Best Kept Secret: A Novel

Though he told me not to expect to hear from him unless something significant came up, when there’s no immediate word from Scott about my joint meeting with Martin and Mr. Hines, I become even more twitchy and unsettled. Working at the restaurant and getting the house cleaned up and ready to sell does help, but there are still too many hours in the day where my mind wanders into dangerous places. I worry that my mother’s silence means I’m not going to like what she has to say. I worry that treatment won’t make a difference, that Mr. Hines has already made up his mind and is simply going through the motions to make his decision look impartial.

“You don’t know that,” Nadine tells me when I call her and tell her my fears. “And you can’t control what he’s thinking or what decision he’s going to make. The sooner you come to peace with that fact, the better. When I get as wound up as you are right now, the only thing that works for me is getting out of myself and doing something to help another alcoholic.”

“Help them how? Like clean their house? Or make them soup?”

“Sure, if you want. Or, you can just pick up the phone. Listening to what someone else is going through is a great way to quit moping around.”

I’m not moping, I think, but then realize she is right, which irritates the hell out of me. It dawns on me that I’ve spent a lot of my time over the past couple of years feeling sorry for myself for one reason or another—sorry that my career didn’t turn out the way I wanted it to; sorry that my marriage ended and that I couldn’t stop drinking. Poor pitiful me.

I decide to send Martin another e-mail about Charlie’s birthday party. E-mail feels safer than talking with him on the phone; something about the sound of his voice makes it difficult for me to keep my emotions under control. Charlie’s birthday is only six weeks away and if I’m going to convince Martin to hold our son’s party at Bouncy Land, I’m going to have to do it soon.

Dear Martin,

I understand that you and Alice want to have a low-key birthday party for Charlie this year. I just feel like we should maybe respect what Charlie wants, too, and he told me he wants to have his party at Bouncy Land. I’d also really like to make his cake—he wants the same chocolate mud cake I’ve made him every year. The one with all the gummy worms on it? It’s kind of a tradition.

I’m not trying to start an argument with you. But with all that is going on, I just want to give Charlie the birthday party he deserves.

As usual, I get Martin’s prompt response.

Cadence,

I talked with Charlie after our last e-mail about this. He told me he wants a backyard pool party at his omi’s house. So that’s what we’re going to do. Again, if you want to bring the goody bags for the other kids to take home, that would be great. But my mother is going to make the cake. I really don’t feel like we need to discuss this anymore, okay? See you later.

This is nuts. Why is he being such an ass? I suppose, like everything else right now, I have to find a way to let it go. Now if someone could just tell me how the hell to make that happen, I’d be fine.

Discontent and frustration weight me to my chair. Though I know I should, I don’t want to go to a meeting. Andi’s voice plays in my head: When I don’t want to go to a meeting is when I probably need to be there most.

I decide to do what Nadine suggested and call Laura instead, see if I can help her in some small way. I don’t understand why I’m sober and she’s not. We went to the same treatment classes, we did the same assignments. We wrote about our “losses” and “yets”—things we lost due to drugs and alcohol and things that we have yet to lose, but will if we drank or used again. Was her list of losses not significant enough? All I wrote for my list of losses was a single word: “Charlie.” The fear of that loss becoming permanent has been sufficient to keep me from drinking. Maybe Laura didn’t feel like she had anything left to lose.

She squeals happily when I ask if I can take her to dinner, telling me she’ll be waiting at the curb. Punching the address she gives me into my GPS, I follow the lulling, computerized instructions to a neighborhood not too far from Northgate Mall. The beginning of dusk drapes a misty purple curtain around me as I drive along; the feathery arms of towering evergreens fall black against the quickly fading sky.

I see Laura standing on the parking strip in front of a pale yellow, two-story Craftsman, as she promised she would be. She climbs into my car, leans over to hook a skeletal arm around my neck, hugging me to her. I catch a whiff of alcohol on her breath. Or maybe I didn’t. Maybe I just imagined it.

“Hey, lady,” she says. “It’s so good to see you.” Her voice is thin, tired, a mere shadow of the robust girl I first met at Promises. I am only a little over a decade older than Laura; still, I always feel rather maternal around her—something about the hard-ass but false shell she presents to the world, I think. Some part of me feels compelled to warn her against the long-term hazards of maintaining that kind of bravado.

I smile. “You, too.” I glance at her out of the corner of my eye as we drive away from the curb, attempting to surreptitiously assess her emaciated appearance. She wears a fitted, short-sleeved lavender T-shirt, exposing enough skin for me to see a collection of angry, abusive bruises splattered across her forearms. They stand out like piles of ripe berries smashed against a snow white blanket. The left side of her face, right beneath her eye, is swollen and stitched in a two-inch, crisscrossed, black-bloody line. I make a low, whistling noise. “What happened? It looks painful.”

She shrugs, fiddling with the controls of my stereo. Her fingernails are chewed to the quick; bloody, ragged skin frames each one. “I don’t remember, really,” she says. “The docs in the ER say someone beat the hell out of me.” She laughs, an empty, joyless sound. “Obviously. It looks worse than it feels.”

“I’m so sorry,” I say quietly.

“Don’t be,” she says. “You didn’t have anything to do with it.” She attempts a cheery grin. “Where do you want to eat?”

“You choose,” I say. “You look like you could use a steak.” And a couple gallons of ice cream, I silently muse. Daily, for a couple of weeks, at least. If she’s been drinking, maybe the food will help sober her up.

“I could use ten steaks,” she agrees. Her tone is flat, a pummeled thing.

It doesn’t take long to find a steakhouse back near the mall. As we walk inside, the low, soothing moans of Miles Davis’s Kind of Blue album pour out of artfully hidden speakers, rich and smooth, subtly muting the conversations of the other diners. Heavy velvet scarlet curtains line the walls, dim-lit candelabras and flickering hurricane candles only serve to add to an atmosphere of quiet intimacy.

I’m glad for this atmosphere, conducive to private conversation, even though I’m not entirely sure what to say to her. And yet, I want to ask her what happened. How did you get here? I’ll say. Tell me what I should do to keep from ending up in the same place.

“So,” I begin, haltingly. “How are you?”

She drops her chin to her chest, looks up at me from under dark, lifted brows. “You want the honest answer or the I’m-hooked-on-recovery, can’t-wait-to-get-well-again answer?”

“Honest.” I watch as she fiddles with a packet of Sweet’N Low, tearing it open and pouring it into a tiny white mountain on the table between us, then destroys it with a single swoop of her hand. She glances up at me.

“I’m all sorts of fuckered-up.” Her dark, almond-shaped eyes are ripe with a pain too big for her tiny frame to carry. Her words are slightly slurred. I tell myself she’s tired, that it can’t be anything else.

“Do you want to talk about what happened?”

“Why not?” She shrugs, then proceeds to take a couple of swallows of the giant Coke the waitress has set in front of her. She looks at me, takes a deep breath in, releasing it in a fast, hard push. “Well, William—that’s my ex, right?”

I nod.

“Okay. Well, he took me out, you know? I know, I know . . . Andi told me to stay away from him, but I really wanted to give him a chance.” She smiles wistfully, the innocence of her youth shining through an otherwise haggard appearance.

“He took me to this real nice place downtown, too,” she goes on, “all filled with candlelight and tablecloths and all that fancy shit, and I’m thinking, wow, look at this classy place, he’s trying to support me, I might really be able to kick it this time.” She gives another dry laugh. “Then he goes and orders a bottle of champagne. He was all, ‘C’mon, baby, you can have some, you’re addicted to the needle, right? One drink won’t hurt you.’” She swallows, shaking her head as though not believing the words that were coming out of her own mouth. “I said no at first, you know? I was strong. But then he poured the glass, set it in front of me, and the smell, it got to me. I took a sip, and it was like liquid relief pushing through my veins.” She looks at me, tilting her head in question. “You know that feeling?”

I nod. “Yes. Of course.” I would take a swallow of wine, feel it hit my bloodstream like a gush of warm water. If I close my eyes and imagine it, I can almost feel it again.

She nods, too. “So, the moment I got that feeling from the booze, I wanted to shoot up.” She gives me a heartbreaking smile. “William took me to that hotel we used to like to go to and we scored. We shot up for a few days. When we ran out, he called some friends of his over and let them have sex with me. He took their money, left to go score, and that’s when I got beat up, I guess. I vaguely remember saying no to the fifth one. That didn’t go over so well with him.” She gestures to the evidence of this under her eye, her tone flat, completely matter-of-fact. “After he was done, I called nine-one-one.”

“Oh, Laura,” I say, my throat constricting with tears. Horrible images are filling my mind: her sprawled out helpless on a hotel bed, scabby, disgusting men circling her like vultures. “Did you file a police report?”

“Nah,” she says, giving me a quizzical look. “Why would I?”

“Because they raped you?” I say, trying to keep the incredulity out of my tone.

“Oh. Yeah, well, it’d get thrown out, I’m pretty sure, even if they could ID the guys. There’s no physical evidence, since they didn’t rape kit me. They probably figured I’m just a junkie, turning tricks to score. Which, technically, I was. Not like I haven’t been arrested for that before.”

Aghast from this astonishingly unemotional dissection of her attack, I can’t think of a lucid response. Our server approaches, sets the dip in front of us, admirably avoiding too prolonged a look at Laura’s battered arms and stitched-up face. Laura digs into the dip, slathering a crostini half an inch thick before putting it in her mouth. My appetite is momentarily quelled by her story, so I only sip at my soda, trying to dislodge the heavy lump lodged in my throat. It only takes her a few minutes to demolish most of the appetizer on her own, washing it all down with the remainder of her drink.

“Yum,” she says, smiling. “That was tasty.” She looks at me askance. “What’s wrong?”

I don’t know how she can talk about being gang raped, beaten, and then eat, as though we were having a conversation about shopping for shoes. I shake my head, pressing my lips together, unable to verbalize the thoughts that are racing through my mind.

She sighs, reaches over to squeeze my hands with both of hers. Her fingers are bony, but her grip is strong, reassuring. “It’s okay, Cadee. I barely remember any of it.”

“Not remembering it doesn’t make it okay that it happened,” I say, gritting my teeth.

Our server places our dinner salads in front of us. “Can I get you two anything else right now?” she asks.

“Yeah,” Laura says. “I’d like a martini, please. A double, with three olives.”

“Of course,” the server says, then departs.

“Laura,” I say. “Do you really think that’s a good idea?”

She laughs, pulling her hands off mine, then leans back against the leather booth. “Why not? I already fucked up. What’s the point?”

I don’t know what to say. A strange panic swells in my belly.

Laura spears at her salad, lifting her fork, hesitating right before putting the bite into her mouth. “So anyway, I spent the night at Harborview, and then they kicked me out.” She laughs, takes her bite, chewing as she speaks. “And since I can’t afford Promises, I’m screwed. My mom won’t take me back in ’cause I used again, so I’m staying with a few chicks I knew from my last stint in detox. It’s supposed to be a sober house, but you know, whatever.” She rolls her eyes. The server brings the martini and Laura slithers her hand around it. She puts the rim to her mouth and takes two long swallows, draining half the cocktail glass.

“You can call me anytime, you know that, right?” I say, grasping at the only thing I can think to offer. “We can take a walk around Green Lake, or go to a meeting. I’ll come get you.”

She forces a smile, blinking back the tears, pats my hand. “Sure. That’d be great.” Fear is peppered across her face, though she fights hard to disguise it, lifting her jawline almost imperceptibly. She lifts the drink to her mouth again and finishes it.

Our server returns with our dinners and Laura waggles her empty glass. “Can I have another, please?”

There is an agonizing, sinking feeling in my stomach. I ache to offer her something, anything, but there is nothing more I can think of to stop her. I feel grossly ill-equipped.

“My mom’s such a bitch for not letting me move back home,” she says suddenly. Her words are coated with venom. “How am I supposed to kick this shit without her support? You know, because she didn’t have anything to do with my turning into an addict. Same thing like your husband.” She repeatedly pierces the same piece of lettuce over and over again, attempting more to maim it than eat it.

I pause, considering how best to respond. I don’t blame Martin for my drinking. I never did. Laura drew that conclusion on her own. No one made either of us do anything. No one stuck the needle in her arm. No one poured the wine down my throat.

The server delivers Laura’s drink along with our dinners. She gulps it down, like a parched man after crossing the desert, emptying it without setting down the glass. That’s it. I can’t stand it anymore.

“You need to stop,” I say. I want to pull the words back as soon as they leave my mouth. They’re only going to piss her off.

Her skinny shoulders twitch, as though she was trying to shake off something uncomfortable against her skin. “What?”

I lean in, try to grasp her hand in mine, but she yanks away. “I can’t be around you when you’re drinking, Laura. I didn’t know you were already drunk or I wouldn’t have picked you up.”

“I’m not drunk!” Her eyes are wild, indignant.

“Yes, you are.” My eyes fill. “I’m sorry, but I can’t be a part of this. It’s too hard.”

“Whatever. I need to go to the bathroom.”

She tries to stand up, pulling the tablecloth with her. I have to grab her untouched dinner plate to keep it from landing on the floor. As she stumbles toward the ladies’ room, I take a few deep breaths. I feel sick. Was that how I looked when I drank? How I spoke, smelled, acted? Is that what Charlie saw every night, his mother loose and out of control?

I pull my cell phone out and call Nadine. “I don’t know what to do,” I say when she answers and tell her what’s going on with Laura. “I don’t want to be around her when she’s drunk. It’s completely freaking me out.”

“Then don’t be around it,” Nadine says. “Put her in a cab.”

“I can’t leave her alone like that.”

“Why not?” Nadine is matter-of-fact. “She didn’t think about how her being drunk would affect you. She’ll be fine. You need to keep yourself safe right now, Cadence. Trust how you feel.”

A few minutes later our server approaches the table. “Your friend is getting sick in the bathroom,” she says quietly.

“Oh God,” I say. “I’m so sorry. Can you please call her a cab?” I hate myself for it, but I cannot take Laura home. It’s too much. I can’t have her in my car. I can’t handle it. This is horrible. This is not the night I had planned.

“There’s already one outside. They sort of count on this kind of thing happening on Friday nights.”

“Thank you,” I say, handing her a stack of bills from my wallet. “I’ll go take care of her.” I head toward the bathroom, only to find Laura spread out on the small couch in the waiting area. The hostess is looking at her like she is a disease. I squat down next to my friend, push her hair out of her face. She smells strongly of vomit and booze. I have to swallow back the gorge that rises in my throat.

“Laura?” I say. “Come on. They have a cab waiting for you.”

She grunts but doesn’t move. I stand up and sigh, reaching to pull her into a sitting position.

“Hey,” she slurs, lifting an arm in sloppy dismissal. “Leaf me ’lone.”

“I can’t. You have to get up.”

“Sleep,” she groans.

I look up just in time to see our server stepping over to help me. “Thank you,” I say, relieved.

“No problem,” she says. Together, we manage to get Laura to her feet and shuffle her out the door into the waiting cab. I give the driver her address, a stack of cash, and ask him to take good care of her.

After she is gone, sadness presses through my body as a physical ache. I bend at the waist, bowed by the kind of grief that will not allow me to stand. The server places her hand flat against my back. “She’ll be okay,” she says, I’m sure assuming my posture is due to worry over my friend. “Someone will get her well.”

I don’t have the heart to answer, to tell this woman how wrong she is. No one can do this for Laura. Or for me, for that matter. If she wants it, she’ll have to do it herself.