but not living with his wife and it was the
wife who wanted the separation, the wife who had asked me to leave,
kicked me out, fortunately both their children were adults now
and capable of assessing the situation for themselves, a man like The Senator
with a love of life a love of people both men and women a zest for meeting new
people for exchanging views an appetite for... perhaps it was appetite itself.
Biting,
sucking the very marrow. Thrusting yourself into it to
the hilt. Christ how otherwise do you know you're alive?
Mr. Kelleher understood, it seemed. Yes Daddy you'd be a goddamned hypocrite not to.
Mrs.
Kelleher was upset, distraught. Kelly squirmed with guilt seeing that look in
her mother's face but it made her fucking angry too. Mommy
just stop thinking about me, that way I mean. My girlfriends'
mothers—they handle it perfectly well.
The
difference is, Kelly, I love you.
Oh
hell. Give me a break.
I
love you, I don't want you ever ever to be hurt Kelly
that's the one thing I want to shield you from, that was my thought... you might
not believe this but that was my actual thought... when they gave me to you, in
the hospital when you were born, and I knew you were a girl and I was never so
happy in all my life before or since, I vowed I would never let my daughter be
hurt as I have been hurt I will give my life for her I swear to You God.
Mommy
was crying, and Kelly was crying, turning her head from side to side spitting
and gagging, tasting the oil, the gasoline, the sewage, not entirely certain
any longer where she was, why her spine so twisted, both her legs twisted, she
was upside down was she?—in the dark not knowing where is up, the pressure of
the black water on all sides now, churning, rising, eager to fill her mouth,
and her lungs.
Saying,
relenting, All right Mommy I guess so. Yes.
Take me home from here Mommy. I'm here.
It
was not clear whether Mr. and Mrs. Kelleher had been summoned to the scene of
the accident and were standing now on the embankment as the car was being
lifted out of the creek; or whether they were already at the hospital, waiting
outside the emergency room. Kelly was puzzled too seeing their faces not as she
remembered them, but so young—so attractive. Her own age?
Mommy
such a beauty, her face unlined, her eyes so clear—and that stiff-glazed
bouffant hair, so silly so regal!
Daddy
so handsome, and so lanky!—and his hair, my God his hair, thick and curly and
coppery-brown like Kelly's own, as she had not seen it in years.
Yes
she'd loved them all her life even more now in her own precarious adulthood
than previously but how do you say such a fact?—how choose the words?—and when
of all occasions should they be uttered?
Mommy, Daddy hey I love you, you know
that I hope, please don't let me die I love you, okay?
She
was running in her little white anklet socks on Grandma's prickly carpet having
kicked off her shiny new patent-leather shoes, squealing giggling as the quick
hard hands swooped from behind to lift her, it's
always a surprise how hard, how strong another's hands are, a man's hands, and
he cried Who's this! who's this! mmmm who's this little angel-bee
who's this! lifting the kicking
squealing child high above his head so his arms trembled and afterward she
overheard Mommy and Grandma scolding him about his blood pressure, what on
earth are you doing you might have dropped her.
He'd
winked at her. Grandpa loved her so.
And
now she tasted cold, and the unspeakable horror of her situation washed over
her: if the black water filled her lungs, and she died, and the news came to
her parents and grandparents, they would die, too.
Oh
God no, oh no. That can't be.
They
loved Kelly so, they would die, too.
Except realizing then suddenly, a bit
of relief: Grandpa Ross was dead, himself—so he'd be spared,
knowing.
And
maybe they would not need to tell Grandma?—Kelly saw no need, frankly she saw
no need.
Mommy you see my point don't you ?—