Like a Woman (4 page)

Grinning, she waved at the detective and ran over to the lady with the mixing bowls. “Hey, ma'am, please lady, can you help us? We're here all by ourselves and there's a strange man that's been following us all over the store. My brothers are really scared. I think he might be a molester or something. Could you maybe just pretend to be our mom until he goes away? Please? Please, lady?” She took the startled woman's hand and pointed over to where Mike and David were sitting. Mike definitely looked scared and the man was definitely watching him.

Before the lady could answer, Taylor waved happily over to the boys. Keeping the lady's hand gripped tightly in hers, Taylor hollered out, “Hey, Mike, David, I found her. Come on, let's go!” Mike slowly got up, carefully wheeling David away from the frowning man. Taylor gave him a wave as well and then turned back to the lady. “Those are nice bowls. Can I hold them for you? My mama has bowls just like these. Are you gonna buy them? Is that bad man gone yet? Thank you so much for helping us. I don't know what we would have done without you. You really gotta be careful these days, don't ya?”

At the funeral home, Taylor watched Mike lean over the casket and say goodbye to David. Mike looked old, hard and tired, but it had only been a couple of years since that day they'd stolen the fancy red pillow from Sears and built David a headrest for his wheelchair, strapped together with duct tape and a couple of one-by-twos they'd busted up from a keep out sign Taylor grabbed on their way home.

Taylor watched Mike's hands tighten on the edge of the casket, his knuckles white. A slight tremor snaked up his arms and back. She could see he was fighting to keep his jaw clenched but the tremor transformed into a shake. Taylor watched in horror as Mike's whole body convulsed. At first there was no sound except for the soft pounding of Mike's head on the edge of the coffin. Then his body became racked with sobs, long rough moans that sounded more like they came from a tortured animal than a thirteen-year-old boy.

Taylor had never seen Mike cry. He said he never had. Not when he broke his arm playing street football. Not when he fell from his garage roof onto the unfinished concrete wall in the back alley, landing on a piece of rusted rebar. Not even when his dad took the belt to him after they got home from the hospital, tearing up the unbandaged flesh of his skinny, shirtless back.

“Never cry” was the number one rule governing survival if you were born into the Doyle family. It was a rule they had tried to teach the middle boy, Ryan, ever since they could remember—lesson after lesson after lesson, usually huddled in the back closet after a beating. But Ryan, Ryan was a crier. That boy never learned how
not
to cry. His mom would just look at him sideways and he'd start bawling, and once he got started Mike was the only one who could calm him down. But now Mike was the one sobbing, ragged howls, feral, unleashed. Taylor felt like she was going to be sick. The room began to spin and she left her body to watch from the top of the chapel. She saw Ryan panic, get up, and run red-faced out into the street, and she remembered the morning two weeks ago when everything began to break apart.

It was that hot, sticky summer dawn when she'd heard something hit up against her bedroom window.

“Taylor, get up! You gotta come help me,” Mike was whisper-shouting from the walkway below. Her room was at the end of the house, just across from the Doyles' living room. She heard everything that went on in the Doyle house and could tell from the sounds which kid was getting beaten or whipped. Mike was too big for his mom to hit. Tommy was trying to get big fast but wasn't quite there yet, so when Mrs. Doyle cupped her hand against the side of his head it sounded like a pumpkin dropped off a roof. Before David's accident, he and Sean made exactly the same quick squeal of outrage and then became real quiet because they knew it only made their mom madder when they cried. Pretty soon she'd stop and they'd go running back outside to play.

Ryan was the problem because no matter what they tried, he couldn't stop crying when his mom yelled at him. Taylor had spent the morning listening to the high-pitched wail: “RY-AN, WHY ARE YOU CRY-ING?” Whup! “RY-AN, STOP YOUR CRY ING!” Whup! Every time Mrs. Doyle yelled, Ryan cried. Every time he cried, she belted him again and he cried harder. Taylor had heard it a hundred times before. She knew there was nothing to be done until she heard the silence that meant Ryan had been knocked unconscious, or the loud music that meant Mrs. Doyle had given up and was trying to drown him out. Either way, Taylor knew she'd find Ryan locked in the back closet on the other side of the house.

It was the silence Taylor had been listening to when she heard Mike at her window. They had the routine down by now, but it hadn't always been that way. The first time Taylor tried to help Ryan, she learned her body could make the same thick sound hitting against the wall as any boy bodies Mrs. Doyle flung that way. It had happened when she and Mike climbed in through the back window and unlocked the closet to get to Ryan. He was bleeding from a cut above his eye and softly moaning, too dazed to even cry. Taylor stood back a little, watching Mike cradle his brother on the floor of the closet. She was trying to figure out where she was going to get Ryan a jar to pee in, which was the only thing he wanted, when Mrs. Doyle came bursting into the room. Taylor couldn't get out of the way. She felt her right arm jerked out of its socket, her left side slam into the wall, and in between she flew.

Taylor slid down the wall to the floor, trying to find air. Mike ran out of the room, getting backhanded across the head. Unable to move, Taylor crouched in terror as Mrs. Doyle picked up the bloody child and began rocking him back and forth.

“Ry Ry, what's wrong, baby? Mommy's here. You know you're my baby. You know Mommy loves you best.”

That was the thing about Ryan. You couldn't ever tell if he was going to get hit or held. When Taylor could get her breath, she ran.

After that, Mike and Taylor perfected their rescue techniques. They decided Taylor would go to the front door and cause a distraction while Mike and Tommy snuck in through the back window with warm washcloths, water, and a pee jar. Since Taylor didn't belong to Mrs. Doyle, she was the least likely to get hit in the moments following an explosion. Plus, she was the closest thing to a girl in the neighborhood, even if she could kick the butt of every boy around. Her mom once told her that part of what made Mrs. Doyle nuts was, one, that she was married to Mr. Doyle and, two, that she kept trying and trying for a girl baby, but they kept coming out boys—Mike, Tom, Ryan, Dave, Sean, Bobby—till finally she snapped and went crazy, probably around Ryan. All Taylor knew was she was scared shitless of this woman built like a halfback, who could throw her across the room like a little piece of nothing.

But on that one hot, sticky summer morning when it all began to break apart, it was precisely because she was peacefully listening to the silence that Taylor was so surprised to hear Mike knocking at her bedroom window. She went over to the window, climbed up on the dresser, and looked down at her friend.

“Hurry up, Taylor,” Mike whispered. “I think Ryan's hurt bad.”

Taylor climbed out the window, thinking hard. She looked to the street. Mr. Doyle's car was gone. It was too early in the morning to borrow David. He wouldn't be dressed yet. Mrs. Doyle didn't like to loan cigarettes, bacon was too expensive, and Taylor had already borrowed sugar twice that week. Maybe a little margarine, she thought. That might work. Plus she could make it a really girl thing and ask Mrs. Doyle about a recipe for something. Last time she'd helped Mrs. Doyle do the grocery shopping she discovered the ten ways to use Hamburger Helper so your family doesn't know they're eating the same thing every night.

“Okay, I got it,” Taylor said. “Do you need any towels?”

“Nah, I got some,” Mike said. “Try and give me at least ten minutes, okay?” Mike took off around the back side of the house before she could answer.

“Yeah. I'll try,” Taylor replied, slowly walking up to the Doyle's front porch. She took a deep breath and knocked on the front door. There was no answer. She waited another minute and then knocked again, harder. Still nothing. She grew worried that Mrs. Doyle might be heading toward the back room where Ryan was. She thought of running around the house and warning Mike, but she didn't want to
not
be there if Mrs. Doyle answered the door. Closing her eyes and leaning her head on the doorway, Taylor wished she were somewhere else. Anywhere else. She felt her stomach rise and her heart sink. She knocked really hard a third time and then tried the door. It opened and she entered the living room, hollering out as loud as she could, “Hey, Mrs. Doyle, are you home? It's me, Taylor. Can I talk to you?”

The navy blue sheets Mrs. Doyle used for curtains were all drawn shut and the room smelled of stale Pall Malls and Wild Turkey. Taylor felt her stomach lurch at the familiar odor. The front door had closed behind her and she could hardly see without the morning light. She took a few steps toward the kitchen. “Mrs. Doyle,” she called. “Are you home?” She heard a bump in the back bedroom where Ryan was locked up in the closet. Then something moved right beside her and she jumped at the sight of Mrs. Doyle sitting silent in the center of the room.

Inside she screamed and ran, but out loud she stayed and said, “Oh, Mrs. Doyle, you scared me. I'm sorry to bother you. I didn't know you were sleeping. My mom asked if I could come over and maybe borrow some margarine. We're getting ready to make some French toast. You ever made French toast? My mom said you might know how.”

Mrs. Doyle glared past her, stood up, and slowly made her way into the kitchen, steadying herself on the back of the old grey sofa. Taylor followed behind, smelling before she actually saw them the crusty dishes and pans, the open, half-empty cans of Chef Boy-Ar-Dee and SpagettiOs littering the table and countertops. Over in the corner she saw Sean sitting on the floor with the baby, tearing off crusts of Wonderbread, making up hard little balls with the white insides, placing them carefully in patterns only his eyes could see. Sean rolled the doughy balls back and forth on the floor while Bobby patted around on the pile of discarded crusts. Mrs. Doyle handed Taylor half a stick of margarine. The girl took it, flinching slightly at the touch of Mrs. Doyle's clammy hand, feeling how soft and warm the margarine was even though it had just come out of the refrigerator.

Mrs. Doyle glared at her. Taylor knew she was supposed to leave, but it hadn't been ten minutes yet. “So, do you know how to make this stuff?” Taylor asked. “I think you put the bread in eggs and then fry it up, but I'm not sure. Have you ever made French toast?”

Mrs. Doyle walked slowly past Taylor into the living room. Taylor had never seen her like this, hollow and mute, like something out of the
Night of the Living Dead
. The girl knew she had to do something to keep Mrs. Doyle from walking back down the hall to the closet room. Rushing around in front of her, Taylor blocked the hallway, stopping in front of the room she knew David slept in.

“Is David up yet?” Taylor asked. “Can I take him out for a walk today?” She looked into the room, swallowing the bile that rose in her throat. David was lying on a pile of old sheets, having attempted to crawl away from the corner where he had shit. Taylor grabbed his wheelchair, making as much noise as possible. “Can I help you get him dressed?” she asked.

Mrs. Doyle sat down on the edge of the bunk bed Ryan and Sean slept on. Hunched over, she stared at her hands, as if she were trying to remember something. Taylor grabbed some dirty clothes off the floor and started dressing David, wiping the rest of his shit off onto the sheets. By the time she got him into his chair and out the door, she figured it had to have been enough time for Mike to tend to Ryan.

Taylor wheeled David down to the park, where she knew Mike would come looking for her. Settling, Taylor leaned up against the base of her favorite tree, pressing her cheek into the warm, rough bark. She chewed on a handful of long grass she had picked up on the way. By the time Mike found her, she was holding onto the thick tree, puking.

Mike put his hand on her shoulder. “Come on, let's work his legs some, okay?”

Late that night Taylor woke to the methodical sound of pumpkin blows and silent cries. She knew by the sound of creaking metal that it was David being hit. She thought of his crimson red headrest. She thought of the train sounds he made in the Sears' customer service area.
Woooo woooooo wooooo
. She thought of the way her fingers fit so perfectly in between his ribs at the city pool as he flapped and splashed around. She thought and thought of something she could go borrow. She looked at the alarm clock by the side of the bed. It was three in the morning. Each metallic blow rocked through her slight frame, pinning her down. She tried to swing her legs over and get up out of bed, but they felt like cement blocks. She could only move her arms; her eyes thrashed wildly in her head. She felt a huge boulder crushing into her chest, letting in only the thinnest stream of air. “
Oooooo. Ooooooo.”

She lay there for a long time until the pumpkin sounds stopped and the dawn broke. Then she lay there some more. Around ten the next morning she heard the wailing cry of a siren rush up next door. Standing on shaky legs, Taylor looked out her bedroom window. Mr. Doyle's car was still not there. She saw three medics run into the Doyles' house and then emerge slowly, wheeling something on a cart. She heard muffled voices. Sliding down out her window, Taylor crouched in the bushes, watching the small gathering of neighbors in front of David's house.

“What happened?” asked one.

“That crippled kid fell out of his chair and hit his head,” answered another.

“Just a damn shame.”

Hair wrapped up tight in lime green curlers, Mrs. Jablonski set her coffee cup down on the sidewalk, pulling rosary beads out of the pocket of her orange floral robe. “Yes,” she said. “A shame but also a blessing. God has finally brought deliverance to that poor sick boy trapped inside that simple brain and useless body.”