, flip, and sell for a fucking profit. Happy?”
<
br /> She’s going to take all my money and leave us with nothing. She doesn’t care about anyone but herself.
Trent went to the fridge and opened another beer. He guzzled it down, while deflecting Camilla’s disgust.
She fucked Gethin. Never said she didn’t. Spends all her time and money on him.
Camilla screwed up her face. “You got something to say?” She wasn’t done fighting with him. Not even close. If he stopped, she would try even harder. This wouldn’t be over between the two of them until they had exhausted every cussword and insult in the English language.
The last of the beer drizzling down his chin, Trent said, “Every day, you’re gone for hours. Wasting money. Fucking Gethin. You have a family here, and you’re not even trying.” He crumpled the can and, in a fit of rage, threw it at the garbage.
“I’m not trying? That’s good. That’s real funny.” Camilla’s eyes went black. “I’m not trying? I’m not trying? What do you do all day beside sit around here and drink and feel sorry for yourself? And I’m gone all day? When’s the last time you spent time with Gemma? When’s the last time you spent time with me? When I actually wanted you to be around me, you fucking prick? I’m not trying? I’m doing something and you’re just—”
TRENT GEMMA CAMILLA
Gemma wasn’t hungry anymore. The half-eaten pizza on her plate made her stomach turn just looking at it. She wanted to get up, but like with every other argument before this one, she found herself rooted. Piece of shit, son of a bitch. Cheating whore, useless moron. She’d heard it all before, in every room of the house and most places in town. But she didn’t move, didn’t go to her room, because what she needed to know would only come at the end. When they were tired, sometimes crying. At the end was when they’d make the serious threats, the real threats. Threats like if the divorce were going to happen, and when. But the worst of it was when they talked about who would keep Gemma. Like she was one of her mom’s antiques up for auction.
“You don’t do anything for anyone else. You’re not there for Gemma, and you were never there for me,” her mother shouted. She was bearing down on Dad, shoving him against the refrigerator door.
Gemma scooted in closer to the table to give them more room to fight. She reached into her pockets for her cell phone, which was upstairs, dead. She had a few friends, not good friends, really, but convenient ones. Easy ones. They swore up and down their parents fought like hers, but she’d never seen it at any of the sleepovers. They tried to make her feel good about her situation, but their sympathy was too sweet to take on a daily basis.
Her friends were good distractions, but terrible reminders of one crushing truth: Gemma’s home life for the last thirteen years had been anything but normal. When she realized that earlier this year, she retreated, into books and herself, and only emerged when she was clothed in mischief and misdirection.
Dad slammed the fridge shut. His fist was balled and in her mother’s face.
“Do it!” she said, almost snarling. “Go ahead, Trent. Hit me in front of your daughter. Show her how a man is supposed to treat the woman who’s carried his ass all these years.”
At that accusation, her dad’s arm went limp.
“How long were you out of a job for? How many extra hours did I work to keep the bills paid? You sat on your ass for months, not doing a god damn thing.”
Her dad threw his hands into the air, shouting, “I was injured. What the hell was I supposed to do? My knee still isn’t right.”
“Boo hoo,” Mom mocked. “Are you kidding me? I practically paid all the bills. I worked damn near sixty hours a week. I took Gemma to school. Did her homework with her. Oh, and helped my mom, when she lost her house, and my sister, when she was sick. What else did I do? Oh, that’s right. I talked to your boss for you. I got your job back. And what did you do? You did everything you could to make sure they’d fire you again. And that woman? That god damn woman before we got married.”
“When are you going to stop bringing this up?”
“I was going to stop bringing it up when it stopped happening, but it hasn’t, Trent. You skate by in life, not putting an ounce of effort into anything but trying to give me a fucking heart attack.”
She laughed, looked at Gemma, who laughed too, just so she’d take her insane eyes somewhere else.
“When am I going to stop bringing those things up? You know what? Never. Never, Trent. And it doesn’t matter. It’s over. We’re done. I don’t have to forgive you for shit. And I don’t have to do a damn thing for you anymore.”
The woman? Gemma, next to the pizza on the counter, picked at the crust as her mind chewed on the notion. The woman? She had heard her mom bring her up before, that night when Dad found out she’d cheated on him. She always figured he had cheated on her once, but her mom never said for sure. Which was weird. She rubbed everything else in his face every chance she got. But not that.
“We’re not done,” Dad said, following her mom into the living room. Breathing down her neck as she dropped onto the couch, he said, “We are not getting a divorce. You are not destroying this family!”
“Oh, so it’s my fault?” She flung a pillow at his face. “You’re going to blame me for this?”
“You cheated on me, you god damn…”
“Say it,” she said with a smile, eyes shining. “Whore?”
“I am willing to forgive you.”
Oh no, Gemma thought. She loved her dad, but he was an idiot. When he said things like that, it was as though he were asking her mom to kill him. Gemma slinked into the living room, staying clear of her parents, who were infected with the disease fifty percent of all married couples supposedly had. She had to think, had to do something. She had to intervene; otherwise, this would be going on all night, and tomorrow, too, until one of them, most likely her dad, got kicked out.
This was the beginning of her summer break. She was not going to spend it in a warzone, being captured by both sides and used as a way to bait the other into a fight.
“Shut up,” Gemma whispered.
But her mom was on her feet again, spitting words in Dad’s face. Pushing him around. Daring him to knock her down.
“Shut up,” Gemma said a little louder.
But her dad couldn’t hear her because he had grabbed Mom by her shirt and was screaming, “Who did you sleep with?”
Gemma closed her eyes. All the tears there bunched up against her lids. When they leaked out, she quickly wiped them away. She didn’t want them to see her cry. She didn’t want to make this about her, or rather, how they were hurting her. It was too late for them to see that. And if they had already seen it before, then they obviously didn’t care; otherwise, they would have stopped. No, she was going to be their problem to solve. Not their kid to coddle. It was fine if they knew how much she hated them. Hate was easy. Hate was like a fire sealing a wound. She’d heard that in a song once, and right now, she believed it with all her heart.
So she punched the wall with both her fists and screamed at the top of her lungs, “Will you two shut the fuck up? Shut up! Shut up! Shut the fuck up!”
TRENT GEMMA CAMILLA
Camilla was two bitches away from flat-out slapping Trent across the face when Gemma exploded.
“Will you two shut the fuck up? Shut up! Shut up! Shut the fuck up!” her daughter belted, leaving dirty fist marks on the wall, like the autistic children Camilla used to teach would do.
Derailed, and damn near deranged, Camilla set her sights on that insubordinate seed of hers and said, “Go to your room. Go! If I so much as raised my voice at my parents, they would have popped my lip. Go, Gemma.”
But Gemma didn’t move. Instead, she stood there, crouched over, taking short, raspy breaths, as though the fighting had made her feral.
“Gemma,” Trent said, joining Camilla. “Listen to your mother and get upstairs right now.”
Their defiant daughter arched her shoulders. Her cheeks quivered; she dug her nails into her thumbs. Thunder and lig
htning battled for the family’s attention, but the thirteen-year-old’s incoming meltdown would be impossible to ignore. Camilla had to stop herself from going off on Gemma. She knew exactly what her daughter was trying to accomplish, because she had done the same thing with her parents when she was her age. But in moments like this, with all the bloody rage for Trent boiling inside her, it was hard. Because she saw more of her husband in Gemma than she did of herself. It hadn’t always been this way. But truth be told, she saw a little of Trent in everyone nowadays. And she just about hated everyone for it.
“I’m… sick of the fighting.” Gemma ground her teeth, only because she knew Camilla hated that. “I’m sick of it. Just get fucking divorced already.”
“Alright, upstairs. Now.” Trent started towards her.
Gemma screeched and ran past her father, through the living room. She stormed up the stairs, each thunderous step somehow worse than those earth-shaking claps outside. From the second floor, she bellowed, “I wish you both would leave.”
Camilla took a deep breath, Trent at her side. She turned away from him. The smell of beer and his aftershave was making her sick.
He did this. He started this. He’s the one who fills her head up with lies and turns her against me. He acts like he’s perfect. I’m the one who has to do everything around here. Would he hurt us if he drank enough? That one… but I did, too. He has to go. Anyone but him.
TRENT GEMMA CAMILLA
Trent took a deep breath. Camilla beside him, he stared past her out the window, into the dark world pressing against the glass. The heat of his wife was singeing, and she smelled bad, like wet fur and old gum.
She did this. She started this. She wants to make me look like an idiot, like a piece of shit in front of Gemma. She thinks there’s nothing wrong. I swear to god she’s lost it. I’m the only one keeping this house together. Who did she sleep with? Who did she tell? Who’s laughing at me now?
