We Were The Mulvaneys

by Joyce Carol Oates

  She would find him in the flimily room. Or the kitchen. Or his office. If she looked. She'd discover an empty Early Times bottle in the trash, beer conspicuously missing from the refrigerator. If she looked Probably there'd be an empty glass somewhere on the floor, tipped on its side: Michael wasn't troubling to hide his tracks, much, any longer. Too angry, and since anger wears you out, too exhausted.

  Her worst fear: the telephone ringing.

  At 12:50 A.M., and Michael not home.

  It was late April, after Easter. Corinne was in bed upstairs, propped up with pillows, too anxious to sleep; reading, or trying to read, one of

  Patrick's science magazines. Though every cell and nerve ending in her brain quivered with wakeflilness, she could not concentrate on a passage she'd read, reread how many times.... No evidetwe either in the living world of today or of past geological epochs for a continuous transition of species... what we artually find are separate and weU-distinguished species

  intermediate stages from one species to another which should he found are nOt met with. The worlds of organisms, living and extinct, do not represent a continuum but a discontinuum. -.. Certain conditions of stability exist not only for the individual genes -ut alsofc-rgenOmeS A "species" represents a state in which a hannoniously stabilized "genetic halan-e" has been. established, that is... Thinking of Marianne who was so deeply unhappy at school. Yet never spoke of it. Poor Marianne with so few friends now, few telephone calls, and all that visiting the girls had done back and forth at one another's houses----sUdde1ilY, for Marianne, all that had ceased as if it had never been. She'd quit the cheerleading squad, rarely attended club meetings or her Christian Youth meetings. Her grades had dropped to C's but seemed to have levelled off. She was happiest at church, so far as Corinne could judge. Singing hymns in her thin, sweet soprano voice-"Rock of Ages," Corinne's Livorite hymn of all time, was Marianne's, too. It was the only public place she felt comfortable: the First Church of Christ of South Lebanon was a one-room foursquare white-shingled church miles from Mt. Ephraim; the congregation was mostly country people; no one knew the Mulvaneys except as relatively new churchgoers, Corinne Mulvaney and her three children. Corinne drove to church in the mud_splattered rust_speckled Buick station wagon with the bumper sticker 4-H: HEAD HMirl' HANDS HEALTH and. on a rear window, a frayed decal FUTURE FARMERS o- AMERICk 1974. No one would have judged her the wife of a prosperous businessman, or, maybe, anyone's wife at all. If there was a Mr. Mulvaney, no one had ever sighted him in South Lebanon, nor would.

  It was a tenet of the First Church of Christ not to judge one's brothers and sisters in Christ. Let him that is without sin first cast a stone.John 8.

  Corinne knew she was neglecting her sons. The youngest especially-poor Judd! Babyface, DimpleRaflger. She loved the boy but hardly dared hug him, now he was thirteen. A quiet, good-natured child, all but lost in the ferocity of Mulvaney family life; he'd stopped asking about Marianne, stopped asking about his father. Only a phase Corinne would tell him. God sends us son-ow sometimes to strengthen us.

  Do I believe that? Corinne wondered.

  Of course, I believe. I must.

  Then there was Patrick. Haughty P.J.! The child least like either of his parents. It was a mystery to Corinne how Patrick continued to accompany her to church services at the little South Lebanon church, now he was eighteen years old, a tall, restless, skeptical- minded young man. "Monosyllables of wisdom" Patrick cruelly and wittily described their minister's sweetly simple sermons. The congregation he called "the flock"-if you know animals, you know there's nothing dumber, less attractive, than an adult sheep. As a boy he'd tried to take part in hymn singing but now he seemed merely to be mouthing the words, his mind elsewhere. He was visibly embarrassed when "witnesses for Christ" came forward; lie shuffled to the communion rail with an expressionless face, like a stoical child taking his medicine. His participation in "clasping of hands in Christ" was distinctly less than enthusiastic. Yet, he continued to accompany his mother, sister and younger brother to church; it was their custom for Patrick to drive the Station wagon home, so that Corinne could sit quietly beside him, fingers to her eyes, adrift, her soul almost palpably buoyed by the love ofJesus Christ she'd taken into her heart anew. Patrick was being, Corinne guessed, a good son. Mom's good son. Acquitting himself dutifully and with a measure of good humor, just possibly counting the days until he left High Point Farm for college and could leave his Christian faith behind. It worried Corinne terribly, but-well, she just knew!

  What her sensitive, easily offended son was thinking about it, what experiences he was having at the high school in the wake of it, Corinne shrank from imagining. She knew what adolescent boys could be like-what cruelty, dirty-mindedness, mockery of those perceived as weaker, or as outsiders. Yes, and girls, too! The cruelty of the barnyard: how chickens peck fiercely, relentlessly at an afflicted chicken in their midst, pecking to the raw flesh, seeking blood. She supposed Patrick must suffer as Michael Sr. suffered. She supposed he couldn't help but overhear remarks about his sister and Zachary Lundt; he'd have to see the Lundt boy every day, Mt. Ephraim High was so small, only a few hundred students. Yet he was managing, he was quiet but resolute. If he shared his innermost thoughts with anyone, it was no longer Mom.

  As for Mike-eldest son, firstborn baby, so grown. Mikey-Junior who'd turned twenry-one-----no: twenty-two--last month. Corinne had been stunned by Mike's abrupt decision to leave home and live in Mt. Ephraim, just at the time of his birthday. But why? Corinne had asked, for to her High Point Farm was paradise, and why would one leave paradise willingly? Mike said, Well, it's time. Corinrie asked again, But why? and Mike said, shifting his shoulders restively, clenching and anclenching his fists, It makes sense to live where you work, right? and Corinne said, Yes but you could ride in with Dad instead of driving in yourselL the way you used to-how can that be a reason? and Mike laughed and said, Mom, you just don't get it, and Corinne said, hurt, I guess I don't. Michael Sr. didn't approve of the sudden decision, either. Why the hell did Mike want to move to town, to an apartment! A mere apartment. And in a cheaply flashy stucco building in the new Riverdale section of Mt. Ephraini where the Mulvaneys knew no one. Corinne tried for a lighter tone, teasing Mike about how he'd prepare his own meals?-for Mike was the biggest eater of the Mulvaneys, always huti-y. Mike said with a shrug he'd eat in restaurants mostly. and Corinne said, chiding, Restaurant meals!-they aren't very nourishing, and they're expensive. And Mike said, in that winking way he had with his mom, as if there were a subtext to their conversation she hadn't been getting, Hey Mom: it all depends upon the restaurant.

  All depends upon the restaurant.

  It was then, waking Corinne from sleep, the telephone rang close beside the bed.

  But she hadn't been asleep-had she?

  Fumbling to lift the receiver, the palm of her hand already damp with panicky sweat, she knew, just knew it must be bad news.

  "Corinrie? Hey sorry-did I wake you? It's-"

  The voice was familiar, gratingly-Conflne recognized it even as she struggled to comprehend what she was being told.

  1-law Hawley. At Wolf s Head Lake. Calling to say that Michael had had an "accident""Nothing too serious, but he shouldn't be driving tonight. We thought we'd better let you know, so you wouldn't worry-"

  Corinne was already out of bed. "Is he hurt?"

  "Hurt?"-as if the idea hadn't occurred to Haw. "Well-not really. I mean, he's mainly sleeping. We put him in one of the rooms, in bed."

  "I'll come get him," Corinne said.

  "Now? So late?"

  "I said, Haw, I'll come get him."

  So Connne drove to Wolf's Head Lake, arrived at 1:25 A.M. in hastily thrown-on jeans, sweatshirt, sneakers without socks. She had not so much as glanced at herself in a mirror, hadn't had time to splash water onto her face or drag a comb through her hair, rushing off, calling to the children (of course, they'd been awakened-or had they been asleep, at all, waiting too for the telephone to ri
ng?) that things were all right, their dad was all right, at Wolf's Head Lake and she was going to get him.

  How strange to be driving alone at night, arriving alone at the darkened lakeside. Buildings made unfamiliar by night, their lights extinguished. The faded red neon wOLF's HEAD INN extinguished. There were only two vehicles in the tavern parking lot, one of them Michael's pickup. Haw was waiting for Corinne on the Inn veranda, beneath a bug-swirling light, a tall, burly, apologetic nian who made no effort to shake Corinne's hand, or touch her to comfort her-that wasn't his way. "Michael got in a, kind of a disagreement with a local guy," Haw said, "-they'd both been drinking and they shoved each other around. But nothing serious." Corrnne entered the neardarkened tavern, diminished and melancholy it seemed without patrons, even the jukebox turned off, but, oh--that smell. She would know it anywhere. "How badly drunk is he?" Corinne asked. "Sickdrunk? Passed-out drunk?" She was trying to be matter-of-fact. She was trying not to sound fririous and reproachful, a raging wife. Wasn't she a farm woman, after all-she'd had plenty of experience with emergencies. Telling herself, As long as he's alive. He's alive.

  A light was burning at the rear of the tavern, beyond the bar and the shabby old-fashioned kitchen, beyond the stinking alcove, and Corinne hurried in that direction, not waiting for Haw, who was short of breath, to lead her. He lumbered close behind her, squint-. ing at her through smudged glasses, smelling of beer himself, male- sweat and beer. Saying, "Michael looks worse than he is. Don't be upset." But when Corinne saw her husband sprawled atop a bed, his face swollen, his upper lip swollen and bloody, shirt stained and eyes shut, snoring, she began to cry. It took some time to wake him and when she finally did, crouched beside the bed in a posture of abriegation and appeal, stroking his heated face, she had a sense of going in and out of focus in his eyes, a hapless female figure in a cartoon.

  The room was minimally, shabbily furnished and smelled of insecticide and stale tobacco smoke. It had an adjoining cubbyhole of a bathroom, however, and Haw was kind enough to provide a rudimentary first-aid kit, so Corinne could tend to -jchael-WaShing his face, putting iodine and Band-Aids on his cuts. He groaned- cursed, thrashed about; he was deeply ashamed, disgusted with himself Saying, "I don't lu-mow what the hell happened, honey. One niinute 1 was O.K. and the next-" His arm lifted, only to fall back limp onto the bed.

  Haw said, "You're both welcome to stay the night-of course- Drive back home tomorrow. That way, you won't have to both come again, to get Michael's pickup." He was hanging about in the hallway, awkward, apologetic, yet trying for an amiable tone. O-d-friends-tvho't'e been- - ag h- wo rse-tha th,t-gether tone. Corinne remembered their encountet in the Kmart and felt a physical, visceral dislike of the man.

  Stiffly she said, "Thank you, but I want to take Michael home tonight."

  "But-"

  "Not Tonight."

  She was close to clamping her hands over her ears, like one of her children.

  "Corinne, come on," Haw said, scratching at his beard, "-d'you hate it here that much? Hate me?"

  Corinne stared at I-law, wiping her eyes. A wave of shame caine over her: how could she, Corinne Mulvaney, whose sense of herself as one privileged by God had defined her entire adulthood, knowledge hating any living person, let alone this sad, hopeful, raddie-faced and lonely old friend? One of the few men of Corinne's life who had desired her, as a woman? "Well, all right." she said, relenting. "You're right, I suppose. But we'll pay you for the room."

  "Corinne, what the hell-"

  "I said we'll pay you."

  Surprising, how tough she could be, even in her nerved-up exhausted state. She'd almost forgotten how good it felt.

  Brisk, capable, fueled with purpose as a mom should be, Coriune telephoned home to assure the children that everything was under control. Patrick answered the phone on the first ring. He asked how was Dad and Corinne said Dad was fine and Patrick persisted, what had happened?-afld Corinne said that nothing had happened. "It's just Dad isn't up to driving tight now. But he'll be fine by morning. We'll both be home by midmorning." Still Patrick asked, reproachfullY-

  "What's wrong with Dad? I've got a right to know." Cormnne said sharply, "We'll talk about it tomorrow, Patrick. Good night!"

  As long as he's alive. Alive.

  I give us both over to You, God. Protect us!

  They lay together exhausted. Only partly undressed, their shoes off. Not in, but on top of- the dank-smelling bed that was hardly more than a cot, pushed into the corner of the cramped little room. Michael's left eye had swollen almost shut and promised to be luridly blackened. There were cuts in his eyebrows, his upper lip was swollen, the color of an overripe plum. His knuckles, too, were skinned and swollen. A jittery sobriety had overtaken him by 3 A.M. just as Corinne sank toward sleep. "Jesus, honey, I'm sorry!" Michael murmured. Corinne murmured, "Well." She was holding him in a way she'd held him frequently, after lovemaking, in the early years of their marriage: her arm slipped beneath his heavy shoulders, his head on her shoulder, his arm slung across her. Seen from above, they would appear to be huddling together like dazed and desperate children. With an air of dogged incredulity that seemed genuine Michael was saying, "-ust don't know what happened." Corinne said, tak- ing the tone she'd taken with Patrick, "It isn't what happened, Michael, it's what you've done." The schoolmanrnsh edge was a way of keeping herself from more tears, or worse than tears. Adrenaline had pumped through her veins for a long time and was beginning now to wane and Corinne knew that, when it did, if she Wasn't safely unconscious, she would be washed out, despairing.

  God protect Us/-we're your children, too.

  She wished Michael, willed him, to sleep. To relinquish shame. The tattered remnant of his pride. A man's pride, carried like a burden on his back. But vaguely, wonderingly he continued to speak. Corinne had not inquired what the quarrel with the stranger had been. Haw claimed not to know and Corinne did not think it had had anything to do with it-Wolf's Head Lake was a considerable distance from Mt. Ephraim. But she preferred not to know, would -1ever ask. There was the relief of her husband's living se?f When the :elephone had rung waking her from her stuporous sleep she had iad the instantaneous terrified conviction that Michael had been rifled, or had killed; that he had transgressed beyond his capacity to :eturn. But that was not so. With God's iove, it would not be so. he could save him, would save if only God showed the way.

  Now, the comfort of his warm, perspiring body heavy against hers. Her arm growing numb from his weight. His damp hair, the hard intransigent bone of his skull. A smell of his body and breath- beer, whiskey, sweat. It was a smell she savored as, a farmer's daughter, she'd learned to savor, young, the smells of the barnyard, the smells that nieant home. Well, yes-they were stinks, sometimes. Exacerbated by rain and humidity. Yet, still, they were familiar, they meant home. They meant what is known. U/hat is given to us, to know.

  The light in the room was extinguished. There was a window beside the bed, no blind to draw so Corinne was aware of the starlit sky above Wolf's Head Lake; a faint-luminous pearly moon that seemed to be pulsing. Unless it was an artery in her brain that was pulsing. Confused, she mistook it for-what? A streetlamp. Somehow, that was logical. There were lights on poles in Haw Hawley's parking lot turned off for the night and somehow this was one of them except floating. And there was a streetlamp in a famous painting of a jungle, a dream-jungle, a French painting of the previous century Corinne had seen years ago but could not now identify, yet recalling the jungle flat as wallpaper and clearly a dream and the artist had inserted a streetlamp in it because that is the nature of dreams.

  She'd believed that this heavy perspiring man huddled against her was asleep but suddenly he began to speak. A low, aggrieved, jarring voice she could not escape. "-This thing that I did I didn't tell you, nor the lawyer either, flick him, flick them all, think I don't know how they tall about me behind my back? take my money and ridicule me?-so I acted on my own, yesterday morning I went to the Chautauqua County distri
ct attorney and demanded the S.O.B. talk to nie in person, Birch himself- big-deal Democrat, I voted for him for Christ's sake, so I demanded he bring crnninal charges against the kid who'd assaulted n-my daughter, she could not testify herself so we would have to bring charges on the strength of her doctor's records, Dr. Oakley's records could be subpoenaed and he could be made to testify-couldn't he? Isn't that the law? Where a felony has been committed against a minor? A medical man, a man who knows exactly what happened to my daughter! He could be made to testify, he would have to tell the truth And Birch listens, or pretends to listen. Saying then it did not seem to him a `winnable' case. Just to take it to a grand jury-not a `winnable' case. If the victim refuses to testify. And I say but what if the victim had been killed? You would charge the murderer wouldn't you? What kind of criminal justice system is this for Christ's sake? And Birch asks why won't my daughter testify, has she made a statement to the police?-and so on. Questions like that. Fucking lawyer questions! Pretending he's sympathetic. Saying, `In such cases the defense will argue "mutual consent." All but impossible to convince a july where it's a female's word against a male because the jury must deliberate evidence and can convict only beyond a reasonable doubt. Unless the young woman has been seriously injured and can't testify, and her injuries documented, and maybe a semen swab matched with the young man. It would be a rare case, possibly if the victim was retarded, where she reflised to testify or was ruled incapable, and a grand jury would indict. Not "winnable," Mr. Mulvaney. You'd only be opening your daughter and your family to public humiliation. If the defendant didn't cave in and there's no reason he would in such circumstances, in fact his lawyer would move to dismiss and a judge would probably concur. This is Chautauqua County,' Birch says, `we had a hell of a time getting an indictment against a man in Milford-you read about it, maybe- who beat and kicked his pregnant wife a while back-juries don't like to "interfere" in domestic cases. In male-female cases. If sex is involved, especially. Remember that trucker who shot his wife and her boyfriend with a shotgun?-the grand jury did indict, but on second-degree manslaughter-the jury acquitted him-"not guilty by reason of temporary insanity." Probably you wouldn't know, Mr. Mulvaney, "sexual misdemeanor" and assault and rape cases are reported all the time, including pretty brutal rapes, but these cases rarely get to trial. Even if a grand jury indicted which I don't believe they would it would be impossible to conduct a trial without your daughter and if she did testify it would destroy her'-and I'm listening to this bulishit and can't hold back any longer saying `I want the flicker punished! I want justice! I see this kid around town, my daughter has to see him in school, and my son-he's getting away with it, with the hurt he inflicted on us.' I was getting excited, I guess. I was yelling at Birch saying `We deserve better in this town, my family and me!' And these deputies came in, guards-"