Touch & Go (Tessa Leoni, #2)(60)

Mick smiled, blew us a kiss. Most fun he’d had in ages, you could see it on his face. Couldn’t wait to do it again.

Then he stepped out, the steel door clanged shut and Ashlyn and I were alone.


WE DIDN’T CRY. By mutual consent, we curled up on the top bunk, out of immediate reach of smothering beetles. From this vantage point, I could see out the narrow window to a dark, dark sky. Still middle of the night, not even the next day, and yet it already felt like we’d been in this hellhole forever.

My daughter lay on her side, with her back to me. I put my arm around her waist, my face against the top of her hair.

When she was little, Ashlyn used to creep into our room. Never say a word. I’d simply open my eyes and find her standing next to my side of the bed, a pale little ghost. I would lift the covers and she’d crawl in next to me, our secret as Justin didn’t approve of such things.

I never minded, though. Even then, I knew these moments wouldn’t last forever. That the first five years of my daughter’s life, for all of the exhausting sleeplessness, were one of the only times she would truly belong to me. First, she’d learn to crawl, then walk, then run away on her own.

So I liked to hold her close, smell the baby shampoo scent of her hair. Feel her like a hot little furnace, nuzzled up next to me.

My girl wasn’t little anymore. At fifteen, she stood at nearly my height. And yet her rib cage still felt so slight. She was growing like a colt, all skinny arms and legs. Given Justin’s size, she would probably top my head next year. It was one of those things, I guessed. She’d always be my little girl and yet, she never would be again.

My body started to shake, my stomach cramping. I willed the tremors away, but they didn’t listen.

“Mom?” my daughter asked. Her voice was soft, subdued.

I brushed back her long wheat-brown hair, and for the first time in a long time, my own weakness shamed me. I never should’ve taken that first pill. I never should’ve let something as stupid and pathetic as my husband’s affair become an excuse to fall apart. Maybe my marriage was done. But I still had motherhood. How had I forgotten about that?

“My concussion,” I mumbled, a vague enough excuse.

My daughter wasn’t fooled. She rolled over, staring at me. She had my eyes, everyone always said that. Not gold, not green. Somewhere in between. She was beautiful and smart, and growing up too fast. I touched her cheek, and for once, she didn’t flinch.

“I’m sorry,” I said. My brow was starting to sweat. I could feel the beads of moisture, except in my hazy state, they felt less like water, more like blood.

“You need your pills,” she said.

“How did…” I wasn’t sure I wanted to know.

“I’ve been going through your purse,” my daughter stated matter-of-factly. “And your cell phone. Dad’s, too. Both of you, you didn’t just stop speaking to each other. You stopped speaking to me.”

I didn’t say anything, just searched her gaze, tried to find myself in my teenager’s unflinching stare. “We love you. That will never change.”

“I know.”

“Sometimes, parents have to be people, too.”

“I don’t want people,” she said. “I want my mom and dad.”

She rolled back over. Then my time was up. One side effect of taking an opiate: severe constipation. Meaning once you go off that drug, your body has some catching up to do.

I made it to the toilet just in time.

The diarrhea was violent and smelly and awful. I would’ve cried, except between the chronic vomiting, sweating and now this, my body didn’t have any moisture left.

Ashlyn remained on the top bunk, did her best to give me privacy. Not that it really mattered anymore.

I was being broken down, I thought, clutching my cramping stomach. Devolving from human to animal. From a respectable wife and mother who once knew her place in the world, to a woman who might as well collapse in a gutter.

Then, the worst of the diarrhea was over. All that remained was shaking and sweating and aching and the deepest, darkest despair.

I made it off the toilet. Curled up on the floor.

And waited for the world to end.


LATER, Ashlyn told me that Radar came. He had a jug of water, a pile of towels and a bunch of pills. An antidiarrheal, some acetaminophen, an antihistamine. It took both Radar and Ashlyn to get the pills down my throat.

Then Radar was gone, and Ashlyn was left with the task of dampening towels and wiping my face. She couldn’t figure out how to move me to the bunk, so she sat with me on the floor.

At one point, I remember opening my eyes, watching her watch me.

“You’re going to be okay,” she murmured. Then, “I don’t feel sorry for you, Mom. It’s the least you deserve.”

Except later, I heard her crying, hushed, wracking sobs and I tried to touch her face, tried to tell her she was right and I was wrong, but I couldn’t move my arms. I was underwater again, sinking down, down, down, watching my daughter drift away from me.

“I hate you,” my daughter was saying. “I f*cking hate both of you. You cannot leave me like this. You can’t leave me.”

And I didn’t blame her. In fact, I wanted to tell her I understood. I hated my father, too, because he hadn’t wanted to wear a helmet. And I hated my mother, who even when we couldn’t afford dinner, always had a fresh pack of cigarettes. Why were parents so weak, so fallible? Why couldn’t my own parents have seen how much I loved them, needed them beside me?