Two
1985
“What do you want to do when you grow-up?” Noah asked.
“I don’t want to grow up,” Cora said.
They were sitting on the hot sidewalk, shivering, trying to get dry. A delivery truck had smashed into a hydrant in front of their apartment complex shooting water into the air and spilling it down the streets. It had been over one hundred degrees every day since the Fourth of July, and the water had felt like a fountain from heaven. Noah, Mercedes, and Cora hadn’t wasted time getting in their suits, afraid the fire truck would arrive and shut the water down before they could change. Their shorts and T-shirts were drenched, their legs stretched out in front of them, highlighting the differences in their skin tones. Brown, white, and red—Cora burned so easily her nose was perpetually peeling. Noah didn’t burn, but his legs were white compared to Mercedes. Mercedes was normally golden, but in the summertime, she was downright chocolatey. Their legs looked like Neapolitan ice cream.
“I want to own a beauty salon when I’m older,” Mercedes said. She already had a name for it. MeLo—pronounced mellow—for the first two letters of her first and last names. Mercedes Lopez. MeLo. She thought it was the perfect name for a place where people went to relax and turn into butterflies.
“Why do you want to do that?” Noah asked.
“Because I like making people look beautiful. I love makeup. I love hair. I love clothes.” Mercedes shrugged. “And I like bossing people around, so I need to own it. Not just work there. What do you want to do?”
“I want to be a doctor,” Noah said, lying back, his eyes on the sky, his skinny arms folded behind his head. Cora and Mercedes immediately lay back beside him.
“I couldn’t be a doctor. I couldn’t look at blood all day.” Mercedes grimaced.
Cora shuddered. “Or bones. Or vomit.”
“I don’t want to be that kind of doctor,” Noah said. “I want to be a doctor who helps people with mental illness.”
“We’re eleven, Noah. What in the hell is mental illness?” Swearing made Mercedes laugh, so she swore often.
“Noah wants to help people who are sad. Like my dad,” Cora explained.
“And my mom,” Noah added. He turned his head and gave Mercedes a smile. “You make them look good on the outside, Mer. I’ll fix ‘em up on the inside.”
“Maybe I should go to beauty school too,” Cora mused. “Then I could work at your salon with you, Sadie.”
Mercedes shrugged. Cora forgot to brush her own hair half the time. Mer couldn’t imagine her styling someone else’s hair and being happy doing it. “If you want, sure. Wouldn’t you rather do something else, though?”
“I told you, I don’t want to grow up. It scares me,” Cora murmured.
“That’s because every grown-up you know needs a doctor like Noah,” Mercedes said. The Three Amigos Apartments were full of crazies.
“Your mom and dad don’t, Mer,” Noah argued.
“That’s because we’re Mexican. Papi says Mexicans are tough,” Mercedes said proudly, jutting out her chin.
“Then maybe when I grow up, I’ll be a Mexican,” Cora said. Noah and Mercedes laughed uproariously, and Mercedes sat up and looked down at her friend. Cora’s hands were folded over her chest, and her eyes were closed. Her red hair fanned out around her head and shoulders on the concrete, fiery in the sun, reminding Mercedes of the painting Abuela kept over her bed, the one of Our Lady of Guadalupe, her body surrounded by a holy glow. Cora wasn’t laughing, and suddenly, neither was Mercedes.
* * *
Noah read Viktor Frankl’s book, Man’s Search for Meaning when he was sixteen. He read it so many times the cover fell off and the pages came loose. The first half of the book chronicled Frankl’s experiences in a concentration camp, but the part that impacted Noah most was when Viktor described laboring in the forest near Auschwitz, believing his wife was still alive across the way in the women’s camp.
She wasn’t. But there was a moment when Viktor looked up into the sky and out into the cold beauty of the world around him, thinking of his wife, and he realized that the soul itself could not be incarcerated. He still had the liberty to love. He still had the freedom to hope, to experience joy and gratitude, even amid all the horror around him. The knowledge liberated him and kept him alive.
Noah thought of Viktor Frankl more in the weeks following Cora’s death than he’d thought about him in years. How ironic that he, too, would long for his wife, taken from him too soon, whisked into a Neverland where only God and his angels could see her face. He had not yet experienced his own liberation; his soul was chained to the earth by regret, and Cora was in the clouds. He was the same man, but his chest had been cracked open, his skin peeled back, and in the wake of Cora’s passing, he walked around with everyone staring at his gruesome, exposed heart, unable to help him, secretly wishing he’d go away until it healed.
He didn’t go back to work immediately; better not to subject the staff at Montlake to his chest wound. He would have to go back soon. Cora had a sizeable life insurance policy, but there was a suicide clause, and an investigation was being done. The person who saw her car go over the edge said she hadn’t even slowed. Noah didn’t want the money—it made him sick and sad—but he needed it, if only to buy him some time to figure out how to negotiate fatherhood without help. Maybe that wasn’t fair. He had help, though his helpers were sporting hearts almost as bruised and battered as his.
Cora’s mom, Heather, cried whenever she talked to him, and Noah was grateful for her preoccupation with her own bloody scars. It kept her from seeing his. Mercedes didn’t cry; her pain was more like an abscess, invisible to everyone else, but patently obvious to him. It would have to be lanced eventually, but she wasn’t letting anyone near her. She cooked and cleaned and made sure Noah didn’t run out of diapers and that his cupboards were stocked. She didn’t ask him how he was. She knew. They moved silently in each other’s orbits, solitary planets in a lonely galaxy.
Gia, in all her innocent oblivion, was his saving grace. It was only when he looked down into his daughter’s sleeping face, when he held her in his arms or saw her smile, that, like Viktor, he realized joy was possible amid terrible pain. Viktor had searched for meaning in his life. Noah didn’t have to look very far. Gia gave him purpose. She was his why when every day he woke up thinking, “what the hell do I get up for?”
Grief was greedy and depleting, and he could not take care of Gia if he allowed himself to wallow in it. His mother had done that. Wallow and wade, making the hole deeper and darker, until her grief became a warm cloak of excuses. Noah had been forced to grow up the moment Shelly expelled him from her womb. Her sadness had aged him.
He didn’t want that for Gia. So he bandaged up his oozing flesh and put his grief in the room where he kept bad memories and useless truths. He didn’t ignore it. He just didn’t change his dressings or open the door very often. When he did, he barely cracked it, reaching in for the bare minimum before ducking out again and pulling the door shut behind him. He kept his eyes averted from his mangled chest and faced each day in pieces and small parts, conquering the essentials one by one, and trying not to worry about anything unnecessary. He had to feed, change, clothe, and comfort, and he focused his efforts there.
He wasn’t especially skilled at diaper changing. He was ashamed to admit he hadn’t changed many in the first year of Gia’s life. He’d never gotten up with Gia in the night to feed her. The most he’d done was rise, take Gia from her crib, and pass her to Cora. He didn’t have the necessary equipment for breast-feeding, and Cora had been adamant about the ritual. But a month after Cora died, Noah could change a diaper and make a bottle and barely wake up to do it. No saggy bottoms and loose tabs. He diapered the way he’d learned to make his bed in boot camp. Tight corners, straight lines, everything tucked and smooth. It didn’t take long before he knew what temperature Gia liked her formula, before he knew what foods she would eat—mashed potatoes were always welcome—and which ones made her shudder.
Gia’s hair was another issue. It stood on end when it didn’t hang in her eyes. He found a little, pink barrette in the bathroom drawer, but she immediately yanked it out along with a handful of hair, and howled in pain. Noah fell back on what he knew. He got Gia’s hair wet, slicked it down with pomade, and called it good. Her hair didn’t move. Problem solved. That is, until Mercedes stopped by to check on them, took one look at Gia, and crossed herself like her abuela used to do. Mercedes sat them down in the kitchen, Gia in her high chair, Noah on a stool, and gave them both haircuts.
“If we cut Gia’s hair short, it will grow in better—no long pieces and bald spots. I told Cora a hundred times, but she wouldn’t let me do it. She couldn’t bear to cut it.” Mercedes stopped talking abruptly, Cora’s name dripping from the shears she held in her hands. With a deep breath, she began snipping, and Cora’s wishes fell to the floor with Gia’s baby hair.
When she was done, Gia’s hair was an inch long on the sides and maybe two inches long on top. Mercedes wetted it down and parted it neatly like Gia was going to the office. All she needed was a tiny suit and tie.
“She looks like a businessman.,” Noah murmured.
Mercedes rolled her eyes. “Like you can talk. The way you had her hair slicked back, she looked like Gordon Gekko from Wall Street.”
It was true, and Noah laughed. Mercedes’s head shot up like she’d missed the sound, and she flashed him a grin. A jolt of misery and guilt lanced his heart, and his smile fell away. Mercedes pretended not to notice.
“She looks chic. Like Twiggy,” Mercedes huffed. “We’ll pierce her ears if you want to make her look a little more girly.”
“And what was Cora’s opinion on that?” Noah asked.
Mercedes didn’t answer, though he guessed she knew. She swept up the wisps of blond hair from the tile and handed Gia her sippy cup and a teething biscuit, ignoring his question. Knowing Cora, earrings were a thumbs-down. Cora cried when Gia got her shots—every time—and Noah couldn’t imagine her wanting to poke holes in her baby’s ears unless it was absolutely necessary.
“Your turn, cave man,” Mercedes changed the subject. “That beard is only attractive if you can’t hide small, woodland creatures in it.”
He closed his eyes and let her have her way. She trimmed and snipped the hair on his head and the growth on his face, talking about this and that, about a new line of hair color she was selling in the shop, about the rising temperatures—finally—in Salt Lake City, and he just listened, letting her voice fill the quiet, answering only when necessary, growing drowsy in the safety of her hands.
“I’ve put you both to sleep,” she murmured. Noah opened his eyes and peered at Gia. Her head was drooping. Mercedes set her scissors down and tucked a stack of dish towels between Gia’s left cheek and the tray on her high chair, easing her to a more comfortable position. Mercedes resumed her ministrations, and his eyes grew heavy again.
“I’m leaving on Thursday, Noah. I’m taking that course I told you about—all the new innovations in beauty care, products, services, stuff like that. It’s in LA . . . remember? I get to work with industry experts—Hollywood hair and makeup artists—and I will be working on the set of that period movie. I hate to leave you and Gia right now, just when you’re going back to work. But I’ve been preparing for this for a year. I’ve got to go.”
Noah was suddenly alert. He stared at her blankly.
“How long will you be gone?” he asked.
“It’s a two-week course and another four weeks on set.”
Noah had no memory whatsoever of Mercedes planning to be in Los Angeles for six weeks. Panic bubbled in his healing chest. Cora had been gone for six weeks. Six weeks was a millennium.
“Who’s running the salon while you’re gone?” he asked. What he wanted to ask was, “Who will run my life?”
“Keegan,” she said, drawing his name out, as if trying to stimulate Noah’s memory.
“Who’s Keegan?” An image of a too-pretty, male stylist with white teeth and perfect hair flickered through his muddled brain. He didn’t like Keegan. But Mer seemed to get along with him well enough. She and Keegan were chummy. Keegan wanted to be more than just chums. It was obvious. So far, Noah didn’t think Mer had taken him up on it, but Cora had been convinced Mercedes would give in eventually. Noah hoped she wouldn’t. She deserved better than a pretty face and a hollow head.
“Noah!” Mercedes lowered her brow and pursed her lips, not sure if he was teasing. He was too morose, and his comedic timing was shot to hell. “You know Keegan Tate. He’s been a stylist at Maven for three years. I started training him to help me manage six months ago.”
“Sure. Yeah. Keegan Tate.”
“I’ll call. Heather will be here, and you know you can call Mami if you need anything too.”
Noah nodded woodenly. Mercedes had been training Keegan to help her manage the salon, but no one had had trained Noah to manage without Cora.
“I’m proud of you,” Mercedes whispered.
“Why?” he whispered back.
“You’re so strong. You’re such a good daddy, and you never complain.”
“What choice do I have?” he said. He sounded bitter, and he reached out a hand to his daughter’s freshly-shorn head and touched her hair in silent apology.
When Cora told him she was pregnant, he took a two-day furlough and got drunk. He wasn’t happy. He wasn’t excited. He was scared and angry. They’d talked about kids, sure, but it had always been something a long way down the road. He’d earned his associate’s degree when he was still in high school. It was cheaper that way. Four years after he graduated high school, he got his Bachelor’s degree in psychology. It would have been only two years, but he joined the Air Force reserves. Between Basic Training, Tech School, and a year in Kuwait, he lost a little ground. Marrying Cora at twenty-two had been a luxury he really hadn’t been able to afford. She’d just graduated and had her first teaching job, and between school, one weekend a month at Hill Air Force Base, a part-time psych tech job at the Montlake Psychiatric Clinic, and medical transcription jobs at all hours of the night, he’d had no time to do anything but breathe. He’d married her anyway.
Two years into his doctorate program in psychology, he’d picked up his Master’s degree. Two and a half years after that—at twenty-seven—he became Dr. Andelin. He’d worked his ass off to get there. Cora had worked her ass off to get him there. For seven years, he’d gone non-stop.
Then 9/11 happened. Noah had just finished his post-doctorate internship at Hill Air Force Base—a condition of his enlistment and his doctoral program—when he was deployed. A nine-month tour in Afghanistan at the National Military Hospital in Kabul.
One month after arriving in Kabul, he found out he was going to be a father. An email from Cora—Surprise!—had triggered a meltdown. He would miss Cora’s entire pregnancy. He would miss his child’s birth. Of all the things he’d expected during his deployment, Cora telling him she was pregnant was not one of them. He’d thought she was going to leave him. He’d braced himself for it. The deployment couldn’t have come at a worse—or better—time for their marriage. He figured the time apart would make or break them.
“Remember when you left for boot camp?” Mercedes asked, shaking him out of his private thoughts. She stepped back to view her handiwork, and something flickered in her eyes when she met his gaze. They both swiftly looked away.
“I remember.”
“Well, this course is boot camp for me. I’m not looking forward to it, but I’m committed. Thankfully, it’s only six weeks instead of nine, and there will be no running and weapons involved. I will also be able to call you every day—no letters required—okay?”
Noah saluted her, and she scooped pomade into her hands, rubbed them together, and styled his hair with the confidence and comfort of long companionship. Funny, he hadn’t thought about boot camp—or the day he left—in forever.
He and Mercedes had never talked about that kiss. It was the only time he’d ever kissed her, the only time she’d acted like she wanted him to kiss her, the only time she gave him hope. It was the kiss that came before Cora. Before he’d made a choice. Before Mercedes made the choice for him.
Mercedes wrote to him at boot camp, like she promised she would. But she didn’t ever mention the way they said goodbye, and how right that kiss felt. How good it was. How perfect. Mer, in her letters, was the same girl he knew at ten. The girl he knew at twelve and fourteen and sixteen. The girl who was as much a part of him as the palms of his hands or the heart in his chest. Something changed between them that night, no doubt about it. But Mer had hesitated. She’d turned back. She stepped away from the edge, and Noah didn’t want to fall in love by himself. So he climbed, hand over hand, back to the way things were before, and joined her on familiar ground.
Cora wrote to him too, long, lovely letters about philosophical things, and Noah discovered that he adored Cora on paper. He’d never been able to talk to Cora like he talked to Mercedes, but when she wrote, another woman emerged, and he saw her in a whole new light. Cora was a chameleon—colorful and quiet—becoming the girl she needed to be when the curtain rose. She wasn’t false; to say so would have been an injustice. She was adaptable and amenable. Sweet. Smart. And she wrote beautiful letters. She was convinced she loved him. He saw it in the curling words and the flowing phrases that filled her pages, and he began to feel things he hadn’t felt before.
He fell in love with Cora when they were apart.
Oddly enough, when he was deployed to Afghanistan ten years later, after six years of marriage, the phenomenon did not repeat itself. Mercedes was as constant as always. She sent chatty letters that made him laugh and packages filled with treats and silly gifts to pass the time—a joke book with the stupidest jokes ever written, boxes of trivia questions, a yo-yo, card games, and fake dog poop. He hadn’t had a yo-yo in years, but Mer reminded him that he’d been playing with one the day they met. Her letters were light and unchanging. The same Mer. His buddy. His pal.
Cora rarely wrote, and when she did, Noah didn’t recognize his wife. They weren’t letters from the girl who’d once captured him with her words.
Special arrangements were made for them to Skype right after Gia was born. Mer and Heather were there with Cora, who smiled weakly and asked Mer to hold Gia up to the camera so he could get a better look at his tiny, newborn daughter with her pink skin, downy fuzz, and fat cheeks. Gia’s cheeks were bigger than her whole head, and he’d laughed and cried, feeling the awe and the responsibility that fatherhood brings. He told Cora he loved her, and he’d meant it, convinced Gia would be the new start they needed. She said she loved him too, but he could tell something was wrong, and he felt it, even half a world away. He blamed it on distance and the trials of giving birth alone during a long deployment. They weren’t the first couple to go through it. They wouldn’t be the last.
He was home again two months after Gia was born, but Cora was struggling, and he didn’t know how to help her. She cried often and slept rarely. Her milk was plentiful, and Gia was content, but his wife was troubled. He asked a colleague—Dr. June from Montlake—to see her, thinking it would be easier for Cora to take advice and receive care from someone other than him, and Dr. June prescribed a mild anti-depressant. Cora was convinced it would be bad for Gia and refused to take it. Noah suggested a mother’s health was key to a child’s health, and that breast milk was important, but formula would do just fine if it meant Cora felt better.
“You’re a psychologist, not a pediatrician, Noah. You don’t have a medical degree. What do you know about it?” Her tone was weary, not angry, and he didn’t push it. Maybe he should have said he knew a lot about it. He’d had a mother who was clinically depressed, who suffered from debilitating anxiety, who rarely left the house in the daylight, and who died in her sleep a week after he turned nineteen. But hey, what did he know?
He sighed, rubbing his hands over his face, and watched Mercedes sweep up his hair clippings and tidy the kitchen. Mer never stopped moving, never stopped doing, and he wanted to beg her to stay, to cancel her trip, so he didn’t have to be alone. He was so damn lonely. So damn tired.
He rose and carefully removed the tray from Gia’s high chair. He needed to change her pants and put her pajamas on. It was bedtime—or close enough—but he was afraid he would wake her and be unable to get her back to sleep.
He unlatched the little seatbelt that kept her from slipping out of her chair and eased her up into his arms. Her diaper felt dry and maybe pajamas weren’t that important. A few golden clumps of hair were stuck to her back, and he felt a flash of panic. It was her first haircut. Was he supposed to save her hair? Didn’t some parents do that? And where did he put hair clippings if he saved them? Oh God, was he supposed to make a baby book?
“Feed, clothe, comfort,” he chanted softly. “Stick to the basics, let the other shit go.”
“Words to live by,” Mercedes said, drying her hands. She brushed a kiss on Gia’s soft head and, standing on her tiptoes to reach his scruffy face, pressed a sisterly kiss on his cheek.
“If you need me, I will come home. You know that, right?”
“I know that.” But he wouldn’t ever ask her to come home.
“I love you, Noah,” she said quietly.
“I love you too.”
“It won’t always hurt like this, will it?”
“You know the answer to that, Mer. We both do.”
“Yeah. I guess we do.”
She kissed his cheek again and let herself out. Noah climbed the stairs, put Gia in her crib, covered her gently, and tiptoed out. He showered quickly and fell across his bed, exhausted. But he didn’t sleep. Like he’d done every night since Cora died, he pulled a blanket and a pillow from his bed and slept on the floor near Gia’s crib, afraid he would sleep so hard he wouldn’t hear her, afraid she would cry and no one would come.