The Confession Club (ARC)

by Elizabeth Berg

  “I do!” says Nola.

  “No?” Monica says.

  “I do!” Nola says, louder.

  “Well, okay, if nobody wants to unwrap those big blocks of butter for Roberto—”

  “I will do it!” says Nola, and her voice practically bounces off the walls.

  Monica grins.

  One of the eighty-something men sitting at a table with his cronies says, “Anybody know when laryngitis season starts?”

  Dinner Date

  At five-thirty on Saturday evening, Iris inspects herself in the bathroom mirror one more time. She’s wearing white jeans and a periwinkle-blue silk blouse, the sleeves rolled up, a few silver bangle bracelets, silver hoop earrings, sandals. It’s still only May but the temperature was in the eighties today. She’s lightly made up: mascara, pink lipstick. Her hair is freshly washed and loose around her face. No perfume. Just an instinct she had.

  When she comes into the kitchen to tell Maddy and Nola that she’ll be back with John in about forty minutes, she sees Nola kneeling on a kitchen chair, frosting the chocolate cupcakes she made “completely by herself.” Maddy is standing by the window, leaning against the frame and looking out.

  “Hey,” Iris says.

  Nola looks up. “Hi, Iris. You look pretty.”

  “Thank you, Nola.”

  Maddy turns around. “Wow, you do look pretty.”

  “Thank you! I just wanted to let you know that I’d be back by six. I guess we’ll have the wine and cheese out on the front porch—what do you think? It’s so nice out.”

  “Sure,” Maddy says. “I’ll pick some daffodils and put them out there. Then I’ll finish the salad. I’ll put the eggplant lasagna in the oven in about ten, fifteen minutes?”

  “Perfect. I’ll see you soon.”

  “Can I walk out with you?” Maddy asks, and then, “You okay, Nola?”

  Nola nods in the springy, overenergetic way of children. “I only need to frost”—she stops to count—“three more. And then I’m going to put cherries on top. And then I’m done. But I might put chopped walnuts on there. Like glitter.”

  “That sounds great,” Maddy says. “I’ll be right back.”

  Iris had told Maddy only a few things about John. She described him as a man she ran into when she went to cut lilacs. A nice guy. So, you know, she invited him to dinner. Maddy had looked at her as though she were perfectly well aware that Iris was holding something back, but she wasn’t going to press her. It wasn’t like Maddy to press anyone. But now Iris thinks that Maddy may have a few questions after all.

  Once they are outside, though, Maddy only says quietly, “I’m thinking of enrolling Nola in the Little Red School House for the summer. Do you know it?”

  “I’ve seen it. I know people like it. But … are you sure?”

  Maddy looks away, nods.

  “So … you want to stay here that long?”

  “I don’t know. I might. If it’s okay with you.”

  “Of course it’s okay with me. But …” Iris looks at her watch. “I would love to talk more about this, Maddy. I just want to make sure you’re okay.”

  “This was a bad time to tell you. I’m sorry. But I’m going to take Nola over next week and talk to the director.”

  “Would you like me to go with you?”

  Relief brightens her face. “I’d love that.”

  “Okay,” Iris says. “We’ll talk more tonight, after …” She shrugs, smiles. “After whatever this is!”

  She gets in her car and starts the engine, checks her face in the rearview mirror. Whatever this is, indeed. Meeting John has made her aware that she has been feeling a clanky kind of loneliness, a sorrow that seems to steal in sideways when she least expects it. It makes her feel empty, almost ill, when it comes. This feeling is better.

  It is precisely six o’clock when Iris reaches the farmhouse. When she goes down the driveway, she notices that it’s not nearly as bumpy as it was; many of the ruts have been filled in. Leaning against a nearby tree is a shovel, a new one, from the looks of it. Has he smoothed out the driveway for her? She thinks he must have, and she feels an uptick of pleasure, even pride.

  She pulls up to the end of the drive, nearly even with the house, and waits for a moment, thinking he might come right out. No. She toots the horn. Nothing.

  She gets out of the car and goes to the back door, knocks lightly, then more loudly.

  Still nothing. She opens the door and steps in. “John?”

  He’s not in the kitchen. He’s added some dishes, she sees, a metal platter featuring a rooster, a dented black teapot. On the kitchen table is the same stack of books she saw before, but there is also a worn black journal and what looks to be a fountain pen. She steps closer.

  Yes, a beautiful blue fountain pen, and she picks it up, even though she feels she should not. For Iris, fountain pens have a declarative feel in hand, much as fabric does. She runs her fingers along the smooth, cool surface, lays it in her palm to appreciate the small, compact weight, then sets the pen back down. What she really wants to see is the nib, but what if he walks in and sees her fooling around with his personal things? She would never open his journal, but what temptation lies there! She moves away from the table to the window, looks to see if he might be outside. No.

  “John?” she calls again. “John?”

  No answer, but there is a scrabbling sound in the walls that makes her shudder.

  She opens the door to the next room. On top of an old iron bed frame, serving as what Iris guesses is a mattress, are a few flannel shirts placed end to end and stuffed with something. The quilt that he offered her on that rainy day when she last saw him is folded at the bottom. There is a wooden nightstand missing a drawer. On top of the nightstand is another candle, this one a cream-colored pillar, or what is left of it: his bedside lamp, she presumes. What must it be like to read in bed by candlelight, the only sounds the pages turning and the wind blowing and the cicadas singing in the trees? On a chair in the corner she sees some clothes, folded neatly, and a few pairs of shoes lined up beside it.

  It occurs to her suddenly that something might have happened to him. He’s staying out here alone—illegally, she supposes. Anyone could have come here: a rowdy group of kids, a thief, a wild animal. The cops, too, although the cops in Mason were more like Andy-of-Mayberry police than anything else. They’d probably take him out for a meal and then ask him if he wouldn’t mind leaving in the next day or so, if that would be all right. They’d probably offer him a lift to the outskirts of town and make sure the temperature in the squad car was adjusted to his comfort.

  He might have gotten ill and gone to the ER.

  But surely he would have called her if that had happened.

  Called her! Of course! That’s what she can do, is call him. She feels foolish for not having thought of that before. But there’s something about being here in this old house that makes you forget about things like cellphones. There’s something here that makes modern-day trappings feel … well, off your back.

  She goes to the car for her phone. She’ll call him and there will be a simple explanation for why he’s not here. He might be walking back from town right now, carrying his latest find. Iris saw a paint-by-number image of lilac bushes at a garage sale just yesterday that she almost bought for him, thinking he’d appreciate the irony and maybe even the painting itself. Twenty-five cents.

  If he is walking home, she’ll be able to drive out and meet him and give him a lift back here so that he can drop off his treasures. They’ll be a bit late getting back to her house to dinner, but she’ll give Maddy a heads-up. Eggplant lasagna only gets better when you let it sit out, anyway.

  She finds John’s number in her phone’s history and calls it. While she waits for him to answer, she looks around again to see if he’s out in the yard. Wouldn’t it be funny if he c
ame up behind her and startled her again?

  He is not behind her. He is not anywhere that she can see. Nor does he answer his phone; she is met with a generic message informing her that the person at this number is not available. Iris goes back in the house and calls out John’s name once more. She looks in the two rooms of the house again. She doesn’t want to venture farther; she can see that the next room is empty but for some tattered lace curtains, and the stairs to go up are treacherous-looking: missing boards, what looks like rot.

  She goes back outside, a dullness in her. A kind of shame. On the way to the car, she breaks off a few branches of the lilacs that are left, even though she’s not sure they’ll be alive by the time she gets home.

  When Iris pulls into her own driveway, Nola runs out, shouting, “You’re late! You’re late! For a very important date!” She looks around Iris—for John, presumably.

  “He’s not coming,” Iris says, getting out of the car.

  Nola holds herself very still. “Why not?”

  Iris walks over to sit on the bottom porch step, folds her hands between her knees. It’s lovely out, everything covered by a golden wash of early-evening light. “He wasn’t there when I came to pick him up. And he didn’t answer when I tried calling him.”

  “How come?”

  “Well, I don’t know.”

  Nola scratches her elbow. “Do you feel sad?”

  “Do I look sad?”

  “Yes, you look like this.” Nola hangs her head and turns her mouth down.

  “I guess I’m disappointed,” Iris says. “But the good thing is, we have a delicious dinner that you and Mommy and I can enjoy.”

  “It was supposed to be for company,” Nola says. “I made a decoration for the table that is paper flowers but in a real vase. They are on pipe cleaners is how they stand up.”

  “I can’t wait to see them. Are you hungry?”

  Nola spins around in a circle. “I am staaarrrrving.”

  “Well, okay, then,” Iris says, getting up. “Let’s eat!”

  Maddy, standing at the top of the stairs, gives Iris a look as she passes by.

  Iris shakes her head.

  “Not coming?” Maddy says, and Iris calls over her shoulder, “Nope!” How funny to sound so gay.

  Well, she wanted to talk to Maddy, anyway. In private. After Nola goes to bed, they’ll have privacy. And a lot of leftovers.

  An arm hangs from a tree. An arm? No. A branch. The elephant grass they are moving through hisses like snakes. He is not afraid. Fear is walled off in an area of his chest—he feels it like a stone but he is not afraid. It is as though extra eyes and extra ears have grown all over him, as though even his skin were hyperalert. He tries to make no noise whatsoever. A cough is a death sentence.

  There are three of them up ahead of the rest of the line, cutting the trail. It’s exhausting work; no one can do it for more than half an hour at a time. But it’s their turn. Sanchez is first, John is second, Beauregard is third. It’s hot, so humid. His breath feels like pudding in his lungs. A shot rings out and Sanchez goes down, hit in the throat. Blood geysers up and Sanchez gurgles and twitches, then goes still. Another shot and Beauregard drops and begins screaming, “My foot! My foot!”

  “Medic!” John cries. A bullet flies by his own forehead, just missing him. He looks back at Sanchez, the flies already on him, then at Beauregard, crying and shaking and moaning, “Not here, not here! Ma! Ma! Ma!” John drops his gun and begins to take off everything on his body. His helmet, his rucksack, the metal container he carries beneath it with letters from Laura and from his mother, with paperback books and his notebook and pens. He takes off his belt of extra ammo, his uniform, his underwear, his boots and his filthy socks, his dog tags. Then he stands there. Because just get this over. It doesn’t get over. The rest of the line catches up to him and Gaines grabs his arm and says, “What the fuck, Loney?” The next day John talks to a doctor and the day after that he is back at it.

  Out in the field where he is lying, the birds have roosted in the cottonwood trees. John makes his hands into fists and pounds his eyes. Unsee. Unsee. He will never not see. So many years ago, and he still sees. More than fifty-eight thousand names on the Wall, five of them boys sixteen years old who lied about their age so that they could enlist. More than fourteen hundred killed on the last day.

  He sits up, then stands and starts making his way back to the house. Night is coming on.

  He is here now. There is a bed, there is a roof, there are walls.

  Before he goes in, he sees a wasps’ nest hanging from a corner of the house. It’s a good foot and a half long. If he can make it up the rotted steps inside, he can knock it off through an upstairs window. Although why.

  He’s almost out of water. He’s almost out of food. He’s almost out of money.

  Things hurt.

  He sits at the kitchen table and lights the candle with a hand that is still shaking. Opens a book. Shuts it. Opens his journal and uncaps his pen. Writes nothing.

  He moves to the window and watches the stars come out one by one, as though they’re just being made and coming off an assembly line. He says her name, just to hear his own voice for the first time today. Laura.

  He moves to his bed and lifts the quilt to find his phone. Almost entirely out of juice—he didn’t make it to anywhere where he could charge it today. There is a message, and he wonders if he should listen—shouldn’t he save what little power is left in case he needs it? It’s probably just Proud Mary. He owes it to her to let her know once and for all that he’ll never return.

  He listens to the message, and it’s not Mary. It’s that lovely woman who came and picked lilacs and then invited him to dinner. Iris. It was for tonight, then. This is Saturday, then.

  He looks over at the window: completely dark out now. It’s too late to try to walk there. It’s too late, period.

  He flings himself down on his bed and puts his arm over his eyes. His father: You were born a loser, and you’ll die one. It’s a wonder you’re my son. Maybe you’re not. His mother: Ah, Johnny, don’t listen. Come here to your mother.

  Eight years old, and he steals her a bottle of Coca-Cola for Mother’s Day. “Just what I wanted,” she tells him, and she claps her hands. She drinks only a little at a time; it takes her three days to finish it. Then she wraps it in foil and uses it to hold the wildflowers he brings her with the same sense of helpless hope.

  Making Her Way Back Home

  “Well, girls, I have nothing to confess,” Toots says, yanking on her sweater to stretch it out over her belly. “Can you believe it?” And then, as though someone else has said this, her mouth drops open.

  “Maybe you just don’t want to tell us your sin,” Karen says. “Which is fine. My husband just got back from a retreat and they talked a lot about how it’s not always healthy or necessary for people to share wrongdoings with their pastors. ‘The silence of the lambs?’ I asked him, but he didn’t find that funny.”

  “No, that’s not it,” Toots says. “I thought all week about what I might want to confess, and I just don’t have anything. I haven’t done anything wrong. I have nothing to be embarrassed about or to figure out. Nothing.”

  Gretchen nods enthusiastically. “She told me when she came into my store yesterday, she said, ‘I have nothing to confess. What am I going to do?’ And I said, ‘Are you sure? Seems like we always have something.’ But she said no.”

  Toots says, “One time, when I was a little girl, I was in line for confession and I didn’t really have any sins that time, either. So I just said things like, ‘I didn’t always pay attention in church.’ You know, that caliber of sin. Like, way less than venial. And the priest was real quiet and finally he said, ‘Well, you are a good girl. You just go in peace now, and God bless you.’ I said, ‘What about my penance?’ and he said, ‘You have no penance! You’re a
good girl!’ Well, I just strutted out of that booth, let me tell you. But now … well, I’m not proud that I don’t have anything to confess. ’Cause maybe I forgot something bad that I did. Or, you know, blocked it. What I decided, though, is that I would like to forfeit my time. I’ll forfeit it to one of the newbies.”

  All of the women turn to look at Maddy and Iris, who, seated side by side, look at each other.

  “Uh … I guess I’m not quite ready,” Iris says. “But thanks.”

  All eyes on Maddy. She swallows, then says, “Okay. I’ll go. Just give me a minute. I’ll be right back.” She leaves the room.

  “Anyone need anything while we’re waiting?” Rosemary asks. “I’m getting more pie. I almost never eat dessert, but, Lord, this pie is worth every one of its bazillion calories.”

  Karen, who made the sticky toffee pudding pie, beams. “I make this for funeral lunches,” she says. “Even the grief-stricken gobble it up. Good thing I made the large size!”

  “I could have another slice,” Toots says. And then Gretchen says she’d like another one, and then Joanie and then Dodie.

  “For Pete’s sake,” Rosemary says, “there’s only one piece left!” She goes into the kitchen and comes out with the pie plate and many forks. “We’ll pass it around,” she says.

  The women have just about finished the pie when Maddy comes back into the room.

  She sits in her chair, clears her throat, and begins speaking.

  “What’s that?” Dodie says. “You’ll need to talk louder, honey; I can’t hear a word you’re saying.”

  “Sorry,” Maddy says. “I was just saying I don’t really know how to begin except to sort of dive in the middle. So. I am lying to my husband, and I have been for some time.”

  Silence.

  Then, “Lying about what?” Toots asks, gently.

  Maddy begins to weep. “About why I came here. About who I am. About what I want to do. About how I don’t even know what I want to do! About how scared I am that he’ll want to leave me if I tell him all that I’m feeling. About how not telling him how I’m feeling will make him want to leave me, too. I keep … withholding, and I can feel it making us grow apart, and I know if I lose him, I’ll have lost the best thing I ever had, except for my daughter.” She stops crying and wipes the tears from her face. Now her voice lowers to barely audible again. “And also I’m lying because I don’t tell him how much I … don’t like myself.”