Текст книги "Asking for It"

Автор книги: Lilah Pace

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Текущая страница: 19 (всего у книги 20 страниц)

Thirty-three

After dropping Geordie off, I don’t return to the studio. My concentration is shot. Instead I head home, take a long shower, and go to bed early. Since Friday night, I’ve been riding various adrenaline rushes, from desire to terror to fury; by this point, I’m ready to drop.

I slide into bed and turn out the lights, but sleep eludes me at first. Too wired. So I lie there on my side, wearing an oversized T-shirt from a charity 5K I ran two years ago, exhausted, unsexy, and very much alone.

Alone isn’t the worst thing, I remind myself. My sister is probably lying in the same bed as Anthony right now. I’ll take my fate before hers any day. Besides, at the moment, I need the kind of silence only solitude provides.

Someday soon, I’ll figure out what to think of all this. I’ll come to terms with losing Jonah, and find out if my friendship with Geordie is going to survive, and hold my own within the new dynamics of my family. Doreen will help me. So everything’s going to be okay.

I tell myself this. For the most part, I believe it. But I remember how I fell asleep the night before last—how safe I felt in Jonah’s arms. It seems as if I’ll never feel that safe again.

Right now he’s in his fancy downtown apartment, as alone as I am. I wonder if he’s already taken down my etching.

Probably he has. Yet I hope he hasn’t. That way one thing I gave him—one message straight from my soul into his—that would live on.

•   •   •

My phone rings not long after four A.M.

Fuck, I think grumpily. Just when I’d fallen deeply asleep. If this is a wrong number, I swear to God—

But then I remember Dad’s surgery. Panic grips me as I lunge across my bed to snatch my phone from its charging dock. Dad could be okay—Chloe could be calling just to yell about Anthony, or maybe this is Geordie telling me to sod off, or—or it could be Jonah—

None of the above.

Frowning, I answer, “Arturo?”

“You were asleep, weren’t you?”

“At—four seventeen in the morning? Strangely enough, yes. What in the—” My voice trails off as I realize the answer to my own question.

Arturo says it out loud. “You told us, when Shay went into labor, you wanted to know first thing. Well, we’re heading to the hospital now.”

“Oh, my God.” As weary as I am, I laugh out loud. “Is she feeling okay?”

“She’s doing great so far.”

In the background I hear Shay yell, “What do you mean great? Something the size of a watermelon is trying to come out of my—ohhhhhhhhh—”

“We gotta go,” Arturo says hastily. “Come to the hospital when you can!” With that he hangs up.

Labor can take a long time. Sometimes even days. I’ve spent some time leafing through Shay’s dog-eared copy of What to Expect When You’re Expecting, so I know the average length of a first-time labor is eight hours. I could certainly go back to bed and get some more much-needed sleep, and I’d probably still make it to the hospital before Shay gives birth.

Instead I text Carmen. Which one of us is picking up the coffee?

Immediately she sends back, I’ve got it. See you there!!!!

Seton Central is all the way on the other side of town from my house, but at this time of night, the roads are empty. I get to the hospital within twenty minutes to find Carmen already pacing in the waiting room. Her outfit makes me giggle—a silver and black San Antonio Stars jersey and hot pink sweatpants—but I’m one to talk in my oversized fleece top and faded jeans. Carmen knows why I’m snickering and sticks her tongue out at me. “Laugh it up.”

“Sorry, sorry, I’m tired. Everything’s funny.”

And it is. A few hours ago I felt worn out and hopeless, but I guess the baby decided to remind me of all the good things still waiting in the world.

We drink our coffees and walk up and down the halls, watching the sun rise. Carmen tells me about the conversations she’s had with Arturo over the past few days. “When he finally understood how freaked out I was about my graduate work, he told me I was being an idiot. Which was not exactly a helpful thing to say—but I knew what he meant. And Arturo said neither of us would let anybody down.”

“Because you’re both smart, and determined, and probably the two most together people I know,” I say.

But Carmen shakes her head no. “He said it was because we were the most bullheaded people on earth. If we say we’re going to do it, it gets done.” She pauses. “Unless, like, a meteor hits the earth or something.”

“I think we can give you a provisional meteor exception.”

“Thanks.”

Shay’s baby might have gotten an early start this morning, but is apparently in no rush. Carmen and I breakfast on reconstituted orange juice and stale pastries in the hospital cafeteria. You’d think a place dedicated to health wouldn’t serve this kind of junk. (Maybe they’re trying to drum up future business.) We leaf through “women’s magazines” that are all about fugly crafts and baking and seem to be an average of eleven months old. We pace around the waiting room like Ricky Ricardo in that old episode of I Love Lucy. None of it makes the baby come any faster.

At one point, just to make conversation, Carmen says, “So what’s up with you and Jonah?”

All my exhaustion seems to descend on me again in a second. I sigh and lean back in my chair. “I don’t know.”

“You guys seemed pretty into each other at the party.” Carmen bats her eyelashes, deliberately over-the-top, in an attempt to make me laugh. “What’s wrong?”

“He came home with me this weekend.”

She sits upright and stares. “Jonah Marks went home with you after your father’s heart attack?”

“Yeah.”

“Vivienne, that’s major.”

“I know.” I hug myself tightly, my fingers buried in the cranberry-colored fleece of my sleeves. “And having him there helped so much. But—”

“But what, after that? You can’t agree on the chapel for the wedding?”

It’s a joke, of course, but Carmen’s so far off-base it hurts. She understands that I don’t get along with my family, even if she doesn’t know exactly why. This means she knows something of what Jonah’s support meant to me. How can I possibly explain that it all fell apart within an hour? “I think maybe we rushed things.”

How inadequate. It’s all I’ve got.

Carmen frowns, and I know I’m about to get the full third-degree treatment from her—but that’s when Arturo appears in the doorway. He’s wearing blue scrubs and an enormous smile, and while he’s still the same guy I know, he’s someone else now too, somebody new.

We both get to our feet, clutching hands. Tears well in Arturo’s eyes as he says, “I have a son.”

Then we’re all crying, and hugging, and the weary, bitter world somehow feels brand new.

Visiting Shay and holding the baby have to wait for a little later in the day. Carmen stays at the hospital, but I run a few necessary errands—picking up food for the new parents to keep in their room, putting out their trash at home, et cetera. I even buy a few pale blue balloons and tie them to their doorknob, so the neighbors will know the good news.

And they’ll realize they need to buy earplugs now, I think as I smile. A newborn is moving in.

It’s almost lunchtime before I return to the hospital. As I look around for someone to ask about visiting hours, I hear a cheerful voice say, “Hello there!”

I turn to see Dr. Rosalind Campbell in her white coat and scrubs, looking nearly as tired as I feel. She wears a luminous smile nonetheless. “Hi,” I say. “Everyone’s okay?”

“Right as rain. A good, easy birth.”

Bet Shay doesn’t describe it as easy. Then again, an obstetrician probably has an entirely different frame of reference for this sort of thing. “When can I go in?”

“On the hour. But the baby’s in the nursery now, if you want to see.”

Just the thought of seeing this child—a brand-new person who is half Arturo, half Shay—fills me with delight. “Okay, I’ll head that way.”

“I’ve got another mother coming in any minute,” Rosalind sighs. “How do all the babies know to be born on the same day?”

She waves as she heads off. From her friendliness and ease, I can tell Rosalind still has no idea that Jonah and I have split. He wouldn’t have gotten around to telling anyone yet. It’s hard for me to remember that Jonah and I had our last terrible argument just over forty-eight hours ago. The safety I felt with him already seems to belong to another lifetime.

No. I’m not going to let anything drag me down right now. This is a special day—the birthday of someone I already love—and that should eclipse everything else.

I walk to the nursery, which is filled with infants bundled tight in white blankets, their tiny pink faces peeping out. Every single one of them is adorable, in the squished way that newborns are adorable. Like miniature Winston Churchills. They seem identical to me, until I look at one baby and recognize him. Because I know him already, even though he’s hours old. He has Arturo’s nose, and Shay’s stubborn chin, and I would know this kid anywhere.

When I tap on the window, one of the nurses looks up at me, amused but tolerant. They must get this all day. I point and say, “Can I see him?”

In response, the nurse lifts the baby up and holds him close to the window. He blinks in the weary confusion of the newborn.

Nicolas Gillespie Ortiz, I think. Welcome to the world.

They settle him back in his crib after only a few moments, but I stay where I am. Until he’s taken up to Shay’s room and I can visit with the whole family there, I might as well enjoy the sight of a dozen infants, all exhausted by their long journey into this life. Yet they sleep peacefully, and something about this sight quiets the anger and fear inside me as few other things ever have.

At one point, a young Chinese man stands there for a moment, looking at a tiny girl very near the window. I remember hearing the nurses whisper about him and his wife earlier: This baby’s a citizen. That means they get to stay in the United States. Which is great for them, I guess. But right now, that’s not what this man is thinking about. Instead he gazes down at his newborn daughter as if astonished to discover just how much love he can contain.

Someone else walks up not long afterward and comes to stand only a few steps from me. Nicolas is yawning his first yawn, so I don’t turn to see who has come close. Then I hear, “The baby looks just like his parents.”

I turn my head to see Jonah. His hands are jammed in the pockets of his navy blue coat; dark circles shadow his eyes. He stands there, awkward and uncertain. Probably that’s how I look too.

The difference is that I’ve never seen Jonah like this. His confidence defines him; his command of himself is as absolute as his authority over others. Now, though, he stands before me and lets me see how vulnerable he truly is.

I always thought of Jonah as a strong man, but this is the first time I’ve realized he is also brave.

“They’re all so new,” he whispers.

“Well, yeah.” My voice sounds calmer than I would have expected.

“I meant—the world breaks so many of us. Maybe all of us, in the end. But everyone starts out like this. Untouched, happy. Perfect. And we put all our hopes on children, all the hopes we can’t believe in for ourselves any longer.”

“Not all,” I say, but I know what he means. “It’s not really fair, is it? We expect so much of them, even when we let ourselves down.”

“Who knows. Maybe they’ll do better than we ever have. Eventually someone has to get it right.”

If only Nicolas could have that kind of life. For today, I refuse to think of all the disappointments and dangers ahead. Right now his world is only about food and warmth and love. Let him enjoy it.

Jonah doesn’t seem to have anything else to say yet, so I ask, “Rosalind called you?”

He shakes his head. “When I came into the office this morning, people were passing around a card for Shay. I signed it, did what I had to do, and then came straight here.”

“I’m sure she’ll appreciate that.”

“You know I’m not here for Shay.”

I hug myself more tightly. “Are you here to . . . what . . . take it all back?”

“No. I’m here to explain, if you’re willing to listen.”

What could Jonah tell me that would make everything all right? Nothing, I realize. But that’s not why he’s here. We can’t fix this; we were smashed up long before we ever met. Jonah only wants to tell me the truth. His truth.

And I should tell him mine.

I’ve come to realize that speaking the truth can be a form of love. Maybe listening can be too.

Thirty-four

Seton Central is located in a major urban area, not far from a highway—and yet, right next to it stretches Seider Spring Park. It’s a long, skinny green space that runs alongside the winding Shoal Creek Trail. Within a few minutes of leaving the hospital, Jonah and I are walking between trees, next to the water, seemingly away from the rest of the world—even though the distant roar of cars sometimes mingles with the rustling of leaves.

Pale skin, shadowed eyes, stubble, beat-up jeans beneath his coat: Jonah looks like hell. No doubt I do too. We’re long past worrying about appearances, yet I can’t help but notice.

Mom’s lessons die hard.

“I’m sorry I was so abrupt in the car,” Jonah says. “It was a difficult time for you, in many ways. I should’ve held it together for your sake.”

“You told me what you were honestly feeling. You don’t have to apologize for that.”

We walk on together, side by side. Our footsteps crunch on fallen leaves and drought-dry grass. In Austin we don’t get autumns of crimson leaves or winters of brilliant white snow. The year ebbs away into colorless cold.

Jonah finally asks, “Do you want to tell me what happened with Anthony?”

Once I thought I could never say this to anyone, least of all him. Yet now Jonah’s the only person I can imagine telling. “I was fourteen. He and Chloe were in college, dating. One night when he was visiting, Chloe went to bed early, and my parents did too. Anthony raped me on the couch.”

After a long moment, Jonah says, “He came on you. Didn’t he?”

God, graphic. But true, and nothing less than the whole truth will do anymore. “Yes, he did. I’ve hated that ever since.”

“You said you told Chloe and she didn’t believe you?”

I shake my head. “I told my mother and she didn’t believe me. Anthony told Chloe I tried to flirt with him, and she got angry with me for trying to steal her boyfriend. The week before her wedding, I made one last attempt at getting her to see who and what Anthony really is, and I tried to explain the whole story to her, but she didn’t want to hear it. Now my rapist is in the family, and he’s half of Libby, whom I love so much. That means he’s part of my life forever.”

Jonah’s gaze has turned inward, as if he’s studying my story from every possible angle. “I thought most rape victims couldn’t stand seeing even allusions to rape. Much less . . . what we did.”

“You’re right. Most rape victims have a very different reaction. But this is what it did to me. Who I am now.”

He nods, still deep in thought. “I should’ve realized,” he says quietly. “When you never wanted to fuck any other way—some of your limits—I should’ve known.”

“You have your limits, just like me,” I say. It’s mostly me parroting what Doreen and I talked about.

But then I find myself remembering that first night in the wine bar, when Jonah and I negotiated the terms of our arrangement. He asked me to defend him, not to injure him too badly, and—not to call him Daddy.

My stomach drops; nausea sweeps through me. My voice sounds strangled as I ask, “Jonah, did it happen to you too?”

“Was I raped? No.” But Jonah stands still, weighing his next words. “It was—so much more fucked up than that.”

What in the world could be more fucked up than that? I can’t imagine.

But I don’t have to imagine. I’m here, and I can listen. “Will you tell me?”

He doesn’t answer for a long time, long enough that I begin to think he’ll say no. Instead, he turns away from me, stares at the brook, and begins to speak.

“I was four years old when my father died. Not quite six when my mother married Carter Hale. Elise was five then, and both Rebecca and Maddox were two. They took formal portraits of the new family—you know, little suits for me and Mad, velvet dresses for the girls, Mom and Carter smiling. The money, the children, the airline, the real estate. They wanted the whole world to know they had it all.” He shakes his head. “No one ever guessed what was really happening behind the doors of Redgrave House.”

“Which was what?”

Jonah takes a deep breath. “The first time—the first time, it was late at night, and I heard my mother crying. I’d heard that before, after my father died. Sometimes it helped her if I came to her, gave her a hug, something like that. So I went to her bedroom. And Carter was . . .”

“They were having sex?” I say. That would freak out almost any kid, but surely even the archetypal Freudian event wouldn’t leave Jonah so deeply scarred.

He says, “Carter was raping my mother.”

“Oh, my God.” I can’t imagine seeing that, ever, much less as a small child.

“I didn’t understand.” Jonah’s voice breaks. “I had some idea of what they were doing, but my mother was crying. Bleeding. And then Carter saw me, and he was so angry. I thought he would beat me, but he did worse than that.”

“What?”

“He made me watch.”

Bile churns in my gut, and I think I might actually vomit. Who the hell does that to a child? Whose mind works that way? A monster. Only a monster. All these years I thought Anthony Whedon was the worst thing that could ever happen to me, but Carter Hale is another level of evil altogether.

“Carter took his time. I think I was in there an hour before he was done with her. He told me that—that this was what it meant to be a man. That this was what women wanted. What they deserved.”

All this time, I thought I was working out my darkest demons while Jonah just played our games for fun. Never did I dream what secret burden he might be carrying.

But even if I’d spent hours psychoanalyzing him, guessing what might underlie his own desires, I would never have guessed this.

“I didn’t believe him,” Jonah says. “I knew it couldn’t be right, the way he’d hurt my mother. But the next day, when I was alone with her, I asked her if we would run away. Mom said—she said it was just that way between men and women sometimes. She pretended everything was all right. I told myself that must be true.”

By now I remember how this story began. “Jonah, you said—you said, ‘The first time.’”

Jonah’s smile is sharper than any blade I’ve ever seen, maybe as sharp as the blade Jonah wishes he could hold to his stepfather’s throat. “Maybe it turned Carter on. He likes humiliating my mother, and what could be more humiliating than bringing her child in the room to watch? So he started coming into my bedroom when I was trying to sleep. He’d carry me into their room and wouldn’t let me leave. He made me say out loud all the things ‘Daddy’ was doing to her.”

I picture a small boy in his PJs, maybe with rocket ships printed on the cotton, having to speak those words. It’s as if the pain from that moment leaps through the distance and the years to pierce my own heart. “Oh, God, Jonah, I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.”

He doesn’t seem to hear me. Now that this terrible story has begun, he can’t stop until he’s gotten it all out. “At first Carter made me watch from the corner. After a while, he started making me sit on the foot of the bed. And a couple of times—he—Vivienne, Carter made me ride on his back.”

Jesus Christ. I’ve gone from feeling nauseated to feeling faint. If it’s this terrible for me to hear this, what must it have been like for Jonah to grow up this way?

“Eventually he made Elise watch too,” Jonah says. “We were able to keep him from ever starting in on Rebecca and Maddox, though. We protected them. Sometimes I think that’s the only truly good thing I’ve ever done, protecting them. So they get to be the normal ones.” He runs one hand through his hair. “If you think I’m screwed up, you should meet Elise.”

I imagine little Jonah and Elise suffering to keep the two babies safe, and their bravery tears through my heart. “When did he stop?”

“When did Carter stop raping my mother? Never, as far as I know. But when Elise and I got close to puberty, he stopped wanting us in the room while he did it. Maybe he had a touch of pedophilia mixed in with all his other psychoses. Or he thought we might finally be big enough to challenge him. At the time, I didn’t analyze the reasons why. I was just glad it was over.”

“And your mother never left him?” Of course not. They’re living on different floors of Redgrave House. I remember the news stories now—Jonah’s mother’s insanity, her violence.

No wonder the children haven’t turned on her. They know she’s mad because Carter Hale drove her mad.

“I used to ask her why she didn’t go,” Jonah says. “When I was little. I said she shouldn’t let Carter hurt her. But she told me—over and over, she told me, that’s how things are between men and women. She pretended nothing was wrong. And so in my head, that kind of violence, that kind of humiliation—to me, that was what sex was.”

He’s been reliving his worst memories. Letting his demons out to play. Each of us assumed the other was simply indulging a kinky fetish, when in fact we were shepherding each other through our nightmares.

“Obviously I learned the difference between sex and rape.” Jonah turns back to me. When our eyes meet, it feels like we’re looking at each other for the first time. “I knew I would never, ever do to anyone what Carter did to my mother. That I would defend any woman in that kind of danger, to make up for the times I wanted to defend my mother and didn’t. Yet deep inside, on a level I couldn’t consciously reach—I wanted something I could never allow myself to have.”

“Until we found each other,” I say.

“No. Knowing what happened to you . . . it changes everything.”

“Why?” I want to shake him. “You haven’t hurt me, Jonah. You’ve helped me. For some reason, what we do helps me work through this. I’ve felt so ashamed of myself for so long. So dirty. With you, I could let some of that shame go.” Why do I feel so much freer when I’ve surrendered to Jonah in that way? I don’t know, and yet I do.

Our games are the only escape from that shame I’ve ever had.

Jonah looks torn between anger and tears. “I’m glad it meant something to you. Something good. But the things I do to you—I can’t do that, knowing how you’ve suffered. Knowing that when we’re together, you’re reliving an actual rape—I just can’t.”

I cannot handle any of this for-your-own-good bullshit right now. “You’re leaving me to protect me?”

“No. I’m protecting myself.”

He gets to have limits, Doreen’s voice reminds me. Maybe I should restrain myself for Jonah’s sake, too. We’re dealing with horrible experiences, probably not in a very healthy way. Yet I still feel like I could scream, or shout, like I would do anything to keep him from walking away again.

“What we have goes beyond sex,” I say. “At least, it does for me.”

Jonah won’t look at me. “For me too.”

“So shouldn’t we at least try to love each other?” I take one step toward him. “We found each other—two people broken in the exact same way. That’s pretty rare.”

“And you think our broken edges would fit together, make us whole?” He looks so sad. So lost. “It doesn’t work that way. I wish it did.”

Is Jonah right? Maybe he is. Despite everything, I can’t make myself believe that.

But I also can’t make Jonah stay.

“Is this good-bye?” I ask.

Jonah opens his mouth to say yes—I can sense the word on his lips—but instead he says, “I don’t know.”

Hope seizes me. He wants things to be different. He doesn’t seem to know how they could be, and I don’t either, but if we both want that, maybe there’s still a chance.

“You know where to find me,” I say. “Even if it’s not, you know, about us. If you just want to talk.”

He gives me a look. I don’t think Jonah makes a habit of sharing his troubles with anyone. However, after a moment he says, “You can talk to me too.”

Jonah has now become the only person besides my therapist who fully understands what’s going on with me. I’ve needed someone like that in my life. But Jonah and I will never have the kind of transition to friendship that Geordie and I have—or had, before I confronted Geordie last night.

What we have cuts too deep. Matters too much. Jonah and I will find our way back to each other, or we’ll drift apart forever. We won’t wind up with anything in between.

In either case, our future won’t be decided today. It will take a long time for us to weigh the truths we’ve learned, and told.

“I should leave,” Jonah says.

Don’t walk away. Don’t go. But this intensity is too much to bear for both of us. We have to leave the wreckage of our pasts and go back to the lives we’ve built. “Me too. I’m supposed to go see Shay and the baby.”

“Tell them congratulations.”

Does he mean it, or is it just something to say, words to fill the silence? Both, probably. “Okay. I will.”

We walk together through the park, the only sounds our feet crunching on dry grass, the distant rumble of traffic, and the water flowing next to us. Neither of us is walking very quickly. Jonah wants to stretch this moment out as much as I do, I realize. The difference is, he’s willing for this moment to be our last.

I’m not. But how do I change that, if I even can?

Only when we reach the edge of the park does Jonah speak again. “I’ll never forget you.”

Goddammit, now I’m going to cry. “I won’t forget you either. Like I ever could.”

He smiles unevenly at me. “I’ll think of you every time I see your picture on the wall, of the man capturing the dove.”

“He’s not capturing the dove.”

“But his hands are cupped around it—”

“He’s protecting the dove. Keeping it safe. In a minute, he’s going to open up his hands to let it fly.”

Jonah looks at me for a long moment, his gray eyes searching mine. Then he nods and walks away. Yet again, no good-bye.

This time I’m glad he didn’t say it. Because it’s not good-bye for us. When I told him about the dove flying free, I saw something in Jonah I’ve never seen before.

I saw hope.

And that’s how I know that somehow, someday, Jonah will find his way back to me.