The Opposite of Love (17 page)

43

CHASE

In between watching Walter chop green peppers and grate mozzarella cheese, Chase threw out bits of conversation like seasoning. “Somehow, I never pictured you cooking a three-course vegetarian meal.”

“Somehow, I never pictured you just standing there watching me cook a three-course vegetarian meal. Come on, get your hands dirty,” Walter said, holding out an onion to Chase with a lopsided grin. Lex had informed Walter that all she wanted for her birthday was a home-cooked vegetarian meal.

“Oh, thanks. Give
me
the onion. You just don't want me to see you cry.”

“Right as rain,” Walter tossed out jovially, not bothering to look back. “Come on, now. Haven't we ever cooked together before?”

Chase heaved himself up from the kitchen stool. “Are you kidding me? First of all, the most I ever saw you cook was boiling macaroni or barbecuing hot dogs. And second of all, cooking
together
or doing anything
together
would mean we actually talked to each other. I don't think you and I had conversations longer than two minutes, max. And third of all, most of our conversations were you lecturing
to
me or yelling
at
me, not a back-and-forth kind of thing.”

“That's how you remember it?”

“That's how it
was.
” Chase took a breath, feeling braver by the minute. “I don't know what happened to you, but you're completely different.”

Walter turned away from the counter and looked straight at Chase. “I guess I wasn't a very good father.”

“You were mostly a shitty father.” Never before would Chase have dared to say such a thing to his dad, let alone say it when there were knives anywhere within reach.

“
Mostly?
” Walter asked seriously. “That means I did something right?”

“It's all relative, no pun intended.” Chase leaned back onto the stool for support, the onion still in his hand. Suddenly, he felt hot both inside and out. “You beat me like a dog. You scared me shitless. I watched you break my mother's arm more than once. There were times I thought you were going to kill one of us.”

“I don't remember very much of that,” Walter said, looking a little sad. “The drinking was so constant back then that I lost days at a time. I blacked out.”

“I don't want to knock this recovery thing. But it's
bullshit
to put it all off on that.
You
did those things to us.
You
did. Maybe the alcohol helped, but
you
did it.” Chase could feel his blood rushing to his face and angry tears building up behind his eyes.

“That's fair, I guess.” Walter looked cornered, but resigned. “All I can say is that your childhood and my childhood were not that different. My pop drank like a fish and came after us as long as he could stand. I left home when I was about your age, and I never looked back.” His eyelids seemed heavy.

“As much as I hated him, he was the only father I knew. I suppose I told myself I was teaching you to be a man. But a part of me knew I was out of control. When your mom was pregnant with Daisy, I got after her real bad one time … ” His voice broke.

“I remember.”

“And I–I guess I sort of woke up for a minute and realized I was turning into my father and I tried to pull it together, honest I did.”

“I remember that too.”

“My thinking was all backward and upside down, Chase. I guess I kind of got high off it, off the adrenaline, or something. I can't explain it. Shit. I don't even understand it myself.” Walter ran his fingers through his hair, forgetting the bits of chopped green pepper on his hands, which now decorated his shaggy waves.

“I hated you for it.” Chase wished he
was
cutting the onion, because his eyes were tearing up.

“I hated me for it too.” Walter probably wished he'd held on to the onion himself, because his eyes were also full with tears. He waited for a moment, breathing heavily. “Do you still hate me for it?”

That Chase had to think about. “Yes and no.” He sighed carefully. His chest felt tight. “I hate you for putting us all through that. I hate you for leaving us and for not helping us out with money. But I don't hate the person you are now. I don't really understand who you are now, but I don't hate you.”

“I hear you.” Walter brushed his hands together to clean them off. “I made so many mistakes I can't even count them. But I can't change them either. All I can do is try better from here on out. I beat myself up about them for a long time after I left you guys. But that only made me want to drink more. When I finally got involved with the twelve-step program, I met other people in my situation, and I felt like I got to start with a clean slate. Now, I'm just trying my best every day. It's not easy, because I think I'm a rage-aholic just like I'm an alcoholic. I have to constantly work to keep it in check.”

Chase heard himself say, “I hit my mother.” The words hung heavily in the air.

“I know.”

“I don't ever want to be you—the old you.”

“I don't want you to be me either. Half the time, I don't want to be me myself.”

Chase turned around then, because it was too hard to look Walter in the face. He braced his upper body against the counter, leaning his head down toward it. “Why did you contact me? Why did you want to share custody after all that time?”

“I was ready. It was time. I wanted to try to repair things.”

Chase whipped around, his face wet. “
Bullshit
. It was because of the child support.”

Walter stepped suddenly closer and Chase instinctively shrank back. Walter stopped short. “It was time, is all. I wasn't ready before.” Walter lifted his hands helplessly and dropped them down, like he didn't know what to do with them. “I had to be ready. Otherwise, what was the point? I'd just be right back where I started.”

“But I wasn't going to come! I was going to stay with my girlfriend—and you were going to let me.”

“I know. Just because
I
was ready to try to repair things with
you
, doesn't mean
you
were ready to repair things with
me
. I get that.” Walter turned back toward the counter and picked up the chopping knife. He hunched his shoulders. “Where I come from, we don't say things like I love you. But that doesn't mean I don't feel those things. I just can't say them.”

Walter worked in silence for a while, his back still facing Chase. The room seemed like it was spinning, for all the water in Chase's eyes. He stood there like a fool until Walter sniffled. “Cut that onion, already, why don't you? I can't have Lex walking in on us all weepy and shit.”

So Chase did.

44

ROSE

Rose had never seen so many cans of tuna fish in her life. Stacked one on top of another in the pantry, like the Parsimmons were preparing a tuna-fish survival kit for the next big earthquake. Rose stood there, mouth open for a moment, until she heard Mr. P. scrape his chair against the kitchen floor behind her.

He cleared his throat. “They were on sale,” he explained. “And I, uh, noticed you've been eating a lot of tuna fish in your room.” Rose whirled around and eyed him, trying to figure out what he meant. He couldn't possibly know about Nala, hidden in her room, could he?

Uncomfortable silence. “I like tuna fish myself,” he added. “Good source of lean protein. Good for my cholesterol.” He patted himself on the chest, and it was so corny that Rose almost groaned.

Rose grabbed a can and headed for the can opener, thankful she'd remembered to close her bedroom door. Nala had never ventured from her room, even the couple of times Rose had forgotten to close the door or shut her in the closet. It was almost as though Nala knew to be afraid.

Rose spun the can around the blade to open it, tipped it over the sink to pour out the tuna juice, and spooned out the wet tuna. As she carried the plastic plate to her room, aware of the concerned heat from Mr. P.'s eyes on her back, little bits of her plan peppered her thoughts.

1. She would not stay at the Parsimmons' forever.
2. She would not stay silent forever.
3. She would not stay depressed forever.
4. She would not allow them to keep her from her real mother forever.
5. She would do whatever it took to escape.
Whatever it took.

Granted, the plan was more like a wish list than an actual step-by-step strategy, but it made her feel like she was doing
something.
Even with the plan as inspiration, many days were lost to the darkness of sleep, so Rose knew she must still be depressed. There was one thing she knew for sure. An exit strategy was a necessity.

As strict as the Parsimmons were and had always been, they were stupidly naïve about the Internet. They had no idea how to set up parental blocks on the computer and were too proud to ask anyone for help. Not that Rose was visiting porn sites or anything like that. Just that she was researching for her plan, a plan she wanted the Parsimmons to know nothing about.

Logging on to the Internet made Rose feel more connected to the world. Even though she didn't respond to any emails or instant messages, she read them daily, often several times. Most were from Becca, with a smattering from Chase, and a bunch of spam.

At first it seemed like Becca was trying to apologize or connect in some way, but since Rose never responded, now Becca just sent jokes. And an e-card too, for her birthday mid-September. Sweet sixteen came and went with about as much excitement as a trip to the dentist.

How many shrinks does it take to change a lightbulb?
Sent at 2:55 p.m. No response from Rose, although it was fun trying to figure it out.

Maybe … a hundred because they just sit there waiting for the lightbulb to talk about its feelings, and any idiot knows a lightbulb doesn't talk. Or have feelings.

Maybe … two. One to listen, and one to nickel-and-dime you for every second on the couch.

Maybe … zero. A shrink couldn't figure out how to change a lightbulb any better than he could figure out how to change a juvenile delinquent like Rose. The lightbulb would go unchanged.

Give up? Okay here's the answer: Only one, but the lightbulb has to want to change. Get it?
Sent at 10:28 p.m.
I miss you, Rose. I thought you'd like that one. Here's to all the Parsimmons' money you've wasted by sitting like a lump in a shrink's office. Ha! Some shrink probably bought his wife a pair of new boobs for all of that.

That image made Rose smile, as she thought of old, saggy Dr. Gutman, the psychiatrist, with an old, saggy Mrs. Gutman, sitting there with big, old perky boobs, kind of like a cross between a Barbie doll and the nanny from
101 Dalmatians
.

For the last month Chase had been emailing her as well, sometimes with sappy Buddhist crap he must have lifted either from Daniel Stein or from Hallmark cards. Just seeing his name on the screen tugged at her heart, but she pushed it away. Of course she didn't respond to either of their emails. If she let either Chase or Becca back into her world, she'd only hurt them worse when she did what she had to do.

Rose relaxed as her fingers fluttered across the keyboard, accessing the Google search page. Time to research her plan. Nala climbed onto her lap, smelling of tuna.
Watch out, fur ball,
Rose teased,
or I'll cut you off from your supply. I know you're addicted to Bumblebee tuna.

The cat batted at her again, as if to ask,
Why, for the fifth time in one week, are you googling the word ‘Chumash'?

Rose raised one eyebrow at Nala, something she'd perfected in the mirror a week ago.
I know, I know, no one ever told me I have Chumash heritage. I just figured it out. I'm smart like that
. Rose knew she had to have some Native American in her because people always said she looked like Pocahontas or Tiger Lily. And she remembered her mother's face. Her strong nose. Her large eyes. The dark hair that hung to her waist, each strand fine, but so much of it that it looked thick and strong like an unbraided rope.

And Mrs. P. had that article on the Chumash hidden away in her secret Rose-info shoe box. The same box with the articles on prostitution. But it was the section on traditional Chumash jewelry that confirmed her beliefs. Because the photo of the abalone shell bracelet looked identical to the one she'd worn as a little girl.

Rose remembered how her mother had pulled the bracelet from the box she hid under her bed and wrapped it around Rose's small five-year-old wrist. “This was mine when I was a little girl, and now it belongs to you.” Mrs. P. later called it a trinket. But it wasn't a trinket to Rose. It was a treasure.

With time, though, Rose's wrist grew, and the thin string holding the bracelet together didn't. It got so that the string and the shells cut into her skin. It was then that Mrs. P. finally snipped it off, using a pair of sewing scissors, and threw it away. Mr. P. had to hold Rose down while Mrs. P. did it. They didn't understand that they were cutting away her mother. Memories slipping like the shells off the string. Rose wondered what that bracelet would have looked like to her today with her grown-up eyes. Would it now look dinky, like it had been bought from one of those quarter prize machines? Or would it still look and feel like a treasure?

Rose shivered, even though the air inside her room was not cold. She reread to herself what she'd already seen the last five times she searched the Web. Somehow it was comforting. The Chumash had been a hunter-gatherer tribe, a matriarchal society. They never wasted any part of an animal or plant they killed, and lived life in balance with nature. “Chumash” sounded soft and sweet when she whispered it to herself. It sounded mushy, like chocolate pudding.

Today a small number of Chumash lived on the Santa Ynez Reservation, she read. Others lived in cities along the coast of Southern California. Rose felt her heart skip a beat or two.

She looked around at the flowered wallpaper and all the pink that she'd known for over a decade. She looked at the charcoal sketches she'd tacked on her walls, one after another, each perfecting the image of her mother's face. Always within the pupil of her mother's eyes sat a baby girl, as if her mother was watching over her.

Rose sighed. Was she really going to do this? She
had
to, didn't she? Things would not get better for her with the Parsimmons. In fact, they might get much, much worse.