Her Mother’s Grave

Chapter Fifty-Seven

JOSIE – FOURTEEN YEARS OLD

There were other instances that caused cracks in the tenuous peace inside the trailer since Dex had moved in. One evening her mother had come home early from work and found them sitting side by side on the couch, laughing at a movie on television. She had flown at Josie, raining down open-hand slaps onto her head until Dex pulled her away. Josie had fled to her room and stayed there until the arguing died down. That night Dex did leave, and he didn’t come back for a week.

There was the time it was raining—pouring in sheets—and Dex left her mother at the trailer to pick Josie up from school so she wouldn’t have to walk home through it. At first, her mother hadn’t made much of it, but when Dex was asleep she had burst into Josie’s bedroom, pouring a bucket of cold water over her as she slept. Startled awake, Josie found herself on the wrong end of an expletive-laced tirade. If Dex had noticed how tired Josie was the next few days while her mattress dried out and she slept on the floor, he didn’t comment.

The forensic science books that Dex had found at a thrift shop for Josie were burned in the metal barrel outside of the trailer while he was at work. When he asked if she was enjoying them, she didn’t have the heart to tell him what her mother had done. Maybe she should have. Maybe he would have left. Or maybe he would have simply followed her mother into her room and banged her some more. Josie never understood their strange relationship. She never understood anyone’s relationship with her mother. Except Lisette’s—her gram hated her mother fiercely.

The death knell of that mostly bright year was all Josie’s fault. Perhaps having someone there to talk to her, to care about her, to show interest in her, had made her bolder. Or perhaps it had simply made her just as stupid as Dex. There was a freshman dance coming up—a formal dance—and Ray had asked her to go with him. His father had been gone for a year, and he was finally feeling his freedom—he wanted them to be normal and go to a dance like boyfriend and girlfriend. Josie figured she could do her own hair and makeup, like she’d seen a few of the other girls at school doing theirs in the bathroom. But she knew she needed a dress, and she didn’t have much money.

She had asked Dex if he would drive her to the thrift store and then, later that evening, drive her and Ray to the dance. But Dex, being Dex, had gone above and beyond, dropping her outside a dress shop and telling her there was a deposit behind the counter for whatever dress she wanted. Her heart sang as she chose a slinky but fairly modest blue dress that the saleswoman said brought out her eyes. Dex also had a cousin who owned a salon, and he’d arranged an appointment for her there once she was done.

Josie barely recognized herself in the mirror as Dex picked her up to take her back home so she could change before the dance. “Ray won’t know what hit him,” he told her, smiling.

Josie couldn’t wait to see Ray’s face when they picked him up. In her bedroom, she put on her dress and twirled in front of her mirror, feeling pretty for the first time in her life. Her bedside clock showed that she only had a few minutes before Dex would take her to get Ray. Her mother would be at work all night, and Josie hoped she would never find out about the dance, or the dress, or the makeup, or the way Ray had made her feel when he asked her to be his date.

Dex’s eyes lit up when he saw her. “Wow,” he said. “You look amazing.”

“Thanks,” Josie replied.

They were standing by the front door, ready to leave, when Dex stopped her. “Wait,” he said. He took her shoulders and peered into her face. For a moment, a bolt of fear shot through her, and she flinched as he lifted a hand, licked the pad of his thumb, and rubbed at a spot just below her left eye. “Mascara,” he said.

Josie laughed nervously. The palm that remained on her one shoulder was warm. She hadn’t ever been this close to Dex. The proximity—mixed with her anticipation of going to the dance—was dizzying. He grinned at her. “JoJo,” he said softly. “You make sure you have a good time tonight, okay?”

She nodded.

“Ray’s a lucky guy, kiddo.”

A sudden impulse made Josie rock up onto her toes and plant a kiss on Dex’s cheek. Surprise lit his face, and they stood frozen in time for a moment—Josie’s lipstick on his cheek, his hand on her shoulder—smiling stupidly at one another. And that’s when the door opened; her mother stood there, a six-pack of beer in her arms. She stared at them for a long time, taking everything in: Josie’s dress, makeup, and hair, the way they stood close to one another, Dex’s car keys now dangling from his free hand.

Josie’s heart stopped, and she counted two long seconds before it thundered back to life like an angry beast trying to claw its way out of her chest. She waited for her mother’s fury, for her to throw the beer cans at Josie’s head, or to fly at her, tearing at her dress and hair until Josie was too unkempt to be seen in public.

But her mother did nothing. She simply stood there. Then she asked, “What’s going on here?”

Dex said, “JoJo has a school dance. She’s going with Ray. I told them I’d drop them off.”

Her mother turned her gaze to Josie. “Your grandmother sneak you that stuff? That interfering bitch.”

Josie would have let it go. That would have been best. But Dex jumped in before she had a chance to formulate her response. “No, I did, and I didn’t sneak it. JoJo needed a dress for the dance, and my cousin does hair and makeup, so I asked her to help out.”

Her mother narrowed her eyes at him. “You did this?”

“Come on, Belinda. You never went to a school dance? Give the kid a break. You won’t let her see her grandmother. Her dad’s dead. The only person she ever sees is that scrawny little Ray. So she wants to go to a dance; let her have some fun.”

Josie braced herself for the attack she knew was inevitable. She closed her eyes and took a deep breath, waiting for the blows, the tearing of her beautiful dress, the bruises on her face that would render her makeup useless.

But it didn’t come. She felt something brush by her, and when she opened her eyes, her mother was seated on the couch, popping a can of beer. Both Josie and Dex stared at her in shock, but she simply sipped her beer, picked up the remote control, and turned on the television. When she realized they were both still looking at her, she said, “Well, you better get going then.”

They walked outside, letting the trailer door flap closed behind them, a fizz in the air like they had narrowly escaped something huge. They didn’t speak or look at one another the entire route to Ray’s house.

Ray seemed oblivious, possibly mistaking her nervous energy for jitters about the dance. She tried to have a good time, to focus on Ray and the way he kept looking at her like buried treasure, but her mind kept returning to the terrifying calm of her mother, sitting placidly on the sofa, drinking beer.

When Dex brought Josie home from the dance later that night, her mother looked as though she hadn’t moved an inch, except for the bottle of vodka in front of her. Dex said, “I’m going to bed. You coming?”

“No,” she said. “I think I’ll stay up awhile. Might sleep out here by the TV.”