After the fireworks stopped, Nora crawled out of Harrison’s bed, her limbs heavy. “I have to go home. I have to wait for her.” Harrison nodded and pressed her hand, barely waking.
At home, Nora didn’t sleep. She sat on the sofa downstairs, the television on the Home Shopping Network, the volume off. When her eyes drifted closed, she propped them open using determination born of fear. Her leg muscles cramped with disuse. She straightened and shook them, then stuck her heels under the couch cushion Ellie liked to hold against her belly. From outside came random pops and squeals followed by the occasional M-80 blast that set off car alarms and made neighborhood dogs bark.
How could she possibly go to bed? Her daughter was gone, missing. It might be her fault. No, it was her fault. Ellie had probably been right—she’d probably asked for chicken. She shouldn’t have argued with her daughter about it—oh, god, she remembered it all over again. Ellie hadn’t left because of the chicken.
Ellie had left because Nora had hit her.
Confronted with the reality of her newly untrustworthy mind, she’d hit her own daughter across the face as hard as she could.
She didn’t blame Ellie for not coming home.
The analog clock on the wall read a time, but it had been getting harder and harder to decipher it lately. Maybe she needed her contacts prescription checked. She knew what was important: it was predawn—the morning paper had just slapped against the front stoop, and cars were still using their headlights. And her daughter still wasn’t home.
Nora placed her fingertips against the blank piece of paper in her journal. Responsibility. She could write that to her daughter. Responsible women . . .
Didn’t hit their children in anger.
No, it was even worse than that. It hadn’t been anger. Nora had hit Ellie in fear.
Fear was displacing the hope. Every day less of one, more of the other. Nora couldn’t control it, she couldn’t iron it out, she couldn’t deep clean it, she couldn’t paint over it, she couldn’t make it pretty and tasteful. She couldn’t write a funny column about it. She couldn’t make it anything else but what it was, which was . . .
Even now, she was having a hard time staying on track with her thoughts. She kept thinking that she’d get up and do something useful while she was waiting, but then she needed to finish her tea, and then she got caught up in whatever the HSN girl was displaying. Even with the volume off, the whapper-icer-dicer looked interesting enough to warrant watching for a while.
Or hours. In the dark, with just the clock she couldn’t read to tell her where she was in time, Nora didn’t know how long she’d been sitting there. She was completely alone. Technically, she knew that on the other side of the globe, whole nations were awake and functioning—laughing, loving, dying—in daylight hours. But here, in her living room, it was possible it would never be light again. That’s what she was scared of. Every night, and especially this night, the night she’d struck her daughter because she was scared that Ellie was right about everything, right that Nora had asked for chicken, right to be horrified at her mother’s tantrum, right about all else that would ever happen, ever.
Ellie would be the right one from now on.
Nora’s shoulders ached from the tension in her neck. She rolled her head and heard a satisfying pop. No, Ellie wasn’t even responsible enough to check in to tell Nora where she was, which proved both her ignorance and her youth.
Then the seesaw tilted again, and Nora thumped down to the hard ground of truth. She had struck Ellie. It was her fault. Good for her daughter to take herself out of an unsafe situation. How many drills had they run on that over the years? What do you do if your boyfriend hits you?
Ellie would roll her eyes. Leave.
What if you’re married to him?
Do you really think I’d marry an abuser, Mom? God.
What do you do?
Run. Leave. I know this.
What if he only hits you once and you know it was an accident and that he’d never do it again?
On a groan of exasperation, Ellie would give her the right answer. Leave forever anyway. If he does it once, he’ll do it again. Can we go back to the movie now? Please?
Nora was the guy. Nora was the abusive boyfriend, the violent husband. And her daughter had done exactly the right thing. The pain of that realization lacerated her gut as if she’d swallowed a razor; the only thing that kept her alive was the stubborn, low-grade pride that knitted her partially back together, sloppily lacing up the wound that kept slipping open.
Ellie was a good girl. She’d be a good woman.
Nora picked up her pen, finally ready to commit the words to the page. She wished for humor, like she injected into her columns. But the pen wouldn’t move on the page until she found the right words. They weren’t the ones that would make her daughter laugh.
Responsibility is a thick woolen coat. We don’t wear those here, so you probably don’t know about the weight of a peacoat. They were popular when your aunt and I were growing up, and we sweated through way too many dates while wearing them. I gave mine to the Salvation Army as soon as I realized I couldn’t afford to have it dry-cleaned and that the smell of sweat would never come out of its armpits. Too heavy, too warm, too much.
One day, though, it might get actually cold. Maybe it will snow. (Have you ever seen snow fall? I think you haven’t. I’ve failed you in this, too.) When the blizzard hits, you realize it feels good to pull that thick coat on over your cotton sweatshirt. You won’t believe me now, but responsibility is like that, too. You’re scared of paying bills until you’re grown-up, but the day that your checkbook balances and you’re left with a dollar or two more than last time in savings, you realize you enjoy the heaviness on your shoulders. Calling the plumber gives you a sense of satisfaction, and if you manage to fix the leak yourself, without calling him? It’s even better, the coat even warmer.
I don’t think I’m leaving you my coat. It’s already gone, or at least, it’s going. You’re going to have to find your own. I’d tell you what thrift store I donated mine to, but I can’t remember anymore, and besides, your shoulders are wider than mine ever were. You were born stronger than me.
You can do everything.
And I’m so sorry you’ll have to.
I’m so sorry.
Nora closed the book and wrapped her fingers tightly around it. She went to the front door and made sure it was unlocked, just in case Ellie had forgotten her key. Upstairs, she undressed slowly, deliberately. She put on her pajamas, the ones she’d worn on New Year’s, and she got into bed.
If Ellie never came back, she would never get up again. That was the easiest answer. The only one, really.