Chapter Twenty-Three – Trudy

The spaghetti oh’s made a sucking almost gurgling sound as Trudy tapped the back of the can, causing what Campbell’s claimed was pasta to plop into the pot which began to sizzle happily as it accepted the can’s offering. Trudy wrinkled her nose, squishing the can-shaped pasta down into a manageable form. For the life of her, Trudy could not understand why Brady loved spaghetti oh’s but it was the one thing she actually ate without complaining so Trudy was only too happy to serve it to her young daughter.

Minutes later, Trudy balanced two bowls of the pasta and two cups of soda with a practiced hand as she stepped out of the kitchen and into the small living room in her apartment, smiling at Brady who was sitting in front of the television, completely ignoring the bright flashing images of The Fairy Odd Parents, instead, drawing away on the sketchpad Trudy had purchased for her only a few weeks before.

“Hey sweetie,” Trudy set the food down and settled herself onto the ground next to her daughter. “Lunchtime.”

“I’m not hungry.” Brady stated, not even looking up from her drawing.

Trudy frowned, brushing back Brady’s bangs to mask the fact that she was checking her daughter’s temperature. Brady was always hungry! Satisfied that her daughter was quite cool, she coaxed her gently, knowing that there was no way she was going to eat an entire can by herself.

“They’re your favorite. Spaghetti oh’s.” Trudy wriggled her eyebrows up and down as she lifted a forkful of the orangey-red goo. “See?”

“No thank you.” Brady replied politely, this time actually glancing up for a half of a second. “I’ve got to finish this.”

“You can finish it after, Brady.” Trudy told her blonde daughter firmly, “You need to eat now. Your picture can wait.”

“No it can’t!” Brady exclaimed loudly, defiantly.

“That’s it, young lady.” Trudy set the food down so fast it caused some of the gelatinous sauce to slosh out of the bowl. She glared at her daughter, knowing that if it came down to it she would punish her if she had to. “You are going to eat your lunch and you’re going to eat it right now.”

“No!” Brady shouted, throwing down the black crayon she had been using. “I won’t! I won’t! I won’t!” With that Brady leaped to her feet and raced out of the living room and to the bedroom she shared with her mother, stepping on her drawing in the process and breaking several crayons.

“Brady, come back here!” Trudy shouted after her, a deep sense of weariness suddenly washing over her. She started to rise to her feet but slumped back down, utterly exhausted. Slowly she shook her head, struggling to hold back the hopeless tears that threatened to consume her. “You’ve got too much of your father in you, Brady.” Trudy mumbled softly, a few single tears sneaking out. “And not enough of your uncle.”

Trudy bit down on her bottom lip, a deep sadness filling her. Since Bray had moved to Auckland he hadn’t once phoned her or Brady, even though he had promised he would. Trudy tried to tell herself that it no longer bothered her, that she knew that Bray would never and could never love her like she had always loved him, but the sting of his rejection still hurt.

“Knock it off, Trudy.” She scolded herself, picking up Brady’s coloring absentmindedly. “What are you fourteen? You have no time to be moping about over some loser who doesn’t love you.” Then as a side note, “And obviously doesn’t care about his niece.”

Expelling a wistful sigh Trudy glanced down at the picture Brady had been drawing, her heart immediately turning into ice. A gasp escaped her lips and the picture slipped from lifeless fingers falling to the floor, Trudy unable to tear her eyes away from the gruesome scene her little girl had drawn.

A nauseous feeling overtook Trudy and she slowly shook her head, trying to tell herself that she was only imagining Brady’s drawing, that it was really a horse running or a flower in bloom, the normal things little girls drew, not a picture of her uncle being killed by her father.

“Brady…” Trudy called out at last, wiping her sweaty palms on her dark blue jeans. Her voice was wobbly and full of anxiety. Trudy hoped Brady would not pick up on it. “Brady, sweetie, could you come here for a minute?”

Seconds later Brady obediently appeared in the doorway, her large soulful eyes studying her mother intently. “What is it mummy?” She asked in her childlike voice.

“Sweetie, mummy needs you to tell me why you drew this.” Trudy picked up the picture that had been so important to Brady only moments before. “Did you have a bad dream last night and your uncle and daddy got in a fight?”

Brady slowly shook her head, making her way over to Trudy. She sat down on the floor, then wiggled herself under Trudy’s open and accepting arms. “I saw it.” She told Trudy, her voice honest and open.

“You saw it?” Trudy felt all color drain from her face. “What do you mean you saw it? Did your daddy do something to your Uncle Bray before he left for school?”

Brady shook her head. “I saw it in my head.”

“In your head?” Trudy felt like an echo, repeating everything Brady had said as she desperately tried to make sense of it. Sudden recollection of Brady’s teacher’s concerns for her daughter’s mental health came rushing back to Trudy, as did her insinuation that it might somehow be connected to Martin.

“No!” Trudy exclaimed suddenly, gripping Brady tightly.

“Mummy!” Brady cried out. “You’re hurting me.”

Trudy instantly released her daughter, running her fingers through Brady’s delicate golden blonde hair. “Mummy’s sorry, Brady. I didn’t mean to. I’m just—I’m just scared, that’s all.”

“Scared of what, mummy? Daddy?”

“I…” Trudy’s throat went dry as she stared into the deep whimsical blue eyes of her daughter. So young and innocent yet she had more understanding and wisdom than most children twice her age. “No.” She lied quickly, adverting her gaze as she spoke. “Of course I’m not afraid of your daddy. In fact, I’m going to call him right now. Why don’t you sit down in front of the TV and watch some cartoons and once I get off the phone with your daddy you and I could go out to lunch.”

“To KFC?!” Brady asked excitedly.

“Whatever you’d like.” Trudy promised her, doing a few quick mental calculations to make sure taking her daughter out to lunch would fit into their budget. It would be tight, but if she made good tips tomorrow night they would be fine. “I’ll be right back, Brady. Okay?” She hesitated for a moment before she rose to her feet. “Don’t draw any more pictures for a little while, okay, sweetie?”

“Why?”

Trudy pursed her lips together trying to come up with a clever lie. “Well,” She began slowly, “Because you’re almost done with your entire pad of paper and if you run out I won’t be able to buy you a new one for several more weeks.”

Brady seemed to accept this and nodded, turning her attention to the television screen, allowing Trudy to stand up and slowly make her way to the kitchen were the apartment’s only phone was. She wished she could have the privacy of a closed door between her and her daughter as she spoke to Martin, but they did not have a cordless phone and Trudy preferred being able to keep on Brady while she spoke on the phone anyway.

Quickly dialing the phone number she knew by heart Trudy waited on the other end as it rang once, twice and finally a third time before it was picked up. “Hello?” Martin’s voice greeted her on the other side, sounding as nice and pleasant as he always was.

“Hi, Martin, it’s Trudy.” Trudy felt flustered. Normally she spoke to Bray when it came to things about Brady. Things between she and Martin had never exactly been good, though they tried to make the most of it for Brady’s sake.

‘Trudy, Bray’s not here. I thought you knew that. He moved to Auck-“

“Yes, yes. I know that.” Trudy snapped impatiently, racking her fingers through her mussed dark brown hair. “I need to talk to you. It’s about Brady.”

“Brady?!” Martin cried in alarm. “What is it? Is she alright? Has something happened to her?”

“Well, yes and no.” Trudy told him, keeping her voice quiet. “Nothing’s happened to her but she seems to be having these disturbing thoughts. I thought they might be nightmares, but now I’m not sure.”

“Disturbing thoughts?” Martin sounded incredulous, almost as if he couldn’t believe Trudy had called him just because their daughter was having ‘bad thoughts’.

“I don’t really know how to explain it, Martin.” Trudy retorted back, feeling the old familiar resentment rising up inside her. “She’s been drawing these pictures… These awful pictures and when I ask her about them she says she saw it in her head. Her teacher talked to me a couple days ago about it, but I really didn’t think anything of it at the time. But today…”

“What happened today, Trudy?” Martin pressed.

“Well, today she drew another picture. Martin,” She hesitated, gnawing on her lower lip nervously. “She drew a picture of you standing over Bray with a gun. Bray was on the ground… Dead.”

There was silence on the other line for several long seconds and Trudy feared Martin might have hung up on her. It wouldn’t be the first time. At last he cleared his throat and spoke again. “I see.” He sounded completely calm, unfazed by Trudy’s bombshell she had just dropped.

“I see?” Trudy exclaimed loudly, growing angrier with each passing second. “That’s it? I see? What is with you Martin? Do you not care about your daughter? About your brother? About me?”

“Trudy, you know I love Brady and I love my brother. And if you had given me a chance to explain before you jumped to conclusions you would have realized just how much I do care about my family.” Martin stated his voice cold and even. “I don’t know why Brady might have drawn that picture. Bray and I have never ever roughed housed in front of her so I don’t see how that could get in her head but, well, there are things in all our heads that sometimes we don’t understand and we need help to figure out.”

Trudy winced, knowing exactly what Martin was talking about. “Martin,” She said slowly, glancing out in the living room to check and make sure Brady was still content watching cartoons. ‘Brady’s not crazy. She’s not having episodes like you were back in school. She’s just having disturbing thoughts and putting them down on paper.”

“I’m not saying she’s crazy. All I’m saying is maybe we should take her to someone, have them check her out and make sure she’s alright. Maybe she’s stressed or something. I don’t know. Dr. Greenfield is an excellent doctor and he really helped me—“

“No!” Trudy shouted, gritting her teeth and clenching her fingers into a fist at her side. “There is no way I’m taking my daughter to see a psychiatrist, much less that creepy Dr. Greenfield. You know I don’t like him, nor the way he was looking at Brady that one time you insisted we all go with you for your little appointment.”

“Dr. Greenfield is a really good guy, Trudy.” Martin snapped. “You need to stop being so critical of everyone who doesn’t agree with you all the time. Anyway,” He sighed, “I really don’t want to get into this. My suggestion to you is to take her in to see Michael. I can call him as soon as I get off the phone with you and set up an appointment. How about that?”

“No.” Trudy shook her head, though she knew Martin could not see the movement on the other line. “Brady is not going to see Dr. Greenfield and that’s final. I guess if you won’t help me I’ll just have to think of something myself.”

She abruptly hung up the phone, inwardly fuming. She could not believe the audacity Martin had. He knew how much Dr. Greenfield scared not only Brady, but Trudy as well. He had watched them both greedily, as if he couldn’t get enough of them, and then when they were finally free to leave his horrid and suffocating office he had grabbed Trudy’s hand and slobbered all over it, though Martin insisted Dr. Greenfield was only kissing her hand, as was once the fashion. Whatever it was, it disgusted Trudy.

Letting out a heavy and drawn out sigh, Trudy glanced back into the living room. Brady was still watching cartoons. Trudy recognized the voices of Rocket and Reggie from Rocket Power. Brady would be transfixed to the screen for at least half an hour.

Trudy closed her eyes for a moment and made a decision. It would be difficult for her to do, mostly because she knew he would think she was throwing herself at him again, but he was the last person she could turn to. Picking back up the phone Trudy dialed the number for Auckland’s information operator, hoping that maybe, just maybe Bray would know what to do.