Have You Met Nora?

by Nicole Blades

  Nora cut her eyes at her friend and the hairs at the back of her neck stood tall as she spat the words out. “My mother. My mother raised me.”

  “Oh, Jesus. Nora, I’m . . . I didn’t mean it like,” Jenna stuttered. “It’s just a thing you say and I didn’t mean to say it like that. It came out wrong. That was stupid, and I’m sorry.” She pushed through the water, moving over toward Nora, who sat motionless, glaring back at her. “Hon, I’m so sorry.” She continued on her pool path to Nora and opened herself up, prepping for a hug as she got closer.

  No.

  Nora threw her arms out, sweeping them in front of her in a block and shaking her head hard. “No!” she said again, this time out loud and with the force of a strike. But Jenna kept coming, making Nora back up with each of her sure steps.

  “Hold on.” Jenna exposed her palms to Nora and slowed her forward movement. “Honey, I know. I know. Believe me, I know how much you miss her right now. This is the happiest time in your entire life and your mother, she’s not here, and it fucking sucks. Cancer fucking sucks. It hurts. I know.” She inched over to Nora. “Your mom, she’s not here, but you can’t push away your support that is, you know? All of us—Fisher, the Beaumonts, Oli, me—we are standing with you, because we love you. We can’t help ourselves.” She smiled. It was weak and thin, but Nora saw it. “We love you; we’re here, behind you. And if we have to carry you down the aisle on our shoulders to make sure you are standing next to Fisher telling the world ‘I do,’ that’s what will happen. That’s where you belong, Nora. You deserve to be standing there with him. We all believe that. You need to start believing it, too.” Jenna reached out and pulled Nora into a tight grasp. “The truth is the truth, hon. Accept it.”

  Every measure of Nora’s being started folding in on itself. She knew that she couldn’t keep the spigot locked tight any longer, and so she let go, burying her face in Jenna’s naked shoulder and weeping.

  “This is what you needed. Let it all fall into this pool, hon,” Jenna said, cradling the back of Nora’s head in her hand. “And leave it here. Let these ridiculous oxygen-intensified waters handle it.”

  Nora gave her a half nod between sobs.

  “And, look, I apologize about the thing I said before . . . I’m sorry. I put my fucking foot in my mouth—again. What else is new, right? But don’t give another thought to it. This is your time to be happy. Focus on that.”

  Nora pulled away and leaned back on the pool’s smooth wall, wiping her wet face with her wet hands. “I’m . . . I’m such a mess,” she said, trying to regulate her staccato breathing. “I’m sorry.”

  “No, don’t be sorry. Nothing for you to be sorry about. Just be happy.”

  Nora stared off at the cluster of soft bubbles floating in the farthest corner. She shook her head and said simply: “She won’t let me.”

  “Honey, who won’t let you?”

  Nora wanted to look over at her friend and call out the bogeyman, say her name into the quiet and let it reverberate through the secluded room. But it would do nothing to make her troubles disappear. Dawn would still be there, ready to strike the match, whether Nora spoke her name or not.

  She chose not, and instead splashed more water on her face.

  “What has you so tortured, Nora?”

  The question only brought back the tears, knitting her brows together again. Jenna swooped in and sat close.

  “No, no. Forget it,” Jenna said, holding her hands up and waving them in front of Nora. “It doesn’t matter who or what. Honestly, none of it matters. Whatever it is, let it fall away into this here pool. No more tears, okay? You’re at the spa, darlin’. There’s no crying at the spa,” she said, tacking a chuckle on at the end. “That’s a Kardashian rule, goddammit!”

  Nora wiped her stinging eyes. “They do set the rules, that group.” Her voice was gravelly and she could feel the snot from her nose about to tap the edge of her lip, but she smiled anyway.

  “Exactly. The Kardashians just know shit. Praise hands.” Jenna started moving quickly toward the steps in the shallow pool. “Gotta motor. My massage starts, like, now. You’re going in for the body scrub with Charlotte, who is divine. I think we meet up for the pedicures.” She grabbed a fresh towel and draped it over her shoulders. “But first, I need to check to see if the new pod episode is available.” She rolled her eyes. “Slay is my dealer. I need to get my hit. Facts, y’all. See you later.” Jenna took a few steps over to the pool again. “You good?”

  “I will be,” Nora said, smiling up at her. “Jenna . . . thank you.”

  “Of course,” she said.

  “You’re a good friend.”

  A strong blush took over Jenna’s face and she pulled the end of the towel from around her neck to cover it. “No! Don’t you dare. Don’t start that!” she yelled, as if Nora’s warmth might melt her. “I’ve got to keep my head in the game for the poison, murder, and subterfuge.” She turned and trotted out of the steamy room, giggling.

  Without her friend’s shoulder and kindness to buoy up the heft of her real problems, Nora let her body sink to the bottom of the heated pool. She held her breath, opened her eyes, and forced herself to stay submerged and not float back up to the top. She needed to stay under so the special, infused waters could seep into her brain and instill it with something potent, something worthwhile and convenient that she could use to permanently shake this pall from her bright, right life.

  Dawn was the stain that won’t leave. And Nora’s hands were raw from all of the scrubbing.

  The throbbing in her head got louder as her lungs began to sting.

  Don’t exhale.

  Stay under.

  This would be easy, Nora thought, and closed her eyes against the pain building in her chest, fighting the urge to exhale and fill her straining lungs with clean air. But then her heart broke through. She didn’t want to give in. Not like this.

  Nora’s eyes shot open. She wanted life—her life with Fisher and Jenna and all the good things lined up for her taking. She pulled herself to the top of the pool, gasping and gagging, and rested there, hanging off the ledge of it, catching a new breath.

  This was not the way.

  She hurried out of the water, a fresh plan sprouting in her gut. She had barely wrapped the towel around herself properly before she was pushing the swing door open hard. Nora needed to get to her phone this minute. She needed to find a way to contact Dawn one more time. No skits, no lines, no calculations, and definitely no money. Nora was going to try a different route with Dawn, one that was direct and honest.

  As she rounded the corner, bounding toward the changing rooms, Nora ran right into a tall brunette dressed all in black and soft-heeled shoes.

  “Hi. You must be Nora,” the woman said. “I’m Charlotte, your body treatment specialist.”

  Nora stood still for a moment, taking the woman in, noticing everything about her from the sleepy sound of her voice to the way she held the clipboard lightly trapped in arms loosely crossed over her chest. Her eyes softened and she smiled warmly.

  “Looks like you were really enjoying the vitality pool?” She sent a smooth, but obvious glance over to the wall clock. “I’m sure you’re ready to move on to the next level of your care here at Mandarin Spa today.” Charlotte didn’t wait for Nora to respond, and gestured to one of the wet rooms near where they stood. “After you,” she said, and pointed more explicitly to the room.

  “I’m sorry, but I think I need to cancel all of this,” Nora said matter-of-factly.

  Charlotte tilted her head and looked as puzzled as a new puppy. “Excuse me? I . . . I don’t think we can do that.”

  Nora shook her head and started again. “Right. Well, at least let me take a quick break. This is an emergency.” It was Nora’s turn not to wait for a response as she skirted the woman and darted to the adjacent door for the changing rooms.

  And it really was an emergency for Nora. She was about to save a life. Hers.

  CHAPTER 17r />
  Contacting Dawn turned out to be the easy part. Nora had to climb back down into the pit of red herrings and hacking to get a coded message out to her, all without letting Mateo on to anything. But it worked and here she was at the Bean House Café again sitting at their special table, waiting for Dawn to show.

  The barista Gillian seemed to have just arrived for her shift and gave Nora an enthusiastic wave from far behind the shiny espresso machine. Nora put in her same order with a different server: a Good Morning Blondie in a large mug for Dawn and hot water with lemon in a to-go cup for herself.

  “Actually,” she said as the young woman tapped on the iPad, “can I change that?”

  “Sure, I guess,” the woman said. She already looked too through with the day and it wasn’t yet ten o’clock. Nora smiled at her anyway. “What do you want to change?”

  “Instead of the hot water and lemon, I’ll have the mint verbena tea, please. And in a mug instead of a to-go cup, if you can.”

  “So, you basically want to add a teabag to the cup.”

  “Well”—Nora gnashed her teeth but kept the smile activated—“I guess that’s right.” She wanted to tell the girl where to get off, as her mother would say, but kept her focus on what mattered: Dawn would soon be there and she was likely bringing with her a second chance for Nora. “Thanks”—she looked at the server’s name tag—“Hannah.” Nora lingered. “Did I say that right, Hannah?”

  “Um, yeah, sure.”

  “Sorry . . . I just like to get people’s names right. It’s important, what we call things, you know?”

  Hannah had bottomed out on caring and pushed out a tight, uncomfortable grin that looked more like a wince. “A mint tea to go and a Blondie in a mug. That’s all, right?” Nora didn’t bother correcting her on the to-go part of the order and nodded. “Great. That brings your total to seven—”

  “Here,” Nora said, thrusting the crisp bill at her. “Keep the change. We’ll be over there.” She turned sharply and started over to the table. A limp “thanks” floated out and hit Nora’s back when she was halfway there. She didn’t bother to respond and sat, relaxed, looking at the door. Her mind was clear and her nerves were beginning to steady out. For this meeting, Nora decided to forgo a plan or scheme. She was simply going to speak from the heart and hope, against everything, that Dawn would choose to hear her.

  But the minute Dawn blew through the door, Nora sensed that something was off. There was no carbon copy outfit, no smirk, no easiness about her at all this time. She wore black slim jeans and two dark tanks loose and layered on top of each other. Her arms were very toned; Nora could see each muscle carved out. And her normally twisted, curly hair was pulled up into a tight topknot. Dawn marched over, her glare burning a hole in Nora’s forehead. When she reached the table, she stood behind her pushed-in chair—flinty, stiff, and peering down at Nora.

  Trying to read Dawn was like flipping through a blank notebook.

  Nora took her in, standing there taut and sinewy like a dancer waiting for the orchestra to begin playing. And for the first time, she noticed the tattoos. One ran the length of Dawn’s forearm. It was severe and striking and not at all simple: a tall jet-black tree with bare, rawboned branches that reached out to tickle her wrist and at its base, thick, tangled roots that appeared to vanish into the bend of her arm. The other tattoo sat on the left side of her chest just above her heart. It was a word, one word and period after it—restore.—all lowercase, but large enough to be imposing and inked in the blackest black.

  Nora figured she should start; say something to at least bump the nose of her boat against the giant iceberg wedged between them. “Hey. Thanks for coming to meet me,” she said, and gestured with a quick hand toward the chair in front of Dawn. No response, not even a blink. “I ordered you a latte, if that’s okay.”

  Dawn narrowed her eyes at her.

  Hannah came by balancing a tray with their order on her hand. “Hey. Here’s your stuff,” she said, sounding out of breath and hurried. She looked at Nora, then Dawn, and back to Nora. “Who’s getting the Blondie?”

  After too long of a pause, Nora began to stutter out a reply, but Hannah had already made the decision and placed the mug by Dawn, who was still standing, and placed Nora’s tea near her side of the table and left without another word.

  The silence brewed further until Nora sliced into it. “Okay, I give,” Nora said, forcing a mellow chuckle. “Why are you just standing there? What’s wrong?”

  Dawn sighed and arched her back, then peeled off her small cross-body bag and took a seat. She leaned over the mug on the table and started blowing the steam off of her coffee, looking around the café as if she were seated alone and content enough to people-watch.

  Nora rolled her eyes. “Do I have to guess or something? Why don’t you just say what happened?”

  Dawn’s eyes shifted back to Nora like freshly calibrated lasers. “What happened is, you lied. Again,” she said, firmly. “Like I should expect anything different.”

  “I didn’t lie . . . what are you—I didn’t lie to you.”

  “Do you think I’m an idiot?”

  “Dawn, no, I—”

  “Stop,” she said, raising her palm. “The answer is, yes, you do think I’m an idiot. You think you have me figured out. And that will always be your problem.” Dawn’s voice was as sharp and stinging as her stare.

  “I don’t think any of that. Just . . . calm down.”

  “What?” Dawn pushed back in her chair so hard it jutted out of place, scraping the floor. “Don’t tell me to calm down. See? You’ve been playing this part for so long, you even sound like them. ’Bout calm down. The fuck outta here with that.”

  “All right, all right. I didn’t mean it like that,” Nora said, minding her tone and volume. Her heart was already beating faster. “Look, Dawn, I’m trying to understand what you’re talking about. That’s all. You’re throwing out all this shit at me about lying and thinking you’re stupid or whatever, and that’s not what’s going on. Like, at all.”

  “This one, this is all me.” She thumped at her chest with her two fingers—dud dud. “I should’ve known. You, you’re just doing what you do: lie. But I sat here, listening to your story, and I felt for you. I really did. That kind of shit, no one deserves that. But there was something in what you were saying that didn’t curl all the way over. And I couldn’t pretend like it didn’t have no stench. It was like, Bitch, why are you lying—still ? And about this? Yo, that is so fucked up.”

  “Dawn, I told you the truth. I’ve never told anyone everything that happened, but I told you. I told you what happened.”

  “For fuck’s sake, enough already, Nora. Just stop. I checked on it. I looked into your people, all right? The Bourdains.”

  Nora held her breath and kept her face even—no twitch of the brow or lip—and held Dawn’s angry glare.

  “I know that old dude died a few weeks ago. Heart surgeon falls over from a heart attack—yeah, I know all about it. And his wife, Elise. I know about her, too. Blond. Thin. Glamour and style down to her toenails. Kind of like you, how you modeled yourself. She’s what you’re supposed to be, right? Just like her, your adoptive mother.” The smirk returned. “You left that part out, of course.”

  “No, it’s not like that. Just, wait, let me explain,” Nora said, her voice cracking and pleading.

  “Explain what, exactly? How this white woman, your so-called mom who died of cancer, is actually all the way alive and kicking in Canada? Montreal, specifically. You go’n speak on that magic? Cuz I’m all ears.” Her eyebrows collided in the middle of her forehead and she dipped her face into the mug for a long sip.

  “Everything I told you about them is true. My mother”—Nora closed her eyes as she said it—“she worked for them. She was their maid. And she . . . died, when I was thirteen, from cancer. They adopted me after she passed away. That’s the full truth. And that’s why I asked you to meet me. I wanted to let you know everything, fo
r once and for all.”

  “Oh, is that why?” Dawn snickered. “Look at you. Trying your hardest not to break. Keep your face quiet and blank. But that’s it. That’s what sells you out. That’s when I know you’re lying.”

  “You have to stop this,” Nora snapped. “I said I’m not lying.” Her chest heaved and she could feel the heat rolling through her body, taking over. She gripped the cup of tea, consumed by the urge to dash the piping hot full of it in Dawn’s smug face.

  “At this point, your words, they don’t mean shit. Not an ounce of shit. And to keep it really real? I don’t even want to hear my own voice on this anymore either. Tired of talking. It’s action now.” Dawn waved her hand at Hannah standing behind the counter.

  Hannah was tableside before Nora drew her next breath. “Did you need something else,” she said, flat like a statement instead of a question.

  “Yeah, I need this to go. Could you make the switch?” Dawn pointed at Nora’s hand wrapped tight around her black cup. “I want one just like that. All black.”

  “Sure.” Hannah scooped up the mug and hustled back behind the counter.

  “Now, that is one person who seems absolutely bored by life,” Dawn said, her eyes following the server along her path. “You know what? You should invite her to the wedding, because let me tell you—fireworks. Especially when I show up with my plus-one.” She leaned into the table, whispering loudly. “Should I give you a couple hints, or just spoiler-out that shit altogether?” Dawn bent her arm like an injured wing. “Aahh. Fine. You’ve twisted it out of me, Nora. I give, I give! And I think life already has too many surprises, don’t you? We’ll go with the hints. She’s tall, blond, white, and not a zombie, plus”—Hannah swooped in and dropped off the cup, and Dawn held her chin up and mouth ajar watching the young girl walk away as if waiting for her to be out of earshot—“plus she’s glamour and style right down to her toenails.”

  The strength of the punch landed square in Nora’s gut. “What?”

  “Mm-hmm,” Dawn hummed, and sipped from her to-go cup.