Mary Jane

by Jessica Anya Blau

  “The one and only,” I said.

  “I heard the Joneses have a house here somewhere,” Mrs. Cone said. “Hopefully she’ll stay the rest of the summer while we’re back in Baltimore.”

  “Did she give you cake?” Izzy asked. “She makes good cake!”

  “No,” I said. “No cake this time.”

  On my lap was a shopping bag full of clothes paid for by Sheba. I had been worrying about how I was going to get any of them past my mother. Even the sandals Sheba bought me seemed sexy; they were made of black leather and had a woven ring that went around the big toe.

  “No one knows where we’re staying,” Mrs. Cone said. “So she won’t be dropping in with any cakes.”

  Sheba sang, “Beeeanie Jones, Beeeanie Jones, when she enters the room, there are hollers and groooooans.”

  We all sang the line and then Sheba went on, “Beanie Jones, Beanie Jones, first she grunts and then she moooooans.”

  We repeated that line and then Izzy came up with, “Beanie Jones, Beanie Jones, the telephone rings ’cause she’s on the phones!”

  “Good one!” I hugged Izzy and felt a rush of pride.

  Mrs. Cone sang, “Beanie Jones, Beanie Jones, she storms into town like a trail of cyclones.”

  “Your turn, Mary Jane!” Sheba said.

  “Okay . . .” I bit my lip, thinking. “Beanie Jones, Beanie Jones, her body is flesh, then there are bones!”

  “Bones, bones, bones,” Sheba sang. “Beanie Beanie Jones. Bones, bones, bones, she hollers then she moans!”

  We all repeated those last two lines, with Sheba taking melody and me on harmony, for the rest of the ride home.

  10

  At breakfast, Jimmy looked at the last two recipe cards. One was for pot roast and the other was for tomato soup and grilled cheese sandwiches.

  “Pot roast.” Jimmy slapped the card down in front of Izzy. Izzy had come to the table in her nightgown but removed it when I wasn’t looking. She was now eating her porridge naked.

  “That’s not a summer food.” Sheba was in a different bikini than yesterday. This one was white with a crotch so small the fuzzy scribbles of her brown pubic hair poked out along the sides. I was wearing my new suit, but had thrown my new Dolfin shorts and new striped T-shirt over it, as I couldn’t bring myself to walk out of the bedroom wearing just the suit.

  “But I love pot roast. And I’ve been so good!” Jimmy climbed off his chair, went to Sheba, and started kissing her all over. She batted him away, laughing. Izzy got out of her chair and ran over to kiss Sheba all over too, so Sheba was covered by the two of them. I watched, smiling, and wondered what it would feel like to kiss so freely like that.

  Dr. Cone came into the room and Jimmy lifted his head up from the kisses. “Richard, what do you think of pot roast for dinner tonight?” He sat at the table.

  Dr. Cone looked at me. “Mary Jane?”

  “Well, we bought all the ingredients. But Sheba thinks it’s not summery enough.”

  “If we bought the ingredients, let’s not waste them.” Dr. Cone went to the stove and served himself a bowl of oatmeal from the pot.

  “Seriously, Mary Jane. Does your mother make pot roast in the middle of summer?” Sheba lifted her bare legs and crossed them on the table. Izzy settled on Jimmy’s lap. She looked over the recipe card and sounded out the letters.

  “I copied her recipe cards for the meals she had scheduled this week, so, yes.” I wondered if Dr. Cone cared that his naked daughter was sitting on a grown man’s lap. No one else seemed to notice.

  “You got a hell of a mother,” Jimmy said. “The best meal my mother ever made was when she’d buy a brick of cheddar cheese, pull out a sheet of tinfoil, and then melt the cheddar on the foil.”

  “And then what?” I picked up Izzy’s nightgown from the floor and slipped it over her head.

  “Then what what?”

  Sheba said, “What did she do with the melted cheese?”

  “Nothing. That was it. She took the foil out of the oven, put it on the coffee table, and we pulled it off with our fingers and ate it while we watched TV.”

  I laughed. “What did you call it?”

  “She called it ‘melted cheese.’”

  “How did you ever get so creative and smart?” Sheba recrossed her legs, left over right now. “Your mother was of no help to you.”

  “At least she was there. Unlike my dad, who was with the macramé lady who lived down the road.”

  “We did macramé at camp!” Izzy cried.

  “Who was the macramé lady?” I asked.

  “She sold macramé plant holders outside the supermarket. She had big eyes and big tits. That and the macramé did my dad in. He followed her home one day and that was that.”

  “Tits,” Izzy whispered. I hoped she wouldn’t ask what it meant.

  Mrs. Cone walked in wearing a breezy yellow sundress and leather sandals. She paused, looked at Sheba, and then slipped off the dress, revealing another microkini. Then she sat at the table.

  “Izzy and I made oatmeal,” I offered.

  “Lovely!” Mrs. Cone clapped.

  I went to the stove and ladled out a big bowl for her. “Do you mind pot roast for dinner?”

  “What does everyone else think?”

  “I think it’s too wintry.” Sheba recrossed her legs again. Each time she moved them, it was like a flash of lightning that everyone but Izzy turned toward.

  “I want it,” Jimmy said. “It’s better than melted cheese on tinfoil.”

  “Jimmy’s dad loves the macramé lady with big eyes,” Izzy said.

  “Baby,” Sheba said, to Jimmy, “you’re right. This time is about you. Pot roast it is.”

  “Hurrah!” Izzy shouted.

  At two p.m., Izzy and I stuck the roast in the oven. It had to cook for four hours. Back on the beach, we decided we’d collect shells to decorate the dining room table.

  “Hat.” I plopped a purple hat on Izzy’s head. Her face and shoulders had been burning and peeling all week long and I wanted to stop the cycle. Everyone but Dr. Cone and Izzy had been slathering on Bain de Soleil tanning oil all week, trying to heighten the sun’s effects. Sheba was the darkest, with Jimmy coming in second. Mrs. Cone only crisped and then molted, so she had to start all over again every second day. Dr. Cone was uninterested in tanning, but had been turning brown nonetheless. I looked as brown as a nut and my hair had gone blonder.

  “Bucket,” Izzy said, and she gripped the handle of her bucket and started marching down the beach.

  “We’ll be back in a bit,” I said, but Dr. Cone—the only one on the beach with us—wasn’t listening.

  I hurried after Izzy. I hadn’t put on my shorts or shirt and felt like there was too much air on my skin as we walked along. Each time I bent over to pick up a shell, I pulled my bottoms out of my crack and checked the triangles of the top even though no one was around to see me.

  Izzy started singing a Jimmy song from our favorite Running Water album. Soon, I was singing with her and forgot about my near-nakedness. After each song ended, Izzy paused for what seemed like the same number of seconds as the silence between songs on the album before starting in on the next one in order.

  “Look!” Izzy stopped mid-song and pointed at a horseshoe crab shell as big as a serving platter. It was in perfect condition; a mottled, brownish-red, the color of Mrs. Cone’s skin just before she peeled.

  “Cool!” We’d found half shells, three-quarter shells, and shell shards earlier in the week. But this was our first encounter with an unbroken, completely formed shell.

  “Where’s the crab?”

  “Probably eaten by seagulls.” I flipped it around so we could study the underside. “Look at how big this is! Horseshoe crabs are older than dinosaurs.”

  “Can we keep it?” Izzy lifted the giant shell and tried to put it in the bucket. It was far too big.

  “Yes. But let’s pick it up again on our way back.”

  “What if someon
e else takes it?” Izzy pressed the horseshoe crab shell against her chest. It covered past her protruding belly.

  “We can hide it in the dunes and get it on the way back.”

  “Yes!” Izzy held the shell high above her head like a boxer with his trophy, and ran toward the dunes. I jogged a couple of paces behind. She climbed to the top of a dune and stopped as if she’d bumped into an invisible wall. When I caught up to her, my body did the same halting bump.

  Behind the dune was Jimmy, naked except for his leather-and-feather necklace, and naked Beanie Jones. I supposed they were having sex, but I’d never imagined sex looking like this. Jimmy was on top of Beanie’s back; her rump was in the air and his mouth was on her shoulder, like a biting dog. Beanie’s face was half on the towel and half in the sand. Her blond hair was fanned around her head and covered most of the exposed side of her face. They were gleaming, sweaty. I was so stunned by this sight that I was silenced. I couldn’t move either; it was like I was trapped in mud.

  Beanie’s eyes flashed open. She said, “Oh!” and then rolled out from beneath Jimmy.

  “FUCKING SHIT! FUCK ME.” Jimmy stood. His penis jutted out in a way that I’d never seen in sex ed filmstrips or Izzy’s coloring book. It was airborne, upright—like there was a string attached to it and someone was yanking that string up.

  “Sorry,” I managed. Then I picked up Izzy, who was still holding the horseshoe crab, and ran back toward the water.

  When we got to the bucket, I put Izzy down and dropped to my knees. I was shaking. Izzy got on her knees and laid her head on my lap. She breathed in deep, her tiny back rising and falling. Neither of us spoke for a minute.

  Finally Izzy sat up and looked at me. “Was Jimmy addicting?”

  “Yes, I think so.” I rubbed her hair. My hands trembled.

  “What were they doing?”

  “They were wrestling.”

  “Naked-y?”

  “Yeah. Naked-y wrestling.”

  “Will Sheba be mad?”

  “Yes. I think so.”

  “But this isn’t our kitchen.”

  I knew what she meant. “Yeah, it’s not. I don’t think Jimmy will break all the dishes here.” I wondered how I would have responded to a situation like this when I was Izzy’s age. All of it—the kitchen destruction, the beach lovemaking—had been unimaginable until I encountered it. I had to quickly get over my own shock and be the adult—the one who made everything okay for Izzy when the grown-ups messed up in extraordinary ways.

  “Maybe we don’t tell anyone so Jimmy doesn’t get in trouble,” Izzy said.

  I pulled Izzy onto my lap. Then I shut my eyes and thought for a second. It seemed important that I get this right. “You don’t have to keep secrets from your parents, okay? If it’s on your mind, you can tell your mom and dad.”

  Izzy nodded into my neck. I could feel tears leaking into my skin. “I don’t want it on my mind.”

  “I’ll talk to your dad and he can figure out what to do about it. He’s Jimmy’s doctor. This is his job.”

  “I’m worrying about Jimmy.”

  “Don’t. This isn’t your worry to have,” I said. “This isn’t your problem. You just be you. We’ll make dinner. We’ll decorate with shells. Okay? Jimmy’s problem is not your problem.”

  Izzy nodded again. She sniffed and then wiped her nose on my neck.

  “Let’s go back and make a centerpiece for the table.” I put Izzy on the ground and picked up the bucket. She carried the horseshoe crab against her chest with one hand. Her other hand was in mine. I squeezed her fingers and she squeezed back. We squeezed in a rhythm as we walked toward the house.

  And then Izzy started singing to our squeezing beat, “Beanie Jones, Beanie Jones, first she hollers, then she moans.”

  In my head I was singing too, Bones, bones, bones, Beanie, Beanie Jones.

  I plugged the kitchen sink, then filled it with water and dishwashing liquid. Izzy pulled a footstool up and, one by one, placed the shells we’d collected in the water. She put the giant horseshoe crab shell in last.

  I got out a cutting board and sliced up vegetables for the green salad. I’d add the lettuce last, just before dinner.

  We were silently working like this when Dr. Cone came in from the beach. “Smells delicious.” He bent over and looked through the glass door of the oven. Then he went to Izzy and kissed the back of her head.

  “I’m washing the shells so we can make the center—” Izzy looked at me.

  “The centerpiece.”

  “The centerpiece.”

  “That will be beautiful.” Dr. Cone kissed his daughter again.

  “And,” Izzy whispered, “Mary Jane, tell Dad about the sand dunes.”

  “Yes?” Dr. Cone looked at me. My heart was banging. Izzy turned back to her chore.

  I swallowed a walnut down my throat. “Can I tell you somewhere else?”

  Dr. Cone nodded. “How about we go onto the porch?”

  “I’ll be right back,” I said to Izzy. “Don’t climb off the stool. Just stay here and keep cleaning. Okay?”

  “Okay.” Izzy’s head was down. She appeared to be scrubbing each groove of every shell with her tiny fingernail. I knew she was fully in the task and no longer worrying about Jimmy.

  Out on the porch, I took a deep breath. “Izzy and I found Jimmy with Beanie Jones behind a sand dune.”

  Dr. Cone blinked several times. “Were they doing drugs?”

  “No.”

  “What were they doing?”

  “I think they were making love.”

  Dr. Cone paused for a few seconds. Then he said, “Did you tell anyone else?”

  “No. I told Izzy they were wrestling, and I think she believed me. But she also knows that the naked wrestling was wrong and that Sheba will be angry.”

  Dr. Cone nodded. “Let’s keep this between us for now. After Izzy goes to bed, we’ll deal with it. As a family. Me, you, Bonnie, Jimmy, Sheba.”

  “Okay.” I nervously smiled. Until I’d met the Cones, I had no idea that a family would dare discuss something as volatile and embarrassingly personal as infidelity. In my own house, each day was a perfectly contained lineup of hours where nothing unusual or unsettling was ever said. In the Cone family, there was no such thing as containment. Feelings were splattered around the household with the intensity of a spraying fire hose. I was terrified of what I might witness or hear tonight. But along with that terror, my fondness for the Cones only grew. To feel something was to feel alive. And to feel alive was starting to feel like love.

  Izzy squatted on the dining room table. She placed the horseshoe crab shell, back up, in the center of the table. On the spiny, hard dome, she put the tiniest seashells, one by one. Around the horseshoe crab shell, she placed the bigger seashells, alternating faceup with facedown.

  “That’s so beautiful,” I said.

  “It’s the centerplace.”

  “The centerpiece.”

  “The centerpiece.”

  Jimmy came into the room. We hadn’t seen him since the dunes, though we’d seen Sheba and Mrs. Cone as they’d passed through the kitchen to go to their rooms to dress for dinner. Jimmy was wearing cutoff shorts and no shirt. The leather string with feathers dangled on his neck. It seemed to be pointing down toward his crotch. I couldn’t stop myself from seeing his penis again, the way it had bobbed up in the air. My stomach lurched. I was now certain that I was a sex addict. I would have to ask Dr. Cone to treat me. But how would I pay for the therapy? And would he be required to tell my parents?

  “Jimmy!” Izzy raised her arms, the signal to be picked up.

  “Izzy, baby!” Jimmy lifted her up off the table, twirled her around, and then hugged her close to his chest.

  “We saw you wrestling,” Izzy whispered.

  “I know. I’m sorry.” Jimmy carried Izzy toward me, and with her still in his arms he hugged me. “I’m really sorry.”

  “Um.” I didn’t know what to say. Jimmy clung to
me and the three of us rocked back and forth, Izzy squished between us. I could smell the sun on Jimmy’s skin, and his chest hair tickled my face. His penis popped up in my mind again, just as it had popped up in the air.

  “I’m really, really sorry.” Jimmy held on tighter and kept rocking. I closed my eyes. It felt good to be wedged in there like that. I tried to push Jimmy’s penis out of my mind, but instantly discovered that willing it away put as much focus on it as not willing it away.

  When Jimmy let go, he stared into my eyes.

  “I told Dr. Cone but no one else,” I confessed. Tears sprang to my eyes. I was angry at Jimmy for betraying Sheba, and for making love with the married(!) Beanie Jones. But I knew he was an addict. I knew his body was like a teenager’s that he had to wrangle into control every day. Until I met Jimmy, I hadn’t understood that people you loved could do things you didn’t love. And, still, you could keep loving them.

  “I know, he told me. It’s okay.” Jimmy wiped my tears with his thumb.

  “Mary Jane, are you crying?” Izzy leaned out of Jimmy’s arms into mine.

  I shook my head, but tears were spilling down my face. I’d cried more this summer than I had in all the years since I was Izzy’s age. And I’d never been happier.

  “It’s okay, Mary Jane. You didn’t do anything wrong.” Jimmy leaned in and kissed my forehead and this made me cry a little harder. I inhaled deeply in an effort to suck it up. I didn’t want to freak Izzy out.

  “Mary Jane.” Izzy kissed my face all over. “Don’t cry. I love you.”

  “Everyone loves Mary Jane.” Jimmy kissed my head and then he started singing, “Mary Jane, Mary Jane!”

  Izzy sang with him and I started laughing. Jimmy sang as he went to the living room. He returned, still singing, with his guitar.

  As Izzy and I set the table, Jimmy sat on a chair plucking at his guitar and singing. I wished so badly that we hadn’t seen Jimmy with Beanie Jones. Or that Beanie Jones had never moved to Roland Park.

  Sheba came into the dining room first. She was wearing a long batik sundress with no bra, and was barefoot. She sat right beside Jimmy, watched him for a minute, and then harmonized. They sounded magical together. What if Jimmy and Sheba broke up because of Beanie Jones? What if they never sang together again? What if Sheba went nuts again and Jimmy ran off and did drugs and overdosed? Something was going to unravel and I felt like I was the person who was holding the loose string, about to pull and watch it all fall apart.