Shatter My Rock (8 page)

I
am sadder still for the fact that Tim may not be able to right this wrong with Owen,
a child connected to him solely through the quirks of assumption and imagination.
But at least there is Ally.

Tim’s
half-drunk beer warms on the edge of a banquet table, while I escape to the
ladies’ room. When I return, I find that my husband has trotted out his newest
baby game: peek-a-boo.

Intently,
I watch as he cradles Owen in the crescent of his lap, covers his face and
waits. With glee, he flaps his hands aside and booms, “Peek-a-boo!”

Owen
is not old enough to be an equal partner in this game, yet the delight he feels
is evident in the sparkle of his eyes and his open-mouthed, baby-bird smile.

Tim
plays on, attracting a throng of gooey-centered, middle-aged women who either
pine for the good old days or wrestle with the thought of giving motherhood one
last shot.
Don’t,
I want to scream at them, warn them off the idea
before it sticks.
Don’t do it.

I
think this not because of Eric Blair but because of Owen, what he’s just now
done, what he continues to do. His little baby arm, once soft and squishy as a
Campfire marshmallow, has snapped rigid in a way that hurtles me back to
Ricky’s bedside, nineteen seventy-three. It’s a myoclonic jerk, the harbinger
of Dukate Disease. Owen’s death knell.

The
six weeks Eric Blair has been laid up nursing the leg I had a hand in breaking
have slipped away from me, fallen victim to my knotted mind.

It
seems as if I think hard enough, ignore facts that cast doubt, ferret out the
right research—or create it whole cloth—I should be able to undo what has been
done to my precious Owen. Yet every road I embark upon dead-ends in the same
intractable conclusion: God has cursed me and all the souls unlucky enough to
orbit my sphere.

“I’m
leaving early,” I tell my assistant, Laurie, without explanation. “Forward
anything important to my cell.”

She
should be used to my erratic behavior by now, its frequency increasing by the
day. But each time I break stride, she balks too. “What should I tell legal,”
she asks uncertainly, “if they call about the Harper case?”

That
damn sexual harassment lawsuit has clawed its way back from the dead, three
potential settlements having fallen apart at the eleventh hour. “I only accept
good news,” I say in my best deadpan. “How about that?”

The
smile I can tell she is suppressing breaks through. “You’re the boss.”

The
truth is, I may not be in charge of much before long, including the tying of my
shoes or my very sanity.

Tim
is getting suspicious, and if I don’t do something soon to appease him, I fear
he will act without me, bring this house of cards tumbling down.

The
myoclonic jerk I witnessed nearly two months ago was not an aberration, some
freak coincidence I could rationalize and sublimate. There have been more, and
they are worsening. Even Tim knows something is wrong.

I
want to tell the truth, drag the whole ugly mess kicking and screaming into the
light. But at what cost? I cannot fix Owen; nobody can. Dukate is fatal and
swiftly so. Ricky was lucky to have made it to age nine—or perhaps not so
lucky, depending on one’s point of view.

As
for Eric Blair, nothing would please me more than feeding his mangled carcass
to a pack of wild dogs—except, of course, a cure for Dukate. But I can’t make
Tim and Ally casualties of this vendetta or this disease. Too many lives have
already fallen.

I
creep into the cemetery, my foot clamped to the brake pedal, my gaze searching.
The eternal resting place of Charlotte Rosemarie Ross lies on a sun-drenched
hill in Oak Grove Memorial, my father’s final gift to the woman he once loved:
a sliver of peace and tranquility.

I
know the location of the plot based solely on fuzzy recollections of trips to
Ricky’s graveside that seem as if they belong to someone else, visits that
ground the last bit of fight out of our mother before she broke for good.

As
I inch along, these ancient images bleed into one another, construct a coherent
whole. A few yards short of the spot, I stop and park, shut the car down.

But
I cannot yet move.
Is this where we will bury Owen?
I wonder.
How
soon?

I
ease the door open and slip out, leaving the contents of my purse scattered
about the seat behind me. The enormity of what I aim to do turns the atmosphere
to molasses, forces my muscles to earn every step. But eventually I arrive,
darken the threshold of fate.

First,
I go to my knees, then my stomach. The ground is wet and cold. I embrace the
earth, wish to return to it like Charlotte and Ricky, their slabs looming like
prison guards.

“Why?”
I ask the worms and the grass. “Why Owen?” Then to my mother, “Do you regret
it?”

I
know not to which question I seek the answer:
Does she regret aborting a
child who could have lived or extending the life of a child who should have
died?

I
know what Ricky would say, because he said it to me. It was nineteen
seventy-five, and we’d been in the carriage house just over a year—a kindness
afforded us by the Whitneys, friends of our father who’d saved the property
from foreclosure during his downward spiral—when a rabid dog lurched its way
into our consciousness.

Ricky
spotted the thing first from that upstairs window seat, wanted me to drag it
inside for a bath and a treat. He was five then, still had the bulk of his
eyesight, but not for long.

Our
mother told Ricky that the dog was sick, too sick to come inside and play. I
suppose she should have known better than to paint the dilemma out this way,
frame it in terms of illness: Ricky’s language. Long ago we’d whitewashed our
vocabularies of phrases like
next year
and
in the future,
but
talk of sickness persisted to the end—an end that came swiftly for the dog, which
was shot dead by the Whitneys’ eldest son as Ricky and I looked on.

A
good twenty minutes passed before Ricky whispered, “Why? Why did he…?”

“He
had to,” I said. “To protect us. And to help the dog.”

The
notion of putting a creature out of its misery required no explanation in
Ricky’s world. “Is he better now?”

I
nodded, fought back tears.

“I
want to be better.”

“Don’t
say that,” I told him, even though I had no right. “Not that way.”

Twice
more that summer, Ricky raised the idea, begged me to set him free. And I could
have done it. Easily. But I declined. Because of me, my brother got three more
years, years he spent bedridden, demented, and nearly blind. Time I will relive
with Owen—and soon.

The
damp earth soaks through my bra and underwear, having made easy work of my soft
cardigan and lightweight trousers. And somehow this comforts me, reminds me
that, however great my troubles, I remain as superfluous as a birch in the path
of an F5 tornado.

I
push myself up, kneel kitty-corner to Ricky’s grave as if I aim to pray. But
even God lacks the power to grant what I ask. Instead, I broach Ricky for
permission.

“How
are you?” I say, hoping I will recognize his voice if I hear it all these years
later.

And
I think I do. Not a human voice, but the melodic flutter of the wings of an
angel, or the wind whispering through the trees. These reverberations tell me,
Death
is peace
and
Ricky is home.

I
feel as if my stomach has flipped inside out, my lungs emptied of air. “If I
send him,” I ask, “will you watch over? Be his guide?”

The
answer comes with both melancholy and jubilation.
Owen is loved,
I hear
in my bones.
He will be safe with us.

The
questions I have posed to my mother drift to the forefront, and there is no
mistaking her words:
To keep him is selfish, the refuge of a cowardly heart.

I
recognize this as true, yet doubt my capacity to do what Owen needs. “Thank
you,” I say to the breeze, because although I may not succeed, at least now I
know I must try.

On
the first day of spring, Muffin ran away. It was the culmination of months of
disturbed behavior that began with the destruction of the fertility idol. Looking
back, it seems as if he may have been trying to tell me something, shout a
warning loudly enough for me to hear.

“We’re
going to find him,” I assure Ally as she palms a missing-dog flier to a
telephone pole and I wield a staple gun. I squeeze the trigger, pinching my
skin as the gun kicks back. “Ow.”

Ally
doesn’t bother consoling me, too distracted by Muffin’s absence to care. “I
thought we microchipped him,” she says with an undertone of complaint. “Didn’t
we…?”

“It’s
not a GPS,” I say, “but if someone turns him in, we’ll get a call.”

This
is not good enough for her. “Can’t we…?”

We
move on to another pole, as if the chance of locating Muffin correlates with
the number of times his face confronts a stranger’s. “We’re doing everything we
can,” I say. “I’ve called all the vets, put an ad in the paper, personally
knocked on every neighbor’s door…and the fliers.”

She
mumbles, “I guess.” Perhaps now that Muffin is gone, his disquiet has
transferred to her. She shifts gears. “Owen’s been crying a lot lately.”

I
spike a new flier to a pole and say nothing more than, “I know.” If I encourage
her interest in Owen’s irritability, I may lose my grip, let the secret spill.

From
nowhere, there is a jab at my ribs. Ally’s finger. “What…?” I begin, but soon I
see. Leaning against the next pole, bathed in the dusky glow of a streetlamp,
is Eric Blair.

I
stiff-arm Ally to the background, act as her shield. When Eric’s eyes catch
mine, he smirks, uncrosses his legs and starts at us.

I
consider turning on my heel and spiriting Ally away, but there are things that
demand saying. “Go home,” I grunt at her instead, my double-barreled gaze set
to trigger. To emphasize the point, I give her a little backwards shove.  

Although
I can’t relax my defenses enough to check, I’m sure I feel Ally slip off. Two
and a half blocks and she’ll be safely tucked inside the cocoon of cul-de-sacs
that ring our property.

“What
do you want?” I ask Eric, before he gets within ten feet of me.

“Is
that any kind of greeting? And after you did this?” he says, pointing at the
leg I now notice hitches with every step.

“That
was your fault,” I propose. “And you deserve a lot worse.”

He
stops only inches off my shoulder, leans in as if he has a secret to share.
“I’m bionic now,” he tells me gleefully. “Titanium. Eighteen screws; three
metal plates. The fucking Million Dollar Man.”

I
take a step back, regain control. “That’s nice. Now if you don’t mind…”

For
a moment I think he is set to disappear, which gives me pause; there is one
thing left for me to say.

But
I’m wrong. Instead of melting into the night, he winds his tentacle-fingers
around my arm and draws me closer. “You did one thing right, you know,” he
hisses. “The boy. Owen.”

I
want to rake a cactus over his tongue for having the gall to utter my baby’s
name. “You don’t know what you’re talking about.” My skin withers under his
touch. “He’s sick. He’s going to die.”

His
hand flinches, but his eyes never do. He shakes his head. “You’re crafty,
Claire-bear. I’ve underestimated you.”

“This
isn’t a game, asshole. Owen’s dying. He has Dukate Disease.” I yank my arm
away, think hard about whether I owe this paramecium anything more. “And you’re
a carrier,” I inform him, if only for the sake of the innocent souls he has the
power to destroy.

These
words have the strangest effect, settle a mask of humanity over Eric Blair’s
sterile face. “I’m sorry.”

“The
hell you are.”

“What
can I do?” he asks, sounding pained.

It
hits me that the narcissistic center of this man loves my child, because it is
a part of him. “Nothing,” I say. “Dukate is fatal; there’s no cure. Just let Owen
go in peace.”

He
nods gently, a frown tugging at the corners of his mouth, then simply slinks
away.

No
one believes me when I say this, but Tim and I have never had a fight—at least
not one of the name-calling, vase-smashing, duke-it-out sessions my parents
were famous for, even before the stress of Ricky.

The
lowest we have sunk is raised voices, audible huffs, the occasional cold
shoulder or short-lived silent treatment. And it takes a lot to get us there.
But this is changing. “I’m taking him in tomorrow,” Tim tells me, his voice
rising and quaking at the same time.

I
watch Owen stiffen in his arms and think,
You’re right; we owe it to him.
Yet
I say, “Don’t you think you’re overreacting? He’s just a little jumpy. He’ll
grow out of it.”

This
train of thought has helped me sway Tim for the last seven or eight weeks, but
no more. “How do you know?” he demands, his words doused in acid. “Are you a
doctor? Or a nurse? Do you have a medical degree? Do you even care, for fuck’s
sake?”

I
am suddenly nauseous, Tim’s contempt the one thing I cannot withstand. “Why
would you…?” I rip the baby from his arms, clutch him to my chest. “What time
is the appointment?”

“
You’re
going to take him?” he asks, sounding incredulous. “Why the big turnaround?”

I
don’t like this version of my husband, yet he is a monster of my making. “Yes,
I am. You’ve got the fieldtrip, and Ally is counting on you.”

It
just now strikes me to check on our daughter, gauge whether she has overheard
any of this nastiness, but I don’t bother.

Tim
shakes his head. “Whatever you say, Claire,” he reluctantly agrees as he turns his
back on me. “Always.”

Tim
and Ally leave for the Roger Williams Park Zoo without as much as a
good-bye
or a
good luck.
Tim’s frustration with me, I know, springs from his
belief that I have morphed into a heartless dictator, a charge not so farfetched
considering my behavior of late. Ally’s disdain I trace to Muffin’s continued
absence, for which she somehow holds me culpable.

But
today is about Owen, my chance to give him all of me before he goes. I scoop
him from his crib and murmur, “Good morning, baby boy.”