Diary

And Tabbi says, “Mom?”

Misty opens her eyes.

Tabbi’s colored birds and flowers down the length of her cast. Blue birds and red robins and red roses.

When Paulette brings up their lunch on a room service cart, Misty asks if anyone has tried to phone from the front desk. Paulette shakes out the cloth napkin and tucks it into the collar of the blue work shirt. She says, “Sorry, nobody.” She takes the warming cover off a plate of fish and says, “Why do you ask?”

And Misty says, “No reason.”

Now, sitting here with Tabbi, with flowers and birds crayoned on her leg, Misty knows she’ll never be an artist. The picture she sold Angel, it was a fluke. An accident. Instead of crying, Misty just pees a few drips into her plastic tube.

And Tabbi says, “Close your eyes, Mom.” She says, “Color with your eyes closed, like you did on my birthday picnic.”

Like she did when she was little Misty Marie Kleinman. Her eyes closed on the shag carpet in the trailer.

Tabbi leans close and whispers, “We were hiding in the trees and peeking at you.” She says, “Granmy said we had to let you get inspiration.”

Tabbi goes to the dresser and gets the roll of masking tape that Misty uses to hold paper on the easel. She tears off two strips and says, “Now close your eyes.”

Misty has nothing to lose. She can indulge her kid. Her work couldn’t get any worse. Misty closes her eyes.

And Tabbi’s little fingers press a strip of tape over each eyelid.

The way her father’s eyes are taped shut. To keep them from drying out.

Your eyes are taped shut.

In the dark, Tabbi’s fingers put a pencil in Misty’s hand. You can hear as she sets a drawing pad on the easel and lifts the cover sheet. Then her hands take Misty’s and carry the pencil until it touches the paper.

The sun from the window feels warm. Tabbi’s hand lets go, and her voice in the dark says, “Now draw your picture.”

And Misty’s drawing, the perfect circles and angles, the straight lines Angel Delaporte says are impossible. Just by the feeling, it’s perfect and right. What it is, Misty has no idea. The way a stylus moves itself across a Ouija board, the pencil takes her hand back and forth across the paper so fast Misty has to grip it tight. Her automatic writing.

Misty’s just able to hold on, and she says, “Tabbi?”

The tape tight over her eyes, Misty says, “Tabbi? Are you still there?”