Mazie Baby (21 page)

Mazie clicked the bathroom door
shut, put down the toilet lid and sat on the cool plastic. “Rachel, what’s happening?
Are the cops still around?”

“Not as much. Yesterday a few of
them were in your back yard. I snuck out and listened through the fence.”

“You eavesdropped on the police?”

“Hey, nosy neighbour, remember?”
She winked. “My thighs may rub together when I walk, but I can be stealthy when
I need to be.”

“How did they find him so soon? I
told everyone he’d be gone for ten days.”

“Some guy he works with. He came by
a couple of times. I caught him pounding on the back door. Told him no one was
home. He said he was supposed to go fishing with Cullen. Said he’d been trying
to get him on the phone.” Rachel finished off her cigarette and butted it out of
camera range. “I told him Cullen had already gone, but he could see the truck
right there. Next thing I know, there’s a cop car parked out front and two
uniforms knocking on doors and shining flashlights in the windows.”

Mazie was certain Ariel could hear
her heartbeat through the door. She wiped a dewy line of sweat from her cheeks.
“Damn it.”

Rachel nodded. “Yeah. I know.” She
lit another cigarette, leaned back and blew smoke at the ceiling. “Anyway,
damned if the police didn’t set up a ladder and peer into all the windows on
the second floor. I guess there was a crack in the drape. Apparently they could
see enough because all hell broke loose.”

“You lied for me.” Mazie let tears
drip down her face.

“Hell yeah I did. But I’m worried.”

“Why?”

“Look, hon, I don’t know how to
tell you this except to just up and say it.” She took another long drag and
blew the smoke at the screen. She crossed her free arm across her chest and
rubbed her forehead with the hand holding the smoke. “Mazie, it’s your mom.”

Mazie swallowed, her chest
vibrated. “I talked to her yesterday. I know about the cancer spreading.”

“Sorry, I didn’t know about that. Cops
found your van in her garage. They know you have her car. They’ve been hounding
me no end, but I keep telling them the same bullshit story about Disneyland.”
Rachel wiped tears from her face with one shaking hand. “Honey, they put a lot
of pressure on her. And shame on them, harassing a frail old lady like that.”

“Rachel, is she all right? She doesn’t
know where we are.”

“I think they told me this to try
to get me to tell them wherever it is you’re hiding.” She put her lips to the cigarette
and took a long drag. “She overdosed on sleeping pills and scotch last night.”

Mazie’s focus narrowed. The small
screen blurred and the rest of the room faded to black. She gripped the counter
with one hand, but her legs came out from under her and she slid off the toilet
seat and landed on the floor. “She. She’s —”

“I’m so sorry.”

Mazie let the tablet slip out of
her fingers. Waves of sobs overtook her body. She wrapped both arms around
herself, rocked, and wailed.

Ariel knocked on the door. “Mom?
Mom are you all right?”

Mazie couldn’t form any words.

Ariel pushed the door open until it
met the resistance of her mother’s feet, then squeezed herself through the
small open space it offered. “Mom, what the hell?”

Mazie grabbed Ariel’s hand and
pulled her to the floor, hugged her hard and put her lips next to her
daughter’s ear. “Grandma died.”

Ariel pulled away, her eyes wide,
mouth agape. “What? But we just saw her!” She melted to the floor and curled
into her mother’s embrace.

“I’m gonna disconnect.” Rachel’s
voice on the tablet seemed a million miles from reality. “Call me back. Tonight.”

They lay on the bathroom floor until
the tears receded and Ariel’s shoulders stopped shaking. Mazie sat up, her back
against the cupboard, the knob poking into her spine.

“We need to tell Daddy about
Grandma.”

“Your father didn’t like my mother.
He wouldn’t care.”

Ariel pushed away from her mother’s
arms. “He still deserves to know.” She wiped her splotchy cheeks with the
sleeve of her shirt. “You have to tell me what’s going on. What did Polly mean
by police?” She swallowed hard. “Is Daddy all right?”

Nausea welled up in Mazie’s stomach
and saliva filled her mouth. She rolled to her knees, lifted the toilet lid,
and vomited. Second-hand mustard burned her throat.

When she sat back down, Ariel
handed her a fistful of toilet paper, reached over her head and flushed the
toilet. Tears filled her eyes. “Mother, tell me. Now.”

Ariel helped Mazie to her feet. She
led Ariel out of the bathroom and sat beside her on the bed. She held her
daughter’s hands, took two deep breaths, and closed her eyes — like that would
make confessing this sin go down any easier. “Sweetheart.” She opened her eyes
and tucked a stray lock of Ariel’s hair behind her ear. With the new cut, that
years-old habit no longer worked and the strand popped back onto her temple.
She cupped her daughter’s chin. “Your father.” She blinked one long blink and
swallowed. “He’s dead.”

Ariel’s face contorted, her chin
dimpled, her cheeks and eyes blossomed with red patches.

“What?” she whispered.

Mazie hung her head. “I didn’t mean
to. I just wanted him to know how I felt. I was just going to leave him, take
you with me, before —”

Ariel jumped away from Mazie like
she’d burst into flames. “You killed him?” she screamed. Both her hands flew up
and grabbed the sides of her face, she buckled over and fell to her knees on
the carpet. “No, no, no, no.”

Mazie slid onto the floor and put
her arms around Ariel.

She shoved Mazie away, clamoured to
her feet and ran to the door. She spun around, one hand on the doorknob. “I
hate you!” She ran from the room, the door left open behind her.

“Ariel, stop!” Mazie stumbled to
her feet, snatched the key card from the dresser, and fled out the door. By the
time she got out of the hotel, Ariel was nowhere.

Mazie raced back into the room and
grabbed her keys, ran to the car in the underground parkade. Her trembling
fingers fumbled the keys and they landed on the floor mat. “Damn it.” She
fished them from the floor and managed to get the car started. By the time she
pulled out onto the street, her vision was blurred by unstoppable tears. Her eyes
darted in all directions searching for any sign of long black flowing hair and
purple polka dotted denim capris.

No. Short hair. Maroon hair. Damn
it! She pounded on the steering wheel with her open palms. “Fuck, fuck, fuck.”

The alleys darkened in the
increasing dusk, every shadow sinister, every doorway a potential hiding place.

A police car crossed the
intersection ahead of her. She slammed on the brakes, turned a hard right and
slipped into a narrow laneway a few blocks from the hotel. She slapped the
gearshift into park and draped her arms over the steering wheel, laid her head
on her arms, and gulped for air.

She’d murdered her husband. Her
mother was dead. And now she’d driven the only person who mattered out of her
life. She should just kill herself. Should have done that right off the bat, as
soon as he was dead. Then maybe Ariel could have forgiven her. Found a happy
life in a home without anger and violence. A life devoid of lies.

She leaned back in the seat. Time
to call the cops. Turn herself in. Find Ariel and send her — where? She had no
home left. No relatives left. Just a murderous mother doomed to spend eternity
behind bars.

Maybe Rachel would adopt her.

She sped back to the hotel and
parked the car out front. Three people hovered around the elevator. Mazie yanked
open the door to the stairwell and took the steps two at a time to the third
floor. Her jogging footfalls thudded in the dim hallway. When she rounded the
end of the hall, she stopped short. Her knees weakened and she began to cry.
“Ariel?” she whispered.

Ariel sat next to the door to their
room, her forearms on her bent knees. At the sound of her mother’s voice, she
looked up. Her face was swollen from grief, her eyes bloodshot. “I didn’t know
where to go.”

Mazie sat beside her and took her
hand. “I am so sorry. I can’t even start to tell you how truly, truly sorry.”

Ariel rested her head on Mazie’s
shoulder. “Why? I mean, I know he was mean to you and hit you. A lot. But why?”

“I didn’t plan to. It just
happened. I was afraid he would kill me.”

“Daddy would never do that.”

Mazie sighed. “I used to think that.
But he threatened to. And he’d nearly done it before.”

Fresh tears pooled in Ariel’s eyes.
She sniffed and wiped them away. “You never told me.”

“How could I?” She rested her head
against the wall. “I can show you now if you like.”

“Show me? What do you mean?”

Mazie stood and offered Ariel her
hand.

Ariel hesitated, then slipped her
soft palm into her mother’s and allowed Mazie to pull her to her feet.

Mazie opened her suitcase and
unzipped the removable lining from the hard outer shell. She slipped her hand in
and felt around until her fingers found the envelope. The paper that contained
evidence of his cruelty shot tiny tendrils of pain through her fingers.
Negative energy. Bad juju. Ariel needed to see it. To understand. Or Mazie
would never be forgiven.

She held the envelope, heavy with
the weight of the duplicate set of Polaroids and her second diary, in both
hands. “I kept a journal. Not feelings or anything. Just dates. Times.” She
swallowed. “And pictures. Of what he did.”

She sat on the edge of the bed.
Ariel sat cross-legged at the edge of her peripheral vision. “I never planned
to share this with you.” She turned to face her daughter. “I didn’t want you to
know. Didn’t want you to see who he really was.”

Ariel held out her hand.

Mazie shook her head. “Just a sec.”
She cleared her throat. “You have to know that he wasn’t always like this. It
was good in the beginning. But things changed. It was years after he first hit
me before I took the pictures or wrote it down.”

“Why’d you start?”

“I’d fooled myself into thinking he
didn’t mean it. He’d stop. But he never did. And I knew it would never end. I
was certain that he would kill me one day. He’d come close before.”

“Like when I called the cops.”

“Yeah, like that. And other times.”

“Why didn’t I know?”

“You weren’t usually there. That’s
another reason I knew it was time to leave. He didn’t care if you saw anymore.”
She licked her lips. “He started to treat you the same way,” she whispered.

Ariel nodded. “Do you still love
him?”

“I don’t think so. Not for a while.”
She smiled. “But I used to. Oh boy, did I love him.” She closed her eyes and
let a picture of Cullen, young, handsome, long chocolate hair, strumming his
guitar and singing to her in their bedroom, fill her mind. “I miss him.” Her
voice cracked.

“Really?”

She opened her eyes. “The old him.
The original him. Not the him I’m going to show you.” She took a deep breath
and bent the flap of the envelope open.

The pictures had shifted. They were
out of order, in total chaos. Where to start? She stared at the one on top, a
hand print on her neck. She touched her scarf, found the knot, loosened the
noose, and let the scarf fall away.

Tears sprung to Ariel’s eyes and
she gasped. She touched one finger to the bruises and red marks, like blood
that never washes off.

Mazie sifted through the photos and
flipped the ones of her freshly choked neck upside down on the bed. It was like
dealing a tarot deck where every card was the death card. She gathered them and
tapped them until they were in a neat pile. The first one was the last time
he’d choked her, just days before she’d done the same to him. She handed it to
Ariel. “That is what happens when you get choked over and over again.” She
rubbed her neck just below the jaw line. “I don’t think it’s ever going away.”

Ariel held the picture but looked
at her mother’s face. She swallowed hard, closed her eyes, turned to face the
Polaroid, and then opened her eyes. She squeezed her lips together, her chin
atremble. “He did that?”

“Just last week.” She handed Ariel
the stack, about fifteen pictures in all. “And these too. The dates are on the
back.”

Ariel looked at each picture,
tossed one after another on the bed. With four left in her hand, she flung them
all away. Two teetered on the edge of the bed. Two sailed off and drifted to
the carpet. “I just thought you liked scarves.”

“Oh, sweetheart. I fucking hate
them.”

Ariel’s eyes bugged out. “You said
fuck.” She giggled, then clamped her hand over her mouth. “Sorry. I don’t know
why I laughed.”

“It’s okay. Laughter is good.”
Mazie put one arm around her daughter’s shoulder and squeezed. “I’ll put the
other pictures away.”