Push(67)

“Where is she now?”
“She died. Years ago.”
Anna Spaight’s obituary didn’t say that she was a tattoo artist, nor did any of the other articles about her death. But, in the picture, the one where David is standing behind her, his tattoos are there. Wrapped around her. Is he talking about Anna, or is he talking about someone else? Being on medication for depression and paranoid schizophrenia doesn’t make you a junkie, does it? I want to ask him if it is Anna—but I won’t, because my question will tell him that I know about her. To have two women in your life die would break a man—even a man like David. It must be Anna he is talking about.
“I’m sorry,” I say. I want to cry. I want to cry for Anna. And for David. And for me.
“It’s okay,” David says. “Really. She was messed up, and it was over between us long before she died. I only stayed for as long as I did because I was trying to help her.”
“Oh.” It must be Anna. In my mind, I am picturing David and Anna together, imagining him holding her up by the shoulders the same way he is holding me right now. Trying to help her find her balance.
“You already know that I am the raven, Emma. We both are.” He lets me go and lifts up his arm to show me the dark, thick bird. The one above his right underarm. The one I found the night he took me to the bridge. The clever and self-assured and peculiar raven. How could I have thought that he would see himself as a frail hummingbird? The ridiculousness of my earlier question tugs at me. Anna was the frail one. And David didn’t love her because ravens don’t love the weak.
With that thought, I straighten myself. I don’t need David to hold me up. I am centered now, and I put my lips against the raven. I kiss its beak and run my tongue across its body. David tastes of salt, of skin. His hands move to the back of my head, and he lifts my face up to his, kissing my mouth, lapping his tongue against mine. I can feel how much he wants this. How much he wants me. When we finally separate, it’s clear that David has something on his mind.
“I know Saz told you about Lucia the other night. I’m sorry you had to hear about that from him.” His voice sounds uncomfortable. As if he is embarrassed and ashamed.
“It’s okay,” I say, hoping to quell his feelings.
“I should have told you about her.”
“Why didn’t you?”
“I guess because you never asked. You’re different than anyone else I have ever been with. You don’t ask a lot of questions about where I’ve been and who I’ve been with.”
“Oh. Well, it’s not that I’m not interested, because, trust me, I am. But I figure you’ll tell me what I need to know, whenever the time is right.” I shrug and add, “Your past is really none of my business.”
“But it is your business,” he says sharply. He is looking down at me, and I give him a what-the-f*ck-is-that-supposed-to-mean look. “It’s your business because the women I have been with are a part of who I am. They matter to me because they all became a small part of me in some way. A small part of who I am today.”
I’m not sure if this is my cue to start asking him questions, but right now, I am too f*cking tired to go there.
We walk down the hallway together and lie down on my bed. I shift down into the crook of his arm and close my eyes. What if he tells me a bunch of shit I don’t want to know? What if whatever he has to say about his past changes things between us? It won’t, I tell myself. Because whatever it is—when you love someone—it doesn’t matter.



chapter Thirty

David drives me to work on Tuesday, and when I get to the office, I know that I must start my day with a phone call. I have decided against calling Ricky, at least for now, so instead I search the internet for the phone number of the hospital in the town where I grew up.
When I tell her why I am calling, the somber young woman who answers the phone transfers me to another line. The phone rings a few times, and a male voice answers.
“Nurse’s Station. Trauma I.C.U. May I help you?” I tell him I am calling to find out the status of a patient named Michael Groff.
“Are you a family member?” he asks. Yes. I am his stepdaughter. Emma Searfoss.
“Ms. Searfoss,” he says when he returns to the line after putting me on hold for a few minutes, “I’m sorry no one from your family contacted you about this, but Mr. Groff died yesterday morning. Your brother Ricky made the decision to remove your father’s ventilator.”
Holy f*ck. Michael is dead. “He wasn’t my father,” I say bitterly.
“I’m sorry, ma’am,” he says. “Would you like to speak with one of Mr. Groff’s physicians? I can have someone call you to provide you with further details if you’d like.”
“No, thank you,” I say. “I’m good.”
I say goodbye and hang up the phone.
I sit in my cubicle staring at the calendar pinned to the wall. My hands are in my lap, and I feel as if the floor is rising beneath me. As if I am about to be catapulted up into the air. As if I could jump up out of this seat and throw myself right up into the sky. Relief and elation are pouring out of my body. It is over. He is over. I think of my mother, and I am thankful, for the first time, that she is not alive. That she did not have to see this. That she did not know about the shame of Michael’s business activities or that he was murdered so brutally.
I don’t think I could be any happier about Michael’s death. Still...I start to cry. I sink my face into my hands and begin to weep. It is half out of relief and half out of sorrow. For my mother, not for Michael. Not for him.