Chapter Thirteen

Rochelle’s body is an angry road map. The inflammation swells behind tissue, twists and turns within the fibrous lining of her breasts. She imagines them gone. She sees herself looking at where they used to live in a long piece of glass and places her dream hands on her bony cage. She moves them over the hardened surface; the only soft thing existing anymore, the heart that lies beneath it.

But even that is starting to stiffen a bit.

She wakes on the plane. The air is stale and the club soda she asked for, rotting in her mouth. She really wants ginger ale, but she can imagine the drink accelerating the cancerous lump, prodding it along with sugary fingers. Besides, she already has a headache.

The excitement has worn off. She wants to see Wren so much, she’s started to ache in her joints. But when the social worker called that morning, she casually mentioned how Rochelle would be responsible for taking Wren to see Natalie on a weekly basis. “Once Dr. Carol gives consent, of course,” was the nasally whistle in Rochelle’s ear. Dr. Carol. Rochelle had to work her lip with her teeth partly to keep from laughing and partly from throwing up.

Now it’s trash thrown away, seatbacks in the upright position, and tray tables locked in place. It’s the strained sound of an ancient plane descending, the wind battering at it, but the plane doesn’t think to turn back like a sane, sentient being. Instead it propels forward, slightly taking a dive into the unknown until the wheels delicately kiss solid ground.

#

WREN CAN’T SIT STILL and neither can Roy. They travel from the couch where her mother isn’t, to her bedroom where her mother isn’t, to the kitchen where only an accordion partition in the window separates her from the social worker. Denise. She’s outlined in black. Black mascara, and black tight curls, and a black dress over black tights, and black heeled boots. She smiles, her lips thankfully untouched by the darkness, but there’s a slightly forced tone to the way she talks, like she’s counting down the minutes in the back of her head.

Today, Mimi comes. It’s why Wren got to come home to the apartment. She had been staying with a foster family, the Mastersons, a couple who couldn’t have children and tried to turn all three of them into blood relatives. You can’t turn cough syrup into blood, she had said in her head where Roy read her thoughts. No-siree-bob. But maybe we still be nice to them. Maybe it’s hard not having what you want. And Wren nodded with his fur tucked under her chin, trying not to cry.

The last few days were fastened securely behind her, which means she can breathe a little bit easier now. But when she does, she can only smell the faint traces of her mother who is nowhere to be found.

#

SHE WAS LUCKY. AND she knew that. One year of rehab and psychiatric evaluation. The guy in the Bronco lived. Her heart almost took a stroll right out of her mouth when she heard that. First time drug offense, a miniscule amount of coke. The single mother card was played, no priors.

She wanted to blame it all on Mary, make her take the stand. But deep down, she knew Mary was right. She was nothing but a bulldozer.

“We should be throwing a party,” her attorney (courtesy of Glenn) had said, a fierce looking redhead who threw caution to the wind when choosing her pink power suit that morning.

“Break out the noise makers,” Natalie said.

Her room–no, the room she’s staying in, she reminds herself–is the dullest shade of taupe to keep her from getting over-excited. Or over-angry. Or over-anything.

The first week, her eye still stung from the altercation in the cell where they were holding her before trial. A prostitute had landed her fist into the right side of Natalie’s face for sitting on the wrong bench. The sting was like an electrical current that snapped something inside of her brain. She looked at the woman like prey that needed to be hunted. And then she offered her own fist.

She thought that would have affected the case, but apparently the guard on duty was too lazy to mention it. Her lawyer ignored the green blob on her cheek, and the defense attorney seemed too enthralled by the pink power suit to take note.

What a lucky duck I am, Natalie thought, trying hard to ignore the strong smell of newly mopped floors. Now at The Peaceful Palms–a rehab facility forty miles north of White Smoke– Natalie sits in a room the color of putty and a small whisper in the back of her brain wants to confront the truth, sift through her past.

“No,” Natalie says out loud to no one. Because she’s spent too much time trying to make things make sense.

Maybe it’s the taupe.

#

“YOU CAN’T LEAVE.” IT’S the thing Dr. Cohen had said when she told him about Natalie. “You need treatment.”

Rochelle knew he was right. But she also knew the opportunity God was giving her, and if she traded it for surgery and chemo, she’d have to watch any chance of reconnecting with her granddaughter fade away. Besides, she was pretty sure her stubbornness alone would keep her heart pumping.

Five months in, she’s almost ready to reconsider that decision. Wren is in the kitchen playing with the play dough they made with flour and salt. They colored it with red food dye, so both of them look like they’ve recently committed a heinous crime. Rochelle places one of her hands between the breasts she still has. She feels for her heart. She looks at the cordless on Natalie’s bedside table. She calls Glenn.

“Hello.” He says it like he’s the one who’s calling. She puts on each syllable like a coat and hat. The relief is instantaneous.

“I just needed to hear you say that,” she breathes.

“What’s troubling you?” Glenn breathes back. He’s lying on the bed they share together with a young woman who looks slightly like his wife. She’s no more than twenty and crinkles her eyes at him when she smiles.

“I...you know, nothing. Nothing, Glenn. Just miss you is all.” Rochelle plants her red-stained hand harder against the truth. She wants to ask him to visit, monthly maybe, because a year is too long without him. She’s not allowed to leave the state with Wren.

But there’s something etched between them as delicate as lace. Rochelle can feel it’s webbing dividing them, holding back everything she needs to say. She knows her friend, Ann, will ask if Glenn came to see her, and she’ll have to brush her off with a “work” excuse. But she knows this has nothing to do with Glenn’s work and everything to do with the world he’s created. Her being in White Smoke right now has nothing to do with that world.

“Miss you, too,” Glenn says, planting his lips against somebody else’s hair.

#

THEY SAY ALL KINDS of things at school. She almost wishes she had someone to talk to. Maybe even Rhonda but Rhonda goes to the school on the other side of town.

That’s okay, you know. We’ve got Mimi. And the people at church seem nice. Wren knows Roy’s just being empathetic. Mimi is nice to have, but she isn’t Mommy. And people at church are old and some of them smell kind of funny.

What about the dresses? You look very pretty in them. And Jesus sounds like He’s a good man. Yes, that’s true.

“He’s also God,” Wren says because she learned that one the hard way. She had said the same thing to a group of women clucking like hens around Mimi, that Jesus was a nice man. And one of the smelly ones shot back: He’s God, you know.

Roy did the impression for weeks, placing his paw near his collar like he was the Queen of Sheba.

They both lie on Wren’s bed, choking on a fit of giggles.

“I have you, too,” she whispers in Roy’s ear, and then they both close their eyes to sleep.

#

THEY’VE HAD SEVERAL visits at this point–twenty-nine to be exact–and on each one, Rochelle has looked like death. Natalie has had enough decency not to mention it, although today, the vegetables tasted raw at lunch, and Dr. Carol wouldn’t let up on Natalie’s “feelings of victimization.” So she decides to let off a little steam.

“Rochelle, you look like a dump truck’s rolled over you. What gives?” She watches Rochelle shift on the white leather couch, the noise an unlady-like contrast to the baby blue sweater set she’s wearing. It’s early March, and it’s a hot one in White Smoke. But Rochelle doesn’t look like she’ll give way to short sleeves any time soon.

“Wren, baby. Do you mind if Mimi has a minute alone?” Natalie’s eyes roll hard in their sockets. She’s been noticing little bits of Camp Rochelle staking claim on her territory. The way she always has a hand on Wren’s back. The cutesy voice she uses to control the conversation. The countless times she refers to how tired Natalie seems and that maybe she’ll want Rochelle to stick around when her time at rehab is up next month.

Fat chance, Natalie thinks.

When Wren moves to the table and chairs in the middle of the room, Rochelle picks tiny blue threads from her sweater. “Cancer,” she says.

It socks the breath out of Natalie’s lungs. She’s sad, and angry, and hateful all in one swift move. She pushes her heels down into the cheap tile floor to keep from flinging her feet at Rochelle’s face. How could she do this? How could she do this to Wren?

How can she do this to me? Natalie thinks before quickly releasing the thought.

“I should have told you.”

“You think so, do you? So what’s going to happen? You croak, and I’m stuck here, and Wren gets thrown back into foster care?”

“It’s not that bad,” Rochelle lies.

“Then I’d hate to see bad.” Natalie is crying, which makes her even angrier. She gets up gingerly, trying to keep the tasteless couch quiet and goes to hug her daughter. She places her face at the top of Wren’s head, Wren who’s hugging hard on Roy McGruffin’s neck. But Wren keeps her body stiff, and Natalie pretends she doesn’t notice.

#

IT FLEW, THE TIME. Wren is brushed, and polished, and beautiful in a new dress Rochelle bought for her, and looking at her hurts.

“Time to go, little duck.” The social worker is waiting outside at the apartment. She suggested taking Wren alone to “ease the transition.” So these are the last moments Rochelle has Wren all to herself. At least she has comfort knowing she’s been baptized.

“Who loves you?” Rochelle asks.

“Mimi.”

“And?”

“Mommy.”

“And?”

“Jesus.” Rochelle nods and holds her tight. She holds onto the truth even as her mind carefully sifts for thoughts of Glenn like a fishing net.

#

ROCHELLE IS GONE AND Natalie breathes relief. But she’s also heartbroken. She thought she’d get to say one last goodbye to the closest thing to a mother she’s had in a long time. But that would be painting a rosy picture. That wouldn’t be telling the truth.

Instead, she’s greeted by the social worker, and Wren who hides behind her stuffed dog shyly. She goes and gives Wren a hug, but all she feels is the lumpy softness of her husband’s past.

“We’ve got a big job to do, baby girl.” And it was one. In the next few days, Natalie gathers her letters of recommendation from Dr. Carol and a few other staff at The Peaceful Palms. She dresses up her resume, opting to glaze over her year-long hiatus, and takes Wren to the library so they can print it out. She becomes increasingly concerned as Wren stays quiet and looks at her with her bare brown eyes, searching Natalie’s face for answers. And Natalie becomes increasingly annoyed when Wren shoves off into her room and talks to that stuffed dog for hours.

The phone rings a few times one of the days Natalie is craving a pint of vodka. She lets the recorder pick up and then deletes the message when she hears Rochelle’s voice.

Finally, the big day comes. Natalie wears one of the pantsuits Women Who Work gave her. She feels obnoxiously like her redheaded lawyer. They drive to JCC, and Natalie swallows down the bile swiftly rising in her throat. She doesn’t want to face Tara McMahon who could rip her in two even with a pity sneer. She doesn’t want to see the faces of her former team as she walks the long, empty space between their cubicles and Tara’s office. She doesn’t want one of those faces to be Mary’s that she might just claw off in the alley behind the building. She doesn’t want any of it. But then she looks down at Wren who’s absorbing her through her pupils.

“You need to stay here, baby girl. I’ve got to go inside and hopefully change our lives.” She feels terrible Wren has to sit alone in the parking lot, but she doesn’t have any other options. She’s fortunate enough that Glenn agreed to pay her lawyer fees, not to mention her rent that he’s still paying until she can get back on her feet. She doesn’t like the pity pay-off or the weight of having to do something monumental just to get things back to normal, especially when normal wasn’t that stellar to begin with.

She doesn’t like that she can’t even afford a babysitter for her daughter. And she most certainly doesn’t like the way that stuffed dog is looking at her.

But she goes inside. It’s a risky move so close to lunch but Tara’s car is still there. She spends ten minutes convincing Susan, the secretary–a loud mouth older lady who treats everyone like her small-minded child–that she needs to see Tara immediately, and finally, she gets a little face time. But that time is short-lived and clouded by Mary who darts her eyes at Natalie like two very sharp knives.

In the car, she knows her face is bloated by the tears she’s cried in the parking lot. She avoids Wren’s face when she gets inside.

“New plan. From now on, we don’t rely on anyone to throw us a bone. We take what we want, what we need. Because nobody is going to do it for us,” she says, and Wren’s raw eyes barely understand when Natalie takes Roy and sends him sailing to the back of the car.    

#

NATALIE WON’T ANSWER her calls. This terrifies her but also gives her a sick sense of closure. It’s confirmation that Rochelle isn’t crazy and that her daughter-in-law needs help. But it’s also confirmation that Rochelle won’t be the one giving it.

When she got home, Glenn wasn’t around. She thought maybe he’d pick her up from the airport, but she only got the machine when she called after landing. So she took a taxi back home and found a quickly scribbled note about a tennis game. In an instant, she saw a woman behind her closed lids and thought she could smell the cloying scent of overripe perfume. But she shook it off. Her mind and body couldn’t take that sort of suspicion.

She went to her bedroom, pawed through the luggage she struggled upstairs, and that, too, was too much to bear. She found her Bible lying on top of her clothes. She held it next to her on the bed, hugged it like the person that wasn’t there and let her head rest on the pillow.

“Help,” was the single-worded prayer Rochelle whispered until it lost all meaning.

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