Read Online An Illustrated Death by Judi Culbertson - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: Judi Culbertson
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and a dozen pairs of shoes on a white wooden rack below. She closed the door again. “Sometimes I just come in here and cry. I don’t know what to do with anything.”
“It’s only been three months. It’s too soon.” I could barely speak myself.
“I had so many plans for her.”
Back in the living room we sat side by side on the couch. “I try to tell myself that it was better for her this way. I think about the years ahead, when I would have had to try and find a place for her in the world. I was worried what she might do to other children and all the rejection she would feel. And yet . . . I don’t believe it.”
We sat in silence, Bianca staring at the pink album she was holding again. “You know what the very worst thing was? I don’t know if I can even tell you without . . .”
“Go ahead and cry.”
“When Gretchen came to find me after it happened and we got to the pool, Rosa was wailing and the others were all kneeling around Dad trying to give him CPR. I couldn’t even see Morgan at first. Then I saw she was lying so still on the cement all by herself. Like a doll someone had forgotten to bring in. It was the end of her life and no one cared!”
In the next minute I was hugging Bianca, holding her while she sobbed and sobbed.
I felt something long-frozen start to thaw in me as well and then I was crying hard too.
Caitlin, Caitlin, Caitlin.
C HAPTER F OURTEEN
A F TER LEAVING B IANCA’S cottage it was hard to go back to the studio. The pleasures of that morning seemed far away, replaced by the sadness that was real life. I had things of my own I wanted to think about. I reminded myself that I would have all weekend to visit the past, but that now I had to finish assessing the books I had pulled out and tidy up the studio.
It was nearly six when I zipped away my laptop and looked around to make sure nothing was out of place. I left the burnt photograph in the fireplace.
Once I was out on Cooper’s Farm Lane the sun was nowhere in evidence and dusk had started to creep in. Automatically I switched on my headlights in the gloom, then realized that another car had pulled behind me from the side of the road, its bright lights flooding my mirrors like a rude gesture.
It seemed an odd coincidence that another car would be right in back of me on this deserted country lane. When Jackson Pollock raced down these roads in his convertible, killing himself and a young woman passenger, it was hours before anyone came by and discovered the carnage.
The mystery car hugged my fender like a magazine salesman. Blinded by its glaring lights, all I could tell was that it was a large, late-model black sedan. When I reached the sign at Sagabonac Road, I was too nervous to come to a full stop and kept going, thankful that there was no traffic from the cross street. It didn’t help that I felt wrung out emotionally from my afternoon with Bianca, facing once again how dark the world could be.
The car started beeping its horn rhythmically like an audience clapping for a matinee to start.
Drivers will beep at you sometimes to point out that you have a flat tire. But other times it’s a ploy to make you stop. On the highway to Pompeii from Rome one summer afternoon, three men in a battered green Fiat pulled up beside us and began honking and gesturing frantically. Colin glanced at them, then pressed the door lock button and drove faster. Our pursuers kept up the charade for several miles before falling away.
Think, Delhi.
I could pull into a driveway and try to get to a house. But the other car would be right behind me and by the time I got out of the van, I could easily be grabbed or shot. Call the police —except that my phone was in my bag on the floor and I’d have to stop the van to reach it. I’d heard that you should drive to the nearest police precinct and honk your horn outside, but I wasn’t familiar enough with this part of the island to know where that was.
The other car stopped
“It’s only been three months. It’s too soon.” I could barely speak myself.
“I had so many plans for her.”
Back in the living room we sat side by side on the couch. “I try to tell myself that it was better for her this way. I think about the years ahead, when I would have had to try and find a place for her in the world. I was worried what she might do to other children and all the rejection she would feel. And yet . . . I don’t believe it.”
We sat in silence, Bianca staring at the pink album she was holding again. “You know what the very worst thing was? I don’t know if I can even tell you without . . .”
“Go ahead and cry.”
“When Gretchen came to find me after it happened and we got to the pool, Rosa was wailing and the others were all kneeling around Dad trying to give him CPR. I couldn’t even see Morgan at first. Then I saw she was lying so still on the cement all by herself. Like a doll someone had forgotten to bring in. It was the end of her life and no one cared!”
In the next minute I was hugging Bianca, holding her while she sobbed and sobbed.
I felt something long-frozen start to thaw in me as well and then I was crying hard too.
Caitlin, Caitlin, Caitlin.
C HAPTER F OURTEEN
A F TER LEAVING B IANCA’S cottage it was hard to go back to the studio. The pleasures of that morning seemed far away, replaced by the sadness that was real life. I had things of my own I wanted to think about. I reminded myself that I would have all weekend to visit the past, but that now I had to finish assessing the books I had pulled out and tidy up the studio.
It was nearly six when I zipped away my laptop and looked around to make sure nothing was out of place. I left the burnt photograph in the fireplace.
Once I was out on Cooper’s Farm Lane the sun was nowhere in evidence and dusk had started to creep in. Automatically I switched on my headlights in the gloom, then realized that another car had pulled behind me from the side of the road, its bright lights flooding my mirrors like a rude gesture.
It seemed an odd coincidence that another car would be right in back of me on this deserted country lane. When Jackson Pollock raced down these roads in his convertible, killing himself and a young woman passenger, it was hours before anyone came by and discovered the carnage.
The mystery car hugged my fender like a magazine salesman. Blinded by its glaring lights, all I could tell was that it was a large, late-model black sedan. When I reached the sign at Sagabonac Road, I was too nervous to come to a full stop and kept going, thankful that there was no traffic from the cross street. It didn’t help that I felt wrung out emotionally from my afternoon with Bianca, facing once again how dark the world could be.
The car started beeping its horn rhythmically like an audience clapping for a matinee to start.
Drivers will beep at you sometimes to point out that you have a flat tire. But other times it’s a ploy to make you stop. On the highway to Pompeii from Rome one summer afternoon, three men in a battered green Fiat pulled up beside us and began honking and gesturing frantically. Colin glanced at them, then pressed the door lock button and drove faster. Our pursuers kept up the charade for several miles before falling away.
Think, Delhi.
I could pull into a driveway and try to get to a house. But the other car would be right behind me and by the time I got out of the van, I could easily be grabbed or shot. Call the police —except that my phone was in my bag on the floor and I’d have to stop the van to reach it. I’d heard that you should drive to the nearest police precinct and honk your horn outside, but I wasn’t familiar enough with this part of the island to know where that was.
The other car stopped
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