Durable Goods_ A Novel - Elizabeth Berg [28]
On Friday afternoon, Diane comes home with one of Dickie’s puppies and a large box that toilet paper came in. My mouth hangs open to let some happiness out. “You got one!” I say.
“Help me,” Diane says, and I take the box from her.
“Where should I put it?”
She shrugs. “The kitchen, I guess. She’s used to that.”
I put the box in the corner. There is newspaper on the bottom, and I am sorry for all the puppy has lost. “She should at least have a blanket,” I say.
“She’s all right,” Diane says, lowering the puppy into the box, and she does seem to be. She has her dog-in-love look on. She sits expectantly in the middle of the box and then, suddenly, barks. It is such a pure and perfect sound, high and ringing slightly.
“What’s her name?” I ask.
“Bridgette.”
I look at Diane, and she shrugs. “Dickie made me promise. He likes that name.”
I pat the puppy’s head, pull her ears gently through my fingers. They are something like silk, but warm with lifeblood. “She looks like a Bridgette,” I say.
“You want to feed her?” Diane asks.
We are mixing baby cereal and milk with dry meal when my father comes in. He walks over to the box, looks in. “What the hell is that?”
“It’s a puppy,” Diane says.
“What’s it doing here?”
“Bridgette is her name,” I say. “Pick of the litter.”
He doesn’t acknowledge me, looks instead at Diane, who says, with a kind of weariness, “She’s mine. I’m keeping her.”
“The hell you are.”
“Dad,” Diane says, “now is as good a time as any to tell you: I’m not moving with you. I want to stay here. I’ll finish school and find a job. Mary Jo Anderson said I can stay with them.”
“You’re not staying with anyone. You’re coming with us. Now get rid of the dog. That’s the last thing I need.”
“I’ll take care of her,” I say, but apparently I am invisible. There is something mounting between Diane and him, blocking the view of anything else.
“I am keeping that dog,” Diane says. “And I am not going with you.” I see his color darken, his cheek begin moving in and out. I back out of the kitchen, go into my room, close the door. There is a lot of math homework. And reading in geography. I open my Nations of the World book, find the place. I hear Diane yell, “I am eighteen years old and you can not stop me. I don’t want to go. I don’t want to live with you! I don’t want to and I don’t have to!”
Well, he hits her, of course, and now I hear it getting louder, the mess of him at her. She runs up the stairs and bursts into my room. He is right behind her. I keep my eyes on the book, start to read about exporting soybeans. “Stop it, stop it!” she screams. I look out of the corner of my eye and see him straddling her on my bedroom floor. He has her wrists pinned down and he says between his teeth, close into her face, “Don’t you ever, don’t you goddamn ever tell me what you will and won’t do!” She starts to slither away but he grabs her, slaps her, slaps her again, slaps her again. I read. Soybeans. Exported. Soybeans. Exported. I think I’d better be quiet with my breathing, and so I stop.
I have been in bed for a long time, and the house is quiet. I will see if Diane is all right. And then I will feed the puppy. I don’t think anyone fed the puppy.
I push Diane’s door open, whisper her name. Nothing. I walk over to her bed, reach out for her. She is not there. I snap on her light. The bed is made, the window beside it open. A breeze comes in, stops, starts again. Did she go out the window? I wonder.
I sit on her bed. I do not think this is a regular sneak-out. I think she is gone. I wrap my arms around myself. I could go downstairs and look, but I already know: the puppy is gone, too.
Now I am alone with him. And I don’t know anything. I go back into my bedroom, stare into the mirror. “Help me,” I say.
Bubba comes to sit beside me when I am out on the porch after school. He nods his head as though we have been having