The Other Side(62)
I stay at Dan’s until last call most evenings, because at that time my walk home is quiet and I can pretend I’m alone in the world while most of the city sleeps. It’s after midnight when I step in the front door of the Victorian, the chill in the air flirting with inebriation and urging it toward sobriety. The decibel level of sound coming from inside 1A is enough to urge it a few more degrees, and I’m not happy about that. Raising my fist to pound on the door and tell them to quiet down, I’m stopped short by someone standing on the stairs to the right of me. It’s Chantal from 2B, her arms are crossed over her chest. She’s worrying at a hole in the sleeve of her sweater with her fingertips, and at the corner of her bottom lip with her teeth.
“She’s been yelling like a banshee at him for a while now. I knocked an hour ago and asked her to please quiet down so my grandma can sleep, but she slammed the door in my face. She’s saying awful things to him, Johnny. Just awful.”
My unfocused eyes aren’t my greatest ally when it comes to discernment, but even they can’t deny the fear in her eyes.
I press my ear to the door first—unnecessary given that Marilyn is yelling again. Her voice unhinged and tremoring through sobs. “You stupid, useless piece of shit, you’re dead to me! Do you hear me? You’re dead!”
Silence. Which is helpful because I need a moment to dissect what she’s said. This is the point at which I know I should knock, but my mind isn’t firing on all cylinders and begs me to wait another minute to hear what she says next.
“It should’ve been you, Toby! If you thought a gun was such a goddamn good idea, you should’ve just used it on yourself!”
That’s it, I’ve heard enough. I pound on the door at the same time I look at Chantal and tell her to go back upstairs to her grandma’s apartment. I pound until the soft flesh on the side of my palm begins to radiate bruising pain. When she doesn’t answer, I yell, “Open the door, Marilyn!” while I continue the assault on the hardwood.
When the door finally creaks open, there’s a two-inch slot held from further advancement by a short string of brass chain, and her bloodshot eye rimmed by blotchy, shock-red skin is fixed on me. “This ain’t your concern, Johnny. Leave me be.”
I take a deep breath, because it’s either that or kick the door in, and then I say calmly, “It is my concern.” That’s a truer statement than I would like to acknowledge. “When you’re keeping the whole building awake, it’s my concern. You need to quiet down, Marilyn, or I’ll call the cops.”
She barks out a bitter laugh. “You’ll call the cops? You know they won’t do shit.”
She’s right, they won’t. They’ll come, tell her to quiet down, and leave. And then she’ll start up again before they make it to the curb to get in their car. While I’m thinking through the next step in this mess, I break eye contact with her and look over her head into the apartment. She’s a little over five feet tall and I’m a little over six; I have an unobstructed view. Toby is sitting on the couch, curled up into a ball, his face buried in his arms. His shoulders rising and falling as sobs violently shudder through him.
My eyes still on him, I ask, “What’s going on?” Marilyn has never been the poster child for motherhood, far from it, but I’ve never seen her like this.
I can’t see everything she’s doing due to the limited view the two-inch peek into the room provides, but from what I can make out she’s thrusting a finger accusatorially at the destroyed boy on the couch as she declares, “That little shit killed my daughter!”
The words punch me in the face. “Killed your daughter?” I repeat, in my head or aloud, I’m not sure.
She presses her face tight against the opening, the door and doorjamb pressing deep creases down her cheeks on either side of her mouth, and she screeches in my face, “He fucking killed my Nina!” The tirade is accompanied by spittle that her drunken state and anger can’t contain, pelting the front of my T-shirt.
“Shh,” I reflexively answer, because she’s going to wake up the entire block if she keeps this up. “Open the door and talk to me.” My voice is masking the anger that’s boiling inside me.
Her mouth disappears and she takes a long pull from a bottle of clear liquid, gin judging by her breath. It won’t take much more of that before she’s passed out cold, so I let her take two more swigs before I try again. “Open the door, Marilyn.”
“No,” she whisper-shouts defiantly, like a mouthy child, her lips pressed against the opening again. At least she toned down the volume this time.
I wait. I’m an impatient man, so the wait is tortuous, but I do it. I have to take a leak and my lower back is starting to ache, but I remain with my feet planted in place. When her body finally slumps against the wall and slides down into an unflattering heap of unconsciousness on the floor, I whisper, “Finally. Jesus Christ,” before I call out, “Toby, open the door.” When he doesn’t look up, I call out louder, my nerves urging me not to yell and make this all worse for him, “Come open the door, Toby. Let me in.”
He looks up, and I’m not prepared for the eyes that meet me. The swollen eyelids of someone on the losing end of a brawl, circling the dying eyes I see in my nightmares. Eyes filled with horror, despair, self-loathing, and agony so deep it looks like something that can’t be survived. He just turned sixteen; no one this young should ever wear those eyes. Slowly, he unfolds his limbs that he’s been using as a shield and makes his way cautiously to the door. He closes it and I hear the chain slip off its track and rattle against wood before the door opens again. I don’t say anything as I bend over and pick up Marilyn. When I deposit her on her bed, I whisper, “You will never talk to him like that again, you bitch.” I know she can’t hear me; the words are more for me. This is the night it stops and I do what I should’ve done a long time ago.