Nell and Lady: A Novel

by Ashley Farley

  Regan sighed. “What I really need, though, is to talk to you about my dad. Booker claims Dad acted inappropriately toward his mother on the night of Mom’s sixteenth birthday party. Mom has told me her side of the story, but I’d like to hear yours. And Dad won’t return my calls. I don’t know what to think or who to believe or what to say to Booker. I’m sorry, Willa, for dumping this on you when you’re so sick.”

  Willa ran her tongue across her dry, cracked lips and uttered something Regan couldn’t make out.

  “What’s that?” She lowered her head close to her grandmother’s lips. “Are you trying to say something?”

  “Nell,” Willa muttered in a voice so soft Regan could barely hear.

  “What about Nell?”

  Someone coughed behind her, and Regan looked up to see Lady in the doorway. She wondered how long her mother had been standing there and how much she’d heard.

  “Willa and I were having a little heart-to-heart talk—one-sided, of course.” Regan shifted back to the lounge chair. “Did you get some lunch?”

  “Yes. There’s a Subway down there if you’re interested. And I brought you this.” She handed Regan a bottle of water and a white chocolate macadamia nut cookie.

  “Thanks, Mom,” Regan said, breaking off a small piece of the cookie.

  Lady went to the window and looked out over the MUSC campus. “So what were you telling Willa in your one-sided heart-to-heart talk?”

  “Nothing important. But she tried to talk just now. Maybe she’s getting better.”

  “It’ll take a few days at least. And that’s provided she doesn’t have any complications. You should go back to school. I know you’ve missed most of the day, but if you leave now, you can probably make your last class.”

  “I don’t know, Mom. I’d hate to leave her. I want to be here when she wakes up. And what if something happens?” Her voice broke, and she couldn’t continue.

  Her mother lifted Regan’s backpack off the floor and handed it to her. “I’ll stay right here by her side. Keep your phone on silent. If I need you, I’ll text you.”

  “You’re right. I should probably go. I’m already behind in school from missing that day last week.” She slung her backpack over her shoulder and moved to the end of the bed. “Willa and I have an understanding. Don’t we, Willa?” She pinched her grandmother’s big toe through the blanket. “You’re counting on me to be valedictorian, and I’m counting on you to get well.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

  NELL

  A disgruntled patient, a finicky old man with no family support, kept Nell on her toes all day at the hospital. By seven o’clock, she was ready to turn her shift over to the night nurse. When she collected her things from the break room, she noticed her phone was dead. She’d charged the battery the night before and barely used it during the day. She’d been expecting the damaged screen to eventually cause it to die.

  Nell tossed the phone back in her bag. She would stop in at the Apple Store on her way home. She slipped on her windbreaker and headed down the hall. Booker having his own transportation was making her life so much less complicated. She should’ve insisted Desmond buy him a car when he got his license.

  Nell experienced a sense of déjà vu—and not in a good way—when she spotted Lady in the crowded elevator. No one spoke on the ride down except two of her coworkers who were discussing the most recent episode of This Is Us. She stared at Lady with a questioning gaze, but Lady kept her eyes glued to the back of the woman’s head in front of her.

  What was she doing at the hospital? Had she come to confront Nell for failing to show up for her visit with Willa on Saturday?

  The elevator emptied at the first floor, the floor that housed the connector to the parking garage. When Lady stayed behind in the elevator, Nell stepped back inside.

  “What are you doing here, Lady?” Nell asked as they rode down to the ground floor.

  Lady refused to meet her eyes. “I’m here with Willa. She was admitted to the hospital earlier with pneumonia.”

  “How did that happen?”

  “You’re the nurse, Nell. Why don’t you tell me?” The doors parted, and Lady fled the elevator.

  Nell followed on her heels. “Of course I know how a person gets pneumonia, Lady. I’m just surprised is all. For a woman fighting lung cancer, she seemed in reasonably good health when I saw her.”

  Lady kept walking. “That was almost a week ago. The last chemo treatment was hard on her. And she was crushed when you broke your promise to visit on Saturday.”

  Nell increased her stride to keep up with Lady as they crossed the lobby. “Are you blaming me?”

  “I’m not blaming you for her cancer. Even you don’t have that much power. But I blame you for a lot of other things.”

  When they reached the exit doors, Nell, pointing at the ceiling, said, “You know the entrance to the parking deck is on the next floor up.”

  “I know how to get to the parking deck. I’ve been there, remember? The night Willa sent me to tell you about her cancer. What a mistake that was,” Lady said, and burst through the exit doors.

  As she hustled to keep up with Lady, Nell thought back to that night in the parking deck. How surprised she’d been to see Lady after so many years. And saddened to learn Willa had cancer. Nothing had been the same since that night, the same night Desmond had come home reeking of perfume and she’d told him she wanted a divorce. One day shy of two weeks and so much had happened. Is it possible I could have changed so much in such a short amount of time?

  Lady arrived at a beat-up old Buick sedan of some extinct model and spun around to face Nell. “I warned Willa that bringing you back into our lives was a mistake. We would’ve been better off if I’d lied and told her I couldn’t find you. She hasn’t been the same since you kicked us out of your life. Neither of us has, if you want to know the truth. You don’t get to call the shots anymore, Nell. Something happened the night of my sixteenth birthday that changed you. And I want to know what it was.”

  Nell glanced around the parking lot. A crew of EMTs, unloading a patient from an ambulance, was within earshot. “This is not the time or the place to discuss this.”

  “You’re right about that,” Lady said, her hands balled into fists at her sides. “The time to discuss it was the night it happened. Or sometime during the days or weeks afterward. I asked you repeatedly back then. I begged you to tell me what’d happened in the closet that night with Daniel. You wouldn’t talk to me, your then best friend, yet you confided in your son, who told my daughter, who now thinks her father is a rapist. Tell me, Nell. I have a right to know the truth. I deserve to know the truth. Did he rape you?”

  Nell studied Lady’s face, flushed now with anger. The years—and, Nell suspected, too much time with the bottle—had not served Lady well. But she saw traces of the girl who had been the best friend she’d ever known beneath the puffiness, wrinkles, and broken capillaries.

  “All right.” As she collapsed against the car, the years fell away, and Nell was back in the closet with Daniel.

  “Technically, he didn’t rape me. We didn’t have sex, if that’s what you want to know. But he assaulted me. He left bite marks and bruises all over my body.” She squeezed her eyes shut, trying unsuccessfully to block out the memory of Daniel’s malicious grin, his lip curled in disgust. Brown sugar tastes like shit. “And he said things to me, things I can’t bring myself to repeat. He robbed me of my innocence and my dignity. Nothing was ever the same for me after that.” She opened her eyes. “Now I have a question for you, Lady. Why’d you marry him after what he did to me?”

  Her head jerked back. “After what he did to you?” she said, her voice raised. “I had no idea what he did to you, because you never told me what he did to you.”

  Nell’s mouth dropped open. “What did you think happened, then?”

  “I honestly thought the two of you had consensual sex, that you agreed to do something you were later ashamed of. I considere
d every possibility on the planet for about a minute. But I dismissed every single one of them. You want to know why? Because I believed in my heart that you would’ve told me if he’d mistreated you. You and I’d shared all our secrets since we were tiny little girls. How was I supposed to know you were keeping the biggest one of all from me?”

  Nell looked away, unable to meet Lady’s wounded gaze. “You’re right. We knew everything there was to know about each other. There were plenty of things we never said, things that never needed saying because, somehow, we just knew. Like we were telepathic or something. I just assumed you knew this too.”

  “Well, you assumed wrong. And your assumptions altered the courses of all our lives. You walked away from Willa and me. We considered ourselves your family, and you shut the door on us. After all my mother had done for you.” Lady pointed at the hospital building. “That woman loves you, Nell, more than she ever loved me.” Her voice broke, and tears streamed down her cheeks. “God knows why after the way you’ve treated her.”

  Nell’s chin quivered. “You said yourself that something changed in me that night. The truth is, that change began two years beforehand when I lost my mother. I didn’t understand the impact her death had on me until years later. I am grateful for everything Willa did for me. Without her, I would’ve been forced into foster care. Instead, I lived a privileged lifestyle in a loving home. But I was proud of my mama, and I was proud of who I was. She was my link to your world. When she died, I felt like I no longer belonged. I felt like a misfit. Things that were once so right suddenly seemed so wrong. And the incident with Daniel, terribly wrong in itself, exacerbated the feelings I’d been struggling with for two years. It was all too much for me. And even now, after all this time, it’s difficult to explain.”

  “Then save it. Because I don’t care anymore.” Swiping at her tears, Lady nudged Nell out of the way so she could open the car door. “I’m in a hurry. I need to grab some of Willa’s things from home and get back as soon as possible. I don’t want to leave her alone for too long.”

  “I’d be happy to go sit with her until you get back.”

  “No! You’ve done enough damage already.” Lady slid behind the steering wheel and started the engine. “I mean it, Nell. Mama is too weak to ride on your emotional roller coaster. I want you to stay away from her. And from me.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

  NELL

  1981

  During the immediate aftermath of the assault, Nell wore turtlenecks to cover her bruises and a stony expression to hide the pain she felt inside. She trudged through the days, forcing herself out of bed in the mornings after nights of tormented sleep. She saw Daniel everywhere, in the faces of the men she passed on the sidewalks and the boys in her class at school. At night, when she was alone in bed, his hateful words to her at the party echoed throughout her room.

  Willa and her teachers noticed and expressed their concern for her uncharacteristically sullen mood. But the real change happened deep within her and was more gradual. Throughout the spring and summer months of that year, she experienced a cataclysmic shift in her perspective on life where everything she had once held dear suddenly seemed meaningless and insincere. Dinners at home were torturous affairs. One, in particular, stood out from all the rest.

  It was a warm evening in late May, a week before school let out for the summer. Taking advantage of the pleasant weather, Willa had set the table on the piazza. She’d called the girls to supper, and Nell was on her way out the front door to the porch when their maid, Bernice, motioned her to the kitchen.

  “Help me with these plates, girl. My arthritis is acting up something terrible.”

  Nell cringed but did as she was told. She didn’t mind being asked to help out. She helped out around the house all the time. It was Bernice’s derogatory use of the word girl that made her angry.

  Willa had long since given up on finding a suitable housekeeper when, in March, one had unexpectedly fallen into her lap. Out of the blue, the neighbors down the street had moved to Texas, leaving their beloved Bernice without a job. Willa felt compelled to help the Steeles by offering Bernice a job. At first, things appeared to be working out well with Bernice. Willa and Lady had grown fond of her and were disappointed when Bernice announced she was moving to Savannah, Georgia, in June to live with her daughter. Nell, on the other hand, wished Bernice a speedy farewell. Bernice had made it clear through subtle innuendos how much she disapproved of Nell’s presence in the Bellemores’ home.

  Nell forgot about Bernice once she’d taken her seat at the table on the piazza. She refused to let that old battle-ax spoil her good mood, a rare feeling those days. The sweet scent of honeysuckle filled the evening air, reminding her that summer was not far off. As a child, she’d longed for summer evenings when she and Lady were allowed to stay outside after dark to catch fireflies.

  Nell felt overdressed in a skirt and blouse next to Willa, who was still wearing her gardening clothes and sun hat, with dirt caked beneath her fingernails, and Lady, who appeared on the piazza in her new bikini, four triangles of white crocheted cloth attached by strings with the tag still hanging out of the bottoms.

  Willa’s eyeballs popped at the sight of Lady’s bikini. “That swimsuit is vulgar. March yourself back upstairs and change into proper attire.”

  Lady stomped her foot and went inside to change.

  “And return that swimsuit to the store tomorrow,” Willa called after her.

  Lady was back in a flash wearing a terry cloth cover-up over her bikini. Nell could smell the alcohol on Lady’s breath despite the mint gum she was smacking. Five out of the past seven nights, Lady had shown up intoxicated for dinner, and Nell found it disturbing that Willa didn’t seem to notice. Who knew where Lady got the alcohol or where she went to drink it? Nell suspected she’d been cutting classes. She certainly hadn’t been studying. At least not that Nell had observed. Willa would hit the roof when Lady’s grades came.

  They held hands as they blessed their food—liver and onions, Nell’s least favorite dish. Bernice’s cooking was almost as bad as Willa’s. Almost.

  Lady removed the gum from her mouth and stuck it to the side of her plate. “So . . . ,” she started as she sliced off a sliver of liver. “Mindy’s parents asked me to spend the summer with them on Sullivan’s Island.”

  “The whole summer?” Willa asked with raised eyebrows. “I don’t think so.”

  Lady let out an exaggerated sigh. “Why not?”

  “Because that is too much of an imposition on the Bowens.”

  “It’s not, actually. They practically begged me. Mr. Bowen is hiring us to work in his sandwich shop during the day, and the next-door neighbors want us to babysit their twin four-year-olds when they go out at night. Come on, Mama, please,” Lady said in that whiny voice that grated Nell’s nerves.

  “You may visit them for a week, possibly two. That’s a gracious plenty.” Willa turned away from her daughter and set her eyes on Nell. “And what’re your plans for the summer?”

  She shrugged. “I’m planning to earn as much money as possible for college. I’ve interviewed for several jobs. I’m waiting to hear back from them.”

  “Good for you! How admirable of you to want to save money for college.”

  “That’s just great!” Lady dropped her fork on her plate with a clatter. “Let me get this straight. Nell’s admirable for getting a job, but I have an opportunity to work at the beach, and you won’t let me because I didn’t offer to help pay for college. I’ll give you every dime I earn if you let me go. I don’t want to be stuck in Charleston this summer, sitting around this house all day watching Nell sulk.”

  Willa cut her eyes at her daughter. “Watch your tone, missy.”

  Lady mimicked her mother. “Watch your tone, missy.”

  Willa’s face beamed red. “I’m tired of your attitude, Lady Bellemore.”

  Lady balled up her napkin and tossed it on her plate. “And I’m tired of you putting Nell on
a pedestal, when she’s not your daughter and I am.”

  “You’re both my daughters, Lady.”

  Lady rolled her eyes. “Yeah, right.”

  “You may be excused.” Willa nodded her head at Lady, a signal for her to leave the table. “And take your plate to the kitchen.”

  Lady pushed back from the table. “I don’t care what you say, Willa. I’m spending the summer on Sullivan’s with the Bowens. They’re nicer to me than you are.” She stormed off the porch, nearly colliding with Bernice, who’d been eavesdropping from inside the doorway.

  Bernice appeared flustered. “Oh goodness. Excuse me, Mrs. Bellemore. I came to see if you need anything.” Bernice moved toward Lady’s plate, but Willa motioned her away. “We’ll worry about that later, Bernice.”

  Bernice hustled back inside.

  “Now that that’s out of the way, we can eat our supper in peace,” Willa said. “I’m sorry, Nell. I don’t know what’s gotten into Lady lately.”

  Nell stared down at her plate, the liver and onions blurred by tears. “It’s fine.”

  “No, it’s not fine. Nothing has been fine around here for months. Lady’s delivery needs some work, but her message was loud and clear. And I happen to concur. I sense that something is desperately wrong in your world. But I can’t help you if I don’t know what it is.”