Chapter Ten

Eugenia

Dear Grams,

Thanks for yer letr. Last nite we climbd Mt. Whitface and I got dizzy. You r wasting monee on this shitty playce whre they think we can climb a moutn just by usng moon lite to see. I will be ded soon. Luv, Minnie. PS Plse let me come home. Ill be good.

Lily doesn’t call today. I am at loose ends as I head into the evening. Last night’s storm has caused temperatures to plummet and I haven’t been outside all day. I try to busy myself with cooking. Still, I am distracted.

I am alone in the house as I sit down to a light supper of scrambled eggs with chives and prosciutto, accompanied by a scoop of cottage cheese and a lovely watercress salad. A small roll with butter. At seven, I’m done. I load the dishwasher, pull some clothes from the dryer, and lightly mop the kitchen floor. Although I move slowly, I find that I enjoy doing light cleaning.

My mood lifts and my head finally begins to clear. A March snowstorm has blown in and I watch from the kitchen window. Wet, large flakes ooze into the garden. The patio is coated with slush. The wind is blowing. I feel cozy.

At eight, as I am about to head upstairs, Lily rings the bell.

Dressed for the polar vortex, she is wearing a long black puffy down coat that makes her look like a snow tire. I can hardly see her face behind the hood. A scarf is wrapped tightly around her mouth.

Neither of us speaks as I open the door. She walks in without bothering to take off her boots or even wipe them.

Once she is unwrapped, and seated on the sofa in my living room, her boots begin to melt on my hardwood floors. I notice that her eyes are red and her face looks swollen. She looks particularly unbecoming in her pink sweat pants and a navy blue polyester sweater that’s stretched, faded and boxy.

Soft featured and pallid, she has a face so slack it could use a zipper. Lily was always a carelessly outspoken presence at the school. Appearance was beside the point as she threw herself into the heart of anything Whitley: class parent, president of the PTO, and most recently, chairwoman of the auction committee. As Lily dove deeper into her roles, she would look progressively more haggard, stressed and unkempt. She pushed for rigorous curriculum. She needled parents relentlessly to get more involved. And she never failed to raise the money. The worse she looked, the more successful the outcome.

Three months ago, Lily handed her post over to another parent and officially withdrew Claude from the school. Tonight, she stares at me with gimlet eyes and I shift uncomfortably on the couch.

Away from the Whitley landscape, she looks diminished.

“Imagine the shock,” she begins. “One minute, I’m orchestrating the book drive for our little sister charter school in the South Bronx. The next minute, I’m on my way to the police station to pick up my daughter.”

I open my mouth, but before I can speak, she continues. “There must have been eight mothers helping me that day, boxing up wonderful young adult books for our poor little underprivileged friends in the Soundview Leaders Academy. And before I know what’s hit me, I’m taking a call in the corner of the cafeteria from Detective Santiago.”

She stares at me hard again.

“People like me aren’t supposed to get that kind of a phone call.”

“It must have been so frightening for you,” I offer.

“Of course it was!” she says sharply. “Word travels fast through the Whitley community. I was in every mother’s mouth.”

The school is rife with stories.

Three days after the girls were picked up, the school held a special assembly to offer cautionary tales about what choices not to make. They brought in two young girls to share their struggles through recovery. They brought in a substance abuse counselor.

“In another two years,” says Lily, “our girls will become the tall tales of Whitley. Two freshmen girls who held up a bank and took an Uber driver hostage.”

She is quiet for a moment.

Then: “News alert, Eugenia: If I were there, I would have helped organize that special assembly. And I would have gotten better guest speakers. Higher quality addicts.”

I don’t tell her that on my worst days, I envision my own story: Minnie, at eighteen, on her own in the woods after she has gone missing from her group while foraging for hallucinogenic mushrooms. After two years, the search has been called off. There are occasional sightings. Little children are frightened around camp fires as they build on the story. Minnie’s hair is long and matted, her face is filthy. Eyes are febrile. Her teeth are exposed in a ravenous smile, with a glint of the braces that were never removed. Walking on all fours by now, she is like a wolf with nothing but the moon and her appetites to guide her.

Loud rings the bell.

“Before things went so horribly wrong, Claude and I were reading Great Expectations together,” says Lily. “Every night before bedtime, we’d lay in her bed, propped up against pillows and she’d put her head here.” She points to her right shoulder. “I read, she listened. Until we got to Chapter Twenty Seven. Enter Minnie, exit Claude, and bye bye Charles Dickens.”

Although I have never been invited into their home, I can see Claude’s bedroom, with its yellow walls and floor to ceiling windows with white shutters. Furnishings are tasteful. Dresser is crafted with reclaimed wood and brass fixtures. Colorful Amish quilts are spread across the bed and there’s just enough clutter still in there to make the room look like it’s being used. Lily has done her best to keep it intact, although I’m sure substances are hidden inside linings that she would never think of ripping into.

Even if Claude comes through this intact, her mother will never stop grieving.

“Claude was always light years of everyone else.” Lily smiles mirthlessly. “So I suppose it makes sense that she’d leave me with an empty nest three years ahead of schedule.”

“You’ll get her back,” I say.

“And then what?” she snaps. “I won’t get back the time I lost with her.”

By now, a small puddle of melted snow surrounds her feet. Salt from the sidewalk will eat away at my floors. But I stay silent.

She looks down, but doesn’t say anything.

I stand up and head to the kitchen. Moments later, I return carrying a tray with a pot of tea, two cups, and a plate of cookies. I place it all on the coffee table.

Lily shakes her head. Then, reluctantly, she reaches out for a cookie.

“Ambrosia Bakery?”

I nod.

“They always donate gift certificates to the school auction. Big seller.”

She’s quiet again. Munching.

“I’m sure Betsy Langford is doing a lousy job of soliciting donations this year. Doesn’t have the balls to hit up the big guns and pull in the loot.”

She continues: “I know nothing about Whitley anymore because no one bothers to keep me in the loop.” She rolls her eyes. “Apparently, I’m contagious.”

Shoulders a bit rounded, mouth slack, hair hanging over her eyes, she looks like the woman who has misplaced the keys to her kingdom. I suspect that in spite of her devotion to Whitley, Lily forged no enduring friendships there. Parents were drawn to her maniacal drive to get the job done, but they probably would step into oncoming traffic before they’d go for a cup of coffee with her.

Much as I hate to acknowledge it, I have something in common with Lily Renquist: neither of us has friends.

Oh, every few months, Netta Ashburn comes by for a visit, and we act like we are old pals. We catch up on gossip and retell stories that are creakier than an attic staircase. But we are not friends. She was my fast friend, my go to friend when I didn’t want to drink alone. Drunk, we spewed confidences along with assurances that secrets were safe. Sober, we warily circled each other, wondering what secrets we’d given away. These days, her visits are reminders that we were once famous, that we are never more than an eyelash away from relapse, and that we still can’t stand each other.

Lily takes another cookie and then a sip of tea. An outsider looking at us easily might mistake us for friends. Here we sit, our faces earnest. At seventy eight, I don’t know the first thing about making a new friend. But I feel some warmth towards this woman who is sharing her sorrow with me. Sober and clear eyed, I will help her carry this burden. I feel stirrings of kindness.

“Claude left for Utah on a Thursday,” she tells me. “By Friday, my phone stopped ringing. Membership in Whitley Mommies Club officially over.” She snaps her fingers. “Just like that.”

“Oh, my phone stopped ringing way before that,” I confide, settling back against pillows. “Those mothers were just too much. So judgmental.”

Lily stands up abruptly, reaches for her scarf and heads for the door. “Of course your phone doesn’t ring. Why would it?”

*************************************************

Raeven comes over on Thursday night to sit down with Alexander and me to wait for a conference call with the wilderness therapist. There are rumblings about moving Minnie to a different program. Some kind of residential treatment center out west. Raeven and Alexander sit at the dining room table with the laptop, checking out links.

I am tearing apart the living room, looking for my porcelain shepherdess. And the praying hands, along with two china teacups. If Minnie weren’t away, I would assume she’d pawned them for drugs. But today I wonder if Francine broke them and secretly disposed of the remains. She’s become clumsy and a little addled lately, and I am in a dither about whether or not to ask her about this. For now, I will give her a pass and keep looking.

Patty The Wilderness Therapist, calls. I put the search on hold, steeling myself for the latest bad news. On the speaker phone, Patty sounds tinny but sure of herself. I picture her in her little wilderness office, in the clearing amid conifers and sugar maples. This is where Patty The Wilderness Therapist updates frantic families. Although she sounds quite young, she carries the ancient knowledge of the boreal forests in her voice. Each week she assures us that the stark landscape – the icy brooks, the perilous trails, the howl of the coyotes, and the monumental pines – will teach Minnie humility and gratitude. Give it time, she reassures us each week. The wilderness will win.

But now, Patty The Wilderness Therapist is dubious. Minnie is still in a power struggle with the mountains. She won’t bust a fire with a rock and stick. She still won’t pack her backpack efficiently or even take the most basic steps towards survival. She demands too much attention from the group, creates chaos, and doesn’t do enough to contribute to others’ well being. They have a certain number of miles to travel on the trail each day and she holds them back, creating drama after drama: a twisted ankle, a stomachache, or a melt down.

Patty saves the worst for last: three days ago, a new camper sneaked in four painkillers that were somehow overlooked during intake. She and Minnie became fast friends and got high.

“We have to think about the physical and emotional well being of the others,” says Patty the Wilderness Therapist.

“So what are you saying?” asks my son, running his fingers through his hair. Raeven sits next to him, looking pale.

Patty the Wilderness Therapist wants us to consider residential treatment. She’s met with her supervisor and her team of therapists, and they suggest a lockdown facility in Montana, where Minnie will get the supervision she needs.

Here’s what we are being told to do: hire transporters to come into the wilderness within the next 48 hours, where they will take Minnie in the middle of the night and move her to a safe house before she has time to manipulate us into bringing her home. From there, they will fly her out west.

“No!” says Alexander. “No! No!” He is standing up, pacing the dining room.

“You need to think about your daughter’s emotional state,” says Patty The Wilderness Therapist.

She is from Maine, and she speaks plainly, rooted in the language of the loons and the simplicity of core values. How can we not believe that she and her team of experts know what is best for our overindulged girl?

“Minnie is in a spiral,” she says. “We’re not sure how much longer we can keep her safe. She might run.”

“No!” says Alexander. “We’re not sending her away like that. Not before I see her for myself.”

“What about that nice little dairy farm?” I suggest. “In Western Massachusetts?”

“I suggest Healing Youth in Montana,” Patty The Wilderness Therapist says evenly. “It’s a higher level of care, more intensively therapeutic. And it’s part of our network of programs. We refer many kids there, with good results.”

The three of us sit in silence.

“You have forty eight hours to make arrangements to get her transported.”

“Well.” Says Raeven after we end the call.

Alexander continues to pace the dining room.

“It doesn’t sound like we have a choice,” I say.

“If we mail Minnie across the country like a package,” my son says slowly, “we will lose our girl forever.”

“How do we know we can even trust Patty?” asks Raeven. “She’s just getting pressure from the higher ups to fill beds in a more expensive facility. All these places – wilderness, boarding schools, lockdowns – are owned by private equity. They just keep moving kids up the ladder to the next rung, at greater costs. I know this world. Nothing is covered by health insurance. Wall Street has desperate families by the balls.”

Alexander and I stare at her, but her face reveals nothing.

“I’m going to get Minnie,” says Alexander.

“And then what?” I ask. “What will you do once you get her?”

“I’ll figure it out as I go along.