I can tell you—although it hurts me to say this—I see now that I am the reason why Zoe and I couldn’t have a baby. That was Jesus, hitting me in the head with a two-by-four over and over until I understood that I wasn’t worthy enough to be a father until I welcomed the Son. But Reid and Liddy—they are another story. They’ve been doing everything right, for so long. They don’t deserve this kind of heartbreak.
We both look up as Pastor Clive comes out of the house. He stands in front of Reid, casting a shadow. “She threw you out, too,” Reid guesses.
“Liddy just needs a little time,” the pastor says. “I’ll come check on her tonight, Reid.”
As Pastor Clive lets himself out the gate, Reid rubs his hand over his face. “She won’t talk to me. She won’t eat anything. She won’t take the pills the doctor gave us. She won’t even pray.” He looks at me, his eyes bloodshot. “Is it a sin to say that, sure, I loved that baby, but I love my wife more?”
I shake my head. After all the times I found myself boxed into a corner and couldn’t find a way out, only to notice my brother’s hand reaching out for me, I can finally be the one to reach out tohim.“Reid,” I tell him, “I think I know what to do.”
It takes me ten hours to drive round-trip to Jersey and back. When I pull into Reid’s driveway, the light in their bedroom is off. I find my brother in the kitchen washing dishes. He’s wearing Liddy’s pink apron, the one that saysI’M THE COOK, THAT’S WHY, and has a frill of ruffles around the edge. “Hey,” I say, and he turns around. “How is she?”
“Same,” Reid replies. He looks dubiously at the paper bag in my hands.
“Trust me.” I take out the box of Orville Redenbacher’s Movie Theater Butter popcorn and stick one bag in the microwave. “Did Pastor Clive come back?”
“Yeah, but she still wouldn’t talk to him.”
That’s because she doesn’t want to talk,I think. Talking only brings her right back to this nightmare. Right now, she needs to escape.
“Liddy doesn’t eat microwave popcorn,” Reid says.
Actually, my brother doesn’tletLiddy eat microwave popcorn. He’s a big fan of organic stuff, although I’m not sure if it’s because there’s a health benefit or because he just likes having the priciest items, no matter what the category. “There’s a first time for everything,” I answer. The microwave dings, and I take out the bloated bag, rip it open into a big blue ceramic bowl.
The bedroom is pitch dark and smells like lavender. Liddy is lying on her side under the covers of her big four-poster bed, facing away from me. I’m not sure if she’s asleep, and then I hear her voice. “Go away,” she murmurs. The words sound like she’s at the bottom of a tunnel.
I ignore her and eat a handful of popcorn.
The sound, and the smell of the butter, make her roll over. She squints at me. “Max,” she says. “I’m not really in the mood for company.”
“That’s cool,” I tell her. “I’m just here to borrow your DVD player.” I reach into the paper bag and pull out the movie. Then I load it and turn on the TV.
Bullets won’t kill it!the promo promises.
Flames can’t hurt it!
Nothing can stop it!
The SPIDER . . . will eat you alive!
Liddy sits up against her pillows. Her eyes drift to the screen, to the incredibly fake giant tarantula that is terrorizing a bunch of teens. “Where did you get this?”
“Just a place I know.” It’s a head shop in Elizabeth, New Jersey, that has a mail-order cult B-movie business. I’ve ordered online from them. But because I couldn’t wait long enough for a DVD to be shipped to me, and because this was Liddy we were talking about, I drove to the store instead.
“This is a good one,” I tell Liddy. “1958.”
“I don’t want to watch a movie right now,” Liddy says.
“Okay.” I shrug. “I’ll turn the sound down low.”
So I pretend to watch the television, where the teenage girl and her boyfriend go looking for her missing dad and find instead a massive web from a giant spider. But in reality, I’m stealing glances at Liddy. In spite of herself, she can’t help but watch, too. After a few minutes, she reaches for the popcorn in my lap, and I give her the whole bowl.
Just about the time the teenagers drag the lifeless body of the spider back to the high school gym to study it—only to learn it’s actually still alive—Reid pokes his head into the bedroom. By then, I’m lounging back on his side of the bed. I give Reid a thumbs-up, and I can see the relief on his face when he sees Liddy sitting up, engaged in the world of the living again. He backs out and closes the door behind him.
A half hour later, we’ve almost finished the popcorn. When the tarantula is finally electrocuted and falls, I turn to find tears running down Liddy’s face.
I’m pretty sure she doesn’t even know she’s crying.
“Max,” she asks. “Can we watch it again?”
