The Animators(65)

“Pretty, iddint it,” Shauna says.

“Dude. Right?”

I turn as we pass, trying to look as long as I can.

Something inside me shifts. I picture a deep, rich rendering of Phillips-Stamper, its purple girth, its lights twinkling on the slope, soft pricks against the night. How vibrant and full it would look. Like something you could stick your fingers into and feel.

There in the rushing dark, I am, for the first time in months, inspired. My chest opens. Adrenaline spreads hot down both legs. It’s the opposite of what happened at the dinner table, that terrifying moment of shutdown. This is your chest hinging open and gasping with relief. This is air and light, this is blood flow and movement, the belief that I will overtake all this before it overtakes me.

This is how it happens. I am terrified, I fear for my life. But I fall. I fall.

—

There’s another joint to smoke. It is decided that we should park behind the D.P. Smith water treatment plant. We spark up, watching the tower of light and the water churn through the machines, everything glowing and moving. The whistle sounds. A guy walks past our window, calls, “Hey, Shauna.” She lifts a polite hand, a tight-lipped smile.

“You gonna tell Mom?” Shauna asks me.

“I don’t know.”

I slide down in my seat, a shiver of shame running down my spine. Shauna, whether you know it or not, you’re all material. But I close my eyes and see the Phillips-Stamper hilltop, indigo, slightly wavering on a frame. And despite my shame, I smile.

—

We pull up the drive at twelve-thirty. Kent’s car is still parked there. “Guh,” Shauna says. Pantomimes kicking its rear fender.

“Come on. He’s not so bad,” I say.

“He’s still him.”

Kent has gone to bed. Caelin and Jaeden are gone; Brandon picked them up, said something about the truck needing a new transmission, and took them home. “Well, he’s paying for the fuckin thing,” Shauna grumbles.

“You need to take this up with him. And y’all shouldn’t be pickin at each other in front of the kids.” Mom’s in an old T-shirt and robe, a ripped pair of sweatpants cinched at the waist and ankles, ancient UK football symbol on the thigh. She stomps across the room to us, belly trembling. “What are you doing keeping Sharon up so late?”

“Sharon wanted to stay out. Sharon’s a grown-up.”

“It’s true,” I say.

Mom rolls her eyes and snorts. She’s done with the cooking and hugging; we bug the shit out of her and she sees no reason to hide it. She turns to Mel. “So what’d you think of Faulkner.”

Mel brandishes five cartons of cigarettes. “These are only forty bucks here,” she says. “Kentucky’s the tits.”

Mom shakes her head. “The tits,” she mutters. “Well, that’s a new one on me, I’m telling you.” She thumps out. I hear the fridge open and close. She returns and pushes a glass of water into my hand. Her forehead does not smooth until I drink the whole thing. “Shauna, go home and go to bed.”

“I’m going.” Shauna plops down on the couch. Her eyes are red. She glances at me. Raises an eyebrow. I nod. She nods back.

Our mother looks back and forth between us. “What did you all do tonight? I knew y’all didn’t just go to Walmart. I knew y’all were gonna go out and screw around.”

“Momma, quit,” Shauna whines. “Just stop.”

Mom exhales hard through her nostrils. She reaches deep into her robe and pulls something out: Caelin’s pageant bridge, smeared with lipstick. She picks up Shauna’s palm and slaps the bridge into it. “Brandon forgot this,” she says, “but I think he’s got the right idea because them pageants are sick, and you might just go to hell for putting her in one of em.”

“Look who’s talking,” Shauna moos.

Mom grinds her foot into her leg. Shauna shrieks. “Y’all are drunked up or high or somethin. Need to behave yourselves.”

“Quit,” Shauna yells, and kicks her. The volume in the room doubles. Shauna lolls back, scrubs wrinkled, stinking of weed. They kick, feet aflurry. Mel picks a loose piece of skin from her bottom lip, staring. Goes, “Hee.”

Shauna reaches in and slaps Mom’s leg, half meaning, half play. Mom giggles and smacks her head. “Go, goddammit,” she yells. She straightens her robe and gives her head a final tap. “Go home. I mean it.” She turns to us, breathing hard. “Mel, I got you a bed ready in Shauna’s old room. There’s clean towels in there. And I got your old room ready for you.” She takes the glass from my hands. “Out drinkin and druggin when here you just got out the hospital. Ought to be ashamed.”

“I’m okay. Really.”

Mom comes at me, grabs my chin between her forefinger and thumb. “Lemme see,” she mutters, and pulls my line of vision directly in front of her. I get a close-up of the gray in her eyes—they were always gray, but are nearly transparent now—and the large pores around her nose. How much do I resemble her? I should ask Mel. Objectivity is the key when evaluating visuals. Distance. Parsing a whole down to its barest, most shape-based elements, passionless, exact. I try to turn to look, just to make sure Mel’s there, but my mother makes a noise like “Aaaht” and jerks my head back.