Miriam Toews - Summer of My Amazing Luck

It was in Cactus Flats that everything was supposed to happen. According to the plan Teresa and I had made, Lish and I would call Teresa to find out what was happening and she’d tell me that Lish had received a postcard from one of Gotcha’s friends, saying that Gotcha was dead, killed outside a movie theatre, shot randomly by some drug dealer or buyer or whatever. An American thing. She’d say that in the postcard the guy, Gotcha’s friend, had written that Gotcha had never forgotten Lish and up to the day he died remembered her the most fondly of all the women he’d known on the road. As the most fun. And he’d never forget all that wild black hair. And that he always regretted stealing her wallet. It would say that his parents had already retrieved the body and buried it in their local cemetery in — the guy couldn’t remember where Gotcha was from — but he’d never forget him. And, oh yeah, he loved kids and had always wanted one (or two) of his own. It would say that Gotcha had said that he was happy that Lish had that big silver spoon, at least, as a reminder of their love.

I had written the postcard before we left so Lish would be able to get her hands on it just as soon as we got back. It was written badly, like all the others, but I thought it important that I was consistent.

It was strange: tricking Lish this way I was filled with a sense of wellbeing and an overwhelming sense of dread at the same time. Every five miles or so my mood would shift from one to the other, but I tried to ride it up the middle and focus on my project and convince myself it was for the best. I looked at the twins and tried to tell myself that Gotcha would never ever have shown up anyway, not after five years of no communication at all, and so for their father to be dead was best. Hell, even if he did show up some time, it would be a great story for the twins to tell their friends. Out dad died and came back to life so he could see us. Oh god, the next five-mile section of dread was coming up. What was I doing?

When I was eight, my parents bought a cabin at Falcon Lake, and every Sunday we went to church and Sunday School at an outdoor tent set up a few miles down the road. I had short hair and red jeans and a Jimmy Walker shirt that said “dyn-o-mite” on it and everyone thought I was a boy. I wanted to be a boy. So I said, “Yeah, my name’s uh … Jimmy,” and I got to go in the boys’ Sunday School for weeks and play with the boys until one Sunday the minister guy came up to my mom and dad and me in the car and said, “So how’s Jimmy liking Sunday School?” And they said, “Who?” And the minister smiled and smiled, looking back at me and them, and I buried my face in my mom’s lap and cried all the way home, while my mom and dad tried not to laugh. After that I refused to go back to the outdoor church and so we all quit.

I think it was a big relief for everyone. Except for a while there I was hung up on the Rapture story that I had heard in Sunday School. If I came home from school and nobody was home, my dad gone, even my mom and her clients nowhere to be seen, no murmuring coming from her office, I’d think the Rapture had happened and I’d been left behind to fend for myself on earth while everybody else had managed to get taken to heaven. For those split seconds I’d be afraid and pissed off, too. I thought Geez, even my mom’s clients who were so messed up managed to get to heaven and I, an innocent child, was left behind. Go figure. What had I done? What had I done? For a while there I couldn’t go to sleep until I had gotten down on my knees and thanked God for everything in my life and asked to be forgiven for just about everything I had said and thought that day. I had scraps of paper with terrible things I had thought and said during the day so I wouldn’t forget come forgiveness time. For some reason I never worried about dying during the day at school or something without being forgiven. It was only at home at night in my bed that I feared the morning would never come.

I also made myself read two pages of tiny print in the King James version of the Bible, which is almost entirely incomprehensible. If I didn’t do that I’d fear for my life and worry about eternal damnation. It got to be a problem, a real problem, though, because I’d lie in bed almost asleep and think an evil thought just because I knew I wasn’t supposed to and then poof I’d be on my knees again praying for forgiveness. I had to be kneeling to be forgiven, this I knew. Eventually I told myself to fall asleep kneeling against my bed in a repentant pose so I wouldn’t miss being forgiven for every single bad thing I thought before I fell asleep. During the day I was dragging myself around, totally exhausted and hurting from a terrible crick in my neck. My mom started to worry and took me to three doctors before she finally caught me kneeling at my bed, head in my hands, fast asleep at three in the morning. She had come in to close my window. She told me evil thoughts are normal and beneficial: they are God’s way of preventing us from actually carrying out evil deeds. And when we have good thoughts, you know, kind and gentle ones, we’ll be so pleasantly surprised that we’ll want to have more. She told me there are two things I should not do. They were lie and throw stones.

She told me more things that night, but I didn’t hear them, because I was sound asleep, beside her in my little twin bed. What I heard was Don’t lie, Don’t throw stones. That was good. I could do that. I could breathe easy. Since then I’ve lied a bit, okay a lot, and even thrown stones. But it’s definitely a good base to work from. I’m still alive, anyway, and I’m not so tired. And if the Rapture’s happened, nobody I know got picked to go up to heaven.

If Lish found out I had rigged this whole thing, I wouldn’t be able to leave Half-a-Life as easily as I had that outdoor church. Public housing isn’t exactly popping up all over the city. And I don’t think anybody would be laughing. And I certainly wouldn’t be able to cry in my mom’s lap. But things might just work out. The next five-mile stretch of wellbeing was coming up and Lish was singing and the kids were quiet, listening. The van was still running, the children were happy and it was not raining.

Cactus Flats. Where history was made, thanks to me and my big mouth and my need to shape other people’s lives. Was I like my mother? Would I die holding onto the secrets of other women’s lives? I was acting more like a dictator than a mirror. If my mother reflected women’s lives, I twisted them around like nutty putty. “I think we should call Teresa and see how things are going,” I said to Lish that day in Cactus Flats. “You know, the mail.” Could I be more obvious. Denver was only a day’s drive away and I had to make sure we didn’t get there. “Fine,” she said. Just like that. We bought a carton of Camel cigarettes for Teresa and bourbon for Lish and then we found a pay phone. I do not remember any details about the town of Cactus Flats, other than that it was very quiet. In the phone booth Lish kept flipping her hair back so she could dial: every time it hit the side wall of the booth. She was wearing a black t-shirt with the sleeves and neckline cut off and it read, “She Who Must Be Obeyed.” I was nervous, really nervous about the call. I was worried about how Lish would react. What would I tell her? Why hadn’t I rehearsed that? And how would the kids, especially the twins, feel? Lish spoke to Teresa. I only heard what Lish said.

What?

No.

No.

No way.

No.

No fucking way.

No. Fucking. Way.

Yeah, read it to me.