July 29—The New Moon

JUST FOR THE RECORD, the weather today is heavy and scratchy and it hurts every time your wife tries to move.
Dr. Touchet’s just left. He’s spent the past two hours wrapping her leg in strips of sterile cloth and clear acrylic resin. Her leg, from the ankle to the crotch, is one straight fiberglass cast. It’s her knee, the doctor said.
Peter, your wife is a klutz.
Misty is the klutz.
She’s carrying a tray of Waldorf salads from the kitchen into the dining room when she trips. Right in the kitchen doorway, her feet go out from under her, and Misty, the tray, the plates of Waldorf salad, it all goes headfirst onto table eight.

Of course, the whole dining room gets up to come look at her covered in mayonnaise. Her knee looks fine, and Raymon comes out of the kitchen and helps her to her feet. Still, the knee is sprained, says Dr. Touchet. He comes an hour later, after Raymon and Paulette help her up the stairs to her room. The doctor holds an ice pack on the knee, then offers Misty a cast in neon yellow, neon pink, or plain white.
Dr. Touchet’s squatting at her feet while Misty sits in a straight chair with her leg propped on a footstool. He’s moving the ice pack, looking for signs of swelling.
And Misty asks him, did he fill out Harrow’s death certificate?
Misty asks, did he prescribe sleeping pills for Peter?
The doctor looks at her for a moment, then goes back to icing her leg. He says, “If you don’t relax, you may never walk again.”
Her leg, it already feels fine. It looks fine. Just for the record, her knee doesn’t even hurt.
“You’re in shock,” Touchet says. He brings a briefcase, not a black doctor’s bag. It’s the kind of briefcase a lawyer would carry. Or a banker. “For you, a cast would be prophylactic,” he says. “Without it, you’ll be running around with that police detective, and your leg will never heal.”
Such a small town, the whole Waytansea Island wax museum is spying on her.
Somebody knocks at the door, and then Grace and Tabbi come into the room. Tabbi says, “Mom, we brought you more paints,” and she holds a plastic shopping bag in each hand.
Grace says, “How is she?”
And Dr. Touchet says, “If she stays in this room the next three weeks, she’ll be fine.” He starts winding gauze around the knee, layers and layers of gauze, thicker and thicker.
Just so you know, the moment Misty found herself on the floor, when people came to help her, as they carried her upstairs, even while the doctor squeezed and flexed her knee, Misty kept saying, “What did I trip over?”
There’s nothing there. There’s really nothing near that doorway to trip over.
After that, Misty thanked God this happened at work. No way could the hotel beef about her missing work.
Grace says, “Can you wiggle your toes?”
Yes, Misty can. She just can’t reach them.
Next, the doctor wraps the leg in strips of fiberglass.
Tabbi comes over and touches the huge fiberglass log with her mother’s leg lost somewhere inside it, and she says, “Can I sign my name on it?”
“Give it a day to dry,” the doctor says.
Misty’s leg straight out in front of her, it must weigh eighty pounds. She feels fossilized. Embedded in amber. An ancient mummy. This is going to be a real ball and chain.
It’s funny, the way your mind tries to make sense out of chaos. Misty feels terrible about it now, but the moment Raymon came out of the kitchen, as he put his arm under her and lifted, she said, “Did you just trip me?”
He brushed the Waldorf salad, the apple chunks and chopped walnuts, out of her hair, and he said, “Como?”
What you don’t understand you can make mean anything.
Even then, the kitchen door was propped open and the floor there was clean and dry.
Misty said, “How did I fall?”
And Raymon shrugged and said, “On your culo .”
All the kitchen guys standing around, they laughed.
Now, up in her room, her leg cocooned in a heavy white pinata, Grace and Dr. Touchet lift Misty under each arm and steer her over to the bed. Tabbi gets her green algae pills out of her purse and sets them on the bedside table. Grace unplugs the telephone and loops the cord, saying, “You need peace and quiet.” Grace says, “There’s nothing wrong with you that a little art therapy won’t cure,” and she starts taking things out of the shopping bags, tubes of paint and brushes, and setting them in piles on the dresser.
Out of his briefcase, the doctor takes a syringe. He wipes Misty’s arm with cold alcohol. Better her arm than her nipple.
Can you feel this?
The doctor fills the syringe from a bottle and sticks the needle in her arm. He pulls it out and gives her a wad of cotton to stop any blood. “It’s to help you sleep,” he says.
Tabbi sits on the edge of the bed and says, “Does it hurt?”
No, not a bit. Her leg feels fine. The shot hurt more.
The ring on Tabbi’s finger, the sparkling green peridot, it catches light from the window. The rug edges along the bottom of the window, and under the rug’s where Misty’s hidden her tip money. Their ticket home to Tecumseh Lake.
Grace puts the phone into an empty shopping bag and holds her hand out to Tabbi. She says, “Come. Let’s give your mother a rest.”
Dr. Touchet stands in the open door and says, “Grace? If I could talk to you, in private?”
Tabbi gets off the bed, and Grace leans down to whisper in her ear. Then Tabbi nods her head, fast. She’s wearing the heavy pink necklace of shimmering rhinestones. It’s so wide it must feel as heavy around her neck as the cast does around her mother’s leg. A sparkling millstone. A junk jewelry ball and chain. Tabbi undoes the clasp and brings it to the bed, saying, “Hold up your head.”
She reaches a hand past each of Misty’s shoulders and snaps the necklace around her mother’s neck.
Just for the record, Misty’s not an idiot. Poor Misty Marie Kleinman knew the blood on her panties was Peter’s. But right now, at this moment, she’s so glad she didn’t abort her child.
Your blood.
Why Misty said yes to marrying you—she doesn’t know. Why does anyone do anything? Already she’s melting into the bed. Every breath is slower than the last. Her levator palpebrae muscles have to work hard to keep her eyes open.
Tabbi goes to the easel and takes down a tablet of drawing paper. She brings the paper and a charcoal pencil and puts them on the blankets beside her mother, saying, “For in case you get inspiration.”
And Misty gives her a slow-motion kiss on the forehead.
Between the cast and the necklace, Misty feels pinned to the bed. Staked out. A sacrifice. An anchoress.
Then Grace takes Tabbi’s hand and they go out to Dr. Touchet in the hallway. The door closes. It’s so quiet, Misty’s not sure if she hears right. But there’s an extra little click.
And Misty calls, “Grace?” Misty calls, “Tabbi?” In slow motion, Misty says, “Hey there? Hello?” Just for the record, they’ve locked her in.