Elena Undone (9 page)

Expressions of sympathy traveled about the room.

“How about you?” The instructor caught Peyton off guard.

“Oh, well...” Peyton cleared her throat. “I’ve wanted to have a family for as long as I can remember...I’m single but I’m a writer and can be home all hours of the day for a child…and I…I really believe I can make a good home for an unwanted child.”

Elena considered Peyton as she spoke. She had won“ She hadered all morning how she knew this woman, this woman who looked so different than most of the women she knew. She had an air about her. Commanding, almost masculine, but she was also womanly with her wavy brown shoulder-length hair. Something about her was quite striking, even though she appeared sad, tired. But why did she seem so familiar? Had she met her at the church? A church function? Then Elena realized the woman was looking right at her and she quickly glanced away.

“I’ve just wanted a baby forever...” One of the last women spoke, a woman who looked as hopeless as so many of them felt. “Oh God...they are just full of so much promise. Isn’t that what we’re all here for...a promise for a better tomorrow?”

Everyone glanced about, uncomfortable at the raw truth and desperation in the room. Elena, beginning to tear up, quickly gathered her purse and walked from the room.

*

Peyton walked to her car, but as she passed a red Sierra van, she noticed the same tall and quite beautiful Indian woman working on trying to find her keys. She stopped a moment, and was about to just keep moving on when she heard the woman’s voice, low and frustrated.

“Damn!”

Peyton offered, “Everything okay?”

When the woman turned Peyton could see that her eyes were red and a bit swollen.

“Hey…I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to scare you.”

Elena tried to collect herself. She felt humiliated. She had spent the last twenty minutes in the women’s restroom crying. All of this felt so desperate, and it made her feel her own loss. It took every bit of strength to stop herself from going down that path—she simply couldn’t—or she would hit a paralyzing depression. As soon as she had been able to collect herself, she had rushed to her car, but then...

“I...I can’t find my keys.”

Peyton gingerly pointed over Elena’s shoulder to keys that were sitting on the roof of Elena’s van.

Elena, realizing she had inadvertently left them there, shook her head, turned back to Peyton, shrugged and smiled.

“Happens to me all the time.” Peyton grinned sympathetically, then cleared her throat, shy but concerned. “Don’t mean to pry...but are you okay?”

“Uhmm...yeah. I’m...” She sighed. “It’s all just a little overwhelming.”

“Yeah...I know.”

Their eyes caught. Elena smiled shyly and then they stood awkwardly, both wondering where to take the conversation or if to just leave it. Peyton began to leave but Elena stopped her with, “I hope you dodth hope yn’t mind my asking...I overheard you earlier...why do you want to do this alone?”

“Well, it hadn’t been the plan.” Peyton shuffled, uncertain how much to share. “I thought I could make a difference…in some small way...you know what, it’s a really long story.”

“That’s right—you’re the writer.”

Peyton grinned. “Yeah... What about you?”

“I’m...well, I used to be a photographer. I mean I still am...” Elena realized how uncertain and silly she must sound. She cleared her throat. “I just started doing some pickup work.”

Elena looked at Peyton a moment, was about to ask something, but didn’t. Peyton found herself getting nervous. She wasn’t sure what to say, but managed to ask, “So...do you have a card?”

Elena felt shy suddenly. “Yes, well I do in fact. It’s somewhere in here.” She scrambled around in her purse, found a card that appeared crumpled and possibly like it could be the last business card on the planet.

“It’s kind of old.” They both grinned. Peyton gingerly took it from Elena and handed her one in return.

Elena’s phone rang. “Oh gosh, duty calls. I...I really should be getting home.”

“Yeah…me too.”

Elena held out her hand but decided that felt too formal but just as she went to hug Peyton, Peyton put out a hand to shake Elena’s. Neither knew what was appropriate, and both grinned awkwardly and hastily made their exit.

*

Peyton walked in from work, moved to her desk to look through the mail and suddenly realized she was not alone. She turned to see Margaret slinking in, looking very attractive in tight black jeans and a low-cut forest green top. She was made up, and her eyes sparkled as she held up two tickets. “Bonnie Raitt.”

Peyton’s jaw tightened.

“And...special passes to the after party,” she purred.

Peyton continued to take off her jacket, walked to the mail sitting on her desk and glanced through it. She felt Margaret come up from behind her.

“I know I’m still on probation...but what can a little...” Margaret wound a finger down Peyton’s neck, then moved in for a kiss, “...hurt?”

Peyton’s lack of engagement did not discourage Margaret’s seduction in the least.

*

“Babe...El?”

Elena looked into his intent blue eyes.

“Should we not?”

“I’m sorry.”

“Hey…if you’re not into it…”

And then he followed her gaze to the picture frame of a newborn baby. Sarah.

“Oh, God, El! I’m so sorry...” He quickly dismounted, moved to her side. “Christ, I can’t believe I forgot what day it is.”

He shook his head, and in his eyes she saw the same pain she felt reflected back to her. After all, they had both lost her. They had both felt the enormous grief. This pain didn’t belong to just her. And as she felt the sudden urge to blot out the agony of memories, she also felt the strong need to comfort him. She pulled him back. They looked at one another for a long moment.

“Are you…are you sure, El?” Barry whispered, but she could hear the plaintive need in his voice.

She nodded slightly. She felt him hard against her, like she had for so many years, felt him enter her, knew precisely the way in which he would mount her, knew the exact rhythm, the roughly five to seven minutes it took for him to achieve climax and knew from the way his legs trembled the second he would come. Something was comforting about knowing someone that completely. She did not consider this to be intimacy. It was more akin to wounded soldiers together, trapped in an empty foxhole; their camaraderie their only link to survival. Whatever else they were to one another, they were in this together. They were bound by more than this life. They were bound by death as well.

As his breathing became ragged, she closed her eyes and after he came and slumped against her, she stroked his head until she felt the calm breathing of his sleep.

*

Margaret’s voice was husky silk. “I really don’t know why we can’t make another go of this. I’ve told you I’m sorry. I’ve told you over and over, again…I made a mistake.”

Peyton tried to remove herself from Margaret’s clutches.

“You know I loved your mom...but I begged you to let her go. And you wouldn’t. Dammit Peyton, I...I was lonely.”

“Lonely I understand. Erin’s another matter. Wave’s been trashed too.”

“Christ, Peyton, you’re kidding right? Wave had no business being with Erin—” Margaret shook her head, reprised her sardonic look. “How many times does it take for her to get that she shouldn’t sleep with the hired help?”

Peyton sighed.

“Just because they’re done, doesn’t mean we are. We’ve had six good—okay mostly good—years.” Margaret slowly but smoothly began to undress Peyton, leaned in to kiss her. “Look. You still want a baby...and I still want you.”

Peyton softened momentarily. She was lonely too. It had been so long since anyone had touched her and well, at least with Margaret, she knew what she was getting into. Maybe…maybe just for old time’s sake...

Three weeks later

“Off, off, off,” Peyton whispered under her breath, “off, off, off.”

And on it went. She had been checking, double-and-triple checking the stove knobs for the last twenty minutes—

Oh and there was a smudge of dirt on the counter—

Peyton walked to her three pairs of rubber gloves (the green for the dishes, the blue for counter work, and the yellow—well, because they reminded her of her mother) carefully pulled them on so as not to get any wet inside (if she did she had to take that pair off and start with a new pair) and grabbed a sponge. She furiously began scrubbing. Scrubbing, mashing, tearing at the dirt; real or imagined until—

“Hello? It’s me, where are you?”

“Thank God,” Peyton yelled back, even as she continued to persevere, “I’m in here—in the kitchen.”

Wave walked in with a bottle of wine she sat on the granite counter, then she moved directly in front of Peyton. She grabbed her by the shoulders, straightened her up then snapped off each glove with finesse.

“Damn it!” Peyton smiled bleakly. “I’ve been so stuck in a loop.”

Wave smiled back with compassion, held up the wine. “For medicinal purposes, naturally.”

*

Elena was just finishing the dishes when Tori ambled in, looking a little lost.

“Nash would like a snack—actually a pound of chocolate chip cookies was the actual order—as apparently his brain requires them to function at maximum capacity.”

Elena considered Tori as she heaved herself up on the counter, grabbed a banana, but did not peel it. Garbed in a plaid skirt, striped vest, pleated knuckle gloves and her ubiquitous tie, she was, well, all Tori. Elena was the last one to understand American fashion in the teen universe as most of it looked ridiculous and an overwrought attempt at individualism. But, somehow Tori pulled it off. She was definitely one of a kind.

“Did you realize the average human utters around 124,000,000 words in their lifetime...just wondering how many of them are empty promises.”

But Elena saw through Tori’s shtick.

“Your dad?”

“Promises next weekend. Promises last weekend. All I got to say is he should just stop opening his mouth. Foot taking over.”

“Sweetie...I’m sorry.” Elena hugged Tori, then lifted Tori’s chin to see her puppy-dog brown eyes. “And your mom?”

“Doin’ her whole staying-up-all-night-mania thing.”

It had been months since Elena had actually seen either of Tori’s parents, but that wasn’t unusual. Her dad was, in Tori’s own vernacular, “a megageek—that’s where I get my aptitude for retention” and worked as a sound technician for what Tori referred to as “really bad white boy’s music.” But for whatever reason, they were a hugely popular rock band, and he was rarely home. Tori’s mom looked very much like her daughter, beautiful, but fragile and highly strung. She was a painter who was known to spend three days solid locked up in her attic, forgetting she even had a child. When she was present, she was a lovely and very entertaining woman, even with her constant nervous habits and ticks, but both Elena and Barry worried that she was potentially borderline and heading straight toward serious mental illness.

Early on both Elena and Barry considered Tori’s options when she had become best pals with Nash when they were six, when Tori had defended Nash from a schoolyard bully, not by violence, but by talking so hard, so fast and furiously at the kid-thug that he ran from the schoolyard, humiliated. Back then Tori’s father was working locally and when he was home he was a great father. But when he took the road job, they didn’t know whether to go to Children’s Services, do an intervention for Tori’s mom or some other action—until one day Nash made the decision for them, at nine, when he simply stated. “Tori’s my very best friend. She should just live here.”

Because the two were already inseparable, it truly was the most workable solution and the one that caused the least amount of pain and transition. Tori simply became part of the family and engaged with her own family when they were available to her. She still slept at her home half the time, which was just several blocks away, and half the time she slept in what was once Sarah’s room, that had lain dormant for years. Elena found it healing to create a sweet girl’s room for Tori, because for Elena, Tori practically was her daughter and yet they also had a wonderful friendship, sharing fashion, “girlie things” as Nash referred to them, and many long discussions. Tori made her laugh more thanhe gh more anyone else she knew and she loved the ease in their relationship, even if there were times that Elena wondered if Tori, with her innate wisdom, wasn’t really the wiser and older of the two.