Talk to me!
I begged him silently.
How have I changed? What do you rememberâ
He arched his back and spread my legs, and just then a memory surfaced, a quick flash to the very first time he pushed inside, how unexpected it was and how much it had hurt and how, to stifle a cry, I'd bitten my lip until it tasted sweet and I was bleeding from two places at once. And when finally he'd pulled out at the end and seen the blood and recoiled in shock from the stain of my virginityâ
You didn't tell me!
âI had lied and told him I was having my period.
It wasn't much of a memory, but it was enough for now. As he eased his body against mine, I locked my ankles around his waist, and before he could start the bed bouncing, I shifted and rolled until I was sitting on top. Then the heat returned. He opened his eyes, surprised, but I could see he didn't mind the way the heels of my hands pressed his shoulders into the spongy mattress, nor did he resist the rhythm I imposed upon his groin. It was not a thrusting so much as a stern undulation that rocked and built, locking our hips in a conjunction that existed solely in the present, so that when we both came, unfettered by any memory at all, I could throw back my head and let my throat open in a cry of reprieve. It mingled with his, then continued along on its own.
Â
Â
“You are amazing.” He lay on his side, reaching out to trace the line of my jaw with his finger. I turned my head away. On the road, outside the thin walls of the motel, I could hear the sounds of large engines as heavy farm equipment rumbled by. Armies on the move. The harrowers were squaring off against the undulating fields. The smell of dust and diesel and acrid fertilizer filtered in through the drywall and hung in the air. Planting had started, and it was spring, and these were sounds and smells that I remembered.
“I have to go.”
“Stay.” He held on to my arm. “Just a while longer. I mean, don't you think this is amazing? After all these years?”
“I guess so.” I studied a water stain on the ceiling. It was shaped like a kidney. Its edges were brown. He wanted to talk now, to reminisce, but now I didn't want to hear any more. It was over. I had to go pick up my kids.
He sighed. “You always were so orgasmic.”
I could feel my face flush. This was the danger of nostalgiaâonce exposed, it became vulnerable to correction. “Elliot,” I said, addressing the stain, “I never came.”
“What?”
“I never came.” I pushed up on my elbows and looked at him. “I was fourteen years old, for God's sake. A fourteen-year-old kid getting screwed by her history teacher is way too uptight to have orgasms.”
“You're joking.”
“No. If you remember me coming, either you're remembering it wrong or I faked it. Probably I faked it. Now that I think about it, I used to worry about whether faking counted as a lie and a sin, so that shows you exactly how young I was.
“You were only fourteen?”
“What did you think? I was in ninth grade. You were my teacher.”
“But . . .”
In all honesty I'd probably lied about my age, too, but the fact was, he didn't remember. I could see the doubt and confusion shifting across his naked face as he searched for an explanation. I knew what he wanted to sayâ
But I was young, too!
And it was trueâtwenty-three or -four at most.
But I was so much younger.
Nineteen seventy-four. I remember that summer before school started, before I fell in love with Elliot, because it was the last summer of my childhood. The high point in Liberty Falls was Evel Knievel's historic attempt to leap across the Snake River Canyon. There were posters up in all the store-front windowsâEvel dressed in skintight white leathers, dripping with fringe, standing next to his star-spangled, rocket-powered motorcycle.
All the kids were going, and I wanted to go, too, but Lloyd said no. He didn't actually come out and say that it was cheap, low-class entertainmentâafter all, Cassie's daddy was going, and he was taking her, and it wasn't right to criticize your neighbor. Instead Lloyd said it wasn't safe. He didn't approve of thrill seeking. Life was dangerous enough, and it was disrespectful of God to promote jeopardy, never mind profit by so doing.
Later I couldn't help but identify when Cass told me that Evel's safety parachute had opened prematurely, cutting short his flight and sending him and his motorcycle on a slow drift downward, to the bottom of Snake River Canyon. Similarly tethered, I thought I understood what it must have felt like, getting jerked out of the trajectory of one's life like that. I felt a desperate need to cut the cords, to give my own little throttle an extra squeeze and torque and sail out from a cloud of spitting gravel into the clear, empty air. In my mind's eye I could see the ground rising up to meet my wheels, safely, on the far side of the canyon.
What the mind's eye couldn't see, at the age of fourteen, was clear to me now: the real possibility of free fall, sans parachute, sans safety net at all. I sat up in bed and contemplated Elliot, who was trying hard to understand what he barely remembered.
“I can't believe it,” he was saying, dumbfounded. “How could I have been sleeping with a fourteen-year-old?”
Not a fourteen-year-old. Not any old fourteen-year-old. Me.
He was my great leap forward, and I had loved him, and he had fallen short, landing me smack in the gulch. I'd been crawling out ever since, had even reached the far side of stability, until now, when life's restless cycling delivered him back to me again.
“Generally guys get sent to jail for what you did,” I informed him. “You were a child molester, Elliot.”
Watching his face sink as he grappled with this new crisis of conscience, I realized I didn't care. I just wanted to ride his discomfort, hard, until it caught up with mine. I wanted to feel him again, between my legs, my rocket-powered motorcycle, once turbocharged.
I wanted to choke him hard.
I wanted to hear him splutter.
little bear
She had come by late to collect Poo. Face flushed. Eyes hard and wild and shining. It was a look Cass recognized from a long time ago, and she didn't need to ask where it came from. Poo, sensing his mother's fever, struggled in Cass's arms. He wanted to be near the source, to press against that radiating energy, and who could blame him? She handed him over, and he bounced up and down in Yummy's arms, gurgling and paddling her cheeks with his fat pink palms as she covered his face with kisses. Cass collected the last of Poo's things into a sack and opened the door. Only then, with Yummy standing safely outside, did she ask through the screen, “Are you going to see him again?”
Yummy turned around on the stoop. “I know it's crazy. I know I should just tell him to fuck off, but part of me . . .” She shrugged. “He said he's sorry. I don't know. He's leaving on Sunday. I guess I'll see him one more time. . . .”
“I'll take Poo,” Cass said. “It's fine.”
Â
Â
Double-click and bring up the atlas of North America. Zoom into the map of the western states. There were border crossings into Saskatchewan due north, all along the edge of Montana. Portal, Poplar, Climax. Tiny one-man outposts where they never searched luggage or checked the trunks of cars. It would be easy. Cass smiled. Climax. What a place to cross over. She'd always liked Saskatchewan because of the names: Moose Jaw, Lucky Lake, Success. Any place with towns like that had to be optimistic and upbeat. Cass didn't have much experience with optimistic and upbeat, but suddenly she wanted to try.
Will was planting and wouldn't get back until after dark. As soon as he left for the fields the next morning, she went out to the shed, just to see if the suitcases were still there. It took her awhile to dig them out, and when she did finally pull them free, she found them flattened from years of crushing. The fabric was festooned with cobwebs and dangling bits of insectsâbrittle cricket legs, powdery moth wings. They needed to be cleaned anyway, so she brought them inside and took the vacuum to the sides and corners.
Packing was no trouble. It wouldn't be wise to cause suspicion by having too much luggage, and she could easily fit everything she'd need into the smaller suitcase. The larger one could be lined with pillows. She took a utility knife and made a number of small, inconspicuous slits in the fabric, then widened them, just to be sure. The plaid pattern on the fabric helped hide the openings. She didn't have a passport, but she could enter with her driver's license, especially at a rural crossing. She'd need food, so she packed some in a cardboard box. When she was done, she took the Suburban to the gas station at the entrance to the freeway and filled the tank, then drove home again and waited.
Yummy arrived just after lunch, casually dressed but with a sheen on her that Cass hadn't seen since she'd watched her take her bows at curtain call after the Thanksgiving pageant. She smelled of cigarettes and aromatherapy. Cass had a sheen on her, too, but of course Yummy didn't notice.
“Thanks,” Yummy said. “You have time for a cup of coffee?”
Cass thought quickly. “I've got errands in Pocatello.”
“Oh.” Yummy lingered in the doorway holding the baby.
“Anyway, you have a date,” Cass said.
“Yeah. I guess. I don't know.” She gave Poo a kiss and cuddled him like she didn't want to let him go. Cass waited. Finally Yummy sighed and handed him over.
Cass forced herself to smile. “Have a good time.”
Yummy nodded. “I guess.” She reached out and squeezed Poo's foot and backed away down the steps.
“Hey,” Cass called. “Stick Poo's car seat in the Suburban, will you?” She watched Yummy wrestle with the plastic seat. It was bulky but sturdy, and Cass wanted Poo to be comfortable. Comfortable, but more than that, she wanted him to be safe. As soon as she saw the Pontiac's taillights turn the corner, Cass headed for her car. Poo whimpered. It was cold in the Suburban. He had just come from outside and wanted to stay inside now. She strapped him into the car seat and went back in for the suitcases. By the time she returned, he had started to cry.
“Please, Poo,” she whispered, rubbing his hands. “Please, little bearâ”
But he wouldn't stop. All the way down the dirt road he cried, gaining in volume as she cut across town and turned onto the highway. She tried singing for a while, all the songs that normally quieted him, but he just cried louder. She switched on the radio, but in the rearview mirror she could still see the tears squeezing from his eyes and his small body shaking with sobs. She drove for a whole hour and part of the next, until she couldn't stand it anymore. She pulled into a rest area just south of the Montana state line. As soon as the car stopped, his sobbing quieted and he started to hiccup. She thought about the brandy she'd packed in her purse to put in his milk just before they crossed the border. She checked her watch. The border was still eight hours away. She climbed into the backseat and took Poo from the car seat onto her lap. Together they watched the big trucks hurtle by. She gave him his bottle of milk but left the brandy where it was.
He started to doze off as soon as she turned the car around. By the time they were home, he was fast asleep. He was a good little sleeper. She got him out of his parka without waking him and put him down in the middle of her bed. “I'm sorry, little bear,” she whispered, then closed the door behind her.
In the living room she retrieved her purse, unscrewed the cap on the brandy bottle, and took a long drink. It tasted terrible, treacly and sweet, but she liked the warmth it brought to her body. She took another big sip, then capped it. She looked around. Barely three hours had passed since she'd driven away, but everything seemed different.
At least she had tried. Even if it was a stupid idea and nothing had come of it, she felt proud of herself for that. She went out to the Suburban and brought the suitcases back into the house and unpacked them. Then she put them away in the storage shed, in the very back, and covered them up with boxes. She thought of how she might explain to Will about the air holes, then realized she probably wouldn't have to. The only time they'd used the suitcases was on their honeymoon, when they'd rented a cabin in the woods for a week. They often talked about taking another trip like that, but with one thing and another . . .
It was after dark by the time Yummy came for Poo. Cass had called over to the house and spoken to Charmey, who said she would get the older kids fed. Cass was keeping Will's dinner hot in the oven, waiting for him to get in from the fields.
“Oh, God,” Yummy said as she came through the door. “I'm sorry I'm so late!” She smelled of whiskey and tobacco smoke and faintly of cologne. “Where's my Poo-bear?”