Grand Avenue (28 page)

“He has my kids.”

“Not for long. We’ll call Vicki first thing in the morning. She’ll know what to do. In the meantime, you’re going to stay here with me. And as soon as we get your kids, they’ll stay here too, at least until everything gets sorted out. Which it will, I promise. Now, let’s go upstairs. You’re going to get out of those ridiculous clothes and I’m going to pour you a nice hot bath, and you’re going to get a good night’s sleep. How does that sound?”

Chris smiled. “Too good to be true.”

Barbara sat on the side of the tub, watching the water gush from the tap, occasionally stretching her hand toward the flow, checking and adjusting the temperature. Hot, but not too hot. Not so hot Chris wouldn’t be able to sit down comfortably. No way she wanted to add to her injuries. Dear God, what had the woman
been through? Clearly, the things she’d told Barbara tonight were just the tip of the iceberg. Although why should that surprise her? Hadn’t Tony been abusing Chris for years? Hadn’t he hacked off her hair, for God’s sake? And hadn’t she sat back—hadn’t they all sat back—and done absolutely nothing?

The Grand Dames. Friends for life.

Some friends.

Barbara closed her eyes in shame and regret. It was too easy to conclude there was nothing anyone could have done. Too easy to put the responsibility squarely on Chris’s shaking shoulders and Tony’s brutal fists. They were all responsible.

And yet, what could she have done?

“It’s not your fault,” Chris said suddenly, coming into the bathroom, sitting down beside Barbara on the edge of the tub. She was wrapped in Barbara’s voluminous white terry-cloth bathrobe, and her hair, grown back to shoulder length, was pushed behind her ears.

The ponytail was gone forever, Barbara thought, realizing how much she missed it. “I should have been there for you,” she whispered. “At the very least, I should have been there for you.”

“You were.” Chris reached over, took Barbara’s hand inside her own.

“No. I stopped trying to find you.”

“What choice did you have?”

“I thought about you all the time.”

“I know.”

“We all did. Grand Avenue was never the same without you.”

“How are the others?” Chris asked, her eyes suddenly
hungry for information. “Vicki and Susan? Owen and Jeremy? The kids?”

“Everyone’s fine.”

“Still together? Still well?”

“Still together. Still well.”

“I’m so glad. And you, how are you?”

Barbara smiled. “Better now that you’re here.” She stroked Chris’s beautiful face, as if to convince herself she was really there and not just a figment of her lonely imagination. “Please tell me you’ll never go back to him,” she said, almost afraid to say the words out loud for fear of what Chris might say in return.

“I’ll never go back to him.” Chris’s voice was surprisingly strong.

“No matter what he says or does.”

“I’ll never go back,” Chris said again, even more forcefully the second time.

“You promise?”

Chris nodded. “I promise.”

Barbara pushed herself off the side of the tub. “Take your bath.”

Chris undid the belt at her waist, shedding the oversize terry-cloth robe, like a butterfly emerging from a cocoon, Barbara thought, averting her eyes, about to leave the room when Chris’s voice stopped her. “Don’t go.”

Barbara said nothing. Instead she lowered the lid of the toilet seat, sitting down and watching as Chris slipped naked into the tub, her body quickly submerging beneath the hot water. Had she always been so thin, so terribly fragile? Barbara wondered, wincing at the sight of the myriad bruises that stained Chris’s
body, dusty yellow blotches along the insides of her arms, neon purple circles on her thighs, flat blue shadows everywhere. There were other marks as well, Barbara realized, unable to turn away. Scratches on Chris’s neck and around her ribs, what appeared to be several bite marks on her left shoulder and breast, just above the small, earth-brown nipple. “How’s the water? Too hot? Too cold?” Barbara realized she was talking strictly for the sake of hearing her own voice, that she was afraid if she didn’t talk, she might start crying and never stop.

“It’s perfect.”

“You must be exhausted.”

“I was thinking the same thing about you.”

“Don’t worry about me,” Barbara said.

“Don’t worry about
me.”

The two women nodded silent understanding. “Would you like me to wash your back?” Barbara asked after a pause of several minutes.

Chris smiled, grabbed the bar of soap from its container, handed it to Barbara. Then she raised her knees and leaned forward over them, hugging her thighs to her chest, as Barbara soaked a washcloth in the water and began rubbing it across her back. Chris moaned, twisted her head from one side to the other, closed her eyes.

“Too hard?”

“Feels great. Feels perfect.”

Barbara rubbed soap into the washcloth, letting the cloth glide across Chris’s back and neck, the gentle ablutions hypnotizing both of them. “Promise me you’ll never go back to him,” Barbara said, as she had said earlier.

And again Chris promised, “I’ll never go back.”

Only later, with Chris safely back inside Barbara’s white terry-cloth bathrobe, her wet hair securely tucked inside a thick, white towel, both women sitting on the side of Barbara’s bed, did Barbara notice Chris looking at her with newly inquisitive eyes, as if seeing her for the first time. “What is it?”

“Your face.” Chris lifted her hand to Barbara’s cheek. “Something’s different.”

Barbara patted her hairline with self-conscious fingers. “I had a little surgery a while back.”

“Surgery?”

“Just a few little nips and tucks. A girl’s got to stay beautiful.”

“You always look beautiful.”

Barbara felt her eyes sting with tears.

“You
are
beautiful.” Chris gently wiped the tears from Barbara’s face.

“Thank you.” Barbara folded one lip inside the other to prevent a sob from escaping.

“I’ve missed you so much.”

“I’ve missed
you,”
Barbara hugged the other woman to her, both women crying freely.

At the same moment, each pulled back, began drying the other’s tears. “I love you,” Chris said.

“I love you too.”

And suddenly Chris leaned forward, pressed her lips against Barbara’s, so tenderly Barbara wasn’t sure they were really there at all.

My God, what’s going on? Barbara asked herself, trying to pretend what was happening was a dream, that this whole crazy night was a dream, except she
knew it wasn’t. What she didn’t know was how to respond. What she didn’t know was what to do next. She loved Chris. Loved her with her entire being, her heart and her soul. But she’d never thought of Chris in any sexual sense, never so much as fantasized anything like this happening between them. And Chris was frightened and vulnerable and confused. She’d just escaped from a crazy man. She was grateful and relieved and desperate for warmth. For affection. For love.

That’s all it was.

One lost soul reaching out to another.

And then they heard the noise, and the women quickly pulled apart. “What was that?” Chris asked, fear instantly returning to her eyes as they shot from the bedroom window to the hall, then back to the window.

Barbara ran to the window, peeked under the heavy curtains toward the backyard. She peered into the darkness, trying to catch sight of anything, anyone. But all she saw was a silent wintry tableau—a postage-sized yard liberally sprinkled with snow, the ice-encrusted branches of the small trees swaying precariously in the cold wind. Had one of the branches snapped off, fallen to the ground? Had someone thrown a pebble at the window? Barbara checked the ground for debris, the window for scratches, saw nothing out of the ordinary. Had Tony figured out where Chris had gone? Was he out there now, waiting in the dark, watching the house?

“Stay here,” Barbara instructed, heading for the hall. Or was it possible that Ron had returned, was even now ransacking the house for items he’d forgotten the first time around?

“Where are you going?”

“I’ll be right back.”

Barbara crossed the hall, opened the door to Tracey’s room, looked toward the bed. Tracey might have gotten up to use the bathroom. Maybe that was the noise they’d heard. Except that Tracey was sound asleep in her bed, her breathing steady and rhythmic. “Sleep well, my sweet girl,” Barbara said, kissing Tracey’s warm forehead, securing the blankets around her shoulders, tiptoeing from the room.

She approached the stairs, her fingers trailing across the wall as she inched her way down the steps in the dark, bracing herself for the sudden touch of unfriendly hands on her shoulders. But there was nothing. No unwelcome guests lurked inside. No sinister ghosts lingered. Both the front and side doors were securely locked. Again, Barbara peeked outside, saw no one. “Go away, whoever you are,” Barbara said to the ominous silence. “Stay away.”

“Barbara?” Chris’s voice wobbled toward Barbara from the top of the stairs.

“It’s okay. There’s nobody here.”

“It was probably just the house,” Chris said once Barbara was safely back upstairs. “You know how houses sometimes make noises when it gets really cold.”

Barbara looked around warily. “That’s probably what it was.”

The two women stood awkwardly in the middle of the room. The first time they’d ever felt awkward with one another, Barbara thought sadly.

“Barbara,” Chris began, then stopped, undoubtedly feeling the same way.

“You should get some sleep,” Barbara said, trying not to think about what had passed between them only moments before. “You must be absolutely exhausted.”

“Yes,” Chris agreed readily. “I am.”

Barbara nodded gratefully. “Me too.”

“About what happened before …”

“I understand,” Barbara said quickly.

“Do you? Because I’m not sure I do.”

Barbara tried to give Chris one of her patented beauty-pageant smiles, but the smile refused to stick to her lips. “Can we talk about it in the morning?”

“Sure.”

Without another word, the two women crawled into Barbara’s bed, Chris’s back curved into Barbara’s front, like two spoons, Barbara thought, allowing her arm to fall gently across Chris’s side. “Good night,” Chris murmured, sleep already softening the consonants, so that the word emerged more as a sigh.

“Sleep well,” Barbara whispered, as Chris’s body relaxed beneath her arm. In the next minute, Chris was asleep. Barbara clung stubbornly to consciousness, refusing to give in to sleep. She lay awake for the balance of the night, watching the darkness bleed from the sky until it was light, keeping watch over her beloved friend until morning.

1991–1992

A
riel, have you seen my purple cashmere sweater?” Susan stood in the middle of her walk-in closet, a pile of discarded sweaters scattered around her bare feet. She could hear the radio blasting from Ariel’s room, so she knew her daughter was in her room, probably still in bed. Susan checked her watch. Eight thirty-five. Which meant Ariel would be late for school. Yet again. Which was something Susan wasn’t prepared to get into at this particular moment. She had a nine-o’clock editorial meeting, and right now her missing purple sweater took priority over her chronically tardy teenager. “Ariel?”

Owen’s head poked around the closet door. “Something wrong?”

“My purple sweater is missing. I’m sure Ariel has it.”

“You’re not going to accomplish anything standing in the closet screaming.”

Susan smiled, but what she really felt like doing was
hurling a shoe at her husband’s head. Did he always have to be so damned logical? Besides, she wasn’t screaming. “Ariel, honey,” she called, louder this time, “have you seen my purple sweater?”

This time the response was fast and furious, blasting through the wall between them like a stick of dynamite. “How would I know where your stupid sweater is!”

“Don’t say anything,” Susan warned her husband, who promptly backed off, then disappeared from view. She took a deep breath and returned her attention to the shelves she’d been searching through. “You can’t fight if you don’t bite,” she intoned solemnly, the mantra Dr. Slotnick had suggested she repeat whenever the urge to throttle her difficult older daughter—or her easy-going husband—threatened to overwhelm her. According to the esteemed family therapist Susan had briefly consulted, Ariel was merely testing the waters, rebelling because rebelling was what teenagers were supposed to do. It was the child’s way of separating from her parents, the good doctor had explained, her way of becoming her own person, asserting her unique, independent self. Susan should try not to take it personally. Which she might be able to do were it not for the fact that Ariel’s unique independent self was so singularly unpleasant.

Owen, on the other hand, seemed to have no difficulty following Dr. Slotnick’s advice. He dealt with their ill-tempered daughter with the same good grace he dealt with his patients. He was gentle, understanding, and unfailingly respectful, no matter how rude or disrespectful Ariel might be in return. He was a role model for proper parental behavior, Susan
thought, and he was really starting to get on her nerves.

Susan pulled open the top drawer of her built-in dresser, her hand rifling through the neat stacks of bras and panties, not surprised to discover the sweater wasn’t there. Why would she have put her sweater anywhere but with her other sweaters? She slammed the drawer shut, forgetting her finger was still inside. “Damn it! Damn it, damn it, damn it!” She began hopping around the small space, waving her fingers in the air, as if she could shake out the terrible sting.

“What’s the matter now?” Owen asked from the bedroom.

Not what’s the matter, but what’s the matter
now?
Where was all that famous patience where she was concerned? Susan padded sheepishly into the bedroom. “I closed the drawer on my fingers.” She held her hand out toward her husband.

“You’ll be fine.” He cast a cursory glance in the direction of her wiggling fingers. “Stop waving them around like that.”