I have never seen Nancy as pretty. I’ve seen her big and I’ve seen her relatively small, seen rage and revenge and hurt written all over her, but never pretty.
“I told you before, this part isn’t for you. You grow up with someone as up and down as Nancy’s been over the years, you got to take care of yourself; I get that. You’re doin’ it. This other part’s my duty. I’m just sayin’ . . . I could only help her heal if I was ready to heal myself.”
I rub my eyes, look at him. “You thought she was pretty.”
“I knew damn well she was pretty. Hell, how do you think you got to looking like you do? That Rance fella’s no prize.”
We sit awhile, watching people move in and out, set up their laptops.
I’m overdue at home, so I pack my stuff into my backpack and stand up with him. “Keep following me, Walter.”
He nods, puts a hand on my shoulder. I move his hand and hug him. “You’re a great guy, Walter. Kind of like a saint.”
“Long damn way from that.”
Cool thing about book club; it goes year-round. Sharon is not fond of the fact that schools work hard to make sure we don’t read anything we can fall in love with, so she does her best to work around our schedules.
“I just read a chapter of a book we should consider,” Leah says. She holds it up. “Living Dead Girl. Elizabeth Scott.”
Maddy says, “Zombies?”
“Way not zombies,” Leah says. “It’s about this cool little tough ten-year-old girl who gets kidnapped by a pedophile. First night, he parks with her across from her home and describes in great detail what he’ll do to every member of her family if she tries to get away. He knows all their names. She tells the story as a teenager, still his captive.”
I say, “Jesus, Leah.”
“That’s right,” she says. “I’m doing it for you. Worst thing you can do when bad things happen is dance around them. Making yourself tough is never the wrong thing. Ask Lynne Cox.”
Maddy says, “Cold water and losing . . . they’re not the same.”
“Body and mind,” Leah says. “One in the same. Ask. Lynne. Cox.”
The very thought of reading the book she just described makes my stomach churn, but in a strange way, tugs at me.
Sharon glances toward me. “It’s a good book, but every bit as disturbing as good. I have to put a warning label on this one.”
“For me,” I say.
“For you,” she says.
“Well, you’re right. It’s killing me. But I gotta go with Leah. And Lynne Cox.”
Sharon rolls her eyes and throws up her hands. She’s funny.
I’m curled up on the couch in the basement rec room watching an installment of this very strange cable TV series called The Leftovers. The premise is that on October 14 of whatever year, at the exact same moment, two percent of the population of Earth vanished. That’s two out of every one hundred people, so no matter who you are, you lost somebody or somebody close to you has. If you were in a car with a driver who disappeared, you better get your foot over to the brake. If you were some guy making love with one of the two percent, you better be on a soft mattress because you’re going to fall about a foot. Farther if it happened to be Nancy. At any rate, it seems everything I run into these days is about loss. Marvin is playing a video game on his computer and watching out of the corner of his eye. As much of a control freak as Pop is, he doesn’t use Parental Controls and these “leftover” people screw like rabbits, because who knows when it will happen again. I’ll bet Marvin is hitting all-time lows on his game scores.
My iPhone pings.
Walter: Meet me for coffee
Me: When
Walter: Now
Me: On my way.
I say, “Marvin, memorize the naked scenes. There’ll be a test.”
“Which I will pass with flying colors. I may even go on the Internet afterward to pick up some extra credit.”
And I’m off to Revel.
“Sheila’s gone,” Walter says as I join him at the back table.
“Where?”
He shrugs. “If I knew that, I’d have said so. After your mom and Sheila’s last tangle, Sheila quit coming over. Nancy got to feeling bad for her part in it and sent me to see if I could coax her to come for dinner. Place was empty.”
“No Yvonne either?”
He shakes his head. “I’m worried. The girl’s got nothing going. She’s gotta figure when Frankie comes back, he’s going straight into the system. That mess on his arm by itself wouldn’t have gotten anything but a warning, but the case is high-profile now with all the damn TV and your family history. The fact that he disappeared out from under her nose along with her current free-fallin’ weight loss. . . . three strikes.” Walter still talks like there’s no chance Frankie won’t show up.
My stomach jumps. The other side of Sheila’s rage is hopelessness. “You think she’ll hurt herself?”
“I would.”
I close my eyes. “I guess I might, too. Does Nancy know Sheila’s gone?”
“Not yet.” He scratches the week’s growth on his chin. “One other thing. I’m not gonna tell you quite yet, but . . . do you think you could get me an audience with that old caseworker of yours?”
“An audience?”
“Fancy word for a talk.”
“I know what an audience is, Walter,” and I laugh. “It’s what I get with you every week or so right here. Why do you want to talk to Wiz?”
“All will be revealed, young lady. All will be revealed.”
We’re wrapping up our book club session on Living Dead Girl and I’m glad. This story is the kind of fiction that’s truer than truth, because of what it does inside your head. Sharon was right to warn me about it, Leah was right to bring it, and I was right to read it; it set me up for anything. It doesn’t end the way I’d like, but enough is enough.
Mark
