I thrust her into the passenger seat and turned on the ignition, then pulled a bottle of cold water from my purse. We counted our sips while the air conditioner battled with the heat. Sweat poured off our bodies and dried instantly, leaving a salty residue.
I gazed down at Bridget with my usual anguished adoration. Tendrils of dark curly hair, so much like mine, stuck to her forehead, and her round cheeks looked like small ripe tomatoes. Her eyes were swollen with weeping, and she still gave the odd hiccupping sob.
Our trip to the supermarket had ended, as usual, with a tantrum. Bridget was placing each item from the cart onto the counter with mathematical precision when the cashier smiled at her. “How are you today, honey?”
Bridget hid behind me, grinding her face into the backs of my knees.
“Oh, she’s fine, just shy.” I spoke quickly, giving the cashier a significant look. But she hadn’t taken the hint.
“Don’t worry, sweetie. I won’t bite.” She reached down and patted Bridget on the head.
Bridget let out a primal scream. All around us, heads swivelled. I thrust a $20 bill at the cashier and grabbed my bag of groceries with one hand while Bridget howled like a banshee. We fled to the public washroom and hid there until she was calm enough to leave the mall.
The fan had now reduced the interior temperature to eighty-six degrees, and the searing metal seat belt buckles were cool enough to touch. I didn’t want to waste any more gas, so I backed the car out of the parking spot and we headed toward home.
It wouldn’t be home for very long, though.
Between the heat outside and the waves of burning anxiety that washed over my body, I felt dizzy. Each hour seemed to speed past more quickly, as if time were accelerating. We had to leave our rented condominium before midnight on the last day of July. I glanced at the dashboard clock. We had twenty-eight days, eight hours, and thirty-seven minutes left.
Back at the condo, we performed our usual ritual of going straight into the bathroom and scrubbing our hands. Bridget ran off to the sanctuary of her bedroom while I put away the tortillas, canned beans, lettuce, and cheese, then I walked into the living room and sank into the cream leather couch.
I looked around at the stylish furniture. This was a former show home, and five years ago I had been happy to rent the place fully furnished. As a result, we inhabited a space-age interior filled with glass tables and snowy tiles. Even Bridget’s bedroom was starkly modern.
I wondered occasionally if she yearned for pink drapes and fluorescent stars on the ceiling, but she hadn’t complained. Like me, she preferred an orderly life. Just yesterday I had come into her room to find her sixteen Barbie dolls laid on the bed in a neat row.
“Are you playing with your dolls?” I asked indulgently.
“Mama, I’m not playing with them, I’m organizing them!”
As they say, the apple doesn’t fall far from the tree.
I dragged myself to my feet and went over to my immaculate desk. This was the second worst year of my life. Second worst, because nothing compared with the catastrophe I had experienced twenty years ago, when I was only twelve.
But this was going to be a close contender.
Two months ago, I had been laid off by the accounting firm that hired me fresh out of college. The recession hit Phoenix like a tidal wave, and I watched several rounds of layoffs with increasing terror until finally it was my turn.
I came home and glued myself to my computer, emailing hundreds of resumés. But there were no accounting vacancies, not in private firms, banks, or government departments. My skill with numbers and my stellar academic credentials were simply without value in today’s marketplace.
I had barely managed to make July’s rent. Yesterday I dismissed Gabriella, the Mexican nanny who had cared for Bridget ever since she was a baby. And I didn’t have the courage to tell my fragile little daughter that Gabby wasn’t coming back.
Tomorrow I would start looking for the cheapest apartment I could find, in a less desirable area. I would find a daytime job as a retail clerk or server, and Bridget would be forced into a low-income daycare centre.
I didn’t mind so much about myself. The fancy condominium and the white furniture could go. And I could endure waiting on tables for the sake of a paycheque.
What I couldn’t bear was the effect it would have on Bridget. When I thought about leaving her in an unfamiliar place, filled with noisy children and strange adults, then turning my back and walking away, I felt physically ill.
I opened the financial folder on my computer desktop and studied the numbers again. How I wished that the great banker of life, like the one in the Monopoly game, had made an error in my favour. But the numbers remained the same no matter how many times I reviewed them.
At work they jokingly called me “The Human Calculator.” So it didn’t take long to add the figures in my head. My total assets included my personal savings, the 2006 Nissan Altima purchased before Bridget’s birth, and some miscellaneous belongings.
My liabilities included a medical bill from the ear infection that struck Bridget two days after I lost my job, along with my company health insurance. Bridget’s psychotherapy had already drained my savings account, and I still owed the child psychologist $2,000. When I told Dr. Cassalet we couldn’t afford to come back, she looked grim. “Please get Bridget into treatment as soon as you can,” she said.
After setting aside money for the first and last month’s rent in a new apartment, I had $800 to last until I found a job and received my first paycheque. If I could find a job. Otherwise we would be living in a homeless shelter.
I took my hands off the keyboard and scratched my elbows. My eczema had flared up again, and both elbows and shins bore an itchy, painful rash. My skin never did well in the Arizona heat, anyway. I had the milky white complexion of my Celtic forebears that burned without tanning.
With an audible sigh that sounded more like a moan, I left the computer and went into the kitchen, opened a can of beans, and started to make burritos. Cheap and filling, they were one of the few things that my fussy child would eat.
When the phone rang seven days later, my heart leaped. Hoping it was a potential employer, I snatched it up without checking the call display.
“Hello!”
“Hello, is this Mary Margaret Bannister?”
“Yes, it is. Who’s calling, please?”
“My name is Franklin Jones. I have a legal practice in Juniper, Alberta. I’m the executor of a will in which you are named as the principal beneficiary.”
My impulse was to hang up immediately, but he was still speaking.
“According to the will, you’re the only surviving relative of Mary Margaret Bannister Lee. She passed away two weeks ago.”
I paused. It was true that Mary Margaret Bannister was the maiden name of my grandfather’s sister, but she had died decades ago, somewhere in the Canadian wilderness. I had been named after her, although everyone called me Molly.
“Where did you get this number?”
“I searched for Bannisters in Arizona and found your name on Aztec Accounting’s website. When I called the office, one of your former colleagues was kind enough to give me your telephone number. I realize it’s unorthodox to call rather than write, but I wanted to expedite matters.”
“Well, I’m afraid you have the wrong person. I did have a great-aunt by that name who lived in Canada, but she died