Free Irma Voth by Miriam Toews Page A

has to get back and I’m worried—
    Now you’re worried, said Diego. First Marijke, now you. You girls are professional worriers, I’ll say this.
    I’m not going back, Irm, so don’t worry your pretty little head over me, said Aggie.
    You don’t know that expression, I said.
    You don’t know everything, said Aggie.
    We’ll stop and buy some food and it’ll be green and good for your anemia, said Diego.
    Not mine, Marijke’s, I said.
    Okay, said Diego. I could make it myself but José and I have paperwork to fill out and the guys are still feeling a little sick. Plus, I promised in their contracts there would be meals and I’m worried about a mutiny. Please, Irma, I really need your help.
    I didn’t say anything. I waited to feel that old familiar pain in my chest, my cue to continue.
    I’ll do it, said Aggie.
    No, you won’t, I said. She can’t.
    Why not? said Diego. It makes no difference, you or her.
    I want to do it, said Aggie.
    No, I’ll do it, I said. It’s fine. No sweat.
    Aggie started to say something to me in German, but Diego cut her off in English. You and Aggie can sit in the cab with José and me, said Diego. Marijke will drive with Alfredo.
    What? I said. I told you, remember, that Marijke doesn’t want to drive with Alfredo. She’s worried that—
    It’s all right, said Diego. I talked to Alfredo. I ran four times around the pasture with him and afterwards he was healthy.
    José opened the passenger door for Aggie and me and we got in. Oveja jumped up and down throwing himself against the window, crying and howling. Aggie said we had to let him in and Diego said no, not possible, he had to ride in the other truck and Aggie said fine, let her out then, but the other truck had already taken off so Diego had to let Oveja ride with Aggie. The truck got stuck in the muddy field and we had to push ourselves out and José helped but fell and was covered completely in mud and very angry because he hadn’t brought extra clothes from Mexico City. We had to stop all over the place to buy supplies, food and water and beer and gas and some new pants for José.
    Aggie and Oveja and I sat on a box outside a store in Rubio and looked around. Aggie couldn’t remember the last time she’d been to town. She was making some jokes and goofing around but I was trying to ignore her. Did you know that there’s this country that nobody really knows about that’s kept in an office building in Paris? she said.
    A girl wandered over to us and asked if she could sit down too, and we all moved over a bit and waited. She didn’t look much older than Aggie. She was drinking some juice out of a plastic bag. She told us her name was Lindsay Beth and that she was from Indianapolis. We told her we were Irma and Aggie from nearby and that the dog was Oveja.
    Why are you dressed like that? she said. We shrugged and looked around some more. That a pit bull? she asked. We nodded.
    Are you here all by yourself? said Aggie.
    Yeah, she said. They had to keep me in a cage.
    Who kept you in a cage? said Aggie.
    Rehab, she said. She told us they had thrown a box of soap in her cage and she was supposed to use it to carve her urges into shapes and she’d carved a giant key.
    I would kill for OxyContin, she said.
    Then how are you allowed to travel all by yourself? I asked her.
    It’s about establishing trust, she said.
    What is OxyContin? said Aggie.
    This is the last time my parents are going to bail me out, said Lindsay Beth. I’m not actually by myself.
    She was wearing pyjama bottoms that said dark side of the moon all over them. A little boy who had been playing around in the dirt came over and practised his reading on her legs. He poked at her pyjamas. His small finger traced the words. Dark. Side. Of. The. Moon, he said. Dark side of the moon. Dark side of the moon. Dark side of the … He pulled the fabric a bit where it had crinkled … moon.
    This is my brother’s kid, she said. We waved at him.
    Where’s your