by Julie Frayn
“Like when I called the cops.”
“Yeah, like that. And other times.”
“Why didn’t I know?”
“You weren’t usually there. That’s another reason I knew it was time to leave. He didn’t care if you saw anymore.” She licked her lips. “He started to treat you the same way,” she whispered.
Ariel nodded. “Do you still love him?”
“I don’t think so. Not for a while.” She smiled. “But I used to. Oh boy, did I love him.” She closed her eyes and let a picture of Cullen, young, handsome, long chocolate hair, strumming his guitar and singing to her in their bedroom, fill her mind. “I miss him.” Her voice cracked.
“Really?”
She opened her eyes. “The old him. The original him. Not the him I’m going to show you.” She took a deep breath and bent the flap of the envelope open.
The pictures had shifted. They were out of order, in total chaos. Where to start? She stared at the one on top, a hand print on her neck. She touched her scarf, found the knot, loosened the noose, and let the scarf fall away.
Tears sprung to Ariel’s eyes and she gasped. She touched one finger to the bruises and red marks, like blood that never washes off.
Mazie sifted through the photos and flipped the ones of her freshly choked neck upside down on the bed. It was like dealing a tarot deck where every card was the death card. She gathered them and tapped them until they were in a neat pile. The first one was the last time he’d choked her, just days before she’d done the same to him. She handed it to Ariel. “That is what happens when you get choked over and over again.” She rubbed her neck just below the jaw line. “I don’t think it’s ever going away.”
Ariel held the picture but looked at her mother’s face. She swallowed hard, closed her eyes, turned to face the Polaroid, and then opened her eyes. She squeezed her lips together, her chin atremble. “He did that?”
“Just last week.” She handed Ariel the stack, about fifteen pictures in all. “And these too. The dates are on the back.”
Ariel looked at each picture, tossed one after another on the bed. With four left in her hand, she flung them all away. Two teetered on the edge of the bed. Two sailed off and drifted to the carpet. “I just thought you liked scarves.”
“Oh, sweetheart. I fucking hate them.”
Ariel’s eyes bugged out. “You said fuck.” She giggled, then clamped her hand over her mouth. “Sorry. I don’t know why I laughed.”
“It’s okay. Laughter is good.” Mazie put one arm around her daughter’s shoulder and squeezed. “I’ll put the other pictures away.”
“No.” Her eyes pleaded, but a tinge of fear and apprehension pinched at the corners. “I want to know.”
“Are you sure?”
Ariel nodded.
Mazie pulled a random picture from the pile. “This is the second time he broke my wrist. I wasn’t documenting things the first time.”
Ariel took the picture and ran her finger over the image of Mazie’s left arm, black and swollen, bent slightly at an awkward angle. “Is that when you had the purple cast?”
“Yup.”
“You said you fell down the stairs.” She looked up at Mazie. “You fell down the stairs a lot.”
“I’ve never really fallen down the stairs. Tripped on a laundry basket once or twice, but never hurt myself.” She sifted through the stack and pulled out a shot of her broken ribs. “This was another ‘fall down the stairs.’ Three broken ribs and a bruised kidney.” She shuffled the deck. “Concussion and broken collar bone.” Underneath that picture was one of her face, cut and broken, purple and black. She sighed. “This was the accident that never happened. The one time he broke my nose.”
Ariel stared at each picture in silence.
“Most of the black eyes I just covered with makeup, but that time it was impossible. So he told people how I’d been hit by a car in a crosswalk.” She shook her head. “I’m amazed everyone bought the lies for so long.”
Ariel sniffed. “I’m sorry, Mom.” She wiped her eyes. “I should have seen it.”
“No, no, no.” She turned her daughter to face her. “You were a child. Still are a child.” She stroked Ariel’s cropped hair. “None of this is your fault.”
“How long had you been taking the pictures?”
“The last four years.”
“And you were going to leave him?”
“Yes. Planning to for the last year. Saving money. Waiting for the right time. I knew it was time when he hurt you. When he said —” She bit her lip. “It was just the right time.”
Ariel squinted. “Said what?”
“You don’t need to know everything.”
Ariel turned her head and stared at the window. “How did he die?”
“Like that. You don’t need to know that.” Mazie gathered the pictures from the bed and picked up the ones that landed on the floor. She turned to find Ariel reading the diary, her fingers gripping the gold chain Cullen had given her. “You don’t need to read that.”
“I do. Please?”
Mazie shifted her feet and looked to the ceiling. Had she written anything about what he said he’d do to Ariel? No, not in the journal. Just in the note she left for the police. “All right. But you don’t have to.”
“I know.”
“Are you hungry? It’s getting dark out.”
“No.”
“Me neither. I have to call Rachel back.”
“Does she know?”
Mazie nodded. “She’s trying to give me a heads up on what the police know. But I think I might turn myself in.”
Ariel looked up from the diary. “No! You can’t. What would happen to me?”
Mazie sat on the bed and engulfed Ariel in her arms, kissed the side of her head. “I’m not sure. But I either have to turn myself in, or we have to get out of here.”
“Why?”
“The police know I have Grandma’s car. They’ll be looking for it.” A chill ran through her. “Damn, I have to go get the car into the parkade. Then we’ll call Rachel and figure out what to do next.”
~~~~~~~~
“Oh, thank God. What took you so long?” Rachel had connected within two seconds of starting Skype. She shoved a mouthful of mashed potatoes in her mouth and washed it down with a slug of beer. “I been sitting here playing solitaire waiting for you to call back. Got George to bring me my dinner so I didn’t miss you. Sorry for the mouthful.”
Ariel smiled.
A vision of Ariel in a wedding gown passed through Mazie’s mind. George walking her down the aisle, Rachel in the front pew crying, Polly all pretty in lavender and pearls standing next to the bride. And Mazie rotting in a jail cell.
“Can I talk to Polly?”
“Sorry, love. She’s having a bath.” Rachel took a bite from a chicken leg. “Can I talk with your mom for a bit?”
Mazie squeezed in beside Ariel. “It’s okay, Rachel.”
Rachel pursed her lips and stopped chewing. “She knows?”
Mazie nodded.
“Everything?”
“Enough.”
Rachel put down the chicken and leaned her elbows on Polly’s desk. “How you doing, honey?”
Ariel’s eyes filled with tears. “I’m not sure.” She scratched at her cheek. “Did you know what he was doing?”
“Not for sure. But I knew something was happening. I could see it in your mother’s face. In his too. Seen it before, with Polly’s father.”
Mazie gasped. “George hit you?”
“Not George. He’s my second husband. First one is in jail for attempted murder.” She leaned toward the screen. “Mine.”
Mazie covered her mouth with one hand. “Rachel, I had no idea.”
“Yup. Polly was just an infant. Met George a year later. Took a whole lot of wooing before he got past first base, let me tell you.” She laughed. “But it was worth the wait. He’s a sweetheart.” She pointed a finger at the screen and wagged it back and forth
. “You remember this, Ariel. A good man will never, and I mean ever, raise a hand to you. And never force you to do things you don’t want. Capisce?”
“Yes ma’am. I understand.”
“Good. Now how are you going to ditch that car and get out of Dodge? They know you passed through Temiscaming. Something about a gas station and security cameras.”
“Rachel, you ought to be a spy.”
~~~~~~~~
Mazie knocked on the bathroom door. “Are you ready, bug? We’ve only got a couple of hours before daylight.”
“Mother?”
“What’s wrong? Are you crying?”
“Mom, I’m bleeding.”
Mazie jiggled the door handle. “Unlock the door.”
The knob clicked. Mazie opened the door.
Ariel sat on the toilet, tissue smeared with pink and dotted with red spots in one hand.
Mazie sighed. “Oh, sweetheart. You’ve got your period.”
“Already?”
“Well, twelve isn’t unusual.” She pulled two feet of toilet paper from the roll, folded it into a makeshift pad, and handed it to her daughter. “Just tuck this into your underpants. We’ll make a quick stop at a drugstore and then you can use the bathroom when we stop for gas.”
“What do I do?”
“Don’t worry, it’s all normal. You’ll get used to it in no time. We just need pads.”
“Don’t you have any?”
“Only tampons, but you’re too young for those.”
“Turn around?”
“Yes, sorry.” Mazie left the bathroom and closed the door behind her.
The whole privacy thing was new this past year. Before she turned twelve, Ariel pranced around her room naked, only covered herself when her father was around, and even then, not always. When her breasts started to bud and pubic hair sprouted, everything changed. Like it had between Mazie and her mother all those years before.
They checked out of the hotel and inched the car into the dark streets. The first gas station they came across was attached to a small market. Mazie parked in back and they entered with hoodies up and heads down. Mazie guided her daughter through the sparse array of feminine hygiene products the market carried and dropped them on the checkout counter along with a blue Sharpie, some sweet snacks for breakfast, and an extra-large, extra-strong coffee with extra cream and twice the normal sugar.
Ariel went into the bathroom to start hew new life filled with pain and discomfort. And blood. Mazie returned to the car, tore the marker from its cardboard packaging and crouched in the dark lot. On the front and back license plates, she changed the C into an O, a three into an eight, and the F into an E. She stepped back to appreciate her work. Not perfect, the blue was a bit darker than the plate colour, but flying by on the highway at a hundred and ten kilometres per hour, it could pass for authentic.
Once on the highway they headed west. They’d scoured maps on the tablet the night before, finally settled on a final destination — Cornwall. A hop and skip into the States if it came to that. And a city Mazie had never visited. Never even passed through. Somewhere that no one knew her name. Or her face.
Every car they passed, that came up behind them, that sped along the highway in the opposite direction, was a threat. She held her breath each time, waiting for the inevitable police cruiser.
When a sign announced that highway one-forty-four loomed ahead, Mazie slowed, and turned south toward Sudbury. At five twenty-three by the dashboard clock, the sun crested the horizon to the left. A few kilometres down the narrow two-lane highway, a gravel road came into view ahead. She checked the rear-view mirror. No one behind them, no cars coming the other direction. She slowed and pulled onto the shoulder, then cranked the wheel to make a sharp right. The road narrowed, the gravel soon disappeared and they were bouncing between thick copses of fir and pine.
The axle groaned against deep ruts of dried muck. “It must be an old logging road.” She slowed and swerved until the path disappeared altogether and they were surrounded by nothing but wilderness.
“Look at those trees. You think I can manoeuvre the car in there?”
“Maybe.”
Mazie eased the gas pedal and sandwiched the car between the firs. Branches screeched across the metal body, one side-view mirror snapped off. No more than ten yards in, the tires caught on something and the wheels spun. She turned to Ariel. “This is it. The car’s final resting place.”
Ariel opened the door. It clunked against a tree. “Mom, I can’t get out.”
Mazie opened the windows. “Crawl out.” She popped the trunk. “Grab everything you can.
Ariel took her CDs and put them in the bag with their remaining snacks. Mazie gathered up loose change and anything usable. She ran her hands over the steering wheel. “Sorry, Dad. I know how much you loved this old beast.”
She reached one arm out and rested her purse on the roof of the car, slid her head and shoulders through the window, and shimmied out of the vehicle.
She dodged branches and fought her way to the rear of the car, pulled luggage from the trunk and turned to see where they’d come from. “Bit of a hike back to the highway.”
Ariel rubbed her arms against the cool of the dawn. “Then what?”
“Hope for the kindness of a passing motorist?” She flashed a fake smile and bounced her eyebrows up and down.
“Yeah, one that’s not a serial killer.” Ariel pulled the handle of her suitcase up.
“Or a cop.”
A loud snap echoed through the forest. Mazie and Ariel froze and stared at one another. Mazie scanned the area and hesitated at the motionless form of a deer not twenty feet away. It stared back at her, flicked one ear and blinked.
“Well, at least it’s not a bear. Let’s get out of here.”
They jogged down the road, their luggage bouncing in the ruts. When they got to the gravel, they slowed to a walk and dragged their bags across the small rocks.
They walked along the shoulder of the highway until engine sounds echoed between the banks of trees. If it looked like there were lights on the roof, they’d hide in the thick trees at the edge of the road. But every time, it was only a car with a roof rack.
Twenty minutes later a van crested the hill and headed toward them. Mazie put out her thumb. Ariel sat on the blacktop and rubbed her shins. The van slowed and pulled to the side. An older man sat behind the wheel, a grey-haired woman in the passenger seat. The woman rolled down her window. “Now what are you young ladies doing hitchhiking in the middle of nowhere? Do you know how dangerous that is?” Liniment and cinnamon wafted from the open window.
“Yes, ma’am, we know.” She motioned to Ariel. “Would you be able to give me and my daughter a ride to the next town? We just need to find a bus station.”
“We’re heading home to Sudbury. That work for you?”
“That would be wonderful. Thank you.”
The man leaned over his wife’s lap. “You hop in back.” His door clicked open. “I’ll get your bags.”
“That’s okay, sir!” Ariel grabbed her suitcase. “We can do it.”
The man smiled and saluted her. “Yes, ma’am.”
Mazie and Ariel piled their luggage into the back of the van and climbed in through the sliding side door.
The woman twisted around in her seat. “I’m Effie, and this is my husband, Edward.”
“Pleasure to meet you.” Mazie reached forward and shook Effie’s hand. “I’m Charlotte. This is my daughter, Clementine.”
“Clementine?” Edward called, and looked at her in the rear-view mirror. “Like the song?” He broke into a gravelly rendition of My Darling Clementine, his wife joined in near the end and they shared a laugh.
“Our son is OPP,” Effie said. “We hear all kinds of stories about what happens to girls who hitchhike. You’re lucky we came along.”
Mazie swallowed and nodded. “Yes ma’am, we certainly are.”
Effie opened the centre console. “You look thirs
ty.” She handed Ariel a juice box and opened a plastic container of cookies. “Homemade.”
Ariel took a big bite of a ginger snap. “Thank you,” she said with her mouth full.
Effie flashed a sweet and genuine smile at her. “You remind me of my granddaughter. Though she’s only five, and her hair is longer. But it’s the eyes. Beautiful green eyes.”
Mazie glanced out the window.
Cullen’s eyes.
~~~~~~~~
“Charlotte, dear. Wake up.”
Mazie started at the hand on her arm and bolted upright. Ariel snoozed beside her in the back of a strange minivan.
Right. Edward and Effie.
She rubbed crud from the corner of one eye. “Are we in Sudbury?”
“At the bus station. Eddie is getting your bags. You girls must have had a rough night, you both conked out almost two hours ago. I didn’t have the heart to wake you.”
“That’s very kind of you.” Mazie turned and grazed Ariel’s cheek with the back of her fingers. “Bug, time to go.”
“What?” Ariel jerked awake. “Where are we?”
“Sudbury. Let’s get our things and thank these nice people for the ride.”
Mazie climbed out of the van and stretched.
Effie handed Ariel two more cookies, turned, and gave Mazie a hug. “Where are you headed?”
Mazie hesitated. “We’re on our way home. Regina.”
Effie’s eyes grew big. “That’s a long bus trip!”
“Yes ma’am.”
Ariel slipped her hand into her mother’s.
That simple gesture said more than words could ever convey. It meant Ariel still loved her, still trusted her. If only she could believe it meant forgiveness.
Mazie squeezed Ariel’s hand.
They thanked Effie and Edward and made their way into the bus station. Within the hour, they boarded a Greyhound bus and headed for the back row. “You want the window seat?”
Ariel nodded. She sat, retrieved the tablet from her backpack and pressed the power button.
“It works without a plug?” Mazie looked over her shoulder.
“As long as there’s a Wi-Fi hot-spot. And until the battery dies.” She pulled up a map of their route. “About an hour and forty minutes to North Bay.”
