Page 12 of Pieces of Ash
A sob rips from my throat as my shoulders shake with the force of my weeping.
“Didyouknow?” I sob aloud, my pitiful voice drowned out by the rush of water. “My god, Tig…did you know?”
Did she sell us both—willfully—into this life?
Tigín wasn’t agoodmother, but she was all I had, and I believed, in her own way, that she cared about me. How could she do this to us? How could she sell us to someone as ruthless as Mosier Raumann?
Though I don’t know very much about Mosier’s business dealings, my interactions with him and observations of him and his life over the past five years have been enough to paint a picture of his character.
His house—a massive brick estate in Westchester County, New York—is surrounded by a high black metal fence, and a force of six men, in alternating shifts, always guards the perimeter of the property. They carry handguns and walkie-talkies, and none of them are allowed to look at me. If and when they ever did, Mosier was swift to blacken their eyes or break their noses, as he did his own sons’ that day by the pool.
Anders and Damon were not allowed to be my brothers in any real way. We weren’t allowed to swim together or watch TV alone. When I was home on breaks, a woman named Mrs. Grosavu followed me around the house. I was told that she was there to take care of me and see to my needs, but it always felt like she was watching me, making sure that I behaved a certain way, reminding me when I should be more modest, more subservient, more womanly. Over time, I saw her more as a jailer than a helper, and I was relieved, in fact, when I arrived home this past Easter and was told she’d taken a job somewhere else.
More than once, I watched Mosier dispatch his men after loud cell phone conversations in a foreign language, and though I wondered where they were going, I dared not ask. When Iasked my mother, she replied that Mosier’s business concerns were none of our affair.
At least twice, my mother and I were woken up and sent down to the wine cellar apartment in the dark of night. There, behind a fake door that appeared to be a wall of wine, we had every creature comfort, but an armed guard stood outside the apartment door, prohibiting us from leaving, until Mosier, Anders, or Damon arrived to take us back upstairs.
I know that Mosier is some sort of criminal, involved in the sorts of business dealings that could get a man, and his family, killed.
But I also know that he likes the high life—movie premieres and weekends in Vegas—always with a large security force—and regardless of how dismissively he just spoke of her, my mother was a diamond on his arm because of her former status as a supermodel.
But I never suspected—not even for a moment—thatIwas a part of his plans. My god, didsheknow?
Tig…did you do this to me?
I close my eyes, clasp my fingers together, and pray,Please, God, don’t let her have known. Please don’t let her have chosen someone like Mosier for me. Amen.
When I open my eyes, I reach for the shampoo, pour some into my hands, and massage it into my light-blonde hair, trying to stay calm.
Mosier called my school two days ago with the news of my mother’s overdose and death, and the advisement that Eddie and Anders would be coming up to collect me for the funeral the following day.
At first, I didn’t believe the news. For as much as my mother had battled an intense substance abuse problem between the ages of twenty and twenty-nine, she had straightened herself out by the time she married Mosier. And I watched carefully overthe next five years—every time wine was poured into her goblet at dinner, every time champagne was passed around at an event, she never took a sip, never even lifted a glass to her lips. I was home one month ago for Easter, and her eyes were sad and withdrawn, but clear. How could she have backslid so quickly and completely? And with Mosier’s watchful eyes on her, how in the world did she manage to obtain heroin, let alone enough for an overdose? And how—with a veritable army of security guards and house staff—did no one find her until she was dead?
I have so many questions, but I am frightened to ask Mosier or his sons what happened. I don’t think I would get a straight answer, for one thing, but after our conversation in my bedroom, there is a more pressing and immediate concern on my mind:
I am meant to be the child bride of a monster thirty-three years older than me, for the sole purpose of breeding.
I lean back and rinse my hair, placing my hands over my heart.
Sex.Something I know almost nothing about. Something my mother knew a great deal about.
I remember her bringing men over quite frequently when we lived in LA. I was meant to call them all Uncle.Uncle John. Uncle Frank. Uncle Ken.She’d walk in with them, point to me watching TV, and say, “That’s my kid sister. Ash, this is Uncle Wes. Say hi.”
I’d say hi without looking away from the TV while she’d lead them into her bedroom. I’d turn up the volume of whatever show I was watching so I couldn’t hear her moans and screams, his grunts and groans. When they were done, my “uncles” didn’t stay long. They’d slip out quickly when the deed was done. The front door closing was my cue to bolt it, turn off the TV, and slip down the hallway to my bedroom.
By the time was eight, I had figured out, more or less, what my mother was doing. I had my first kiss—with the son of oneof my mother’s old supermodel friends—when I was ten, and I let a boy from school touch my breasts through my shirt in the janitor’s closet when I was eleven. Looking back, I was probably on track to lose my virginity by thirteen, but that just happened to be the year that everything changed.
My mother met Mosier the month after I turned thirteen.
Within three weeks of meeting Mosier Raumann via a high-end Hollywood matchmaker, my mother married him and moved us to his home outside New York City. She told me that he was her sugar daddy, and we’d never have to worry about anything else for the rest of our lives. She told me that New York would be just as fun as LA, and we were going on an adventure. She told me I’d have a new father and brothers, and a chandelier in my room, and wasn’t I just the luckiest kid who ever lived?
Once we got there, I didn’t feel very lucky. My favorite clothes were taken away and replaced with a Mosier-approved wardrobe. I was no longer allowed to leave the house unaccompanied. I was not to speak unless spoken to. I was enrolled in a religious boarding school, away from my mother, a few weeks after we arrived.
That summer, Tig’s bright blue eyes lost a little more luster every day. Once, when I asked her if we could go back to LA to visit our friends, Tig told me, without much confidence, that our lives in New York would get easier, and besides, she added, Mosier would take care of us…no matter what.
It’s recalling that “no matter what” now that sends a chill down my spine and makes me think that Tigíndidknow of his plans for us—and, ultimately, for me.
Turning around, I rinse the conditioner from my hair and quickly soap and rinse the rest of my body.
