separate. The steps varied in cadence from carpet to wood to bathroom tiles, then stopped. She heard the stream of his pee, first hard, then softer until he flushed and the water swirled down the drain. He jiggled the handle until the tank started to fill up. Drops of urine flooded her vagina; pee trickled between her legs, puddling in the crack of her rear, then soaked through the fabric of her nightgown into the bare mattress. The smell of urine tightened her stomach muscles, stretched her nightgown up like a tent between her hip bones. She struggled to wiggle her butt off the damp spot. It was okay, she said to herself, it didn't really mean anything. I am still the same person. She tried to move again, but each time, the cord that ran under the mattress forced her back into the cold pee.
Somewhere downstairs a washing machine rattled to life, must be from the little room, off the kitchen, the one her mother called the mud room, where a table, covered with detergent granulesand single socks, stood across from the Maytags. There was a shopping bag overflowing with puffs of blue dryer lint and a freezer filled with frozen hamburger meat. Her mother had put in a late load and she tried to separate the sound of the engine from the thumping cadence of wet clothes. She was lying in her bedroom half asleep, listening to the rotating water downstairs and to the music box on her nightstand, watching the ballerina twirl around slowly. She called her Elena, a name she thought Russian and sophisticated. The dancer was the size of her pinkie, with a tiny brown bun, pink toe shoes, and a little satin skirt that covered the top of her white legs. Her stuffed animals, that napped all day on the yellow gingham pillow, were displaced now, strewn into the alley-way between her bed and the wall. Each one had a name, a personality all its own, but in the dark it was only their eyes, toxic green or red, that shone up at her and made each seem like tiny sinister strangers.
She felt the blueprint of her house around her, a phantom sensation, hard to throw off because she wasn't in her own bedroom, but held hostage in this room with its wood-paneled walls, brown boxes stacked in one corner and a colonial chair. This room could be anywhere, maybe in one of the Main Street mansions downtown. She'd always thought of them, white or butter-colored with round turrets and generous front porches, as somewhat ominous. Most had turned into boardinghouses, the big rooms cheaply remodeled into drywall apartments, where dazed-looking people in sleeveless T-shirts and cheap vinyl shoes sat all day long looking out the window. Or maybe it was one of those ratty condominiums out by the airport. A boy at school told her prostitutes and drug dealers lived there. Once she heard the big globular sound of a water cooler and figuredshe was being held in one of the half-empty glass office buildings along the highway. Other times she thought she'd been pulled through a portal into another dimension, that this room was underground, that the man with the white beard was the devil and this her particular hell.
She turned her ear to the wall, heard the static snap of the television obeying the remote and turning itself off, the electricity slithering out of the TV, through the cord, and back into the wall. He threw his weight up, the couch springs adjusted, and he walked like a younger man, an altogether different man, into the kitchen. He broke the vacuum of the refrigerator and felt around inside. She heard glass jars clink, the rustle of aluminum foil against the wire shelf. A fat hum kicked in as the fridge spilled cold air into the kitchen and began to generate more. The door sucked shut and she heard his hip nudge a chair, the squeak of its legs on the linoleum. He opened the microwave, closed it, his fingers pushing buttons; the familair beeping sounds rang out, then the electric drone as water molecules heated up in whatever he'd decided to eat. He turned on the
Somewhere downstairs a washing machine rattled to life, must be from the little room, off the kitchen, the one her mother called the mud room, where a table, covered with detergent granulesand single socks, stood across from the Maytags. There was a shopping bag overflowing with puffs of blue dryer lint and a freezer filled with frozen hamburger meat. Her mother had put in a late load and she tried to separate the sound of the engine from the thumping cadence of wet clothes. She was lying in her bedroom half asleep, listening to the rotating water downstairs and to the music box on her nightstand, watching the ballerina twirl around slowly. She called her Elena, a name she thought Russian and sophisticated. The dancer was the size of her pinkie, with a tiny brown bun, pink toe shoes, and a little satin skirt that covered the top of her white legs. Her stuffed animals, that napped all day on the yellow gingham pillow, were displaced now, strewn into the alley-way between her bed and the wall. Each one had a name, a personality all its own, but in the dark it was only their eyes, toxic green or red, that shone up at her and made each seem like tiny sinister strangers.
She felt the blueprint of her house around her, a phantom sensation, hard to throw off because she wasn't in her own bedroom, but held hostage in this room with its wood-paneled walls, brown boxes stacked in one corner and a colonial chair. This room could be anywhere, maybe in one of the Main Street mansions downtown. She'd always thought of them, white or butter-colored with round turrets and generous front porches, as somewhat ominous. Most had turned into boardinghouses, the big rooms cheaply remodeled into drywall apartments, where dazed-looking people in sleeveless T-shirts and cheap vinyl shoes sat all day long looking out the window. Or maybe it was one of those ratty condominiums out by the airport. A boy at school told her prostitutes and drug dealers lived there. Once she heard the big globular sound of a water cooler and figuredshe was being held in one of the half-empty glass office buildings along the highway. Other times she thought she'd been pulled through a portal into another dimension, that this room was underground, that the man with the white beard was the devil and this her particular hell.
She turned her ear to the wall, heard the static snap of the television obeying the remote and turning itself off, the electricity slithering out of the TV, through the cord, and back into the wall. He threw his weight up, the couch springs adjusted, and he walked like a younger man, an altogether different man, into the kitchen. He broke the vacuum of the refrigerator and felt around inside. She heard glass jars clink, the rustle of aluminum foil against the wire shelf. A fat hum kicked in as the fridge spilled cold air into the kitchen and began to generate more. The door sucked shut and she heard his hip nudge a chair, the squeak of its legs on the linoleum. He opened the microwave, closed it, his fingers pushing buttons; the familair beeping sounds rang out, then the electric drone as water molecules heated up in whatever he'd decided to eat. He turned on the
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