But that’s all in the future. First things first. Start the car, drive away from here, drive home. Can’t go anywhere without going home first.
Christ, why won’t my hands stop shaking?
Trisha Marx
Out there in the dark, Anthony kept shouting my name. He’d sounded annoyed at first, then kind of exasperated; now he was just pissed. He had a flashlight from the car and he kept shining it here and there over the trees and bushes, trying to find me. But he didn’t even come close to where I was hiding under a big pile of dead branches and oak leaves.
“Irish, goddamn it! You better come out, man. I’ll leave you here, I mean it, I’ll drive off and you can freakin’ walk home. That ain’t gonna make things any better. Trish? Shit, Trisha!”
The flashlight beam danced and stabbed. It was hard, white, like frozen light, and it kept cutting weird wedges and strips out of the dark — parts of tree trunks and limbs, ferns, rocks, like pieces in the magazine montage on the wall of my room. Don’t like all those pieces... I’m still stoned. Three joints, way too many. Why’d I think it’d be easier to tell him if I smoked some dope first? Stupid. Weirded me out and made him horny. Come on, querida, I’m getting lover’s nuts. Oh yeah? Come on, Anthony, I’m already pregnant with your kid. Wham. No more lover’s nuts, huh, Anthony?
It ain’t mine. I always used a rubber.
At least one time you didn’t.
It ain’t mine. You been screwing somebody else.
That’s the lowest, Anthony. You know better.
I don’t want no freakin’ kid!
You think I do?
Get rid of it.
No.
You want me to marry you? No way, man.
What happened to “I love you, Trish”? Just bullshit to get into my pants, right?
I ain’t getting married. Lose the kid or we’re quits.
I knew it. I knew it’d be like this. I knew it!
Slapped him, hard, harder than I ever thought I could hit anybody. And then out of the car, into the woods. And here I am.
“One more minute, Trisha. That’s all you got.”
Jerking light, pieces of the night. But I couldn’t see him at all. Good. I never wanted to see his crappy, lying face again.
“I mean it. One minute and I’m outta here, I’m history.”
Fuck you, Anthony. You’re already history.
I lay there shivering, waiting for him to go away, get the hell out of my life. The wind up here on the Bluffs was like ice, even down low to the ground where I was. The water in the lake must be like ice, too. Black ice. Deep, black ice.
“Okay! That’s the way you want it, man, it’s on your head. I’m gone.”
The light blinked out. So dark again I couldn’t see a thing through the leaves, not even the shapes of the oak branches swaying in the moany wind overhead. But I could hear him crunching around out there, heading back to his junky TransAm. Door slam, revving engine. Light again, spraying the trees, spraying the bare ground out toward the cliff edge as he swung away onto the road. Run, you asshole, go ahead and run. And the light faded away and he was gone and I was alone. Stoned and pregnant and all alone.
He wouldn’t come back. If I knew him, he’d go find Mateo and the two of them’d buy some coke or crank and really get whacked. If I knew him... only I didn’t. I thought I did and how he felt about me, but I was wrong. Wrong, wrong, wrong. My mistake. My kid. All alone.
“I don’t care,” I said out loud. “Doesn’t matter. I don’t give a shit about anything anymore.”
Then I started to bawl. I couldn’t help it. I lay there bawling my head off, with my knees pulled up against my chest, and I couldn’t stop — for the longest time I couldn’t stop. Couldn’t suck in enough air and then I got too much and started to hiccup and then finally I stopped hiccuping and just lay there, tear-wet and cold and empty.
Empty, man.
After a while I crawled out from under the leaves and dead stuff and stood up, all shaky and feeling even more weirded out than before. That wind was really icy. Black ice up here, black ice down in the lake. The open part of the Bluffs was off to my left and I went in that direction, toward the road. Once I tripped over something and fell and skinned my knee, but I didn’t care about that either. I wasn’t thinking about anything anymore. I felt so empty and weird. When I came out of the trees I saw the road, empty like I was, leading down, but I didn’t go that way. Instead I walked out toward the cliff edge. I still wasn’t thinking about anything.
Then I was standing right on the edge, where the ground falls away sharp and straight down. Seventy or eighty feet straight down. The wind shoved at me like hands, so hard I could barely keep my balance. Over on the far shore the town lights and house lights winked and shimmered, reflecting off the black ice. Anthony was over there by now, maybe. And Daddy... Oh, God, how could I tell him? He’d have a hemorrhage. I quit looking at the lights and looked straight down instead. Some rocks down there, in among the cottonwoods and willows... never mind that. Look at how shiny the black ice is, out away from the shore. Lean forward so you can see better. Heights don’t bother me. Deep, black ice doesn’t bother me either. I felt so weird. The dope... Anthony... the baby... my trashed life. But I wasn’t afraid. Shiny, black ice. Lean out just a little farther—
Noises behind me, quick and close and louder than the wind. And somebody said, “You don’t want to do that.”
I almost lost my balance turning to look. My foot started to slip. But he was almost on top of me then, a big, black shape that caught my arm and yanked me back and swung me around before he let go. Then he was the one standing at the edge, with his back to it, like a wall that had sprung up there.
“Pretty close call,” he said. “You ought to be more careful.”
I couldn’t see his face too clearly. All I could see was that he was big, real big. My arm hurt where he’d grabbed me.
“Who’re you?” My voice sounded funny, like somebody pulling up a rusty nail. “Where’d you come from?”
“I’ve been up here awhile. Where’d you come from? The car that drove off a few minutes ago?”
“Doesn’t matter.” I was still thinking about black ice, but I didn’t feel so spacey anymore. The weed high was starting to wear off. “Why’d you grab me like that?”
“I didn’t want you to fall.”
“Why should you care?”
“Why shouldn’t I? What’s your name?”
“Trisha.”
“Trisha what?”