“Do you understand?” our mother said.
“Yes,” I said. “I’m sorry.”
A moment passed. Would she nod and turn away?
No.
“I don’t think you do understand, Matthew. I’ve gone to a lot of trouble already. I bought fresh, good, and interesting food—and no, it wasn’t cheap, I saw you looking at the receipt—and I did it for you. It’s going to take me a long time to prepare this meal, because it’s a special meal and special things take time and care. Most people wouldn’t bother. Most people microwave fish sticks or serve cereal for dinner to their kids and think that’s good enough. But when I cook for my kids, I make it count. I spend money and take time. And you had better appreciate it.”
I knew better than to say what I did say next, but she had stolen my birthday present, Murdoch’s phone number.
“What exactly are you trying to tell me, Mom? That you don’t want me to throw out the grocery bags?”
She snatched the plastic bag of mussels off the counter and slammed me across the face with it. Once. Twice.
My head had jerked to the right. My cheek stung. I didn’t move to touch it, though. I looked into her eyes.
At this point, there was never any way to know what to do. Sometimes she wanted you to confront her. “Act like you have balls, for God’s sake.” But other times, any show of strength made her angrier and it was better to grovel.
I chose. I shifted my gaze down to the floor and waited, like a good beta monkey.
I saw her feet move. She took one step away. I thought it was over. But then she whirled back and slammed me across the face with the mussels again, on the other cheek. “That’s to teach you not to criticize how I keep my kitchen. My home.”
And suddenly I had an idea. I dropped the torn and balled-up grocery bags onto the floor.
It worked. When I looked up, she had turned back to her paella.
Air returned to the room.
Over her shoulder, Nikki said conversationally, “So, who’s this Murdoch McIlvane guy? You trying to set me up on a date? I was just thinking it was time to find someone new. I’ll pay him a visit tomorrow, check him out. I’ll tell him my kids set us up.” She smiled right at me. “Don’t worry. I’ll be at my most charming. He’ll love me.”
I couldn’t say anything. I saw Callie looking at me, horrified. I could read her mind. Our mother was going to turn right around and meet Murdoch the way Callie had wanted us to do. Wouldn’t this ruin everything for us? Ruin the possibility of Murdoch becoming our friend? Callie wanted me to stop our mother. Somehow.
But I didn’t know how.
I looked away from Callie.
8
MIRACLE SUMMER
When you’re living your life in endurance mode, you don’t expect anything good to happen. I’m not saying you don’t dream about some miracle that would change everything for the better. But you pretty much know it’s only a fantasy, and that you have no real control over anything.
So it’s a huge shock if a miracle does occur in your life.
I know you remember some of that miracle summer with Murdoch, Emmy, because we’ve talked about it.
Who would have thought that one of Nikki’s embarrassing schemes would have gone so well for her and for us? But it did. The next morning after she took Murdoch’s address away from me, Nikki put on a short summer dress and left with you. I only asked Murdoch recently exactly what occurred.
He says Nikki looked him up and down when he opened the door. She had you in her arms, and, smiling over your head, she introduced herself. “Murdoch McIlvane? Listen, I know this’ll sound crazy, but someone I know thought I ought to meet you. And so, well, would you like to go over to the L Street diner with me and Emmy for coffee? Right now?”
“I was charmed,” Murdoch admitted. “Women usually aren’t so direct, and I liked it. She was so pretty, and Emmy was smiling at me. It was just coffee at the diner. I wasn’t doing anything. I wasn’t seeing anybody. I thought, why not?”
Do you remember that first date between them, Emmy? I suppose that’s too much to expect, that you would remember the start of the miracle.
Anyway. Here’s something I remember.
One Saturday night, during the miracle time—which lasted a little less than three months—Murdoch and Callie and our mother and you and I watched a movie about a prisoner of war. Well, okay, you weren’t watching. You were sprawled on top of Murdoch on the sofa, asleep. He had one hand stroking your hair and the other was holding our mother’s hand. Callie and I were on the floor with the popcorn and the remote control.
We loved being on the floor. Murdoch had this red and blue rug with a pad underneath it, and big soft cotton pillows to lean on. As I watched the movie, though, I was on the verge of deciding that Murdoch’s TV was too small. I was that relaxed.
Anyway, in the war movie, the prisoner guy was locked up in the jungle in a tiny bamboo hut on stilts. The hut was too small for him to stand up or lie down, so all he could do was crouch or sit hunched over in one or two positions. They shoved food in at him every so often, and he, you know, did his business out of a little hole in the floor, and the sun beat down overhead during the day and turned his cage into a stinking oven. The days and weeks and months and years passed, and that was his life. Nobody ever even talked to him.
“Are you kids sorry you picked this movie?” Murdoch asked, after about twenty minutes. He had put it on Pause. “I’ve got some other movies we could watch instead.”
“No,” Callie and I chorused together. “It’s interesting,” I added. I wondered if Callie, like me, was remembering the times we’d been locked in our room . . . especially in the summer.
Murdoch turned to our mother. “What about you, Nikki? Are you okay with this movie for the kids?”
“Sure,” said our mother. “Whatever they want.”
Murdoch was still frowning. “You kids should know, this isn’t made up for Hollywood. This sort of thing really happens to people. The purpose of this particular kind of torture is to make someone lose his mind. It usually works, too.” He paused. “It would for me. I’m sure of it. It probably wouldn’t even take a month.”
We all said we would go crazy, too. We maintained a respectful silence for a minute or two, and then Murdoch, with obvious reluctance, pressed the Play button again.
I don’t know about Callie, but I was just agreeing with Murdoch because, even though I was fourteen, I was sort of being a baby. I wanted to dress like Murdoch, act like Murdoch, be like Murdoch. Where he was, I was. What he said, I agreed with. I even would try to get him to talk about what he had been like when he was my age, where he had lived, what his parents had been like. He never had much to say about his childhood or parents and always answered shortly and then changed the subject. I thought if he would only tell me, I could try to be more like him.
But, as I watched this war movie, I wasn’t convinced that I would actually go crazy, if it were me in a little jungle hut. Funny how I remember this. I’m not saying that I didn’t know that guy had it way worse than Callie and you and me. But I couldn’t help thinking that he had some stuff going for him. Predictability. Every day was the same. He didn’t go to sleep thinking he might wake up with somebody holding a knife to his throat and giggling. And there wasn’t anybody else he had to stick around to protect, either, which meant he had the option of trying to kill his tormentors—or even himself. Certainly he could afford to pursue the survival strategy he chose, which was zoning out. Turning his mind off until it was needed. Until his miracle happened.
He was luckier than us there, too. His miracle lasted. By the end of the movie, he was free. Whereas, I always knew that our miracle wouldn’t last. Couldn’t. But while it did . . .
I broke my own rules of survival while it did. I did things that I knew were stupid and useless, like hoping, and praying. I got spoiled and cocky and took things for granted, like that soft carpet and that TV and that nice, clean, safe apartment w
ith Murdoch cooking stir-fry chicken for dinner, and always enough milk and juice in the refrigerator for you, which you appreciated, I knew, even though you still weren’t talking.
I even began to take for granted the way our mother was during that time. Soft. Laughing. Warm. Reasonable.
You know what I was hoping for? I bet you can guess, Emmy. I wasn’t just hoping for Murdoch to stay with us. I was hoping I’d wronged Nikki all these years. That maybe—like us—all she’d ever really needed was Murdoch. And then she, and we, could all be normal.
It seemed like it could happen, that summer. Miracles were all around. During week three, when we were all having dinner at Murdoch’s apartment, you held out the Minnie Mouse mug that Murdoch had bought specially for you. You waved it imperiously in the air.
“A little more milk, Em?” he asked you.
“No, thank you, Murdoch,” you said, as if you’d been talking in full, clear sentences all along, as if we’d never worried about whether you’d be able to start school on schedule in the fall. “I just like this mug.”
9
ON THE ROCKS
She pretended to be normal, our mother, during most of those weeks she was with Murdoch. She tried hard, which was something I’d never seen in her before and was the thing that made me hope for the impossible. But she didn’t, or couldn’t, cover up her personality perfectly. There were cracks in her behavior, times when her true self would seep through the veneer of warmth and merriment like water into a basement. I watched Murdoch to see if he would notice. To see if he would understand what he saw. To see what he would do then.
A weak man would be hypnotized, paralyzed. (As far as I can tell, this was what happened to my father, Ben, when he met Nikki as a teenager.) A bad man would be attracted to her on a more equal basis. And a good man, of course, would run like hell.
Murdoch eventually ran. But not at first. At first, it seemed to me that he was just puzzled. Like I said, Nikki was trying. And frankly, we kids were trying hard, too. We covered up for her, and we also did our best to surround Murdoch with appreciation and, well, love. We wanted him to want to be with us. We wanted him to want us.
I sort of cringe to remember it. We were pretty pathetic. But he did like us. It was obvious he did—obvious that he liked kids. His invitations to Nikki almost always included all three of us. Only rarely did they go out alone together at night, to a club or a party or a nice restaurant, the kind of things she liked to do. He wanted to take us all to the ball game, or the aquarium, or to have a barbecue in his backyard. She’d be dressing to go out for a drink at eleven at night, and he’d be yawning.
Nikki played along with this for a while, but I think she got really tired of it. Then came her first major slipup.
It was a Sunday afternoon in late July, and Murdoch had taken us all on a picnic to Gloucester. We set up by the ocean on huge flat rocks. Below us, a steep incline ran down to the water. We ate and talked idly and watched the white-capped waves at the base of the rocks and the soaring, cawing gulls in the blue sky above. We felt the sun and the breeze on our shoulders and faces. We inhaled to smell the difference between the Gloucester air, thirty miles north of the city, and the air at home in Southie.
Just before our mother cracked, I was eating a perfectly ripe peach, leaning over carefully so that the juice dripped down onto the rocks and not my T-shirt. Callie had taken you to examine a little tide pool a few yards across from us on the rocks, and our mother was lying on her side, leaning on one arm, listening to Murdoch and me talk. She had taken off her high-heeled sandals and was wiggling her bare toes with their blue sparkly toenails.
Okay, maybe I did monopolize him and maybe it was dull for her and maybe I should have known better. Maybe I actually did know she was bored and edgy. But I kept Murdoch focused on me anyway as I asked questions about his current job. I didn’t ask just because I liked hearing Murdoch talk—although I did—but because I knew he would enjoy talking about it.
Murdoch loved his work as a home building and improvement contractor. He knew all about the details of building; floors and fittings, windows and ceilings, decorative tile and wainscoting, built-in cabinets and perfectly plastered walls. He could get almost poetic about well-planned plumbing and electrical lines. And when he talked about these things, you could feel his competence along with his love for doing them. He liked houses that were all messed up. He liked to fix them, to make them beautiful.
“We salvaged the old wood floors from this house that was being demolished,” Murdoch was saying. “It’s amazing stuff. Listen, you know what, Matt, I can bring you to the site and show you—”
Nikki suddenly jumped up. “Oh, please! My head’s exploding from boredom. Come on, let’s have some fun!”
She laughed, and I saw Murdoch smile as he looked up at her, but I knew that laugh of hers. I got up. I wanted to warn Murdoch to get up, too, and to hurry. But it was too late, she’d already run across to the rock pool, grabbed you, Emmy, up under one arm like a football, and raced down the incline, toward the ocean.
Our mother’s hair flew out behind her like a flag. She ran from one giant rock to another. She shouted for us to come join her, to show some spirit, to have some fun. Were we alive or were we dead?
Emmy, you screamed. I guess it was a delayed reaction to being seized. Simultaneously, Murdoch was up and yelling, “Nikki! Stop! These rocks aren’t safe for running around. This isn’t a beach—”
Nikki did stop. She turned and called back to Murdoch: “It’s not safe?” She sounded almost reasonable.
“No.” Murdoch’s brow smoothed out when she turned. “Some of the rocks are unstable down there. It’s just not a good place to run around.” He’d gotten up, but that was all. I knew he thought she’d stop and just come back. She wasn’t very far away yet.
Meanwhile, though, Callie and I had already started down toward you. Murdoch was right—the rocks were unstable; one of them shifted dangerously beneath my feet and I saw Callie slip on another. “Hey!” Murdoch called after us. “Matt, Callie! Didn’t you hear me? That’s not safe. Come back up here.” He began following us, moving quickly, competently.
Below, our mother laughed again. She put you down on your feet, Emmy, and then grabbed your hand and made you run with her, pulling you along by one arm. “Chase us!” she yelled. “Come on! Come on!”
She went from rock to rock, running parallel to the ocean, dragging you. Once you fell and got yanked to your feet, forced to run on.
“Come on! Losers—catch us!”
Do you remember any of this, Emmy?
Callie and I were running, too. It was what Nikki wanted. We had to pretend we were all playing her game; we had to get you back safe—I don’t really know why we ran after you, I just know we did. I was terrified; the rocks were slippery and some of them moved when you landed on them, and I was wearing old sneakers without good gripping soles. Callie was barefoot, like Nikki, which was maybe better for gripping, but the rocks were jagged. I could hear her panting beside me. I spared a moment to wonder what Murdoch was thinking, and where he was—
He came even with us and we felt his hands come down on our shoulders, stopping us in our tracks. “Sit down. Stay right here!”
He was enraged.
“You don’t understand,” Callie panted. “Emmy!”
His voice was clipped. “I’ll get Emmy. Stay here.”
He didn’t even dream we’d disobey. He was already past us, running full tilt across the rocks, gaining on our mother and you. “Nikki! Nikki, what do you think you’re doing?”
Callie and I exchanged one look and then we started running again. We didn’t know what was going to happen, but we knew our mother would do something. She was looking over her shoulder now as she ran. She watched Murdoch as he got closer and closer—
She changed direction, heading farther down the incline toward the ocean where waves smashed against the rocks. At first, Emmy, she dragged you behind her, but as Murdoch gained
on you both, she grabbed you up again in her arms. And then, suddenly, you were on the very last rock, next to the edge. A big rock, with what looked to me like a long drop to the churning water below.
Our mother turned so her back was to the water. Murdoch was now only the width of a few large flat rocks away from her. He slowed down and reached out.
“Nikki, look. This isn’t a playground. I don’t think you understand—”
Two things happened. Beside me, Callie slipped and fell. She yelled, and in a glance I saw that her left foot was cut and bleeding. I reached down to help her up.
And our mother giggled. I looked up to see that she now had you suspended upside down over the churning water at the edge of the rocks.
She was holding you by your ankles.
Murdoch was an arm’s reach and a half away. Too far.
And Callie and I, we were too far away, too.
Gently, our mother began to swing you. Out over the water. Back over the rock. Water. Rock.
Water. Rock.
You weren’t screaming anymore. If you were making any sound at all, I couldn’t hear it. What I could hear was the drumming of my blood in my ears as my heart pumped.
Over our heads, the gulls cawed. And then even they were silent.
“Emmy loves this!” Nikki called. “I know what my kids like.”
“Nikki.” Murdoch’s voice carried up to Callie and me. I thought of that moment in the Cumberland Farms store, when Murdoch had faced that angry man.
I held my breath.
I don’t know how long we all stood there. Maybe just a minute. Maybe two. Murdoch’s eyes were locked on our mother’s.
Then: “Just joking,” our mother said, and pulled you back up into her arms. “Just having fun. I mean, you’re all so serious, so boring. We should have gone to that carnival in Lynn. That would have been more fun than this.”
Murdoch didn’t answer. He stepped closer, reaching out to take you. Our mother let Murdoch take you from her. She smiled at him.