Grace Read online

  Of course, she would never admit that she felt this way. It was her secret. Kurt didn’t know how hard she worked just to get through some days with Trevor, how exhausting it was. Thank God for Kurt. Kurt who was patient and kind. Kurt whose love was always equal. Elsbeth knew that Kurt never had such terrible thoughts. At least Trevor had his daddy. Always. She knew she needed to call Kurt, let him know what had happened. What had almost happened. Jesus, that woman infuriated her. She’d send Kurt to get him. Kurt would know what to do.

  When Elsbeth called, Kurt was out in the yard looking for a ’92 Camry hubcap. He was pretty sure they had one, but it wasn’t showing up in the system. He searched through the shiny stack, like a haphazard pile of fallen spaceships, but couldn’t find the one he was looking for. The customer was a lady, and he could tell she was watching the time. She was one of those coffee-break shoppers. Thinks she can show up at three in the afternoon, find what she needs, and make it back to work without anybody noticing she’s gone. She was teetering on a pair of scuffed black high heels, scrunching up her nose at the smell, as Kurt sorted through the heap.

  Beal came out to the cap pile, carrying the chirping cell phone like it was on fire. “It’s Elsbeth,” Beal said, breathless, holding the phone, which had ceased its song.

  There were a billion reasons Elsbeth might be calling (something she needed him to pick up at the store on his way home, a question about where to find the hammer or Phillips head or WD-40), but today Kurt’s first thought was of Trevor. Of what did he do now? As Beal handed him the phone and wiped the sweat off his forehead with the back of his shirt, Kurt felt a knot grow in his gut.

  “Thanks,” he said, looking at the screen that announced the presence of a new message.

  The lady put her hands on her hips and tapped her foot, glanced at her watch. At this rate, she’d be lucky to make it back to her office without somebody figuring out she’d been gone.

  “I’m real sorry, ma’am. Why don’t you leave your number with Beal here and we’ll give you a call as soon as we find the cap you need,” Kurt offered.

  “Maybe you didn’t understand when I said I needed it today,” she said, like she was talking to a four-year-old. “I’m showing a client a house in an hour, and I can’t be driving around town without a hubcap. It’s not professional.”

  He wanted to listen to Elsbeth’s message, but this lady with her high heels and impatience was their first customer of the day, possibly their only customer of the day the way things had been going lately. They couldn’t afford to lose her business, even if it was just a forty-dollar hubcap.

  “Beal, see if you can find this young lady’s cap for me?” Kurt asked.

  “No problem,” Beal said.

  “Beal here will help you find exactly what you’re looking for,” Kurt offered, and the woman scowled.

  He listened to the message as he made his way back to the shop through the maze of car carcasses, waiting until he was out of their earshot to call Elsbeth back. He leaned against the yellow husk of a 1979 Mercedes and hit the speed dial.

  “Hey, baby,” Elsbeth’s voice said. The thick, gravelly sweetness of her voice could still make his knees go soft. “Did you get my message? Trevor’s in detention again and Gracy’s still napping. Would you mind picking him up at school at four?”

  “What did he do?” he asked.

  “I don’t know. Another fight, I guess. She said the janitor stopped it before anybody got hurt. Can you get him?”

  “Yeah. I’ll go.” He glanced at the scratched face of his watch. He had about twenty minutes. Beal could close up the shop. Hopefully he’d find that damned hubcap before the lady gave up.

  As he made his way to the shop to grab his truck keys, he surveyed the sea of glass and chrome. He’d been working at the salvage yard since high school. Back when he still had plans to go to college, he’d helped Pop out every summer, socking away any money he made for his tuition. But then, after Billy took off, and later when Pop keeled over at the A&P, the stroke leaving his whole right side paralyzed, Kurt knew he wasn’t going anywhere. He’d taken over the yard and been here ever since. He’d married Elsbeth, Trevor was born, and then Gracy. He had a family, and he really didn’t have a choice but to keep the business going, unless he sold the yard. Not that he hadn’t thought about it. Not that he hadn’t been tempted. But the sad fact was that he had grown up among this wreckage. These hollowed-out skeletons of Caddies and station wagons and Volkswagen buses had been his playground as a kid. Getting rid of the salvage yard would have been like selling off his own childhood.

  And the yard had actually been a lucrative business until last year. But now people were driving their cars into the ground rather than scrapping them when things started to break. It also seemed like everybody was finding what they needed to keep them running on eBay. And the folks who used to drop stuff off were trying to make a profit off it themselves, selling parts on craigslist or out of their own garages. He’d stopped looking at the books; he knew that as soon as he did, he’d have to cut back Beal’s hours, maybe even let him go, and Beal’s wife was just about to have twins. Despite everything, Kurt loved the yard, and it pained him that the business was going to shit. He used to think he’d pass it on to Trevor someday when he was grown.

  Trevor. Ever since the episode last month, the new principal seemed to have it out for Trevor. He was always coming home with pink slips, warnings about his behavior, signed in that curlicue handwriting that looked more like it belonged to a teenage girl than a school principal. The times they’d been called into the office, Mrs. Cross hardly said anything, just shook her blond head, like he and Elsbeth should know better. Like they were at fault for his bad behavior.

  Not that Kurt didn’t blame himself. Of course he did. Trevor was his son. He was the one who had raised him. But ever since Trevor was just a little boy, he’d had a hard time with other kids. He’d been pushed around and made fun of for one thing or another, off and on for twelve years. Up until this year it was the other kids whose parents were getting the pink slips and fancy handwriting and calls from the school. They’d been to the school counselor a hundred times, but she insisted that there was nothing wrong with Trevor. He was a good student, sensitive but well-behaved; it was the other boys who were the problem. The school did what they could, but Kurt knew how devious kids could be, how much they could do when the teachers weren’t looking. And lately, Trevor refused to talk about it. But Kurt could still see it in his eyes. He’d seen it in his brother Billy’s eyes when he was a kid. Trevor didn’t have a single friend, and Kurt knew exactly how to read the pain of his loneliness. He didn’t know what to do for him, didn’t know how to make that sorrow go away.

  But this fighting business was new. It was like something shifted inside Trevor since he turned twelve. First off, he grew seven inches. Went from being the shortest kid in the class to the tallest in just one summer. He also put on about thirty pounds. A thin line of hair started to grow above his lip. He went from boy to man in about thirty seconds flat, except for his voice, which remained that of a little boy. Kurt knew this was part of the problem: something else that set him apart from the other boys.

  It wasn’t two weeks into the school year that Kurt and Elsbeth got the first call from Mrs. Cross. Apparently during the seventh-grade recess some kids had been giving Trevor a hard time, pushing him around, and he’d, finally, pushed back. There had been two other “incidents” since then, the same kids picking on him, and both times instead of just taking it like usual, he’d fought back, once shoving one kid into a snowbank. Part of Kurt was proud of Trevor. These stupid asshole kids were finally getting what they deserved. But the school didn’t see it that way. The same counselor who had insisted that Trevor was fine now said she “didn’t know what to do with him.” She thought he should see an outside professional, someone who could help him manage his anger. But even if Kurt hadn’t thought that therapy was a load of shit, his insurance wouldn’t have covered i
t anyway. He knew Trevor shouldn’t be fighting, that he’d have to punish him, again, for this, but he also knew that there weren’t a lot of other options.

  Kurt grabbed his keys from the shop and went to his truck. The windshield was filthy. He lifted the wiper-fluid lever, and the motor buzzed. Empty. He turned the wipers on anyway, and they pushed the sludgy grime across the glass. He waited until the windshield was clear enough to see, until the road came into focus in front of him, and then sighed, backing out of the driveway and heading to the school.

  Trevor sat perched on one of the wheel wells in the back of his dad’s truck as they drove away from the school. He watched as the school became a dollhouse and then just a red-brick pinprick in the distance. Trevor loved riding in the back of the truck. With the wind coming at him from all sides, he held his arms out and could feel every inch of his skin. Sometimes, in the summer, his dad would take him and Gracy swimming up at Lake Gormlaith, and they’d get in the back still soaking wet, their towels flapping around like capes. By the time they got home they’d be dry, their eyes red and stinging from the wind. He loved the taste of the air, held his mouth wide open and stuck his tongue out, tasting the seasons on his tongue. Spring tasted like fresh-cut grass. Summer tasted like hay and heat. Fall like overripe fruit. It was too cold to ride in the back in the winter, but he imagined winter air might taste like peppermint. In the back of the truck, he felt free. His skin stopped prickling. His muscles relaxed. He let the breeze wash over him. It made him feel clean. In the truck, he could almost forget about school.

  School. He almost wished Mr. Douglas hadn’t gotten to him so quickly. If there had been an actual fight, he would have gotten suspended. And if he got suspended, at least then he wouldn’t have to go back to school tomorrow.

  Mr. Douglas, who restrained and then detained him, considered himself the school cop as well as the janitor. (After somebody started calling in bomb threats a few months ago, Mrs. Cross gave him a neon orange bib that said SECURITY across the front, which he wore when he patrolled the parking lot at the school.) He was fat and sweaty. When he’d pressed Trevor’s head down onto the sticky cafeteria table and yanked his arm behind his back (which Trevor thought was pretty ridiculous considering he hadn’t even gotten a chance to hit anybody), he’d hissed into Trevor’s face, “You’re in a lot of trouble, mister,” and his breath smelled like hot dogs and cigarettes.

  Trevor turned toward the cab and looked at the back of his dad’s head. When his mom rode in the truck, his dad would stretch one arm across the backseat behind her and rub her neck. But today he had both hands on the wheel, his knuckles tight and white. Trevor wasn’t sure what would happen to him when he got home. His mom would probably try to get him to talk about it, but he knew that even though she asked the questions (What did they say to you? What did they do, baby?), she didn’t really want to hear the answers. What she wanted was for him to be like Gracy. Sweet and loveable and easy. But he wasn’t any of those things, never had been.

  All the other times, his dad had taken him out to the shed, made him yank down his pants, and hit him twice on his bare backside with his belt. It hadn’t hurt much, but it made his eyes sting with shame. As further punishment, his dad had made him go to the yard and stack tires all day on the weekends. He couldn’t get the smell of rubber off his hands, even with soap. His dad didn’t try to talk to him; he was probably smart enough to know there wasn’t any way for Trevor to explain. No way to describe how he felt right before he snapped. When the things they said to him pricked his skin like needles. Freakshow, Frankenstein, Faggot. How could he tell him about that rusted-out taste in his mouth that meant all hell was about to break loose?

  When they pulled into the driveway, he stood up and hopped out of the back of the truck. He could see Gracy peering out the front window at him. She pressed her nose against the glass like a pig and blew her cheeks out. He smiled at her, and she waved, leaving greasy prints on the glass.

  “Come on,” his father said, exasperated, leading the way to the backyard, loosening his belt as he walked.

  It was only five o’clock, but the sky was already darkening. The whole world looked bruised. They’d made this same trek a dozen times or more since last year. There was practically a path worn into the ground. When they got to the shed, Trevor closed his eyes and braced himself, leaning his hands against the cold siding.

  “Damn it, Trevor.” His father’s voice was deep and soft, a lullaby voice. Trevor squeezed his eyes shut tighter and tried to pretend that he was only waiting for sleep. But then he heard the slide of leather through denim, the belt catching on the loops, and his whole body tensed, readied itself.

  “What am I supposed to do with you?” his father said softly. “What the hell am I supposed to do?” But he wasn’t talking to him, to Trevor, not really, but rather seemed to be asking the question to the dusk. To that damaged sky.

  And then it was over, as if it had only been a couple of distant cracks of thunder. As if it had only been a faraway storm.

  Outside the hospital window, the sky was like a fairy-tale sky. A violet sky, a violent sky, with a terrible moon. If this sky were flattened into the pages of a book, the moon might have a face, a sneering face. And the story would be about what happens to bad little girls when they don’t listen to their mothers.

  Crystal’s mother sat at the side of the bed, busying herself with the remote control as if the most savage thing in the world hadn’t just happened to her daughter.

  “You can go home, Mom,” she said. “I’m okay.”

  Distracted, she turned to Crystal and said, “Don’t be silly.” But she couldn’t hide the look of relief on her face, the gratefulness for Crystal’s permission to leave. For all of the arguing over the last several months, now neither one of them seemed to have any words left for the other, and they had spent the last two hours sitting in silence. “Seriously. I’m fine. They said I can check out in the morning. Just come back at nine.”

  The truth was, she didn’t want her mother to stay. She wanted to be alone with this strange sorrow, the one curled like a cat in the corner of her mind. If her mother left, then it might leap to her lap, let her stroke its soft fur. But not as long as her mother insisted on lingering. As long as her mother was here, she had to pretend. To make believe that it was as simple as this.

  “Well, only if you promise me you’ll be okay,” her mother said, cocking her head slightly and reaching for Crystal’s hand. She ran her thumb gently, absently, over the IV needle stuck into the vein in the back of her hand. This tenderness felt like a blow. Her mother hadn’t given her so much as a good-night kiss in months; she couldn’t remember the last time she hugged her. But now that it was all over, now that her mother had gotten what she’d wanted, the warmth she’d withheld was suddenly released. Her lips pressed against Crystal’s forehead; she squeezed Crystal’s hand. “We love you,” she said, speaking not only for herself but for Crystal’s father, who had known enough to leave three hours ago, as well. “We’re proud of you. This was the right decision.”

  Crystal could feel her throat thickening, the sorrow filling her body in all the new, empty places. She nodded because if she spoke she would cry. And she would not cry.

  “Okay, then,” her mother said, straightening. “You call if you need me to come back. Even if it’s the middle of the night. I can come back.”

  Crystal kept nodding, willing her mother out the door. Watching, relieved, as she disappeared, as the heavy wooden door closed, leaving her, finally, alone. Her whole body felt like a limb that had fallen asleep and was just now prickling back to life. The pain was there but not there. Like some shimmering thing underwater. And the memory of what happened tonight was also soft at the edges.

  She’d been out walking Willa after dinner. She hadn’t been able to eat more than a few bites before she felt bile rising like mercury up the thermometer of her esophagus. Like fire in her throat. She thought that maybe if she walked, gravity would preva
il, and there would be some relief.

  She’d only gotten to her sister Angie’s school before she needed to sit down. Her heart was skipping beats again, stuttering and stumbling and then stalling. It took her breath away each time, like a dozen small deaths. She’d looped Willa’s leash to the swing set and sat down on one of the swings. The canvas cradle was not designed for a girl in her condition, but she needed to rest. She didn’t feel right.

  Willa hadn’t found a place to relieve herself yet. She’d sniffed nearly every bush, every tree, along the way. But now she was squatting at the foot of the slide.

  “Willa, no!” Crystal said.

  Willa looked up at her as her body convulsed with the effort of relieving herself.

  “Jesus, Will,” Crystal said, grabbing onto the cold chains of the swing to help her stand up. She shoved her hands in her pockets, hoping she’d remembered to put a plastic baggie inside or else some poor kid would get a terrible surprise at the end of his ride.

  Willa sniffed at the pile, and Crystal located a bag in her pocket. She enclosed her hand in plastic and bent over awkwardly to scoop up the stinking mess. Suddenly, she felt a shock go through her entire body, and then a deep ache across her abdomen. She stood up, hand full of shit, and swooned from the stink and the pain.

  “Come on, Willa,” she said, and Willa obeyed.

  The two blocks home felt like two miles. She had to stop every other house it seemed, her entire body quaking with each contraction. When she walked past Ty’s house, she wondered if he was inside. What would he do if she just stopped here? If she just had the baby right here on his doorstep? Would Lucia invite her in, make her some chamomile tea? She almost laughed at the thought of it.

  By the time Crystal got back to her house, she realized that this was it. It was finally, really, happening. She needed to go to the hospital; the baby was coming tonight.

  And now, just eight hours later, it was over. All of it. The baby had come. And gone.