Like I said at the beginning of this book, I’m tired of holding back. I’ve got nothing to lose.
I SPILL THE BEANS
Emma got me this new book. I like it better than the last one—at least on the outside. The cover is light blue with a picture of a cream-colored seashell stamped on the front, that spiral kind called a nautilus. It’s real pretty.
Inside is a different story. Oh, it looks nice enough: The pages are a buckwheat color, and thick—almost like a cracker. But they’re rough, with big flecks of stems, or splinters, or wood chips (I don’t rightly know what they are) that make my pen snag and the ink spit. I’ve gotten where I write so fast, I don’t have time to slow down for any potholes or bumps in the road. If that’s not bad enough, this purple pen is on its last legs. You’d have thought Emma would buy me a new one to go along with this book, but I guess she lost interest, so I’m on the lookout for a new one.
Now that the weather’s nicer, I’ve taken to writing outside. A minute ago one of the girls who work here pushed the laundry cart by and said, “What’re you up to, Miz Sledge? You writing a book about all of us?”
I grinned and nodded like the old fool she thinks I am. I wonder if she’s the one who took my money.
Glenda brought the book on her last visit. “What’s going on, Mommy? You look so nice!”
“You think something’s wrong if I don’t look like hell?”
Fact is, I lost more weight. Eighteen pounds! Marcos’s eyes dangle out of their sockets every time I step up on that scale. I don’t know what got into me, but I let the cat out of the bag. Long story short, I told her about Vitus. I just came right out and said, “Maybe I look good because I’m in love.”
She didn’t know whether to shit or go blind. “What are you talking about?” she asked. She smiled, then she frowned, then her eyes crossed. “Are you serious?”
Even though I have nothing to be ashamed of, my face started burning. I was already wishing I’d kept my mouth shut, but it has a mind of its own. “Serious as a heart attack,” I said.
“Why, Mommy!” She leaned forward and laid her hand along the side of my face, like I had a fever. “I just don’t know what to say.”
“Try not saying anything.” My armpits got to itching. I had a hard time looking her in the eye.
“Well, who is he? How did you meet this man?”
“He’s just a man,” I mumbled. “A man who lives here.”
She walked over to the armchair and dropped into it like her knees gave way. She loved her father. She was his biggest fan. She ran her hands through her hair and stared at her lap. Lord have mercy, I thought to myself. Here it comes.
When she looked up at me, her face was the color of biscuit dough. “I just don’t know what to think about this,” she whispered.
I shrugged and waved my hand like it was no big thing, but inside I was panicking. What if Vitus got wind of this? I hadn’t let on anything to him—that is, I hadn’t said nothing straight out. The way men are, you got to ease into things or it can scare them off.
“What’s his name?” she asked like a policeman.
“Don’t matter. You don’t know him.”
Her eyes fired up and the color came back to her face. “Seems to me that if my own mother is in love with someone, I at least deserve to know his name.”
“Vitus,” I muttered.
“Vitus what?”
“Vitus Kovic!” I yelled. “I don’t need the third degree!”
We stared at each other. She’s got them same close-together eyes as her dad.
“Is he a nice man?”
“Depends on what you call nice,” I said with a laugh.
She heaved a big sigh and covered her eyes with her hand, like the whole world was just too much for her.
“I thought you’d be happy for me,” I said. “I thought you’d be glad I had some company instead of rotting here alone.”
Her eyes were red around the rims when she looked up. Her top lip started twitching the way it has since she was six months old. “I’m just thinking of you!” she bawled. “I’m scared for you! I don’t know this man! What if he hurt you?”
“If you’re so worried about me, what am I doing here in the first place? Last time I checked I was a grown woman with a mind of my own.”
“Well, is he good to you? Is he polite?”
“I don’t need polite! That’s not what I’m after!”
“I don’t know if you should see him, Mommy,” she had the nerve to say. “He might take advantage of you in some way.”
“I wish he would!”
You’d think I’d dropped my drawers and did a naked hula on Main Street by the look on her face.
“It’s not like I’m going to get pregnant!” I was used to talking to Marcos about these kinds of things. With him I could say whatever I wanted, no beating around the bush. “What are you afraid of?” I asked. “Don’t you think I can take care of myself after all this time?”
“Well, how do you know if he’s the kind of man you want to associate with?”
Who was she to talk? Three husbands and not one of them worth a plug nickel. “You’re not exactly an authority on men,” I pointed out. “I’m entitled to make my own mistakes, just like you.”
She shriveled up and started bubbling and snotting like a salted snail.
Nobody likes seeing their own daughter hurt. I went over and patted her arm. “Look here, straighten up. Don’t cry now. You got to understand that I got feelings like everybody else. You can’t just put me away like I’m in a museum and I’m going to sit on the shelf and not say a word or have an emotion for the rest of my life.”
“When I was a teenager, you had to see every boy I ever went out with!” she cried, raising her face up so I could see the water streaming down her cheeks. “You and Daddy made me bring him in the house so you could interrogate him. I couldn’t go anyplace alone with them and I had to be home at ten o’clock. You never cut me an inch of slack!”
“Well, I never,” I said, drawing back from her. “Talk about holding a grudge. You want to get even with me now, forty-five years later?”
“You made my life miserable!” she shouted, like she was fourteen years old again.
“Hmpf.” I snorted. Two could play that game. “The feeling’s mutual.”
“You never loved me!”
“That’s the craziest thing I ever heard.”
“Did you?” she asked in a sneaky voice.
“Of course I did.”
“Well, you didn’t act like it.”
Oh my God. It was like a scene out of one of Marcos’s soap operas. I felt like I was being dragged through a knothole.
“Listen here. I love you to death, just like I always have,” I told her. “I’m still your mother, no matter what happens. But my life isn’t over yet. Long as my heart’s still beating, I got to go where it leads me. You got no right to interfere.”
You could tell she didn’t like it, but she had to give in. I don’t regret all the times I wore out her fanny with a switch when she was a youngster. It still pays off.
“I’d like to meet him,” she said with a meek little smile.
“Maybe after awhile, when we get to know each other better.” I felt silly now that the storm had blown over. “To tell you the truth, I don’t know what’s going to happen,” I said, eating a little crow. “I shouldn’t have said anything. Me and my big mouth.”
She wiped her face and nodded, poor thing. I pity that girl sometimes, I really do. She’s missing something—a backbone or a little fire. But if you’re born that way, there’s not much you can do about it.
“All right, then. I know you got things to do, so I’m not going to keep you here any longer,” I said. Lonesome as I get, I feel antsy when I’ve been around somebody too long. Besides, I was worn out. “Oh, and Glenda honey, I need some more money.”
“Oh, I stopped in the office before I got here,” she said.
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
“Well, your big news pushed it right out of my head. Anyway, things are missing right and left. They’re asking around and keeping their eyes open. They have some ideas about who it might be.”
“Who?”
She shrugged. She has the curiosity of a dead fish. “They said just be sure to keep your room locked at all times, even when you’re here. And if you have anything valuable, they want you to keep it up there in the office.”
“Guess I should put up some barbwire. Like I’m not prisoner enough already.”
She sighed. “Is there anything left? Did they take it all?”
I pointed to the three quarters I’d left as bait in the dish on my dresser. “That’s it. Everything I got.”
“I only have about forty dollars on me right now.”
“Better than nothing.”
Truth is, my crystal’s vexing me more than the money. I’ve felt unhinged since it went missing. But I didn’t want to make a fuss. The long and short of it is, now I got a reason to want to stay here, not forever, but for the time being. I know I pissed and moaned to get out, and I do want out, only now there’s Vitus. A plan’s taking shape in my mind, and until I figure things out, I don’t want anybody messing with me.
LOSING
I don’t dread getting on the scale anymore. When Marcos comes calling, I leap up there like a mountain goat. This week I lost five pounds. Five! When I was done laughing and clapping, I gave him a kiss. He’s been pouting since our little tiff. He doesn’t give me the time of day.
“Listen here, don’t be like that,” I told him. “Whatever I done or said that made you mad, I’m sorry.”
He just looked at me with his bloodhound eyes.
“What do I need to do to make it up to you?” I asked. “Go out there and lay on the freeway and let the cars run over me?”
He didn’t crack a smile, so while he was listening to my heart, I said, “Guess who I seen.”
“Please don’t talk. I’m behind schedule. I can’t hear your heart.”
“Your boy. Renato.”
His whole face changed, like he’d been sleeping and just woke up. “Where?” he said. “When?”
“Oh, never you mind. You’re busy. Got a lot on your mind.”
He took the stethoscope out of his ears.
“Got a cute little butt on him,” I said. “Jeans so tight I could read the dates on the coins in his pocket.”
“Where was he? What was he doing?”
“Don’t get your drawers in a twist. He was in the closet down at the end of the hall, filling the shelves up with toilet paper.”
Marcos let loose a big blast of air from his mouth and his head seemed to shrink like a leaky balloon. The color drained from his face. He started gathering up his things. “I’m through with Renato,” he said in a dead voice. “It’s all over.”
“How can that be? Just the other day everything was hunky-dory. What changed so fast?”
Big tears rolled down his cheeks and dripped off his poor, ugly nose. I went over and stroked his fat hand and stumpy fingers. “You listen here. I saw that boy. He is pretty, but he’s not worth all this. Now you just straighten up. What’s all the fuss about?”
His bracelets jangled when he wiped his eyes. “Haven’t you ever been in love, Cora?” he sniffed.
I went stiff as a board and my lips pressed so tight together I thought my head would pop. “There’s somebody I got an interest in, just like you got an interest in Renato.” I couldn’t believe what came out of my own mouth.
Marcos’s eyebrows shot up to the top of his forehead. “What’re you up to, Cora?”
“None of your business.”
“Cora,” he leaned in close and whispered. “Who is it?”
I swatted him. “Now you just forget I said that.”
He softened up. I tell you, when that craggy, ugly face of his melts into a smile, he looks like a sweet little boy. I couldn’t help myself. I put my arms around that fat belly of his and gave him a big hug. “You’re still my sugar, you know that? I wouldn’t trade you for the world. If that loverboy of yours gives you any trouble, I’ll flay him alive.”
I’d seen Renato in the dining room surrounded by girls. The nurses’ aides and girls who work in the dining hall simper and frolic around him like May lambs, and he plays along, that cute little thing.
“I’ll tan his hide,” I added. “I’ll give him what for if he does you wrong.”
Marcos pursed his blubbery lips. “Loving him is an honor,” he said. “No matter what he does.”
I shook my finger at him. “You got it bad. Worse than me.”
He raised his chin up like he was real proud and made like he was staring off into the distance. His nose holes flared like a stallion’s.
“You’re a lot older than him,” I said. “There’s no telling what he might do.”
“We are alike, you and me,” Marcos said. “We don’t hold back.
We give everything.”
“That’s right, we go whole hog,” I said, patting his bottom to see if I could get away with it.
He gave me a sad smile. “And so, señora, I must go.”
I walked to the door with him. He dug around in his bag and took out a can of Pringles. Sodium and calories up the wazoo, but I could have jumped for joy.
“For you, my darling. So you don’t waste away to nothing.”
“Wait until next time.” I winked. “You won’t recognize me.”
He stepped out the door, but stuck his head in just before I closed it. “You still haven’t told me who he is.”
“My lips are sealed.”
“But maybe I know,” he whispered. “Maybe I know more than you think.”
THE FOUNTAIN PEN
You might notice I’m using a new pen. I got two: one I found on the counter at the nurses’ station, and one I found there in my top drawer where the money was. The purple one with the squishy handle finally gave up the ghost. Sayonara, I said when I threw it away. It was like saying good-bye to an old friend.
This new one is a cheap ballpoint, just a thin tube of white plastic with a real fine point. I like it, though. It writes small and pointy, so I can fit more on the page. And it cuts right through those chips and chunks in the paper. I feel like I’m using a needle, or a knife, when I’m writing with it—like I’m ready to get down to business. It didn’t have anybody’s name on it when I went by the nurses’ station the other day (yes, I’m walking a lot more since that night I went upstairs to find Vitus), so I figured it was meant for me. The black ink is good, too. Makes everything I write look important.
The one I found in my drawer is a fountain pen! Lord knows where it came from. I can’t for the life of me remember where I got it or how it came to be in my drawer, but it’s not the first thing I’ve forgotten about, and it probably won’t be the last. There’s lots of things I’ve got as gifts, useless things, things I just tuck away. I figure I uncovered it when I was searching through my underwear for those missing bills. Now that I’m writing in this book, I got use for it, and I’ll tell you, it’s a doozy.
It’s beautiful: a deep wine color with a gold nib. The ink is brown! When you write, it looks like a treasure map. But you have to hold the pen just right, and I can’t get the hang of it. The ink sputters and splashes and it takes a long time just to write a few lines. Plus it doesn’t dry right away. You got to blow on the page. So I decided to use the fountain pen just for show. I lay it on top of my book when I’m done writing and set them both on my dresser. But I’ll use it here so you can see. Look:
Coral Spring
Cora Sledge
Mrs. Cora Kovic
THE LIST
Before I get too far in this book, here’s a list of things I want to do. They ar
e part of my plan.
1. Wean myself off these pills.
Ever since they found my pills at the house, everybody has been after me to get a handle on my meds. That’s how they say it. I hate for anybody to tell me what to do. Always have. But they don’t know the half of it. I been taking pills of one kind or another for a good thirty-five or forty years now, sometimes more and sometimes less—sometimes I walked around in a fog for months or even years and sometimes I didn’t take hardly any at all, maybe just a pill or two when I had to do something that made me nervous, like go to the kids’ open house, or show up at a wedding, or sit through a Christmas dinner with a million people around.
There were days I couldn’t see straight by the time the kids came home from school. I cooked dinner in a daze, nodded when they told me about their day. I put the food on the table, cleared the dishes up afterwards, told the kids to brush their teeth and say their prayers and get in bed, all the time high as a kite. Nobody blinked an eye. Later me and Abel went to bed and whatever he wanted was just fine with me. Nothing made much difference. Next day the same thing, and the day after that. A lot of time can pass like that. It just slips on by.
I tried to stop. I made so many resolutions I lost track of them. I flushed pills down the toilet, hid them from myself, even called one of them hotlines, thinking I’d ask for help. I hung up the minute they answered. I prayed, pleaded, and bargained with God. I gave myself talkings-to in the bathroom mirror, called myself every filthy name in the book. But the years went by and I didn’t quit. Truth is, it’s not easy to kick that stuff. I got used to taking it. I took ten or twelve a day and didn’t turn a hair. Long as I could get what I needed, everything was fine.
Except for a few pills I was able to grab and hide here and there, I got cut off all at once when they put me in here. My mind and body went into such a tailspin, it’s a wonder I’m still alive. This isn’t the time or place to tell you everything about that, but I will say that for a couple of months I was hardly human. I didn’t have control of nothing. It was a living nightmare, with every kind of monster and ghoul you can imagine. I finally had to beg for mercy. I went to that damn Dr. Kildare and said, “Listen here, I’m losing my mind. If you don’t give me something I’m not going to make it.” It was no exaggeration, and he knew it. So he doled out a few pills. With that and what I’ve been able to rustle up on my own, I’ve managed to make it so far.
Breaking Out of Bedlam Page 11
