We Were The Mulvaneys

by Joyce Carol Oates

  Blessed be they that mourn: for they shall be comforted.

  She could not speak of the -oy that arose from such hurt, stirring her to excited wakefulness in the night, so she climbed from bed, knelt on the bare, hard floorboards, flung herself against the edge of the bed and prayed, prayed. A cold-glaring frill moon suspended in the sky like the unblinking eye of God. And the wind, the wind that never ceased at High Point Farm, above the Valley--twining into the very ventricles of her heart.

  Jesus! I thank You, I am alive. I thank You for this - this breath.

  For Zachary might have strangled her, after all. He might have dragged her limp body out of the car, pounded her head against the icy pavement, hadn't that been a possibility? an unspoken (unless it was a spoken) threat?

  She harbored such secrets, such revelations. Dared not speak of them to her father (so upset, distraught, he was making himself sick) but spoke elliptically of them to her mother (who hurried to Man anne as if summoned, so powerful was the connection between them, and the two knelt and prayed together, weeping, sometimes laughing, clutching hands like young sisters, the simplest of prayers Our Father --io art in Heaven hallowed be -my nanje until their cheeks were streaked with tears, the color returned to their faces). For there was comfort to be taken in such hurt-Jesus knew, on the cross. Public shame and humiliation. Knowing of course how everyone must be speaking of her, pitying her-at the high school, and in town. Through the Chautauqua Valley- Zachary Lundt would have told his buddies, of course, would have boasted-yet even if he had not, news of it, of Marianne Mulvaney and her father's intervention, the arrest, the police, would have spread, irrevocable.

  You Mulvaneys. Think you're hot shit don't you.

  Few of Marianne's friends had called to ask after her. Though she'd been absent fromn school for days. No boy had called. Trisha who was her closest friend, since fifth grade, hadn't called. Well, yes-Trisha had called, on Tuesday of the second week Marianne had stayed out of school, and Corinne had answered the phone, but when Marianne called back, hours later, Tnisha wasn't in. And Mrs. LaPorte spoke so stifily to her, so-oddly. As if she scarcely knew who Marianne was. Marianne said quietly, "Please tell Trisha I'm sorry she's involved in any way, in this." After a startled pause Mrs. LaPorte said, "Involved? My daughter- My daughter isn't involved in anything. I haven't the slightest idea what you're talking about."

  So she prayed, and by degrees healed herself. The bruises and abrasions were gone, or almost gone. A second visit to Dr. OaUey and there remained only coin-sized discolorations on the insides of her thighs. Where Zachary had torn at her with his furious fingers, where he'd poked. pushed his b1ood-engorged penis-again, again, again, again-was healed. At any rate, the bleeding had stopped. She would not know for another several weeks if her regular menstrual pattern would resume but she wasn't thinking of that now.

  I was drinking, I was to blame. If I could relive that night but I can't. How can 1 hear false witness against him?

  One day Mom removed the soiled, torn prom dress from the hack of Marianne's closet where it was hidden. She hadn't needed to ask Marianne where the dress was. Found it, unerring, without wishing to examine it; wadded it into a ball and stuffed it in a paper bag with other household trash. Mom's eyes gleaming with tears but she wasn't crying nor was Marianne. Not a word uttered.

  Bright-glaring snowdrifted winter mornings at High Point Farm! It would be Marianne's last winter here, she seemed to know. Two mornings in succession, the last week of February, the school bus couldn't get through, so Patrick and Judd stayed home. That air of excitcd childish expectation, listening to WYEW-FM radio as they'd done for years, years, years on blizzard mornings, waiting to hear of county school cancellations. Though Mananne was upstairs when the Mt. Ephraim district was announced and P.J. and Ranger cheered in unison.

  Not that P.J. much liked to stay home-"quarantined" as he called it-amid so much snow, silence.

  Winter silence. His eyes avoiding hers, young face ravaged in shock, pity, distaste.

  (How much did Patrick and Judd know? Presumably, their parents had told them something. And Mike, an adult, knew. He'd known from the first, the evening of the day Corinne had taken Marianne to Dr. Oakley.)

  Mananne had agreed to see Dr. Oakley another time, at Morn's urging. On the examination table steeled herself against pain shutting her eyes Jesus! Jesus!Jesus! as beads of sweat formed at her hairline but there was no pain. Jesus had helped her banish pain. Afterward dressing herself, articles of clothing slipping from her fingers numbed and without sensation like strangers' fingers weirdly annexed to her hands. She'd overheard a man's voice in the room next door. "-made the right decision, under the circumstances. An ugly, messy prospect-" but she'd stopped listening.

  There was Michael Mulvaney Sr.: Dad. Tried not to think about Dad.

  After that first night when he'd gripped her hand, so hard. And cried. The shock of seeing Dad cry! She was temfied, her heart was breaking. So she vowed not to think of it afterward, with Jesus' help. For there was nothing to be done. She could not testify against Zachary Lundt for she could not recall, with any degree of accuracy, the sequence of events of the early hours of Sunday February 14 nor even herself during that time. It was like a movie where something has gone wrong with the film, images continue to flutter past, but dim, confused, out of focus. Nor could she accompany her father as he wished (where? to the Chautauqua County district attorney's office, in Chautauqua Falls?)-sirnply, she refused.

  Could not, could not. God forgive her, she could not.

  And so it became a household of silence. As if in the afterniath of a violent detonation. No wonder Mom played the radio so loudly in the kitchen, her brothers turned the TV up, even the dogs barked at the slightest provocation-a flock of noisy crows in the pear orchard, a helicopter with propellors chop! chop! chopping! the air on a mysterious early-evening flight through the Valley.

  There was the discovery she'd never actually looked at, never seen, Michael John Mulvaney, Sr., until this time. For always he'd been Dad. Or Captain, or Curly. (Though not "Curly" for years- one of the names he'd outgrown.) Seeing him now, Dad, yet Michael John Mulvaney, Sr., when she could not look at him directly, at all. For his eyes shifted uneasily in his sockets when she appeared. If she entered a room in which he stood or sat, he would shortly leave. Forehead creased, eyes shifting so he need not see her.

  He'd aged a decade in ten days. Heavy-footed on the stairs, turn a corner and there he was-who? A bearish man, shoulders slumped, rubbing a fist into an eye and panting like a winded horse trying to catch its breath. His face like uncooked, flaccid dough.

  Daddy I'm so sorry.

  Daddy what can I say.

  Can't remember, can't testify. Daddy I'm so ashamed.

  She did not wish to hear but sometimes (by chance, in the bathroom adjacent to their bedroom) she heard. And there was Dad's voice lifting in anger, incredulity and Mom's voice quieter, pleading. The quarrel subsided, you would think it had been extinguished, but like a smouldering swamp fire it had simply gone underground and would soon erupt again, another night. The quarrel was as much a matter of silence, withheld speech, as it was speech itself And suddenly Michael Sr. who was Dad, her Dad, stalked from the room not giving a damn who heard, Marianne, Patrick, or Judd, down the shuddering Stairs and out the back door, a dog or two scrambling across the kitchen floor in his furious wake, toenails clicking on the linoleum. A few seconds later came the sound of the Ford pickup revving into life, the engine turning over, catching, tires spinning in the packed snow, catching too, and Dad would be halF-vay down the drive before switching on. the headlights.

  Those red taillights: Marianne would watch from her bedroom window. If she'd risen from bed, to stand and see. Smaller and smaller the lights like rapidly receding red suns (dwarf stars, Patrick called them) in her vision blurred with moisture until they disappeared.

  Strange: how when a light is extinguished, it's immediately as if it has never been. Darknes
s fills in again, complete.

  Those days when the phone rang a number of times in succession (for Dad-he took the calls in his study, door shut) and other, more frequent days when Dad was in town and the telephone never rang. Or if it did Morn might call out, in her cheery general-bulletin yodel, for anyone to hear who was interested: "Wrong-nurn-ber!"

  There were few calls, these days, for Corinne Mulvaney, as for her daughter. What had happened, so swiftly, to their popularity? She could count her friends on the thumbs of both hands, Momjoked.

  Though Mom didn't joke much, these days.

  Rarely whistled, even to call the household brood to be fed.

  Sometimes in an open-eyed frowning trance she'd pass by Foxy, or Little Boots, or Troy, or tremulous Silky gazing up at her with widened hopeful doggy eyes and tails beginning to thump in happy anticipation, sometimes she'd collide with one of the cats, in particular Big Torn whose aggressive habit it was to block her way in the kitchen in order to shunt her in the direction of the bowls in the cats' corner. Just didn't seem to see these creatures, not at eye level. "Oh, you! Hungry so soon? Didn't I just feed you?" Automatically pouring dry kibble into a bowl taking no heed of the Cat or dog staring up at her in mute animal perplexity.

  Yes and Feathers might burst explosively into song, aroused by the whistling teakettle, or wild birds tittering at the feeder outside the window, but he'd sing alone. His marvelous trilling rising-andfalling soprano, but he'd sing alone

  Some mornings, you'd hardly guess Corinne Mulvaney was in the house.

  They'd asked her about Austin Weidman, how many times. And how ashamed she was, about Austin!

  And about Zachary Lundt.

  Can't bear false witness. Because I can't remember. If! could relive but I can `t.

  Playing upon her vanity. Her pride. So shrewdly. That she alone,

  Marianne Mulvaney, younger than he, in all ways less experienced than he, had had the power nonetheless to bring him, a sinner, Zachary Lundt, Zachary of the lank dark hair and dreamy heavy-hdded eyes, to Jesus Christ, their Savior. Like there's the real me, Marianne, being with you brings out. Not the mean dumb asshole I usually am.

  Hunched like a broken-backed snake on a step beneath her, at Bobbi Krauss's party. His thin handsome face, sallow skin and intense eyes. Unnerving to see boys in tuxes like adult men, and Zachary Lundt most of all-but then, he was two years older than Marianne. His bow tie removed and stuffed carelessly in a pocket, stiff white collar unbuttoned. Drinking beer, straight vodka, Zachary Lundt even the senior girls watched sidelong but were wary of, his reputation, tales you'd hear of Zach and his buddies, a wild circle, well-to-do kids and most going on to college though their grades were low-average and their school activities virtually nil. That gang of five or six guys hadn't exactly been invited to Bobbi Krauss's after the prom but sure Bobbi was flattered, sort of, when they showed up-Zach in his new-model Corvette (but lacking his prom date, poor Cynthia Slosson-he'd taken her home early?) and Ike Rodman in his dad's Caddy with some of the guys They'd been drinking already, and ready to party. And right away Zach moved onto Marianne Mulvaney, staring at her, in that way she'd noticed him (impossible not to notice him) staring at her, unsmiling, at basketball games and pep rallies where "Button" Mulvaney and her sister cheerleaders performed. And shortly afterward they were observed in earnest conversation in the Krausses' rear hail, then seated on the stairs that led to the second floor, Marianne in her beautiful creamy Satin dress with the strawberry-colored netting seated on the third step, Zach on the second, leaning on his elbow peering up at her. As if seeing in her (her heated face that felt swollen? her small so- distinct breasts in the pleated bodice he'd accidentally brushed with his wrist, handing her a drink?) a way of salvation. Salvation!

  Oh how could she confess to her mother, to any of them: such shame.

  Yet she'd believed him sincere. How, otherwise?-Sonletimes I wake up in the middle of the night scared as hell, Marianne why are we here on earth -f we're just gonna die?

  Urging her to drink the "orange juice cocktail" he'd made for her so delicious "screwdriver" somebody called it she'd never tasted anything quite like it, better than champagne, sweeter than champagne she'd had several times, far sweeter than any of Dad's and Mom's beers she'd sipped out of curiosity, and her throat was parched from the hours of dancing, she was so dizzy so happy! (But wait: was this at Bobbi Krauss's or was it possibly at Glen Paxton's-had they gotten to Glen Paxton's, at all? She would not recall afterward.) Austin Weidman was whining he had to leave by 12:30 A.M. to take Marianne to the LaPortes' so that he could get home by I AM, which was his curfew (they laughed, laughed at him-a I AM, curfew, for a senior boy) and kept hovering in the rec room doorway his bow tie crooked, his dirt-colored hair stringy where it had been fine and feathery at the outset of the long evening and his eyes behind thumb-smudged lenses aggrieved. Zachary said politely he'd drive Marianne to the LaPortes' where she was spending the night with Trisha (who'd already left the party) and Marianne stammered blushing not knowing what to say and there was the sick look in Austin Weidman's face as if he'd been kicked in the belly as it began to sink in at last how he wasn't wanted. Chewed-looking lips, black plastic glasses like his father's. If you looked at him head-on you saw he was a nice-looking boy but who wished to look at Austin Weidman head-on? He had dabbed a sort of flesh-colored ointment over a pimple on his chin, and sweating had made it run. His breath too had a medicinal odor, like tooth fillings. He believed himself in love with Marianne Mulvaney, though he hadn't dared tell her, or anyone. Hoping instead to impress her, bragging, as an adult man might brag, about "future plans": he intended to be a dentist like his father, here in Mt. Ephraim; their sign would say `F. WEIDMAN, D.D.S. & A. WEIDMAN, D.D.S., FAMILY DENTISTRY. At the prom Austin had danced awkwardly with Marianne, perspiring, staring at her in won- derment and holding her loosely, as if he feared stepping on her delicate size-six satin pumps with his size-twelve black leather dress Florsheims-but he'd stepped on them anyway. Marianne had spent much of the time talking and laughing with her own circle of friends, as Austin looked on smiling, like an elder brother. And of course she'd danced with other boys all evening. Lots of other boys.

  Marianne! I need your help, you're the only person u'ho can help me.

  Touching her knee, his warm fingers on the smooth satin skirt, lightly, as if merely in emphasis as he spoke, spoke with such urgency, and a sudden sensation swelled like a balloon between her legs. Will he kiss me? Is that what will happen next? But he did not kiss her. Perhaps seeing something in her face, her startled eyes, that dissuaded him. He leaned close to her, his elbow now on the step beside her, looking up at her speaking quietly, earnestly and she'd sat transfixed staring at him not daring to speak nor even to breathe.

  The only person, the only person who can help inc.

  Immediately afterward, or was it much later?__Marianne was laughing so hard, tears leaked unbecomingly from her eyes. Rock music-Mick Jagger's brawling voice-was deafemng, so loud you couldn't hear it. Beat beat heat burrowing into the heart like heartworm. They were in the Krausses' rec room where in summer glass doors slid open onto a flagstone terrace and a pool overlooking the Country Club golf course_Marianne had come swimming here a few times, though she wasn't a close friend of Bobbi Krauss, one of the glamorous senior cheerleaders. It was time to leave, time for the next party-where? Zach's friends who were all seniors Marianne didn't know were laughing saying piss-pot Weidman had gone home in his old man's piss-pot Dodge which was a car that for some reason elicited derision. Marianne's friends were gone. Zach was red-faced losing his poise muttering in an undertone Puck off, assholes! when his drunken buddies tried to detain him and Marianne at the door, tugging at Marianne's arm, even her hair, and at Zach who shoved them away laughing and angry. Hey can we come along? 1-Icy Zach: ain't gonna forget your buddies are you?-bawliflg like hyenas.

  The first stab of nausea hit her, Oh! oh God! as Zach, cursing under his breath, carried Ma
rianne's coat, helped her walk to his car, her knees weakened suddenly so he had practically to support her. Helped her climb into the freezing car not seeing or not caring how her skirt was caught in the door when he slammed it shut. Marianne swallowed down bile, gagged, choked, Where was her little beaded purse, with tissue in it? Something hot and stinging spilled from the corner of her mouth as Zach gunned the Corvette motor, jerked away sliding from the curb. Marianne's head rolled on her shoulders like crockery.

  After that, Marianne didn't remember.

  You Mulvaneys think you're hot shit don't you.

  No. She didn't remember.