2010
SALT LAKE CITY
I’m hungry and it’s two in the morning. The fridge is empty. And Mom is dead on the couch.
I know she’s not sleeping. She’s in her bra. Jeans unbuttoned. Her exposed skin is covered in bite marks, yellowing like whey. The couch is stained purple. It used to be blue. Fifth grade started last week. I have a spelling test tomorrow morning.
“I’m sorry. I-I didn’t … We were just—” Devon stammers from the shadows. I’m too afraid to look at him. I’m just staring at the purple couch that used to be blue.
“We were just messing around and then … you know.”
I don’t. I’m ten.
I grab Mom’s cell phone from the coffee table, trying to dial 911. Devon rips it out of my hand, and bends my wrist backward. But I don’t feel the pain—not at first. He chases me in circles around the kitchen. My throat goes ragged as I scream in his face. I try to yank a kitchen knife from the butcher block but I can’t hold on to it. My wrist is on fire.
“It was a mistake, Mia! I made a fucking mistake, okay?” I really don’t care. Leave, I hate you. Leave, I hate you. I hate you, I hate you, I hate you.
No one’s heard of Saratov’s syndrome yet. People are still dancing in the dark and feel safe enough walking home at night with a friend. Devon’s probably one of the first carriers.
He stops chasing me. We’re both gasping for breath, standing on opposite sides of the couch. I wonder if I’ll have to live with Devon now. I hardly know him. Mom hardly knows him. Knew him.
We met him at the Fourth of July festival. He was there by himself and Mom thought he looked lonely. I thought he looked weird. Stringy, unkempt hair the color of dead grass. A tattered tank top that exposed his gangly arms and crude stick-and-pokes.
Mom waved him down and offered him a beer. Later, when we threw away our trash, I realized the can was still full. He’d been pretending to drink it. I thought that was strange and I told Mom, but she had nothing to say about it.
Some nights she doesn’t come home. I don’t know what they do together. She doesn’t go to the store, doesn’t buy food. I’ve never seen Devon eat, and she doesn’t get hungry when he’s around. Last night I had ketchup and crackers for dinner.
I didn’t even know they were here. If she screamed or struggled, I didn’t hear anything.
Devon picks up the knife I dropped on the floor. “I can fix this,” he whispers.
I back away as he slices across his wrist. I don’t want to see any more blood so I look out the window. The night is starless. Clouds suffocate the moon.
He tells me to close my eyes, that he doesn’t want me watching. “Just hold her hand, that’s all you gotta do. Okay, Mia?”
I take the icy, dead weight of her hand in mine. But I can’t close my eyes. Too afraid of what he might do when I’m not looking.
Her body lurches at his touch as he sits down on the couch, like he’s radiating some strange electricity. I swallow hard, trying to pretend I didn’t notice. He told me not to watch.
He holds his bleeding wrist to her blue lips. As I finally force my eyes shut—
Hers open.
NOW
TUCSON
The needle worms its way into my vein, iron cold, like a key turning a lock. I grit my teeth, realizing I forgot to breathe. I always seem to forget. My eyes rivet to the timer counting down on my phone. Two minutes and thirty-five seconds. That’s how long it takes to get a quarter pint. Thirty-four. Thirty-three. Thirty-two …
Mom shuffles around the cluttered kitchen in a pair of shabby house shoes the color of Astroturf. The slip-slap sound they make on the tile floor is an aggravating constant, like a leaky faucet. Her frizzy red hair is swept into an off-center topknot. She’s wearing a pair of my PJ pants—new ones, in fact, that I bought at Target last week, with monkeys and bananas on them. I don’t mention it, though. We wear the same size. We’re only eight years apart now. She looks so childlike and out of place, like a bewildered ten-foot-tall Alice, accidentally trampling a singing daffodil. Sometimes it feels like she’s moving backward through time. But maybe that’s just me. Moving forward.
One minute and twenty-four seconds. Twenty-three … twenty-two …
She always paces and clenches her fists while she’s waiting for me to draw, like she’s juicing ripe fruit in both her hands. I study her as she leans over the kitchen sink. Her lips have that telltale bluish tint. But that’s normal. She tries to distract herself, watering a pot of succulents beside the window she’s avoided all day. Only a faint raspberry-sherbet streak of sunlight remains outside. The night-blooming cereus cacti are starting to flower—slowly, imperceptibly. Petal by petal. There’s a dead saguaro by the mailbox, blackening to a crisp in the sun. Its bone-dry, lopsided arm still points erect, but barely—like it’s exhausted after waving at us all these years, hoping we’ll wave back.
Fifty-six seconds. Fifty-five … fifty-four … fifty-three … She starts emptying the dishwasher.
“Mom, I got it.” She can’t control the shaking while she’s waiting for me to draw and always seems to break something.
She grabs a pink plastic tumbler from the dish rack as she approaches. The cup wasn’t pink when we bought it. Over time it’s turned a weak, unsettling Pepto-Bismol color. But at least we know which cup is hers.
There’s a rubber reservoir connected to the needle, gathering the blood. It’s almost full, weighing down my forearm. When you see that much blood at once, it’s so dark it almost looks black. I used to get a little light-headed during this part and would use it as an excuse to eat a whole sleeve of Oreos. It helps to not stare at the reservoir. Instead, I focus on the cheap wooden plaque above the fridge that reads, IN THIS HOUSE: WE LAUGH. WE GIVE BIG HUGS. WE NEVER GIVE UP. AND WE LOVE ICE CREAM.
Well, one of us, anyway.
Twelve … eleven … ten—
She’s right behind me. My hair stands on end as her labored, humid breath hits the back of my neck. She cranes her head over my shoulder, clutching her pink plastic cup like a vise, watching the countdown with wide, bloodshot eyes. I resist the urge to scratch an itch on my nose. If I so much as flinch in the wrong direction during the last ten seconds, it might spook her. And what she does when she’s spooked is out of my hands.
Four … three … two …
A cheerful little jingle. I carefully remove the needle from my arm. Detach the reservoir. Mom presents the cup in her trembling hand and I pour in the blood.
I quickly stand, anxious to toss my needle into the red sharps bin we keep next to the recycling. Type 1 diabetes, if anyone asks. No one ever has. No one comes here.
I don’t like to watch when she eats, so I keep my back to her and dig through the freezer for a package of English muffins. I’ve been on an egg sandwich kick lately.
As I pop one in the microwave to soften it up, I hear a muffled ping! from her pocket. Someone’s texting her. I notice this, because nobody ever texts her except for me. There’s the occasional message from one of her employees at the restaurant, calling in sick. But that’s it. I also notice the phone is in her pocket instead of under her pillow or sitting on top of the toilet. Most nights it takes us a good fifteen minutes to find the damn thing before she leaves for work. She’s been expecting this message.
I turn and watch her pound a response, one-handed, as she drinks from her cup. I can’t imagine something urgent enough to interrupt her dinner. I realize I haven’t moved, that I’m anchored to the spot, finger hovering over the DEFROST button on the microwave. She meets my gaze, aggressively sucking her teeth as she drinks to keep them from getting stained. At one point, I got her a fun, curly straw to help with that. But she’s always too impatient, unless I remember to grab it for her before I start the draw.
“What’s up?” I squint at her, as though I might be able to make out what she’s typing.
“Kayla’s wondering when the next BevMo shipment is coming.” The words rush from her lips. I notice a ruddy glow in her cheeks, but that might just be the color returning to her skin after eating. She places her phone on the table and turns it facedown.
The microwave beeps. I transfer my English muffin to the toaster and negotiate with the janky pilot on our stove. We need to get it fixed, but we’d rather not have anyone come over. The gas belches and feeds the flame. I can feel her eyes on me.
“Anyhoo,” she chirps. Nothing shreds her nerves like silence between us. “How was the store today? Did a lot of people come meet that author?”
I nod as I crack an egg into the sizzling pan. “She was kind of a jerk, though. She didn’t let us take her picture ’cuz she’d just gotten some gross chemical peel this morning.”
Mom’s phone pings again. Her spine stiffens and she reflexively reaches for it. But then, she smiles at me and switches it to silent. She knows I know something’s off. It’s impossible for us to keep secrets from one another. There’s a gnawing feeling in my gut. I’m hurt that she’d try to hide something, no matter how innocuous. She promised me, the day Devon left, that she’d never lie to me again. Even then, I knew it was a silly promise. Just a thing you tell a kid. But after thirteen years, I’ve actually started to believe it.
“Is Kayla melting down ’cuz she drank all the chardonnay?” I offer, trying to loosen the tense snag.
“She’s fine.” That smile is still frozen on her face, like a glitchy video.
I pop my nightly iron supplements with a tall glass of water, then assemble my sandwich. Sit down at the table, across from her. She nudges the centerpiece aside so she can see me: yellow tulips I bought her a few days ago. She still loves springtime. Flowers. Sunshine.
“That looks good,” she lies as I take a bite. She always watches me eat. I don’t know if it’s because she misses it or if she thinks I shouldn’t sit alone. Either way, it’s kind of weird. But I’ve never called her out on it.
“Oh my God, so I read in the newsletter today they’re reviving the Main Street Electrical Parade.” She smacks her lips, fidgeting excitedly in her chair.
“I don’t know what that is.”
“Yes you do, it’s that parade with all the Christmas lights, remember? There was Mickey’s train and those twinkly snails spinning in circles? I showed you the video, I know I did.”
Mom gets alerts in her email about all the Disney parks, even the ones in China and Japan. Every couple of days, she’ll deliver her remarks on which rides are being rebuilt, which characters are getting makeovers, which limited-edition stuffed animals are being sold where. We were supposed to go to Disneyland over my spring break in the seventh grade. We figured we’d hunker down in the hotel room all day and come out at night to hit the rides and stay till they closed. But that was also the year we had to slash hours at the restaurant and couldn’t stay open after dark. Money was tight, so we stayed home. Same thing the following year. By the time we could afford to go, all the parks had installed Sara scanners. She still hasn’t unsubscribed from the emails.
I glaze over as she chatters on about the parade. When I think of my mom, I have to think of her as three different people. There’s the effervescent art-school dropout, wine-drunk and tie-dyeing T-shirts in the backyard, decorating for Halloween six weeks in advance. Then there’s who she was after the turn: Alone. Afraid. Burying emotional land mines so I always had to watch my step. Now, she’s both those people combined. Sometimes it feels like she’s lost in time: Fantasizing about a trip to Disneyland we never took. Random sobbing in her sleep, dreaming about the night I broke my leg thirteen years ago. I’m not sure if she knows how old I am. I mean, I guess she knows. Fundamentally. But human memory builds barriers to separate the weeks, months, and years. Hers are eroding. Time isn’t passing. It just is, like a whirling sphere suspended in space. At least, that’s how I think it must feel. She doesn’t talk about it.
“Did you put those jalapeño poppers back on the menu? With that funky green cilantro sauce?” I try to engage her on a new topic.
“I think you’re the only one who ever ordered them. Luke’s trying out some new things. There’s gonna be a black bean burger.”
“Awesome, I can sample for him tonight.” I’m the one who gets to approve the menu at the Fair Shake. For obvious reasons. But Mom frowns when I mention this.
“Oh, you’re coming?”
“Of course I am, it’s Thursday.” Karaoke night at the Fair Shake is my favorite spectator sport. It’s become quite the scene since the blood scanners were installed and bars were allowed to reopen. People go out every night of the week now.
Mom cocks her head like she’s got water in her ear. “Oh, shit. You’re right. It’s Thursday.”
I shovel the rest of my sandwich into my mouth, but she’s stopped watching me. She gazes into the middle distance, picking at her nail polish—pale mint green, like an Easter egg. I wonder when she did them. We always paint each other’s nails. Sometimes we even have this whole elaborate at-home spa night, with masks and hilarious New Age music. Why would she exclude me this time? I feel that gnawing in my gut again.
I almost ask her about it. But before the words crawl up my throat, I stop myself. Not because she’s an adult who’s entitled to a secret every now and then, but because I remember what she is. My job is to keep things agreeable. We don’t fight, because we can’t. Because I’ll lose.
“You mind if I wear that striped tank dress tonight?” she asks.
“Go nuts.” She knows I never wear it. She bought it for me, but it’s not my style. I’ll be buried in a flannel and cutoffs.
I stand to clear my plate, and she regards me with a tired half smile. She has exactly one wrinkle, a faint frown line beneath the apple of her left cheek. But her eyes always give away her true age. She hates when I bring it up, but I spend a lot of time thinking about my birthday eight years from now, the day she and I will be the same age: thirty-one. She probably thinks I’m dreading it. But I’m not. I’ve always imagined I’ll feel proud on that day. Proud our secret survived for so long. That we survived.
Copyright © 2023 by Elizabeth Kerin
