When She Flew (33 page)

“Think you can sit up?” Without waiting for a reply, he pushed a button on the side of the bed, and a whirring sound escorted Jess into a sitting position.

“Hi, Mom.” Nina sat in a chair at the foot of the bed, holding both her own purse and Jess’s. With no makeup and her hair pulled into a ponytail, she looked as young as Lindy. “The doctor said you did great.”

Tears filled Jess’s eyes. She tried to speak but her lips would not move. Only air would pass from her throat through her mouth, like heavy breathing. Her emotions loomed large and buoyant inside her, but she had no voice. No way to say, “I love you, I love you, and I am more sorry for everything than I can ever forgive myself for.”

“The surgery took longer than expected,” the nurse explained to Nina, “so they had to intubate her. That’s why she’s having trouble talking, but it’ll pass.”

Nina stood and walked over, leaned down to kiss Jess’s cheek. She left behind fruity girl smell, a smear of lip gloss on Jess’s cheek. “Does it hurt?” she asked, sounding worried.

Jess tried to shake her head no as tears ran down her cheeks. Nina’s eyes filled, and she looked at the nurse. “Is she okay? Is she in pain?”

Oh, how Jess wanted to reach up to hug her daughter, to take her small dark hand in her own, but her arms remained as still as her voice was quiet. Waves of murkiness kept trying to pull her back under.

“Don’t worry,” the nurse said. “It’s just the anesthesia. She’s still coming out of it. Sometimes people get kind of emotional when they’re under. She’s fine. Aren’t you, Jessica?”

“Uhn,” Jess heard herself moan.

“Are you sure?” Nina asked. “She just looks so . . .” Tears escaped, ran down one pretty cheek.

“Honey, why don’t you take a break and go get a Coke or something? It’s going to be a while before she really comes to. She’ll never even know you were gone.”

“Stay with me,” Jess tried again, her eyes closing.

“I’m staying here,” Nina said, her slim, soft fingers wrapping around Jess’s, tethering her as she slipped back underwater.

 

 

 

AT TWO THIRTY THAT AFTERNOON in the recovery room, Jess finally felt alert enough to sit on her own, legs hanging over the side of the hospital bed. The IV had been removed; her shoulder felt simply like a bag of air next to her head. She couldn’t even feel her forearm or hand.

Nina had driven down early that morning and sat with her the entire time she’d been sleeping off the anesthesia. Nina hadn’t wanted to take the time to drop Teo off with Clara, so he was being well cared for in the waiting room by Chris, who was clearly going to be late for work, again.

Nina helped Jess dress, improvising with two hospital gowns around her upper body and the huge dressing on her shoulder and arm. The skill with which she figured out how to make it all work surprised Jess, but it shouldn’t have, she realized. Nina was a mother, used to taking charge. She stuffed Jess’s bra and blouse inside a backpack with Teo’s toys and snacks. When they were ready, the nurse wheeled in a chair, saying, “Here’s your ride, darlin’.”

Even though she still felt nauseated from the anesthesia, Jess claimed she was fine so they would let her go. Out in the waiting room, she grew warm and queasy, wondering if perhaps she should have waited a little longer. She just wanted so badly to be home, on her sofa, with Teo toddling round, busy with blocks and toys, Nina doing . . .what? She closed her eyes, remembering closed doors, bodies brushing against each other in the hall, the years of silent standoff.

“Are you all right?” Chris asked. He had Teo on one hip, slung there as naturally as he wore his sidearm. Nina carried both their purses and the backpack. Jess took several deep breaths and tried to smile, but it was an awkward moment made worse by the feeling that she might throw up, and she had turned down the little puke dish the nurse had offered.

“So, you all have . . . met?” she asked.

“Oh, yeah,” Chris said. “We’ve been talking crap about you the whole time, believe me.”

Nina looked at him with her familiar old scowl, then back at Jess. “Who knew cops could be such comedians?”

Jess started to say something, to explain, to defend, then realized Nina was kidding. Her daughter could use that dour face in jest now.

Teo struggled to get down, saying, “Grammy go for ride?”

“No, baby,” Nina said. “You can’t ride in Grammy’s wheelchair. She’s hurt.”

“It’s okay,” Jess said. “Just put him on my good side.” She patted her left thigh, and Chris let the boy slip down his leg. Teo walked carefully toward her, then stood with big eyes in front of the wheelchair, taking it all in.

“Grammy hurt?”

“Never too hurt for you,” she said. “Come here.”

“Careful, buddy,” Nina said, lifting him to sit in Jess’s lap. He laid his chubby hand carefully on the layers of dressing protecting her shoulder.

“Owie?” He looked at her, the same worry in his eyes as Nina’s. As her own, Jess knew.

She bent down to kiss his forehead. “Everything’s okay, sweetie.”

Nina went to fetch her car from the parking lot. It seemed to have been decided already without Jess’s input that Nina would drive her home, but it was for the best. It was amazing that Chris had been with her all this time, had stayed through the whole ordeal, but now it was time for Jess to be with her family.

As they waited for Nina’s return, Teo sang a reasonable rendition of “The Itsy-Bitsy Spider,” and Chris stood a few feet away, hands in his pockets. He’d probably heard it hundreds of time already that day. Jess looked up at him. “I guess I’ll just get my things tomorrow, or . . . whenever.”

He shrugged. “That’s okay. I’ll bring them by later.”

She breathed deeply for a moment, quelling nausea and trying to figure out how not to feel so awkward with him now that there was no reason for them to see each other. “Aren’t you on this afternoon?”

“Day off,” he said, and she couldn’t tell if he was telling the truth or if he’d been suspended. She hadn’t even asked him early that morning. She’d been so groggy from the pills, so caught up in her own drama.

“Don’t worry,” he said, as if reading her thoughts.

“They suspended you,” she said, and he shrugged.

When her eyes filled again, he cocked his head at her. “Enough with the waterworks already, okay? I did what I felt I had to do. Just like you.”

Jess nodded. Of course he did.

Nina pulled up out front, and Chris rolled Jess’s chair through the automatic doors into the afternoon heat.

As Nina loaded Teo into his car seat, Chris took Jess’s good arm and helped her navigate from the wheelchair to the front passenger seat.

She would have tried to thank him again for all he’d done, looking up at him through the open door, but she knew he’d be more comfortable if she didn’t. “See you later?” she asked.

He nodded, closed the door, then waved as they pulled away from the curb.

“He’s nice.” Nina sounded like she might actually mean it. “Dad’s girlfriend is such a flake.”

“Really?” Jess said. “Well, as long as they make each other happy.”

Nina looked at her suspiciously, then said, “I guess.”

Jess had thought they’d be beyond their old hit-and-miss style of conversation, but it didn’t seem to be so. She knew she should be patient, but she was so tired of waiting.

“So,” Nina said, “what do we do about the reporters at our house?”

Our house.
Jess felt her sinuses fill, but it was just a turn of phrase. “Actually, they’ve left,” she said, trying to sound casual. “Thank god.”

“Bummer. I wanted to be on TV. I wanted to say ‘No comment’ or something.” Nina looked genuinely perturbed.“‘Leave my mom the hell alone.’ ”

My mom.
Jess closed her eyes, swallowing, and turned her face to the window. She waited until she thought her voice would be steady, then turned to face her daughter.

“Nina, do you know that I will never give you up? That I’ve never given up on you?” She wanted to reach across the console and touch her, but it might be too much. “From the moment I first felt you fluttering around inside me until the moment I die, I’m going to be here for you.”

Was it the drugs talking? Maybe, but she felt clearheaded, almost unnaturally so. Why had she never said this before?

Nina’s face turned dark pink. Her jaw quivered. Her nostrils flared.

“Then how could you have wanted me to give up
my
child?” Her voice was quiet but wounded. Still. She glanced in the rearview at Mateo. A fast line of tears escaped down her cheek; she wiped it away.

“Oh, god, Neen. I just wanted you to make the decision that was best for you so you could have the life you wanted.”

“All I wanted was somebody to love me,” Nina said, her voice shaky. “And he does.”

Jess flinched at the remark, but she remembered the feeling of holding Nina for the first time. That was why so many teenage girls had babies, Jess knew now, after so many years of police work: so that they could have someone in their life who they knew loved them. Maybe that was why she’d had Nina.

“There isn’t a day that goes by that I’m not thankful we have Mateo,” Jess said. “I was just so freaked out back then, and scared. It’s really, really hard, Nina, this mom stuff. We don’t get everything right.”

Nina nodded, wiping away more tears.

Jess paused. “Especially when you’re all by yourself.”

Nina nodded again, but stayed quiet.

Teo had fallen asleep in his car seat. Jess studied the small colorful Virgin of Guadalupe on Nina’s dash, which, like Jess’s, had been given to her by Clara.

“You know,” Jess finally said, “if you’d like, I could help you more.”

Nina sniffled, wiped her nose, but did not assent. She said nothing, just signaled to make a left, then a right, driving with impeccable attention to the road.

Jess wasn’t surprised that her daughter made her wait; it was ingrained in Nina:
prove you love me
, over and over. Jess had helped make her that way, always putting job and safety and security before love, and now she had to deal with it.

“What I mean is, I’d really like that,” Jess said when the silence had grown too long.

Nina finally sighed. “Yeah,” she said, “I guess I could use some help.”

The clear moment of ecstasy that had accompanied Nina into the world filled Jess now. The weight of having a daughter, the heft of the responsibility, was equal to the sweet warmth of closeness, no matter how fleeting or how occasional.

Nina stopped at a red light and reached into the backseat to squeeze Teo’s bare foot, looking at him in the rearview mirror with a longing Jess felt in her own chest.

“So, anyway,” Nina said, “I’ll take you home and get you settled in, then go get your prescription and something to make for dinner. And I need to get Teo yogurt and grapes for breakfast. That’s all he eats these days.”

So, they were staying with her. Jess breathed in, perched at the edge of something lovely but not yet familiar.

As the light went green, Nina put her foot on the gas.

Teo roused at the forward motion. He looked around, instantly awake as only children can be, and began to sing in his husky little monotone: “Out came da sun . . .”

Jess exhaled, a smile easing across her face, and began to sing along.

35

W
hite afternoon light spilled through the living room windows onto the couch, where Nina had settled Jess with magazines, her phone, ginger ale, pain pills, and a fresh ice pack. Nina and Teo were on the road back to Tacoma for the workweek ahead. It was a quiet Sunday, the way Sundays had always been in Jess’s neighborhood. Four days had passed since she last reported for her shift the Wednesday before, the day a bird-watcher reported seeing a young girl alone in the Joseph Woods.

Jess had thought she’d relish sleeping in her own bed after two nights on the futon, but it just meant she was alone with her thoughts in the dark. Sleep was tenuous, fragmented by pain the medication couldn’t reach whenever she tried to roll onto her right side, the side she’d always slept on. Lindy appeared in jangled dreams, and Jess missed her in a way that seemed ridiculous after spending an entire weekend with her own daughter—without fighting, no less.

Had Ray calmed down again, gone back to being the loving dad Jess had initially trusted him to be? After she’d witnessed his plunge from the window, it was tough to imagine, but post-traumatic flashbacks were generally temporary, if recurring. Should she have let Chris and Larry pursue him? Ray wouldn’t have stayed on the farm, or accepted medical or psy chiatric help. Jess knew it in a way that she’d always known her father could never have been able to go on living as only part of a man, had he survived his injuries. She’d never admitted to Clara that she’d prayed for him to join his parents in heaven that night in the hospital, rather than help her mother keep him alive. She’d long ago given up praying, but she hoped now that Ray could pull himself together for his daughter. His focus for the past five years had been to be a good dad, and he’d done a pretty great job until cornered. And Lindy loved Ray in a way Jess felt viscerally from her own childhood. The desire to be parented was absolute, regardless of the parent or circumstances.