by Juliette Fay
Back in the house, Malinowski poured himself a cup of coffee and sat down at the kitchen table. “So, what was…that guy…that priest…doing here this morning?”
“I just didn’t want to call anyone who, you know, cares too much about me.” Her own words sounded strange to her. She tried to make them make sense. “I didn’t want anyone who would freak out. He’s good in a crisis.”
“He didn’t have shoes on.”
“Yeah,” said Janie. “I can’t explain that.”
Dylan came down the stairs with Nubby the Hairless Bunny clamped under his arm. “I want juice,” he said and curled into Janie’s lap and closed his eyes again.
“I’ll get it,” said Tug.
“How’d you sleep, sweetie?” Janie ran her fingers through his unruly black curls.
“Good,” he grunted.
“Did you have any dreams?”
“No.” He twisted around to reach the juice Tug had placed on the table near him. “Just bad words.”
“Bad words?”
“Bad guy words.”
“Who was saying them?” Janie asked.
“A bad guy.”
“Were you scared?”
He shrugged. “I want toast. Is it time for camp? Where’s my ball?”
“Hey,” she said. “We might go hang out in the park after camp. Tug says he’s going to be doing a lot of loud banging.”
“I like loud banging.”
“It won’t be that bad,” said Tug.
“You just said it would,” Janie said, questioning.
He shrugged and put his mug in the sink.
FRIDAY, JULY 27
There’s been a police car down my street every half hour since the sun set. I never liked Dougie Shaw, but now that it’s dark, I don’t mind him so much. A guy broke into my house last night and, to use the Experiential Safety lingo, I disabled him. I don’t really want to write about it because I’ve told the story too many times today and I’m boring myself. Shelly was at her boyfriend’s house when it happened, and today she pumped me for every last detail.
Cormac is sleeping in the little twin bed in the back room, the poor guy. All bent up like a pretzel. I told him he didn’t have to, but there was no stopping him. He’s been on his cell phone since I came up to bed. He’s talking low. Must be Barb.
I ended up telling Aunt Jude about it myself. She went so white I thought she might faint. Once she got over the shock she did natter on for a while about the state of the world and taking precautions and God’s saving hand, but it wasn’t as bad as I thought it would be. She rubbed my shoulders and I thanked her for making me take that class. I think I could hold up under torture, but if I’m getting my shoulders rubbed I’ll tell any secret you’d care to hear.
Tug talked me into letting him install an alarm system. A cheap one. At first he thought the guy got in through the plastic, but he didn’t. The window in the office was pried open. Still, he feels bad. Not sure why.
Jake didn’t end up coming over today. Something about meeting with a couple about a wedding. I think he might feel weird. I feel weird. I slept next to a priest! Jerry Springer will be calling any minute for his segment on “Ass-Kicking Widows Who Cozy Up to the Celibate.” I e-mailed Jake and told him I’d be offline tonight because of Cormac sleeping over. He hadn’t replied by the time I shut off the computer and came up here. Hope he doesn’t feel too weird.
I’m glad Cormac’s here. I’m so tired.
WHEN JANIE GOT UP the next morning, Cormac was long gone. The Confectionary opened at 5:30 a.m. even on Saturdays, and he liked to be the first one there. A rainstorm had come to break the heat, and the pungent smell of rehydrated lawns and rinsed asphalt filtered in through the windows. She checked her e-mail before making coffee. The one from Jake said:
“Jane, I’m glad your cousin is there. I was worried about you being alone and scared. You’re going to be shaky for a while, and it helps to have someone you feel safe with. I find myself saying little prayers for you throughout the day. You’ve been given so much to shoulder, and somehow you seem to rise to the occasion. I admire that in you, Jane. As a man whose family life was something less than ideal, I can’t help but think how lucky your children are to have you. Sleep well. Jake.”
Carly was starting to talk to herself up in her crib, little singing, humming noises, playing with her voice like a toy. Then she called, “Ma? Ma!” and Janie went up to her. Dylan was just opening his eyes, so Janie took Carly with her into his bed, and the three of them snuggled and giggled. In the happiness of their little family heap, the coffee didn’t seem so necessary.
WICK LALLY, A REPORTER for the Pelham Town Crier recognized the white truck as he pulled his Volvo up behind it. “Mal!” he called, crossing the lumber-strewn yard. “Mal, buddy!”
“Hey,” said Tug, barely looking up from adjusting a piece of trim around the new window. “What’s up. How’s the back?”
“Ah, it’s nothing. Little twinge.”
Tug chuckled as he banged in a nail. “That’s not how it looked last week. Looked like you were headed for a body cast.”
“Well, you know, a walk-off home run has its price. You’ll see when you get one. Someday.”
“I just never got one that made me cry, is all,” said Tug. “You here for Mrs. LaMarche?”
“Yeah, is she home?”
“Nope.”
“Where is she, when’s she coming back?”
Tug shrugged. “You should lay off her. She’s been through enough.”
Wick laughed and wagged his head. “Lay off her? I’m just hoping she won’t break my balls! What is she, like six feet, two hundred pounds?”
“She’s average. And she’s been through enough.”
Janie chose this unfortunate moment to pull into the driveway. Dylan and Keane scrambled out of the car and immediately began dueling with what had once been paper towel rolls, now brightly colored and festooned with crepe paper streamers.
“Those aren’t for fighting,” said Janie as she pulled at Carly’s car seat.
“Get the pirate hats!” yelled Keane. The boys ran for the house, calling “Hi, Tug!” as they passed.
Janie looked at the two men in her yard. One was listing slightly to the left but smiling brightly all the same; the other was rubbing the butt of a hammer in the palm of his hand and looking annoyed.
“This is Wick Lally, a reporter for the Town Crier,” said Tug. “He’s a reporter.”
“Well, now that my occupation is firmly established, Mrs. LaMarche, may I speak to you for a few moments?”
Janie looked back to Tug, whose hard gaze and barely perceptible head shake gave her the impetus to say, “I’m sorry I can’t talk right now.”
“I understand,” said Wick, all sincerity. “I’ll return in an hour when you’ve had time to settle in.”
Janie glanced at Tug again and then back to Wick, “I’m not going to talk about it.”
“I understand completely. However, many victims do say how much better they feel when they’ve discussed a harrowing event, and told their side of the story.”
“First of all,” said Janie, “I don’t consider myself a victim. Second of all, there are no sides to this story. What happened is what happened. It’s not up for interpretation.”
“As a twenty-four-year veteran of the newspaper business, I can assure you there are sides to every story. Won’t you feel more comfortable if yours is told in your own words?”
“Jesus, Lally,” said Tug. “She said no.”
“Thanks for your input, Mal,” Wick said, “but if she’s capable of beating the daylights out of an intruder, she’s capable of making up her own mind without the assistance of her carpenter.”
Janie’s eyebrows went up. Tug’s face locked into a blankness that Janie no longer mistook for passivity. “Wow,” she said to Wick. “That was a poor choice of words. You can go now.”
“Mrs. LaMarche, it’s in your best interest—”
&
nbsp; Janie took a quick step forward, and to the great amusement of her carpenter, Wick Lally flinched. “No comment,” she murmured.
When the Volvo pulled away, Janie said to Tug, “I guess I’ve got a reputation now.”
He grinned broadly and she could see tiny flecks of opalescent brown in the dark of his eyes. “Comes in handy sometimes,” he said.
THE MONTH OF AUGUST announced itself with a thunderstorm, the heat crackling in the sky like kindling for a giant bonfire. The rain came too, however it sprinkled itself meekly, apologetically, succumbing to vapor almost as soon as it hit the ground. When the storm passed, Shelly Michelman happily pounded a For Sale sign into the damp soil of her meticulously landscaped yard. She positioned the sign so that purple and blue pansies surrounded the post, as if the flowers sprang from the sign itself and not the ground. It was calculated to beckon, to charm, to sell.
THAT CRACKLING IN THE air, that sense that a cloud could burst at any moment did not give Janie second thoughts about her Friday walk with Jake. She was relieved, in fact, that things were, in her assessment, getting back to normal. They had somehow managed to get past their initial discomfort over the events of the previous week. Whenever Janie thought about how she had called Jake rather than a member of her own family, cried to him, clung to him in his well-worn T-shirt and jeans, how the feel and smell of him had been the things that had calmed her, even more than the soothing words…well, she just put that right out of her mind. Mostly.
She heard Jake’s car pull into the driveway and peeked through her new kitchen window. He got out wearing the standard black pants and collared shirt, but then he quickly unbuttoned the shirt, removed it and arranged it across the back of the driver’s seat. Underneath he wore a black T-shirt. Janie hastened Carly into her baby backpack, adjusted her sun hat, and went out to meet him.
“I’ll be back in a bit,” she said to Tug, who was on a ladder, working on collar ties for the vaulted rafters of the porch ceiling. He glanced at her, flicked his gaze at Father Jake, and did not respond.
Janie smiled at Jake. “Is there a Black Store somewhere where all you guys shop?”
He chuckled back, “Yeah, but it’s also a Goth favorite, so we have to be careful to avoid the shirts with chains and the studded wrist bands.”
“I don’t know,” she said, “those might be a big hit with the Prayers for Peace group.”
They walked down the street on their usual route to Jansen Hill. Carly bounced along chewing on her fist and drooling on the back of Janie’s neck. “She’s teething,” explained Janie, as Jake dabbed at the dampness with his handkerchief.
“What’s happening with the intruder?” asked Jake when they resumed. “Will you have to testify?”
“Dougie Shaw says no, it doesn’t look like it. They got a confession out of him at the police station before they took him to the hospital. He’s locked up until the plea hearing.”
“They didn’t take him straight to the hospital?” said Jake. “You said he was bloody.”
“Apparently they felt he was healthy enough to be questioned. Dougie says a broken nose speeds up an interrogation like you wouldn’t believe.”
They walked briskly, much faster than they had when they first started taking their Friday hikes several months before. Janie had begun taking strolls around the neighborhood without him a couple of times a week, and her muscles felt strong and steady. She was secretly proud that she could keep up with him even with a twenty-pound baby on her back.
Their speed was also a function of anticipation. When the road ended and the path through the unpopulated woods began, their conversations inevitably turned more relaxed and personal. Walking past houses, they looked straight ahead; in the trees they made eye contact.
“Your mother’s coming tomorrow?” said Jake.
“Yeah, Uncle Charlie’s picking her up at Logan Airport around noon.”
“You don’t seem excited.”
Janie thought about this for a minute. “I guess I should be, but I think I might be kind of pissed.”
“She hasn’t spent much time here since Rob died.”
“Exactly! And no one else seems to get that. Aunt Jude and Cormac and everyone—they don’t seem surprised that she just went right back to Europe-as-Usual. Am I crazy, or is that weird?”
“It’s hard to understand, I’ll grant you. Sometimes people have their reasons for things, though.”
Janie slowed and leaned over, hands on her knees, to rest for a moment. The baby felt heavy now. “You’re siding with her.”
Jake squatted down next to her and caught her eye. It was a look that said, You know better than that. He tucked a piece of Janie’s hair back behind her ear, and ran a hand over Carly’s silky head. She grinned at him around her drooly fist. “You’ve got a little monkey on your back,” he murmured to Janie. “A sleepy little monkey.”
The impulse to be too close to him overwhelmed Janie for a moment. She wanted to slide her arms around his waist and lock them across the back of his black T-shirt. She wanted to feel his hand in her hair again, to be embraced by him, baby and all. She stood up quickly and began to walk.
Jake fell in stride beside her. The path was wide, and appeared to have been originally blazed by a cart of some kind, perhaps a hundred years ago or more. Janie walked in one ancient wheel track and Jake in the other, divided only by wood grasses and the occasional sapling.
“I’ve often wondered if there might have been some sort of shelter up here at one time,” said Jake.
“There was,” said Janie. “Mike and I used to sit in the old foundation and play farmers.”
“I didn’t know you had an agricultural streak,” he teased.
“Not much! If I recall, my main activities were churning imaginary butter and shooting imaginary bears. And Mike spent all his time planting pebbles and pine needles in elaborate designs.”
Janie veered off and followed a lesser trail through some brush, careful to step over fallen branches. They soon came upon an indentation in the hill bolstered on two sides by decrepit rock walls. A half-rotted log lay at the base of one wall. “See that log?” said Janie. “We spent an entire afternoon rolling that thing in here. Mike didn’t like to get his jeans messy sitting in the dirt.”
“Fastidious,” commented Jake.
“Like you wouldn’t believe.”
“Were there any farmer children?”
“Yeah,” Janie laughed. “I was pretty strict, when I wasn’t letting them eat their fill of butter.” She lowered herself onto the fallen log and Jake sat down next to her. They didn’t touch, but his hand rested near hers on the disintegrating wood. “Did you ever want to be a dad?” she asked quietly.
“I think I did in the abstract. I thought a lot about how I would protect them and teach them to stand up for themselves. But I don’t have that longing to reproduce myself that some people have.”
“You’re very kind,” said Janie, staring out into the pine boughs. “That’s important in a father.”
“I have a temper,” he admitted.
“Join the club.”
“Yes, but you seem to be able to use yours purposefully, in appropriate ways.”
“Like beating the hell out of a burglar? Let me tell you, past the fear and the panic, I really wanted to kill him. I was almost disappointed when he dropped so fast. To me, that’s a little scary.”
Jake turned toward her and looked her full in the face. “You were protecting yourself and your children. You were in a terrifying situation and you handled it perfectly. How many people can say that? I can’t. If I’m honest with myself I have to admit that I envy you.”
“Jake, you were a child when you were assaulted. Repeatedly. By your own father. Do you think I could have done what I did under those circumstances? How could anyone?”
He was quiet and motionless except for the blinking of his eyes. Finally he said, “It’s with me still.” He shook his head and the motion dislodged a tear. “I can’t
get away from him.”
Janie put her hands on his cheeks, brushing the tears back with her thumbs. “There are things that happen that can’t be undone,” she said. “But you, Jake Sweeney. You have figured out how to really piss him off. He may still be with you, but if he is, you kick his ass every time he sees the kindness in you. When he sees how you reach out to the most miserable of us and give comfort. That’s not the man he raised. You’re the man you raised.”
The tears fell faster down his cheeks, and she pulled him toward her, wrapping her arms around his shoulders. She felt his hands reach for her waist, finally gripping the bars of the back pack in which Carly slept. His silent weeping went on for several moments and the shoulder of her T-shirt where his face was buried became damp.
When he stopped crying, he eased back away from her and pulled the hem of his T-shirt from his pants and wiped his face with it. Janie caught a glimpse of the soft, dark hair that swirled at his belly.
“Jane,” he said finally. “Thank you.” He patted her cheek and smoothed her hair. “I’ve never known anyone quite like you. I feel very lucky to count you as a friend.”
She nodded. What else could she do?
When she got back to her house, and Jake drove away, she deposited a fragment of the old rotted log in her jar.
11
LATE AFTERNOON THUNDERSTORMS DELAYED Noreen Dwyer’s descent into Boston. This bit of intelligence was relayed by her brother, Uncle Charlie, self-appointed official driver of returning and exiting relatives. Janie often speculated that this designation may have originated with her father’s final ride to the bus station. Or whatever vehicular transport Mac Dwyer’s retreat entailed.