hadn’t been much water in my lungs. I had scraped up an arm pretty badly, and knocked myself unconscious with some combination of fear and impact, but the worst of my injuries was a broken tibia. Once the wound above it closed and the risk of infection passed, the doctors told me it would heal normally. Though my leg occasionally throbbed, and the cast I wore itched like crazy, I reminded myself that I was lucky. I’d overheard a doctor telling my aunt that if the rock had hit my head two inches lower, the fall would have killed me.
Aunt Claire stayed in a Tallahassee hotel until my parents got back, visiting and reading me kids’ books. I was too exhausted to pretend I was too old for them. She made me excited promises about all the things we could do with my hair when it started to grow back, and was always reluctant to leave me for the hotel in the evening. I turned nine in the hospital; a nurse baked me a homemade red velvet cake; the entire pediatric staff sang to me; Aunt Claire bought me a beautiful set of turquoise-jeweled hair combs to decorate my shorter hair.
When my mother finally arrived, I heard her before I saw her. My parents had gotten in at midnight and come straight to the hospital. It was one in the morning when they got there, four days after my admittance, and they had to threaten several overprotective nurses in order to be allowed to wake me. When my mother saw me, she cried. My father was so wrapped up in hugging me and so close to crying himself that I don’t know if he even noticed her tears, but I wished somebody would have held her.
“I’m so sorry, baby,” she said when she had composed herself. “We never should have left you. Allison is damn lucky she called the cops, lucky you’re alive, and lucky your father and I don’t believe in juvenile detention centers, or we’d be pressing charges against her for pushing you off in the first place.”
“Maybe it was just an accident,” I said. What I meant was that Allison might have wanted to go home, more than she wanted to hurt me. Hadn’t she said so? Hadn’t she confessed, even before I was awake to accuse her?
My mother waved this possibility off.
“I called my brother,” she said. “They cut their cruise short in Guam and came back several days ago. She’s got a lot of problems that have nothing to do with you. She’s very confused. This is all your grandmother’s doing. I’m sure if she hadn’t been treating you so badly, Allison wouldn’t have thought she could do the same. Why didn’t you tell me what was going on in that house?”
I considered this. I was very confused.
“You were in Brazil,” I said finally. “What are they going to do to Allison now?”
“Frankly, that’s her parents’ problem now, not mine,” said my mother, cradling me closer to her, and stroking my still naked feeling head. “My only job is to take care of you.”
But Allison was the other half of the story; the half I didn’t tell because it didn’t belong to me anymore. People would ask me sometimes what happened to her. “I’m sure she grew up,” I would say, and they would nod at my empathy and rarely point out that growing up did not mean and never has meant the same thing as getting better. The truth was I didn’t know much about how Allison was doing. My mother had deliberately cut off contact with her family after that summer, deciding the whole lot of them were toxic. I’d heard her though, talking to my father about the fact that my uncle had decided to leave Allison with my grandmother for a little while, to straighten her out. “That’s a mistake,” my mother had said. “What an unfortunate pair.”
An unfortunate pair. Her words were in the back of my mind when she called me a few weeks after my law school graduation. I had been hibernating, wearing headphones and reviewing for the Connecticut bar, and it was only because she called three times in a row that I bothered to pick up the
Aunt Claire stayed in a Tallahassee hotel until my parents got back, visiting and reading me kids’ books. I was too exhausted to pretend I was too old for them. She made me excited promises about all the things we could do with my hair when it started to grow back, and was always reluctant to leave me for the hotel in the evening. I turned nine in the hospital; a nurse baked me a homemade red velvet cake; the entire pediatric staff sang to me; Aunt Claire bought me a beautiful set of turquoise-jeweled hair combs to decorate my shorter hair.
When my mother finally arrived, I heard her before I saw her. My parents had gotten in at midnight and come straight to the hospital. It was one in the morning when they got there, four days after my admittance, and they had to threaten several overprotective nurses in order to be allowed to wake me. When my mother saw me, she cried. My father was so wrapped up in hugging me and so close to crying himself that I don’t know if he even noticed her tears, but I wished somebody would have held her.
“I’m so sorry, baby,” she said when she had composed herself. “We never should have left you. Allison is damn lucky she called the cops, lucky you’re alive, and lucky your father and I don’t believe in juvenile detention centers, or we’d be pressing charges against her for pushing you off in the first place.”
“Maybe it was just an accident,” I said. What I meant was that Allison might have wanted to go home, more than she wanted to hurt me. Hadn’t she said so? Hadn’t she confessed, even before I was awake to accuse her?
My mother waved this possibility off.
“I called my brother,” she said. “They cut their cruise short in Guam and came back several days ago. She’s got a lot of problems that have nothing to do with you. She’s very confused. This is all your grandmother’s doing. I’m sure if she hadn’t been treating you so badly, Allison wouldn’t have thought she could do the same. Why didn’t you tell me what was going on in that house?”
I considered this. I was very confused.
“You were in Brazil,” I said finally. “What are they going to do to Allison now?”
“Frankly, that’s her parents’ problem now, not mine,” said my mother, cradling me closer to her, and stroking my still naked feeling head. “My only job is to take care of you.”
But Allison was the other half of the story; the half I didn’t tell because it didn’t belong to me anymore. People would ask me sometimes what happened to her. “I’m sure she grew up,” I would say, and they would nod at my empathy and rarely point out that growing up did not mean and never has meant the same thing as getting better. The truth was I didn’t know much about how Allison was doing. My mother had deliberately cut off contact with her family after that summer, deciding the whole lot of them were toxic. I’d heard her though, talking to my father about the fact that my uncle had decided to leave Allison with my grandmother for a little while, to straighten her out. “That’s a mistake,” my mother had said. “What an unfortunate pair.”
An unfortunate pair. Her words were in the back of my mind when she called me a few weeks after my law school graduation. I had been hibernating, wearing headphones and reviewing for the Connecticut bar, and it was only because she called three times in a row that I bothered to pick up the
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