At the new place (and every place was the new place, until they left, when it became the old place), Sarah was assigned to clean. She did not mind. She preferred to keep her hands busy so her mind would stay quiet. She cleaned at the old place. At a few of the old places. Cleaning was better than whatever it was her mom did all day. Talking? Crying? Feeling her stupid feelings? Cleaning was real. Cleaning had a before and after. Unmistakable evidence. You could see it, right there in front of you. You could feel the warm dishwater. The softness of the clean clothes. Real.
It was like Sarah’s dad said once, when she was a little kid. He was making her breakfast before he went to work. He must have made her breakfast many times, but she could not remember any of those times, only this one time in particular.
“Do you want butter on your toast?” Even asked.
“Yes,” she said.
He brought her plate to the table. Where was the butter? She didn’t see any butter. Even explained, he had buttered the toast, but the toast was warm, so the butter melted, soaked into the bread so you couldn’t see it anymore, but it was still there. She would taste it as soon as she took her first bite.
“No,” she cried. “I want butter!”
Even slathered the toast again. Cold thick pats, unmistakable icebergs of butter. Sarah was satisfied.
“You’re one of those people who have to see it to believe it,” he said. “Nothing wrong with that. A pretty good way to be.”
For the first time in her young life, she experienced the awareness that her dad loved her. He had always told her he loved her, but she never felt it in her body, never knew it, until then. He usually kept a distance, as though he was watching her in a zoo—interested, entertained, but careful not to get too close, no hugs, no kisses, no tickles, no kind words, no spontaneous affection. With the toast, she had proof, proof of how he really felt. He didn’t say, come on, you’re being silly, go ahead and eat it. He saw what she needed, and he respected it. What else was that but love? It melted into her until she glistened.
It was the last time she would ever see him.
Sarah knew you could not judge true character until a few months passed and you could see what was on the other side of the smile.
A girl showed Sarah where to go, to clean. There was a girl like her at the old place. A girl who had been there longer, who knew how things worked. A girl who seemed friendly enough, but Sarah knew you could not judge true character until a few months passed and you could see what was on the other side of the smile. This girl didn’t say much of anything. Colby, her name was. They climbed a gravel driveway to the main road, an empty two-lane highway. Instead of cars there were pine trees as far as Sarah could see. They crossed the street and up another gravel driveway until they were out of breath. Sarah’s backpack flattened the sweat against her shoulders. At the top was a big house and a wide lawn. It was sleek and modern, much nicer than the other buildings at the new place.
“Does the leader live here?” Sarah asked.
“No.” Colby clicked a code into the front door keypad. “It’s a vacation rental.”
They got to work tidying up after the outgoing weekend tenant. Sarah fell quickly into the rhythm of spritzing sprays, the comforting dishwasher thrum. How satisfying it was to make order out of mess. She wiped the tall glass wall that peered over the river valley. There was a huge bird shit smeared down one window, but it was outside and far too high to reach, even if there had been a ladder. It loomed in the sky like a green-black meteor streaking towards the distant hills. Taunting her, a reminder that certain messes hung right over your head that you could not fix. Your parents’ marriage. The loss of your dad. Whatever was going on with your mom. The stark exhaustion of your rootless, friendless life. You stood there with a rag in one hand and unquenchable frustration in the other. The invisible pane between you and peace.
Sarah scraped a slimy condom off the side of the kitchen trash can. Adults were generally gross and here was more evidence. They could get a dick into just about anything but they couldn’t get a single condom into the gaping mouth of a trash can. She had never had sex and she was already disenchanted by its aftermath. An abandoned condom or an abandoned child. Take your pick. An older girl at the old place had told Sarah everything she needed to know, had passed down the carnal folklore in one long soliloquy. The older girl taught her how to embroider, too. The needle pricked up. The needle pricked down.
“Up and down, like you-know-what,” the older girl teased. After her lesson, Sarah knew running stitch, satin stitch, chain stitch, back stitch, missionary, doggy style, cowgirl and reverse cowgirl. With her new vocabulary she had finally been able to interpret the sounds coming from her mom’s room, from all her mom’s rooms, from all the old places. She stitched the image in her head: Azza’s legs bent, a man squishing himself into her, the sideways flopping of breasts. After the bedthumps and grumbles, her mom would burst in and wake up Sarah who pretended to be asleep, ranting about how blessed she was to have a daughter, and she’d rub her nose raw from whatever she had snorted, and declare how much she loved her, she had it all figured out, it was all coming together, they would buy a house and find a real school and finally get down to living.
“The world can be a terrible place,” Azza would muse. “That’s why I only ever wanted one child.”
Sarah and Colby carried armfuls of streaky sheets to the laundry room in the basement. Colby showed her which settings to use on the washing machine, and how much detergent, and how to add a scoop of sodium percarbonate to stop the well water from staining everything orange with iron. She was impressed with Colby’s efficiency.
“If you start the laundry first,” Sarah said, tentative, not wanting to offend. “If you start it before you clean the rest of the house. Then you don’t have to wait around for it to finish.”
“Or,” Colby said, equally tentative. “If we do the laundry last. We can stay here and hang out for another couple hours. Without any adults.”
Colby grinned and the washing machine clicked shut and Sarah’s mind was made up. She liked this girl. She was not a goody two shoes or a snitch. Not like the older girl who taught her about sex and embroidery, who ended up ratting her out when she stitched FUCK THIS in curlicue letters. Colby would not be like that. Colby understood how it was. The power of a tiny rebellion in your pocket. The small freedoms that kept you sane. The word friend beat in her chest but she tried not to get too excited. She had been let down so many times before. She would not be conned again by hope. With great pleasure, she pulled the lint trap from the dryer and scratched out the gray fuzz with her fingernails. The tuft was mouse-soft. She cupped it in both hands, like a nest of tinder for an imminent fire, and carried it gently upstairs and laid it in the trash can, right on top of the condom, blocking it from view.
The girls sprawled out on the massive sectional in the living room to wait for the washing. Sarah had not been in a house so luxurious before. The sofa was real leather. She could see the whole valley through the windows. The twists of the river. A bridge. An inflatable raft floating downstream. Big dark birds circling higher and higher. She pretended not to care about the giant shit-streak hovering above it all. She took her embroidery out of her backpack. She never went anywhere without it. Up and down, in and out, Sarah’s needle fucked the canvas. A hundred stabbing penetrations, framed in a neat wooden hoop.
“Can I see?” Colby asked.
She held it up. There was a snake and the words KILL ME.
“That’s wonderful.”
“Thanks.”
Sarah made a lightning bolt with a neon pink satin stitch. She rubbed her finger over it, the satisfying sensation of smoothness.
Sarah made a lightning bolt with a neon pink satin stitch. She rubbed her finger over it, the satisfying sensation of smoothness. Her mind loosened with each taut pull of the thread. Up and down. Up and down. She bordered the hoop with a green running stitch. A dashed line. Porous, like the line on the highway. Passing allowed. You could slip right through it. Like your father slipping through your fingers.
Sarah often thought of running away. In the old place she yearned for a rescuer, but nobody was coming for her. Her dad was dead. She had nobody else. If she wanted to go she would have to go alone. It would be easy to leave. She could follow the road for miles. Where would she end up? That was always the question. A dashed line was a trajectory but she had nothing to aim for. He had been right. Sarah needed to see things to believe them. She needed to see the needle going through the canvas, she needed to see the stains washed out of the sheets, she needed to see inside her mom’s cosmetics case to make sure there were no hidden pills. And she needed to see a future before she could run towards it.
Bizzy Coy’s writing appears in The New Yorker, McSweeney’s and Vulture. She recommends Amparo Dávila’s The Houseguest and Other Stories, translated by Audrey Harris and Matthew Gleeson.
