In Plain View

“Come on.” Her aunt led the way down the hall. Jenny hurried to keep up. “There’s a couch in the break room and a VCR. You can watch a movie.”

“Where are you going to be?”

The break room had a cabinet with snacks next to the fridge. Her aunt grabbed a package of popcorn. “I’ll be in the editing room. Where I just showed you.”

“Can’t I watch in there with you?” Jenny asked. The couch looked pretty scuzzy.

“No.” Maddy slammed the microwave door and hit the power button. “You’ll be fine here, kiddo. I’ll be right down the hall.”

Jenny didn’t answer. Her heart started beating really hard, like she’d been running a monster lap in gym.

Aunt Maddy fumbled around with the video. The preview started and the familiar music helped Jenny catch her breath. She looked over at the screen and nodded.

“Look, the faster I get to work, the sooner we can go home. Here’s the popcorn. I’m right down the hall. Okay?”

“Okay.” She repeated the word because it was what her aunt wanted and sometimes if you did what a grownup wanted for a while, they would give in and do what you wanted for once.

Jenny didn’t watch her leave, but she did slip over to the doorway and peek down the hall to be sure which room her aunt was going into.

The previews ended and the movie started. Jenny went to the couch and let the story take her mind away. She’d watched it almost every day since her mother was gone. The girl in the story didn’t even have a mother. Sometimes Aunt Maddy said, “This one? Again?” but she never made her choose something else.

Jenny hadn’t been watching very long when she heard voices, loud voices. She hit the pause button and listened.

“…and I don’t have time to play any fucking sales games tonight, Schmed. I’m working here.”

Jenny’s face got hot. That was the baddest word there was. She’d only heard it in school twice. She went over to the doorway, backpack in hand, and tucked herself into the door jamb close enough to hear and see what was happening.

A tall man was talking. “…like I’m not? It’s practically my office you’re getting.”

“Get over it.”

He snorted before he spoke again. “All I’m asking is you go talk to him. Is that too much to ask? A little cooperation between departments.”

“Take it up with Gatt.” Her aunt sounded more than angry. She sounded mean.

“Fine. I will.”

The man stepped out of the room and looked up the hall. His clothes reminded Jenny of this one neighbor on the block who was always playing golf.

When he caught her watching, Jenny froze.

“Hello? Who’s this?” he called out. His voice was icky-happy. “You have a kid with you, O’Hara?”

Aunt Maddy came back into the hall. She turned toward Jenny with a look that meant everything all right? “Yeah. She’s with me. Come here, Jenny.”

Jenny walked slowly at first, then faster, up the hall. She kept her eyes on the man as she slid in beside her aunt.

“Jenny, this is Mr. Schmed. He works at the television station.” Her aunt sounded angry.

“Hi there, honey.” He smiled a big white grin at Jenny. His eyes creeped her out, even more than his teeth. “You’re working late, aren’t you?”

Jenny didn’t say anything. She tried to smile but her lips felt too stiff.

“Pretty girl, O’Hara. You should put her on TV,” he said.

“You’re just full of good ideas tonight aren’t you, Jim?” Aunt Maddy answered. She put her arm around Jenny and directed her into the little editing room. “Nice chatting with you. I’m going back to work now.”

“We’ll talk Monday, O’Hara. After I see Gatt.”

“Great,” she said, but Jenny could tell she was lying. Maddy shut the door and added, “Bite me.”

“Whaaat?” Jenny giggled. She didn’t even know what that one meant.

“Technical talk, kiddo.” Her aunt rubbed her face with her hand. She looked tired, like she was trying to scrub herself awake. “Movie over?”

Jenny shook her head no.

“Oh. You want to stay in here with me for a while?”

Jenny nodded yes. She sat down in one of the spinner chairs and tried to pay attention to the mini-screens flashing around them. Her aunt stopped noticing everything but the picture in front of her. She watched the screens while both hands moved over something that looked like a giant computer keyboard and a PlayStation controller. The picture on the screen would stop, go back, play, go back, play, stop, go faster, stop again. It made Jenny dizzy. Every now and then, her aunt would write something down or lean back and hit a button that made a bunch of machines all clunk and whir at once.

It was boring. All Jenny had to do was sit and spin and think. After a while, she had to ask. “Were you fighting with that guy?”

“Don’t worry about it,” Aunt Maddy mumbled.

That was one of those things grown-ups said all the time that Jenny really hated. Things like how are you? or see you later. Things that didn’t mean anything. Did they think she was stupid? If Aunt Maddy wasn’t getting along with the people at work, Jenny knew she wouldn’t want to stay in this job. Where would they go? What would they do?

Inside, Jenny got that scary feeling again. It felt like shrinking, like all her guts were disappearing. Jenny felt if she breathed too hard, her hollow inside might pop and she’d vanish, like a bubble. Forever. She bit her finger where the blood had come out before but it didn’t help. “Aunt Maddy?” she said, real soft and quiet. “Aunt Maddy, I feel shrinky inside again.”

Her aunt leaned closer to the screens, straining to see or hear something Jenny didn’t understand.

“Damn,” Maddy whispered. The picture flashed. Stop. Go again. “What? Sorry, Jen, I gotta work here. Don’t talk to me, unless it’s an emergency.”

Jenny stood up and walked to the door, dragging her backpack. She didn’t try to be especially quiet. She didn’t have to.

(Rachel, V.O./Audio only): “Thomas said something once, when I first visited him and I was stiff about the Englischer. ‘The closer you look at Plain people, the more you see that things are not always so good. And the closer you look at the Englischer, the more you see it is not all so bad.’”

SUNDAY

8:55:12 a.m.

I could feel the blood tickling its way down my leg into my shoe.

“Where have you been?” Jenny demanded the second she opened the front door. “You were running.”

She sounded like a high court judge. I pushed past her and limped toward the kitchen. Squish, squish.

“Is that blood?” The icy, early morning wind snapped her nightgown around her legs. Jenny didn’t budge. She stood there in bare feet, scowling at me. Kids have no sense of self-preservation.

“Close the door, you’ll freeze to death,” I said.

Cold water from the kitchen faucet dulled the throb in my palms and cleared the dust off my face.

She followed me as far as the kitchen door. “What happened?”

“I fell.” My eyes wouldn’t stop watering. Because of the dust. That’s my story and I’m sticking to it. “Go get dressed.”

Jenny took a giant step away from me, eyes wide.

“Wait, Jen-find me the phone, would you?”

She nodded, then vanished.