Nicola Griffith - Stay

“So now you’re saying he wasn’t a monster?”

“No, he was. Is.”

“Okay. Then you think he wouldn’t have kept hurting people?”

“Of course he would have kept doing it!”

“Don’t yell. I told you you’d get mean if you didn’t take those pills. I’m just trying to figure this out. Geordie Karp was a sick son of a bitch and I’m glad you hurt him. He probably deserved everything he got.”

“Yes, but how do you stand it, every day, not being sure? Even you’re saying ‘probably.’ I never used to feel this way.”

“Let me see if I’ve got this straight. You used to kill people and not care about it much one way or another. But you’re upset about Geordie—even though he’s not dead, and even though you hurt him for a good reason. Yes? You’re upset that you feel when you practically kill someone?” She waited for my nod. “You don’t think that’s an improvement?”

“She said that I was like Karp.” That I used to be. That I pretended to be.

“She said—?” She cleared her throat. “So she died, when?”

“Five months and four days ago.” And a few hours: it had been midafternoon.

“And you saw Geordie for the first time in New York just this week.”

I nodded, shivered.

“But you said she told you—That she said you were like Geordie.” I shook my head. “Someone else said that?”

“No. She just asked me who he reminded me of.”

“And that was… when?”

“Three days ago.” Or two, or four, or whenever I’d been under the trees.

“That’s who was in the woods, wasn’t it? You see Julia.”

“Yes.”

Silence. Then she said, “What’s that like?” and my muscles locked up. Nothing worked, except my eyes. I wept soundlessly. I couldn’t even turn away.

She got up, sat down again, stared some more, and after a while hitched herself closer and pulled me awkwardly to her chest. She didn’t say anything, just stroked my head. The touch of her hand was like someone taking an axe to a dam; I wrapped my arms around her waist and keened. I hated her for not being Julia, but I couldn’t let go, and I couldn’t stop. Her hand went on stroking my head, and I wanted to shout, Stop! No! This is mine!, but that touch just kept widening the breach.

“She’ll never see this place,” I said. “You have, but she never will. I’ve never seen her grave. I should have stayed, in Atlanta. Should have helped her mother. Seen to her things.” Her clothes still lying on the floor in front of my washing machine.

It was getting dark out, and quiet. Tammy shifted, the couch creaked; her shoulders looked tight and tired. I wiped my face with the back of my hand, smearing the ointment. I didn’t want to talk anymore.

“I think I can make it to my own bed, if you help. The bathroom first.”

I used the toilet again, brushed my teeth, paused in the middle of wiping my mouth with the towel. It wasn’t my face anymore. It wasn’t just the smudges under my eyes, the smears of antibiotic, the scab. The muscles moved differently, as though someone else’s bones were trying to emerge.

Morning. I hobbled out of bed, made coffee, took it and the blood-stained folder to the table. Tammy was still asleep. I leafed through the documents. The pictures. The medical evaluation. The passport, the birth certificate and certificate of adoption. Karp was the legal adoptive father. No mention of permanent residency application, and the visitor’s visa had expired. I had no idea what the INS would make of that. No mention of the Arkansas couple on any official paperwork, though I found check stubs I had missed the first time around, records of bimonthly payments to J. Carpenter. There was no photo of either Jud or Adeline Carpenter, no hint of their age or anything but the fact that they were “good Christians who believed in old-fashioned family values,” and some details about the congregation they belonged to. What would they do now that Karp was permanently out of the picture and the money supply dried up? What would happen to the child?

I pushed it all to one side, took my coffee to the door, and opened it. It was a bright, cold morning. The season had shifted. The vibrant color of a week ago had faded and everywhere I looked bare branches poked through the threadbare tapestry. Careful of my strapped and swollen knee, I propped myself more securely against the doorframe. My coffee and breath steamed. During the night, fog had frozen on the fallen leaves and spiky turf, riming the world in sparkling hoarfrost. Something small had left tracks across the gray carpet, and while I watched the tracks expanded as the sun warmed the ground. Where a bird had hopped about on the hood of the rented Neon, bright green showed through.

“How’s your knee?”

I turned awkwardly. Tammy looked tired and frowsy in her pile of blankets.

“It’ll take my weight. But I’ll have to keep it strapped for a while. Coffee’s hot.”

“What I really liked about you being away was being able to sleep past dawn.”

We silently contemplated everything that had happened since I left: Tammy writhing on tape; my hands red and dripping; telling her what I’d told no one about Julia; asking for help—and getting it from a most unlikely and mostly unliked person.

“Stay in bed,” I said. “I’ll bring you a cup.” I closed the door, stumped into the galley, poured and stirred, and stumped more slowly back.

She nodded her thanks. I took my coffee back to the table and sat. Neither of us said anything for a while.

“So,” she said. “What do we do now?”

“I don’t know.” It would take some time to understand the shape of the change between us, so I ignored it for now. “I have to make some phone calls. You may as well stay in bed and enjoy your coffee.”

The first person I called was my lawyer. Her personal assistant picked up.

“Ms. Torvingen! Ms. Fleishman’s been trying to get in touch with you for a couple of weeks now. Hold just one moment and I’ll get her on the line.” A click, followed by Bette Fleishman’s velvety, young-sounding voice. A great voice, especially if you were really sixty-two and as brittle as a praying mantis. “Aud Torvingen, the original mysterious disappearing woman. How are you, girl? I’ve been calling your machine and leaving messages for a month it feels like. There’s some few year-end matters that need to be taken care of before—”

“Are they urgent?”

“If you mean urgent as in life-or-death, hell no, but they might save you a dime or two if you could get them tidied up before the end of the tax year.”

“Just use your best judgment, Bette. I’ll be in before the end of the year to sign anything you think I should. But for now I need some information about adoption and immigration law.”

“Outside my area of competence.”

“Yes, but—”

“But if you let me finish my thought, I know just the person you should talk to. Great guy, crackerjack, a real immigration hotshot.” I imagined Bette flipping through her Rolodex, which she swore was faster and more reliable than a computer. “Name of Solomon C. Poorway. Believe he goes by Chuck.” She gave me the number. “Make sure he knows I sent you. And Aud, I know you’re in a hellfire rush, but don’t forget about coming in before year-end.”

I dialed the number she’d given me and was soon speaking to a contained, careful-sounding man. I outlined Luz’s situation: her age, visa status, the fact that she was in private, unofficial foster care and her adoptive parent was dead—or as good as. Poorway asked me a few questions about nationality, date of entry, and so forth. “Not an ideal situation,” he said, with lawyerly understatement. “With the visitor’s visa expired, adoptive father dead, and no permanent residency applied for, she is technically an illegal alien. If her existence is called to the attention of the INS, they’ll deport her.”