The Mare

Ginger

I called her that night. Not right after we got home, but during the soft time before bed. She picked up the phone eagerly. She asked what we had for dinner and if I went for a walk. She asked if there were any fireflies.

And then there was screaming in the background, vicious, hateful. Velvet screamed back, wild strings of Spanish words, raging but imploring too — and then she dropped the phone and the scream went raw. I shouted her name, almost hung up to call the cops when somebody else picked up the phone and said “Cat food!” at me like a curse; the brother. Then Velvet had the phone again, yelling sideways off it before sobbing to me that her mom had told her she was no good all night even though she didn’t do anything bad and now she called the horseshoe dirty and threw it out the window.

I talked to her; I called her honey, darling. I said if she was with me, I’d hold her in my arms like she was a little girl. I said it would be all right. The words came out of me — desolate, helpless, and real. She got quiet; her silence felt a little incredulous, embarrassed even. I told her she could find the shoe tomorrow, sneak it back in and hide it. I told her we would do homework together and she could come to see us soon, on the weekend. The yelling in the background became angry talking, then normal talking between the mother and little boy. Velvet said, “I just decided something.”

“What?”

“I’m not gonna yell anymore, not even when I’m mad.”

“There’s nothing wrong with yelling when you’re mad. You’re a fiery girl,” I said.

“What does that mean?”

“That you’re intense, you have strong feelings.”

She didn’t say anything, and I began to worry that I’d insulted her somehow. Then she said, “I just decided something else. From now on, I’m going to call my mare Fiery Girl.”

When we hung up, there was a smile in her voice.

I didn’t speak about it to Paul. But when we got in bed, I turned with my back to him and curled into a ball. I thought over and over of Velvet, of holding her like I said I would, brushing her hair, singing to her. I thought of the way she said “My mare,” like “mah mare” or “ma mère”—my mother in French.