Ten Thousand Saints - Eleanor Henderson [117]
The door between the boys’ room and the bathroom creaked open. Eliza snatched her hands out of the bag. After a moment, she heard another knob turning, and she remembered suddenly the goose bumpy thrill of being in another bathroom, with Teddy, listening to someone try the handle on the other side. Then the door between the bathroom and her room opened, too. She remained crouched on the floor, hoping the darkness would hide her.
“Eliza?”
It was Jude’s whisper.
She stood up and waited for him to pad closer. Gropingly, they found each other in the dark. She whacked him, as quietly as possible, on the shoulder. Then she took his hand and led him outside.
What the hell are you doing?”
“What the hell are you doing?”
The view from their door, glimpsed in the dim light of a moth-swarmed bulb, was of the parking lot. The Kramaro and the van were surrounded by five or six vehicles in only slightly superior condition. Beyond the parking lot and a stand of trees, I-95 rushed by.
“I couldn’t sleep,” Eliza said. “Okay?”
“Me neither. I heard something. I wanted to check the van.” At Jude’s side was a large black gun, which he was doing his best to hide.
“Jesus! Where did you get that?”
He had no place to put it, no pockets. He was wearing a T-shirt and a pair of boxers. “It’s my dad’s. It’s no big deal.”
“That’s McQueen?”
“Yeah. He gave it to me.”
“Jesus, Jude. What do you think you’re going to do with that thing?”
Jude shrugged. “We’re in Philadelphia. It’s got like the highest murder rate in the country.”
“So you’re going to shoot the guy breaking into the van.”
“Not necessarily.”
“Are you sure you weren’t just spying on me?”
“Spying on you. No. I was maybe checking on you. I heard someone moving around. I wanted to make sure you were okay.”
“You mean you wanted to make sure I wasn’t getting high. Jesus, Jude!” She smacked his arm again. “You have the ears of a fucking Indian!”
Eliza was aware that this was not the proper designation. Teddy was Indian. Gandhi, not Geronimo. Her child would be a “fucking Indian.” She pictured her daughter’s face. Her black, almond-shaped eyes, her endless eyelashes. Powdery, cardamom-colored skin. (How Eliza missed the smell of Neena’s cooking!) Eliza knew her daughter would be beautiful, and perfectly formed; she would have her ears pierced early, the way the babies in Spanish Harlem did. This was a familiar vision. It kept Eliza company when she lay awake at night; it had limitless backdrops and Easter-hued outfits; it was not unlike the happy fantasies of any expectant mother.
But it scared her, too. It scared her that her child would look like a stranger. She slid down the wall and lowered the bulk of her ass to the ground.
“Eliza? You okay?”
“I’m okay. I’m just really tired.”
“You want something? Something to drink?”
“Yeah, a scotch.”
Jude sat down beside her. He placed the gun on the sidewalk between them and leaned against the wall. It was a balmy night, breezy enough to scatter the skirt of Eliza’s nightgown. Jude’s blue paisley boxers made her think of sperm.
“You know what fetal alcohol syndrome is?” he asked her.
“Don’t lecture me, Jude. I was kidding.”
“I had it. I mean, I have it, I guess.” He was staring into the parking lot.
“Jesus, Jude.”
“I mean, I might have it.”
Eliza had given some thought to what happened to babies when their mothers did drugs, but she hadn’t considered that one day the babies would grow up to be teenagers.
“I’m sorry. I didn’t know.”
“I guess I’m supposed to go to the doctor to find out for sure.”
“Maybe you don’t have it, then.”
“Come on. Look at my face.”
“What?”
Jude looked at her. He had these swimming-pool-blue eyes, even bluer than Johnny’s, with these sleepy, heavy lids. He had these outrageous freckles and a little boy’s ski-jump nose and the reddest hair she’d ever seen, just a trace of it, such a tragedy that he’d cut off all that perfectly wild red hair.
“It’s a nice face,” she said.
Nice. It was so much more than nice, but she couldn’t think of a better word. You didn’t call a