The room was underheated, but Becky was sweating. The gagging sensation in her chest was like the carsickness of her childhood, the prospect of sex unfolding like a mountain road ahead of her, a hundred curves coming to make her even sicker. She’d gotten into the car of being Tanner’s. Now she wished it would slow down.
“My point is,” she said unsteadily, “he really needs you to play tonight.”
“Or wait. Wait.” The eyes behind the pink lenses narrowed. “Have you even had sex?”
“Have I—？”
“Oh my God. Of course you haven’t. No, please, no, the Bible says you shouldn’t touch me there.” Laura laughed. “Not that being a churchgoer ever stopped our boy. He’s quite the frisky Christian. You’d better be ready for that.”
The cold sweat of carsickness.
“Or, no, I hope you’re not ready. I hope the only thing you let him do with you is sing hymns. Serve him right.”
“Please,” Becky said. “We need to go right now. The agent is there, he came to hear you, and I just think—we should go.”
“I told you to get the fuck out of here.”
“Please, Laura.”
Laura sprang to her feet and came at Becky. Why Becky dropped to her knees, she couldn’t have said. Maybe she didn’t want to be so much taller, maybe it was a gesture of supplication. But, finding herself kneeling again, she bowed her head and pressed her palms together. Please help Laura, she prayed. Please forgive me.
Laura shrieked. “What the fuck? Are you fucking kidding me?”
Becky kept her head bowed. From above her came a sputtering, and then a cold hand was in her hair, grabbing a fistful of it, violating her physical sanctity, trying to yank her to her feet. She could feel hairs tearing from their roots, but she refused to stand up. The hand let go. An instant later, she was walloped in the ear. The blow was vicious, there was wristbone in it, and sparks in her vision—stars. She saw stars. The blow that followed was neck-wrenching, brain-shaking. Worse than the pain was the sheer fact of violence. No one had ever hit her. She squeezed her eyes shut and tried to keep praying.
Now Laura was kneeling, too. Her fingertips brushed Becky’s ear, which felt skinless and hot. “Becky, I’m sorry. Are you all right?”
Please, God. Please, God.
“I’m—shit. I’m no better than my old man.”
At the change in Laura’s voice, which might have been an answer to her prayer, something stirred in Becky’s core—the same opening-up that she’d experienced in the sanctuary. God was still there. She concentrated, not wanting to lose her connection to Him. But Laura spoke again.
“You know about that, right? Tanner told you?”
Becky shook her head.
“He didn’t tell you why I moved in with him? With his family?”
It was news to Becky that Laura had lived with the Evanses. Never mind the why of it.
“I know what it’s like to be hit,” Laura said. “I’m sorry I did that to you.”
“It’s all right. I did a bad thing to you, too.”
“That’s exactly how my old man made me feel. Like I deserved it.” Laura touched Becky’s shoulder. “Are you really all right?”
“Yes.”
“An open hand can do a lot of damage. Like, I’m partially deaf in one ear. It was Tanner’s mom who noticed. She was my piano teacher, and now she’s basically my mother. The other one—I can’t even be in the same room with her. He still hits her, and she still thinks she deserves it.”
Becky felt grateful—to God—that Laura was speaking more kindly, but beneath the gratitude were the beginnings of a grievance with Tanner. He hadn’t told her that Laura’s father had beaten her; that Laura had lived with his family; that she was practically his sister. If Becky had understood the depths of what she was stepping into, she would have been more careful. The harm she’d proceeded to cause was partly her fault, but it seemed to her that it was partly also Tanner’s.
“I’m so sorry,” she said.
“It’s just the left ear.”
“No, I mean, about everything. I’m sorry about everything. I’m thinking—maybe I should step aside. Leave the two of you alone.”
“Too late for that, sister. He’s in love with you.”
Again the carsick vista.
“I asked him point-blank,” Laura said. “That was his answer.”
“But it’s only because I threw myself at him. If I just went away…”