The Descendants by Kaui Hart Hemmings Read Free Book Online Page A

under the sink of her bathroom, behind the toilet, in between stacks of towels. I rifle through the pages of books and end up getting distracted by Alex’s childhood things: old stuffed animals (a monkey, a worm, a Smurf) and old books ( Ping, Ferdinand, books I remember from my childhood, many about wayward animals with deep psychological problems). I find pictures of Alex with her friends at camp on the San Juans, sailing on Puget Sound, having campfires in front of tepees. I see a stack of yearbooks and read the copious notes telling my daughter to stay cool. Some notes take up an entire page and are written in a strange code: Remember hot pants and dirty Christine! Poison ivy and BYOBucket! Are those ants??? Point, the van, that’s my mom’s favorite reindeer!
    I imagine Alex reading these words as an old woman and not knowing what any of them mean. Girls take so much time organizing the past. There are various collages documenting Alex’s weekends with friends, yet the testimonials to good times seem to stop once she hits her junior year and goes off to boarding school. Joanie came into this room a lot, told me she was rearranging things, maybe turning it into a guest bedroom. I look in the jewelry box where Joanie found the drugs. She showed me a miniature Ziploc bag filled with a clear, hard rock.
    “What is this?” I said. I never did drugs, so I had no idea. Heroin? Cocaine? Crack? Ice? “What is this?” I screamed at Alex, who screamed back, “It’s not like I shoot it!”
    A plastic ballerina pops up and slowly twirls to a tinkling song whose sound is discordant and deformed. The pink satin liner is dirty, and other than a black pearl necklace, the box holds only rusty paper clips and rubber bands noosed with Alex’s dark hair. I see a note stuck to the mirror and pick up the jewelry box and move the ballerina aside. She twirls against my finger. The note says, I wouldn’t hide them in the same place twice.
    I let out a short breath through my nose. Good one, Alex. I close the jewelry box and shake my head, missing her tremendously. I wish she never went back to boarding school, and I don’t understand her sudden change of plans. What did they fight about? What could have been so bad?
    I go back to the bedroom, ashamed to be looking for anything at all. My wife cared about the sale. She appreciated Holitzer. She thought this sale would change our lives. My wife had friends she met at Indigo. Gay men and models adore that restaurant. My wife kept things from the past. My wife had a life outside this home. It’s as simple as can be.

 
     
    7

     
     
    TUESDAY. TODAY IS my date with the doctor, and I’m not going to run away. I’ve let the front desk know that I’m here.
    “A slow but gradual recovery,” I imagine him saying. “When she comes out, she will need you. You will have to help her with the most basic things, everyday actions you take for granted. She will need you. Need you.”
    Scottie and I walk down the hall. Her T-shirt says MRS. CLOONEY, and she’s wearing wooden clogs that ti-tap-ti-tap-ti-tap on every step. The hospital is so busy, you’d think they were having some kind of going-out-of-business sale. Scottie looks eager; her mouth is moving, and I think she’s rehearsing what she’s going to say to Joanie. This morning she told me she had a great story for Mom, and I’m excited to hear it. I guess I’ll need to talk to Joanie as well. I’ll need to relay to her whatever Dr. Johnston says to me.
    When we get to the room, I see we have a visitor. A friend of Joanie’s whom I don’t know well. She’s been here before. Tia or Tara. She models with my wife. I remember seeing a picture of her in a newspaper ad. It must have been right before the accident. In the advertisement she was drinking bottled water and holding a straw purse with an expensive-looking diamond bracelet around her wrist. I didn’t read the print, so I didn’t know if the ad was for the bracelet, the