“Paul,” Ginny says, but inside I’m running through the trees toward the water with Katrina in my arms. I’m sprinting down the dock and Sheriff Drew is shouting that he’ll shoot, Molly is crying and telling me to just stop running, the panting man in the glasses is screaming that she’s dead, she’s dead, and all I can do is leap into the lake.
My feet sink into the sand, the water spilling over my shoulders, my neck, and my head. My eyes are open and everything is blurred and hazy and I’m floating along the bottom. I hold her in my arms and twist until I am on my back looking up at the ripples in the water, rays of sunlight cutting the surface. We can stay here forever, Katrina. We can stay until the forests have petrified, until the sun has boiled the earth. We can stay until we grow gills and learn to breathe the water.
“He’s hyperventilating,” I hear Sheriff Drew shout. “Lyle! Get in here!”
We can stay until they’ve solved every equation, until X and N are determined.
“It’s okay,” Ginny says.
And then I am ripped from the water, my daughter tumbling from my arms, sinking, slipping farther and farther away.
Chapter 9
I
f the truth were known, I’ve never wanted to be a person who passes out. I’ve never wanted to be a person who keeps things inside until he is physically ill. I’ve never wanted to be anything less than perfect—from my science to my wife to my child to my dreams—I’ve always wanted to be the ideal.
I am a failure at so many things.
It’s five o’clock in the evening and I’ve been asleep. Ginny is sitting next to me on the bed. I can see Sheriff Drew out in the hallway flipping through his notebook. “Feel better?” Ginny says.
“How long have I been asleep?”
“About an hour,” she says. “Sheriff Drew called a doctor. He’s going to be here in about forty-five minutes or so.”
“I don’t need to see another doctor,” I say.
“Paul,” she says, “it’s not normal to hyperventilate like that. I think you’re suffering exhaustion or something.”
“That’s Hollywood speak for being a drug addict,” I say. “Everything just got mottled there for a minute. I’m fine now.”
“Well, he’s on his way anyway,” Ginny says. “You can tell the doctor how you feel.”
Sheriff Drew walks into the room holding the men’s clothes I found in Molly’s room. “How you doing?” he asks.
“I’m all right,” I say.
“You wanna tell me what happened there?”
“I just started thinking about worst-case scenarios,” I say. “Started thinking about the past. Lost control of my feelings and it got the best of me. I’m not used to that anymore, I guess.”
“Ginny tells me you’ve got some scratches on your chest,” he says. “That a related problem?”
“Yes,” I say. “Nervous reaction I have. I’ve had it all my life. I’m genetically predisposed to hold my emotions in. At least that’s what my mother always told me.”
Sheriff Drew smiles lightly and then shakes his head. “I’ve heard that about myself before,” he says. “But I never took it to your level, I’m afraid.”
“Few do,” I say, and for a moment the three of us are silent and I think that maybe Sheriff Drew has some odd habits, too. Just like the rest of us.
Eventually the sheriff remembers the clothes in his hands. “These yours?”
“No,” I say. “They were in Molly’s room when we got here.”
“So you touched them?”
“Yes,” I say. “I don’t think Ginny did, did you?”
“No,” she says. “I just left them where they were.”
“I can’t tell you how much I wished you’d called me earlier,” Sheriff Drew says. He’s mad now, but trying to keep it buried. Trying to stay calm.
“I’m sorry,” I say. “I know you think I’m some kind of monster, some kind of person who doesn’t know how to properly care for people, but it’s not true. I just thought she’d be here.”
“I don’t think you’re a monster. People can be all sorts of things, but not monsters. You’re flesh and blood, Paul, just like the rest of us,” he says. His voice is annoyed, like he is talking to a child who has spilled its third straight cup of milk. I know this voice. It used to be mine. “To the best of your knowledge, did Molly have a boyfriend?”
I think about the locksmith, the lover I’ve convinced myself of, the lover who has no name or face. “Bruce
would probably know better than I would,” I say. “We never discussed that sort of thing.”
“So she doesn’t know about Ginny?”
“I guess she does,” I say, more for Ginny’s benefit than for the truth. The truth is that I can’t remember what I told Molly about Ginny. An image floats into my mind of Molly standing in the kitchen asking me if I have anyone, but I don’t know if I’ve dreamt it or not. “I suppose the answer is that I never asked her if she had anybody.”
Deputy Lyle walks into the room and takes off his hat, like he hasn’t been rifling through my house for the last two hours. “Pardon me, Morris,” he says. “But I found some pictures in the other bedroom that I thought you might want to see.”
“Molly is a painter,” I say, but it comes out sounding defensive.
“I know that, Paul,” Sheriff Drew says. “You two stay put. Why don’t you get some more rest until the doctor gets here.”
“I’m not tired,” I say.
“Well, then just sit here,” he says. “And don’t touch anything else.”
MOLLY PAINTED AND
drew whatever was on her mind. She would paint the face of her mother over and
over again, etching lines into her cheeks, dark circles beneath her eyes, a crooked tooth where none existed.
She’d sit with Katrina and tell her stories about each picture. There was a painting she made after the ectopic of a giant whale floating over the Los Angeles skyline that Katrina always loved. Molly would tell her that the whale was a super hero, a mighty defender of honor and truth for women. Katrina didn’t know what Molly was talking about, of course; she just liked to see the enormous whale.
“Why a whale?” I asked Molly after she’d finished telling Katrina a new story about the picture. It was the same summer our girl died. “Why not a bird or a dog or something?”
“Whales are continuous,” she said. “And they’re mammals. They’re just like us, but without all the unnecessary conversation.”
“I don’t understand,” I said.
“Without a neck,” Molly said, “they’re just these great big heads. These heads that live and breathe and procreate. They don’t have to worry about anything below anything. All they have is all they have. And their words are music.”
“But that’s not true,” I said.
“It’s true for me,” she said. She made a humming
noise then, like she was processing information. “What do you know about women, anyway?”
“I don’t know what you mean.”
“I mean, do you think I can’t act independently of my organs? Do you think I can ignore my ticking clock? Do you think I don’t know that I’m going to spend the next sixteen years of my life raising a child while you go out on digs? Do you think I don’t notice that my passion for you isn’t the same as it was before Katrina was born?”
“Why are you saying this to me?”
“You need to hear it,” she said. “Let’s face reality here, Paul. What are the odds of us getting a divorce? Three to one? Two to one? Where do you place them?”
“I don’t want to talk like this, Molly,” I said.
“Then maybe you should pay attention more often,” she said. “I’m not happy anymore. This medication makes me feel like a robot. Katrina wears me out and you don’t notice anything but a stupid whale in a painting. Why not ask me why we haven’t had a meaningful conversation all summer.”
“It’s the heat,” I said.
“It’s you,” Molly said.
There are some things I can’t erase. There are some things about the last days of my daughter’s life that are still clear to me, no matter the angle of the light
or the density of the air. And this: I remember Molly got up from the couch and started to walk toward the front door, as though she was going to leave. She stopped, though, her hand on the doorknob, and started laughing. “You know what, Paul,” she said, still facing the door, “I know that I’m replaceable to you. I know that after I’m gone there will be someone else who will love you. Is that right, Paul? Do you think that’s right?”
“No, you can’t ever leave me. You leave me and I’ll come with you,” I said. I was trying to sound light. “You move out, I’m coming with you.”
“You’d just erase me and draw another,” she said and went out the front door.
Ginny is not Molly. I know that now. They are different breeds, different branches of the females of our species. What intrigued me about Molly at first was trying to understand why she felt so strongly about me. Here she was: an artist from a wealthy medical family. Here I was: a failed doctor and an aspiring anthropologist who came from a family of aspiring anythings. My mother always wanted to be a lawyer, a doctor, a writer, an actress. She worked for AT&T as an operator for thirty years. My father wanted to be a carpenter, a commercial fisherman, an astronaut. He managed a series of chain restaurants his entire life,
culminating in retirement from Marie Callendar’s a few years before he died.
In the end, what I found most interesting about Molly was her anthropology. Her beginnings. I started to wonder about what parts of different animals she had inherited. What traits of primitive man were still most prevalent in her? What portion of her brain was still living in the primordial swamp? What had she transferred to my daughter? What had made my child so sick?
What makes me believe that Molly and I were meant for each other is the way she never spoke to me like a patient. Even when she was at her sickest, even when I was at my lowest, she always spoke to me like another human should. There was nothing abstract in her back then.
Now, today, with Ginny on this bed in this house I used to live in, I have come full circle. Sheriff Drew is rummaging through our things, again. A doctor is on his way to see me, again.
I take Ginny’s hand and hold it.
“You’re shaking,” she says.
“This is the worst possible thing,” I say.
“Paul,” she says, “tell me the truth. Tell me what went wrong here with your daughter.”
Ginny speaks in words that she thinks make good
dialogue. She doesn’t understand that I’ve been trying to get to the truth since before Katrina died.
“It’s not that easy,” I say. “You’ll leave me if I tell you.”
“I’ll never leave you,” Ginny says. “Don’t talk like that.” Sometimes, I say things to hear how Ginny will respond. Sometimes, I say things to her that I’ve said to Molly. Ginny squeezes my hand tightly; her thumb caresses my wrist, bouncing between the vein and the artery that lead directly to and from the heart. “Let’s get married when this is all over. We’ll just fly to Vegas. We’ll do it, Paul. We’ll be together forever that way.”
“I’m not even divorced,” I say. “I’ve been married. I’ve had children, you know. I’ve made mistakes with everything I’ve ever loved. Why would you want to be with me? You’re a young woman, Ginny. I’ll disappoint you.”
Ginny lets go of my hand and leans back onto the bed with her eyes closed. Her breath is coming out in these tiny rasps, like a sick animal. “I won’t let you do this to me,” she says quietly. “All I want from you is the truth. Why is that so difficult?”
I lie beside Ginny and curl my arm around her. Outside the wind begins to kick up through the trees and I think now would be the time to take Ginny outside to show her the sunset. We could stand on the shore and
watch the ripples of water lap against the sand. I could tell her I love her. I could tell her that I have always loved her and that the truth is very simple. I could tell her that the truth of it all is that I killed my daughter and got away with it.
“I love you,” I say.
“Do you?”
“You are precious to me,” I say, my voice sounds round near the edges. I am a teacher again. I am explaining the problems with an assignment, but I mean it. “We met at the wrong time, I think. You need someone else.” I am a tape recording, repeating words I have memorized. Words I have said in my head a thousand times.
Ginny turns her back to me so that I won’t see her crying. I run my hand down her spine, but she sweeps it away. “Don’t,” she says.
“I’d shed my skin for you,” I say. “I want you to know that.”
I stare at the wall across from Ginny and try to concentrate on excluding her—on making her just an object in the room. Her breath becomes only a sound, her smell just a scent until I feel like I am in the room alone. Until the only thing I can hear is my own heart beating in my ears, the first sounds Homo sapiens ever got accustomed to.
And then, in the clear of my mind, I see what I suspect Sheriff Drew and Deputy Lyle are looking at: drawings of Katrina. They are drawings of her every organ, her every limb, the tumors in her brain. They are concise outlines of everything that made Katrina real, and I am sorry I ever saw them. I am sorry I ever drew them. I am sorry for making Molly teach me.
And there are autopsy photos of Katrina and drawings of Molly. They are just lines: sketches of life, of death, of the undeterminable consequences of time and suffering.
Here’s the truth: I used to feel like the whale in Molly’s painting. I used to feel like I was floating over a sea of water that I could never swim in. I felt like every thing was contained in my head. Sometimes, I would go to school and feel like a completely different person. I would stand in front of the classroom retelling human history like I was completely certain that it was true. When class was over, and the room was empty, it would feel like I had played a game of hide-and-seek and I was the only one who wasn’t found.
What if I have never been found? What if I am a completely different person from who I once was? Who would know if I didn’t? Who could tell me where I have hidden?
“I do love you,” I say. “And when this is all over with
we will get married. We’ll have a huge wedding. We’ll invite all of your friends. Maybe we’ll go to Hawaii and have it on the beach in front of some magnificent resort. Would you like that, Ginny?”
“Don’t say that just to make me happy,” she says, her voice just above a whisper.