Entangled Moon

by E. C. Frey

  “Let’s hitchhike to Tallon again tomorrow.” Fiona bubbled with the success of the day.

  “No way. I’m tired.”

  “Ah, c’mon, Eve. That went so well and we had so much fun. We have to do it again. Besides, we can’t go back to the Rose Garden. I think it’s pretty obvious we’re no longer welcome.”

  Esperanza found the middle ground. “I agree. Let’s wait, though. We can always hang out at someone’s house.”

  “All right. Whatever. We’ll wait a day,” Fiona said.

  Mariah looked at Fiona as she addressed me. “Don’t worry, Heather. I’ll butter your mother up again. It’ll be fine.”

  “Yeah. I hope so. I’m not sure I want to do this all summer long. I’ll run out of excuses. She’ll start tracking me down at the Rec Center and she’ll flip when she finds out we haven’t been there all summer.”

  Mariah hated the purple that marred my left jaw line and she told me so. It looked dirty. “Don’t worry,” she said. “We won’t make a habit of this.”

  “I get it. Day after tomorrow it is, then.” Fiona swung around toward home, her long golden hair swishing with every step.

  We stared after her. No one dared move.

  Eve was the first to break the spell. “All right. I guess we’re going back day after tomorrow.”

  “I guess so,” Esperanza said.

  Mariah watched her. “I know that girl has something up her sleeve. I just don’t know what it is.”

  “I guess we’ll find out later.” Eve slung her arm over Mariah’s shoulder.

  “Well, I hope it’s not going to get us all in trouble,” Esperanza said.

  “Yeah, but I’m not actually worried about being found out.” Mariah frowned. “I’m worried about her intentions and I’m worried about getting Heather out of her house again.”

  I tried to smile. I turned and shuffled toward my end of the street. Despite my fear, I took the stairs. I couldn’t risk a repeat of climbing the hill. And that’s where I saw him.

  “Hey beautiful. What are you doing?” Sitting outside the house where the angry guy who’d returned from the war lived, he sat hunched over, his elbows resting on his thighs. His blue jeans were tattered, but he exuded something I didn’t understand. His chest was muscular and lean. There was something about him. He was dangerous and vulnerable. He was handsome and terrifying.

  “Nothing. I’m going home.”

  “Why don’t you hang out here for a while? You’re beautiful.” His smile was genuine and sexy.

  “I can’t. I have to go home.”

  “Ah, c’mon. You’re breaking my heart. You’re the most beautiful woman I’ve ever laid eyes on.”

  “Th-th-thank you. But I have to go.”

  I ran.

  That night, he was all I could think about.

  It was supposed to be a trip without any hitches—like the previous one. But then, nothing can ever be replicated. The impermanence of experience has its own immutable laws. It was the kind of day you wish had never happened but know, in the cold light, that nothing, absolutely nothing, can change it. There just simply was no taking it back.

  Fiona’s father had once told us that time slowed in comparison to one’s rate of motion. The faster one moved, the more time slowed, and the more one sat on one’s butt, the faster it flew. A tweak of velocity was all that was needed to make time one’s friend. If we ran like hell, could we make it all go away?

  Our childhoods unraveled swiftly then.

  For Eve, the change had already started. None of us experienced space and time identically. Suffering no more so. If we lived in motion, one girl following the other, our watches would tick a fraction off from each other. That difference was real. It would require a fusion of wills to meet the world we had just unleashed.

  It started with the simple act of sticking out a thumb. But life is that way. Karma doesn’t yield even to the most simple of deeds.

  I woke that morning with a jolt. My mother hovered . . . waiting . . . patiently, coldly, intent and satisfaction a gruesome smear across her lips, which were pressed into a thin line of determination.

  “Mom, what are you doing?”

  “Mariah called. You’re not going anywhere today. I have things I need you to do today.”

  “But everyone’s expecting me. Everything’s already planned.”

  “Do you really think I care what a bunch of teenage girls think?”

  “No, Mom. It’s just I promised them.” My voice cracked and I cringed against the backboard. There was no shelter against the hardness of it.

  “Are you talking back to me?”

  “No. B-b-b-b-ut they’re expecting me.”

  The movement was swift. My cheek stung with the force of the blow.

  After all those years, I still couldn’t anticipate it. Not that knowing would have made it hurt any less, but had it been more predictable, the anticipation might have served to counterfeit the violence. The tears streamed hot down my bruised upon bruised cheeks. I crumpled on the bed, my hand held against my smarting skin, my eyes fixed on my mother.

  “What? Have you lost your tongue?”

  I shook my head. My mother disappeared into the watery landscape. I didn’t have to see her clearly to know she was there. The tears hid nothing.

  “Fine. You’ll call your little group of friends and let them know you won’t be there.”

  My mother turned, left the room, and slammed the door. I buried my head into my pillow and let the tears loose.

  By the time I had dressed and wiped my eyes, the sun sparkled in the California sky. Its beauty was almost sacrilegious, as if all that joy could negate my despair. After all, it was the universe that had given me these circumstances.

  Mother sat at the kitchen table with a list of chores. Wordlessly, she handed it to me. It was the longest list I’d ever seen. The tears flowed anew. Mother pursed her lips and pointed her long, lacquered-nailed finger at the phone.

  I dialed Mariah. She wouldn’t judge and she would know how to handle Fiona.

  “Mariah, it’s Heather. I can’t go out today. I have to stay here.”

  “I had a feeling. I spoke to your mom earlier. Fiona’s here and she wants to talk to you.”

  “No. I can’t.”

  “She’s not taking no for an answer.”

  Fiona’s tone was firm. “You need to get out. You’re not getting out of this. Would it be better if we came over and came up with a story for your mother?”

  “No, I don’t think that would be a good idea.”

  “Let me talk to her.”

  “I don’t think that’ll help. It might make things worse.”

  “Don’t worry. I won’t make it worse. Just let me talk to her.”

  “I think that’s a bad idea.”

  “Just put her on.”

  “She wants to talk to you, Mom.” Sheepishly, I handed the phone to her.

  “Yes.”

  I watched as Mother settled her icy gaze on me. I thought of every room that could be locked and barred. There was no shelter in the house.

  “No, she can’t. She’s needed here.” Her lips disappeared. She clutched the phone so tightly the veins popped along the back of her hand.

  I inched backwards.

  “I told you before, Fiona. She won’t be coming out today!” She slammed the phone down on its receiver.

  Mother’s barely suppressed rage reached deep, her frosty heart turned into an inferno. She walked over to the stove, picked up a frying pan, spun around, and hit me squarely across my torso. The sound of cracking terrified me.

  Doubling over in pain, I heard another crack. The ice burned like fast-moving wildfire across my scalp. Within a moment, I found a black hole. I knew nothing of the rest of that beautiful blue-sky day. That nothingness was what little mercy I knew. It was the fog that concealed the ugliness of my life.

  I’m not that defenseless girl anymore. I can’t let the fog creep back in. Glass crunches as I raise myself
on my elbows.

  “Mommy. I don’t want to get up.”

  “We have to get up, honey. It’s time to go. We need to pack up a few things. Special things. And then we need to leave here.”

  “Why?”

  “We’ll go somewhere fun while someone cleans up the glass.”

  “I don’t want to leave. What about Daddy?”

  “I’m sorry, sweetie.” I stroke her hair, though I know it won’t take away the pain. “We need to leave Daddy alone. He is very angry right now. We need to leave before he gets more angry.”

  Shannon whimpers.

  “I’m sorry, baby. We’ll go see Aunt Mariah, Eve, Espy, and Fiona. We’ll have so much fun. C’mon, baby. Let’s get your best toys.” I tug her up and she melts into my arms.

  It’s time to leave now. I was alone the first time someone tried to kill me. I was amongst strangers the second. This time, the third, I’m with Shannon. Third time is the charm. Third time is the last. I will be my daughter’s shelter. She is all I have left.

  There is shelter in acting, in being someone else’s. That is what my friends have been trying to tell me for years. I just couldn’t see it. Letting things happen is the worst sort of action. There is no protection or salvation in hiding. Someone always finds you. It’s time to stand up and move.

  16 Fiona

  Sunday dawns cold and somber. Large gray clouds roll tersely across LA. The air has the distinction of being named after the baby Jesus, El Niño. But rain in Southern California is a mixed blessing. There is no gentle terrain to soak up the drops; torrents of water wash through gullies and canyons and fill concrete-encased rivers. Water, cool and benevolent in glistening turquoise swimming pools, lays bare the illusion that constitutes Los Angeles. The city is a brilliantly engineered lie that morphs the arid environment into an oasis from appropriated water.

  The image of undulating and morphing glass stares back at me through the mirror-lined wall. I shimmy in the water-like illusion. Or is it my tears? Maybe the wind and rain are causing the mirror to shake, or maybe I have been looking too long and my eyes are betraying me. It’s like the beginning of the year that forged our friendship into an unbreakable bond. By the end of that 365-day stretch, the world in which we lived had shifted. 1968. January began with a minor earthquake that warranted a fleeting comment on the radio station—a recalling of the epicenter, those affected, and what it registered on the Richter scale. The announcer stated a few windows were rattled, but barely noticed by anyone, the quake helped get the new year off to a rocking-n-rolling start as The Doors’ “Light My Fire” blasted through KFRC’s airwaves.

  Living along “The Ring of Fire” is consumptive, but fire suits me. My favorite book when I was a kid, dog-eared and stained, brimmed with images of bubbling viscous lava and incendiary blasts. Fire under my feet. Becoming knowledgeable did little to close the gap between knowing and understanding. But that breach was closed the day I witnessed the wreckage at my feet—my prized antique perfume bottles lying at the base of my dresser, all broken. The world continued as if nothing of note had happened, even as I stood amongst the ruin of my favorite possessions. That was when I understood. It would not be an ordinary year. But by the end of the year, I knew the world could move on even when mine couldn’t. Rocks break into fragments. The whole is changed. But the pieces continue on.

  Daddy once explained to me that tectonics push the land upward to create steep-walled canyons, but gravity brings it down again. Water can make or break the fantasy. Rock, young, vulnerable, and too weak to support the steep slopes it creates, invariably collapses and brings down the mudslides that dispel any illusion of indestructibility. The sin is in the perception. No matter how many times the mountain comes down, people build new houses to cling to its sides. Optimism on steroids.

  I snort into the covers. Sort of like my face.

  Last night’s party was a disaster, a magnitude ten. I stare at my reflection in the mirrored closet that banks my side of the bedroom— half moons of despair shadow my eyes. Those same mirrors used to mimic the act of love I shared with Gavin. Watching me heightened his desire. That was a long time ago—another universe, really. Now the lines of my life are etched out in every gully of my face—lines my husband, who is trained to see every imperfection, has sworn do not exist. He has become more reluctant to tweak my flaws, less and less interested in me. The knowledge stares back through the looking glass.

  Sam shut herself in her room last night and threw things against the wall. The thud of every piece resounded below, where our guests mingled uncomfortably. I ordered another cosmopolitan and then another. I contrived to act as though nothing was wrong, but my demeanor couldn’t hide the truth any more than the walls could hide the violence being done to them. Eventually, the party dispersed. I tripped over my gown on the way to say good-bye to our guests.

  Gavin gave me a disgusted look, and his parting shot was something to the effect that I could no more control my daughter than I could control myself. Turning, he dismissively closed the door to his den.

  Small and alone, I sink into our giant bed. I created this crumbling perfect life. I cannot stop my life from cracking wide open any more than I can stop the earth from shifting. When did everything start to fall apart?

  Of course, I know. It overshadows the smallness of everything around me. The guilt of it tingles deep inside and spreads to the outer limits. Tiny red bumps rise along the seams and contours of my body. Hives! God, I haven’t had them in years. Tiny little busy bees of torment ripple along the surface, and in a fit of salvation from the sensation, I throw off the covers and claw at my skin. I shout from the top of the staircase, praying Abella will hear me.

  “Abella!”

  “Yes, Mrs. McDermott.”

  “I need a box of baking soda.”

  “Ay, mija! What’s wrong?”

  “I’ve got the hives, Abella. I don’t know where they came from.”

  “That doesn’t look so good, Mrs. McDermott. Has Dr. McDermott seen it?”

  “No!”

  “Oh! I’m sorry Mrs. McDermott. I’ll bring up baking soda right away.”

  Abella leaves me clinging to the balustrade. I climb these stairs daily, but from this angle they appear unassailable. From the first step to the last, I cannot count my mounting troubles.

  I’m mad at Gavin. There’s one thing I know. Once the mantle of fury is blown, there’s no way to hold back its course. I watched the same volcanic process in my own parents’ marriage. With every eruption, every toxic word spat in rage, every moment of irreconcilable hurt, a crack deepened until eventually all that was left was a wide chasm of cooled lava. That my parents are still together, sharing separate lives, is a testament to the resigned capitulation of their generation. They remind me of Sean’s wind-up robots who, upon spinning and facing each other, think better of sparring with each other and spin back around to do it with someone else. I ran from that life. I wanted no part of it. In running away, I came home.

  Abella reappears at the bottom of the stairway and makes her way to me. Within her deep brown eyes, I see compassion and love. I am not deserving of either. She hands me the box.

  “Are you all right, Mrs. McDermott? I could stay here while you rest today. I can go to Mass later. I could take the kids out to breakfast.”

  “No, that’s all right, Abella. Everything is fine. I just need to soak in a cool tub. It’s an allergic reaction. That’s all. I haven’t had one since I was a child.”

  “Allergic reaction to what?”

  “I’m not sure. Maybe it’s a sensitivity to something I ate at the party last night.” The words are hollow. Maybe it’s Gavin, for whom I am the perfect prized wife? Or was the perfect prized wife? Or is it Sam? I knew the day would come when she would disentangle her identity from mine. I imagined I would help give her wings to fly. Idiot. I didn’t see this coming. Gavin cannot nip or tuck the untidy pieces of our imperfect marriage or the illusion of our fast-disintegrating per
fect world. Everyone has witnessed the myth of it. No! I have fared no better than my own mother. It’s morning and I’m too weary to face the day. “I’m sorry, Abella. Don’t mind me. You need the rest of your day off. We’ll be fine.”

  “Okay, but I wouldn’t mind staying if it would help you.”

  “Thank you, but you do more than enough to help us. Now it’s time to rest.”

  “But it pleases me to be here, Mrs. McDermott. You’re my only family and it makes me muy sad to see everyone so sad. Everyone is jumbled against each other.” She wrings her hands through her apron and her face twists with anxiety.

  Abella. I know some of her story, but I have never completed the picture. It is more comfortable not knowing. Another one of my transgressions. She traveled with her husband from Ecuador on a work visa and they stayed in the US on green cards. Happy and planning a family, they worked hard. But a stray bullet killed that dream. Her husband’s murderer was never found and Abella buried him without justice. She contemplated returning to Ecuador but it didn’t seem right. Their dream was all she had left. She answered my ad for a family assistant, and when she arrived ten years ago, she somehow fit seamlessly into our busy lives. She has been one of us for so long that she is, I realize, one more person for whom I feel responsible; the guilt of my only just having recognized this spreads thickly through my now itchy iron appendages.

  On my way to the bathroom, I grab a large bottle of vodka from my closet. The walls are frosted with mirrors and I close my eyes to their ice. I draw the cool water and pour the contents of the baking soda box into the tub. When the tub is full, I disrobe and gently lower my body into the water. The biting cold of it pricks at my raging skin.