Counting by 7s(34)

But Pattie decided that today wasn’t the time to think about the future.

Today was the day to order more shades of red nail polish.

She found the new catalog from her most reliable supplier and circled a shade that she thought Willow would approve of.

It was called “well red.”

Just doing that made Pattie feel marginally better.





Chapter 31





Vietnamese is spoken here.

I can understand the manicurists, even the ones who talk fast.

They never whisper back and forth about their customers’ nails.

They talk about their lives.

While they file and buff and paint, I hear their stories, which are nearly all about husbands and children and other family members.

Many of them are related to one another. Cousins and sisters. Mothers-and daughters-in-law.

They are a tribe.

They don’t know that what I hear is hurtful. Because even as they complain about bad men or lazy kids, the pain for me is seeing how they are so connected.

To one another.

And to their families.

And to the world.

These women wrap themselves in their stories from the minute they walk through the glass door until the second they leave at the end of the day.

They use words to build something that is as real as cloth.

And while they complain in lower voices, about one another, they are joined by blood and circumstance and shared experience.

They are part of something bigger than themselves.

Even if they don’t realize it.

I do.



I have seen trees that survive fire.

Their bark is burned and their limbs are dead branches.

But hidden under that skeleton is a force that sends a single shoot of green out into the world.

Maybe if I’m lucky, that will one day happen to me.

But right now, I can’t see it.



Pattie is at the front desk.

Everything in here is white. The reception area. The manicure chairs. The floor.

White = clean.

I’m pretty sure that with the exception of the color red, Pattie would be pleased if every other shade in the world disappeared.

That’s how she sees things.

She has schedules and rules and methods and every day she does her best to impose these on the world, one chipped fingernail repair at a time.

My mother used the old expression “There is a place for everything and everything should be in its place.” But she didn’t practice it.

Pattie does.

I would say that, with the exception of me sitting in the back of this salon, she’s winning the battle.



Pattie is adding up something on a calculator when the phone rings. After she says hello, I hear: “Today?”

I look over because I’m now an expert in her voice, and while it was even and unemotional, I still heard something different in it.

The person on the other end of the phone line is doing all the talking.

Pattie shoots a look to the back of the salon and our eyes connect.

This must be the call where she officially gets rid of me.

I hear her say:

“I work until six thirty.”

Pattie looks out the window. She’s struggling now.

I want to make this easy for her. I get up from my spot in the back and I fold up the furniture pad. I close my computer and I take off my glasses.

I breathe deep.

I know that I’ve been nothing but a problem. I’ve tried to be invisible, but just my presence here has changed the dynamic of the situation.

Quang-ha was mad before, but now he’s a volcano when we cross the alley at night to the garage.

Mai puts on a good front, but even she seems tired of the whole arrangement.

I need this to be easy for Pattie.

She has been good to me.

So I turn to face her and I do my best to smile.

I want this smile to say that I am grateful for what she’s done for me.

I want it to say that I’m sorry for being broken.

I want it to say that I understand her situation.

So I’m trying. I really, truly am.

But my teeth stick to my lip and my whole mouth quivers.

Pattie sees my creepy grin and turns away.

I hear her voice, shaky now, say:

“We won’t be there until six forty-five. Is that too late?”

Pattie hangs up, and right away dials a number.

Her even disposition is one of her best qualities. And she’s maintaining it. Sort of.

Maybe that happens when you’ve been through a lot. All of your edges are worn off, like sea glass.

Either that, or you shatter.



Bakersfield is 130 miles from the Pacific Ocean, but twice I drove to the beach, just outside of Santa Maria, with my parents.

There was a short period of time when I was obsessed with the study of the ocean, since it takes up more than 70 percent of the planet.

But on the two times that we went to visit, I was afraid.

The unpredictable current and the vast, complex system of wildlife that resides beneath the churning water gave me hives.

Literally.

I was a body of bumps.

So I admire Pattie’s composure.

I knew that my time here wouldn’t last long.

And today is the proof.