The Art of Mending (4 page)

“You said that? That
is
pretty bad.”

“Yeah, I know. But you did some terrible things to your brother and sisters.”

“I can assure you I stayed out of the God area.”

“Yeah, but when Stella was only four, you told her you turned into a werewolf at night.”

“How do you know that?”

“She told me. And she also told me that you lined shoes up along the top of your door and then yelled for Danny to come quick, and when he pushed the door open all the shoes fell on him. And gave him a black eye.”

Silence.

“You robbed Tina’s piggy bank twice.”

“All right. Good night.”

“Oh. Oh! And you—”

He leaned over, kissed me. “Good
night.
We have an early morning.” He turned on his side, closed his eyes, and fell asleep. It’s amazing. Head on pillow, and he’s out.

I lay awake, wondering what was up with Caroline. I thought of the drive ahead of us, how the kids would ignore each other for the most part but how there would also be a few fights to contend with. It was only a five-hour drive, though, and then we’d be there. The garden would be perfectly tended, the bird feeders would all be full. There would probably be sheets and upside-down shirts and pants on the clothesline; my mother was a big believer in line drying. One summer I’d tried it myself, but the romance had drowned in the inconvenience.

The food would not be memorable, of course, but the setting would be nice. We’d eat out on the back porch on a green painted table with an embroidered tablecloth, nice old flowered china, a huge vase of flowers, and the cut-glass salt-and-pepper shakers that had belonged to my grandparents—whenever I saw them, I remembered those shakers being on their Formica kitchen table. I remembered, too, my grandfather using his tongue to pop his lower dentures out of his mouth, then gulping them back in, one of the many things he did to thrill us grandchildren. For a long time, I hadn’t known they were dentures, and I’d thought my grandfather was an extremely talented man. I had spent long periods of time lying on my bed trying to loosen my own bottom teeth so I too could perform this interesting feat. My mother had come into my room one day with a laundry basket and had seen me yanking away at my back molars. “What are you doing?” she’d asked. And when I’d told her I was trying to do Grandpa’s trick, she’d laughed and told me his teeth were false.

“But where are his real teeth?” I’d asked.

“Gone.”

“But gone where?”

“I don’t know,” she’d said. “Just gone.”

“But—”

“Laura.” She’d touched my shoulder. “Don’t ask so many questions. You always ask so many questions. Don’t do that. Just . . . accept things.” She’d moved to my dresser to put away neatly folded stacks of underpants, talking with her back to me. “Don’t ask questions and don’t look back. Believe me, you’ll be much more content.”

I’d grown silent, trying to figure out what
that
meant. Then I’d gone back to thoughts of my grandfather’s teeth.

It was strange how my memory was changing. More and more, someone would refer to something that had happened fairly recently, and I would have forgotten all about it. I misplaced my glasses, the cinnamon, the name of an actor I’d always known. An abiding comfort was that it was happening to Pete too. “Guess who was in the store today?” he’d say. And then he’d get this panicked look on his face. “It was . . . oh, you know. You know who I mean.” We would stand in the kitchen, blankly staring at each other. “Oh, man,” he’d say. “Hold on a minute.” He’d concentrate for a while, eyebrows knit together, arms crossed, one foot tapping the floor, and then he’d throw his hands up in the air and give up. Hours later, he’d remember. Or not.

Other things, especially from times long ago, I remembered clearly. I recall, for example, every detail about a time I lay on my belly next to the stream that used to be half a block away from our house. It was a hot morning in July; I had just turned ten, and I’d wanted to go somewhere to be alone and consider my oldness—two digits! I remember the algae swaying seductively in the greenish water, the quick thrill of a school of minnows swimming past, the grit of dirt against the exposed strip of skin at the top of my yellow pedal pushers. I remember the onion-scented smell of the long grass there, and the way it imprinted a pattern of itself against your skin after you lay in it.

That same summer I buried Necco wafers in the dirt and then dug them up again and ate them, to show I was not afraid of germs. The sun had been setting gloriously when I popped the candy into my mouth; I remember the sky looked as though it were on fire. There’d been a ring of admiring neighborhood kids around me, including a six-year-old girl picking her nose rapturously with one hand and holding a Tiny Tears doll wrapped in a pink-checked blanket with the other. I wanted very much to hold that doll, but for obvious reasons I feared touching it. A twelve-year-old boy, the senior member of the impromptu gathering, had tossed a baseball from hand to hand, weighing insult versus compliment, I knew. In the end, he’d split the difference and had said, “Huh!” before he walked away.

And this memory has persisted too: my mother holding a laundry basket against her hip that day she came into my room, telling me what she believed was necessary for living a happy life.

It is my grandfather, sitting in a nubby green oversized armchair in his living room. The flash of the camera is captured in his eyeglasses. He is wearing his gray cardigan sweater, a plaid shirt, and some loose-fitting pants. On one side of his lap, I sit holding a lollipop and leaning back against him, smiling. On the other side is Caroline. Though my grandfather has his arms securely around both of us, she is trying to pull his arm closer still. Her fingers appear to be digging into him. She looks tense and unhappy, trying so desperately to delay his letting go that she hastens it. I remember the exact moment after that photo was taken: a sudden gust of wind lifting maroon draperies printed with exotic lime-green fronds; the smell of frying chicken in the air; my grandfather standing up to go into the kitchen “to help Grandma make the gravy”; and me pinching Caroline because I knew it was she who made him leave. I cautioned her not to tell or I would pinch her again, harder.

4

MY FATHER HAD SENT US AN ARTICLE FROM THE
PIONEER
Press
about some things that would be at the fair this year, and Anthony was slumped in the backseat of the car, reading aloud from it. We’d been driving for three hours, and an edgy monotony had set in.

“There’ll be two hundred and fourteen port-a-johns,” Anthony read. “And they’ll use twenty-two thousand rolls of toilet paper.”

“Gross,” Hannah mumbled.

“What’s gross about toilet paper?” Anthony asked. “What would be gross is if there
weren’t
any.”

“Eeeeuuuuwwww!”
She returned to her paperback, a story of three teenage girls who explore the Arctic by themselves.

“They’ll have elk ragout,” he said. “And walleye on a stick.”

“That walleye’s actually very good,” Pete said. “I’ve had that. I might get it again.”

“Listen to this breakfast,” Anthony said. “Smoked pork chop, scrambled eggs, fried dumplings, and a kolach. I’m getting that.”

“I’m eating
only
fried food,” Hannah said.

“Well, you’re in luck. Listen to this: They have fried ravioli, French fries, cheese curds, onion blossoms, and fried dough. And look at this: deep-fried
pickles
! Hot damn!”

I saw the color rise in Pete’s face at Anthony’s mild epithet, and he started to turn around but opted instead for paying attention to the road. But his eyes sought out Anthony’s in the rearview mirror.

“Sorry,” Anthony said quietly.

“You know, Anthony, you just don’t seem to get some things,” Pete said.

“I
said,
Sorry!”

“He’s smiling,” Hannah said. “He’s not sorry.”

“Hannah!” I said, at the same time that Pete said, “I can see him, Hannah.”

It was thickly quiet for a moment, and then Pete said, “I guess if you can’t remember to respect my rules, I can’t remember to give you money for concert tickets.”

“Dad, I’m sorry, okay? It just slipped out. It’s not—I don’t know why you get so bent out of shape about this! It’s just an expression everybody uses. I don’t get it, why you’re always so—” He stopped, exasperated. Stared out the window. “It’s
weird,
” he said, under his breath.

Pete put the blinker on and moved to the right lane to pull off into a rest stop.

“Uh-oh,” Hannah said. “You’re gonna get it.”

“Pete,” I said, “don’t be so—”

But he stopped the car, cut the engine, stared at me in a direct bid for support, and turned around to look at his children. “There are certain things in your life that will become very important to you,” he said. “You might not be able to explain to anyone else why they’re important. But you will expect the people who love you, the people who are your family, to respect those things. If any of you need to swear, do it somewhere else. It
bothers
me.”

“But—don’t get mad, Dad, okay?” Anthony said. “I just wish you’d tell me
why
you think it’s so bad.”

Pete faced forward and rubbed the back of his neck. “Just . . . don’t. Okay? I tell you again, don’t do it around me.
Period.
” He started the engine.

“Do you want me to drive for a while?” I asked.

“I’m fine.”

“I’ll drive,” Hannah said, and I was relieved to see Pete’s small smile. I too once asked Pete why it was so terribly offensive to him when people swore. It had been many years ago; we’d only been dating a few months. We were out walking in a park, and I’d asked more or less the same question, and Pete had stopped to examine a leaf on a tree. He’d been turned away from me when he’d said, “It’s just . . . it’s a need I have. It doesn’t matter why.”

“Okay,” I’d said. And I thought maybe I’d have to stop seeing him—his answer had made me really uncomfortable, and I had a habit of swearing a lot. But there’d been nothing else so tightly wound about him. Anyway, by then it was too late: I loved the planes of his face, his black hair and blue eyes, his elegant table manners, his deep voice, his love of animals and children, his otherwise easygoing manner. I loved
him.
I would forgive him this and hope he would forgive my own irritating mannerisms.

“They have sixty-five rides,” Anthony said, reading again from the newspaper.

Silence.

“In 1965,” he said, “Princess Kay of the Milky Way wore a formal gown made of butter wrappers.”

“All
right,
” Hannah said. “Just be quiet, now, I’m trying to read.”

“Okay, but just one more thing. You know what else?”

She sighed. “What?”

“You know how they make those sculptures out of butter? The head of Princess Kay of the Milky Way?”

“Yeah. And her court.”

“Right. Well, most of them freeze their heads. But this one princess? She melted hers down for a corn feed.”

“Let me see,” Hannah said.

I leaned my head against the window and tried to doze while peace reigned, but I couldn’t. First I imagined that practical Princess Kay dressed in jeans and a plaid shirt and loafers, hair in a ponytail, standing over a Dutch oven in some farm kitchen, watching her likeness melt down into nothing. Then I thought of my parents, waiting for us. My mother would be wearing some new outfit she’d purchased for the occasion, and she’d meet us at the door, chatting a mile a minute. My father would be puttering in the basement, and when we arrived he would solemnly come into the kitchen to offer his muted greeting. Standing in that familiar place, I believed I would feel the usual odd mix of sensations. Some of it would have to do with the inescapable nostalgia and apprehension—even preemptive irritation—that accompanies any visit home once you’ve moved out. The rest would be because of something I’d always felt but could never name. My mother, smiling brightly, looking directly into your eyes before she embraced you tightly, would feel a million miles away. My father, averting his gaze before he took you into his arms, would be the one who felt close.

5

MY MOTHER WAS OUT CUTTING FLOWERS WHEN WE
arrived, bent over roses such a deep red color they looked black. She turned when she heard our car doors slam and shaded her eyes. She was wearing a white linen blouse, black linen pants cut to just above the ankle, and red strappy sandals. Cute. “Look who’s here!” she cried, and, removing her gardening gloves, headed toward us, arms open wide. “You’re the first ones. I’m so excited!” She hugged Pete and me, then the kids. “You’ve grown!” she told Hannah.

“You always say that,” Hannah said, smiling.

“I know. But it’s always true. You’ve become a
lovely
young lady.” She turned to Anthony. “And you! You’re gorgeous!”

Anthony laughed, embarrassed, then took his bags and headed for the back door. “Grandpa inside?”

“Down at his workbench,” my mother said. She started to take one of the suitcases, but Pete took it from her. “Save your strength, Barbara,” he told her.

As we headed indoors, we heard a car honk. It was Steve, pulling up to the curb, and then we saw Caroline’s car pulling up right behind him.

“Well!” my mother said.

“Good timing,” Pete said, but my mother seemed more unsettled than pleased. She smoothed down the collar of her blouse. Raised her chin. It seemed to me that there was, in these movements, a strange sense of preparation for battle. But then I decided my perspective was skewed by what Caroline had told me the night before. I waved at her and Steve and headed inside.

IT WAS ALMOST MIDNIGHT.
Pete and I were lying in bed in the basement guest room, a room my parents used mainly for storage of out-of-season clothes. Beside us, in the dim light of the moon coming through the tiny, high windows, I could see our makeshift nightstand: a TV tray holding an alarm clock, a tiny lamp, a box of Kleenex, and a small porcelain dish, put there, I knew, for holding Pete’s change. There was a cozy completeness to this utilitarian still life. It occurred to me that one of the values of going away was that you saw that something far less complex than what you were used to would do just fine. More and more, I looked at my house, at my life, and thought,
Why do I need all this stuff?
Maggie and I had been talking about this need to simplify, about what it might mean; she’d been feeling it, too. “It’s the first step in getting ready to die,” Maggie had said, in her usual no-nonsense way. “It is not!” I’d said, but I thought she was probably right.

Upstairs, I could hear the muted conversation of my parents, still up and sitting in the TV room. Soon they’d go to bed and then continue talking quietly, I knew, until they fell asleep.

I lay there, Pete beside me, and the sound of my parents’ voices seemed to erase him; seemed to erase me too, at least as the middle-aged person I was. I became instead a young child, fresh from the bathtub and smelling of Ivory soap, the doll I’d chosen for the night mummy-wrapped in a receiving blanket and held in the crook of my arm. I was not responsible for anything but my own daily meanderings. The purpose of reading the newspaper was to check up on Nancy and Sluggo. Monetary decisions had to do with what kind of candy to buy with the change I had left over from going to the corner store to buy milk for my mother. My parents were my clock and my calendar; they told me where to go and when. My parents were also the arbiters of judgment, of taste, and of politics; I stepped into their values like an outfit they’d laid out for me on my bed. Later, of course, I forged my own beliefs and rebelled against nearly everything they’d taught me. But every time I came home, some large part of me surrendered itself to the past and relished the sense of being the one who was cared for, if only by a TV tray serving as a bedside table. I was in my mid-fifties, but in my parents’ house I was forever made to feel uniquely safe by the late-night murmurings of the people who were in charge, leaving me free not to be. No matter what anyone said, it seemed to me that not only
can
you go home again, you are helpless not to.

I dozed lightly, then woke up again. I’d been dreaming of Caroline, or at least thinking of her in the kind of nether land that precedes sleep. She’d been remarkably quiet at dinner and seemed to be trying to catch my eye at odd times. Something was really bothering her.

I looked at the clock: 1
A.M.
I leaned over Pete, gently touched the top of his head, whispered his name. “Are you sleeping?” No response except deep breathing. I got out of bed quietly and headed upstairs to the kitchen. I turned on the stove light and went over to inspect the contents of the refrigerator. Here were the things I rarely bought anymore but always wanted to eat: butter, salami, heavy cream, cheese, mayonnaise. In the cupboards were great varieties of cookies and chips. And in the bread drawer, white bread and a box of cinnamon rolls covered by thick frosting. My father had high blood pressure and cholesterol problems, but my mother disbelieved certain tenets of modern medicine. She had a particular disdain for mental health workers. When I once told her about a friend of mine who was in therapy, she’d said, “Psychiatrists. They’re crazier than anyone.” There’d been no humor in this remark. There’d been venom in it.

I was sitting at the kitchen table having a salami sandwich when Caroline appeared, ghostlike in this dim light. “Hi,” she whispered. I waved at her, my mouth full. She opened the bread drawer, took out the package of cinnamon rolls, brought it over to the table. “I can’t believe I’m eating again,” she said. “It’s like coming home late at night when we were in high school. Remember how hungry we always were?”

I nodded, smiling. “Yeah. Remember the time you and Steve and I were eating and he dropped that bowlful of spaghetti all over the place?”

Caroline took a huge bite of her roll, talked around it. “And he really wanted it, so he ate a bunch of it off the floor.”

“Right.” I finished my sandwich and went over to the cupboard to take a look around. “Want some Oreos? Oh, boy, they’re double-stuffed.”

She didn’t answer, and when I looked over at her, I saw her face pressed into her hands. “What’s wrong?” I closed the cupboard and came back to the table. “Caroline? What is it?”

She smiled sadly. “I’m sorry. I don’t want to talk about it now. Not here. It was just . . . a moment.”

“They’re asleep,” I said. Amazing how quickly we could lapse into the shorthand of sides: us versus them; kids versus parents.

“We’ll talk when we go out. When Steve’s here too.”

I leaned back in my chair, picked up a cinnamon roll, and started unwinding it. “I was dreaming about you just before I came up here.”

“Were you?”

“Yeah. You were upset.”

“Well, I
am
upset.”

“Well, I
know.
”

She stood, tightened the belt on her robe, and put the box of cinnamon rolls back in the drawer. “Anyway . . . I’m glad you’re here. I’m glad we all are.”

“Yeah. Me too.”

“So . . . I’ll see you in the morning.” She sighed. “I’m sorry I’m such a wreck. But we’ll talk, okay?”

She turned to go and I grabbed her hand. “Hey, do you want to go out now? Take a car ride?”

“I want Steve to be here too.”

“Want me to wake him up?”

“No. I know you’d love to, though.”

“He used to like it when I woke him up late at night.”

“He’s older now.”

From upstairs, we heard the sound of a toilet flushing. “I’m going back to bed,” Caroline said quickly. The hall light turned on, and she disappeared into the living room, where she was bedded down on the sofa.

Then the overhead kitchen light turned on and my mother was standing there, squinting against the brightness. “Is everything all right?”

“Yes, I was just hungry. I had a little snack.”

“Are you the only one up? I thought I heard talking.”

“Caroline was up. But she went back to sleep.”

“Oh?” She looked back toward the living room, then expectantly at me.

“She was just up for a minute. You didn’t miss a thing. Go back to bed.”

I started for the basement steps and she said, “Are you comfortable down there? Cool enough?”

“We’re fine.”

“Because I’ve got another fan if you need it.”

“We’re all right.”

“Maybe that little revolving one. You could put it on the night table.”

“Mom!”

She raised her hands in surrender. Then she turned to exit the room, that old runway spin.

“Mom?”

She turned back.

“Thanks, though.”

“You’re welcome.”

Pete awakened as I climbed back into bed. “Hi,” he said sleepily, pulling me close to him. He kissed my neck, started caressing my breast.

“Don’t,” I whispered.

“Why?”

“It’s my
parents’
house.”

“And?”

“Come on. I can’t do it in my parents’ house.”

“I can,” Pete said. I kissed him quickly, then turned away from him, saying, “Go to sleep.” But then, after a moment, I reached back and put my hand on his thigh, and we both stayed up awhile longer. Sometimes it embarrassed me, how happy we were. Sometimes it seemed like I was making it up.