Carefully stitching my mouth together with shiny black thread.
In one lip and out the other.
Father keeping my head locked in a vise as I shrieked and shook and bawled until I couldn’t. Until nothing came out.
The brown stain turned startling red.
They made me stay like that for one entire day—my lips sewn closed, so I had to breathe through my nose and talk in whimpers. Squint and you can still see the scars—lip rings, I’d tell anyone who asked me later.
I kept my mouth shut the morning the policeman came because I could still feel the sewing needle going in and out and in and out of me. I could still see my Raggedy Ann mouth in the streaked bathroom mirror. I can still see it today.
After the man left, they locked me in the punishment place.
NO . . . please, please . . . I’m sorry . . . I’ll be good . . . please, I’m scared, Mother, please . . .
* * *
—
I’d made it to the end of the block without knowing how I’d gotten there. Like when that woman found me leaning against the car and called the police. It had magically rained on both cheeks.
Behind the rhododendron bushes were two squirrels and a dog’s un-picked-up shit.
I suddenly wanted to get back inside.
I returned as slowly as I had come—not because I was waiting for Becky to jump out and yell boo anymore, but because it felt like I was learning to walk all over again, like in those dreams where you’ve forgotten how. One foot, then the other, then the first foot again, and there I was, walking back down the block, up the front walk, and into the front door.
Up the stairs, down the polished wooden hallway that smelled of lemon Pledge and into my room, which used to be the den, which is why the family computer was there. The computer I hadn’t bothered to switch off or, worse, the one where I hadn’t even bothered to log out of the Facebook page sitting in plain view on the screen. Ben’s Facebook page. I’d forgotten.
His school backpack was in plain view too, slumped onto the chair.
How was that possible?
Then I heard music. A guitar riff that seemed to lift me right off the floor and up against the screen where Ben—who’d obviously decided to cut school and come back into the house—had left a Word document blocking some, but not all, of the memorial page entry about the day Jenny disappeared . . . The rest of the day is still kind of a blur, with the police coming and everyone starting to lose it . . .
The big brother who hardly said two words to me had managed to type three.
WHO ARE YOU?
* * *
—
I stayed in my room the rest of the afternoon, the way Jenny had after the fight over Goldy. I was drawing my own pictures—in my head, I mean. Ben talking to Mom and Dad when they got home, sitting them down and explaining the reason the girl upstairs knew all about Disney World and Grandpa, and playing Indians and the Fourth of July.
Because she’d read about them.
She hadn’t recalled things. She’d memorized them.
And another picture. The doorbell ringing halfway through Ben’s little speech—ding-dong—and Becky Ludlow striding in to join the party. And maybe a phone call from Hesse and Kline, who’d finished digging around and were ready to put me back on the hot seat.
You’re not safe in that house.
No kidding.
There were enemies within and enemies without.
Then I remembered something kind of odd.
About that Fourth of July Ben wrote about.
I thought I’d screwed up three times. That’s why I’d been boning up and left the computer on where Jefferson High School’s number one truant could come home and see it, leaving his backpack and a brief note.
But it wasn’t three.
It wasn’t.
It was four.
One of my last memories of her was at a Fourth of July party in our backyard. My uncle Brent blew off bottle rockets and cherry bombs, and Jenny and me wanted sparklers, but he wouldn’t give us any because he said we were too young. Maybe he was right about that, ’cause the next summer, he let me light a firecracker and I didn’t let go fast enough. I still have the scar.
One of his last memories of me. The summer when Uncle Brent refused to give us sparklers. The summer I disappeared on the way to Toni Kelly’s house.
When Mom asked me about Dad’s stepbrother, about Uncle Brent—I’d said, Oh, sure. I remember. Uncle Brent. You got mad at him because he let Ben light a firecracker once. On the Fourth of July, and Ben’s hand got burned and you got real upset at him.
But the summer Ben got his greatest wish—a real honest-to-God firecracker placed into his eager little hands—that was the next summer, when Uncle Brent was probably feeling sorry for him, Ben having been tragically transformed into an only child. His sister long gone, almost a year by then.
I hadn’t read Ben’s entry carefully enough.
I’d fucked up and made his memory my own.
I’d pictured that time of night when the lightning bugs start to blink on and off like loosely screwed-in porch lights, and I’d smelled the sticky orange ice on my hand and seen Ben and Brent leaning over by the dark hedge where Brent was going Shhh . . . shhh . . . before using the end of his cigarette to light the fuse. I’d heard the sharp pop against my eardrums, seen bits of blue fluttering into the air like confetti, and Ben trying to hold it in before the hot tears took over.
I was careless and I’d fucked up.
That was not the odd part.
Pay attention.
Not that I’d forgotten. That was not the odd part.
It’s that she had.
Sure I remember Uncle Brent. You got mad at him because he let Ben light a firecracker once. On the Fourth of July, and Ben’s hand got burned . . .
And she’d said, Yes, that’s right, Jenny, I was. Ben still has the scar . . .
Already missing one child and her second one almost gets his hand blown off at the Kristals’ annual Fourth of July blowout, where they’re finally trying to get things back to normal—trying being the keyword here, because how will things ever be normal again?—and Mom said, Yes, Jenny, yes . . . that’s right . . . yes . . .
Agreeing with me, as if I’d really, truly been there.
Something she had to know in her sleep couldn’t possibly be true.
SIXTEEN
I should’ve mentioned.
I’d written back to Facebook friend number 1,371. The profile was pretty much a blank slate. No hobbies. No photos. No interests. No playlists. No age, occupation, or hometown. Just a name—a first name, anyway. Lorem. Was that a boy’s or girl’s name?
Who are you?
Your Facebook friend. Who do you think?
Is this a reporter?
No. I’m NOT a reporter.
Is this you, BEN? Are you fucking with me?
I’m NOT Ben. I’m not fucking with you.
So who are you?
Your FRIEND. I told you.
Not after I go ahead and DE-friend you. That makes you an EX-friend.
I wouldn’t do that. You’re in danger. You need to be careful.
You said that already.
Are you? Being careful?
Soooooo careful. I’m staying away from black cats and not walking under ladders.
You need to keep your eyes open. You need to watch everyone.
Why’s that? Oh yeah. Because I’m not safe in this house. WHY’s that again?
Let’s just say they don’t have a very good track record keeping Jenny around, do they?
SEVENTEEN
I should’ve been thinking about bouncing.
Mentally packing up, saying so long to Mom and Dad and Ben and Uncle Brent and Aunt Trude and Sebastian and Melissa and Go
ldy and my new Sealy extra-comfort bed.
To the entire Kristal house, which someone was warning me I wasn’t safe in.
Lorem.
Who was three fries short of a Happy Meal. Your average internet troll taking time off from Fortnite and the latest rant from PewDiePie.
That’s what I kept telling myself, when I wasn’t telling myself the opposite.
That he knew something.
And was warning me for my own good. (Yeah, I’d decided Lorem was a he, after basically flipping a coin.)
Your friend, he swore.
My grandma used to play this game with me before she became persona non grata—tracing letters on my back and making me guess what she was spelling. I L-O-V-E Y-O-U being her go-to phrase, even as the sharp tip of her fingernail triggered wrenching chills up and down my spine. That should’ve been a lesson—love hurts.
The words on Facebook Messenger had the same effect.
You’re not safe . . .
I couldn’t shake the chill long enough to get warm.
I could hear Mom and Dad whispering about something in the kitchen.
I knew what that something was.
I’d heard them come home—Mom first, walking in sometime after five, then Dad about a quarter to seven—and I’d heard Ben down there being Chatty Cathy. Ben, who spoke about six words a week to them, and it was just like I’d pictured it, minus Becky Ludlow walking in, even though I knew that was just a matter of time—it wouldn’t be the landscaper walking through the front door next time.
Yeah. It was probably time to bounce.
Only I wasn’t going to.
I refused.
For one thing, Mom was making chicken and mashed potatoes again.
“I’m making your favorite tonight, Jenny,” she said cheerily. “How about helping me cook?”
You’re correct. I’d been expecting something else. Something along the lines of:
We need to talk, Jenny . . .
Or:
How could you do this to us, Jenny . . . ?
Or:
We’re calling the police, Jenny . . .
I’m making your favorite hadn’t made the list.
“So how was your day, hon?” Mom asked, taking a frying pan out of the cupboard.
“Yeah, what’d you do all day, Jenny Penny?” Dad said, staring at his iPhone on his way out of the kitchen.
I looked up Ben’s memorial page to get my facts straight and then forgot to log out, and Ben walked in and left a note for me: WHO ARE YOU?
“Not much,” I said.
“I worry about you,” Mom said. “Being by yourself all day.”
“It’s fine.”
It was fine. Everything was fine.
Mom was putting on an apron that said WORLD’S BEST MOM on it, a Mother’s Day present from Ben, I guess, before he began toking weed and leaving threatening notes for me. I was standing by the stove, having been given the job of peeling potatoes and dropping them into the pot of boiling water. When I picked up the first potato—it had those gnarly eyes on it, which makes you wonder why someone ever tried eating a potato in the first place—something even uglier flashed into my head, and I dropped the potato straight onto the floor.
“Sorry,” I said, as I gingerly picked it up.
The closet.
I was suddenly back inside it.
The one off the kitchen, which really made it a pantry.
No.
It wasn’t a closet. It wasn’t a pantry.
It was a cell.
The punishment place.
It’s so dark . . . I’m scared . . . please, I’m so scared . . . please let me out . . . please . . . I won’t misbehave . . . I won’t . . . I promise I won’t . . . Mother, please . . . PLEASE . . . I promise . . . I’ll be good . . .
The day I left, I counted the scratch marks on the back of the closet door. After fifty, I gave up. There was a ripped bag of moldy potatoes sitting on the floor. In the light of day, they looked like things you peel and eat and mash, instead of things you fear. But it was the smell that got me. I associate it with raw terror now. It smells like raw potatoes.
“You okay, hon?” Mom asked me.
I knew how I must’ve looked, which was not okay.
“That time of month,” I said.
“Sorry,” Mom said. “Can I get you some Midol?”
“I’m fine.” My hands were shaking. I hid them behind my back.
“Maybe this wasn’t exactly the best day to ask you to cook. Why don’t you go in the living room and lie down.”
“Honestly, it’s just cramps.”
“You sure?”
Mom was flouring the chicken, dropping the pieces of chicken into egg batter and then gently rolling them into the soft mound of white. Dad was in the living room watching a basketball game— I could hear the play-by-play. I needed to leave this room.
Only I needed to ask a question first.
“Where’s Ben?” I asked.
Mom stopped. She had white flour all over her hands, making it look like she was wearing gloves, the kind women used to wear in pictures from the fifties. “At his friend’s,” she said.
“Everything . . . okay with him?”
A mist of flour was drifting over the center island like a passing cloud.
“You know Ben . . . ,” she said.
Mom and I were cooking dinner. Dad was in the living room watching TV. How was your day, Jenny? they’d asked me. Another normal night in the Kristal house.
“Maybe I will go lie down,” I said.
I had to flee that stench. And the place it’d dragged me back to. Dad was lying on the couch staring at the Knicks game. I needed him to stare at me right this minute. To break down the closet door and rescue me.
“What’s the score?” I asked.
“Knicks down by a thousand,” he said morosely. “It might as well be.”
“Are they any good this year?”
“Not much.”
“Did that guy make a foul?”
“Yeah.”
He remained glued to the game.
I’m here, Dad. Me. Right here.
I’d stretched out on the orange love seat. I hadn’t been aware that my legs were splayed out in a right angle, but something I was aware of is that most times when I wanted attention—from men at least—this is how I got it. It was subconscious, or unconscious, not sure what the difference is exactly, only that it wasn’t something I set out to do but would somehow find myself doing. Like some weird blind reflex. That social worker who’d lectured me in juvie hall had asked me if I knew I was being provocative. Not to her— to Otis, the ancient black guard who’d escorted me into her office. I didn’t know it until she mentioned it. The way I’d slowly sauntered over to the chair, giving Otis a good long look at my ass. She’d thrown in my provocative behavior at the Charnows’ just to prove her point. Mrs. Charnow ratting me out for leaving the bathroom door wide open when I took a shower, just as Mr. Charnow passed by.
It’s understandable, she told me, you were sexualized at a very early age. But it’s not excusable. What happened to you as a child wasn’t your fault, she continued. But acting on it now is.
That’s what I was doing now, I guess, legs wide open enough to provide a peek. Acting on it. Falling into old habits I couldn’t seem to break.
“Did you miss me a lot, Dad?”
That got him to finally look over. And look.
I felt a sudden wave of nausea. Stop.
I quickly tucked my legs up under me, as Dad averted his eyes.
“Sure I did, honey,” Dad said quietly, his gaze directed somewhere over my left shoulder. “Of course I missed you. Why wouldn’t I?”
Fair question. Why wouldn’t a dad miss his daughter, except
that I could show him a mom who hadn’t missed hers. I used to sit at the front window and wait for her. I know—real Little Orphan Annie of me—but I honestly kept thinking she was going to show up any minute. Even though they kept saying she wasn’t—that she hadn’t wanted to take care of me anymore, so this was it and I better get used to it. A pang of a memory: eleven years old and watching a TV ad for a silver charm bracelet being hawked for Mother’s Day. Give her a token of your love, each charm something to do with your kid, like a soccer ball or a ballet slipper, and I was wondering what charms would be on my bracelet—a comic book, maybe—and I realized I was forgetting what she looked like, my mom, her actual face, and I asked them why she hadn’t loved me, my mom, just blurted it out like that, and they filled me in, just in case I was still confused on the matter. Oh, your mommy loved you, honey, she just loved Christy better . . .
I’d thought Christy was another girl. They laughed and wrinkled a glassine bag in front of me. Christina, Tina, Chris, Christy, Crystal . . .
“How much?” I asked him, not liking that tremor in my voice, as if the shaking in my hands had spread to the rest of me, wanting to physically sit on top of it. To squelch it.
“What?” he said.
“I never asked you what was it like. How much did you miss me?”
An announcer in a paisley suit was droning away on TV: He is swishing and dishing tonight . . . showing hustle and muscle in the lane . . .
“Very much, sweetheart,” Dad said, looking back over at me. “A lot.”
Now it was my turn to look away. At the blank wall, so he wouldn’t see me reverting into Jobeth. The version who hadn’t been left in that motel parking lot yet. The one who’d grab onto a parent’s leg and refuse to let go.
I wasn’t going to take off.
Consider it a promise.
I’d bounced around long enough. More than a fucking basketball.
There’d been too many years out there. Squatting in junked trailers with roaches. Sleeping in motel beds with snakes.
This was my last stop. My last chance.
Where I had a mom who came in to comfort me in the middle of the night. A dad able to pull pennies out of my ears.
Safe Page 11
