Last Night’s Goodbye, Chapter 3
hate is patient
hate will go to great lengths to pretend
to be love
hate will open doors for you
hate will apologize
hate will seduce and romanticize you
all the while planting infections of fear
to enslave you
to make you useless
hate’s greatest ambition is to make you nothing
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Sophie and Pimm lay in the same bed, facing each other, eyes closed, covers kicked to the floor. Sophia was wearing her favorite jean overalls with little pink lace flowers sewn into the straps. And Pimm was in a white linen dress, the one Lysan’s mom made out of scraps from her hope chest. Their hands and faces were smudged. Lysan knew I didn’t like them playing in the garage with the tools and gasoline, and he didn’t even bother cleaning up the evidence. I found my phone laying where it must have fallen from Sophie’s hand, wondering how late they’d been up watching old episodes of Duck Tails on Netflix. Or had they finished those and moved on to Rugrats? It was getting hard to keep track of what they were into anymore. I checked my texts, and found the girls had been filming each other in the garage. Perfect. Some evidence to confront Lysan with later.
I sat for a while, watching them sleep, no clue their mommy and daddy might not make it. I thought about them splitting Christmases, birthdays, everything, for the rest of their lives. I’d tell them, “You’re going to get two of everything. It’s going to be ok, I promise.” But then there would be the whispering at the school. St. Peter’s, one of the oldest private schools in the area, run by gossips and busybodies who would love to know about our marriage problems. I’m sure the other parents would stop wanting Sophie and Pimm to come to their kids’ birthday parties and overnighters. It didn’t ever seem to matter how hard I tried, how many tables I captained at their fundraisers, how many hours I volunteered for their endless causes. They would never like me, the pretty girl from Dallas who came from money. The girl who had kids young and made them feel old and ugly. They were just bitter from wearing their hair pinned back for the last 40 years and wearing loose fitting clothes that made them look like cross dressing mennonites.
Pimm stirred. She saw me staring and grinned. “Guess what I can do?” She blew raspberries in her sister’s face and burst into giggles.
Sophia jerked awake. “Gross.” She wiped spit from her face.
I tried to keep my composure, but couldn’t help but laughing.
“Classy,” I said, throwing blankets over both their heads. “Now get cleaned up for school.”
I hurried them out the door, grabbing the box of art supplies I’d put together for my volunteer work at the school. We crossed the street to the two car garage we rented to have more space to store all of Lysander’s shit. The door slid up, squeaking on the rusty rails. Two skinny guys with tattooed arms and necks were smoking in lawn chairs halfway down the block. The sight of people smoking when I was stressed always made me regret quitting. They stared at me. I wondered if they’d heard the gun shot. I wondered how many people had heard it, or if anyone called the police.
I called the girls to stop playing with their toys. Still the guys stared. We climbed in and I pulled the van out. As the door rumbled shut, I caught a glimpse of a sleeping bag and couple dozen stuffed animals arranged around it. The girls must have found the trash bag of toys I was planning to donate. They had at least a hundred stuffed animals, but parting with even one seemed to require a memorial service. The scene of those animals around the sleeping bag made me think of the way crowds gather when someone jumps from a building. Or the way crows peck at road kill.
In my mirrors I saw the guys in lawn chairs watch me until I was out of sight.
As my van rolled into the parking lot, I glanced at the church reader board to discover what insights it had for me today.
Jesus forgives you. Shouldn’t you too? And under that, Holy Water Two Packs. $12.
“Do you have your lunches?” I asked as the side door opened, it’s little motor hidden somewhere inside the wall sounding like it was about to give up the ghost. They nodded. “And your homework?
“Yep.”
They darted out and ran past Huma, Assistant Principal in charge of Art Class, Physical Education and K-4 grade volunteers. Her endlessly grimacing face was enough to make my hand search for a cigarette pack in my purse, only to remember for the second time that morning that I’d quit years ago
“Hi Ms. Bassett!” Pimm yelled as she ran past. The bitch didn’t even look at her, eyes locked on me, arms folded more tightly than the bun on top of her head. I grabbed the art supplies, shut the van’s doors with my remote, beeped it locked, and prepared myself for whatever Huma had come up with today to make me miserable.
“Can we skip this today?” I said. “I’m having a shitty morning.”
“I thought we agreed you were taking a break,” Huma said.
“We never agreed to that.”
“I asked Claire to cover Art class today.”
“But I already created the whole lesson.” I showed her the box of art supplies as evidence.
“I’m sorry, but we’ve made other arrangements.”
“What’s your fucking problem with me?”
“Adela! The children.”
“Fuck? It’s in Shakespeare.”
“No it’s not.”
“Well they hear it at Taco Bell.”
“Please, keep your voice down.”
“What did I ever do to you?”
“We’re not having this conversation again.”
I tried to push past her, but she moved in front of me. I saw Mr. Gerald, the principal, watching us from the door to the gymnasium. He looked even more constipated than usual. A few parents whispered to each other in the parking lot.
I looked at Huma. “Please. I worked so hard on this lesson.”
“Claire has something nice planned, I assure you.”
“The last time Claire lead art the kids came home with macaroni glued to photocopies of Jesus.”
“If our art classes don’t meet your standards, you can take that up with Mr. Gerald.”
“I just don’t understand why you don’t want me helping.”
“Please, it’s better if you go. Now.”
I turned, stunned, and slipped into the seat of my van. Sophie and Pimm were laughing on the swings with their friends. No one but the principal and a few parents seemed to have noticed the exchange. Huma stared at me, her feet planted exactly where I’d left her.
I realized with a twist of my stomach that she must have had already heard about the affair. But how could she have found out so quickly? I couldn’t believe they would punish me like this. But Huma had always hated me. She hated that my art lessons were better than the teachers they paid. She hated that I was married and she was divorced. When she saw Lysander with me to drop off the kids she would meet us in the parking lot, have something she wanted his opinion on, and talk his ear off all the way into the school, looking up at him with big brown eyes and wanting smile.
Slowly and sickly the thought grew on me that Huma could be her—the woman fucking my husband.
Tears formed in my eyes as I turned the ignition and spun gravel.
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Complete list of chapters here: Last Night’s Farewell
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