Without Jenny

by Mark Gunther

  The service was already underway. Joy led Danny to seats in the front where she could see no one. She had no Hebrew, only rote memories of certain prayers and the rhythm of certain chants, so she used the transliterations when they were there, or read the English, or just sat and tried to be touched by the vibe of the place, to let it be whatever it was, or could end up becoming, to her.

  Can I pray? Where, Oh Lord, where is my Jenny?

  Singing, some of it familiar. Standing as the Torah scroll was paraded by, Joy touched it with her prayer book, kissed the book, waited, and sat when the scroll was opened. One by one the seven sections of Vayera, the day’s parasha, Torah portion, were chanted in Hebrew. She read the English commentaries, newly vulnerable to the power of the story. Today’s parasha had a lot of well-known action—the birth of Isaac, the exiling of Hagar, and the almost-sacrifice of Isaac, the Akedah.

  Joy never had thought of Torah as living literature, as something she actually could hear, could feel and have a response to as she might to a bestselling novel. She was jealous of Sarah’s happiness over the birth of Isaac, and angry at Sarah’s jealousy, forcing Abraham to exile Hagar, mother of his own son Ishmael. She despaired with Hagar, sitting in the desert, sure her child would soon be dead. Joy had been unable to hold her dying child. No angel interceded; no one came to delay the scaffold’s crash so Joy could slip in underneath and pull her daughter out.

  Joy was shocked at the insanity of the Akedah—Abraham lying to his family, traveling for days, and then binding his only son, lifting the knife, ready to kill him to prove—what, exactly? Faith? Obedience? Obsession? Her child had been sacrificed for nothing. A bottle of water. Abraham will never forgive himself, she thought, when he comes down from his frenzy. How could any parent? At least God sent him a ram to sacrifice instead, but God couldn’t send Joy anything to keep her from leaving the car there at that time, anything to make Jenny come into the store with her mother. Anything.

  In the quiet moments it seemed that her sobs filled the sanctuary. She calmed as the last reader lifted the Torah, spreading the scrolls wide and turning so all could see the hand-scribed text.

  Torah: law, story, idea. But what is prayer? I want an impossible miracle. Does God change the world? For me? Did God kill Jenny? Call Jenny? How? Why?

  The mourners’ Kaddish came at the end of the service. Everyone knew. Rabbi named the long-established dead whose yartzeit, annual remembrance, was in the coming week. He named the recent dead of the past year. And the newly dead? Only one. Rabbi compared the death of Jenny to the binding of Isaac. Joy didn’t get it. Joy knew they were supposed to stand up but she wasn’t sure when exactly, and she couldn’t see anyone else, so she asked Danny, and he said he was new at it too, but it was obvious and they stood with the others who remembered.

  Fifty-one more weeks. Fifty-one more years. Forever.

  “How do you survive it?” She could hear the unspoken question asked from the shallows, as she and Danny fled. He found their car.

  “How do we do this every week?” Joy asked.

  “We don’t have to,” he started.

  “I want to.” She wondered why and didn’t know.

  “Okay,” he said.

  “Let’s go,” she said. “Jake is waiting.” The authority in her voice surprised her.

  “Just another minute.” Danny was breathing deeply. White-knuckled hands gripped the steering wheel in the ten and two position. She put her hand on his arm; it landed like a butterfly, softly. He didn’t react at all.

  She felt a disconcerting kindness emerge. “You don’t have to come every week with me, Danny.”

  “I can’t let you come here by yourself.” He was still looking ahead.

  “I won’t break.”

  “No, Joy, I will. Sitting there by yourself with everyone looking at you, and me sitting at home by myself, looking at nothing? I couldn’t stand it.”

  She loved him. It hurt a lot.

  He started the car, but they didn’t go anywhere. The fan blew warming air as they sat.

  “My Dad said he’d watch Jake every Shabbat,” she said.

  “We’re lucky he lives here. After a while Jake’s friends’ parents can take him.”

  “Maybe after a while. Maybe he should come.”

  “Maybe.”

  Another moment passed.

  “Danny, we can’t lose track of Jake, he isn’t going to know what he needs. God, he’s only six; he’s going to have a dead sister his entire life.”

  “Terrible,” he said. “Just terrible.”

  He put the car into gear. Joy stared straight ahead. Another wet tissue disintegrated in her hand.

  At the front door, Jake came to her. She dropped to her knees and hugged him. He studied her face.

  “Are you sad, Mommy?”

  “Yes, honey, I’m so sad.”

  “Is Daddy sad, too?”

  “Yes, sweetheart. We’re both sad, but we love you and we won’t be sad all the time. Did you have fun this morning?”

  “Mandy and Sarah went to Chestnut Street,” he announced. “Can we play a game?”

  Joy’s body went rigid. Her knees ached. Tears streamed down. She couldn’t stand. She couldn’t lift her arms.

  Carly came into the hall, rescuing her. “I’ll play with you, Jakey,” she said.

  “Can we juggle?” he asked. Carly, who had studied clowning before law school, knew how.

  “Good idea. I’ll teach you. C’mon.”

  Carly touched Joy softly on the cheek, brushing a hair from her forehead. She put two fingers to Joy’s lips, brought them to her own mouth and kissed. She swept Jake into her arms and hustled him up the stairs. He looked back at Joy. From her knees she watched them go. She was alone in the hallway. Everything was so high. So far away. Was this what the world had looked like to little girl Jenny?

  Lizzie came in, reached down, and took Joy’s hand. Sweet, sweet Lizzie, frizzy blond hair, piercing blue eyes, wide face, black dress draping her breasts, nipped in at the waist above her wide hips and sturdy legs. Joy and Lizzie. Best friends always, through grade school, high school, college, inseparable, always finding their way together. When they were teenagers they would meet before school in one of their secret places and talk about homework and movies and rock stars and the mean girls and which boys were cute, and which were bad and which girls they thought were doing what with which boy, and whose mom should learn what from the other’s, and thousands of other things. But when they were little they built worlds. One time they played hospital when Joy the mommy and Lizzie the doctor had a baby. Cradling the doll, they named her Jenny. Sweet Jenny, Charming Jenny, Wild Jenny.

  Dead Jenny. Is it lonely, Jenny, where you are?

  Joy held tightly to Lizzie’s arm.

  Lizzie said, “I’ve got you, Joy. Let’s go sit down.” She sat Joy down on the couch. “Let me get you something.”

  Joy could see the dining room table filled with platters of cookies, muffins, bread. It was the first time the room had been empty all week.

  Lizzie returned with a plate of fruit. “Here, honey.”

  Joy took the plate and put it down. She gestured at the dining room. “Why did people bring all that stuff? We’ll never eat it all.”

  “Most of it is getting donated. Your dad already filled the freezer.”

  “He would,” Joy said.

  Hiram’s parents had lost their tailoring business in the Great Depression. They moved to a tiny flat in West Oakland. His mom took in washing, and his dad picked up work loading gypsy trucks outside the Port of Oakland, one eye always open for the Teamster goon squads. Later on, his mom had a bookkeeping job with the WPA, but Hiram’s dad never really recovered. He died of a heart attack at fifty-four. Joy never knew him.

  Lizzie picked up the plate again. “Here, sweetie, let’s eat something.”

  “I’m not really hungry.”

  “Joy, you have to start eating again, you’re just skin and bones. Try please,
for me?” Lizzie batted her eyelids coquettishly, her face a catalog of feeling, concern, care, maybe even a little anger.

  Joy took a piece of pineapple, put it in her mouth, chewed, swallowed. “There, I did it.”

  “That’s great, Barbie. Now finish the plate.”

  “You haven’t called me that for a long time.”

  “You never had the boobs, but you always had the clothes.”

  “Then Mom would get upset when I got dirty.”

  Jenny’s final set of dirty clothes was in the undone laundry downstairs. One more thing to cry about. Lizzie handed her a piece of cantaloupe. Jenny had been wearing a San Francisco Giants Orange Friday T-shirt on Monday. One more thing to cry about. Joy settled into the crook of Lizzie’s arm. Lizzie picked up a strawberry and put it in Joy’s mouth. It tasted good.

  “This is getting way too maudlin,” Joy said. “Give me the goddam plate.”

  Danny came in. Stacked on his plate was a sandwich, a pile of fruit, and two cookies. He looked at her plate, then at her.

  “That’s a little ascetic, Joy, isn’t it?”

  They looked at each other and giggled.

  “That is a welcome sound, you guys,” Lizzie said.

  “Here, Joy, take a bite.” Danny held the sandwich out to her. “Rye bread, turkey, cranberry, lettuce.”

  It was good! The Common World was knocking on her door and she was too weak to resist.

  “Maybe I will have one.”

  Lizzie gave a happy little clap and bustled out. Joy watched Danny eat. Lizzie came back in with a sandwich and a glass of wine. Joy raised her eyebrow.

  “The wine’s for me. Thank God you at least want a sandwich.”

  Joy was overcome with love for her. “Lizzie, you can go home. You’ve been here all week.”

  “A few more days. I don’t want to be anywhere else. If you want to get rid of me, start eating more! You should know, Carly is taking care of your dinners for the next month. When people ask what they can do, she assigns them a day. You’ll find Tupperware on your front porch every afternoon.”

  Joy began to protest, but Lizzie didn’t let her get a word out.

  “No, Joy. You will accept this. Your friends want to give you something. And you are in no shape to go to the grocery store tomorrow. It’s good for everyone.”

  Joy shut up. They ate. They finished. They looked at each other. Lizzie cleared the plates. It was too quiet. Danny took the plunge.

  “You want to go for a walk?”

  “Okay. Jakey too.”

  “Of course. Everyone.”

  They went upstairs to change and heard laughter coming from the juggling lesson.

  “Thank God for Carly,” Danny said.

  “For everyone,” she said.

  “I know,” he said. “Joey was on the phone for hours. I’m so glad I didn’t have to do it.”

  They stopped and held each other. It was the first time they could. He was warm and strong and big and comfortable. She recognized him. Joy thought that perhaps she wouldn’t die today.

  Danny whispered to her. “I don’t know how to think about it. It’s so horrible but life itself is so ordinary. He was making these calls and we were making these stupid jokes and she was barely gone. I just don’t know.”

  Joy didn’t know either.

  The door flew open.

  “Aunt Lizzie says we’re going for a walk. Can I get ice cream?”

  They looked at each other. It begins.

  Joy hated it, but she said, “We’ll see, honey. We’re going to the water first. Do you want to bring your ball and glove?”

  5.

  JOY REMEMBERED SEEING the moon. Now, grey light was peeking around the edges of the bedroom blinds. It must be the next day. She rolled over and sat up. The bedroom was cool. Her feet found her pajamas on the hardwood floor. She couldn’t remember taking them off. She put them on. Danny had bought them for her. They had little bicycles all over them. She liked bicycles. She had thought that was sweet, before.

  Eight steps usually took her across the bedroom. It did today. She wondered why she remembered that. When finished in the bathroom she walked quietly on the runner in the hallway, and padded down the stairs.

  Coffee’s aroma permeated the kitchen. A return to routine. Danny always set the auto timer for her before he went to bed, especially on her training mornings, so she could save the minutes it took to brew. She liked that he took care of her, and he liked that. She sheltered briefly, there, but then the crash echoed, the dust billowed, the sunlight stabbed, the scream locked in her throat. She had to brace against the counter to keep from falling. When she was sure of her footing she filled a mug and fumbled her way to a chair.

  She heard Danny come downstairs. The front door opened and closed. He must have picked up the newspapers. She watched him come into the kitchen and take some coffee, then disappear into the den. That was where he liked to drink his weekend coffee. She went in and sat next to him on the couch. They held each other’s hand for while. Then they didn’t. She leafed through the San Francisco Chronicle. She put the paper down and stared for a while at the blank flat screen TV on the wall. Danny took their cups to get some more coffee. Then he came back. She leafed through the New York Times.

  “Mommy!” Jake was calling her. Joy remembered that he was her son and she of course had to take care of him. She went upstairs. He was curled up under the covers, hugging Jenny’s favorite stuffed bear, Teddy, and sucking his thumb. Joy lay on the bed next to him and rolled close. She gently pulled his thumb out of his mouth. He opened his eyes.

  “Do I go to school today?”

  “No, honey. It’s Sunday.”

  “Is Daddy here?”

  “Yes, honey. It’s Sunday.”

  “Can we have breakfast?”

  Joy thought to herself, That’s a good idea. She asked him, “What do you want?”

  “What would Jenny want?”

  Joy turned to ask her. The dust billowed. She controlled her tears and turned back to Jake.

  “What do you think, honey?”

  “Jenny liked waffles. Can Daddy make waffles?”

  “I think so. Let’s go see.”

  Neither of them moved. Maybe they fell asleep again.

  “Can we make a waffle for Teddy?”

  Joy didn’t know if that was a good idea or not. It might be a bad idea. It might not matter at all. Maybe Teddy would eat the waffle. Maybe Jenny would reach down from wherever she was and take the waffle. Maybe a waffle was too sticky. Maybe it would be easier for her to deal with a pancake. A silver dollar pancake would be good; smaller would be easier for her to take. But Jenny liked waffles better. Maybe if the syrup was warm she would come and eat a waffle. Maybe if we just imagine waffles she’ll have a waffle wherever she is and we don’t have to make one here. But maybe we have to make one here so the possibility of her having one there exists. Maybe she doesn’t like waffles anymore, where she is. Except they probably have a lot of waffles there.

  “Mommy?”

  Joy looked up.

  Jake was standing by the door, Teddy dangling from his left hand. “I’m hungry.”

  How did she miss him getting up? Joy levered herself out of Jake’s bed. She took his right hand, and they went downstairs. Jake went to Danny and hugged his leg. Danny patted him on the head. Jake had flour on his head. Danny was making waffles. Joy wasn’t surprised at all, but she remembered that a couple of weeks ago they had run out of syrup and Jenny had to put honey on her third waffle.

  Joy cried for a while.

  Danny looked at her. “Tissues are over there. I didn’t know what to do. I thought I’d make waffles.”

  “Okay,” Joy said.

  The front door opened and Lizzie came in with a shopping bag. She had gone home to Seattle for three days and come right back again. She unpacked a bottle of pure Vermont maple syrup. It was the most marvelous thing.

  Joy sat at the counter with Jake in her lap and they watched
Danny work. Joy remembered Jenny, at age four, watching her dad separate eggs for waffles. “It’s dumb, Daddy! Both parts of the egg go in the batter, right?” Then he whipped the whites to their rigid frothiness and Jenny was enthralled, pestering him so much that after breakfast he baked a poppyseed cake with her because it used four separated eggs. Poppyseed cake became her go-to kitchen activity. She had baked one recently. The cake was in the freezer, behind the bags of leftover muffins, challahs, and cookies. Joy remembered, and started to wilt.

  Jake jumped down off her lap and went into the den with Lizzie. He must have felt it. He was leaving her too. Makes sense, Joy thought. I lost his sister. She heard Lizzie reading him The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe. She stood. Her hands were itchy, pulsing, clutching and opening.

  Danny said, “I can’t believe I just did this with her.”

  “You didn’t need to do anything. We still have so much food.”

  “Right. Thank you.”

  He kept at it. Of course he did, she thought. That’s what he does.

  He poured the first batch into the waffle iron.

  She tried again. “Amazing that Lizzie brought syrup.”

  “I called her.”

  Of course he did. She sat down.

  She stood up. “Maybe I’ll set the places.” It was nice to be busy. Jake and Lizzie came in. The four of them took their seats. Joy had set five places.

  Danny made a gentle joke. Lizzie said “Look, Jake, there’s a place for Teddy!” She put two pillows from the den on the chair. Teddy’s head just appeared above the countertop. When they finished, Lizzie washed the dishes. Joy watched Danny clean the waffle iron. The entire arc of waffle-making was clear to Joy: resources, construction, fulfillment, caring for his tools—his cleaning was scientific, and the waffles were always good.

  This is the way he will conduct his grief.

  Strange that she had never really noticed how he cleaned the waffle iron before. She must always have been on to the next thing already: Who she was. There wasn’t a next thing at ten AM on this second Sunday of her bereavement. Probably no one would stop by today. No one had stopped by yesterday. A Tupperware dinner should appear on the porch later.