Page 43 of Nineteen Seventy-Six

Because, Mama. Mama was first. Mama, the only word on earth capable of driving a wedge between him and his impenetrable love for Nicolas. What he thought was impenetrable love, but had been undone with a single word, and then buried deeper into the ground with another word, the one he craved all along and now was the ignition switch.

“Not now,” he grumbled as the beautiful boy, head full of dark hair and eyes like his father’s bounced around behind him, not understanding; his mood first curious and light, but the longer Charles ignored him, the more desperate his dadas grew; the more strained, laced with the terror of not understanding.

This is your fault. You fucking hellbeast. You abominable witch.

This continued, with Charles’ heart beating hard enough to cause black spots to push at the back of his eyeballs, Nicolas’ anguished cries carving scars into both of them, until Lisette appeared and swept him up into her arms.

“My sweet baby boy,” Lisette cooed into Nicolas’ red, damp face. She pressed her lips into his hair and shot Charles a chilling look across the hall. “Let’s go get snack, Nicky,” she said, eyes never leaving the father, who had failed at this, as he failed at everything.

I’m sorry.

“Is this how you be with daughter, too?” Lisette accused as she brushed by him, Nicolas sobbing in her arms.

“No,” Charles replied weakly, and there was no point in explaining why that would be different, because they both knew, and the answer didn’t exonerate him. The answer didn’t bring back his love, nor did it kill his resentment. The answer was as pointless as love, as pointless as joy, which was dependent upon conditions that never lasted.

He would love his daughter until circumstances prevented him, and then he’d find something else to love. Something equally transient, and equally, exquisitely painful when it was time to release it.

Maureen rode the rise and fall of Soren’s bony chest. She always wriggled to find a place to nestle in, but Soren neither had the flab of her middle school teacher, or the taut lines of the high school boys. His body was merely a vessel for other things, and he gave it as much, or as little, disregard as it required in the moment.

The sex was amazing. She expected no less, but what she hadn’t expected was that it was this, these moments or hours afterward, that she craved far more. Sometimes, when they were a tangle of sweat and moans, her mind would drift into the future, where she knew these tender interludes awaited. Where they would talk about everything, and nothing, and sometimes there wasn’t anything to say, just emotions traveling through their tired flesh, mingling into a single sensation.

Maureen was not a romantic. She liked to say, to herself, to Chelsea, to anyone who’d listen, that she was too practical for romance. Her needs were more fundamental, like that triangle—no, pyramid, she was pretty sure it was a pyramid—they learned about in health class, the one that talked about how you had no goddamn use for the fancy shit until your basic needs, like a house, like food, like security, were met. She said as much to her mother once, who laughed, and said, what would a rich girl know about it? But a rich girl could know just as much disappointment, as much pain, as much heartache, as a poor girl. A rich girl could learn to live with what she had, whatever that might be, and never want for more.

“Paris,” Soren said, answering his own question. “What about you?”

“I’ve never really thought about it,” Maureen said. Her fingers slayed across his soft, lean belly. What did they even call this? The sex Maureen had had was over as soon as the man came, and then they returned to their own lives. They never lingered… talked.

Soren removed one hand from behind his head and brushed Maureen’s face aside, so he could see it. “You’ve never thought about leaving New Orleans? Not once? Never considered starting over?”

“I didn’t say that, I just never thought about where I might go.”

“So think about it now.”

His words, soft and inviting, rather than forceful, inspired her to do just that. “I’ve never really been anywhere.”

“How’s that possible?”

“When my father died, we stopped doing things as a family,” Maureen said. “I was just a kid. He always talked about going to Europe, or Africa, like he did as a boy, but then he was gone, and Mama only had use for the essentials.”

Soren ran her hair through his fingers. “Is there anywhere you’d like to go?”

“London,” she said, without hesitation, realizing that was also the answer to the first question, though she’d never been there. “Or Kent.”

“Why London?”

“My favorite book is set there.”

“Wait, don’t tell me. I want to guess.” Soren’s hand stopped moving, and she could hear him thinking; could feel his soft smile. “Great Expectations.”

Maureen jumped up onto one elbow. “How did you…?”

“You remind me a little bit of Estella,” he replied, but quickly added, “the best of her, that is. She wasn’t all bad. She was made that way.”

“You don’t think Estella chose to be a self-centered bitch?”

“It was the path of least resistance. That’s what most people take.”

“That’s very…”

---