Chapter Thirteen: Kim

Kim believes in angels. She’s seen them, when she’s been high. Beautiful, terrifying, wingèd, comprised of light and a sacred geometry. It’s what she misses most about using, most out of all the many things she misses—the joy that overcomes her, a tidal wave submerging every other thought and feeling, when one of them appears. 

Even sober she can sometimes sense their presence. She gets an inkling. She detects a profundity in the room. A sudden assurance: all is well and all will always be well. 

There was an angel in the delivery room, when she gave birth to Desirée. Kim had been scrupulous during her pregnancy. Not a sip, not a puff, not a pill, not a line, not a jab. But labor was its own kind of drug. After twenty-six hours she was certainly high, and she could see it plain as day. An angel masquerading as the nurse who cut the cord, who lifted the child up from the doctor’s hands, swaddled her and brought her close for Kim to witness. 

“Would you like to hold her?” he asked. A beautiful young man. She could see the light trying to escape through his skin. What was he doing there in scrubs, there in the Hartford Hospital? He could only be there for the child. 

A blessing upon the child. 

“Would you like to hold her?” 

How do you say no to an angel? When she had imagined it, this strange, liminal time between the birth and when somebody from the agency would whisk the child away to her other, better life—her mystery life—Kim had been afraid that seeing the girl, holding her, hearing her cry and gurgle, smelling her—salt of the amniotic fluid, blood that was Kim’s blood, both earthy and oceanic—would maybe somehow confuse her. Would weaken her resolve. 

But the angel asked, so she assented. 

How warm! How wriggling! How loud the child wailed, then stopped and stilled. Pregnancy was miraculous, no doubt, in some technical sense of the word, but Kim had mostly experienced it as a horror. Had hated all the ways her body ceased to be her own. The aching, the cravings, the aversions, the swelling, the nausea, the despair, always needing to pee, never being able to get quite comfortable, a new symptom every week. A gauntlet was what she’d call it. But this! The child laid upon her chest, no longer kicking at her from within, but nestling close, eyes squinched shut, then blinking open: arctic blue…this really was a wonder. 

“Wow.” She breathed the word, a reflex. And what she also felt reflexively, though she didn’t say it, was, Thanks. Because to witness this vitality, to have been the agent of its becoming, in an instant she felt all that she had suffered—not just in pregnancy but in life—to be justified. Even though (she then supposed) she would never see the girl again, even though this would be all she ever knew of her, she knew it was worthwhile. 

“Wow.” Thank you. She hoped the angel knew her gratitude. 

But, of course he did. 

Patiently he stood by while time stood still, waiting as Kim gazed upon her daughter, flesh of her flesh, just taking her in, trying to memorize each detail. Curve of her nose, pitch of her cry, birth mark on her left temple. Kim did weep, but she never lost her resolve. The love she felt, so instant and absolute, only confirmed her resolution: that to care for this child she had to let her go. 

And so she did, yielding her to the angel, who, leaking light with every step, bore her away in his heavenly arms, the door swinging shut on his heel, and she didn’t see him again until she almost died, three years ago, the last time she resolved to get sober. 

Desirée has not asked, though Kim wishes she would, Why did you give me up? 

If she asked, Kim could explain it all. The way she had grown up, abandoned by her father, abused by her mother, promiscuous as a form of rebellion, using by the time she was twelve, addicted early to decisions that brought her pain. If she had asked, Kim could have said, I did it for love. And, I did it to save you. To save you from the monster that is me. To save you from a life like mine. 

But without the invitation, it feels burdensome to disclose these facts, to make such declarations. Besides, Desirée probably took one look around Kim’s mobile home and surmised as much. 

She’s been hard to read. She hasn’t offered much. Her presence proves there’s something she wants from Kim, but she’s made only one request, after the cops came looking for her, after Kim spoke with Tricia for two hours. Desirée asked if she could stay. “I can’t be anywhere else,” she said. 

Tricia and Tom, in a chorus over the speakerphone, granted their permission. “We don’t know what to do.” “If this is what she needs…” “If you’re okay with it all…” They offered to pay Kim for her trouble, an offer she flatly refused. But they agreed, the parents, that Desirée could stay in Manteo until the fall semester began. 

Having gone to such trouble to get there, having petitioned so hard to stay, Desirée gave little indication that she was glad her wish had been granted. She was sullen, she was taciturn, answering Kim’s questions about her life in as few syllables as possible, expressing little reciprocal curiosity about her mother’s history or her present. She never offered to wash the dishes or take out the trash, to be helpful. Having taken the initiative to get there, she seemed to have lost her force of will upon arrival, and followed her mother around through the routine of her days like a stray, at a distance but always there. 

She was grieving, of course. And Kim knew grief, how it transports us, sends us out of our minds and beside ourselves, calling all things into question. She didn’t blame Desirée for the way she was behaving, which was: selfishly. But she couldn’t help being disappointed that, when her daughter finally reappeared in her life, she came to her so needy. 

Kim had hoped, since she herself found such comfort in the practice, that ministering to the squirrels might offer Desirée some solace, bring her back into her body, reconnect her to the natural world. That this act of service might shift her focus away from her own sorrow—not to deny it but to remember there was more to life than loss. 

But Des was averse to the messiness of the operation, and she grew frustrated, trying to coax Ned or Orla into drinking. She depressed the syringe too quickly and made them aspirate, or too slowly and they lost interest, and Kim had to conclude this wasn’t good for anyone. 

Instead, it had been Man of La Mancha that seemed to rouse Des from her funk. It was the theater and nothing else that took the edge off of her nihilism. After she accompanied Kim to rehearsals, on the drive home she was the most talkative Kim knew her to be. And when she returned from helping Søren in the costume shop, she seemed most at peace.  

Or so it was until today. Today, Des came back from Søren’s vibrating. Kim was at the sink when she burst through the door, washing out the syringes from the squirrels’ noontime feeding, humming Aldonza’s part in “It’s All the Same,” but even with the water running, even mid-song, even across the room, she could sense her daughter’s agitation, and so she asked, though she had so far avoided such direct questions, “Is everything alright?” 

She couldn’t have dreamed how Desirée would answer.

“You’re an addict, right?”

“I am.” In her surprise, Kim could only answer honestly. “Recovered. But, yes.” She shut off the faucet, dried her hands, tried not to hate herself for the answers she would have to give. 

“What, uh, what did you do? Like, I mean, what drugs?” 

It was Tricia, not Desirée, who had told Kim about their daughter’s best friend and the way he died. Desirée hadn’t mentioned Will, not once. She’d never said what prompted her to come find Kim, and Kim hadn’t asked. She hadn’t wanted to compound Desirée’s sorrow by making her relive it. She knew, there was a time when it hurt too much to utter the words. But she also knew, there came a time when silence hurt even more. 

Maybe that time had come. Maybe this was Desirée’s way of making it known. Kim fidgeted with the dishtowel, twisting it in her hands. “You’re asking because of your friend.”

It wasn’t exactly a question, and Desirée didn’t answer, but she nodded. 

“I did a little of everything,” Kim said. “I did a lot of everything.” 

“Heroin?” 

“Heroin.” 

“What’s it like?”

“Oh, honey.”

“I want to know.” 

Kim prefers not to think too hard about the highs, her Rolodex of pleasure. It’s easier to stay sober if she doesn’t think about it—the elation, the escape—all the ways to feel better than she ever feels without them. 

But she could no more say no to her daughter today than she could to that angel twenty years ago. 

She set the towel on the counter and pulled out a chair from the table, taking a seat, waiting until Desirée had done the same. The girl tossed her giant designer handbag onto the table between them, gave Kim a good hard stare and, “Spill,” she said. 

“Okay,” Kim took a breath. “I’ll tell you about it. But you have to know, this isn’t an endorsement.” 

“Noted.” 

“Okay. So what heroin is is, the experience, it’s like…it’s like heaven blossoming in your veins. I know that sounds nuts, but that’s how it is. It’s better than I could ever describe. Beyond words. Like, it’s a perfect contentment. Ease, bliss. No pain, no fear, no sorrow. It’s warm, it’s a blanket, it’s the most loving embrace, it’s the most compelling assurance that everything is just as it should be. Like, it’s what angels would say if they still spoke to us, it’s the feeling of that. Floating. Knowing for sure that you are loved.” 

God, she missed it. The instant ease. The profound relief. She was rhapsodizing, she knew, and she grew suddenly self-conscious. Felt herself blushing, lost the thread of her thought. 

“But that, all of that, all the good stuff, that’s just half the story. That’s what you have to remember. Right? All that heaven, it comes at a cost. You know? You go down that road, I can tell you, it will destroy your life.” 

“Yeah,” Desirée said. “That I know.” 

“Oh!” Kim clamped her hand to her mouth, as if there were any way to swallow back the words she’d just spoken. “No! Oh, no! I didn’t mean that. I mean—I just didn’t want—”

“Yeah, no, I get it. I know what you mean. ‘Don’t do drugs.’ Right? I get it. I got that one.” 

“Oh god. I’m sorry. What a thing to say! Listen, I’m so sorry.” 

“Seriously. Don’t worry about it. I asked you a question. I wanted to know.”  

Desirée was saying all of this without making eye contact with Kim. She’d stood, and she’d gathered her purse from the table, she was walking back to the door. 

“I think…I’m just going to take a little walk,” she said. 

“Of course. Yes, of course.” 

Fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck! Kim thought, watching her daughter walk down the driveway, kicking at the gravel, walking fast, past the Thompson’s, past the Russell’s, around the bend. How had she said something so awful, so fucking tone deaf? 

She’d been flustered. She’d felt ambushed by Desirée’s question. But, my god, there was no excuse.  

“Stupid!” she threw her fist against her thigh, a whisper of her old penchant for self-harm. Then she burst into tears. She was no good at this, at being a mother. All week all she’d been trying to do was ease her daughter’s pain, and now she’d gone and done the opposite. And what would the consequence be? Kim buried her head in her hands, pressed her fingernails hard into her scalp. 

She knew, of course, what would make her feel better. What would instantly assure her that her misstep was no biggie. That all was well and all would always be well. 

She knew. She’d just been reminded. But she wouldn’t seek that relief. No, she’d run her program instead. Kim raised her head up, she dried her eyes, she pulled two cushions from the couch to the floor and set her mediation timer. 

Six minutes into following her breath, her phone sirened with the order to evacuate. 

It’s been two hours since that order came, and Desirée has yet to respond to Kim’s many calls and texts. Where has she gone? What is she doing? Her car’s still here, a small comfort, but it makes her disappearance that much more mysterious. She isn’t at Søren’s, or the theater or the coffee shop or the pier, any of the places Kim knows she knows. 

She’s checked them all, and it was slow going. The roads are already clogged with cars fleeing the Banks in advance of the hurricane, and Kim feels the ticking clock of Orville’s approach hanging over everything. She imagines all the worst scenarios. Desirée fallen into the ocean and drowned. Desirée kidnapped. Desirée gone in search of some heroin to try to feel what her friend felt before he died. To feel what Kim herself just described. 

It’s fair to say she’s in a panic. And she’s getting ready to dial Tricia, to confess she’s lost their daughter. She’s got her phone out, it’s in her hand, she’s just gathering her resolve, when it rings. 

She drops it, retrieves it from the floor, answers just in time. 

“Kimberly.” Linda B’s Delta drawl sounds in her ear. But this isn’t the languid greeting she’s used to. It’s a tone and tenor she’s never heard from her sponsor. Linda is talking quickly, talking loudly, her voice higher than Kim has known it: frantic. She sounds as anxious as Kim feels. “I don’t know what to do!” she says. A sentence Kim never thought to hear her speak. “She won’t come with me! She’s refusing to leave. She’s insisting. She—she—she—” here Linda breaks into sobs. “Kimberly, she says she’s dying!”

It takes time and patience for Kim to piece together just what Linda B means. Which is: that Linda O has decided she won’t evacuate. She says this is because she wants to be there to help the animals. To begin the rescue effort as soon as humanly possible. But she has also confessed, to prove why she might as well risk the Category Five, about the lump and the scan and the biopsy—positive, Stage Four, aggressive, incurable. 

  “I’ll be right over,” Kim says. 

Of course she’s heartbroken. But she can’t help also feeling relieved to be granted such a straightforward obligation. At last, an obvious way to be of use. 

She’s also been granted a reprieve. 

She’ll wait to call Tricia, to sound the alarm, until she gets back from The Lindas’. She texts Desirée where she’ll be, and, remembering how the girl threw her phone away before, she writes a few notes with the same information, leaving one on the table, one on Desirée’s bed, one under the wiper blades of the Porsche. She’s backing onto the road when she sees, in her rear view mirror, her daughter strolling up Fair Oaks toward her. 

“Oh, thank God!” She leaps out of the Corolla, leaving it right in the road, and runs down the street to meet Desirée. “Where have you been?!” 

This must be the first time she’s seen her daughter smiling. Desirée is positively beaming. “Oh my gosh,” she says, dreamily. “I’m sorry. Were you worried?” 

Is she high? Why is she happy? Kim endeavors not to assume the worst. 

“Was I worried?! Well, never mind. Here you are. You’re here now. But, where have you been?!” 

“Oh,” Desirée says, still so nonchalant, “I walked over to those Gardens, you know? Across the street. I had, like, my phone off.” 

Kim has reached her daughter now, and, in this proximity, scans for signs she might have gotten high. Des has her sunglasses on, so Kim can’t see if her pupils are constricted, but her gestures are fluid, her movements steady, her stance neither stiff nor precarious, and she smells of nothing but her usual rose perfume. It’s only her calm that’s so unnatural. 

“You were gone for hours!”

“Was it hours? I had to think, you know?” Here Desirée’s smile does falter as her thoughts turn, presumably, to Will. 

“Yes,” Kim says, “of course you did. Of course.”

“Where are you going?” Desirée asks, gesturing to Kim’s car in the road. 

“Oh!” One crisis wiped the other from her mind. Now she remembers. “I have to get to The Lindas’! That’s right, I have to go!”

“Did something happen?” 

“It’s a long story.” Kim tells it as briefly as she can. 

“Do you need my help?”

For the second time today, Kim is shocked by a question that her daughter’s asking. She’s been so focused on Desirée’s needs, it didn’t occur to her that the girl might be thinking of hers. Certainly, until this moment, she gave no indication that she was. 

“Oh!” she says, needing to make an effort not to cry. “What an offer! But, the hurricane. You’ve got to go, too. Like, really go. Evacuate. Traffic! The sooner we get you off this island, the better.”

“Right,” says Desirée, failing to sound concerned. “Of course. The hurricane.”

Kim can’t figure out what her tone implies. Is she, in fact, high on something? Or is this just another manifestation of her grief? She doesn’t want to send her daughter off alone, on the road, if she isn’t in her right mind. 

“Where will you go?” she asks, hoping more of a conversation will make clear where Des’s head is at. “Are you ready to go home?” 

“Yeah, sure, yeah, I can go home. No problem. Yeah, I’ll just go home. That’s okay. Don’t worry about me.” 

“I do, though.” 

Desirée makes a sound that might be a sob or a laugh or a cough, but, whatever it is or isn’t, she doesn’t acknowledge any emotion. “I’ll be fine,” she says. “Your plate is—.” 

Full is probably what she says, but Kim can’t hear the word because at that moment the Russells’ are zooming past, all five of them waving, honking, their car packed to the gills, getting out of there. 

Kim gives them a thumb’s up and her best smile and Desirée adds a casual wave. 

Mini Russell is Kim’s fiber arts friend. In the winter they meet weekly at the Harbor Café to chat and knit or felt or crochet, another facet of her life that she hasn’t had the chance to share with her daughter. And now that Orville is cutting short their time together, ending it awfully unceremoniously, she fears she’ll never have the chance to really show her daughter who she is. Something she didn’t know she wanted a week ago, but now she does. And now it’s slipping through her fingers. 

Because, once Desirée gets back to her old life, once her grief fades, won’t she forget about Kim? Or at least, want to leave her in the past with her sorrow. Kim gets a sinking feeling, as the moment to part nears, that this isn’t just goodbye for now, it’s goodbye forever. 

“You know, you can come back any time,” she says. “You can call me any time.” 

Desirée nods. 

“You’ll drive safe? You’ll let me know when you’ve made it safely?”

She nods again. 

“Oh gosh,” says Kim. “I wish this wasn’t so rushed.” 

“Can’t argue with a hurricane.” 

Now it’s Kim who’s nodding, nodding, once more trying not to cry. 

“Hey,” Desirée says, catching hold of her arm. “Thank you. Mom. Thanks.” 

A flutterings of wings. A sudden radiance. Kim can’t see them, but she knows they are there. Knows it by the peace breaking over her like a wave. All is well, and all will always be well.