Dolores Claiborne - Stephen King [40]
There were two other things she said on the way back-one with her mouth and one with her eyes. The one she said out loud was that she'd been thinkin of packin her things and runnin away; that seemed at least like a way out. But runnin won't solve your problems if you've been hurt bad enough-wherever you run, you take your head n your heart with you, after all-and the thing I saw in her eyes was that the thought of suicide had done more'n just cross her mind.
I'd think of that-of seem the thought of suicide in my daughter's eyes-and then I'd see Joe's face even clearer with that eye inside me. I'd see how he must've looked, pesterin her and pesterin her, tryin to get a hand up under her skirt until she wore nothin but jeans in self-defense, not gettin what he wanted (or not all of what he wanted) because of simple luck, her good n his bad, and not for any lack of tryin. I thought about what might've happened if Joe Junior hadn't cut his playin with Willy Bramhall short a few times n come home early, or if I hadn't finally opened my eyes enough to get a really good look at her. Most of all I thought about how he'd driven her. He'd done it the way a bad-hearted man with a quirt or a greenwood stick might drive a horse, and never stop once, not for love and not for pity, until that animal lay dead at his feet and him prob'ly standin above it with the stick in his hand, wonderin why in hell that happened. This was where wantin to touch his forehead, wantin to see if it felt as smooth as it looked, had gotten me; this was where it all came out. My eyes were all the way open, and I saw I was livin with a loveless, pitiless man who believed anything he could reach with his arm and grasp with his hand was his to take, even his own daughter.
I'd got just about that far in my thinkin when the thought of killin him crossed my mind for the first time. That wasn't when I made up my mind to do it-gorry, no-but I'd be a liar if I said the thought was only a daydream. It was a lot more than that.
Selena must've seen some of that in my eyes, because she laid her hand on my arm and says, Is there going to be trouble, Mommy? Please say there isn't-he'll know I told, and he'll be mad!
I wanted to soothe her heart by tellin her what she wanted to hear, but I couldn't. There was going to be trouble-just how much and how bad would probably be up to Joe. He'd backed down the night I hit him with the creamer, but that didn't mean he would again.
I don't know what's going to happen, I said, but I'll tell you two things, Selena: none of this is your fault, and his days of pawin and pesterin you are over. Do you understand?
Her eyes filled up with tears again, and one of em spilled over and rolled down her cheek. I just don't want there to be trouble, she said. She stopped a minute, her mouth workin, and then she busts out:
Oh, I hate this! Why did you ever hit him? Why did he ever have to start up with me? Why couldn't things stay like they were?
I took her hand. Things never do, honey-sometimes they go wrong, and then they have to be fixed. You know that, don't you?
She nodded her head. I saw pain in her face, but no doubt. Yes, she said. I guess I do.
We were comm into the dock then, and there was no more time for talk. I was just as glad; I didn't want her lookin at me with those tearful eyes of hers, wantin what I guess every kid wants, for everything to be made right but with no pain and nobody hurt. Wantin me to make promises I couldn't make, because they were promises I didn't know if I could keep. I wasn't sure that inside eye would let me keep em. We got off the ferry without another word passin between us, and that was just as fine as paint with me.
That evenin, after Joe got home from the Carstairs place where he was buildin a back porch, I sent all three kids down to the market. I saw Selena castin little glances back at me all the way down the drive, and her face was just as pale as a glass of milk. Every time she