The Other F-Word

  “What were you doing in there, Hollis?” Malory asked, narrowing her eyes.

  Hollis smiled. “Not that it’s any of your business, Mal, but I was working on my monologue. Are you familiar with Our Town? Thornton Wilder? It’s a gem of a play. I’m auditioning for Emily.”

  This was an amusing lie, but not nearly as amusing as the look on Malory’s face, like she’d just sucked on a lemon. “That’s not true, and you know it.”

  “We saw Gunnar go in after you,” said one of the Size Zeros. “We know you were hooking up with him.”

  “How does it feel,” asked a girl with a preposterously large Starbucks cup, “being sloppy seconds?”

  “Skank,” another one murmured.

  “What can I say?” Hollis smiled. She opened her arms as wide as they would go. “My lifestyle is an abomination.”

  This was an in-joke between her and Malory, only Malory probably wouldn’t remember because the joke was born a lifetime ago, back when they were friends. Back when there were play dates and birthday parties, a gaggle of giggly girls in the backseat of some mom’s Subaru bound for Rice Park or Chuck E. Cheese. Malory wouldn’t remember, but Hollis would never forget.

  It was second grade, and the worst thing imaginable had just happened. Pam was dead, her ashes scattered by the wind, and Hollis’s whole reality was changed forever. She returned to school heartsick. Because Pam was gone. Because Pam was never coming back. Because once someone you love dies, once you really know loss, you can’t unknow it. And the last thing you want to hear, when you are seven years old and devastated, is this: “My mom says your mom’s lifestyle is an abomination.” But that is what Malory Keener said. She said it to Hollis on the monkey bars, casually, as though she were talking about something insignificant, like ice cream. My mom says I can buy ice cream at lunch. My mom says your mom’s lifestyle is an abomination.

  Hollis hadn’t known what abomination meant. But she did know how to read. So after school she looked it up. She used Pam’s dictionary. Abomination (noun): a thing that causes disgust or hatred. Synonyms: atrocity, disgrace, horror, obscenity, outrage, evil, crime, monstrosity.

  Disgust. Hatred. Evil. Those words Hollis knew.

  “Oh, honey,” Hollis’s mother said when Hollis told her. “Malory doesn’t know what she’s saying.”

  But that didn’t make Hollis feel better. She didn’t care if Malory was just a parrot repeating what her ignorant mother said. Malory had called Hollis’s family an abomination. This would have been bad enough on its own, but Malory’s comment came on top of the fact that when Pam was admitted to the hospital the nurse on duty had refused to let Hollis or her mother into the room because visiting privileges were “family only.” Committed lesbian partners were not “family.” Non-biological daughters were not “family.”

  Not family.

  An abomination.

  That day on the monkey bars, a hard, black seed of shame lodged itself in Hollis’s heart and stayed there, like a popcorn kernel stuck in a tooth. Malory might not remember, but Hollis would never forget. Which was why calling herself an abomination now, right after hooking up with Gunnar, right in Malory’s face, was so satisfying.

  Malory said nothing. She couldn’t even think of a comeback.

  “Ho,” one of the Size Zeros muttered.

  But Hollis just grinned. She gave a little Miss America wave as she walked off down the hall.

  * * *

  Milo called when Hollis was on the bus home. It was well past fifth period, but she was still riding high, picturing the look on Malory’s face when she called herself an abomination. Ha! Hollis thought, smiling out the window. In your face, Malory Keener. Hollis had taken back the power of the word. She owned it now. It was in this warm bubble of invincibility that Hollis was floating when Milo called, saying that he had their donor’s name.

  “What?” Hollis said.

  “I have his name.”

  It all came out in a rush. Milo had emailed the Twin Cities Cryolab last week, he said. He was sorry he hadn’t told Hollis sooner, but he knew how she felt about finding their donor, and, honestly, he thought she might be mad. Anyway, he hadn’t wanted to tell anyone until he actually heard back. Not his moms, because he didn’t want to freak Frankie out. Not Abby or Noah, because he didn’t want to get their hopes up. Because maybe the cryolab wouldn’t be able to give him any information. Maybe they wouldn’t even respond.

  “But they did,” Milo said. “I got the email this morning. I sent you, like, six texts. Why didn’t you hit me back?”

  “I was in class.”

  “I’ve been dying here.”

  “I never saw your texts,” Hollis said. This wasn’t a lie. She’d heard her phone ping when she was in the auditorium with Gunnar, but she’d turned it off before she read any messages.

  “I have his name,” Milo continued, “and his date of birth. They couldn’t give me a phone number or address because he lived in student housing at the time and they don’t know where he moved after college, but since he signed the willing-to-be-known waiver, he gave consent for his name and birthdate to be released upon request from his donor children, so…”

  “So…” Hollis said.

  “I know you said you didn’t want to know anything about him, and I respect that. I do. I’m not trying to pressure you or anything … this is my quest, and I’ll do it alone if I have to … but if you did want to know his name … it’s not like you’d have to do anything with it, you could just—”

  “Okay,” Hollis said.

  “What?”

  “You can tell me his name.”

  “Really?”

  “Sure.”

  Hollis was still floating in her bubble when Milo said the words … “William Bardo” … float, float, paddle, paddle … She didn’t feel a thing. Not anger. Not sadness. Not panic. Nothing. She didn’t feel a thing when Milo said the date of birth either. “September 23, 1978.” He might as well have been reading aloud from the phonebook for all it affected her.

  “Huh,” Hollis said, smoothing Chapstick over her lips. They were still sore, puffy from kissing. Gunnar was a great kisser. Malory must really miss kissing him.

  “I haven’t done much,” Milo continued, “besides Google his name. Four hundred and twenty-three thousand William Bardos in less than a minute … but we could cross-reference the search with his age … if he was born in 1978, he must have graduated around 2000, and we know he went to college in or around the Twin Cities, so we could cross-reference that…”

  “Right,” Hollis said. “Uh-huh.”

  She was being a good friend, she thought … float, float, paddle, paddle … She was being a supportive half sister. Her decision to learn her donor’s name may have been hasty, but her intentions were good. Milo needed to do this. He had legitimate medical reasons for doing this. Hollis was just offering her support.

  “So, anyway…” Milo was still talking as she stepped off the bus. “I wanted to keep you in the loop.”

  “Thanks,” Hollis said.

  “I’m going to tell Suzanne and Frankie at dinner. And I’ll shoot Abby and Noah an email tonight. I’ll cc you.”

  “Cool.” Hollis took out her key, unlocked the front door.

  Silence for a second. Then Milo said, “Are you sure you’re okay with this?”

  “Do I sound like I’m not okay?”

  “You sound like you are okay.”

  “Well then,” Hollis said, “I’m okay.”

  “Okay,” Milo said. He hesitated. “I’ll check in later then.”

  “Sounds good.”

  “Keep your phone on.”

  “Yup.”

  Hollis opened the front door. She dropped her backpack onto the bench in the foyer. She walked through the hall, stepping over Yvette just like she always did. Idiot cat. It wasn’t until Hollis got to the kitchen and poured herself a Coke that she realized Yvette hadn’t come running when she opened the fridge. Yvette always came running when
she opened the fridge. Every time, even though Hollis refused to give her cheese the way her mother did. That stupid cat was programmed.

  Hollis whistled.

  Nothing.

  Okay, Yvette. You win.

  “Eeeeveeee!” she called out. “Cheeeese!”

  Nothing.

  Hollis knew before she knew. Before she actually walked back to the spot in the hall where Yvette was lying, curled up in a square of pale afternoon light shining through the window. Not moving. Not breathing. Staring into space.

  It was like a bowling ball to the gut. Hard, heavy, instant. Pam’s dumb, ugly cat was dead. Just like Pam. Hollis couldn’t bring herself to touch the body. So she grabbed the closest thing she could find, a checkered dishtowel, and covered Yvette as best she could. She took her phone out of her pocket. Her hands were shaking as she pulled up her contacts.

  “Hi, honey.” Hollis’s mother answered on the first ring. “I’m in the middle of a showing. Can this wait?”

  “Yvette’s dead,” Hollis said. Her voice was high and light. She sounded like a little kid.

  “What?”

  “Yvette’s dead, Mom. She’s dead. I just found her.”

  “I’m on my way.”

  Hollis didn’t remember walking into her mother’s bedroom. She didn’t remember putting on Pam’s bathrobe or curling up in a ball on the floor next to Pam’s dead cat.

  “Honey?”

  It could have been five minutes or an hour later that her mother appeared, leaning over Hollis, looking clean and pretty and concerned.

  “Mommy?”

  Hollis hadn’t called her mother “Mommy” since she was a little kid, but here Leigh was, blow-dried and competent in her pantsuit, kneeling on the floor and gathering Hollis up in a hug, rocking her.

  “Holl. Oh, honey. It’s okay.”

  “I was so mean to her.” Hollis burrowed her head into her mother’s neck, letting out a long, shuddering sob. “I was so mean to her and now she’s gone. I never got to say goodbye.”

  “It’s okay.” Hollis’s mother stroked her hair. “Shhh, baby. It’s okay.”

  But it wasn’t okay. It would never be okay. Because this wasn’t about Pam’s cat—although now that Yvette was gone, Hollis ached for her to be here, hocking up a fur ball on the rug, and that ache was both ridiculous and deep—this was about Pam.

  Pam.

  It was a lie that Hollis didn’t remember Pam. Of course Hollis remembered Pam. She remembered everything. Pam’s smell, like basil and brown sugar. Pam’s hands, a cook’s hands, calloused and scarred. At night, Pam used to tell Hollis the stories about her hands. “You see this one?” she’d say, pointing to a mark on her right thumb. “This is from the time I was making tamales and I stabbed myself with a knife while chopping jalapeños … and this one?” She’d point to the top of her hand. “This is where I got scalded with caramelized sugar.” Pam taught Hollis how to press garlic. How to crack an egg with one hand. The morning Pam went into the hospital, Hollis had wanted to make brownies, just the two of them, but Pam was too tired. She’d lost all of her hair by then. She looked like a garden gnome. Her fingernails were black. Her lips were peeling. But Hollis didn’t care what she looked like. She was still Pam, and they were going to make brownies. Hollis put on her apron. She greased the pan. She walked over to the couch by the fireplace and told Pam she was ready.

  “I’m sorry, sweet girl.” Pam was wrapped up in an afghan, her bald head propped on a pillow. “I’m too tired.”

  And Hollis said, “You’re always too tired.”

  “I’m sick.” Pam reminded Hollis of what she already knew, that cancer wasn’t like a cold. It wasn’t like an ear infection.

  “I know what it is! I hate cancer!”

  “Snuggle with me,” Pam suggested weakly. Every word was an effort, like laying an egg. “We can watch TV.”

  This is where it happened. This is where Hollis said it. “I don’t want to snuggle you! I hate you! You ruin everything!” She ran upstairs and locked herself in her room.

  A little while later, the ambulance came. Hollis remembered the men in the white coats. She remembered her mother telling her to put on her shoes. She remembered Pam getting carried out on a stretcher. She remembered still being mad about the brownies.

  Remembering hurt so much she wanted to scream.

  “I never got to say I was sorry.” Her voice was strangled now. “I never got to say goodbye.”

  Hollis’s mother pulled away and looked at her. “Oh … sweetheart. You’re not talking about Yvette, are you?”

  Hollis shook her head and swiped at her eyes with her sleeve.

  “Listen to me. Pam knew you loved her.”

  “No she didn’t. You don’t know. You were in the shower.”

  Her mother looked confused.

  “That morning. Before the ambulance came, you were in the shower. I said terrible things to her.”

  “Like what?”

  “I told her she ruined everything. I told her I hated her … I didn’t mean it. I was just mad. I wanted to make brownies and she was too tired…” A fresh sob burbled out of Hollis’s throat.

  “Oh, honey.” Hollis’s mother stared at her. “Have you been holding on to that all this time?”

  Hollis nodded.

  “You listen to me. Listen to your mother because I am going to keep on saying this until you believe it because this is the truth. Pam knew you loved her. No matter what you said to her that day. And she loved you. Every part of you, Hollis. She loved your fighting spirit. She loved that you spoke your mind and you didn’t let people push you around, even as a little girl. Especially as a little girl. And you know what? You got that spirit from her. You didn’t get it from me. If I had been the one with cancer, Pam never would have let that ignorant wench at the hospital tell her she wasn’t my family and couldn’t go into that room. She would have clawed her way in. She would have gotten a court order and—”

  “Did you just say ignorant wench?”

  Hollis’s mother half smiled. “Pam loved the word ‘wench.’”

  “She did?”

  “She did. And that nurse was the worst kind of bigot. That hospital was the worst example of institutionalized discrimination. If I could go back in time … the fact that I didn’t try harder … you not being allowed to say goodbye to Pam is something that will haunt me forever.”

  It’s weird how it happens, how you can be feeling completely sorry for yourself and then someone says something, just a few words, really, and suddenly everything shifts. “Mom,” Hollis said, squeezing her mother’s hand. “It’s not your fault.”

  “Of course it’s not my fault. And it’s not your fault. And feeling guilty isn’t going to bring Pam back. And it’s not going to bring Yvette back either.” Hollis’s mother flashed a sad little smile at the lump under the dishtowel.

  “We should bury her,” Hollis said. “In the backyard, by the bench Pam used to sit on.”

  Her mother nodded. “I think that would be perfect.”

  * * *

  As it turns out, digging a cat grave in the backyard in Saint Paul, Minnesota, in the second week of January is harder than you might think. They tried a trowel. Then they tried a shovel. Finally, they tried a chainsaw.

  “Since when do we have a chainsaw?” asked Hollis when her mother dragged it out of the basement.

  “I can’t remember. Pam bought it for something.”

  “Well … do you know how to use it?”

  “I think I can figure it out,” her mother said.

  “Are you sure? Because I don’t want you to chop your hand off.”

  “Holl.” Her mother shot her a look. “I’ve been figuring things out by myself for a while now. I can unclog a toilet. I can change a tire. I’m pretty sure I can work a chainsaw.”

  And she did. She actually did. It wasn’t pretty, but Hollis’s mother chain-sawed a hole in the frozen ground and she and Hollis gently lowered Yvette, wrapped in—of
all things—Pam’s bathrobe.

  “Are you sure?” Hollis had said when her mother suggested she take the bathrobe off so they could use it as a burial blanket.

  “It’s warm,” her mother said.

  “But you love this robe.”

  “And Pam loved Yvette.”

  Well. Hollis couldn’t argue with that.

  Holding a cat funeral was weird enough, but holding a cat funeral when the person who loved the cat was also dead was particularly weird. Yvette was in the ground. Yvette, who had been warm and vital that morning, who had been able to lick herself and purr and stretch in the sun, was now gone forever. Just like Pam was gone forever. It made Hollis’s stomach clench, thinking about it. She watched her mother shovel the random bits of frozen dirt and grass that had flown off the chainsaw back into the hole, on top of the bathrobe. “Poor kitty,” Leigh said softly.

  “Yeah.”

  Her mother tamped down the dirt with the back of the shovel. She propped the shovel against the bench. Now what were they supposed to do, say something? What did people say at cat funerals?

  “Yvette,” her mother said, clasping her hands in front of her chest, “I remember the day we brought you home … Your fur was so soft. Your tongue was like a tiny scrap of sandpaper…”

  “This is so weird,” Hollis muttered.

  “It’s not that weird.”

  “You just chain-sawed a grave for a dead cat wrapped in a bathrobe. And now you’re talking about her tongue.”

  “Yvette wasn’t just any cat,” her mother said, squashing the dirt with the bottom of her foot. Her boot left a tread mark. “She was a present from me to Pam.”

  “She was?”

  “After our third in-vitro attempt didn’t take, and we weren’t sure we would ever have a baby, I went out and bought Pam a kitten.”

  “You never told me that.”

  “No?” Her mother’s face looked calm, almost tranquil, not a tear in sight. Hollis didn’t want to say anything to ruin it.