No Shelter by Robert Swartwood Page B

mingled together.  
    About standing there with my gun aimed at my father’s face and wanting more than anything to pull the trigger, to watch his head explode.  
    About turning on the oven and sticking in my head like Sylvia Plath.  
    About opening the porta potty door and knowing who would be on the other side and ducking the punch coming for my face.  
    About watching my father already lying there covered in blood and knowing that the yacht would soon sink and deciding that for the moment there had already been enough killing.  
    About just lying here in bed and staring at the ceiling and letting days and nights pass and not getting up, not eating, not drinking, just letting my body waste away until there is nothing left.  
    About shaking my head at my father before turning and running away, stepping up onto the edge and diving into the water toward the place where Nova was waiting in the power boat.  
    About all the people I’ve killed and all the people I’ve saved because of those people I’ve killed.  
    About the first man I killed, the two of us alone under the clear Iraqi night sky.  
    About swimming toward Nova as he came toward me and being underneath the water for a few moments at a time, hearing nothing at all, floating in a void.  
    About Scooter dying in my arms.  
    About my mother, my sister and her husband and the twins.  
    About Casey and David, even Marilyn and Walter.  
    About Karen again.  
    About all the people I’ve killed and all the people I’ve saved because of those people I’ve killed.  
    About Nova helping me up out of the water just as the fire on the yacht finally reached the gas tank and the entire thing went up, momentarily lighting the night, and how he was shouting above the explosion, asking what happened, what the fuck just happened.  
    About two weeks later learning I was pregnant.  
    About knowing I couldn’t keep it.  
    About taking myself to the abortion clinic and then driving myself home.  
    About nobody ever knowing, not even Tina.  
    About Karen, saying in her deep southern accent, Can you keep a secret?  
    And about how sometimes when I’m in total silence, in the dark void, my unborn child is with me and we curl up together to keep ourselves warm and then just float there, mother and child, safe from evil itself.  

 
     
     
    22

    “Holly, Holly, look at that elephant!”  
    “David,” I say reproachfully, giving him a look.  
    His smile fades a moment as he works the translation in his mind. Then, in a slow, stunted voice, he says, “ Regardez ... l’éléphant? ”  
    “ Très bon, ” I say with a nod.  
    Casey tugs at my shorts. “Can we go see the sea lions?”  
    She doesn’t ask the question in French and before I have the chance to give her the same reproach I just gave her brother, David points and says, “Hey, that’s not fair!”  
    I place a hand to my forehead, try strangling this migraine before it grows any stronger. Another night of little sleep and I didn’t do any running, any exercises, which I know I should have done this morning but which I put off anyway and now here I am with the kids in the Smithsonian’s National Zoo even though the sky is overcast and threatening rain.  
    “Holly,” David says, stressing my name in two syllables, “how come I have to speak stupid French and she doesn’t?”  
    One of my few nannily duties is teaching the kids French, Spanish, and Japanese. Tuesday we try to speak French as much as possible; Wednesday it’s Spanish; Thursday, Japanese. As can be expected Casey and David have never been thrilled with the task, but they do pretty well, especially Casey who seems to be picking up the languages very quickly.  
    But today I don’t feel like fighting with them.  
    David starts to whine again but I turn and lean down and extend my finger so it’s right in his face.  
    “I’m not in the mood right now, David,” I say, my voice low and hard.  
    His face goes serious.