Bone Dust White

by Karin Salvalaggio

  Jared looks her straight in the eyes when he speaks. “I told you on the phone. We can’t be doing this anymore.”

  Hayley cracks a smile and swings the neck of the whiskey bottle between her fingers. “I need a drink if you’re going to get all serious on me.” She sashays into the kitchen, making sure to give him a good view of her ass.

  Jared leans against the doorframe and watches her pour.

  “Ice?” She reaches for the freezer door, her shirt riding up in front, showing off her pierced navel.

  “Fuck if I know,” he grumbles. “Look in the freezer.” This game they play is exhausting.

  Hayley stands in the middle of the kitchen holding an ice tray, an uncertain look on her face. “What’s going on?”

  Jared rests his head back against the wall and frowns. “I don’t want to do this anymore. You’re married. You’ve got kids. Us sneaking around like this.” He knocks his head against the wall to emphasize his point. “It’s not fair to Lexxie. She deserves better from me.”

  Hayley’s eyes light up and her voice grows more animated with each word. “What if we just tell everyone we’re together so we can quit sneaking around? We could sleep in the same bed every night. You could finally get rid of that boring girlfriend of yours.” She walks up to him and slides a chilled finger down his cheek. “You’d like that.”

  “Hayley, that’s never going to happen and you know it.”

  “But I love you.”

  “It doesn’t matter.”

  Hayley digs her fingers into his shirt. Her voice is low and demanding. “And you love me.”

  He can’t look at her. “Not anymore.”

  “Don’t say things that aren’t true,” she whispers, unsure. “Now you’re just being mean.”

  “Fuck.” He loosens her grip and grabs his drink off the counter. “We’ve done this so many times. You’re never going to leave Brian.”

  She pulls a cigarette out of a pack and casts around for a lighter. “I have to see you. Seeing you is the only thing that keeps me sane.”

  “And what about my sanity?” he asks. He finishes off his glass of whiskey and pours another. He raises his voice for the first time. “I can’t give you what you want anymore.”

  Leaving the cigarette unlit, Hayley takes the bottle from him and moves to the living room. She curls up on the sofa and stares at the silent television, not saying a word.

  “Are you going to say anything?” he asks.

  Hayley pours another drink.

  “You understand what I’m saying?”

  Hayley’s eyes snap at him like they’re baby birds wanting to be fed. She won’t cry. He’s never seen her cry. It’s her temper that worries Jared.

  Her voice comes out as a hiss. “So all these times we’ve been together. I don’t mean jack to you?”

  Jared sits across from her on the coffee table and places a hesitant hand on her knee. He squeezes it gently and tries to hold his nerve. “Of course it’s meant something to me. I like spending time with you. I care about you.” His hands fly up in the air. “Which is why we can’t sleep together anymore. It confuses everything.” He stops for a moment and lowers his voice further. “We should just be friends.”

  Hayley’s lip curls when her eyes light on his. Her glass trembles in her hand as she puts it to her lips. “Friends?” She laughs high and uneven. “Brian doesn’t even let me talk to you and you’ve got Lexxie sniffing around all the time. How are we supposed to be friends?” She puts down her drink before taking his hand and pressing it to her cheek. “I promise I’ll be better. I won’t call so often. I won’t come by at night. You just have to let me know when I can see you again, that’s all.”

  Hayley scoots up to the edge of the sofa so they’re closer, one of her knees nestling between his legs. She lowers her voice to a whisper and tilts her head upward so she’s looking straight at him. “It’s the not knowing that makes me a little crazy.”

  Jared closes his eyes and she puts her hand to his face, stroking his eyelids with her fingertips. He curves his cheek into her cupped hand and makes a noise that almost sounds like crying. Her lips move across his lower jaw and onto his mouth. He pushes her away but she only holds on tighter. She crawls onto his lap, wrapping her legs around his waist, rocking against him with her hips.

  Jared lifts her onto the sofa, stretching out on top of her, giving in like he always does. Losing to her arms, to her frantic need for him, to the lightness of her touch. This thing wins every time. An endless loop. Tomorrow he’ll sink down to a lower level. Tomorrow she’ll fall off the edge of his world. Tomorrow will come no matter how good it is tonight.

  Later, wrapped up in Jared’s bedding, they’re almost asleep. Hayley curls around him, her legs entangled with his. She’s nestled in the crook of his arm, resting her head on his shoulder. Her breathing is soft and one of her hands sits flat on his chest. Jared kisses the top of her head, imagining the thoughts worming around inside her.

  Out of habit he asks if she’s okay.

  “Yeah, I suppose so. Brian’s been away ice fishing so it’s been quiet.”

  Jared brushes the hair out of his eyes. Hayley’s husband works as a long-haul trucker and is often out of town for weeks on end. “I thought you told me he was working. When is he back?”

  She yawns. “Tomorrow maybe. I’m not sure.”

  “So he could come back tonight?”

  “No,” she mumbles. “I spoke to him earlier. Definitely tomorrow.”

  Jared stares at the ceiling. It’s quiet outside. As far as he can tell no cars have passed down his road in hours. “How are your girls?”

  She props up her chin so she can look at him. “They’re fine. My sister is with them.” She hesitates. “Brian is being weird lately.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “He’s on edge.”

  Jared runs his hand over her shoulder. “Has he hurt you?”

  She shakes her head. “We had one of his friends over for dinner the other night and Brian drank too much. The next thing you know he’s threatening to kill this guy if he doesn’t stay away from us.”

  “Sounds like he’s jealous.”

  “Maybe, but it’s not like the guy tried to feel me up in the kitchen.”

  “Brian calmed down though?”

  “Yeah, eventually, but I was so embarrassed. Dustin is the only friend Brian has that I actually like. God knows what would happen if Brian found out that he stops by sometimes to help me out when he’s on the road.”

  “Maybe Brian should be jealous. This guy sounds perfect.”

  She digs her chin into his chest. “You’re perfect.”

  “I’m not.”

  She raises her voice. “You are for me.”

  “Hayley, I’m sorry, but I’m not. We’ve talked about this.”

  Hayley lowers her head back into the crook of his arm and closes her eyes. For a long time neither of them says a word.

  “Hayley, this has to be the last time,” he says, feeling her soft body go rigid. “I’m not ever doing this again. It’s over between us.” Jared kisses the top of her head and holds her a little tighter.

  A few hours later he wakes up in an empty bed.

  *

  “What in the hell were you thinking?” Jared leans forward in his truck, hunched over his steering wheel like a gargoyle. Sucking hard on a cigarette, he strains his neck, peering under the thick layer of frost that hasn’t had time to melt from his windshield. His vision is myopic at best. Words fire like shots from a gun; short blasts followed by guilty silence. He takes furtive glances at his passenger.

  Hayley isn’t listening. She rests her cheek against the cool of the window, her damp hair sticking to a face as gray as river stone. Her lips are open and she draws shallow breaths too quiet to count. She’s no longer holding her wrists above her heart as directed. Two well-bundled appendages sit askew on her lap, jumping up and down with every bump in the road. The white gauze is soaked through with her
blood and taped with such violence her fingers are turning blue.

  Jared hits ice and the back end of the truck fishtails to the left, coming close enough to kiss a high cement retaining wall. His expression grim, he turns the wheel a fraction and the truck is on course once more. The road dips and the truck leaps upward, briefly losing traction. A chunk of ice breaks free from his windshield and slides away. His vision cleared, Jared sits up in the driver’s seat. On the right-hand side of the road, the Flathead River runs close and deep, a thirty-foot plunge just beyond the guardrail. As he takes a curve he catches sight of the icy water and thinks about how he’d like to be clean again. Covered in Hayley’s blood, his hands stick to the molded plastic of the steering wheel.

  He looks at Hayley again and lowers his voice, his pulse, and his expectations, addressing his passenger with more patience than he feels. “Hang in there. You’re going to be fine.”

  His headache is a slow-traveling bullet moving forward from the back of his skull. The exit wound is his left eye. It twitches. He swallows back the sick in his throat and holds the wheel a little tighter.

  At the hospital Jared swings his truck onto the ramp marked EMERGENCY ENTRANCE. A sign looms ahead: EMERGENCY VEHICLES ONLY. He ignores it and heads straight for the sliding glass doors, screeching to a halt and laying on the horn with the flat of his bloody palms.

  Before help has time to arrive, Jared’s out of the truck and pulling open the passenger door. Hayley half falls out, her bandaged limbs hanging limp, her torso caught in the seat belt. She’s lifeless but breathing. The doors slide open behind him and there’s a rush of movement. The voices are all familiar, but there’s a strain in their words, like they’re holding back on all the questions they really want to ask. Hayley is unresponsive when they load her onto a gurney.

  The doctor on duty doesn’t waste time with small talk. “Fuck, Jared, what happened?” Compared to outside, the interior of the hospital feels like a sauna.

  Jared keeps his head down, shying away from the fluorescent lights that line the ceiling. “She called me this morning in a panic so I went to check on her.” He pauses, filling in the blanks as he goes. “God, that must have been a little before seven. I don’t know how long she’d been bleeding when I found her.”

  They move past the nurse’s desk and he spots his girlfriend, Lexxie, holding an admissions clipboard in her hands. He focuses in on it, imagining the spot where she will take pen to paper and seal his fate.

  “When did this happen? Where are her kids?” Lexxie runs alongside them. She looks back toward the doors, expecting to see the entire family traipsing into the ER. “Where’s Brian?”

  Jared doesn’t answer. Hayley’s eyes pop when the gurney is jostled. She reaches for his hand. Beside him he hears Lexxie mumble something under her breath but he can’t make out the words.

  “Brian’s away, isn’t he?” Lexxie finally manages to catch Jared’s eye. A quiet look of disapproval hangs around her neat features but she doesn’t raise her voice against him. She directs her frustration at Hayley instead. “Hayley,” she shouts. “Where are your children?”

  At the mention of her kids, Hayley heaves her body up from the gurney and grabs Jared’s collar. Wide-eyed and scared, her face is only inches from his. He’s seen that look in addicts but never in her. She smells of booze and cigarette smoke. Lexxie drops the clipboard and helps pry Hayley off him one finger at a time. Fabric rips and Hayley’s left holding a piece of his collar but nothing else.

  Jared backs away and watches her flop about the rolling platform like a landed fish. She twists around her neck so she can see him, screaming his name. The shredded fabric from his collar flutters to the floor. Jared staggers a few feet farther and leans heavily on the nurse’s desk. He looks down at his work boots, noticing that they too are splattered with her blood. He closes his eyes and waits for the thick surgery room doors to deaden her cries.

  Lexxie slaps her clipboard down on the counter. “Looks as if you’ve had some morning.” She gestures to his bloody hands as she slides around to the other side of the desk. “Anything you want to tell me?”

  Jared flicks his eyes up at her. Her gray eyes blink back at him. He can tell she’s trying her best not to cry. He knows she’ll hate herself later if she causes a scene.

  He has nothing he can say in his defense. “I’m sorry.”

  “Saying sorry really doesn’t cut it.”

  Jared can’t believe what he’s about to ask of her until he does. “I need your help.”

  There’s a high note in her voice that wasn’t there previously. “You’re asking me for help?”

  “You’ve met Hayley’s husband.”

  “Everyone’s met Brian,” she says, filling in Hayley’s admission form, her pen audible as it scratches hard against the paper. “They’re an accident-prone family.”

  He watches her closely for any sign of sympathy. “He can’t know I brought her in. He can’t know I was with her.”

  Like she’s weighing the two possibilities in her head, she nods imperceptibly and fills in the admission form with a flourish. Afterward she shows him the evidence of their pact.

  Jared’s jaw goes slack. “You’ve been here working all night. You can’t put down that we brought her in together. Are you nuts?”

  “I can’t very well leave it blank.”

  “Lexxie, anybody checks and they’ll know you’ve lied. You could lose your job.”

  “Well, you better hope nobody checks.”

  He starts to speak, but she cuts him off.

  “And just so you know, this is the last time I put up with this shit. I swear I’ll call up Brian myself and tell him all about you and Hayley if this happens again.” All business, she checks the clock on the wall. “Just go, your shift is starting soon.”

  Jared stands his ground. “Brian will kill her if he finds out. You can’t go making threats like that.”

  “Yes, I can.” Lexxie’s eyes flick upward as if she’s expecting patience to be delivered from on high. “You don’t think it’s too much to ask. Do you? A little loyalty. I’m supposed to be your girlfriend, for God’s sakes. I’m the one spending Christmas at your parents’, not Hayley.”

  Jared places his elbows on the counter and presses his fingers hard into his forehead. The pain he’s feeling is much sharper now.

  Lexxie leans in and speaks softly. “Are you okay?”

  His voice is muffled. “I feel like my head is going to split open.”

  She puts a hand on his shoulder. “I’ll get you something.”

  *

  The staff locker room smells of cleaning fluids and wet towels. Jared heads straight to a small bathroom, locking the door behind him. For a long time he stands immobile, white-knuckling the sink. He wishes that somehow he could go back to when Hayley first drove up to his house the night before.

  The bathroom door muffles Carson’s words. “Hey, Jared,” he says in a voice that never fails to sound comical. “You okay in there? Lexxie told me what happened.”

  Carson waits a few seconds, and Jared imagines Carter’s head tilted toward the door expectantly. He’s a shade taller than Jared and several years younger. His blond hair is cut short, making his sharp chin and long nose even more pronounced.

  He knocks on the door. “I brought you another shirt.”

  Jared splashes his face with cold water, but it does nothing for him. He puts his hand in front of his mouth and blows and whiskey’s sour breath wafts right back in his face. His reflection in the mirror is a confession of sorts; his hooded eyes, bloated complexion, and unshaven cheeks are all evidence. Jared leans against the closed bathroom door and lights a cigarette. His face relaxes after a couple of drags. He blows smoke up at the No Smoking sign. He asks if Hayley’s mother has arrived yet.

  “Haven’t seen her,” says Carson, just inches from Jared, leaning on the other side of the door, a mirror image minus the cigarette and hangover. “Lexxie pointed me in your direction. If I did
n’t know her better, I’d swear she’s on the verge of a nervous breakdown.”

  Jared takes another drag. “What was I thinking?”

  “When a woman like Hayley crawls through your window in the middle of the night I imagine thinking doesn’t really come into it.”

  Jared bangs his head against his side of the door. “Yeah, it’s not like we ever do much talking.”

  “I imagine not. So what happened this time?”

  “I told her it was over. Brian is going to kill me when he finds out.”

  “That’s not going to happen.”

  “Lexxie threatened to tell him everything and this time I think she just might do it.” Jared opens the door and Carson falls inward, holding two cups of coffee.

  “Damn, Jared, a little warning.”

  Jared watches the locker room swim for a few seconds too long. He puts his hand to the door frame and gulps for air. If he didn’t know any better, he’d think he was six feet underwater. Carson places the coffee cups on the bench and puts a reassuring hand on his partner’s bare shoulder.

  “Hey, buddy,” he says, searching for life signs in Jared’s eyes. “Are you in there somewhere?”

  Jared blinks. “Whatever Lexxie gave me for my headache is giving me the spins.”

  “Why don’t you go lie down,” says Carson, taking hold of Jared and leading him to a cot that sits in the back of the locker room. “I’ll tell dispatch you’re not well enough to work this morning.”

  7

  Macy stands in the shadow of the open doorway watching Grace Adams. She’s never seen someone sit so still. She’s nothing like the little girl Macy met eleven years ago. Macy remembers a skinny kid who couldn’t stop moving. Grace wore a summer dress a couple sizes too big, and her bangs had been so random, Macy thought she must have taken pinking shears to them. Eleven years on and Grace is the very model of composure. Her pale face is unblemished and her shoulder-length black hair hangs perfectly straight. It’s only when Grace looks up that Macy sees something familiar. The girl’s eyes are still haunted. Macy takes a deep breath and reminds herself to take it slow. Somehow she’s going to have to earn Grace’s trust.