Tell Me Lies

by Carola Lovering

  The car slowed with the snarl of Hamptons weekend traffic. Stephen glanced over at me.

  “Don’t be nervous. Are you nervous?” He turned down a Cranberries song that was playing on the radio.

  I wondered if Hickory had died yet. The thought haunted me.

  I shook my head. “I like this song.” I turned the volume back up.

  What’s in your head? In your heaaad. Zombie, zombie, zombie.

  “Ugh, I can’t stand it.” He changed the station. “Luce?”

  “What?”

  “What’s bugging you?”

  “Nothing,” I lied. “I’m not nervous. I’ve met some of your family before.”

  “I know, but this is the whole rowdy group. Well, minus my mom, but she doesn’t count. Anyway, I know it’s a lot.” He squeezed my hand.

  Since the day Stephen showed up at my door with the bok choy and wine, I’d reached a new level of happiness. It was the feeling I had known that only he could give me—the feeling I’d chased for years.

  I wasn’t upset about the really bad stuff. When I thought of Diana Bunn and Nicole Hart and the Unforgivable Thing and Dr. Wattenbarger and the Prozac and Billy Boyd and Marilyn’s jewelry and fighting with Jackie, I understood that all of it was the means to this. I wouldn’t have done anything differently.

  We finally reached Westhampton, which according to Helen and Lydia was “by far the tackiest Hampton.” And while my high school self might’ve once agreed with them, I was far removed from that seventeen-year-old girl, and I thought Westhampton was nice, and that Stephen’s grandfather’s gray-shingled beach house was charming and close to perfect.

  “Remember this place, Luce? We came here that summer. We had sex on the beach off Dune Road. And in the outdoor shower.” Stephen’s eyes widened. “Think of all the places we’ve had sex.” His cheeks and nose were sun-kissed, and his dark hair splayed unevenly over his forehead, salty and dry from the ocean. I’d never been so attracted to anyone.

  “There are some strange ones.” I nodded. For some reason I couldn’t bring myself to tell Stephen about Hickory. I pictured her old, slouched face and knew I was going to be sick.

  “That’s because I can’t be around you and not fuck you.” He leaned over the middle console and gave me a kiss. Through the trees, dusk gathered in the sky, a wash of pale pink. “Come on. Let’s go inside.”

  I remembered the house. The kitchen was simple, with sanded wood floors and awning windows overlooking the small backyard. Mr. DeMarco and a man I’d never met were emptying the dishwasher.

  “Dad, you know Lucy.” Stephen touched his father’s shoulder. “And this is my uncle Daniel. Daniel, this is my girlfriend, Lucy.”

  “A new girlfriend?” Daniel wiped his hands on a dish towel and seemed to realize he’d said the wrong thing. My stomach clenched.

  “It’s hard to keep track, I know.” Sadie, Stephen’s younger sister, appeared in the doorway.

  “Cut it out.” Stephen pinned Sadie a look.

  “Kidding.” Sadie rolled her eyes before walking over and giving me a half hug. “Hey, Lucy.”

  Stephen introduced me to his grandfather, his aunt Amy, and his cousins, Vivian and Christina. Vivian, who I took to be a few years older, held an adorable baby boy wrapped in a beach towel.

  “Cody!” Stephen gushed, grabbing the baby out of Vivian’s arms and turning toward me. “Cody just turned six months.”

  I rubbed Cody’s tiny cheek and he reached for a wad of my hair.

  “Okay, bud.” Vivian laughed and snatched Cody back from Stephen. “Time for your bath. Sorry, he loves hair right now,” she said to me.

  “It’s totally fine. He’s adorable.”

  “I’ll take him, Viv,” said a tall man with cider-brown hair who appeared behind Vivian. Stephen introduced me to Vivian’s husband, Rod.

  “There’s liquor and beer out back,” said Daniel. “Help yourselves.”

  “Sorry about Sadie,” Stephen whispered in my ear when we’d gone outside. “It’s not you.”

  “Seems like it’s sort of me.” I watched him fill two glasses with ice.

  “No.” Stephen sighed. “She just thinks I’m a jerk for dumping Alice. And she knows I cheated on her. With you.”

  “What? Sadie knows about that night in Bear Mountain? At Jared’s house? In that bedroom?”

  “No—God no. Sadie was comatose in that bedroom. She doesn’t know the full . . . extent. She saw us kissing earlier in the night, at the concert. But that’s it.” He handed me a cold drink, full to the brim. “Vodka tonic on the rocks with a twist, miss.”

  “Great. So your sister thinks I’m an adulterous whore.”

  “No. She thinks I was an asshole. But it doesn’t matter what Sadie thinks, anyway. She doesn’t understand how I felt about Alice, or how I feel about you.” His green gaze pinned me. “She’s only seventeen. She doesn’t get it.”

  I shrugged. “I feel weird. Did you bring Alice out here this summer? Before you broke up? Is that why your uncle said that?”

  “Not this summer.” Stephen paused. “The last time I brought her out here was in May, I guess. It was before you even graduated.”

  “Oh.” I sipped the top of my drink.

  “Please don’t feel weird, Luce. Daniel knows all about you. He’s not judging you. Nobody is.”

  “Okay.”

  “Come on.” He took my hand. “Let’s help Amy set the table.”

  Dinner was served on a long table in the backyard—pasta with fresh clams, arugula salad, and garlic bread. Stephen kept his hand on my thigh underneath the table.

  “I can tell my family loves you,” Stephen whispered at some point. “And so do I.”

  “I love you so much.”

  “After everyone goes to bed I’m gonna fuck you in the outdoor shower.” His voice was hushed in my ear. “Round two.”

  He poured me more wine. His eyes were heavy and mollified. Even in my tipsy stupor I could sense the alcohol cloaking the creeping anxiety surrounding the fact that it was not possible for things to get any better—the vaguely unsettling helplessness of needing nothing.

  I knew Hickory was dead by now, but it was okay because she was no longer suffering. She was in heaven. She would have been sixteen on the sixteenth of September, her golden birthday, I realized as Stephen slid a plate of blueberry pie in front of me, vanilla ice cream melting into the warm wedge. And then I realized with a start that the date was August 16, that Hickory had lived to be exactly fifteen years and eleven months.

  August 16 was the date of Macy’s death, too. The night I saw her and the night she died. I’ll never forget it.

  44

  STEPHEN

  OCTOBER 2014

  I got the call at three on a Tuesday morning. I was having the same vivid dream again. In the dream, which is partly a dream within a dream, her long red hair is wrapped around my throat, choking me, the sickening bubble gum smell saturates my nostrils and Zombie zombie zombie won’t stop playing and I can’t get free, and then I wake up and the doorbell’s ringing and the police are there, always two of them, red-and-blue lights blinding my eyes. One of them asks: Where were you the night of August 16, 2008?

  I woke up in a full sweat to my phone’s Für Elise ringtone. I keep the ringer on through the night—always have, always will. You never know.

  When I answered it was my father’s voice on the other end of the line.

  “It’s your mother,” he said, his voice panicked. “She’s been injured.”

  “Injured how?” I pretended to care, but my mother’s well-being had long ceased to interest me.

  “She just got out of surgery. Can you come meet us at Mount Sinai? Everyone’s coming. I just got off the phone with Luke. And Amy and Daniel are driving in.”

  “Right now? What happened to Mom?”

  “She was . . . she got into some trouble. She was attacked in Port Jefferson. She was stabbed.” My father’s voice was nearly shaking.

&nb
sp; “Stabbed? Jeez. By who?”

  “They don’t know, Stephen.” My father sounded rattled beyond reason. “Her friend Pauline—you remember Pauline—found her all beat up and bleeding near the waterfront, right behind her house. She called the cops, then called me. They don’t know what happened, but Pauline thinks your mother owed some people some money.”

  I’m sure she did, Pops. Just like she owes you money. Just like she owes Uncle Daniel money. Unfortunately most people don’t tolerate evasion, and assault is cheaper than litigation. And no, I do not remember Pauline.

  “Yikes,” I said. “Sounds like some sketchy business.”

  “This is serious, Stephen. Your mother is unconscious.”

  “What do you mean? Like in a coma?”

  “Not exactly. She’s stable, thank God. They performed emergency surgery and the doctors said she got extremely lucky that the knife didn’t slice any major arteries. But she’s got broken ribs and a fair amount of internal bleeding. They don’t know when she’ll wake up—it’s too soon to tell. It could be a couple of days. Christ, Stephen. Whoever did this to your mother . . . the shape she’s in, I barely recognize her. I feel like I’m in a living nightmare. Please get to the hospital immediately.”

  “Dad, listen, I can be there at eleven thirty tomorrow morning but I have an exam at nine. It’ll take me two hours and then I’ll head up there. It’s really important. Can’t miss.”

  “Are you kidding, Stephen? Your mother is in the hospital. She needs us.”

  “Dad, she’s not even conscious. You just said she’s not going to be conscious for a couple of days.”

  “Maybe a couple of days, the doctors said.” My father was practically yelling now. “They don’t know for sure. She could wake up at any time. And when she does she’s going to be terrified and in pain.”

  I closed my eyes and momentarily debated powering off my phone and slipping back into a deep slumber. It was no use trying to reason with my father. Why he wanted to be there for his psychotic, freeloading maniac of an ex-wife who hadn’t given him the time of day since 1988 was truly beyond me. But it didn’t matter. Going to the hospital was my only choice; if I didn’t, I’d be deemed the heartless brother and son.

  “All right, Dad,” I said. “I’ll be there in half an hour.”

  I hung up the phone and switched on the bedside lamp, light piercing my tired eyes. I scanned the floor for some clothes to put on.

  I was still shaken from my dream as I gathered my stuff and left my apartment in the dark. The place was a dump in Chinatown that I shared with a random classmate from NYU, but it was cheap and a quick subway ride to school. I didn’t spend a lot of time there anyway, between my classes and workload and staying at Lucy’s.

  I rode the subway uptown, even though it was late and a cab would’ve been faster. I felt like going underground, for some reason. And I can’t afford cabs.

  Forty-five minutes later I arrived at Mount Sinai. A fat nurse directed me to the fifteenth floor. Why are nurses always fat? It couldn’t be more ironic.

  Room 1521 was at the end of the hallway. My mother, Nora DeMarco, lay unconscious in the hospital bed. She looked very small and shriveled under all the bandages wrapping her torso and arms. A dark purple bruise covered one of her eyes and there were smaller bruises and lacerations around her face. An IV was plugged into her left inner arm below some bandaging. My father and Luke and Kathleen sat in plastic chairs around the bed. Sadie wasn’t there because she was a plane ride away at school—lucky bitch—and Amy and Daniel were still en route from Long Island. Kathleen wore an extremely low-cut top that was certainly not spontaneous-middle-of-the-night-trip-to-the-hospital appropriate, but knowing Kathleen she was probably trying to seduce all of the attractive male doctors.

  The room possessed the stuffy hospital smell of cleaning chemicals and sick sweat. In the corner, several flower arrangements sat on a wooden table, which baffled me. You’d have thought my mother had been holed up in this shithole for months instead of less than twelve hours.

  Was this some twisted joke? I would’ve laughed out loud if I weren’t so exhausted. There weren’t any free chairs, so I slumped onto the windowsill. I glanced out the window down to the street and got that pinched, tingling ache in my toes signaling acrophobia. Fifteen stories below the cars were tiny blurred lights moving leisurely down Fifth Avenue. The city, truly, never slept.

  My father’s eyes were red around the rims, fixed on my unmoving mother. I glanced at my watch, which read 4:11 a.m. My exam would start in fewer than five hours.

  “She’s going to be okay, right?” Luke was staring at my mother, his face pallid.

  “That’s what the doctors say.” My father gave a pained smile. “They’re running more tests. They’ll be back with an update soon.”

  I studied the battered woman lying on the bed and almost couldn’t believe it was my mother. We shared the same green eyes, but hers were firmly closed. Her straight dark hair was shorter than I remembered, and streaked with strands of silver. She’d always been a small woman, but she looked even smaller now; her body had begun to collapse in on itself, like old paper that starts to curl.

  Muffled into Luke’s shoulder, Kathleen began to cry. She said all of this reminded her of her grandmother’s battle with breast cancer when she was sixteen. How breast cancer and getting stabbed in the chest were related I did not know, but my family dutifully consoled her.

  Amy and Daniel arrived at five, out of breath.

  “We’re parked illegally but we had to see her,” Amy panted, rushing over to the bed where her ex-sister-in-law lay unmoving. “Oh, Nora. Who would do this to her?”

  Nora was still in a deep sleep three tedious hours later when a young, good-looking doctor came to deliver an update. He introduced himself as Dr. Everett, and Kathleen stuck out her chest and batted her eyelashes. Dr. Everett sounded as bored as I felt as he explained the ins and outs of the surgery they’d performed, a procedure called a thoracotomy. He said the surgery had been successful, but that my mother had lost a lot of blood and would require several more transfusions.

  “So she’s going to be fine?” Luke asked.

  “It’s going to be a long recovery, but yes, she will be fine.”

  Everyone exhaled relief.

  “And you’re in touch with the police, Mr. DeMarco?”

  “Yes,” my father said. “But I want to wait for Nora to wake up before dealing with any of that.”

  Dr. Everett nodded. “I want to emphasize how lucky Nora is to be able to make a full recovery from this accident. Of course she’s the victim here, but I do see in her chart that she’s bipolar one, prescribed lithium. However, there’s no trace of lithium in her blood, which leads me to believe she hasn’t been taking her medication. I don’t know if this circumstance has any bearing on what happened to her tonight, but regardless, I strongly advise that Nora take her medication regularly.”

  My father explained that my mother had been averse to her prescribed treatment for a number of years.

  “I suggest you speak with a counselor here at the hospital, then,” Dr. Everett replied flatly. “They can best advise you on ways to approach the subject with your wife.”

  “Ex-wife.” My father’s face had turned as white as the bandages glued to my mother’s torso.

  “Right, yes.” Dr. Everett shifted uncomfortably before excusing himself and promising to return soon.

  The clock on the wall read 7:50. I told my family that I had to go back downtown for my exam.

  “You’ll come back after, though?” my father asked, though it wasn’t a question.

  Luke jogged down the corridor while I waited for the elevator.

  “Stephen,” he called. “Wait.”

  “Hey, Luke.”

  He stopped in front of me, his expression weary but self-assured. Luke the firstborn. Luke the caretaker. Pure of heart, Aunt Amy liked to say of him.

  “Mom is still family,” Luke said. “That’s why
we’re all here. I can tell you think all of this is stupid, but we can’t just give up on her.” He blinked.

  Luke’s self-righteousness had always been grating, but was even worse now that he wore a wedding ring. Luke the superhusband. Luke the family man. The epitome of convention.

  A ding sounded the elevator’s arrival. I shrugged at Luke and walked inside, the metallic doors clipping closed behind me. I didn’t feel like giving my brother the satisfaction of agreeing with him, especially when I didn’t agree with him at all.

  It was a relief to leave the airless hospital. Outside, the sidewalk sparkled, early-morning sunlight catching bits of silver mica buried in the concrete. Papery red-and-golden leaves hung loosely from the branches of the trees lining Fifth Avenue.

  I crossed three blocks over to Lexington. There was a problem with the downtown 6 train, so I walked down to Eighty-Sixth Street to catch the 4/5. There wasn’t time to go home and sleep before the exam; I’d have to go straight to NYU.

  On Lex, shopkeepers were beginning to open up for the day, the iron-chained gates lifting from the storefronts. The smell of smoke from a hot dog vendor on the corner filled my nostrils. I bought one with relish and mustard and ate it as I walked.

  I got on the express train at Eighty-Sixth. The subway was so crowded you couldn’t move, and the kid next to me was chewing gum and blowing big pink bubbles right in my face. It was undoubtedly Bubblicious, the smell was just too strong, and I’d know that scent from a mile away. I could taste it. It took me right back to the night of August 16, 2008, and there I was, in the car, in the driver’s seat, plastered, broken glass everywhere but not a scratch on my body. Not a scratch. How was it possible?

  I couldn’t stand the sweet, juicy aroma a second longer. I got off at Fifty-Ninth Street and pushed past people on the escalator until I made it up, out of the underground, back into the light.

  August 16, 2008, was the last night I ever spent with Macy Petersen. Beautiful Macy, with her deep, shiny red hair, a striking contrast against her porcelain skin.