"No! No, wait. You don't understand," she said, determined to stay between him and the door. "It's not what you think. He was upset. He-"

"He said you want him to leave his wife." He spoke slowly as if to make her understand.

"Well, I don't! Of course I don't!"

"He said he loved you."

"He was upset. He didn't know what he was saying. Everything's falling apart, his whole life. He needs help. He wants me to help him, that's all. That's why he came." She could see he didn't believe her.

"Well, anyway, I better go now." His face was a mask again, uncaring, impenetrable. He reached for the k.n.o.b.

"Don't do this to me. Don't. Please. Let me explain. At least let me do that," she whispered.

He seemed to be looking at her, though his eyes were fixed and lightless. She wanted him to know the truth, not how quickly the affair had begun or how easily seduced she had been days after Albert's return from Disney World, but how much she had admired Albert's clever business mind and how in trying to be a caring employee and friend, she had become too deeply involved in his stressful life, all the while not only expecting, but insisting that his first responsibility always be to his family. And in this pathetic way she had considered herself part of that family. A most vital part. For she regarded herself as the cog, the one who made all things possible for Albert, his wife and children. She made sure he never went home angry at any of them. She saw to it that his business thrived. Many's the time she had played devil's advocate to get him to see his daughter's or son's side in a squabble. She knew it sounded as if she were making excuses, but she had only herself to blame. Her mistake had been in putting herself last.

"That's always been my trouble. I want to believe in someone so much, I stop believing in myself. Gordon?" Her voice broke. "Tell me you understand. Or if you don't, that you'll think about what I've just said and at least try try to understand?" to understand?"

"Yes. Okay." He opened the door. "Well . . . anyway, thank you for dinner."

His face was all their faces, but his was the worst kind of insensitivity. His was willed, worked at, cultivated. He didn't want to care or feel for anyone. Beyond his own suffering, he had no sense of other-ness. Everything began and ended with his crime. And always would. He needs his guilt, feels safe in its suffocating shroud. If he has nothing else, he has that. It gives him heft and substance. It's the only way he knows to feel real and human. It fills the void, fills all that emptiness He needs his guilt, feels safe in its suffocating shroud. If he has nothing else, he has that. It gives him heft and substance. It's the only way he knows to feel real and human. It fills the void, fills all that emptiness. Better to let him go. Without love, his heart had grown too small. And now it was too late. Such a waste, but it didn't have to be. If he would only put the past aside and find the best he can in others, she was saying. "You're so caught up in yourself, I mean, in what happened, that you can't reach out to people. Someone does something wrong and that's it? You're through? You're done? You just turn your back on everyone? Isn't that what's happened with Jada and Dennis, and now me? Gordon, you can't keep walking away from people. We're human. We make mistakes. You have to forgive us." So that you can forgive yourself, she wanted to say but couldn't.

"I have to go now."

"You know something, I've done a lot of things I'm not very proud of, either because I was weak or lonely or stupid, but one thing I've never, ever done, and that's turn my back on somebody who needed my help."

"I'm sorry." His struggle was painful, terrifying to witness. He couldn't look at her, and when he did speak she could barely hear him. "I'm not who you think I am."

"Yes, you are." She reached to touch him, but he moved away. "The problem is you're not who you you think you are." think you are."

CHAPTER 20.

A dog was barking in the distance. dog was barking in the distance.

"Leonardo! Leonardo! Come on, Leonardo, come on, boy," Jada called from her top step. Head down, Gordon hurried next door, not wanting to see the girl. Or anyone, for that matter. He had alienated the only people he cared about. Dennis blamed him because Lisa had taken the children and left. He hadn't seen Delores in days. But how could he reconcile her affair with a married man while condemning his brother for the same sin? Delores said he didn't know how to forgive because he had never forgiven himself. She didn't understand. Acceptance was the greater struggle. Forgiveness was words, an easy chant to numb the sin, until with time the loss no longer really mattered or deserved its raw place in the heart.

He rang the bell with his good hand. The cut was healed, but the slightest pressure set it throbbing again. He had tried to get his job back, but the moving company had hired someone else. All he had left was thirteen dollars. He couldn't even afford the newspaper, so every afternoon he went to the drugstore and copied the want ads from the cla.s.sifieds. When Mrs. Jukas finally came to the door, she was all dressed up, cheeks rouged and her lipstick a bright red. Her ride would be here soon, she said. She had a nine o'clock appointment in Burlington with her cardiologist. "I'm out of everything." A sinking feeling came over him when he saw her list. "See there?" She pointed halfway down the page. "Next to the eggs? See what it says? White. Remember that now-white! Last time you got brown."

"I'm sorry."

"Leonardo! Leonardo!" Jada's plaintive call ended again in a piercing whistle. Now two dogs were barking.

"My G.o.d, she's making it worse," Mrs. Jukas groaned.

"Her dog's lost," he said. He had been missing for days.

"For good, I hope. Anyway, I should be back before you get out of work. One or two, probably, so I'll pay you then, all right?"

"I need it now," he blurted. "If that's all right," he added quickly. "I don't have much money right now. I'm sorry."

Suspicion narrowed her deep-set eyes; how much did he want? He had no idea. This list was twice the length of the last one, and that had cost twenty-one dollars. Wait, she said, closing the door. She was gone so long that he rang the bell.

"What're you, in some big hurry?" she said out of breath as she opened the door.

"I'm sorry, I thought you forgot."

"I never forget. Ever!" Her malevolent gleam made him squirm. "Here." Stooping close to see, she counted into his hand. "Thirty, forty, fifty. And you'll give me the change back, right?"

"Yes. Of course."

"Gordon!" she called as he came down the walk. "Don't forget now, white eggs. White, not brown."

Across the street, Marvella Fossum huddled on her top step, shivering and smoking a cigarette. He paused to pull a spurt of weeds from the rose bed, but Marvella's thick-tongued rant sent him on his way. "Will you give it up? Will you just give it the h.e.l.l up?" she yelled at Jada, who wobbled down the street on thick-soled shoes, whipping fences, telephone poles, and now the yellow hydrant with the length of clothesline still noosed to an empty collar.

"Jada!" her mother called from the bedroom. Jada didn't answer. Her mother wanted her to go find Feaster and beg him for a hit. "Jada!"

Jada closed the door softly and slipped onto the porch. She sat on the step, staring down at the car that had just pulled up across the street. A white lady with yellow dreadlocks took a vacuum cleaner from her trunk and hauled it onto the porch. Next she carried up a bucket filled with soap bottles and orange rubber gloves. She wondered if she should go tell her the old b.i.t.c.h had left a while ago in a white van. All dressed up, she had been carrying a small brown canvas bag.

A crash came now from inside the apartment, then her mother's frantic call. "Jada! Jada!" She had been so happy when her mother said she was pregnant. She had wanted a baby brother or sister for as long as she could remember. But if things were bad before, they were a thousand times worse now. Her mother was constantly sick, and they had no money at all. She couldn't even ask Feaster. Ever since the cops had chased her that night, he wouldn't answer their calls or pages. To what her mother owed him, he had added the cost of the crack Jada had thrown away in the park. The cable had been shut off again. Inez had let her watch TV upstairs a couple times. But then she had to go and screw everything up with Inez, just like she'd done with Gordon. On the Thursday night that Inez always baby-sat at her son's house, Jada really wanted to watch MTV, so she climbed up the fire escape and crawled through Inez's kitchen window. She had a lot to eat, but in small portions, a little this, a little that, from all the leftover bowls. She was stretched out on the velour couch with the remote when Inez came home earlier than usual with her son. All h.e.l.l broke loose. Carlos started to call the cops, but Inez stopped him. As the commotion moved into the hallway, Marvella charged up the stairs. She shoved Inez. Now the whole family hated them. Even Inez's littlest grandchildren yelled and banged on their door when they ran by.

She hadn't found Leonardo yet, but she knew she would. Somebody had probably picked him up and brought him home. The first chance he got he'd come running back, she was sure of it. In her whole life she had never loved anyone the way she loved that little dog. Not even her own mother.

Right after the pregnancy test, her mother had tried really hard. She'd even gone to a doctor for help, but he'd said it had to be her decision. She still couldn't make up her mind. Detox or an abortion. Either way would kill her, she told him. She had been clean for days, then last night Tron came by. When he and Marvella got back at two in the morning, they could barely walk they were so high. Jada stormed out of the house, as if her mother cared or even noticed. She headed for Gordon's garage for another night in the spidery dark, but the key was gone, so she had to go crawling back home.

"I been calling you." Her mother came onto the porch. She leaned against the railing. "My stomach's going whoa, whoa, like on some kind of roller-coaster ride. We got any crackers?"

"No."

"Go ask your buddy, what's-his-name over there, the big guy. Tell him it's for your mother. Say she really needs something in her stomach."

"He left."

"You're mad. You're still mad at me!"

Jada didn't answer.

"I'd just like to know what the f.u.c.k I did."

Jada chewed her lip.

"You know how sick I am? You have any idea what I'm going through? I'm tryna do the right thing here, that's all, and you're not helping one d.a.m.n bit. You don't even care!"

"Yeah, I do. I care."

"No, you don't!"

"I do, Ma. I care a lot. But you-"

"Who's that?" Her mother pointed across the street.

"The cleaning lady."

The woman had gone back to her car for a laundry basket and a sponge mop. Now with everything by the door, she slid her hand up under the mailbox, then took something out. She unlocked the door, put the key back under the mailbox, then brought her supplies inside.

"Where's the old b.i.t.c.h?"

"She left. On a trip, I think."

"How do you know?" her mother asked in a low, anxious tone, all the while watching the house.

"I don't know-she had this, like, suitcase thing."

Her mother went inside, came right back out with a cigarette. "So she's probably gonna be gone for a few days." Every deep, wheezy drag made her cough.

"I don't know, maybe, but, Ma, you shouldn't be smoking like that. That's like the worst thing you can do."

"No! The worst thing's tryna get rid of it. And I'm not gonna go through that s.h.i.t again." She shuddered. She had almost died trying to abort Jada. Once her mother's cruelest charge, the taunt had come to seem proof of the girl's worth: Nothing and no one could hurt her. And in this indomitability she might also protect her unborn sibling.

"So you made up your mind, then." She tried not to smile.

Coughing and exhaling, her mother stared across the street. When her cigarette burned down to the filter, she flipped it over the railing onto the sidewalk. "I gotta go lay down, so don't leave. Just wait. As soon as she goes, you get me."

Jada had to keep retying the plastic grocery bags over her sweaty hands. Being an intruder in Mrs. Jukas's house filled her with the same tremulous excitement she'd felt in Gordon's and Inez's. It was like her holy feelings when Aunt Sue used to take her to church on Sunday. Scared, she knew she didn't belong but was aware of something beyond herself, a presence that demanded she take notice. But of what, she didn't know. The stillness clung to her from room to room.

Marvella's footsteps moved overhead. Seeing Mrs. Jukas give Gordon money had convinced her mother that the old lady had a lot of cash hidden in the house. Last night Tron had told her about an apartment over on Brand Street, second floor, two bedrooms, just painted, with a screened-in porch. The guy that ran the place owed him a favor, but she'd need first, last, and security, which her mother was sure they'd find stashed away here. She could smell it, she said. Jada tiptoed into the musty dining room. With the shades down and curtains drawn, she could barely see. She felt along the wall, and the minute she flipped the switch the gla.s.s cupboard in the corner filled with light. From floor to ceiling every mirrored shelf dazzled with the small painted statues of children, boys carrying pails, girls with flowers, watering cans. She turned the small key that opened the gla.s.s door. Oh, she loved this one of a girl and her dog with his head back, barking. She slipped it into her pocket. Strange that an old b.i.t.c.h who hated kids would have all these statues of them. She knelt down and from the back of the bottom shelf took another of a girl in a windblown scarf, holding a bucket of flowers. She put it in her other pocket.

Suddenly, there was a crash overhead. She ran up the stairs two at a time. "Are you okay?" A dresser had fallen against the bed. One of the drawers wouldn't open, and her mother had pulled so hard that the whole thing toppled over.

"Look what I found!" Her mother held up a blue velvet Crown Royal bag. She opened the drawstring to show Jada. Stuffed with bills, it had been behind the drawer. "Told you I could smell the bucks," her mother grunted as they pushed the dresser upright.

"We better go," Jada said. The cleaning lady had driven off only minutes ago, but Gordon had left his house long before that. None of his errands ever took more than an hour. Thurman had told her a while ago that he'd gotten fired from the Market.

"There's gotta be more," her mother said from the closet. She'd check the pockets, then toss the suits and dresses back out onto the floor. Mothb.a.l.l.s rolled under the bed. Jada kept sneezing. "There's probably thousandsa dollars someplace here," her mother said, straining to see what was on the cluttered shelf above. "Get me something to stand on."

Jada ran into the bathroom for the aluminum stool she'd seen in the bathtub. It was still wet, she said, warning her mother to be careful. Her mother told her to climb onto it; she felt too dizzy. Jada lifted the dusty covers off each box. In the bags her hands were slick with sweat. "Just old shoes. Old men shoes," she called back.

"s.h.i.t!" Her mother ran to the window. Outside, a horn honked. The car engine sputtered and backfired.

"We gotta go, Ma. What if it's her? What if she comes up and finds us here?"

"It's not her." Her mother peered through the sheer curtain. "It's that a.s.shole Carlos. He's carrying boxes out. I wonder if Inez is moving. That's what it looks like."

"Hey, maybe we could move up there, then."

"What're you being, stupid or something?"

"I know, but if we move someplace else and then Leonardo comes back, he'll never find us." This had been worrying her.

"Jesus Christ, I'm sicka hearing about that dog. Will you just throw down the boxes?"

Jada tossed them onto the bed, then climbed down.

"See! Look! I told you!" her mother crowed. In the toe of one shoe were a pair of onyx-and-gold cuff links and a man's tarnished wrist.w.a.tch.

"Can we go now?" From the doorway Jada kept glancing down the dim hallway to the stairs. "I think we should go. Please, Ma."

Her mother was searching through the hallway closet. "Hey, look at this!" She held up a policeman's uniform. She put the cap on Jada's head, then burst out laughing. "Oh, Jesus!" She covered her mouth and staggered back. "You should see yourself. That's the funniest thing I ever saw." Jada tore off the cap and threw it down, which made her mother laugh more.

A shadow darkened the lower wall. Jada ran to the top of the stairs. Someone was on the porch. They'd just pa.s.sed by the window.

"Who is it?" her mother hissed.

"I don't know!"

The lock clicked.

"Ma!"

Her mother flattened herself in the alcove against the wall, hand at her mouth, frozen with fear. The door creaked open, then the slow drag of weary footsteps entering. They stopped at the bottom of the stairs. "Rosie? It's me. I'm back. How come you're still here? You must've started late," the old lady muttered as she trudged up the stairs, breathless with her labored ascent. "Or was the place that-Oh! Oh no!" The old woman stood in the bedroom doorway, looking in at the disarray.

Jada watched in horror from the opposite wall. Thinking she'd been seen, her mother sprang toward the stairs, trying to get past the old woman, who grabbed her arm in a desperate effort to keep her balance.

"Leave me alone. Let go-a me!" her mother screamed, thrashing and shoving her way free.

There came a sickening crack as Mrs. Jukas fell, landing on her hip. The one grotesquely swollen leg dangled over the steps, stiffly askew as if no longer hers.

As Marvella charged past, the old woman reached out. Whether this angered her mother or frightened her even more, Jada couldn't tell, but Marvella pushed Mrs. Jukas away with both hands. The old woman rolled, hitting each step right behind her mother as if in some last-ditch, desperate attempt to stop her. She seized Marvella's leg. "No! No! No!" the old woman groaned with her mother's kicks. Each blow jerked the old woman's head back.

"Stop it! Stop it!" Jada screamed, suddenly down the stairs so fast that she would afterward think she had jumped. Her mother's fear had flamed into such rabid anger that Jada was afraid to get too close. She covered her face; her m.u.f.fled cries seemed to incite her mother even more. "She's just an old lady! You're gonna kill her!"

Mrs. Jukas's eyes rolled to whites, then back again, each brief gaze locking fiercely on Jada, a beacon of loathing through the waves of oblivion. Outrage and indignation would sustain her. Even with so little left, she could still breathe, still see as long as she could hate.

The bell rang. The old faded eyes widened, fixed on the door. Her mouth opened, the long wordless, soundless scream like a swarm of angry bees in Jada's brain. Her mother pointed down at the old woman. "Shut up! You just shut up!" she hissed.

Again the doorbell rang. Now the telephone was ringing. Again Marvella pointed. Someone was out there, listening, waiting. Next came three soft raps on the door, apologetic, hesitant, then heavy footsteps moving away. Gordon Loomis's shadow fell across the curtained side lights.