Alice Bliss - Laura Harrington [66]
Gram sets out a plate of cookies and two tall glasses of milk. Then she pours herself a nice stiff scotch on the rocks and sits down with her girls. She and Ellie talk about Easter and shopping and will Gram teach her how to play Mah-Jongg after dinner? Gram is saying yes and yes and it’s cozy in this corner with the light hanging over the table, the kitchen full of the smell of baking bread, the emptiness and the darkness pushed back, pushed aside. Alice puts her head down on the table and studies Gram’s hands. Her rings, the pale skin, nearly translucent. She closes her eyes and she’s gone. Gone away, Gram’s voice and Ellie’s voice fading out like a radio from the house next door. For a moment the tick of the kitchen clock is filling her head and she feels Gram’s hand stroking her hair. Another breath and she is fast asleep, blessedly asleep.
Hours later, Alice wakes up, surprised to find herself in bed, stripped down to her underwear. Gram or Mom must have done it. She looks at her dad’s watch: almost midnight. She grabs a sweatshirt and pads down the hall to the kitchen to get something to eat. She’s slicing a big hunk of bread when she hears voices and realizes Gram hasn’t gone home. She slathers the bread with butter and jam and walks back upstairs to her mom’s room. The lights are on, the door is closed. She stands there, eating bread and licking jam from her fingers.
“It’s not forever,” Gram says.
“I know.”
“We don’t know when Matt . . .”
“I know.”
“I’m not here to make comments. I’m just here to help.”
“You can’t help yourself, Mom.”
“I’ll tone it down.”
“Sure you will.”
“My comments are the least of your worries!”
“We’re doing fine.”
“Angie . . .”
“We are. I get to work every day, the kids get to school, we eat.”
“I’m just saying I could do the marketing and cook ahead so all you have to do on weeknights is reheat. I could teach the girls a few things.”
“They love it when you cook with them.”
“Sometimes these things skip a generation.”
“I can cook!”
“I know.”
“I don’t want you to move in, Mom.”
“For the girls, then—”
“You’re just down the street! If I need you I can practically holler out the front door!”
“But—”
“We don’t do too well living together, remember?”
“It could be different.”
“It won’t be different.”
Alice slides down the wall into a sitting position.
“You can stay tonight.”
“But not on a schedule? Something regular for your girls?”
“We can’t need you, Mom; we can’t be falling to pieces, because Matt can’t be missing.”
“That’s wishful thinking, honey.”
“I don’t care! Bring on the magic, bring on the shamans, the charlatans, I can’t—”
“I know.”
“You don’t know!”
“Matt Bliss comes through. He always comes through.”
“If one more person says that to me . . .”
“Don’t give up on him, Angie.”
“Oh, Mom . . .” Angie blows her nose. “Nothing makes sense anymore. Nobody’s telling us the truth, there is no way to find out where he is or how hurt he is or what the odds are or if it’s even possible to survive.”
Alice realizes she’s stopped breathing. How do the grown-ups keep taking in this information and walk and talk and act normal? Is she the only one who feels like her skin is going to split apart, her head is going to crack open?
“Sergeant Ames called me at work. They found Matt’s ID. Recovered is the word they use. Is that good news? Bad news? What does it mean?”
“It means they’re looking for him. They’re actively looking for him.”
Alice curls up on the hallway floor, her toast forgotten. The voices in her mother’s room are softer now. She puts her hand into the sliver of light spilling from under the door as if the light could warm her. She closes her eyes and imagines that the murmur of voices is her mom and dad, and Ellie is three and she is