When I Ran Away

lost Frankie—I’ve come here, cleaned up, made soup and Ma has screamed at me to get out. Sometimes she leaves the soup on the table, untouched. I know because it’s still there when I come back, dried up and cracked like a model of a scorched-earth desert inside a bowl. Dad leaves it there too. He doesn’t clean the kitchen because I don’t think he can stand walking in there, face-to-face with Frankie, surrounded by the minutiae of his life. Ma stopped cleaning because just waking up and breathing were all she could manage.

So for the past few weeks, out of my own exhaustion and desperation for something to change, I’ve left the mess. Left the soup slowly dripping down the wall, left a puddle of it on the floor, plastic bowl overturned in the middle. I’ve left it to see what she would do. To see if she even saw it. We all lost Frankie, but for Ma, every day has just been a continuation of the minute that we knew he was gone. No sunrise, no nightfall. No living after that minute. Just alcohol and scraps of paper from the pockets of his old clothes.

But today I’m watching her kneel on the kitchen floor and clean. Something she always knew how to do. Something she was good at. She’s doing one small thing that isn’t drinking or yelling and passing out. One normal, small thing. Today she’s not leaving the soup on the floor.

13 sudocrem A Wednesday in August 2016, 9:35 p.m. London, Grand Euro Star Lodge Hotel, Room 506

I fell asleep again but the phone vibrating woke me up. Disoriented, I get out of bed and reach for the baby but he’s not here. Because I’m not home. I take a minute to remember where I am. Another buzz. A text from Sharon:

Jeej, WTF. What is happening. Harry called me. Tell me where you are

Before I can process what she’s saying, buzz. A text from Danielle:

Are you OK? What are you doing? Harry called me. Give me the number where you are and stop acting crazy

Buzz. Sharon again:

I’m going to keep texting you every minute until you answer me

Buzz. Now it’s Stacy’s turn:

Sweetheart everybody’s worried. We can’t help if we don’t know where you are

Buzz. Sharon:

I’m not fucking around. I’m like a dog with a bone Bitch. Give me your number. You’re in some hotel right?

How could she know that? Oh my God, another one. Buzz. Danielle:

I just talked to Shar. Are you in a hotel? Are you having an affair? I don’t know what’s going on with you but you need to call us

Buzz. Stacy:

G I just talked to the girls listen if you’re having an affair it’s OK we’ve all been there we’ll help you thru. Just call us

Buzz. Buzz. Buzz. They’re relentless. Suddenly there’s a shwoop sound from WhatsApp. I open it on my phone. They’ve created a group and called it WTF GIGI. Harry called in the big guns.

Sharon:

OK Harry said you’ve been gone all day he doesn’t know where you are. You need to tell us. We’re just going to call you. That’s all. We won’t tell Harry until you say it’s OK, we’ll just let him know that you’re safe? Alright? Just like that time we covered for Stacy and what’s his name, Jose, that Puerto Rican kid she liked back in the day when she was going out with Jimmy. OK? Listen hun everyone makes mistakes

Stacy’s bubble pops up:

Excuse me, Jimmy cheated on me first, remember?

Then Danielle:

Marriage isn’t easy. Is this new guy hot? Anyway if you’re struggling we’re here for you

Back to Stacy:

Gigi sweetheart it’s us. Let us in

Now Sharon, taking no prisoners:

Fucking tell us where you are already!

They keep going. It’s like the Housewives have jumped out of the TV and into my phone. Maybe it’s the wine. Or the sleep, hours of sleep today. Or the fury with which my friends are firing their love at me, or my husband, who I’ve obviously scared the shit out of and who’s finally found a way to get to me.

I put the phone down for a minute, unsure how to answer them. The show moved on to the next season while I slept. I watch Teresa get out of her lawyer’s car and walk into her house for the first time after her year-long stay in prison. She puts both hands up to her face in disbelief that she’s finally home. Her and Joe hug and cry in the kitchen. Of course, no woman has ever looked more amazing on release from prison than Teresa. She’s in skin-tight skinny jeans, knee-high boots and a black leather jacket with a peplum waist, hair straightened, full makeup done, because she is, and always will be, a Real Housewife.

And then there is the moment when they run to her, her four girls, throwing their whole selves at the mother who’s been gone for so long, piling on top of her, clinging to her knees and arms, grabbing any part of her they can get—they sob and cry. The real tears of little girls, their agony and love pulsing through the screen. By the time the Pampers commercial comes on, with the baby boy crawling to his mother, mother embracing child, inhaling the sweetness at the nape of his baby neck, the cup of blue water poured on the diaper, I’m crying so hard I can’t breathe.

I sit up in bed too quickly and my scar pulls against itself in the bed of nails that lies between my hips, where they took him out of me. He survived. And so did I. Maybe I’m already old, like Barbara says, because I know that I survived.

I pour the last drop of wine into a plastic cup. The phone battery’s at two percent. I type:

Girls. Grand Euro Star Lodge Hotel Balham High Street Room 506 Google it. Tell Harry I’m fine. I’m not having an affair. You bitches are crazy

The phone