She said she should be getting home and I tried to say I would take a taxi but I wanted to be right beside her at the cost of my dignity. I thought of Eleanor at home. She’d be waiting for me with her crab pincers, just as her father had.
Alice and I made up, sort of. She apologized. On the way back up the canyon she told me she was thinking of going on a yoga retreat to a place called Feathered Pipe. That she needed to get out of Los Angeles. August in Los Angeles was for the birds, she said, as though I weren’t going to be there. Several weeks earlier, we might have been going away together. It wasn’t until I was about to get out of the car that I asked her where the retreat was.
She picked up her big cat-eye sunglasses from the dirty console and put them on. She smiled in a way I would never forget.
—Montana, she said. Then she winked and pulled away before I’d even closed the door.
Killing becomes something that isn’t outlandish. When you’ve seen what I have, a number of awful things become practical.
27
I GOT ELEANOR A JOB at the café working half my hours so that when she was gone, I was at home and vice versa. She wasn’t exactly happy with the arrangement, but at the same time she knew she had to contribute. It’d been over three weeks by that point. I spent my evenings cooking for the two of us, like we were a married couple. I increased her dose of Xanax to a full milligram so that she would fall asleep early. I laid a blanket over her body on the couch. She didn’t shower every day so sometimes she smelled of onions and I did a load of laundry nightly while she observed me from the couch or watched mindless television, reruns of old shows about high schoolers. I folded her clothes like I was her mother.
One night we sat on the couch together and watched an old film my mother used to love, The Major and the Minor. I took in only art that wouldn’t fell me. I watched only romantic comedies and read books only about subjects that didn’t mirror anything in my own life.
On the coffee table my phone began to buzz.
Nobody called anymore. I reached for the phone, hoping it might be Alice. Even Big Sky, though that was a ludicrous idea. I prayed to my parents for it to be the man I thought I loved. But before I could pick up the phone, the ringing stopped and a message came through.
Is my daughter there? TELL ME IF SHE IS TELL ME Her name is ELEANOR
I showed the message to Eleanor, who looked utterly nonplussed.
—Don’t you think you should call her? I asked.
—She’s lucky I don’t call the police, she said.
—I understand. But. She’s been through a lot.
—It’s her fucking fault. All of it. Will you please block her number?
I blocked the number and we sat on the couch and drank our tea and took our drugs and Eleanor passed out and I watched the movie straight through to the end.
ONCE IT HAD REACHED THE one-month mark, I thought about killing her. It got to the point that there was nobody I didn’t want to kill. I was finally showing, and even though I tried to cover it up with loose dresses, I could see Eleanor staring at my belly, co-opting it with her eyes. I felt bonded to my child. I didn’t need anyone anymore.
I was throwing up every morning. I would do it outside like an animal to avoid Eleanor waking too soon and stealing my morning hours. I wanted to kill everyone.
One day River came by, acting as though we’d never fucked. I opened the door to his knock and shut it quickly behind me so that he wouldn’t see Eleanor inside. She was having one of her spells during which she cried and shook on the floor. The same as the ones I’d had. I watched her during these spells. From several feet away I said comforting things. I never touched her, even though I knew how badly she wanted me to.
River stood in a white tee and cargo shorts, his blond hair catching the sunlight. Kurt was with him. The day was bright but not hot. They were going on a hike and River asked if I wanted to come. I pictured us high up on the mountain on one of those dry trails, fucking amid the monkey flower, my back getting scratched by the ragweed. I imagined it would turn him on to know I was pregnant. It turned me on. It also made me feel hopeful that I might pretend the child inside of me was River’s and not the man in Marfa’s.
I was about to say yes, I was about to say I would just run inside and get my boots, when the door opened. There stood Eleanor, her face a mess.
—Oh, River said, you have company.
—This is Eleanor, I said, about to cry.
—Oh hey, he said, extending his strong arm.
She looked jealous. She lightly took my arm. I felt her pulling me inside. I felt the threat and the pain in her touch.
—Maybe some other time, he said, smiling as though he’d seen something untoward, something a little gross.
I nodded and smiled and told him to have fun and closed the door.
—That’s the guy who lives in the circus tent?
—The yurt, I said, feeling faint.
She asked me if we could go for a walk, just the two of us. She was crying. I began to cry, too.
FOLLOWING OUR DAY AT THE pier, I heard from Alice even more sparingly. Twice a week at most. I considered going to one of her classes, but shame stopped me. I missed her like I hadn’t missed anyone since
