Little Wrecks

by Meredith Miller

  “Oh yes, thank goodness, dear. Your mother misbehaves with that Hancock, doesn’t she? Hancock.”

  “Crap.” Magda mutters to her knees.

  “I don’t really know, Mrs. Skopek.” Ruth shrugs. “Couldn’t tell you.”

  “You’ll help me, won’t you, Ruth Carter? I can’t let them recognize me. Help me, please, dear. Just hold that for a minute.” And she reaches up and pulls what turns out to be a wig off of her head. Underneath it, her head is covered with green netting and pins. Under all that, there are some wisps of gray hair. Now she starts cutting the wig with her sewing scissors.

  “Okay, we need to go now. Our friends are waiting for us.” Isabel slides up and out of the doorway, trying to stay out of scissor range. Ruth looks at the ashtray in her hand and shakes her head. She stays put and so does Magda.

  “Um, bye, Mrs. Skopek. Nice talking to you.” Isabel heads up the street. Checking for Charlie, no doubt. Mrs. Skopek doesn’t notice. She’s busy working on her clever disguise.

  “Mrs. Skopek, listen to me,” Ruth says. “It’s dark; there’s no bus. Go into Flannagan’s and ask them to call you a cab. They’ll do it for you. They’re safe. Don’t worry.”

  “Oh, I knew you’d help, Ruth Carter.” She replaces her wig and retrieves her ashtray from Ruth with precise movements, businesslike, then turns to cross the road.

  “See, problem solved,” Ruth says. “So, now they’re both gone. They’ve taken their crazy shit up the road. You wanna tell me what’s wrong with you, Magda?”

  “Nothing’s wrong with me. We need to help Isabel.”

  “Stop bullshitting me. And also, no, I do not need to help Isabel. I’ve known you all my life, Magda. I want to help you. I don’t owe Isabel anything, trust me. You don’t know the half of it.”

  “You do and you will, Ruth. You’re not that kind of person. You’re the person who knows what to say to make the wig lady feel better. That’s who you are.”

  “Oh, really? Am I? Tell me you’re not just a little bit terrified of Isabel O’Sullivan right now.”

  “A little, but I’m not mad at her. Ask yourself this, Ruth. Was it wrong, what she did?” Magda nods up Main Street towards where Isabel is standing in the flower beds in front of the bank.

  “I don’t know! I wasn’t there. Isn’t the guy some crippled head case? Could he even defend himself?”

  “The scumbag tried to rape her, Ruth.” Magda sounds like she might cry. Even when they were little, she never sounded like that before.

  “That’s not exactly what she said. You’re exaggerating. He tried to feel her up. It sucks and it’s gross and it’s wrong, but how many times a day does that happen? We kill everyone who does that, the human race’ll be extinct in twenty years.”

  “She didn’t kill him. The cop said assault. If she killed him, they would have said murder. Anyway, when are we gonna start hitting back, Ruth? We need guns and swords and fucking grenades. I’m sick of this shit.”

  “Ask the guys in the park how that works out, Magda.”

  “Don’t give me that hippie crap, Ruth Carter. Isabel did what needed to be done. Period.”

  “I want to talk about you, anyway.”

  “No, you don’t.”

  “Is she gone?” Isabel is skipping back towards them with her hands full. She drops a rain of rose petals down over their heads. “Look, it’s spring!”

  “It’s practically summer,” Ruth says. “Why are you tearing up other people’s flowers?”

  “People shouldn’t own flowers. Especially not banks. Does that woman really live near you, Ruth? What is her story?”

  “She’s terrified, Isabel. Weren’t you listening to what she was saying?”

  “Yeah, wow.”

  “Well, that’s her freakin’ ‘inner life,’ Miss Bohemian-Arty-Type. She walks around the block like that all the time, with the cigarette and the ashtray, and sometimes a beer in her hand too. Put that in your Balkan Sobranie and smoke it.”

  “What’s with the whole weird racism thing?” Isabel sits cross-legged on the sidewalk in front of them.

  “The Heos, that live next to the brake repair shop, they’re Korean. Mrs. Skopek keeps freaking out ’cause her husband got killed in the Korean War. She called the cops and told them the Heos were communist spies who came to kill her.”

  “What do the Heos think?”

  Magda snorts. “I’m guessing they think: ‘Welcome to America. Everyone warned us it would be like this.’ Come on, women. We need time to regroup. We need to breathe.” She stands up and takes out a pocket watch to check the time.

  “You have a pocket watch in the toolbox coat?” Isabel makes a grab for it. “No fair you guys always getting cool stuff from the Attic when I’m not with you.”

  “It’s my dad’s. It was his dad’s, too. He doesn’t know I have it. He’ll never notice. You could empty out the whole house, as long as you don’t touch his study.”

  Someone is shouting in the park, and an alarm goes off behind Main Street. Ruth uses the wall to pull herself up.

  “Magda, can you stop this circus town from spinning?” Isabel whines like a kid. “I’m dizzy. I want to get off and get some cotton candy.”

  “I said, come on. We can’t stop it, but we can lie still and let the sky turn without us for a minute. Things are getting complicated. We need a little distance.”

  Magda jumps ahead and makes like a matador, flourishing an imaginary red flag for them. In her head, Ruth can hear the sound of Mrs. Skopek’s scissors, scraping like nails on a blackboard.

  That night Ruth sleeps for the first time in weeks. At first, when she closes her eyes she sees fire and stars and tunnels full of darkness. She just sinks down through it all into the pillow. Near morning she dreams of climbing the water tower alone. In her dream it’s easy to do the scary part where you duck out of the ladder cage and throw your leg over the railing with a hundred and fifty feet of space below you. She stands up on the railing and stretches out her arms, balancing with the muscles working in the arches of her feet.

  Then there are Magda and Isabel, sitting with their backs against the tank like always. Magda flicks a cigarette butt out over the railing, and the glowing end arcs out and falls. It hits the trees and bursts like a red comet, showers of sparks flying out.

  Magda and Isabel gasp and shout while Ruth stands on the railing with the sparks flying past her. She is waiting to let go, to just rotate halfway around the railing and drop off into the empty sky, not hitting anything until the trees. She sees herself burst like those sparks, and then she is one of the stars. The stars feel brittle and frozen, even though they’re balls of fire. They’re like shards of broken glass, cold as the void of space, but they fill her with power. There is no more language and nothing left to touch. She opens out wider than death, with the sky sliding through her skin. She’ll never heal over, never be separate and whole again. Her limit is meaningless now. She lets go of the railing and glides down through the air, arms outstretched. Then she explodes into a shower of red sparks, shooting upward from the trees.

  two

  IN ISABEL’S DREAM it is raining. She’s under a skylight in a boat, and the drops are fat and loud on the glass. Everything is in slow motion, and she remembers she was drinking the night before, on a beach with her mother. That’s right, there they are, she and her mother, drinking, and they’re sinking into the sand. Her mother looks just like she does on the living room couch, with a glass of Dubonnet in her hand. At the same time, she is also Ruth’s mother, which is why they’re on the beach together. Her mother is laughing and looks younger as she disappears into the sand. But no, Isabel is on the boat now, under her skylight. Through the skylight she can see her little houseboat chimney and the fat drops slowly falling. No, they’re birds landing, bird feet scratching on the glass.

  It’s someone throwing pebbles. Isabel is in Castle Gloom. Still there, still scared, holding her breath and wondering when the cops are going to descend on
her with guns and badges and folders full of forms from Social Services.

  Magda is below her bedroom window, wearing a face Isabel has never seen before. She is actually crying, and the next thing Isabel knows, she’s in her backyard in socks and underwear and her brother’s college sweatshirt, and Magda is lying curled up on the grass.

  “Magdalene, honey, you have to get up.”

  “I can’t move, Bel. I can’t move anymore. I don’t know how I got here.”

  “Everyone calls me Bel these days. Listen, sweetie, just until we get into my room. If anyone sees you, you’re going to have to talk to them. You don’t want to do that, do you?”

  Just tears.

  “All right, Warren. I’m gonna hold you up. See?”

  “You actually come through in a crisis, don’t you?” Magda says.

  “I love you, Saint Magdalene of Sycamore Avenue. Stop thinking about what a selfish bitch I am and let me get you inside.”

  Once Isabel has Magdalene curled up on her bed she can put some jeans on and make Sleepytime tea. It’s the only thing she can think of, but Magda won’t drink it.

  “If I could get some booze from my parents, I’d give you that. Dubonnet doesn’t seem right at eight o’clock in the morning. Or ever, come to think of it.”

  “Henry isn’t in his bed,” Magda says.

  “Are you supposed to be babysitting him? Should we go to your house and get him? I’ll help.”

  “Henry never went to bed last night, Isabel.” Magda is sobbing again, and she has the sheet in her mouth. “I can’t. I really can’t. This cannot be happening.”

  “Slow down, honey. Are you saying he isn’t in the house?”

  “He isn’t anywhere. I don’t think he was there when I got home last night, but I didn’t check. I didn’t look in his room, Isabel. I just went to sleep.”

  “Okay, first, whatever this is, it isn’t your fault.” Isabel puts out a hand to lift up Magda’s chin. “Come on, drink the tea. It seems to matter. People always make it when you can’t cope.”

  Magdalene still won’t take anything, so Isabel feeds her the tea like a baby, holding the teaspoon to her mouth and wiping Magda’s eyes with the sleeve of her brother’s sweatshirt. “Now try to start at the beginning.”

  “He’s gone. That is the beginning and the end. Henry’s gone. He isn’t in the house; he isn’t in the yard. He isn’t anywhere on the block. I’ve been looking since six thirty. My dad is still looking. I got up to pee and I remembered I didn’t check in his room last night, so I opened his door and his pajamas were kind of folded up on the pillow. But, you know, Henry folded up, not really folded up.”

  “Listen, he’ll be somewhere close by, hon. He will. Should we call Ruth and go help your dad?”

  “No! I can’t go home. I might not ever be able to go home. Imagine what he’s gonna do to me. And I can’t go home if Henry isn’t there anyway. I love him, Isabel. He’s mine.”

  “We love him too, Magda. And he isn’t going to be gone very long. Seriously. I just know it.”

  “I know the other thing. The feeling in his room. It was just . . . empty.”

  “Stop it.” Isabel tries to sound like Magda would sound if they traded places. “I’m gonna call Ruth and tell her what’s up. We’ll go over there. I think Ruth is first lieutenant. Without you in the driver’s seat, I can’t be the one making decisions.”

  Ms. Carter is groggy and pissed off when she answers the phone, but once she hears Isabel’s voice she gets Ruth without saying anything. Mrs. O’Sullivan is already stationed on the couch when they go past the living room on the way to the front door of Castle Gloom. Out on the street it’s almost hot, almost like a summer morning.

  “Well, there you go, Magda. My mom is on the couch and not behind it. See? Things are looking up.”

  “I can’t make jokes right now, Isabel. I get that you’re trying, but I can’t.”

  They have to stop three times on the way to Ruth’s because Magda’s legs won’t hold her up. She just sits down wherever she is and starts crying. When they finally get there, Ruth is out front, sitting on the shiny new front end of Danny’s car, smoking and waiting for them. The sun is all the way up now and the glare from the white car blinds them. Ruth is just an outline against it, wearing a tank top and one of her mother’s Indian skirts.

  “All right, you two, get inside.” Ruth sounds like she’s in charge, like she just came back from being away and took over. It’s only now that Isabel realizes she’s been gone. Checked out, but she’s back now.

  “Go straight to my room,” she says. “It’s cool with my mom. Me and Danny are going to Sycamore Avenue to scope out your dad. Henry’s probably back already. Isabel, get that fucking coat off her and get her a glass of water. Whenever I cry, my mom makes me drink water. Things seem worse if you don’t.”

  Ruth’s room is in the shade at the back of the house. Out the window, Isabel can see the edge of the trees, where she woke up two Saturdays ago. Looking at it now, you’d never know they’d been there.

  “That’s cool, isn’t it?” Isabel says. “Danny’s better.”

  Magda looks grubby and about twelve years old, but at least she’s drinking the water.

  “It’s like we all have oceans inside us, isn’t it, Magda? Water tables that need to be full. When we cry it’s like the ocean coming out of our eyes, that’s why it’s salty. And we have to take it back in. It’s like the tide.”

  They’re on Ruth’s bed, listening to Danny’s car pull away. Magda holds the glass of water in her lap and leans her head on Isabel’s shoulder.

  “He won’t be there,” she says. “Why would he fold up his pajamas? He was going someplace.”

  “I’ll put some music on.”

  “Isabel, I’m hiding. I can’t hide.”

  “But I think you’re right about not going home. Should we go to the cop shop?”

  “What are you, nuts? You want to just walk into the police station right now? You?”

  “Your dad’ll call them anyway, and then they’ll come looking for us. They’ll want to know why you’re not at home helping.”

  “I talked to them. They’ve been at my house since seven thirty this morning. My dad called as soon as I woke him up. And I’m not at home looking because it isn’t helping. He’s not goddamn there! Looking harder isn’t gonna make him materialize.”

  “Okay hang on, let’s make a map. We need a method.” Isabel gets one of Ruth’s colored pencils and stands with it poised to the wall. “Where are the places he could be?”

  “I don’t want to think about the places he could be, Isabel.”

  three

  “YOU MAYBE SHOULDN’T have said that to Professor Warren, Ruth.” Danny puts his key in the ignition and turns the engine over, pointing the wheels out onto Sycamore Avenue.

  “Yeah, I know. I’m supposed to pretend Magda’s dad is not a self-indulgent, raging asshole. I’m never supposed to tell regular people the truth about themselves or the world at large, least of all Ivy League types. I go to school. I know the drill.”

  Danny has made Ruth put her seat belt on, as usual. But she isn’t usually in the front. Everything today is weird, even the fact that it doesn’t feel weird to be riding in the car with just Danny, having a conversation like people. It isn’t like talking to Mrs. O’Sullivan. He doesn’t get her secrets or anything, but it’s comfortable right now. Danny’s car smells good. Could this be what his house smells like, like salt and tobacco and leather? But he lives with two landscapers, who probably don’t smell good at all. Anyway, Danny is never at his own house.

  “So, the guy asked me a straightforward question,” she says. “Why isn’t Magda there? What other answer could I give him? When she’s in mental agony, her own father is the last person she’d go to for sympathy. Them’s the facts, buster. Don’t we have better things to do than worry about Professor Warren’s delicate feelings?”

  “I’m just saying, the guy can’t find his kid ri
ght now.” Danny turns off Harbor Ridge and heads up the hill on Seaview Road, towards the elementary school.

  “Uh, Magda is his kid, Danny. Remember?”

  “Good point too, flowergirl. Just givin’ you the other point of view.”

  On the football field behind the elementary school the sun has begun to burn, but the grass is still wet. They’ve decided to look in a few places where they usually go with Henry, places he might go to hide.

  It’s obvious there’s no one on the field, so they decide to search the scrubby trees that border two sides. On the other side of that is a development full of sixties colonials with dogs and swing sets in the backyards. Without talking about it they start at one end and take up lines five yards apart. There is something acidic moving through Ruth’s veins, the reality of what they’re doing is fueling her, even while she makes small talk with Danny. She feels a little like throwing up, but it’s no effort at all to keep her mind from wandering. Things are clearer than they’ve been in weeks.

  “I’m sorry about your car, Danny.”

  “Why should you be sorry? Shit happens, flowergirl.”

  “No, I just mean, I’m glad you’re okay.”

  Turns out, that’s actually true.

  “Um, Ruth, I like your mom. I’m not gonna do anything mean to her or anything.”

  “Reality check, Danny. Me and you are never going to have this conversation. Stop now or I’ll start screaming. All the dads will come pouring out of these backyards and kick your ass without waiting to check what’s up first.”

  They wouldn’t, of course, but it seems like a credible threat.

  “I’m saying, I get that you’re a little pissed off. That’s just part of it. That’s cool, you know.”

  “Okay, Zen guy. Good for you. Do you realize what it is we’re looking for? I mean if Henry was back here playing or hiding or anything, we’d have seen him by now. There’s only one thing we’ll find by this method. This is not the time to talk about your deeply philosophical attitude to your love life. Show some respect.”