We Were The Mulvaneys

by Joyce Carol Oates

  Apologetically Marianne murmured, "I guess-fm in mourning, Hewie. I hope that's all right?"

  At this, too, Hewie glared at her, his mouth working, but in silence. As if her question had annoyed, even offended him. He'd stalked out to his car and started the motor.

  After about forty minutes, the funeral party left the church and proceeded into the cemetery. Marianne spied on them shamelessly, biting at her thumbnail, peering out from behind the soaring Stone angel. Now and then a gust of wind threatened to knock her hat askew so she had to clamp it down on her head, mashing the crown. Hewie must have been crouching somewhere behind her, peering into the cemetery, too, but Marianne had forgotten him. There was the minister who didn't look quite like Reverend Schreiber who'd been pastor of the Ransomville Lutheran Church for decades, and therc were the pallbearers, four men, must be Hausmann relatives but Marianne could recognize only the youngest, a cousin of her mother's now bald and stoop-shouldered. The coffin was a shock- maybe coffins are always shocks, to the unexpecting eye?-such a shiny-glary black, like the hearse. Such ostentation and fuss weren't

  Grandmother Hausmann's style. And there were several elderly female relatives Marianne recognized, unsteady on their feet in the spongy soil, and darting among them a tall lean elbowy woman who managed to assist all three simultaneously, a woman in what appeared to be a shiny black vinyl raincoat and a wide-brimmed black hat (straw?) tied tight beneath her chin with a black ribbon. Marianne stared-it was Corinne! It was Corinne of course, and behind her was a skinny boy in a dark blue suit, uncomfortable-looking, fawn-colored hair stirring in the wind-Judd. Marianne jammed her knuckles against her mouth, emitted a small unconscious cry like a kitten's mew. Mom! Mommy!

  But where was Dad, wasn't Dad there, Michael Sr. not at his own mother-in-law's funeral, oh, what did that mean?

  Yet it was logical her father wasn't there, for Mananne had so deduced from seeing her mother's station wagon parked in front of the church; if Dad had driven, he'd surely have taken his own car, not Mom's. It was a newly purchased car Patrick had described at length over the phone: one of those overpriced ostentatious American gas-guzzlers, a Lincoln Continental of all things, wouldn't you think a man on the verge of bankruptcy and in this era of gas shortages would have more sense than to buy such a relic?-Patrick had gone on and on as if he'd not only seen the infamous car, but ridden in it, but Marianne gathered he had not. Anyway-that car, and not Morn's battered old Buick, would have been out front if Michael Sr. had been present.

  Marianne didn't care to consider why her father wasn't at the funeral. A gust of wind blew at her hat, she clamped it down fiercely, and blotted out any further thought on the subject.

  Staring at Corinne, now at the grave site, head bowed as the minister continued with more prayers, and at Judd, her heart suffused with love for them. Her mother, and her brother. Run to them! Run, now! Before it's too late! Oh where was Dad, where were Mike and Patrick? What heartbreak for Corinne, what an embarrassment, no one but her youngest son there beside her at her own mother's funeral; and in the watchful presence of the ftansomville Hausmanns, among them grim-bulldog-cousin Ethel. Go, nsn! Mom will hug you, Mommy you know she really loves you, there's a love that never wears out. You know that-don't you, Button?

  But Marianne had more sense. Resisted temptation, squatting on her heels down behind the crumbling rock wall, not watching the grave site but jamming her knuckles against her mouth, crying now openly. Squinched all together like a deformed pretzel, her hat tumbling off and would have blown away except Hewie grabbed it, spinning like a wheel through the tall grass. Hewie must have squat- ted on his heels a few yards away, and just waited. Offering no predictable words of comfort, solace, commiseration, just let Marianne weep her heart out hunched in pain, long as required.

  When finally Marianne dared peek up again over the wall, she saw that the cemetery was deserted-even Corinne who'd probably lingered at the grave, shedding bitter tears, was gone.

  Somewhere out of sight a wood thrush sang, four throaty, liq- uid notes.

  Resisting temptation. Marianne hadn't known she was strong enough but yes, she was.

  And again, that afternoon in Mt. Ephraini where she'd asked Hewie please to drive slowly along South Main Street. Too upset to explain what on earth she'd been doing, crouching and cringing and hiding and skulking like a fugitive, at that country church and now in town. Her voice was hoarse and cracked from crying, her eyes were swollen, she wouldn't have dared glance at herself in any reflecting surface. Where once (as a cheerleader, as "Button" Mulvaney) she'd been the silliest vainest shallow person, now she could barely force herself to contemplate her reflection, not just in a mirror but in her mind's pitiless eye.

  Part of downtown was a pedestrian mall-what a good idea! Marianne caught a glimpse of the old Woolworth's which looked unchanged, RexaIl Drugs at the corner, across on Fifth Street the movie house showing The Deer Hunter-not a new film. She had a vague sense of things not quite the same, a one-way street where there'd never been one before, then suddenly, abruptly there was Mulvaney Roofing!-the squat building familiar as if she'd last seen it the previous week, not four years ago. The green stucco building with white trim, needing a new coat of paint, oh but what was wrong?-an ugly yellow-and-black sign FOR SAI.F OR LFASfr-Marianne wasn't prepared for the sight though hadn't Patrick warned her? OrJudd.

  Having seen the sign MULVA-EY ROOFING, Hewie braked to a slow crawl, five miles an hour. Unperturbed when other drivers honked impatiently at him, cast derisive glances at his big old boat of a Dodge. Marianne had crouched down in the passenger's seat, straw hat jammed down on her head so that the brim hid most of her face; she peered fearfully up over the rim of the car door, a single eye exposed. Heart pounding like crazy. Beads of sticky sweat on her face. What if-? What if-? Dad steps outside, and sees you?

  He would hug her, wouldn't he. Run right out onto South Main to open the car door, hug her weeping wouldn't he.

  Marianne whispered for Hewie to stop the car if he could, park at the curb. Or maybe she hadn't whispered aloud but he'd heard her nonetheless. Through a haze of blinding scintillating light she stared at the facade Of MULVAN]-Y ROOFING. Immediately she'd understood it wasn't open for business though not exactly empty. The front door locked, that unmistakable look of a locked door, and no one in sight. Where was Leah, her father's receptionist? Leah who'd been so sweet to Marianne, telling Michael Mulvaney how she wished she had a beautiful little girl like his. Marianne saw that there were no vehicles in the lot, either. Not a single truck?-MULVANEY ROOFING in curving white letters.

  "Well. I guess no one's here right now. I guess-" Marianne straightened cautiously, adjusting her hat. Peering out at the build- ing and blinking numbly. He'd run out, he'd hug me, he loves me. If only he could see me! But there was no one at Mulvaney Roofing, not a soul.

  Farther down the block, at the box company warehouse, there was activity-a truck being loaded. And vehicles passing in the street in ajerky continuous stream. If only he could see me.

  After a few minutes Marianne whispered to 1-lewie, "I guess- you can drive away, now."

  Around the corner and along a street she didn't at first recognize, blinking tears from her eyes, except there was the old Blue Moon Caf- with a new smartly-bright blue moon swinging sign. Down to Third Street which was now one-way going the wrong way-a woman in sunglasses driving a handsome car-Suzi Quigley's mother?_Matia1u1- quickly looked away. (She'd written to Suzi, and Suzi had written back, enrolled at Wells College, they'd kept up a correspondence for the first year then Suzi ceased replying to Marianne's letters and Marianne eventually ceased writing, too. But always in her heart she would be Suzi's friend. And Merissa's, and Bonnie's. And Trisha's most of all.) On Fifth Street easing downhill past the attractive Trinity Episcopal Church she'd visited once, for Sunday service, with a friend, which appeared unchanged; and Reynolds' Funeral Home; and a large pink-limestone house, she'd imagined in childhood a mansion, now occupied
by an insurance agency. And so on down the hill to the high school, needing to drive past the high school, already cringing and wincing as Hewie slowed the Dodge, sensitive to Marianne's unuttered wish as her lost lovely Molly-O had been on their good days. Hewie had to brake in any case as clusters of teenagers crossed the street heed1es-, brashly smiling young people Marianne seemed not to know. Not a single one! They would have been younger brothers and sisters of her classmates but she didn't recognize anyone. The girls so younglooking, and so pretty-cutting their eyes at Hewie-snug jeans, oversized sweaters, bright lipstick, permed-fi-izzy hair. The boys were so young-that was even more unsettling. Suddenly she saw one she knew-no, he only looked like luinbering-loutish Ike Rodman-swinging along the sidewalk, a baseball cap reversed on his head. Ajeepload of boys veered past Hewie, rudely honking, laugh-. ter in their wake; at the wheel, a dark-haired hawkish-profiled boy resembling Zachary Lundt. Marianne's temples throbbed. It was silly, an optic-neurological misfiring. As, new at Kilburn State, she'd kept seeing faces achingly familiar until at last the new faces drove out the old which they hadn't much resembled, really. Probably there was a term for such tricks of the eye, Patrick would be the one to ask.

  But she'd lost contact with Patrick, too. He'd spoken vaguely of going off on a "field trip"-with some scientists-or maybe they were fellow dropouts from biology? You could ask Patrick a question point-blank and hear an answer but afterward you wouldn't know much more than you'd known at the start.

  Even as Marianne was thinking of her brother, she was watching a tall blond boy trotting across a patch of scrufFy' lawn, eyeglasses winking. His solitary hunying-away gait-he might have been Patrick Mulvaney, almost.

  Marianne said, stammering, "Isn't it-funny, Hewie, people remind you of other people? Faces remind you of other faces? As if there aren't enough faces in the world to go around, exactly-" She remembered then that Judd was actually a student at Mt. Ephraim High, a sophomore; he'd be leaving the building at this time, except of course he was in Ransomville with their mother. Only Corinne and her youngest showed up, of the precious Mulvaneys. There's a sorry tale there. Marianne was saying, "My brother Judd, he's my youngest brother, he goes to school here. Maybe you met him, Hewie? Around Christmastime, last year? He and my mom came to visit inc in Kilburn, we all had lunch together? They met Abelove..-" Her voice trailed off weakly.

  If Hewie responded, Marianne couldn't make out what he said.

  There appeared then, close by on the sidewalk, on Marianne's side of the car, Mr. Farolino, who'd taught biology to each of the Mulvaney children, in turn- one of Mt. Ephraim High's most popular teachers, admired and feared for his sarcastic wit. Mr. Farolino was loping along the walk-he lived near enough to school not to have to drive. He was carrying a briefcase battered as an old football at his side. How bald Mr. Farolino had become, though only Michael Mulvaney's age! How caved-in his chest, in a white nylon shirt with short fluttery sleeves! His expression was fixed in a fierce grin, eyes lifted to the horizon, to somewhere not in sight; clearly, he didn't want to be waylaid by departing students- But Marianne had hunched down in her seat at once, in terror of being seen. And what -f Mr. Farolino sees you? F-Vhy should it matter so much? Haven't you put that all behind you, silly sad vanity, along with everything else? Poor Button Mulvaney! Taking for granted that everyone adored her, yes they must have been envious of her, "Button" Mulvaney and her close tight circle of friends, "Button" Mulvaney of High Point Farm, the Mulvaneys whom everyone in Mt. Ephraimn knew and admired, how sad to be left out of their circle of friends, how sad not to be them, pity the plain girls of Mt. Ephraim High where being pretty and being popular were so crucial, pity the girls with blemished skins, no boyfriends, no personality-plus Dad and Moni, no good-looking brothers, girls whose pictures never appeared in the school newspaper or the Mt. Ephraim Patriot-Ledger. Girls like poor Della Rae Duncan, their smudged skin, hunted eyes. That kind of a girl. Sad!

  Marianne wondered what had become of Della Rae. The family had lived in a trailer village on the Haggartsville Road, her brother Dwight had been killed in Vietnam. Della Rae had dropped out of school and had-what? Disappeared? Married? Last time Marianne asked Corinne about her, Corinne had murmured vaguely that she didn't know, hadn't the slightest idea.

  Marianne said, "Oh, Hewie, it's as if-I've been gone a hundred years. As if I've died and come back and-"

  Hewie had parked the Dodge at the curb, and was leaning over now to scowl at the buff-brick facade of Mt. Ephraim High. In mild disbelief he asked, "You went to school here, Marianne?" It was the first direct question from Hewie in hours, perhaps all day, and the tenor was unrni stakabl e- That place isn't good enough for you.

  Then, to High Point Farm.

  With that strange fated compulsion with which swirling water is drawn down a drain, each discrete molecule and atom seemingly pressing for extinction, Marianne felt a wildness come over her-to see High Point Farm one more time. As beforehand she'd warned herself No: you must not even as she knew she would succumb, if once she and Hewie drove to Mt Ephraim, only seven miles from the farm. Just to say hello to Molly-O! I promise that's all.

  Shrewdly reasoning that since Corinne and Judd would still be in Ransomville, and Michael Sr. would surely not be at home at such an hour, no one would ever know.

  She took a deep breath. "Hewie, please will you drive out into the country now? I'll tell you where."

  Eager to be gone from the potholed constricting grid of Mt. Ephraim's streets as if he'd been feeling his passenger's pain, Hewie gunned the Dodge's motor at once.

  And so-and so it happened, as in a dream, yet a dream not of Marianne's own volition, they drove out of Mt. Ephraim; a turn, another turn, past the Chautauqua & Buffalo depot, past the water tower with its heraldic Day-Gb scrawls and so to Route 119, the Haggartsville Road, en route to High Point Farm. Just for afew minutes. No one will know. Past Country Club Lane where Marianne's eyelids blinked as in a nervous spasm and Hillside Estates where certain of her former friends lived hidden now by a handsome scrim of rapidly grown poplars and Spohr's Lumber which had expanded, twice the size Marianne recalled but she wasn't looking, Mr. Spohr was one of those men who'd betrayed her father but she wasn't thinking of that, not now. Family secrets you aren't supposed to know, of course you know. The railroad tracks running parallel with Route 119 she found herself staring at entranced, for railroad tracks are neutral territory, lacking identity and history.

  At High Point Road, where it forked off from the highway,

  Marianne murmured, "Here!-" her breath failing, unable to speak she touched Hewie's arm-his knotty-muscled arm-it was the first time she had ever touched him, or any man of her present acquaintance, in their months of formally knowing each other at the Co-op and in these peculiar intense hours in his car, and the gesture was arguably not conscious-to indicate the road.

  The Dodge sped onto High Point Road without slacking speed. As if it were the most natural thing in the world-Mananne bringing a college friend home to visit.

  But: a balmy wind-crazed spring day. The sun shone blindingly in the sky from a thousand points, as if in a shattered mirror. As they ascended into the foothills, Hewie's big old Dodge began to quaver, rock, in the wind. Because you're not wanted here: God is warning you. At once Hewie slowed the car, for he was a careful, conscientious driver; not a boy but a young man of twenty-eight or -nine; danger alerted him, suffused his face with blood. Yet he glanced repeatedly from side to side, blinking at the view-more severe than the Ransoniville countryside, the foothills of the Chautauqua Mountains were higher, more broken and discontinuous than that terrain. Marianne saw the Valley through Hewie's eyes and felt a frightened rapture: May fields planted in wheat, corn, soybeans, sloping down from the road; outcroppings of granite on the other, hilly side of the road, like ancient wounds that had never healed. Sudden drops, open vistas beyond an absurdly low guardrail. They were traversing the ridge of a glacier hill. Hewie pointed-"What's that?" In the distance, thir
ty miles away, chalky Mt. Cataract shone in the sunlight like a hand upraised in greeting. Or in warning.

  The car rocked in the wind, Hewie shifted to second gear. Now he had broken the silence between them he seemed yet reluctant to speak, as if no mere uttered words could be equal to the sanctity of that intimate silence. His voice was thick, shy-"Where is this?- we keep climbing."

  "Well, it's called High Point Road." Marianne laughed nervously, plucking at her hair beneath the crooked brim of the black straw hat.