Stevan Mena - Transience

“Why did you run away?” Laura asked.

“I just…wanted to see…” Rebecca trailed off. Jack’s eyes found her in his rearview mirror.

“What brought you all the way out here, Rebecca?” Jack asked.

Rebecca hesitated, “Just a feeling.”

“Like a gut feeling?” Jack asked. She dropped her head onto Laura’s shoulder. Her hair dripped small round droplets onto Laura’s hand.

“You don’t understand. No one understands.”

“We do understand,” Laura said.

“Everyone thinks I’m crazy.” A drop of rain dripped from the tip of Rebecca’s nose. She blew it off defiantly.

“No one thinks you’re crazy,” Laura said.

“I just don’t want to be scared anymore.”

“Me neither,” Laura said, pulling her close.

Rebecca’s eyes closed from exhaustion. Jack watched the two of them in the mirror. Laura returned his gaze, her expression said “ thank you.”

No thanks necessary …

Laura entered the kitchen. “She’s asleep, finally.” Jack sat at the kitchen table, a half empty coffee cup in front of him. She poured herself a cup and sat down in the seat across from him, wiping her hands down her face, emotionally spent. They sat in silence for a few moments.

“Sounds like the rain is letting up,” Jack said, just trying to make conversation. The clock above the sink ticked loudly in the quiet.

“I’m sorry for the other day.”

Jack shook his head. “It was my mistake to bring her there.”

“Thanks for helping me tonight. I just don’t know what to do anymore.” Laura cupped both hands around her coffee mug. She slowly lifted it to her lips and took a short sip. Jack noticed her hands were trembling.

He turned away and looked over at some of Rebecca’s artwork displayed on the fridge. Jack grinned, even her doodles were fantastic. He wondered if Laura ever knew what it was like to have a child, a real child. Rebecca seemed so old in her skin. Was she ever just simple, innocent?

There was a small photo of Rebecca as a baby sitting on Santa’s lap, one of those expensive photos people stood in line at the mall for hours to get. Her smile was big and bright.

Next to the photo was a drawing of a dog. Jack squinted to focus. It bore a striking resemblance to the dog that licked his face at Hester’s home. A Collie, same markings around the eyes. Jack marveled at how Rebecca’s renderings were so accurate; even when she doodled a sketch of a dog, you could not only clearly tell it was a dog, but what damn breed it was.

Laura looked at Jack and followed his line of vision.

“She’s always been drawing. Since she could hold a crayon. When she was five years old, she drew a picture of the baby sitter. It was so lifelike. When I arrived home she up and quit, said Becca was possessed. I reported her. What happens when you hire out of the Penny-saver. Not sure what I was thinking.” Laura took a sip of her coffee, then rubbed her arms briskly, a shiver. “The doctor, Hellerman, he tried to tell me. I didn’t want to listen.”

“What were you afraid of?”

“I don’t know. The more I think about it, the more things I remember her doing or saying that just don’t make sense. Things she knew that she shouldn’t have known. Things about me. When she started drawing, it frightened me. Her talent, it wasn’t natural. I just wanted my little girl. I don’t know. So much shit in my life… I guess, I was afraid somehow of losing her too. If she started believing all this craziness, what then? I needed to be the voice of reason for her.” Laura rubbed her hands together, scratching at her knuckles nervously. “You knew where she was going tonight.”

“I suspected,” Jack said.

“I want to help her. But how?”

Jack looked across at the drawings on the fridge again. “Maybe it’s like when a child finds out they’re adopted. Suddenly they have to go back, re-imagine their entire life as it might have been. Their first instinct is to try and find out who they really are, where they come from.”

“I’m her mother. She came from me,” Laura said sharply. Jack finished off the last of his coffee. He pushed out his chair a little, ready to get going.

“You want some more coffee?” Laura asked, rising to grab the pot.

Jack shook his head. “I really should get back. We’re holding a suspect in custody.” Laura refilled his cup anyway.

“Can I ask you a question?” Jack shrugged and waited. “How long have you had it?” Jack played dumb. She sat back down, not taking her eyes off him. “I know what cancer looks like.”

Jack’s eyes slowly drifted from hers down to his coffee. “My father had it,” Laura continued, “thin as his sheets when he died.”

“They didn’t tell me how long I’ve had it, just how long I will have it.”

“I’m sorry,” Laura said. Jack shrugged indifferently.

“When did your father pass away?” Jack asked.

“Last June. It took him getting sick for us to finally reconcile.” Laura let out a long sigh. “He had scotch for breakfast. I left home to escape the abuse, then married into it. When my father got sick, I refused to visit. Until he was admitted to the hospital. I figured… I could keep my distance there.”

Laura sniffled, containing it. She saw Jack was still listening so she continued, “I saw that big, frightening force reduced to a helpless pile of bones. I almost felt sorry for him. And for the first time, we actually had a normal conversation, father-daughter.” Laura remembered something and smiled. “He commented on how nice my hair looked.” She puffed air at the thought, drifting back. “He never paid me a compliment my whole life. It was such a simple gesture…”

Jack watched her fingers as they nervously traced the handle on her coffee cup over and over. Clearly, he was the first person she had opened up to about this.

“I realized, all this time… he was just a prisoner in a bottle. I know it’s not an excuse to justify what he did — how he treated us — but that’s how I was able to forgive him. The day they prepped him for surgery, I had to work late. I arrived just as they were wheeling him into the operating room. He smiled, ‘ See ya soon.’ I wanted to say I love you so badly, but all that came out was ‘good luck.’”

Jack nodded, knowing how the story will end.

“When the doctor came out, I just knew. My father was a very bitter man. Looking back, he wasn’t blessed with much luck in his life. Just one disappointment after another. I think, in the end, that bitterness ate him up inside.”

Jack’s face was still as he listened.

Laura exhaled; telling that story took a lot out of her, but sharing it also seemed to lift a weight from her shoulders. “How’s your family taking it?” she asked. Jack simply shrugged. “Don’t you have any family?”

“…I have a brother.”

“Does he help out?”

“We don’t speak.”

“Why?”

Jack rolled his tongue over his front teeth. “Long story.”

“Sometimes it’s easier to talk to a stranger.” Laura leaned forward and gently placed her soft hand atop his. It was warm.

He looked into her eyes. “I don’t consider you a stranger.” Laura smiled a satisfied smile. Jack scratched at his 5 o’clock shadow and pursed his lips, hesitating, searching for the words.

“About 12 years ago, we were at a restaurant, it was my birthday. Me, him, his wife Trish, and my wife…Sarah.” It pained Jack just to speak her name. “We were all pretty liquored up. I got called in to the station. I should have never answered the page. My brother said he’d drive Sarah home. I was so wrapped up in my case, I didn’t—” Jack beat himself up emotionally, clenching his fist and lifting it to his forehead, tapping it. “They stayed late. He dropped Trish off, then drove Sarah home. Trish asked her to just stay the night, but she had to get up for work in the morning. My brother was in no shape to drive.”