Property Of, the Drowning Season, Fortune's Daughter, and At Risk

by Alice Hoffman

  “Don’t you have anyone else?” she asked Rae. “A friend?”

  “If I did would I be calling you?” Rae said.

  “I told you not to call me,” Lila said, but she didn’t sound convincing, not even to herself. If she had only had the nerve to walk into the restaurant on Third Avenue she might not have been in that awful hot bedroom when her labor began, curled up in a bed that had been too small for her since she was twelve. She could have been safe in Hannie’s house, and for days afterward someone would have brought her hot tea and thin slices of toast, and she wouldn’t even have had to get out of bed, she could have held her daughter close, and watched as she slept.

  “Just think about it,” Rae said. “That’s all I’m asking.”

  For two weeks Lila thought of nothing else, but she didn’t return Rae’s call. She simply couldn’t bring herself to say no, not when she knew what it was like to be alone in a room that was so dark it sucked you into itself and filled your throat with so much darkness that every time you took a breath a dozen black plums pushed down on your tongue. When the door to Lila’s room had opened, the light from the hallway had saved her. She could still feel the sensation of the light on her skin as her cousin had walked into the room, she could feel each footstep as her cousin came closer, then mercifully put her arms around Lila and helped her up from the floor.

  If that symbol hadn’t appeared in Rae’s cup, if it hadn’t been so clear that her child would be either stillborn or so damaged that a future was impossible, Lila might have agreed to help her. But instead, Lila stopped answering her phone. She told Richard she’d been getting crank calls, and the two of them lay in bed, still as stones, whenever the phone rang late at night, with a ring so piercing it cut right through your dreams. Lila’s readings suffered—not just because she missed appointments when she didn’t answer the phone, but because she had used up so much energy in not telling Rae the truth that she now couldn’t seem to lie to anyone else. She told one bad fortune after another: old clients began to cancel their appointments for weekly readings, new clients at the restaurant fled from their tables in tears and complained to the management. But Lila couldn’t seem to stop herself. She told old women to draw up their wills, and young women wept when they heard that the lover who was absent on holidays was not with a sick friend but with a wife. The manager of The Salad Connection gave Lila one more chance, and when there were three more complaints in a single afternoon—a divorce, failure at a job, and possible drug abuse—he fired her.

  In a way it was a relief. That very same day Lila took all the tins of loose tea from her cabinets and poured the tea down the drain in the sink. She had Richard call the phone company and change their number; she cut up her white silk turban with a pair of garden shears and threw out the red shawl she always used as a tablecloth during readings. When she decided to go into the auto shop each morning and take over the books, Richard was shocked, but Lila explained that she couldn’t stand another moment of listening to someone’s troubles; adding up the repair bills for BMWs and Audis was exactly what she needed to clear her head. But in the afternoons, when she was alone in the house, Lila was so uneasy that she couldn’t sit still. And when she looked out her window one day and saw Rae sitting in her parked car, Lila’s throat went dry, but she wasn’t surprised. She had been expecting her to appear for days, and, what was worse, she had wanted her to. Lila put on a sweater and went outside; she got into the passenger seat next to Rae and slammed the door shut.

  “I’ve been trying to get up the nerve to come in and let you have it,” Rae said. “You could have at least answered the phone. You could have told me that you didn’t want to be my labor coach.” She stole a look at Lila. “Unless you haven’t decided yet.”

  “I’m not the right person,” Lila said.

  “It hardly takes any time,” Rae insisted. “There are only six weeks of Lamaze class, and they don’t start until February. You wouldn’t even see me again until then.”

  Lila shook her head. “You need somebody else.”

  “Don’t you understand?” Rae said. “I don’t have anyone else.”

  They both looked out through the front windshield. Rae was close to tears, but Lila was the one who was afraid: if Rae reached out during labor and put her arms around Lila’s neck, she might be pulled back into the darkness. Already, she could hear the flapping of huge wings.

  “I’ll tell you what I think,” Lila said evenly. “You may not need me after all. Your boyfriend may come back.”

  “My boyfriend!” Rae said. “That’ll be the day.” But she looked over at Lila, interested. “What makes you say that?” she asked.

  “I just feel it,” Lila said. “He’s not gone yet.”

  Lila found herself agreeing to be Rae’s labor coach if Jessup failed to return—that’s how sure she was that she wouldn’t be needed. But afterward, when Rae had driven away and Lila was walking up the path to her front door, she felt a peculiar kind of regret, almost as if she wanted to witness the birth. She stood on the porch, between the two rose bushes. Even though the front door was open, she stood there a little longer, and she looked down the street. But Rae had pressed down hard on the accelerator—just in case Jessup had already come home—and the Oldsmobile was gone. There was nothing to see on Three Sisters Street except for a line of blue clouds in the western sky, a sure sign that before long the weather would change.

  The following week it rained every day, but in spite of the weather the superintendent of Rae’s apartment complex strung white Christmas lights in the courtyard. The baby seemed more restless than usual, shifting its weight and throwing Rae off balance, so that she had to grab onto furniture and walls to stop herself from falling. It was the worst time of the year, those weeks between Thanksgiving and Christmas when being alone can send you over the edge. Rae had just about given up hope that Lila’s prediction was right—expecting Jessup to come back left her lonelier than ever before. Every morning when she got out of bed Rae switched on the TV, just so she could hear someone’s voice. After a while she moved the set into the kitchen and propped it up on the counter so she could watch as she ate dinner. It was some time before Rae realized that this was exactly what her mother used to do, and it drove her wild to think that now that she finally was no longer haunted by the scent of Carolyn’s perfume she had to go and take on her habits. Once, she actually added mustard to her egg salad before she remembered it wasn’t she who liked egg salad that way, but her mother. Too much time alone was what was making her watch the news while she ate dinner and add mustard to things. When she was with Jessup she used to count the hours till the weekend, now weekends meant nothing to her, and there were times when Freddy had to remind her what day it was.

  It was a Friday, and still raining, when Rae ran through the courtyard to get to her apartment before she was soaked. The door was slightly ajar, and she knew right away that Jessup was inside. She could hear the sound of the TV and she smelled fresh coffee. For a moment as she stood in the courtyard it was almost as if everything was the same as it had been before that awful heat wave. But as soon as she went inside and saw Jessup in the kitchen, she knew that it wasn’t the same. He didn’t even look as if he belonged any more: he seemed too big for the wooden chair he sat in, his boots stuck out from under the far side of the table, his denim jacket was hung over the back of the other chair, dripping water onto the linoleum. The oven was turned on so that his jacket would dry, and Rae felt uncomfortably warm. She stood in the kitchen doorway and stared at him and was surprised to find she had nothing to say.

  Jessup cleared his throat. “I made some coffee,” he finally said.

  Rae looked at the table now and saw that he had set out a ceramic mug for her and filled it with coffee. She could not remember his ever doing that for her before, not in seven years.

  “I can’t,” she said. “I’m staying away from caffeine.”

  “Oh,” Jessup said, as if he suddenly remembered her condition. He
looked at her dead center, and Rae immediately pulled his old rain slicker more tightly around herself.

  “Why don’t you sit down?” Jessup said, as if it was his place to invite her in.

  Rae stayed exactly where she was.

  “I’ve got myself a room in a place outside Barstow,” Jessup said.

  “You don’t even have the decency to tell me what you think,” Rae said.

  “Think about what?” Jessup said uneasily.

  “About the way I look,” Rae said.

  She really had to watch herself; she could hear her voice cracking. She went to the refrigerator and poured herself a glass of milk.

  “You look great,” Jessup said.

  “What a liar,” Rae said.

  She sat across from him at the table and she knew that he hadn’t come back for her.

  “After the movie wrapped I figured I had two ways to go,” Jessup said. “I could try and get my foot in the door of the movie business, which is a joke because once you’re a driver they think you’re an imbecile. Or I could get involved in a business proposition with a guy I met in Hesperia.”

  “What business?” Rae said.

  “I got lucky for once,” Jessup said. “It’s an estate sale. Some old guy died and his family is selling the property cheap. Three thousand dollars up front for me, and three thousand for my buddy.”

  Rae had never heard him call anyone his buddy. She thought of the four thousand they had saved and her mouth tightened.

  “You didn’t ask me how I’ve been feeling,” Rae said.

  “You didn’t give me a chance,” Jessup actually had the nerve to say.

  Rae picked up the carton of milk and threw it at him. He hadn’t expected it so he didn’t even try to duck. The carton hit him on the shoulder and milk poured down his shirt.

  “Oh, Christ,” Jessup said. He jumped up and wiped off his shirt. “It doesn’t take much to get you hysterical these days, does it?”

  Rae realized that she was exhausted. She reached for her glass of milk and finished it, wondering if they were having some kind of divorce here.

  “There are plenty of things you didn’t ask me,” Jessup said. “Like what kind of business I’m considering.” When Rae didn’t ask, he told her anyway—it was forty acres with a trailer and a barn. “You know why the barn’s there?” Jessup grinned.

  Rae couldn’t even begin to guess. “Why?” she asked.

  “Because I’m going to be raising horses.”

  She couldn’t help but laugh. When they had first run away together Rae had found a cabin for rent in Maryland, but, when Jessup had come to look at it, all he had to do was hear the squirrels running back and forth inside the attic walls and he’d fled. They had rented the garden apartment in Silver Spring instead.

  “Laugh,” Jessup said. “But they’re not any old horses. They’re midget horses,” he informed her.

  Rae let out a shriek that was so piercing Jessup ran over to her. It took a few seconds before he realized that she was hysterical with laughter. He shook his head and poured himself another cup of coffee and glared at her. He watched her, waiting for her to stop, but every time Rae even thought the words midget horses she burst out laughing all over again.

  “Go ahead,” Jessup told her. “But you’ll take me seriously when I’m rich.”

  Rae wiped the tears from her eyes and instantly felt sober. He actually believed in this.

  “I swear to God, Rae,” Jessup said, “they’re no bigger than Saint Bernards.”

  He spooned sugar into his coffee.

  “I need this ranch,” he said.

  Now she knew exactly why he’d come back. “Not on your life,” Rae said.

  “Look, you took the car, now let me have the bankbook.”

  “I would rather give that bankbook to a total stranger than give it to you,” Rae said. “I’d tear it in half first.”

  “You won’t give me an inch,” Jessup said.

  “I gave you a little more than that,” Rae said. “Like, try everything. I was in love with you.”

  “Was?” Jessup said. He came up behind her and put his arms around her.

  “Cut it out,” Rae said. “I really mean it.”

  “I could stay here tonight,” Jessup said.

  Having his arms around her reminded her that the room was much too hot. She stood up and turned off the oven. “I don’t want to pay the gas bills to dry your jacket,” she said.

  They stood facing each other. It was getting dark, but neither of them went to turn on a light. There was still a puddle of milk on the floor, Jessup hadn’t bothered with it when he cleaned off his shirt, and the milk looked blue, as if someone had spilled a bottle of ink. Rae could feel the baby shift, and she put one hand against her ribs.

  “I could stay,” Jessup said.

  Rae shook her head. She couldn’t bring herself to look at him until he turned away, then she watched as he rinsed out his coffee cup and put on his denim jacket.

  “I guess I’ll take the bus back,” Jessup said.

  “I guess you will,” Rae shrugged.

  You couldn’t see a thing out the kitchen window, but Rae could tell from the sound of the rain—it was bad weather for taking the bus back to Barstow, alone.

  “I don’t want there to be any bad feelings,” Jessup said.

  “Why should there be?” Rae said. “Because you care more about some horses than you do about your own child?”

  “It’s all in my head,” Jessup said. “Nothing that’s happened lately has anything to do with you.”

  “Nothing you’ve ever done has had anything to do with me,” Rae said.

  “You’re wrong about that,” Jessup told her, and after he’d left she almost believed him. On some of those days when he stood outside her parents’ house, it was so cold even Jessup must have felt it. When she couldn’t manage to get out of the house she could see him from her bedroom window, waiting for hours. She couldn’t help but think of him there on the bus back to the desert; his legs were so long he’d have to stretch them out in the aisle and he wouldn’t get to Barstow until after midnight. In all the years they spent together Rae had believed that if she just kept working at it, she could keep him. But she just didn’t want to work that hard any more.

  That night she didn’t have any trouble sleeping: her bed seemed softer than usual and the rain continued till dawn. In the morning, Rae cleaned the milk off the floor and washed out the coffeepot. But she didn’t open the drawer in the kitchen and reach beneath the silverware until two weeks later. She felt like a total fool to just be discovering that the whole time he’d been sitting there with her he’d already had their bankbook in the pocket of his denim jacket, and that his asking had only been a formality—he’d planned to leave her with nothing at all from the start.

  When Rae didn’t call back Lila felt herself grow more and more anxious. She wanted to hear for herself that their bargain was sealed, she wanted to know the exact hour of the day when Jessup had come back. Rae’s unborn child had begun to haunt Lila: in the shop she thought about foolish things—baby smocks with pearl buttons, tiny silver spoons, bibs embroidered with lace—and each time she added up the columns of figures in the books she added wrong and charged Richard’s customers too little or too much. At night she dreamed of stillborn babies whose fingers and toes were as cold as ice. But what terrified Lila most was that there were actually times when she found herself making a list of names, as if this baby was hers.

  If she was wrong—if Rae’s boyfriend didn’t return—Lila knew that she wouldn’t keep her part of the bargain. Every day she waited for the phone call that would release her, but the call never came. Richard could tell how upset she was; he asked so often what was wrong that finally Lila told him. But Richard didn’t understand; he thought Lila would make a wonderful labor coach, he urged her to keep her promise to Rae. His praise only drove Lila away from him, and it made her realize that if you haven’t told someone the truth for a long en
ough time, after a while you can’t tell him anything at all and expect him to understand.

  So many days went by that Lila began to wonder if perhaps she was free of Rae at last. But then one night, as she was washing the dishes after supper, Lila closed her eyes for a moment and saw a tall man sitting in the very last row of a bus, his head tilted back so he could sleep. It seemed to be very late at night and the sky above the road was so clear Lila could see the Milky Way. Lila turned the water off in the sink and went to sit down. When Richard saw the look on her face, he dropped the magazine he’d been reading and sat up straight in his chair. Lila looked up at him; her eyes were so dark it was impossible to tell their true color.

  “I’ve just seen something,” Lila said.

  Richard tried to get her to explain, but she wouldn’t. He thought what she had seen was the problem, but that wasn’t it. It was the fact that she had seen anything at all. It was simply that on this night Lila knew that she could find out things she didn’t want to know. And she could feel it—it wasn’t the future she was seeing, but the past, and she grew so frightened that she couldn’t even go back into the kitchen alone, she had to ask Richard to walk in there with her and hold her hand.

  They finished the dishes together, but Lila wouldn’t talk to Richard, and later when he said he was going to bed she didn’t seem to hear him. He stood in the doorway, waiting; when he called her name sharply, the way you call to people you can’t seem to waken, Lila told him to go on without her. And as Richard walked down the hallway he had the distinct impression that it was Lila who was walking away from him, even though she was still in the kitchen, staring out into the yard.

  When Richard got into bed, Lila could hear the springs creak; the light from the crack under the bedroom door disappeared as he turned off the lamp. Lila called Rae at a little after eleven. Rae had already been asleep for an hour, and her voice was thick, but Lila could tell, right away, that Rae had been sleeping alone. She didn’t whisper the way she would have if her boyfriend had been there with her. You could hear the raw sound of betrayal in her tone.