trick.
“You see? Nobody’s here.”
If this isn’t the spot where the worst mass murder in San Bernardino County took place, others have apparently made the same mistake as my sister. Beer bottles and fast food wrappers litter the front yard. Less than a couple of months, the house has become a creepy hangout spot for teenagers. It seems too soon. The cops should’ve secured it longer, but there’s no trace they were even here. No yellow police tape sealing shut the front doors or fingerprint dust around the windows and door knobs. No obvious signs of the bloody slaughter that occurred inside.
Cooper attacked the father first because he was the strongest, an ex-Marine who would’ve fought back on instinct. He stabbed and struck the father’s head and chest so many times that one of the man’s fingers was later found inside the closet. Next, Cooper turned the knife and hatchet on the wife who only got as far as the foot of the bed. The children, awakening to her screams, must’ve run toward the bedroom where Cooper hid like a shadow in the dark.
“I want to go home now,” I say.
“Or else what?”
My sister is taunting me by bringing me here. It has nothing to do with overcoming my fears. All she wants is to scare me.
Maybe it’s my anger that forces me out of the car and makes me grab an empty beer can. Although the lip of it is too smooth to do any real damage, I have a plan. The tab twists off easily and there it is, a tiny, jagged stump. I hold it against the car door, the custom paint job that my father jokingly said cost him an early appearance in L.A. Superior Court with a perverted high school gym teacher. The man was caught, his silk running shorts around his ankles, in the backseat of his Prelude during lunch period with a seventeen-year-old girl. Luckily for him, the student thought she was in love and clammed up. My father got the charges dropped, arguing that although he exercised poor judgment, the gym teacher did nothing criminally wrong by showing this girl how to avoid a groin pull.
I rattle my threat for effect.
“A long curly swirl would look cool,” I say. “Or maybe my name in cursive.”
Even in the dark, I think I see her eyes change color.
“You little skatofatsa.”
Cursing me in Greek, calling me a shitface, is just a start. Part of me is scared because I could be in for a serious beating. Sometimes she play fights with me, getting too rough, and I wind up locking myself in my room, hating her, with a reddened cheek or a welt on my forearm. It occurs to me that my sister might even ditch me here on Cooper’s murdering ground.
“Don’t think I won’t do it,” I warn, thinking up my own Greek curse word I’ve heard my father use. “From taillight to headlight, palio hondree.”
I’m not sure what I’ve called her. My father shouted those two words once on our way back from an Angels’ game when we were cut off on the freeway by a female driver. They are successful in getting a reaction out of my sister. She reaches into the glove compartment, pops a pill from a prescription bottle, and downs it with a gulp of Diet Coke. I’ve only seen her take medication if she has a cold. This is different, and I worry if what she’s just swallowed is going to make her sleepy. Already, she looks worn out.
“Christ,” she says. “Just get in.”
I wait until we’re safely back on Central before I dare ask what I called her.
My sister smiles, though it’s an uneasy one. The pill has relaxed her some.
“You called me a fat ass.”
The worst I’ve ever yelled at her is vlaka. Moron is nothing compared to what I just said.
“Sorry,” I say. “You’re not fat.” And although I mean it, my apology comes too late.
For a moment my sister is lost in thought, busily adding up how many more calories she’ll have to subtract from her diet, one less Styrofoam package of soup, one more can of Diet Coke to bloat fullness in her belly. It will be my unintentional insult that starves her to the bone.
“Something’s wrong with Mom.” Rhea changes the subject. “They think she has diabetes.” Hearing this scares me as much as having seen the outside of that family’s house. The real reason why my sister took me out for ice cream was to break the news that our mother is sick.
“How do you know?”
“I heard them talking.”
“How’d she get it?”
“It’s not like it’s contagious. She got it from being pregnant. It’s taken too much out of her. She’s not exactly young, you know.”
“Is she going to be okay?”
My sister nods and takes another sip of Diet Coke. On average she’ll finish two six packs of diet soft drinks plus the fountain kind she picks up in drive thrus per day.
“She just needs to see the doctor more until the baby comes.”
“She’s carrying it low.”
“So?”
“They say high if it’s a girl, low if it’s a boy.”
“Who’s they?”
“I learned it in health class,” I lie. Truth is I listened to Mrs. Lincoln and Miss Marks, the teacher’s aide, talking softly after we came in from lunch recess, when we were supposed to have our heads on our desks, taking a rest. “Besides,” I add. “Men Dad’s age have a low sperm count. All he has left are the male swimmers.”
Rhea seems disinterested, maybe even a little disturbed by what I’ve learned.
“I want another sister,” mine says.
In shame I look out the window, even staying quiet as we pass the prison, because I know she means it.
To waste time while my mother is in the doctor’s office, I play Frogger, a miniature electronic arcade game. She has been in there long enough for me to reach the third level, one I’ve never gotten to before. The digital logs shoot out fast, and there are no lily pads to jump onto for safety. Within a few seconds I’ve let two frogs drown before my finger even presses the “hop” button.
Finally, my mother appears while I’m on my last frog life. The doctor has escorted her to the waiting area, which I know is a bad sign. Usually that job is left for one of his assistants. Dr. Simpkins is old, long past retirement age, probably in his early seventies, and I imagine his age shows the most in his hands. At this stage in his life they’re meant for simple tasks like holding onto a fishing pole off the Florida Keys or pulling down the handle of a slot machine in Laughlin, Nevada. They’re no longer meant for something as delicate and urgent as reaching into a woman’s body to help guide out a new life.
The game beeps indicating the loss of my last frog life, and quickly I turn it off.
My mother’s hands cover her face and her body heaves so hard from crying that her shirt rides up. Something slick and gooey is visible on the bottom of her belly.
Without thinking, I leap out of my chair at Dr. Simpkins.
“What did you do to her?”
Yelling at an adult is wrong, but sending my mother into hysterics isn’t right either.
Awkwardly, with her belly between us, she holds me by the shoulders.
“Don’t raise your voice, Paula.” Her reprimand is weaker than her touch. The last thing I want to do is upset her even more, so I listen. Purposely, after I retrieve my game from the chair, I wedge