You know you wish you were me Page 15

  “Now get out,” Evee doesn’t move. “Get out,” she yells.

  Evee starts crying as she struggles to get her seatbelt undone. Vivian is crying now as well as she reaches in the back to help. She sees the fear on Evee’s face as she reaches. Evee unclips the latch before Vivian can get to it and cringes away from her and out the rear door on the driver’s side. Vivian watches her. She is running fast. She disappears, swallowed up through the double doors.

  Vivian puts the car in drive and lets it crawl forward on its own without pushing on the gas pedal. She is exhausted. She looks at the long, straight road ahead of her and wonders what it would be like to have nothing to feel sad about.

  ******

  SIXTEEN

  Evee runs out of the car as fast as she can, her feet moving over the shiny cool tiles. She sees the set of double doors in front of her. She doesn’t look back. Her heart is beating very fast and the clothes that woman put on her are hanging loosely over her body.

  She reaches up and pulls open one of the heavy doors and an avalanche of noise rolls over her. Bells and cling clang sounds get louder as she steps inside the room. Even though there are lights everywhere, it is really dark. She feels like she has walked inside her Light Bright toy after putting in all the little plastic pegs. Or like when she put her face up real close to the TV. She waited till her mama and okaasan were out of the room and then she pressed her face up to the glass and saw bright reds, blues and greens flashing blurry just like in this place.

  She breathes in a thick smell of smoke and puts her hand over her mouth like her mama always does before she tells the person “do you mind, my daughter is allergic.” She knows she’s not allergic, but she doesn’t like the smell anyway.

  Someone opens the door behind her and she is almost run over by a group of people dressed in fancy shiny clothes and big hats. One of them has a small dog on a leash dressed in a tuxedo with a top hat. She wants to follow them to see if they are going somewhere crazy, but she doesn’t, she has to call her house.

  She looks to her left. There is a long yellow carpeted walkway and all she can see are rows of machines with people, old people sitting in front of them pulling down a metal bar and pushing buttons over and over. To her right it’s the same thing. Straight ahead there are round tables with people in uniforms giving regular people cards. One man is sitting with his head down on the table and another man is patting him on the back.

  Behind those tables far on the back wall she sees a phone. She starts running straight ahead for it, taking her hand off her mouth – she feels brave. She is running fast. If that man, Jay is here, he’s not going to catch her again because there is a clear path between her and the phone.

  “Hey, no running!” She hears a voice call out like at the pool and she slows a little, speed walking.

  She makes it to the phone and reaches as high as she can to get the receiver. She has to jump just a little to get it off the holder. She puts it up to her ear and hears the dial tone. She can’t reach the numbers to dial. She jumps several times, but can only hit random digits. She feels like it is very unfair that she can’t reach the numbers when it is so important to call her house.

  “That’s not a toy,” a deep voice says from behind her. She turns around to see a man standing over her. He is very tall and fatter than okaasan and he has dark skin and is wearing a bright yellow jacket with the words Golden Nugget on it. He squats down to her level. “You got an important phone call to make?” he laughs and she sees his white teeth.

  “I wanna call my house.”

  “That phone takes money, you got any of that? No, well then, you’re out of luck.”

  “No! I want to call my house. I want my mommy,” Evee starts crying loudly. She wants this man to go away and tries to tell him, but he just looks around like he doesn’t understand what she is saying.

  “Shush sweetie. Are you lost?”

  Evee just wants it all to be over. Wants her moms there right now.

  “OK, OK.” He takes hold of her hand as he stands up, but she hits his hand as hard as she can and screams. “Ouch, it’s OK, it’s OK.”

  Evee can see that she did hurt him and she is glad. But he isn’t angry, not like the lady.

  “We can go call your mom over there at that desk, you see that desk over there?”

  The man is pointing to a round place in the wall with a sign in glittery letters that says INFORMATION. There is a counter and a woman standing behind it. Evee’s breath is heavy and her throat hurts from screaming. She has decided she is not going to talk to the woman at the desk. She doesn’t want to talk to anybody except people at her house. She might talk to this man if he smiles at her before they get to the desk.

  The man is on one knee and his face is very big in front of hers.

  “Hey, are you listening?” the man laughs and Evee sees his teeth again. She shakes her head because she hadn’t heard anything he said. She didn’t even see him put his knee on the floor.

  “Are you staying in this hotel?”

  She shakes her head again. He smiles. He can hold her hand this time. But he doesn’t try. The walk together. She leans into his leg a little when she sees a lot of the old people staring at her from the rows as she walks past.

  When they get to the desk, the man leans over the counter and says something to the woman that Evee can’t hear. The woman looks at Evee and opens a door hidden in the wall to let them in and then she gets out.

  “You watch the desk for me, Lenny.”

  “Glenda, I’m on duty.”

  “I need a cigarette. I’ll just be over here. Pretty please.”

  Evee watches the woman blow the man a kiss. He looks down at her and shakes his head, laughing a little.

  “She’s dangerous.” He motions for Evee to sit in a chair in the back of the alcove. “My name is Lenny, what’s yours?” He holds his hand out to her and she puts her hand into his.

  “Evee,” she says as she lets him wrap his big hand around hers and shake.

  He lets go and picks up the phone. “Hiya, this is Lenny in security, I need to make a call.” He puts his hand over the receiver “What’s the number?”

  She tells him her home phone number, the one she is only supposed to give out in emergencies, like this one. As they wait, he makes a funny face. She wants to laugh, but she doesn’t. It won’t come out.

  “That didn’t go through. He puts the phone down. Where do you live?”

  “Ventura.”

  “Ventura? California, right? That’s pretty far away. Who are you here with?”

  “The lady dropped me off outside.”

  “What lady?”

  “I don’t know. I didn’t like her.”

  Lenny scratches his head and picks up the phone again. “Hi, Lenny here again, can you try a number in Ventura, California, I don’t know the area code.”

  Evee watches Lenny’s face. He is not being funny this time.

  “Hello. Hi, I’m calling from the Golden Nugget in Vegas, Las Vegas. I’m looking for Evee’s mom?” he pauses. “Yes, she’s here with me now. Ok, OK just a second,” Lenny hands the phone to her. “Your mom.”

  “Evee, Evee! Are you OK baby?”

  Evee starts to cry as she talks and has a hard time getting the words out.

  “I want to come home.”

  “You’re going to be home real soon. We’ll come get you.”

  Then all Evee can here is yelling and her mom crying.

  “Evee, honey, are you OK?” It’s okaasan.

  “Yes,” Evee wants to cry and laugh and she has to go pee so bad now. Her stomach hurts too and there is so much noise in this place and on the phone and from Lenny’s walkie talkie.

  “I wanna come home. Please come get me.”

  “Evee the police are going to come see you, OK. Don’t be scared baby. You are OK now. You are safe.”

  Okaasan said she would never lie to Evee. She said that when Evee asked her if the tooth fairy was real or fake. Sh
e wanted to know the truth. Okaasan said, I don’t ever want to lie to you and if you want to believe in the tooth fairy, you can believe.

  “No, is it real or not real?”

  “Not real, but maybe we shouldn’t tell your mom because she really likes it when she gets to leave money under your pillow.”

  Two more men in yellow jackets come over to the desk in the wall. Lenny is talking to them. Evee believes she is safe now. Now that she is surrounded by tall people in yellow that work in this place and her moms are going to come get her.

  Glenda comes back to the counter, and leans on it from the outside. Lenny says something to her and she looks at Evee with raised eyebrows.

  She is holding Lenny’s hand very tight now and walking on the yellow carpet past noisy machines and pasty white old people legs and ladies with black tights on and no pants with drinks and money everywhere. Money is on their trays and the sound of coins dropping into buckets and machines counting money. It is exciting. She thinks the lady was not so mean for taking her here. Nothing bad can happen here, she thinks.

  Evee knows what this place reminds her of, the fair and the tent with the paintings of the bearded lady and the tattooed man and other strange looking people on the outside. Okaasan said they couldn’t go in because she didn’t want to pay money to objify people. Mama, laughed and said she wasn’t interested either, but Evee had been, but then her and mama went on the ferris wheel and then got cotton candy, so the bearded lady wasn’t so important anymore.

  When they all get onto the elevator, the tallest yellow jacket man tells all the other people in the elevator to get out and they do. She squeezes Lenny’s hand and moves closer to his leg and looks at the floor. She is scared again. It’s like at the beach when a wave she didn’t see, hits the side of her head and pushes her under. That’s what this feels like. The elevator is so small and the trunk was hot and she still needs to pee so bad.

  ******

  SEVENTEEN

  Vivian drives for three and a half hours deep into the desert. Wishing she was in the south of France, or even Bakersfield, anywhere that would get her out of this car with Evee’s fingerprints and hair all over it.

  She drives the many back roads through the desert. She talks to no one. She doesn’t take toilet breaks, holding it instead. It’s her penance. She holds it for miles and miles. Lifting herself off the seat when she passes over a bump or pothole. Visualizing the sides of her bladder splitting under the strain of filtered coffee and sugar. The pain is nothing compared to what the parents – whoever they are, must be going through. She knows.

  The pain of losing your daughter to drugs. And your husband in the middle of the night on a dark road with badly marked lanes and steep embankments. Nothing could be as bad as that, and she continues to hold it. But she did the right thing in this situation. What else could she have done? What kind of person turns in their own family. He was just so stupid.

  She decides she won’t go home. Too risky. She will drive to Arizona. Her sister’s house. Just a couple of days. She’ll call the hospice from a payphone. There’s nobody else expecting her. Nothing she is scheduled to do. Nobody to wait for her anywhere. It’s almost like she doesn’t exist.

  “What a track record,” she says as she thinks about Jay and his mother. One kidnapper and one drug addict. She sure knows how to fuck them up.

  She opens the glove compartment looking for the white tape. The car swerves as she reaches for it. She goes off the road a little. She puts the tape in. Turns the volume up and screams along to the song.

  We had a love, a love, a love you don’t find everyday

  She thinks about the movie someone could make about this whole thing. It would be a great story. She decides Kathleen Turner would play her and someone tall and handsome could play Dale. She would want him in every scene with her. Standing over her. Encouraging her. Loving her like he did when he was alive. He never blamed her for what happened to their daughter. Never took any of it out on her. All he did was die. And that’s something she will always be angry at him for.

  “God dammit Dale, I told you I didn’t need ice cream. Always trying so hard with me. You always tried so hard. I love you. No matter what I love you.”

  I love you Viv.

  Vivian pulls to the side of the road. The gravel under the car kicking up clouds of glowing dust.

  It has been years since Dale has spoken back to her. And she swears she has just heard him.

  “Dale?”

  Yes love.

  “Dale, where have you been? I’ve missed you so much. I’m in a mess here.”

  Oh Viv, you’ve done the right thing. There’s no harm done.

  “But I should have gone to the police, right? Maybe it would have been the right thing to do.”

  Well there’s right and there’s right, Viv. You did what you thought best, for everyone involved.

  “I’ve missed you so much. I can’t say how much, it hurts so bad still.”

  Why don’t you go to the bathroom Viv. Ease yourself on dear.

  Vivian opens her door and feels the heat coming out from under the car and a soft breeze tickles the hair on her arms. It sends a tingle through her that she attributes to Dale. She looks at the passenger seat. It is empty. Suddenly she is hit with anxiety as she realizes the extreme silence she is in. She sets her feet on the gravel and stands. Her bladder sore. Her legs stiff. She turns her body towards the car and spreads her legs. She pulls her pants down and grips the seat she has been sitting in all day.

  She cries with the relief. A loud cry with more noise than tears.

  The crying reminds her of the day she had to identify Dale’s body. The police told her it would be a good idea to bring someone with her. She didn’t because the only person she would have wanted support from was Dale. How inconsiderate that they would expect anyone else to take his place of importance in her life. How inconsiderate of them to force her to look at his broken body.

  Later she was grateful to have been able to see him. To spend time alone with him before the funeral. She didn’t take anyone with her.

  Dale had shown up that morning anyway. He had encouraged her to eat some cereal before she left the house. Told her she needed to take care of herself, for him. Over the past several years he has shown up to remind her that he is still expecting a lot from her so she better look after herself, and she has to some extent.

  Vivian squats a while after she has finished. Drying. Noticing the heat of the car and desert on her bare skin. Imagining, for a second, sunbathing in a bright swimsuit suitable for a woman her age. A big hat and a drink, with ice cracking in a tall glass.

  She stands and pulls up her pants. She stretches her arms above her head and leans slowly to her left, then her right. She twists her torso and looks up and down the dark road. No cars have passed the whole time she has been stopped. She is in the middle of nowhere.

  “Dale, you still here?” Then she whistles, out of habit. It’s what they used to do when they had been separated at swap meets or shopping malls. It was their sign that is was time to leave, or at least reunite, grab hands and walk together.

  She hears a whistle.

  “I don’t know what to do next. I’m in a mess, Dale. I don’t feel good about this.”

  What if you went home? Home’s safe.

  “It is home. And I can go back to normal, like nothing happened. If I went right now I could be back before any of the neighbors wake up.”

  Vivian feels refreshed and excited. She gets back into her car and turns on the ignition. She hasn’t done anything wrong. Dale is with her and she is going home. He thinks it is a good idea and so it is. She turns the steering wheel hard and pushes the accelerator. The wheels spin out on the gravel and she lets out a holler at the sound and the dust glowing red and yellow on all sides of the car. The car lurches forward and she sees the dark desert swirl in front of her. She is back on the smooth road again heading in the direction she had come. A lighter load in all respects
.

  From this moment forward, she decides, her life is going to mean something.

  She whoops again.

  “From this moment forward, my life’s going to mean something,” she yells as loud as she can. Her throat feels raw, but she likes it.

  Her hands grip the steering wheel tight and she puts her foot down hard on the gas. The car speeds to 100mph. She sees nothing but the road in front of her and that’s all she needs.

  ******

  EIGHTEEN

  Evee can see forever out the window. There is a blue pyramid building and hundreds of other buildings. She sees a city underneath her and wonders how many little kids are playing on the streets right now.

  She feels a little nervous as she presses her head against the cool window. Below she sees the white tops of roofs and cars moving around like little ants. Lenny stands next to her and the police sit in chairs.

  Everyone is being nice to her even when she cried a lot because they made her look at a picture of the man who put her in the trunk. Lenny told her that she could squeeze his hand really hard and it would make her feel less scared. It worked a little, but her hand got tired quickly. He told her she was very brave.

  She wants to be friends with Lenny forever. She thinks mama and okaasan will really like him, too. Templeton can draw his picture and she could take him to school. With all those people around all the time, she will be safe for the rest of her life.

  Lenny sits next to her as she eats the grilled cheese and French fries that the hotel gave her. The food is so warm and her stomach is not feeling so sick anymore and it feels good to eat. She likes the feeling of the cold water filling her belly. It’s like the ocean in the middle of summer when the air outside is so warm that the water cools her down so she can play for longer. In and out of the water all day as mom and okaasan watch her from the shore and run in together laughing.

  Then the door opens so quickly it hits the wall hard and scares Evee until she sees mama and okaasan running towards her. She sits there frozen. She is picked up and squeezed tight. She is smashed into bodies and someone is rubbing her head and kissing her face. She hears crying. It’s her own crying and her moms’.