One Night (28 page)

I repeated, “How do you know about my kid?”

“I assumed you have a child because you have mild stretch marks.”

My hands went to my belly. “You saw?”

“I saw them. I kissed them. I kissed them all. They give you character.”

“They're not that obvious. I stayed in the dark.”

“The television had a nice glow. Enough to see a child's face is tattooed on your arm.”

“She's drawn as roses and angels. That's my daughter.”

“Her image is beautiful. You shouldn't ever cover it up.”

“You made out her face. You didn't say anything.”

“Wasn't sure what to say. Wasn't sure it was what I assumed.”

“When were you sure?”

“Just saw inside your car. Barbie doll buckled in the front seat.”

“My road dog.”

“Plus, there is an infant safety seat in the rear. You definitely have a child.”

“Had.”

“Had?”

“Died. Dropped out of college when I was pregnant. Was never good between her dad and me. I thought I could fix him, and ended up destroying myself. Anyway. Long story. He never really did anything for her. I had a job. As an actress. Had to be gone a few days. He kept her. It was his first time taking her for the weekend. Then there was . . . the accident. I felt so guilty. Dropped out of life when she died.”

“An accident?”

“Started by a dried-out Christmas tree. Her father had bought a cheap Christmas tree, had had it for two weeks, maybe longer, and never watered it. It dried out. It caught fire the night she was there.”

“Jesus.”

I wiped my eyes. “Damn. I don't want to cry in front of you. Sorry.”

“It's okay. It's okay.”

“Should've told you about that.”

“No, it's fine. I hear the pain in your voice.”

“Guy I'm seeing now . . . was seeing . . . I talked about Natalie Rose too much with him. We talked about her online, when we were on Skype, or on WhatsApp, and when we met at Roscoe's. I could tell it became too much for him, and I tried to abstain, but Natalie Rose is in my heart and at times all I can talk about. I guess, no matter what, it seemed like all conversations would lead back to my daughter. Soon he just ignored her. He couldn't relate. He acted as if she never existed. He let her go. I guess that was his way of saying that I had to stop talking about her. The only way to
not
talk about her was to try to not start talking about her. It was so hard to . . . to pretend that . . . she was . . . here but not here.”

“You have family?”

“I have a brother in Florida. Johnny Parker. Parker was my maiden name. But we aren't close. He's had a bad marriage, too. Runs in the family, I guess. He was seeing a nice white girl named Jennifer for a while, but that didn't work out. Anyway. I don't want to call him crying all the time.”

“You need to talk about Natalie Rose. Never stop. You stop, and she dies for real.”

“Doing it now. I always need to talk about her. Some days I can't get out of bed, and I have nights when I can't sleep. When I sleep, sometimes I wake up crying. Not hard, just wake with tears in my eyes. I lost my child. I've had days and nights when giving up was all I thought about. Wanted to start cutting myself. Doctor wanted me on pills, but I wasn't taking anything to mess with my head.”

“What did you love the most about being a mother?”

“Serious?”

“What did you love the most?”

“Why do you ask?”

“I haven't had the chance to be a father. Maybe that will never happen for me. I thought that it would have happened at least five, maybe six years ago, but it didn't. The wife didn't want children.”

“Our kids would have been the same age.”

“What did you love the most about having her in your life?”

It took me a moment, and for a moment I thought that I was going to break, that it would be like one of my tougher days, thought the emotions were about to pull me to my knees and make me scream to the clouds and try to make sense of what made no sense at all, and for a moment my bottom lip trembled. I shook with anxiety and I knew the next battle would be fighting back tears, and then wishing that the day she died they had tied me down and injected me with a lethal dose of pentobarbital so I could leave with her and take her on to the next part of this unknown journey. I almost broke down because after that day, every day was a nightmare, a nightmare when I was sleeping, a nightmare when I was awake. But on the heels of sadness came so many happy memories, and those memories dripped on me like rain, and that rain took me to the moment she was born, carried me from the moment I was so excited to introduce myself to her as her mother to the day I had to let her go, to the days I was no longer a mother, but still had the scars from childbirth, and I shoved the bad feelings away, discarded hatred, and focused and thought of the first days of her life, saw smiles and laughter, and my face lit up with each raindrop.

“I loved so many things. I think teaching her new things was my favorite. Watching her mimic me and try to do things on her own was so amazing to see. She came out of me unable to do anything but poop and cry, and I watched her on her journey to becoming a whole person. Every day was amazing.”

“Was she like you?”

“She was too much like me. She came out of me ready to have an argument about the umbilical cord being cut too soon. She was having too much fun inside me and wasn't ready for the real world. Just like her mother. I laughed the most when I saw my personality or sassiness come out in her.”

“Bet she was the best kid ever.”

“Just being able to be there for her when anything was wrong gave me fulfillment. I was supposed to be there. Nothing bad was supposed to happen. Nothing. We used to watch a few TV shows together, all the kiddie stuff. She would have loved
Frozen
. She would've tried to sing along to it all day. I read to her all the time, and when I worked out, she would mimic me, and we would be on the floor of my little apartment exercising together. I wanted her to be older so we could sit in spa chairs and get our nails done. She was like my little partner in crime. She was going to be all I ever needed. Yeah. She mimicked me. She wanted to do everything I did, and I wanted to teach her everything I knew.”

“He should've been there. The guy you're seeing, whenever you talked about your daughter, no matter what time of day or night, he should have listened to every word. She was taken away too soon.”

“I've been angry ever since. Lost. I can't take her things out of my car. I have tried, but I can't. So I guess she rides around with me. When I do bad things, I hide it from her Barbie dolls. Last night I put them on the floor before I stole the truck and did the con game. Silly, I know. I keep thinking they're going to tell her that I've been a bad mommy or something. Sounds really silly saying that.”

“You leave her stuff in the car. It's like you're keeping your daughter with you.”

“In some ways. I can't part with her toys. One day. Not yet. I left them where she left them. I left the mess she made in my car the same way she left the mess. She stays in my heart.”

He let a moment pass. “It's time for you to go. You should leave.”

“I have nowhere to go.”

A chilling rain dampened our faces as we looked at his wife.

I said, “She's pretty. She's way more than pretty by the standards of mainstream America.”

“I wish I hadn't done that. I'm so sorry that happened. This isn't what I wanted.”

“I know. I can tell.”

“Leave. I don't want anyone to think you were involved, or this was because of you.”

I put my fingers in her blood, then touched the damaged tile, left my fingerprints along with his.

He said, “That won't change anything. I've been caught on video all night at many locations. You weren't in the hotel lobby when I ran into her; you weren't there when I escorted her to the covered parking lot. Cameras might be there too. I will assume they have cameras. They'll know.”

“But I am standing with you now. I'm standing with you until the end.”

“This isn't like the movie theater.”

“I know.”

“Not like 7-Eleven.”

“I ain't going anywhere.”

After that symbolic gesture, I closed the trunk of his car, inhaled glacial air.

I sat down next to him, held his hand, and rubbed his cold fingers until they were warm again.

I said, “You love your wife. This hurt you. Loving her gave you great pain.”

His voice trembled. “I do. Even if she's dead.”

“Loving someone who is dead—nothing wrong with that.”

“Not at all. Some people are easier to love that way.”

“If a man's wife dies, he's called a widower. If a woman's husband has died, she's a widow. When children lose their parents they are orphans. Why isn't there a name for a parent who loses a child?”

“Because you will always be a parent. Even when children have left, or have died.”

“I'm still Natalie Rose's mom.”

“And you will always be.”

“Thanks. I needed to hear that.”

Police sirens wailed in the distance as the rain started to fall again.

Sirens. Sirens. Sirens were far away, but would not stay far away, not for long.

Sirens screamed and Christmas songs were being played all over the land.

I watched the man from Orange County, examined his worry, and touched his chin.

He grinned at me.

He was a well-groomed, honest man who had been dealt an interesting hand in life, a man who would give up his seat to a lady and who told the truth even when it wasn't nice because it needed to be heard; a well-read man who knew how to listen; a man who frowned when he was angry and smiled when he felt joy, and probably cried in private; a romantic man who told me he didn't know all the answers, not even to this mess, but he wasn't running away. He was a man who had learned something every day but hadn't learned everything. Intelligent and still naive, like the rest of the world. He hadn't hardened like me, hadn't learned to never trust anyone.

I'd been served an interesting hand in life as well. I was a big cup of the best of the best covered in hopes and dreams, difficult at times, and smart, very smart, not as smart as Einstein, but I had made my own mistakes, mistakes worse than forgetting to put your pants on, larger than marrying and then divorcing. I read, was trustworthy, was romantic, but had been on the wrong road.

Thump
.

I looked back at the trunk of the car and asked, “Did you hear that?”

He was in another place, reliving his own agony; I held his hand and listened.

Sirens. Sirens. Sirens.

I had a feeling that this time they would approach, but they wouldn't pass us by, and the wave of wails wouldn't recede. I stuck my tongue out, caught a few raindrops, water mixed with the smog.

I said, “We could both use a good night's sleep and a lot of laughs.”

“I have something better.”

“What do you have?”

“Well, maybe not better. But just as good.”

He took out the bag of cheesecake and forks. There were ten kinds of cheesecake.

I said, “Still, it was the best night ever.”

“Didn't want it to end. Not going to pretend. Not the sex, but the connection.”

“It's not over yet.”

“Where do we start? Cheesecake. How do we lay out the food?”

“Smorgasbord.”

We opened all the cheesecakes and put them in front of us like a buffet.

I said, “I want the caramel-pecan piece first. I won that slice first. That slice is all mine, Buster.”

“Caramel pecan. Chocolate chip. Cherry. Blueberry. Chocolate chip–cookie dough.”

“Key lime. Pumpkin. Oreo.”

“Red velvet and Reese's cheesecakes.”

“You kept your word.”

“I did better than my word. Ten kinds of cheesecake.”

“You went all out.”

People began to appear on the boardwalk. Spanish-speaking people who would always be called and considered Mexicans, no matter where in the world they were born, appeared and started hustling umbrellas. He bought one. He bought us a big umbrella. We sat under it, shoulder to shoulder.

He said, “Starbucks in Ladera Heights, the one not too far from where you live.”

“Used to be the black Starbucks.”

“Must you grade everything in black and white? Didn't MLK want that nonsense to stop?”

“I was there early this morning. Was avoiding my landlord. Was stressed, plotting how to get quick money. That's where I saw the MacBook Pro box sitting on an outside table. Someone had left it.”

“I should've been there, too, instead of going to Santa Monica. I should've stopped there and cooled off, maybe evoked slow thinking over quick thinking. Would've been great to see you walk in.”

I asked, “Would you have hit on me?”

“Would you have been receptive to a half-breed, pissed-off man in a suit?”

“Who is playing the race card now?”

He said, “You started it. Would you have been interested in me?”

“Every gold digger's alert would've gone off as soon as your new ride hit the parking lot, and they would've been rushing to grab you like you were on a table at Walmart the morning after Thanksgiving. People will kill over a toaster, and I know they would've been ripping you apart. The Gold Digger Alert goes off at a pitch that only dogs can hear, so bitches would've been breaking their necks to get to Starbucks.”

“Would you have been interested in me?”

“I'm not a gold digger looking for a wish-granting factory that walks on two legs and has a baby-making dick made of wood and comes in gold. If I were, maybe my life would have been a little bit better. I've never been an ass-for-cash kind of girl. I didn't want Natalie Rose to have an ass-for-cash mother.”