Marty followed her finger and nodded. “They nested on the pond, been here all spring.”
“Look at the babies,” she said, pointing again. “One, two, three, four, five, six, seven. Can we feed ‘em?” She gripped the windowsill with both hands and balanced on one foot with the other one propped up at the knee, like a flamingo. Her flip-flops were translucent purple.
Marty turned to April. “Have we got some store bread, hon?”
April said, “That’s supposed to be for us, but sure, give them a piece or two.”
She gave Marty the remaining half loaf of bread. The Mouse retrieved her rain boots from her suitcase and sashayed out to wade in the water.
April rinsed their plates and once Marty had left, she snuck a swig from the handle of whiskey she’d stowed under the sink, behind the cleaning supplies.
She watched an episode of Flo that she’d seen before. Marty and the Mouse were still chattering away out back when the show was over, and when April looked out the window, she saw that he was steadying the rowboat for the Mouse as she crawled in. They rowed out to the center of the pond. Marty had left the empty plastic bread bag on the lawn, and a mild wind dragged it slowly somersaulting across the backyard.
They called Marty’s place a two-bedroom, but that was a stretch. Both bedrooms were tiny, one seven-by-seven and the other eight-by-eight, and both bordered the living room, which opened to the kitchen. All the walls were paper thin. The burnt-orange carpeting was worn down bald and didn’t absorb any noise, nor did any of the threadbare upholstery.
The Mouse talked loudly in her sleep, and she was up at 7:00 a.m. on the nose every morning, stirring around in the bathroom then clattering through the refrigerator. Sometimes she went outdoors first thing in the morning to putter around the lawn and into the pond in her boots, to feed the geese if they were nearby. She never eased the screen door shut behind her; no matter what time of day, she let it swing free to crash violently behind her.
April didn’t trust the Mouse. She was sneaky. She ate too much. They went through a box of Apple Jacks in three days. She always had that one-eyed “is-that-so?” look on her face, and she was seldom fully clothed. She scampered around in shorts and a yellow bikini top with triangles the size of sugar packets over her flat chest.
Marty, on the other hand, was really getting into this parenting thing. He was still on disability, so he had all the time in the world for the Mouse. He took her to the park and to lunch at Arby’s and for cherry-lime rickeys at the ice cream place. He took her all the way to The Cherry Hut, a forty-five minute drive each way, just for one piece of pie. He taught her some silly song about a little man who lived on a red moon, and they sang that song day in and day out. The Mouse was completely tone-deaf, which April pointed out to Marty one time and he said, “Your point being?”
He took the Mouse out fishing in the evening while April drank whiskeys and changed the color of her nails.
When the Mouse caught her first fish, Marty made April get the camera to take a picture of the little thing while it was still alive, wiggling and glittering on the hook. The Mouse didn’t even flinch when Marty beheaded and filleted it on the back porch. April thought that was a little sick.
Later that night, April went to The Blue Slipper and stayed there until last call. Men bought her drinks all night long; she didn’t spend a dime. Marty didn’t even notice that April was out past 2:00 a.m. He was fast asleep when she crawled into bed, snoring like a hog and unresponsive when she started rubbing up on him. April half-wished there had been some new men in town, someone else she could start up with if Marty wasn’t going to give a hoot. Marty was the nicest guy she’d ever been with by a long shot, and they’d been together for almost three years now, but it’s not like she didn’t have other options. Men were always trying to start up with her. Unfortunately at The Blue Slipper, it was just the same-old same-olds.
The next afternoon, April applied tanning oil and Marty drove the three of them out to Lake Michigan. There were only a few others on the beach, a couple dozen people perhaps, if that, and April wished she had more of an audience for her new bikini.
The Mouse was positively giddy on this beach, like she’d never set foot on sand before, never seen a gull or held a shell in her hand. April watched as the two of them pounced into waves. When they returned, they were deep in conversation, and April overheard enough to discover that the Mouse didn’t know how to swim. Not very well, anyway. She could keep her head above water, but had never been properly trained and couldn’t stay up for any amount of time, or go any amount of distance. Already, she had spent lots of time in Monk Pond, but now that April thought about it, she realized she’d never seen the Mouse go out past waist deep.
Marty was saying, “Don’t worry, Mouse. I’ll give you lessons back in the pond. It’s too choppy out here to get a good session in. I had no idea you didn’t know how to swim, woulda thought someone had taught you by now.”
April said, “Crazy that you don’t know how to swim for as much time as you spend in the water. Guess you must be a starfish, huh?”
The Mouse looked up at her. “Why a starfish?”
“They’re the only fish that can’t swim,” April explained.
Marty gave April an unpleasant look and quickly interjected. “But,” he said, lifting a wise finger to the Mouse, “starfish are special. When they lose one of their legs, they up and grow it right back.”
The Mouse seemed satisfied with this information.
April formulated a snide joke about a new leg just being more dead weight, being as the thing still couldn’t swim, but she didn’t share this aloud.
The following morning, the Mouse burst into their bedroom with a fistful of stale bread.
“One of ‘em disappeared!” she cried. She was panting. She set down the bread and dropped her hands to her knees to catch her breath. Marty threw the blanket over April even though she was wearing a T-shirt.
“It’s true,” the Mouse said. She was in her rain boots and navy mesh shorts and a yellow bikini top. She was wearing one of Marty’s baseball caps with the plastic snap panel in the back adjusted to fit her, but the bill stretched beyond her little head in both directions and it was so low on her brow that she had to tilt her head back to see out from under it. “I was feeding ‘em, then all the sudden, there’s a little shwoop and this little goose gets sucked under the water, and just like that,” the Mouse snapped her fingers, “it just disappears.”
She paused for a moment, allowing them time to react, then continued, “So then the other little geese looked at it, where it had been, and there’s just some ripples in the water—”
“Mouse,” Marty propped himself on his elbow to face her. “Relax. I think it was your imagination. It was probably just lagging.”
“No,” she insisted. “I always count ‘em when they come over. And there was seven when they came, seven babies and the mama. Then I counted ‘em again and again to make sure, and I swear there’s only six.”
The Mouse stared hard at April for a moment and said, “You look really different in the morning.” She turned back to Marty. “What should we do?”
“You steer clear of the pond, Mouse,” he said. “I’ll check it out later.”
That evening, when the geese returned for their routine nightly feeding, sure enough, Marty reported to April, there were only six goslings.
“Strangest thing,” he said.
The Mouse, vindicated, nodded emphatically at Marty’s side. Her eyes shone bright and exultant under the porch light, which was swarming with moths and mosquitoes and mayflies. Marty spat on the ground in a tight, practiced stream.
“Yeah,” April said dramatically. “So strange. I can’t even imagine.”
The Mouse swatted at a mayfly and said, “These things have a life expectancy of one day. Do you know how many eggs they lay in one day?”
“Ten,” April said.
“Eight thousand,” said the Mouse. “My dad told m
e that.”
The Mouse had a bad dream that night about a pond monster, and Marty had to go hold her to calm her down. When he came back to bed, April tickled up his thigh with her fingers. He edged away from her.
“So are we just not gonna do it until August? I got needs, Marty.”
“We can do it quiet,” he said, patting her hand, “Just not tonight, I’m tuckered.”
April got up and poured herself a coffee cup full of whiskey and watched the TV on mute until the Mouse came out of her bedroom. Her hair was matted flat against one side of her head and her face was pink, her eyes shrunken with sleep, nightgown bunched in her fists. She pointed at the TV and said, “That flashing light’s bugging me under the door.” April was too drunk to argue and she wasn’t really following the program she was watching anyway, so she turned the TV off and went to bed.
The very next morning, the Mouse came charging into their bedroom again.
“Geez,” Marty grunted. “We knock here, compadre, remember?”
“I saw it,” she said, breathless and clutching her chest.
“Saw what?”
“The monster,” the Mouse whispered in utter terror, as though it might overhear. “This long.” She stretched her arms out as wide as she could in both directions. “Its head is like this.” She made a coconut-sized ball with her hands. “And teeth.” She bared and snapped her own teeth. “It was slithering around like a snake in our yard, then it disappeared into the water.”
“Right,” April said. “A pond monster in our own backyard.” She had a roaring headache and she was so nauseous that their hard, flat mattress felt like a quivering waterbed beneath her.
Marty said, “I don’t think so, Mouse. I’m out there every day. No monsters.”
The Mouse stomped one of her boots. It was still soaking wet and a thin kelly-green weed was spread across the toe. Her knees were starting to grow a little hair on them, and the fuzz shimmered like threads of white gold in the early-morning sun that streamed through the doorway.
“I saw it,” the Mouse said again. “It ate that baby goose and now it’s back for more.”
“Right-o,” April whispered mildly.
“It was the second-most scared I’ve ever been in my life,” she said, gripping her bottom lip with her top teeth. “After the time my cousin Tom locked me in the refrigerator. I got butter on my head.” Her teeth were coming in uneven, fangs first, and looked way too big for her head. She’d probably get the braces that Marty should’ve had, April thought. She wondered if the Mouse was going to cry. April really did not care, one way or the other. The room was hot as blazes and she was certain Marty would smell the whiskey on her. But he wasn’t paying attention to her—he was staring at the Mouse.
He sat up and reached for his shirt, which was in a ball beside the bed. April groaned. She wiped her sweaty upper lip with the sheet and turned the other way. “Better go catch that monster, Marty,” she said over her shoulder. “Holler if you need backup.”
April slept all day, which was a good thing, because the Mouse was up all that night again, certain she heard movement in the grass outside her window. Marty was in and out of bed so many times to console the Mouse that April lost track. He finally dragged the Mouse’s pillow and blanket into their bedroom and set her up on the floor next to his side of the bed. April heard him kiss her forehead.
“Nighty-night,” he whispered.
“You’re babying her,” April said the next morning.
Marty said, “I just want her to feel safe here.”
“Kids need to work that stuff out on their own. I grew up without a dad altogether, and I turned out just fine, didn’t I? You can’t make up for ten years in one summer. You should quit trying so hard.”
“April, you’re bein’ a bit of a bitch.”
April yawned into her shoulder.
The geese weren’t there the next morning, and they didn’t show up that evening, or the next day either. The Mouse was gutted. She stood in the backyard for long stretches, clutching a piece of bread with one hand and using the other to cup around her mouth while she yelled encouraging messages across the pond and into the sky. There was no sign of them. And the Mouse’s nightmares didn’t improve either; she started migrating to the floor of their bedroom every single night, and once she even crawled up into their bed.
“Oh, for crying out loud,” April whispered when she woke to shuffling on the far edge of bed and realized what was going on.
“What?” the Mouse said in a challenging tone. “I’m scared.”
April stared at the Mouse. “Do you have friends at school?” she said.
“Tons.”
Marty said, “Let’s all try and get some sleep.”
“You two have your slumber party,” April said. She went to the living room and smoked three cigarettes with the windows closed then fell asleep on the couch.
Marty had to help a buddy out with a busted sump pump the next afternoon and he asked April to keep an eye on the Mouse. April protested, told him that her day was pretty much packed, but he assured her that the Mouse would entertain herself. April was cleaning the kitchen while the Mouse played outside, when she heard Forrest’s voice through the screen door, asking the Mouse what was new. She heard the Mouse giving Forrest her full account of the pond monster; the disappearance of the gosling, the recent sighting.
“Whattya reckon it is, Forrest?” the Mouse said.
Forrest said, “Kid, there’s a lot about this world that we’re never gonna know, and we’re probably all better off that way.”
April laid down on the couch to take a nap.
The Mouse returned a while later with a chestful of mail, all for Marty. The Mouse eagerly collected the mail every day; she seemed to be expecting a letter that never arrived. She sat with April and they watched TV in silence for an hour or so. A commercial for Gatorade came on, featuring several athletes including the Buffalo Bills’ quarterback.
The Mouse brightened and said, “My granddad played for the Bills.”
“Is that right?” April figured if this was true, she’d have surely heard about it from Marty by now, although he didn’t ever have much to say about Tracy’s mom.
“Yep,” said the Mouse. “My mom’s dad. He was a star. He’s gonna take me and my mom to a game this fall,” she continued. “He told us he could get us some sideline seats.”
“Is that right?” said April.
The Mouse got some leftovers out of the refrigerator and brought them into the living room. She ate chicken wings from a damp, lidded cardboard box. When she finished, she tossed the box full of bones onto the floor and wiped her dirty fingers into the couch. April was deeply annoyed. She wanted the Mouse to take that trash back into the kitchen. She wanted her to wash her hands and also to clean the orange off her face, to realize that it was there without April having to point it out.
During the next commercial break, the Mouse asked April how old she was.
April said, “Forty.”
The Mouse said, “That is so old. That is so old, I don’t think I’ll even live that long.”
April scowled at her and said, “What’re you gonna do, jump off a bridge the day before your fortieth birthday?” As she spoke these words, she considered that they might not be appropriate conversation for a ten-year-old, but then again, the ten-year-old had started it.
The Mouse laughed. April laughed.
Then April asked the Mouse if she wanted to paint nails.
“Mm.” The Mouse made a face. “Nah.”
“How come?” April said. “You spend so much time rooting around, I bet you could really use a manicure.”
“No thanks.” The Mouse got up from the couch. “OK, I’m gonna go play outside.”
April felt like she’d been insulted. “Come on,” she said. “I used to do it for a job before I met your dad. I’m real good at it and I’ve got tons of colors.”
The Mouse bit her lip and slowly drew her hands behind her bac
k.
“What are you doing?” April rose to her feet.
“Nothing.” The Mouse backed toward the door.
April followed her with sudden adrenaline. “What are you doing?”
The Mouse turned to bolt outside, and April grabbed her arm. “What have you got?”
The Mouse squealed and twisted away from April. April looked down at the Mouse’s wrist, which she had in a tight grip. The Mouse had her hand balled in a small fist, but April caught a glimpse of her fingertips. The Mouse’s fingernails were sloppily painted a deep red, flecks of stray polish lining the flesh surrounding her nails.
“Where’d you get that?” April said. “Huh, you little thief? Where’d you get my shade?”
The Mouse shrieked, “Let go of me!”
Marty was bounding in through the kitchen screen door. “The hell is going on?” he shouted.
April dropped the Mouse’s arm. “She’s just squawking ‘cause she got caught. She’s wearing my shade, Marty.” April pointed at the Mouse’s hands. “Which means she went through my stuff. My basket, which is in the closet, which she knows is off limits.”
The Mouse was rubbing her arm. She was flushed and her nostrils were flared. She wasn’t crying.
Marty looked helplessly at the Mouse. “Trace,” he said, “You knew the score. Did you go through April’s stuff?”
“Nope,” the Mouse said.
Marty looked back at April.
April threw her hands in the air. “Why don’t you ask her to show you her polish, ask her where she got that shade? Geez Almighty, Marty.” April turned to the Mouse. “Did you really think I wouldn’t notice, you little thief? Or you thought I’d fall for your lies like your daddy here does?”
The Mouse snorted. “I used your dumb shade, OK? OK? And no, I didn’t think you’d notice. You don’t pay no attention to me. I was bored so I went into your room and used your dumb shade. But I’m not a liar.” She rammed her chin out. “You know what? You’re trash, just like my mom said.”
April lunged at the Mouse, but Marty blocked her. The Mouse cowered behind him, wearing a triumphant face. “Outside, now,” he bellowed over his shoulder at the Mouse, and she went.
Another Place You've Never Been Page 2
