Anna Quinn - The Night Child

She blinks through swimming eyes at the raised lettering on her glass: the kalaloch lodge. Paul had stolen this glass at Thanksgiving, smuggled it from the dining room under his tweed jacket, given it to her as memory of the weekend. He’s right. She shouldn’t care he’s fucking Elisa. He deserves better than this. “I’m going to bed,” she says, standing up, wiping her eyes.

“Admit it!” he says, flinging the words like stones. “You hate sex! You dress like a boy! You always have! You’re so thin you look like a boy! And since all your ‘therapy’”—he makes quotation marks with his fingers around the word “therapy”—“it’s … it’s like you’re not even here! You’re a zombie! Shit, Nora, what do you expect me to do? Be a monk for the rest of my life?”

She’s silent for a long time, then turns from him and walks heavily up the stairs to the bathroom. She closes the door and locks it securely behind her.

She removes her clothes, slowly, her body trembling. She doesn’t remember the last time she’d looked at herself without clothes. Now completely naked, her breathing shallow, in the mirror: her body, the straight and narrow of it, hardly there hips and flat, not-quite breasts looking blank, transparent as clear glass. If not for the curls of blonde hair between her stick legs, a boy’s body.

There is a knock at the door. She wraps herself in a towel, opens it, tears welling up in her eyes. She will apologize. Ask for help.

“Nora,” he says, his mouth tight as a leather strap, “I’m, I’m—” and when she thinks he is going to apologize, say she doesn’t look like a boy, he says, “I’m going out.”

Once he’s gone, Nora walks to the bedroom and covers her naked body with a flannel nightgown. In bed, she tries not to think about Elizabeth and Paul and the things he said and how she hates her body, hates sex and always has. And now, in her mind, here is Elizabeth, Oh, God, no, Elizabeth. God, I’m so sorry . And now, her mind is in high school, down in Bobby Baker’s basement and everyone is touching and rubbing and Bobby is touching her, his clammy hands under her sweater grabbing her breasts and she lets him and she feels nothing. And now here is another boy tearing off her Levi’s and fucking her, saying fucking her is like fucking a corpse and her wishing she’d die. And how for years after that, until Paul, she’d kept her distance from men. And now, Paul is fucking Elisa. And Elizabeth is dead. She reaches in her nightstand drawer for a sleeping pill. She swallows it and floats away.

Nora rolls over in bed, looks at the alarm clock. 7:00 a.m., which means 9:00 a.m. in Chicago. James will be awake. She needs to hear her brother’s voice.

“You did what?” he says when she tells him about the school meeting, how she’d punched a parent in the stomach. Usually, she can tell him most anything, but today she can’t bring herself to tell him more than this. She cannot tell him about the hallucinations and the heart of dust (she’s ashamed) and the fights with Paul and that she suspects he’s having an affair. James doesn’t like Paul and will only tell her to leave him and he’ll get all wired up and right now she only has the energy to tell him one other thing.

“James, a student of mine—Elizabeth—do you remember her? I’ve talked about her?”

“Vaguely.”

“She died. She’s dead.”

“God.”

“She’s fifteen and she killed herself.”

“Nora.”

“And I knew, I knew her father was molesting her, I knew it, and … and … I didn’t do anything. I didn’t do anything, I—”

“Nora—”

She whispers into the phone, “James, I miss you. Will you come here? Can you come here?”

“Nora. I’ve got something to tell you.” His voice choked with feeling. “You might not want me to come after I tell you.”

“James, what?”

Silence.

“I’ve … I’ve seen dad. He’s … he’s in a nursing home in Rochester.”

Silence.

An exploding within her. The fury rises up, huge and violent until there is hardly space to breathe and all she can think about is crashing through the bedroom window and killing the beast once and for all, cutting it to pieces, every artery, every vein, the rotten meat dripping and smelling of blood, but now David’s voice in her mind, “You’re in charge. You’re in charge.” She won’t let the fury take over. She won’t, she won’t, she won’t, she won’t.

“Nora, are you there? Talk to me!”

She hangs up the phone and grabs the railings of her headboard. She is in charge. “Stop!” she yells. “Stop!” And to her shock, the fury abates slightly, the throbbing dulling ever so slightly, though it is still there, coiled, ready to spring. The alarm clock rings. Brrrring! Brrrrring! Brrrring! Oh, God. School. Time to get Fiona to school.

She watches herself then, watches herself stand up, so calm and cool, watches herself dress, watches herself wake Fiona, dress and feed Fiona, and when the phone rings and she hears James pleading on the machine, “ Nora, please call me back ,” she watches herself wink at her daughter, hears herself tell Fiona she’ll call James back later, that now it’s time to walk to school.

The walk to school with Fiona grounds her a bit—the cold air with its salty bite fusing with traffic exhaust and cigarette smoke from pedestrians huddled together at bus stops. Holding her daughter’s small, light hand, the removed feeling of watching herself, the suspension between realities begins to dissipate, but the genesis of it—this terror about her father still in her chest— Be careful not to scare yourself, David keeps telling her. Still. What should she tell herself? Look what happened with Fiona! Look what happened when James called!

“Mommy, shout out the chimes with me!” The cathedral bells of St. John’s ring in the distance, and Fiona calls out, “One o’clock! Two o’clock! Three o’clock, Four o’clock! Shout it with me, Mommy!”

Nora wills herself to count, wills herself to stay present. They shout out, “Five o’clock, six o’clock, seven o’clock, eight o’clock!” This is who I am, she thinks . A mother with her daughter, walking to school, singing to the bells. Everything will be all right.

They arrive at Lowell Elementary School. Red-cheeked children run around the lawn near the entrance, all boots and mittens and hats leaping on crusted piles of dirty snow, making snowballs that fall apart as soon as they throw them. Mothers and fathers, grandparents and neighbors cluster on the sidewalk, keeping an eye on their children and gossiping until the bell rings. As Nora and Fiona get close, heads spin. Stare. A few parents greet Nora awkwardly but turn quickly away. Karen Matthews glares at Nora in such a way that heat slides across Nora’s face like another skin, slides down her neck, and pools in the space between her breasts. Matthews is the volunteer coordinator for the school district and knows everything about everyone. Of course she knows about Nora’s leave of absence. Even though Bill Guenther didn’t press charges and it’s been kept out of the paper, Capitol Hill is a tight community. They all know by now.

The bell rings. Phil Johnson walks by her, holding his son’s hand. He whispers in her ear, “Guenther’s an asshole. Good for you.”

“Come say hi to Ms. Monica,” Fiona says, tugging on Nora’s hand. “You haven’t seen her in forever! And also, guess what?”

“What, honey?”

“She’s having a baby!”

“She is?” Nora has missed things. She’d stopped walking Fiona to school weeks ago when Paul insisted he wanted the extra time with Fiona, insisted she get more rest.