They had arrived in Haddonfield and had asked Mr. Price if they could stay with him. Heather’s mentor wasn’t one to refuse Heather much of anything. Laurie thought the whole thing very surreal. Heather’s father’s house was right down the street, but Heather wasn’t going to stay there. It just seemed wrong to her. But her opinion changed when she finally the man in question. Heather’s father, whose first name was Jeremy, was a widower less than two days, and it smelled like he had been drinking that entire time. Heather had gone to pay a courtesy visit, and Laurie had gone with her. The house had been slightly cleaned, but there were still beer bottles and cigarette ashes all over the place. Windows had been boarded up when broken rather than replaced. Mr. Englund had actually leered slightly lecherously at Laurie when he had first seen her, but that turned to disgust when he discovered that she was his daughter’s “dyke friend.” Just being around him for ten minutes made Laurie’s skin crawl. One of his poker buddies came over and made some offhand comment about making “a real woman” out of one or both of them, and Heather’s father just laughed. Heather’s fist had clenched and her whole body was trembling in pure rage, so she decided it was best that she cut the visit short. Heather’s mother wasn’t even in the ground yet, and her father’s friends were whistling at the two of them on the way out the door.
They had avoided any further contact with Heather’s family and “friends” until the funeral itself. The preacher’s words seemed so hollow during the ceremony. They were the generic things that were said about generic people when no one cared enough to write anything else. Heather’s mother had been a chain-smoking alcoholic who had always looked the other way when Heather was suffering her father’s anger, mostly because it meant she didn’t have to take the blows herself. She had experimented with drugs and adultery, and both had left their marks. The most skilled mortician in the world couldn’t make that face look peaceful. Heather’s mother had died a long time ago, but her body had simply kept moving around and taking up space. Laurie glanced around at the other attendees. ‘How did someone like Heather come from a place like this . . . from people like this?’ Laurie thought. ‘How could someone with as much passion as she has come from two people with no passion at all?’ She looked at her girlfriend and gingerly took her hand. She felt Heather accepting her hand and gripping it tightly. The blonde girl felt a tear developing in the corner of her eye. She admired Heather more at the moment than she had in the rest of their relationship together, and that was saying something. And the strangest thing was that the tear in her eye was probably the only one shed at that event.
The wake itself was the most uncomfortable thing Laurie ever had to attend. A woman, however sad she may have been in life, had just died, and no one seemed to care. She wondered if many of them even really noticed the woman was gone. But they noticed Laurie though. They noticed an attractive woman on the arm of another attractive woman, even though one of those girls was the daughter of the deceased. Laurie was sickened when she and Heather were actually propositioned while they were supposed to be mourning the loss of life. Finally, Heather had enough. She grabbed Laurie by the hand and headed towards the door of her father’s house.
“Where do you think yer goin’?” the man slurred. “Yer runnin’ off to do that bitch of yours, ain’t you? You got some nerve comin’ here and flauntin’ your perversion on the day they buried yer sweet mother.”
Heather stopped in her tracks. “Laurie,” she said with eerie calmness. “Could you please step outside for a moment.”
Laurie realized that this was one of those times that she probably shouldn’t argue. She stepped out onto the dilapidated front porch and closed the screen door. She left the main door open a smidge, having a burning need to know what was going on.
“What?” Heather’s father said. “Got somethin’ you wanna say, you perverted little . . .”
“Father, you can either shut up or I can shut you up. Decide now.” The room went dead quiet. Most of Mr. Englund’s friends were looking forward to this confrontation with almost sadistic glee.
“I’m not too old to . . .”
“Yes, you are too old,” Heather interrupted. “You’re old, drunk and worthless. You may have been able to beat me around when I was little, but I’ve grown up. Now, I can hit back.” Several onlookers began to look very uncomfortable. They generally accepted what had gone on in the house over the years. Hell, similar events probably transpired in their own homes. But like most dirty little secrets, it became a truly distasteful thing when exposed to the light of day.
“You wouldn’t dare,” her father started.
“Yes, I would. I put up with your shit for eighteen years,” Heather almost growled. “And I put up with hers,” she said, looking in the direction of her mother’s picture. “But if you say one more word about Laurie, so help me God I’ll beat the shit out of you right where you stand.” Laurie moved over and glanced in the window. Heather’s father actually looked dumbfounded. He was a bully and an abuser, and those were always uncertain on what to do when actually confronted. Something made sense to Laurie all of a sudden. She understood why Heather had reacted so vehemently when Jamie had emotionally used Alice. Heather had seen that as a way of lashing out against the abuses that she herself had suffered. And now, Heather was standing up for Laurie.
“I’ve got half a mind to . . .”
“I told you to SHUT UP!” Heather shouted. “I get to talk now! You don’t have ‘half a mind.’ You drank your entire fucking brain away years ago. You are NOTHING! Do you hear me? Nothing! You’re the filth under my fucking feet! That girl outside actually loves me, which is something you and Mom never did! And she does it unconditionally! That was something you were supposed to give me. The only thing YOU ever gave me was bruises and disappointments. I had school pictures taken with bruises you left and bones you broke. Well guess what Dad? You didn’t break me! You can’t hurt me anymore, and you’ll never get a chance to hurt Laurie. I only came back because Mom gave me life, and I owed her for that at least. You never gave me anything except the hope that maybe I’m really the mailman’s daughter. Because it would be better to never know my lineage than it is knowing that I’m actually related to you!”
Mr. Englund’s face was contorted in rage. He took one step forward, but that was as far as he got. Heather kicked him in the groin and then punched him in the face as hard as she could, dropping the inebriated man in his tracks.
“Goodbye Father,” Heather said, her voice calm again. “I’m done with you.” And with that, she walked out the door. Laurie met her there, half expecting her girlfriend to be crying or raging or something . . . but there was nothing. Heather’s face was as composed as her voice had been. The two girls headed down the street to Mr. Price’s house, hearing the laughter of the crowd directed at the man who had just been put down by his own daughter. Heather never looked back. That was the last time she would ever see her father.
——————— ———–
The plane trip home . . .
——————— ———–
Heather and Laurie had an early flight the next day. They sat towards the back, chatting idly about airplane food and other trivial matters. Laurie wanted to talk to Heather about what had happened. She was worried, since her girlfriend didn’t seem to be grieving at all. Apparently, her confusion was apparent.
“Don’t over-think it,” Heather said with a slight smile. How many times had she told Laurie that? Then the dark-haired girl placed her hand gently against Laurie’s cheek. “I’m so sorry you had to see that.”
“I think I needed to,” Laurie returned. “I don’t know if I ever would have understood you the way I want to if I didn’t get to see where you came from. I just wish it hadn’t been so hard on you . . .”
“But it wasn’t,” said Heather with a look of curiosity playing across her face. “It wasn’t hard at all. The only thing I feel bad about is that I really didn’t feel bad. Does that make me a horrible person? I couldn’t even bring myself to grieve at my own mother’s funeral.”
“Then maybe all you needed was closure,” Laurie said softly. “Maybe it was your past you were burying, not your mother.”
Heather settled her head on Laurie’s shoulder. It was odd, since Heather was usually the one doing the comforting. Laurie stroked Heather’s hair and kissed her on the head.
“We couldn’t even bury her like a normal family,” Heather said, referring to her mother. “You know that when I was younger, I would go and peek into other people’s houses. Most kids my age would pretend that they were cops, robbers, firemen or famous actors. I would fantasize about being normal. I would dream about sitting around with my parents and laughing about things and eating meals together and going on vacations together. I just wanted a real family,” she whispered.
Laurie was almost at a loss for something to say. She realized on that trip that she had vastly underestimated the abuse that had gone on in Heather’s life. When Alice had been in a state of denial after the incident with Jamie, Heather had told their friend that she knew the signs of depression because she had been there herself. ‘How long were you hiding in those deep dark places?’ Laurie wanted to ask. ‘And how did you survive?’ She made a mental note to do something really special for Mr. Price someday and to give Liz a great big hug when they got back to the ranch. Those two had been the only guiding light for a young girl trying to find her way to a better place.
“You have a family,” Laurie said. “You have me. And you have Alice, Mr. Price, Liz, Mary, Jenny, Mike, Michelle, Freddie and Jane. And all these people are your family by choice. They’re your family because they love you and see how wonderful you are. And I’m going to love you forever because . . . because I don’t know how NOT to love you.”
Heather turned her head up and kissed Laurie gently. “And that’s the answer to your question.”
“What question?”