The Last Secret (26 page)

The room is hot, airless with the young woman's voice, its gloom of resignation, a numbing cant.
She doesn't like me. She doesn't want to be here either but has to, has to do this, has to bare her soul for any bleeding heart with money to give
, Nora thinks.

She squirms. In the best of times she's uneasy here. The wall color is jarring, an orangey pink that reminds her of raw salmon, and the furniture, a clash of donations. The one-armed navy blue couch is half of a sectional. There are two chairs, one, bright yellow with white stripes, the other, a mauve velour wingback The scented burning candle on the scratched glass coffee table barely masks the musty horsehair upholstery. Each of the three conference rooms is like this, the goal being the comfort and security of home, or at least the young priest's vision of home.

“Maybe if we were rich, none of this would've happened.”

Nora glances at the folder. Alice. She always forgets her name. No
storybook Alice, hers the wan pallor of drawn curtains and bolted doors. Her faded blonde hair sprouts a good inch of new brown growth. With every sound her small dark eyes scan the perimeter, as if for shelter. Footsteps, murmurous voices, the clang of a water pipe, all threats. Posttraumatic stress syndrome, which for some abused women can last for years, according to Father Grewley's informational packet.

Nora is here as part of his mentoring program. Months ago when he first asked, she said she couldn't. She was too busy with the paper and her family. This is the last thing on earth she should be doing now, but this time Father Grewley persisted. In the beginning he had more volunteers than he needed, but too many would come once or twice, then call at the last minute to say they couldn't keep their appointments. He finds it bewildering that the same people who believe enough in the mission to give money won't give as generously of their time. It's difficult, Nora tried to explain last time he called. They might not show it, but most people have so many of their own problems, it's hard taking on someone else's. She meant herself.

“Nobody knows that better than me,” Father Grewley said so tersely she knew he felt slighted. But he doesn't understand, not really. Because he is so sincerely and totally driven, Sojourn House is his whole life, an extension of himself A danger, but that's what great projects require, hubris and zeal.

“And I'm sure some people feel way in over their heads, Father Tom. I mean, that's what I keep thinking. I'm no counselor. I don't have any training for this.” When what she wanted to say was, How can I help another wounded woman when I can't even help myself?

“Living, that's all it takes!” the priest exclaimed. “All your wisdom and experience, that's what our ladies need. Someone they can talk to. It's more than counseling. We've got therapists, but it's that woman-to-woman thing. Girlfriends. A pal. Most of them don't know how to reach out anymore. Confide. Ask for help. Or tell the truth. It's been shamed and beaten out of them. A friend, Nora, that's all I'm asking. A once-a-week friend.” She can't even confide in her own friend, but here she is, going through the motions.

Alice is showing her a picture of her family. Three children, two boys and baby girl, husband, herself, all in bathrobes, in front of a Christmas tree.

“That's the most lights we ever had. Twenty-six strings,” she says.

“Lovely,” Nora says of the somber children.

“Every year I buy a few more,” Alice says.

Nora looks up, puzzled.

“The kids like them to blink, but Luke says they use more electricity that way. Off and on, all the stopping and starting.”

“Oh. Really. I didn't know that. Pretty tree, though,” she says weakly, fighting impatience, struggling to seem interested in the suddenly animated description of her painted dough ornaments, glittery stars sprinkled with raw sugar and reindeer with red jelly bean noses, and the popcorn-and-cranberry garland she and the kids strung with clear fishing line, Luke's, but she didn't dare tell him, and, see, that angel at the top, they made that, too, with cotton balls and tin foil, and, for wings, netting stiff with hair spray. “Really?” Nora pretends to study the picture, thoughts racing with memories of Robin's rum-soaked fruitcakes and personalized gingerbread men, and, every year, the hand-painted glass ornaments dated and signed with her cute robin logo, each card and letter stamped with the little brown red-breasted bird on stick legs, and did they exchange gifts these last three Christmases, Robin and Ken, or was it four, she wonders, this suspicion, new among the constellation of clues and betrayals to be probed, and no matter how distant, the pain, like light from a long-ago star, is just as vivid, even now, trying to retrieve details of their dinner together the Christmas before last, recalling only how happy they all were, or seemed, or thought they were, two of them, anyway, the fool and the cuckold, the other two wishing it could be just them …

The now dismal rote continues, “A few minutes later, he dragged the tree outside and put all the kids' presents in trash bags.”

Nora blinks, looks at the photograph. Luke, the bland-faced man in the plaid bathrobe, slightly built, hair cropped like a marine. Everyone in the picture has red eyes, but with Alice's story his seems a baleful glare. Money, she says again. Pressure. Weeks go by with everything
fine, then the least little thing makes him snap. He even made pancakes for them all that morning, but that was part of it, Alice says. Instead of the regular syrup she'd bought real Vermont maple syrup, because it was Christmas. Just a small bottle. On sale, she explains as if still needing to justify her goading error, but it made him so mad. He couldn't stop talking about it. Grumbling. Couldn't get over wasting his hard-earned money on real Vermont maple syrup, 100 percent pure, he read from the label in a voice shrill with disbelief. And for little kids, the baby, as if they'd even know the difference or had the slightest appreciation of anything, anyway. Anger building, he insisted the younger boy, Cam, stay at the table and finish his pancakes, bloated with the precious syrup, while the rest of the family left to open presents. From the other room she could hear her little boy's sobbing gags as he tried to eat, and it tore her apart. Not only was Cam missing his presents, but he hated soggy food, which was her fault for having poured too much syrup on his plate, her fault for even having bought the expensive syrup. She waited until her husband started opening one of his own gifts, the Rubbermaid tackle box and fancy lures he'd wanted, and then she slipped away to check on Cam. Shh, she gestured to the child, as she stuffed his pancake into her mouth. She had just swallowed, when her husband came into the kitchen. He demanded to know if she had eaten it. No, she said, with her son staring into his syrupy plate. He insisted on smelling her breath, but of course, they'd all had the syrup. He checked the garbage can. He turned on the light over the sink and peered into the disposal, sniffing to make sure.

“So then we went in, and took the family picture, and Cam starts opening his presents. And Luke's got that look. Watching. Like he gets when he's fishing, you know, waiting for the tug on the line. Just waiting, I could tell. And then Cam opened his Power Ranger. He loves Power Rangers. I'd gotten him two, the red and the blue. I knew he wanted the blue, but he didn't know, he opened the red one first. And all he said was, ‘Oh, I wanted the Blue Ranger,’ the way kids do. And that was it for Luke. It was like he got what he wanted, finally, exactly what he'd been waiting for. He started running around like a crazy
man, all out of breath, panting and picking up presents, grabbing them right of the boys' hands, even the baby, and of course they're crying and begging him not to. ‘Ungrateful little bastards,’ he's screaming. ‘Bring it back. Just bring it all back’ I tried to get him to calm down, but that's when he hit me.”

Stop, Nora wants to say, unable to hear any more. Her eyes ache with the pressure of tears against the vision of such cruelty. A father bullying his children, babies really, five, four, and two, on childhood's most magical day, the holiday she and Ken delighted in bringing to life with Santa Claus's boot tracks in the backyard snow, alongside the trail into the woods of chewed carrot tops the reindeer had dropped. Maybe Alice and Luke also set cookies and milk out, leaving the crumbs and streaked glass as proof not only of Santa's existence but of some deeper, more enduring benevolence as well. And maybe at dawn they also crept from bed and waited, breathless, at the bottom of the stairs, jingling an old strap of sleigh bells to wake the children. Maybe they did too, in the hope it would work, the hope that maybe, once again, for a time however fleeting, if even just a day, the power of myth and ritual might be enough to subdue the darkness.

“We were supposed to go to my mom's for Christmas dinner, but how could I, with my eye all swolled up and the kids so upset. So I called and said we were all coming down with something. And of course, my mom, she's so disappointed. My brother's up from Texas and my sister and her kids're there. ‘That's all right,’ she keeps saying. ‘Come anyway, honey. We'll take care of you.’ And the whole time, my husband, Luke, he's right there by the phone, listening, scared to death I'm gonna say something, and he writes on a piece of paper and holds it up. ‘Tell her we got the flu and everyone's throwing up.’” She laughs. “He was scared they'd come by and see my eye and the hole he punched in the wall.” She shudders. “And my poor little kids all huddled together, staring at the TV like zombies.”

“Oh!” Nora gasps, this eruption of grief, like a violent seizure. She alternates between crying and apologizing to Alice, who keeps apologizing back and trying to console her.

“I didn't mean to make you feel so bad,” Alice says, coming quickly
to sit beside her. Her arm over Nora's shoulder exudes the harsh smell of days' old sweat, which not only repulses her, but seems to stimulate some primitive gland, making everything more intense, and clear. No matter what Ken's been, he's never been a bad father, never harmed or abandoned his children. And may still be with her only because of them. She cries harder.

“It's not you. It's everything. It's all … all so hard,” she sobs into her hands.

“I know.” Alice leans her head into Nora's. “And you're nice to listen, to even care. Most people don't want to know. Pretending's easier. That way, no one has to do anything, including me.” Her voice drops. “And then maybe next Christmas'll be better because I'd never make that mistake again. You know, real maple syrup. Or pancakes even, putting that kind of pressure on him, that's the way your thinking goes. Or maybe we wouldn't have presents; well, just his, anyway. Because that's what always happened. I didn't even know it, but, after a while, everything was about him. Trying to keep him from getting upset.”

Nora looks up, ashamed. She meant herself, her own problems. “How're the children doing?” she asks, blowing her nose.

“Better. You know kids, they never stop loving Mommy and Daddy, no matter what happens,” Alice says, wearily.

Nora nods. That's right, they don't. And for that she must be glad, relieved her own still have that security, at least. And Ken was always a great dad, especially when they were younger, going to all their games and coaching their soccer teams. Sometimes he'd be the only father with all the mothers on class trips. She remembers the huge tent he set up in the backyard so he and the kids could “camp out” on Saturday nights, and all the hours he spent in the basement teaching Drew to play pool when he didn't make the majors in Little League, a far bigger disappointment for Ken than for Drew. She smiles a little, remembering the white super-stretch limo Ken hired to take Chloe and her friends and their dads to the middle school father-daughter dance.

“But that's the difference now,” Alice is saying, “having it all out in the open. No more secrets. No more lies.”

“What do you mean?” Nora asks, and Alice shrugs. “You're not going back, are you?”

Alice's eyes dart away. “I need to give it one more chance.” Her voice falls flat again, emotionless. “I owe them that much, my kids, I mean.”

“But what about you, what do you owe yourself?”

Alice merely looks at her, with probably the same impenetrable blankness that meets her husband's anger. “You don't understand,” she begins, then pauses. Whatever she wants to say is too difficult. “I don't mean this the way it's gonna sound, but it's not the same for me. I don't have choices. Not if I want to be home taking care of my kids, anyway.” She smiles but with pinched resolve.

Nora asks when she's leaving Sojourn House. Luke is picking them up tomorrow, Alice says, then asks her not to say anything to Father Grewley She plans on telling him tonight. “Here, then.” Nora takes a business card from her purse and writes on the back. “That's my number at home. You call me, it doesn't matter when or about what. I'd like us to … to stay in touch.” To be friends, she wishes she had said.

“Okay.” Alice nods, reading the card. “That'll be nice.”

he cold, windy night
glows with moonlight. Every space in the parking lot is taken; even the side streets are lined with cars. Their brisk, two-block walk to the school makes Nora realize how long it's been since they have walked anywhere together. Ken is telling her about Oliver. Another two or three weeks of intensive therapy, and he's hoping to be discharged.