by Nancy Rue
The coughing subsided, and he apologized in the same gruff voice he’d always used with me, whether to ask me to get him a beer or to say he loved me.
“Are you sick?” I said.
“Aaaah—the doctors want me to quit smoking—and don’t go gettin’ all nursey on me. I know those cancer sticks are gonna kill me eventually.”
If the booze didn’t first. Although he didn’t seem drunk. I knew the sounds of under-the-influence well.
“Listen, Lucia Marie, I’m glad I got you.”
I glanced over my shoulder, but Sonia was engrossed in giving Marnie instructions. Still, I kept my voice low.
“Really?” I said. “When I picked up you sounded surprised to hear my voice.”
“That’s because last time I tried to get in touch with your sister I had to go through fifteen levels of that operation she has going there. What the Sam Hill do all those people do, anyway?”
“Ya got me there, Dad. I’m still trying to figure that out myself.”
“I should have left well enough alone, because when I did talk to her, she preached me a sermon and hung up.” He coughed again. “She hasn’t given you religion yet, has she?”
I almost laughed. “You make it sound like a disease.”
“It’s more hazardous to your health than my cigarettes, evidently. Tell me the truth, now, Lucia Marie—how is she?”
I tried to look nonchalant as I passed Sonia and Marnie and slipped into the bathroom so I could close the door. I turned on the exhaust fan before I gave him a synopsis of Sonia’s condition.
“I got a glimpse of her on the TV,” he said when I’d wrapped it up. “I was surprised to see her walking around, to tell you the truth. You looked good, by the way.”
I let that go without comment.
“I’m glad you’re there with her. That’s what I called to say. I don’t trust that crowd she’s got working for her. She needs family with her.”
I scrubbed at a dried blob of toothpaste on the counter with my fingernail. “What about you?” I said.
“What about me?”
“You’re her family too.”
“Not according to her.” His gruffness went to a coarser grit. “She told me she only had to answer to her heavenly Father, not me, so I should stop trying to make her feel guilty.” My father emitted a hard laugh that didn’t convince me he was amused. “All I called for was to wish her a happy birthday.”
I wanted to reach through the line with a large piece of cheesecake, my traditional means of comforting the man who at this point made more sense than anybody else I had to talk to.
“That was before, Dad,” I said. “And I could use some help.”
“You think I could help out?”
“For openers, the FBI carted the gardener off.”
“It’s bad, isn’t it?”
“I’ll talk to her,” I said. “Just hold on.”
I pressed the phone to my breastbone before he could protest and stepped out of the bathroom as Marnie hurried from the room.
“Who’s on the phone?” Sonia said. “If it’s the press, you need to refer them to Marnie.”
“It’s Dad,” I said.
Sonia’s gaze bulleted through the holes in her mask. “He’s been drinking,” she said.
“I don’t think so. He wants to come and help, and I think we should let him.”
“Absolutely not. You can make me take pain medication, but you cannot make me take him.”
“He can—”
“Is he still on the line?”
“Yeah.”
“Give me the phone.” She was close enough to grab it from me and jammed it to her ear.
“Hello, Tony,” she said. “No—I’m fabulous, I’m sure Lucia told you. Now let me tell you.”
I pressed my fingertips to my now throbbing forehead and went for the door.
“No, sorella, you stay. I want you to hear this too.”
She missed the glare I delivered as she lifted her eyes to the ceiling. My father had been telling the truth: a sermonette was in our future.
“Have you come to the Lord since the last time we spoke?” she said. “There is no need to swear. A simple no will do . . . My stand is no different now than it was before. If anything, I am more firm than ever when I say to you that I will open my home and my heart to anyone who repents and is willing to go to the foot of the cross with me.” She put up a hand. “I know you’ve heard this from me before, but it apparently hasn’t sunk in. I will not have you under my roof if you refuse to give your sin to Jesus Christ and let Him heal you.”
I didn’t have to hear my father to get the gist of what he said. Sonia held the phone away from her ear before she spoke into it again.
“Do not come here, Tony,” she said. “Or I will have you removed. I cannot be surrounded by unrepented sin when I am being healed by the Holy Spirit.”
I heard the click. Sonia pressed the receiver to her chest and then handed it to me.
“Bless his heart,” she said. “He could be healed so easily.”
I let the phone drop into its cradle and headed for the door, determined to get out this time before I imploded.
“You understand why I had to do that, don’t you, sorella?” she said.
“I’m going to go get your saline,” I said. “It’s time to do your face.”
By the time I got through Sonia’s morning routine, Francesca pulled into the driveway with Bethany, and I still hadn’t had an opportunity to inform Sonia that Yvonne had ridden off into the sunset and nobody was taking care of her child.
The one moment when I was about to broach the subject, she’d barked at Marnie, “So, were you able to get hold of anyone to come worship with us today?”
The eleven between Marnie’s eyebrows went to an all-time depth.
“What?” Sonia said. “Why are you acting like you’re afraid of me?”
Because you’re acting like Meryl Streep in The Devil Wears Prada, I wanted to say.
“I had conversations with several of the volunteers.” Marnie avoided Sonia’s eyes. “And, uh, they all basically told me the same thing.”
“Which was?”
“They’re going with what Egan said and giving you some space.”
Sonia turned toward the bedroom window, and the face that couldn’t move took on a paralyzed anger.
“Get my laptop,” she said. “We are going to blog.”
She was talking to Marnie, but I escaped to the kitchen just in case. I was taking inventory of the pantry when the door from the breezeway opened, and Francesca and Georgia swept in. Boys were suddenly everywhere. There were at least enough for a platoon, but in reality I could count only four. Bethany was the only stationary being in the room.
“We thought Bethany might enjoy a little play date,” Georgia said, as the small males opened the refrigerator and hoisted one in their party up to view the top shelf.
Bethany stared at the floor like she would enjoy nothing less.
“Shall we go up to the playroom?” Francesca said.
She put her hand on the back of Bethany’s head and guided her toward the back staircase while the boys, ranging in age from six to eight, abandoned the open fridge and swarmed ahead of them.
“We heard about Yvonne,” Georgia said, sotto voce, to me as we brought up the rear. “I never thought she was that good anyway. We can help out a bit till you find somebody else.” At the top of the steps she stopped and looked down at me, shaking back her blonde bangs. “This is all Sonia needs right now.”
The boys had already assembled in the playroom and, apparently, ransacked it by the time we got there.
“This is all girlie stuff,” was the verdict.
Ya think?
I wanted to ask Georgia and Francesca if they had ever actually met Bethany. Even I knew you didn’t bring in four trainees for WWE to play with a little girl who didn’t even ask for a glass of water.
Bethany shrank against the doorway and watche
d with round eyes as Francesca’s twins, who I gathered were Isaac and Jacob, used a Barbie doll for a missile and launched it at the back of the head of Caden, one of Georgia’s. They were both assaulted by the fourth kid, also one of Georgia’s, judging from his blondness and command of the situation. His name sounded like a partner in a prestigious law firm.
I went to Bethany and squatted beside her. “So what do you and your friends want to do?” I said.
She looked at me, blue eyes somber, and said, “They aren’t my friends.”
“Bethany, honey, of course they are,” Francesca said.
To prove it, Isaac—or Jacob—yelled, “Here—catch!” and hurled Barbie in her direction.
Bethany covered her eyes, but she didn’t hightail it down the hall the way I would have. The way I wanted to.
Georgia looked down at me, running the fingers of one hand over the pristinely manicured nails of the other. “We brought a picnic. What do you say we take this party outside?”
“Sweet!”
“Dude, I’m goin’ swimmin’!”
“I’m there!”
As they bowled past us, I wondered why they all sounded like half-grown men instead of little boys.
“Get your swimsuit on, girl,” Georgia said to Bethany before she went after her boys, who were clattering down the stairs, throwing dares at each other.
I personally hadn’t been swimming in years for various reasons, the first one being the swimwear situation. But at least it might be fun for Bethany. I hadn’t seen anybody take her down to the river since I’d been there. At her age I would have at least been catching minnows, bathing suit riding up over my then-small bun cheeks.
I looked down at Bethany. Her buns were anything but small, though that didn’t usually bother your average six-year-old. But something bothered her. The cherub face went as white as anything in my room, and she kneaded her hands like wads of dough.
“You okay?” I said.
“Yes.”
“You sure?”
She took in a big breath and held it as she nodded.
“I found your suit, Bethany,” Francesca sang out from the hallway. “It’s precious.”
“I’ll put it on her,” said Didi, who had also appeared—even on a Sunday. “Ya’ll go on. I set up your picnic in the gazebo. I’ll bring her down.”
Bethany followed her dutifully, and Francesca looked at me.
“Are you coming, honey?” she said. “You probably need to stay with Sonia, don’t you?”
She nodded in that way that practically commanded me to nod with her. And I wanted to. She wore a stark white sarong that no doubt hid a figure-hugging thing designed to show off her tan. Georgia had just exited in a red ensemble that could only be pulled off by someone with legs like the unfortunate Barbie doll. I would rather have peeled skin from my sister’s face any day of the week than subject myself to that.
And then Bethany emerged from her room, wearing two pieces of pink fluff that left her white puffy belly exposed for all the world to point at. She looked like nothing but the Pillsbury Doughboy in a bikini.
“Honey, you’re going to need a little top to put over that,” Francesca said. She concealed her horror with less success than she had the first time she saw Sonia in her mask.
“Right,” I said. “You don’t want to get sunburned.”
“I’ll get one,” Didi said.
“And I’ll take her down with me,” I said.
“You don’t have to.”
I looked at both her and Francesca and said, “Oh, yeah, I do.”
Bethany didn’t speak as we waddled our way down to the river. A repast covered the table in the gazebo, complete with balloons, but it remained untouched so far. The boys were already in the water and on the covered dock that jutted out into it and on the large inner tube. They did enough splashing and shrieking and cannonballing for an entire Olympic swim team.
“Doesn’t that look like fun, girl?” Georgia said to Bethany.
Clearly, it didn’t. I saw Bethany swallow.
“You can just play by the edge if you want,” I said.
I felt Francesca and Georgia look at each other, sunglasses hiding their obvious disdain.
“It’s not deep, honey, you know that,” Francesca said.
“Can I have lunch first?” Bethany said.
“Absolutely,” I said.
“You can’t go in the water right after you eat.”
That came from the dripping future attorney who now stood next to us. His skinniness showed every rib.
“I know.” Bethany folded her arms. “You’re not the boss of me.”
“Whatever,” Skinny Boy said.
“Judson Taylor Jansen, come here,” Georgia said to him.
“Aw, man.”
Georgia went to deal with that. I looked down at Bethany, who gazed longingly toward the gazebo.
“Why don’t I bring you a plate down here?” I said.
“Okay,” she said.
I headed for the food, passing a whispered conversation between Georgia and young Judson Taylor Jansen. His side was actually in a sotto voce similar to his mother’s and consisted mainly of “No way!”
The fare was, of course, abundant, but low cal. I put some carrot sticks, a little string cheese, and a handful of reduced-fat Wheat Thins on Bethany’s plate and vowed absolutely to take that child out for a pizza the first chance I got. No wonder Georgia and Francesca’s kids looked just short of malnourished. I was pawing through the Williams-Sonoma picnic basket for something a little more filling when I heard the scream.
I don’t know what I did with the plate. I just hauled myself toward the water, heart up in my lymph glands. It was the same scream I’d heard from Bethany in the hospital and on the front porch the day before—a cry of sheer terror.
As well it should be. Bethany was in the water, out past the posse of boys, flailing and splashing and screeching in a voice that lost volume and gained water.
“Can’t she swim?” I heard one of the women call out.
I didn’t wait to find out. Not even bothering to kick off my sandals, I plunged in and past the boys. Far beyond me, Bethany went under and didn’t come up. I pushed on until the bottom disappeared beneath me. I had to swim. Dear God. Dear God.
Slapping one arm and then the other ahead of me, I made my way out to her. The water was murky, and my heart threatened to come all the way up into my mouth as I called out.
Her head came up, three feet away, and was swallowed up again. She wasn’t screaming anymore.
I tried to kick myself forward, still reaching with arms already turned to lead. One hand hit on something soft, and I grabbed. At once Bethany grabbed back, hands on my arms, my shoulders, the top of my head. I went down with her and took in a mouthful of water. Thoughts spun—she’ll drown us both we’re going to die Dear God—until I snagged onto one that made sense. Let her go. Let her go.
I shoved Bethany away from me and surfaced, gasping. She thrashed again, but I got behind her. Wrapping both arms across her chest, I pressed her to me and shouted, “Stop! Stop fighting! I’ve got you!”
Out of exhaustion she ceased struggling and sagged against me. I churned my legs, trying to tread water, but we were both sinking fast. I didn’t have enough energy left to keep us both afloat. With the last of it, I screamed, “Help!”
“Are you okay?” someone called.
“No! Help me!”
I scissored once more and got up high enough to see Georgia and Francesca at the end of the dock, peering at me, hands shading their sunglasses.
“Are they in trouble?” I heard a male voice shout.
Georgia’s and Francesca’s voices were lost in a splash. In approximately half a lifetime, Sullivan Crisp was on us.
“You want me to take her?” he said.
“Please. Go with Mr. Crisp, Bethany. It’s all right.”
Bethany had gone limp by now, but her eyes were wild. She nodded and let Sullivan wrap an
arm around her and sidestroke toward shore. Which left me gasping and heaving to keep my head above the water. My legs were like diving weights. There was no way I could make it back.
And no way I could ask anyone to pull me out.
With a final heave I got myself on top of the water and lay back in a float. I was certain that from the riverbank I resembled a whale separated from its pod, but for once I didn’t care. Bethany was alive.
Above me, the sun sizzled from a sky so seamless it didn’t look real. Beyond me, birds twittered and called and carried on like the boys in their droopy swimsuits. Around me the water was like a womb. I could just sink into it and escape back to nothingness. That sounded far too inviting.
I rolled over and surveyed the shore, where Sullivan Crisp handed Bethany over to Didi, and Georgia and Francesca gathered their boys and their picnic baskets and their beach wraps. The party was over. If I never made it to shore, nobody would notice. But I wanted Bethany to notice. God love her, I wanted her to know somebody gave a rip.
Somehow I got back to the low place at the shore and tried not to breathe like a freight train as I dragged my body out of the water. My gray pants and tunic hung heavily, reminiscent of elephant skin, clinging only in the places I always hid so carefully. I gave Sullivan Crisp that vision as he stepped down to hold a hand out to me.
“I’m fine,” I said. “But I could use a towel.”
He pulled one, miraculously, from around his neck. It was approximately big enough to cover my face. I pretended to dry my cheeks and let it hang in front of my chest, and to his credit, he looked discreetly past me into the water.
“You sure you’re okay?” he said.
“Yeah.”
“Good, because I’m not.”
I pulled the towel down to get a better look at him. His hair stuck up in frightened spikes, and his face was the color of porridge.
“Why?” I said. “Is Bethany—did she get hurt?”
“Just her pride, I think. That scared the heck out of me. You’ve got to be pretty shaken up.”
