Simmee sucked in her breath.
“Not on a date, exactly.” It seemed extremely important that I get this right. If I was finally going to tell the story, I wanted it to be the truth. “He asked me to meet him that night at a park by my house. I was so excited.” I hugged myself again. “I felt like…he made me feel older, like I could finally have something Rebecca couldn’t have. You never had a brother or sister, so it’s probably hard for you to understand.”
“I understand,” she said. “I seen it with Jackson and Larry all the time. Jackson and all his brothers.”
“So you get it,” I said. “Boys never even looked at me. I was gawky. I was very easily seduced.” I hunted for a simpler word. “Easily—”
“I know what you mean,” she interrupted.
“I started sneaking out to meet him at the park nearly every night.” I hated this memory. I wanted it to belong to someone else. Not me. “We’d go riding around in his car. I couldn’t believe how lucky I was to be with him.”
“Did he try to do it with you?” Simmee asked.
I shook my head. “He was too smart for that,” I said. “He kissed me a couple of times, but he wanted to reel me in slowly.” The thought of the kisses that had thrilled me then sickened me now. “We’d just drive around. He’d give me beer or a joint—”
“Weed.”
“Right. I hated it, but pretended I loved it so he’d like me. I thought I was having grown-up kind of fun for a change.”
Simmee smiled uncertainly, and I looked away.
“Becca was miserable, and I…I felt a little guilty, but I was too happy to really care.” I remembered how Zed talked about my parents. What assholes they were for not letting Rebecca see him. How much braver I was than my sister for sneaking around behind their backs. I always squirmed when he put down my parents.
“Finally, one night, he forced himself on me.”
“Oh, no,” Simmee said.
I wrapped my hands around the sugar bowl. What had I expected to happen? That Zed would be content to drive around with me night after night with nothing more than a kiss before dropping me off at the park again? In my fourteen-year-old fantasy world, I’d imagined us getting married one day. I saw myself as a virgin on our wedding night. I’d been incredibly stupid.
I couldn’t tell Simmee the details. It was bad enough to remember them myself. My skin still crawled at the thought of him running his hand up my bare thigh, pushing the leg of my shorts to one side. I still couldn’t wear shorts without feeling exposed and vulnerable. You wore the right thing tonight, Maya, he’d laughed, unzipping his jeans. You won’t even have to take these off.
I fought him, but he was so much stronger than I was. You wanted to be like Rebecca, didn’t you? he’d said.
Why didn’t I scream? I was so scared someone would come and I’d get in trouble, and that seemed even worse than what was happening to me. Still, when he rolled his body between my legs and I felt his penis tear into me, I would have howled if he hadn’t slapped his hand across my mouth. I cried instead, my body shaking as he ripped the innocent child right out of me.
“He raped you,” Simmee said.
“I thought I deserved it because I was sneaking out with a boy my parents hated.” How did this sound to Simmee? Fourteen probably didn’t seem too young to have sex for the first time. “Did you and Tully…? You were just fourteen when you met him.”
Simmee’s eyes widened. “Oh, no. We didn’t do nothin’ like that, and he sure never would of raped me.” She nearly smiled. “I probly would of done it with him, but he treated me like a kid sister in the beginning. I was fifteen the first time, an’ he used condoms till we decided to have a baby.”
“Really?” I hadn’t expected that level of sophistication from Tully, or that her baby had actually been planned.
“Did you tell anybody he raped you?” Simmee asked.
“No.” I rubbed my neck. “And I kept on seeing him. He told me if I didn’t, he’d tell Rebecca what was going on, and I didn’t know what to do. How to…save myself.” I stared out the window, my gut roiling. “I was a wreck. I stopped hanging out with my friends because I couldn’t talk to them any longer. They were talking about the fourteen-year-old boys in our school, and I…I was so screwed up.”
“What’s it have to do with your parents getting kilt, though?” Simmee asked.
“I got pregnant,” I said.
She sucked in her breath. “You did? You had a baby?”
“No. No.” That baby would be twenty now. In my weakest moments, I pictured him or her. Imagined the love between us.
“You had one of them miscarriages,” Simmee said softly.
“No.” I folded my hands beneath my chin. “My father…he noticed I was getting sick in the mornings, because he drove me to school every day.”
“He figured it out?”
I nodded. My good, gentle Daddy. “Instead of taking me to school one day, he took me to the park—the same one where Zed and I hung out at night. He said he knew something was wrong. He was really, really kind.” My voice broke, and I wasn’t sure I’d be able to go on.
Simmee reached over to smooth her hand over mine on the table. Back and forth. Back and forth.
“I started crying and told him everything,” I was finally able to say.
“I’m sorry, Miss Maya,” Simmee said.
“I expected him to get angry with me, but he held me. He rocked me in his arms like I was a little girl. He said he’d help me. I didn’t understand much about abortion—” I looked up at her. “Do you know what an abortion is?”
“’Course,” she said.
“He said he wouldn’t put me through having a baby. He was going to arrange an abortion for me without telling my mother, and he was going to make sure Zed never came near me again. I felt terrible that I was going to have an abortion,” I said, “because my mother had taught me it was wrong. But I also couldn’t imagine myself pregnant. I especially couldn’t imagine giving birth. I viewed the whole thing through a child’s eyes.”
“You was a child,” Simmee said. “I think I was older when I was fourteen than you were.”
“I think you’re right,” I agreed.
“So what happened?”
“I told Zed that my father knew everything and that I was pregnant and was going to have an abortion. He was furious. He said it was his baby, too, and I had no right to get rid of it. He wanted to know where I would have the abortion so he could go there and blow the place up, and he said if my father thought taking a life was no big deal maybe he deserved to have his life taken. I think that’s when I realized he was crazy, and I was so glad my father was going to make him stay away from me.” It wasn’t until years later that I learned my father had retained a lawyer and planned to have Zed locked up for statutory rape. Another father might have tracked him down and beaten him to a pulp, but Daddy was far too civilized for that. “So Daddy took me to the clinic and I had the abortion,” I said. “When we got home, though…” I looked at Simmee. “This is so hard to remember.”
“Tell me.” She tightened her hand around mine, just a little.
“We were in the driveway, and my mother ran out of the house and I thought she’d figured out where we’d been. I was terrified of what she’d say. I was mostly terrified of her…her disappointment in me. She opened the car door and I expected her to…I don’t know. To yell, I guess. But she got in and slammed the door shut and screamed at my father to drive.”
“Why?” Simmee frowned.
“Because Zed was there. In the driveway. I didn’t realize it right away, because he was wearing a ski mask…a mask that covered his whole face. Except for his eyes.” I swallowed hard once. Twice. “That’s how I knew it was him. His eyes…he was holding a gun.” The old terror swelled inside me, and I heard my mother’s screams. “I ducked behind the driver’s seat, and then he started shooting. Blood was…it was everywhere, and the gun was so loud.” I pulled my hand from Simm
ee’s to cover my ears, as though I could block out the sound of gunfire and breaking glass that still filled my nightmares.
“Maya,” Simmee said softly, and somewhere I registered the fact that she had never simply called me Maya before, omitting the Miss, as though we were suddenly equals in age. In social status. In heartbreak. She reached for my hand where it covered my ear, and drew it back to the table, cradled it in both of hers. Her eyes were red. “Poor little girl,” she said.
“My sister.” My voice broke. “Rebecca came out of the house and threw something at him. This boot cleaner we had.” I pictured the boot cleaner on Lady Alice’s porch. “She threw it at Zed. And he ran away. I didn’t see any of what happened, because I was hiding behind the seats.”
“Did the sheriff ever catch him?”
“The police did, yes. Rebecca told them he was one of my father’s students who was angry over something. That was true. He was one of Daddy’s students. She didn’t say anything about him being her ex-boyfriend, and I didn’t say anything about my connection to him either, because then Rebecca would have known that it was my fault our parents were…gone. The cops went to the place he was living and there was a shootout and Zed was killed.”
“Good,” Simmee said. “He deserved it.”
“Becca and I never talked about it,” I said. “I know she probably blamed herself, just like I did. Like I still do. I was always afraid she’d somehow figure out it was all my fault.”
“It wasn’t your fault,” Simmee said. “Not even a little bit. You said yourself, you was just a kid. You wasn’t the one that shot the gun.”
“It still feels like it was my fault. That’s how it’s always going to feel.”
“Just how I feel like my mama dyin’ was my fault, but you were right. It wasn’t. I was a baby, and you was a kid. Ain’t neither of our faults.”
I looked at the table, where she had locked her fingers with mine. “The abortion left scars,” I said. “They think that’s why I keep losing my babies.”
Simmee unlaced our fingers and turned my hand over, peering at my palm. “What you told me explains somethin’ I seen here,” she said, her fingertip lightly touching my palm. “Here on your lifeline. This little square? It’s s’posed to mean you been in prison sometime, but I knew you wasn’t the type that ever was in prison. Now I get it though.” She looked at me. Bit her lower lip. “You made a prison right inside your own head.”
39
Rebecca
REBECCA’S PATIENT, A MIDDLE-AGED WOMAN WITH A MIGRAINE, leaned toward her, “Oh, good Lord,” she whispered, pointing to the corner of the busy clinic, “look at that.”
Rebecca turned her head. In the corner, Adam was bandaging a shoulder wound on a guy whose entire back was covered by a tattoo. A bald eagle sailed across a blue sky, the American flag waving in a breeze behind the bird’s wing.
Rebecca swiveled back to her patient, giving her a look of mock horror. “Yikes,” she said quietly as she handed the woman a bottle of pills. Her own head was still a bit achy, though her cold was nearly gone.
“Why would anyone do that to his body?” the woman asked.
“No way!” The man suddenly shouted so loudly that everyone in the room turned to look. Rebecca saw him leap to his feet, his hand over the bandage on his shoulder. He couldn’t have been more than eighteen.
Adam, syringe in hand, looked up at him in surprise. “You really need a tetanus shot,” he said. “You said the hinge was rusty and—”
“Uh-uh!” The guy grabbed his T-shirt from the gurney. “I’m scared of needles, man!” he shouted, heading for the classroom door.
Adam looked over at Rebecca and burst out laughing, and half of the people in the clinic, patients and staff alike, joined in.
“Oh, good Lord,” Rebecca’s patient said again as she stood to go. “Do you believe it?”
Rebecca smiled. It felt so strange to smile. So very strange.
That morning, she’d told Adam that she’d broken up with Brent—although she didn’t tell him Brent’s response. Brent had hesitated a moment after she told him, then asked, “So who are you fucking there?” His assumption—and the way he delivered it—irritated the hell out of her. It was only his hurt and disappointment coming through, she knew, but it still irked her. Breaking up with him had been the right decision. The relief she felt in every cell of her body told her so.
She was cleaning her examining table, readying it for her next patient, when a teenage boy suddenly burst into the room. His blond hair was so long that, at first glance, she thought he was a girl,
“My mother passed out in the hallway!” he shouted.
Rebecca glanced at Adam. He was shaking hands with a woman who held a squirming little boy in her arms. “I’ve got it,” she said, and started to follow the boy out of the clinic. Fainting in the airless hallway while waiting to see the clinic staff was nothing new. Fainting anywhere in the school was nothing new.
In the hall, she saw people huddled around the woman on the floor.
“Let me through!” she said, and when they parted, she caught her breath. Maya? The woman was Maya’s height and weight and her blonde hair was cut in Maya’s chin-length style. Rebecca rushed forward, filled with irrational hope. She dropped to the floor next to the pale, unconscious woman, knowing she was not her sister, yet still wishing there was some miraculous way to turn her into Maya.
She rested her fingers on the woman’s neck, searching unsuccessfully for a pulse.
“Run back to the clinic,” she told the boy. “Tell Dr. Pollard we need the crash cart. Hurry!”
Rebecca raised the woman’s polo shirt and began chest compressions, ignoring the sickening feeling in her own chest as she crunched down on her patient’s rib cage. In less than a minute, she heard Adam pushing the crash cart toward her in the hallway.
“Ambu bag!” she called. Glancing toward him, she saw the startled look on his face as he took in the woman’s features. He sank to the floor opposite Rebecca. Attaching the monitor leads to the woman’s chest, he whispered, “For a minute I thought—”
“I know,” Rebecca said.
Adam pressed the bag to the woman’s mouth and began squeezing it. “EMS driver’s getting the backboard,” he said.
Rebecca glanced at the monitor. Nothing. She took the paddles from the defibrillator and Adam leaned back as she delivered the shock. Come on, honey, she whispered.
The monitor registered an irregular series of beats that eased into a thready, sluggish rhythm. Good enough for now, she thought.
The EMS driver appeared carrying a yellow backboard. “The medics are at the hospital,” he said. “I’ll drive, but you two’ll have to come with her.”
“Great,” Adam said under his breath.
He wouldn’t be familiar with the back of an ambulance, Rebecca thought, but disaster work had made her a Jill of all trades. She’d be able to find what they needed. If she did one thing today, it was going to be to save the life of this woman who looked so much like Maya.
Inside the ambulance, Adam quickly intubated the woman with the ease of an anesthesiologist, despite his grumbling about the equipment, while Rebecca started a second IV. Like we’ve been working together all our lives, she thought. The driver turned on the siren, but the roads were filled with potholes and the going was slow. They’d all be deaf by the time they reached the hospital, but she didn’t care as long as they could keep their patient’s heart pumping and oxygen flowing. That was all that mattered.
When they finally arrived in the E.R., the woman was quickly whisked into one of the treatment rooms. Rebecca watched the doors close behind the gurney, and bit her lip, folding her hands together almost as if she was praying. She glanced at Adam.
“Wow,” he said. “That was spooky.”
“I’m just glad we got her back,” Rebecca said, then winced at her words. “You know what I mean.” She nodded toward the door. “This patient.”
He nodded, giving her an
empathetic smile. “I know exactly what you mean.” He tossed an arm across her shoulders. “We’re a team, you and me,” he whispered, as if no one should hear. As if it was a secret.
A few minutes later, she and Adam were in the ambulance once again, heading back to the school. This time, though, Adam drove and Rebecca sat in the passenger seat. The EMS driver had bumped into his elderly aunt in the waiting area of the E.R., and he wanted to stay with her. He’d handed Adam the keys. “I’ll find a ride back later,” he’d said.
There was far less traffic on the road leading away from the hospital than there had been leading to it, and they were quiet in the ambulance. Rebecca was tired, both from the tail end of her cold as well as from the frantic effort to save their patient. But she felt exhilarated, nevertheless. High from saving a life. She leaned against the door as they bounced along the road, her gaze on Adam. He was smiling, and she guessed he felt the same euphoria that she was feeling. We’re a team, you and me. His perfectly shaped fingers tapped the steering wheel to music only he could hear, and he nodded his head to a soundless rhythm. His hair was too long, curling over the collar of his uniform vest. She felt an unexpected joy at being with him, and then an ache that stretched across her chest and rose high into her throat.
She loved him.
He glanced at her and she wondered if the emotion, so raw and exposed and wrong, was written all over her face. If he were not her brother-in-law, she might have said something provocative. Suggestive. Instead, she felt her throat grow red and hot, and quickly looked away. Uncomfortable, she reached toward the cluster of knobs and buttons on the dashboard. “Is this the radio?” she pointed to one of the buttons.
“Looks like it,” he said.
She started to push the button just as they hit a pothole. Losing her balance, she leaned hard on the console and its array of toggle switches between their seats. Suddenly, the siren began to blare.