One Hundred Years of Marriage

by Louise Farmer Smith

  Still facing the sink, I slowly dried my hands on a tea towel. “No,” I said.

  “Why not? I need to talk to you.” He spoke to my left and when I turned my head away, he danced to my right. “Kemper is going to become part of Route Nine.” He wasn’t angry. Panic was what I was hearing, and I gripped the cold edge of the sink, fighting the urge to relent and sooth his panic as he expected any of us to do.

  “The city owns the land the trees are on, but, as a courtesy— You saw me saying goodbye to one of the property owners. Please sit down.”

  He didn’t know how much I knew, that it was only a glance: His shoulder had been against the screened door. His hat was off, maybe still in the car the city provided to him during business hours. He’d held her hands in both of his, his head cocked to the side, a lingering gesture, tenderness I’d never seen.

  “No.” I still did not turn around.

  “We can’t just not talk,” he growled.

  I whirled around. “Sure we can not talk! Nobody in this family talks.”

  His jaw hinge was working, throbbing like a heart. I’d never yelled at him before. “What do you want me to do?” he begged, palms up.

  Do? What did he mean? I steadied myself on the back of a chair. He was offering something. Was there anything in the world that would help us? I took a deep breath, then gritted my teeth. “You could be a real daddy to Ernest. He looks up to you, slaves to get your attention and approval. And you do nothing but stay busy, busy, busy. He’s suffering. He doesn’t understand what’s going on with this family. Pay him some attention, for Heaven’s sake!” I was shaking.

  Daddy eyes were wide and his mouth gaped.

  “You can start by figuring out how to get Ernest’s canoe out of the storage room.”

  “What’s wrong? Can’t he get it out?”

  “It’s fifteen feet long and too wide to come out that little door. ”

  “Does Earnest know it’s too big to come out?”

  “I’m sure he does. He’s just working away, embarrassed, hoping we don’t know.”

  He ran his hand through his curls and patted them into place. “We can’t rip open the floor and spoil the bedroom ceiling. He’ll have to take it apart.”

  “No. The whole canoe, safely outside. You figure it out.” I left the kitchen.

  *

  News had gotten around town that Alice Brady, church pillar and model citizen, was back home from the hospital, mysteriously confined to her bed. Mama’s friend, Angela Worth, had been stopping by regularly with food or an offer to sit with Mama while I went out, but I didn’t think she’d like the hours I wanted to be away, every night. I thanked her and promised to call if I needed anything. But other visitors knocked, fellow Methodists from our large congregation, a few I didn’t even recognize. I caught some of them looking past my shoulder into the front room, eyeing my housekeeping.

  The knocking on the door hammered Mother’s body in a way Ernest’s work never had. She lay still like a creature in hiding.

  “Mother’s sleeping. It’ll mean a lot to her that you came by,” I would tell them so they’d feel they got credit for this visit and wouldn’t return. But the official church visitors, Mrs. Pryor and her sidekick, Mrs. Plottle, hung on like plaque, coming back every few days, so I finally let them in.

  Mother’s inability to eat much had stripped her of her curvaceous figure, leaving a skinny, adolescent body and a strangely youthful face dominated by her large wounded eyes. But her voice was as ravaged and full of scrapes and pockets of air as a ninety-year-old’s. As I brushed out her auburn hair, the sight of her sharp little shoulder sticking out of the nightgown broke my heart. What kind of tribe submitted its weakest member to such painful rituals as church visitation? She managed to sit against her fluffed up pillows, and before I let the visitors into her room, I opened the blinds so the sunlight fell across the bed.

  “How are we doing, dear?” Mrs. Pryor cooed. I resented these women, their careful footsteps, their funereal tones. I also suspected they were glad to see Alice Brady brought low and were looking for specific information they could carry away. I got them seated and turned up the big oscillating fan.

  “Alice, honey, does this problem of yours have anything to do with the Change of Life?” Mrs. Pryor asked.

  Mother smiled sadly. “Well, my life has certainly changed.”

  Mrs. Pryor looked over her glasses. “Don’t you know what I mean, dear?” She glanced back at me as though Mother’s little joke was a sign of ignorance or derangement. “You know, Alice,” Mrs. Pryor continued, “Doris Pettibone had a terrible time with the Change and had to have her uterus out. She required nine pints of blood, poor thing. They had to make a hundred calls to find O negative.”

  I watched the netting jiggle on Mrs. Pryor’s hat as she spoke and watched her mouth work, puckered lips extended to enunciate her views. “Just think what a worry that would be your entire life to know you had rare blood. I hope your blood isn’t rare, Alice. It isn’t, is it?”

  Mother was looking to me, and I knew I should never have let these women in.

  Mrs. Pryor patted the bed to get Mama’s attention, and gushed on. “It isn’t rare, is it, your blood, Alice dear?”

  “My blood?” Mama blurted and stared between Mrs. Pryor and Mrs. Plottle as though at a third guest. “It’s common as grass, but poison! I’ve poisoned my whole family.”

  The front door opened and closed. Oh, God, let this be some rescue!

  Olivia appeared in the bedroom doorway and, seeing who I had let in, frowned at me. “Well, hello everyone,” she said brightly. Mama tried to sit up for Olivia who was in white shorts and held her tennis racket casually at her side. Across her rosy forehead sweat sealed some strands of her blond hair. She glowed in the sick room. I sensed a slight tremor between the visitors. Both women turned to stare at Olivia.

  Mrs. Pryor straightened her shoulders and cleared her throat. “Olivia? Tennis?”

  “Yes. I’ve been out playing tennis,” my sister said, not giving an inch. Mrs. Pryor eyed Olivia’s slim, tanned legs. Olivia strode across the room and shook hands. She loved their disapproval and, parking her tennis racket against her hip began to talk about this morning’s game. Hooray, Olivia, I thought, we are not all dead.

  I watched Mrs. Pryor give a nod to Mrs. Plottle to collect her vote, then she said, “Don’t you think you’re needed here at home, Olivia?”

  “Oh no,” Mother cried. “We need her to play tennis. It helps.”

  Mrs. Pryor returned her attention to Mama. “Now dear, I never heard of poison blood.” She reached for Mama’s hand.

  “It’s clotted,” Mama wailed, pulling her hand away. “But that’s better than bleeding in public, isn’t it?” She looked at me for the answer. I didn’t speak, and she covered her face with the sheet.

  “I know you’re suffering, honey,” Mrs. Pryor said, “just like your dear mother all those years, continuing to paint china.”

  “My father was a n’er do well!” Mama croaked from under the sheet. I’d never heard her use that term in regard to Grandpa Dan, and I opened my mouth to say something to cover the silence, but Mrs. Pryor spoke first.

  “Now, you know your dear father took care of her all those years.”

  “Yes,” Mama’s voice through the sheet was muffled, “never spoke a word of anger, either of them.”

  “And you have a wonderful, steady husband, too,” Mrs. Pryor cooed.

  Just then Ernest must have moved the canoe because there was a creaking from above. Mama peeked out from the sheet, and we all looked toward the ceiling. The visitors exchanged looks. Perhaps this girl has another relative in the attic.

  “It’s time for Mama to take her…”

  “What is she taking?” Mrs. Pryor turned to ask.

  Mama sat up and sobbed, “Lithium! Tell everyone.”

  “Oh, no,” Mrs. Plottle cried, seizing her opportunity to make a contribution. “Isn’t that the one that makes a wom
an grow a beard?”

  Mama moaned and bowed her head. I pictured myself taking Mrs. Plottle by the throat, but at that moment, Ernest dropped something sharp between the rafters that pierced the ceiling plaster. A fine shower of white dust poured through the sunlight and onto Mother’s head. The effect was ethereal. She sat up blinking and gasping as though called to attention by God. The church visitors were silent although Mrs. Pryor’s mouth kept working as she gaped.

  “We’d like to be alone now, ladies,” I intoned, and the visitors flapped about for a moment, gathering their purses and adjusting their hats, then rushed away.

  Mama came to supper in the dining room that night. Right after the blessing The General made his pre-speech clearing of the throat and announced, “The ventilation in this house is very poor. I believe all our problems can be solved with an attic fan. We’ll have to cut a huge hole under the eave at the back of the house in order to install it. And, by the way, Ernest,” he looked his only son in the eye, “that would be a golden opportunity for you and me to slide the canoe down into the back yard.”

  There was silence at the table. Ernest blinked like a boy walking out of prison. I patted the table next to my father’s plate. “Good idea, Daddy.”

  The General stared at me, his eye brows up so high they’d disappeared under his silver curls. He was asking were we square now? Would this attic fan scheme secure my silence about what I’d seen across town? Oh, Daddy, I thought, you’ve only begun to secure my silence. “Can I have a ride in the canoe?” I asked Ernest. He grinned and his happiness flooded the room

  He was still speechless and to cover his awkwardness, Olivia began to report on the visit from Mrs. Pryor and Mrs. Plottle. “Those ladies took off like you-know-whats out of you-know-where,” she said. “You should have been there, Daddy, to see Mama face down Mrs. Pryor who doesn’t think the daughters of shut-ins should play tennis.”

  We all laughed, but The General’s laugh was his nervous, let’s-all-settle-down laugh. Then he pressed his hands flat on the table and tapped his fingertips to bring the disorder to an end.

  “It was just my needle-nosed pliers,” Ernest said and we laughed some more.

  “Those old biddies thought it was a sign from God,” Olivia said. Ernest laughed so hard, he choked and sneezed milk out his nose.

  “Let’s just— Let’s all just—” The General sputtered. I ignored him and began to reprise the whole rare blood harangue. Hearing his children make fun of church ladies caused my father to stand up, though he still bent to press his palms on the table. My recital picked up in its intensity. I exaggerated the tackiness of their hats and the persimmon pucker of their judgmental lips, then I squinted over imaginary glasses— “Do you have rare blood, dear?” The laughter got louder.

  “I never did like either of those women,” Mother admitted, and shock at this unprecedented candor pushed us towards hysteria. The General opened his mouth to hush her, but I shot him a look, and he sat back down.

  “My guess is, God doesn’t like them either,” I said, looking at my father who took up ringing his spoon on his glass to restore order.

  *

  I sat on the edge of the bed and held out my bare foot for Tom to slip on my shoe. The night air was stifling. “I’ve lost you, Pat. Haven’t seen you for weeks,” Tom whispered.

  I pulled my foot back. “What do you mean?”

  “Where ya been? I feel like I’m alone. Like you’re just using me each night.”

  “That’s a terrible thing to say.”

  Holding a shoe in either hand he straightened. “We’re not friends anymore like we used to be, Patty. I don’t want to go on like this.”

  Oh, God! “Tom, please.” I knew what he was talking about. But, of course, I couldn’t explain my fears about Mama or my suspicions about The General—one more thing I wasn’t supposed to talk about to anyone outside the family. My life had backed up into an airless tank, and I felt my secrets go rancid in my chest.

  “Tom, I know I’ve been real quiet, but it doesn’t have anything to do with us.”

  “Well, who then? ‘Cause we don’t seem to have a word to say to each other. I feel like you’re mad at me, but when I try to find out anything, I hear some drifted-off woman mumbling. I might as well be in bed with a cigar store Indian!”

  “Please, Tom,” I whispered.

  He lifted my chin, and in the moonlight he looked me dead in the eye. I felt weak. “I can’t talk about this, Tom.”

  “It must be important.” He folded his arms, a shoe poking up from each elbow.

  “Of course, it’s important!” I snapped.

  “Too important to tell me?”

  I shrugged, then took a deep breath. “I’m terrified my mother’s losing her mind.” I clamped my hand over my mouth. Too late. “She got better, but now she’s going under again.”

  “That’s terrible.” He laid the shoes on the bed and sat down beside me. “What makes you think this?”

  “She cries all the time and can’t get out of bed.”

  “Have you taken her to the doctor?”

  “The doctor!” I shot back at him. “The doctor made her worse! We’re all drowning.” I gritted my teeth and tried to keep my voice low. “Poor Ernest slaves away, afraid he’s going to lose his mother, afraid to ask questions, afraid of The General. I don’t help him. And Olivia floats along, acting like she’s having fun every day!”

  “I can’t believe all this.”

  “Oh really!” I blurted. “You think we’re such a nice all-American family! You have no idea! Not even what’s happening on your own street!” I drew back from him and wrapped my arms around my knees.

  “Go on,” he whispered as though I was telling some little story. As though going on weren’t the whole big problem.

  But I did go on. The moon was behind a cloud, so I couldn’t even see Tom’s face. Struggling to keep my voice down, I went on speaking into the stifling dark. “Daddy is always out of the house, saying it’s some danged meeting, like the Republicans have a lot of pressing business on their agenda. What’s wrong with Mama is she’s got a husband running around on her!”

  “You’re saying your father has—” Tom sounded appalled.

  “I don’t know, maybe not. But I’m sure he’s found someone who’s very impressed with him.”

  When Tom didn’t say anything, I hushed for a moment. “I guess I should say, it looked to me, as I was driving by, and saw him with this woman for just a second, to be a tender relationship. Affectionate. I’m sure. The problem is Mama can’t get angry about it.”

  “Why not?”

  “You’re so naive, Tom.” All the hot feelings gushed up again. “That Christian woman wouldn’t dream of defending herself. She turns the other cheek. Fighting back would be unladylike! Women are supposed to be nice! Right, Tom?” I leaned forward and spat the words at him. “You have no idea! She tries to cajole Daddy like he’s another child she’s responsible for. Heaven knows he never sees himself. But mother, she can see it coming. She’s nothing more than an old mop for his messes. And long after his flare-up’s over and she’s still smarting, he’s completely forgotten the whole thing. And I’m going to be just like her—a little creep-around woman.”

  “Patty, not all men are like your daddy. Not all marriages have to be like your folks’. And sweetheart, you are not going to be a little creep-around woman.”

  “Oh, Tom!” I reached into the dark and put my arms around his neck. “More than anything! More than anything, I don’t want to be like her.” I hadn’t thought of it this way before, but now it was out there, spoken aloud. My throat ached. “We’ve been afraid of him so long. It’s a big relief when he’s out of the house. It just never lasts long enough for Mother to find where she left her old self. Or for Ernest to get his head up. No wonder Mother’s decided to lie down and leave it all to God.”

  Tom held me as I gasped and shook, his right arm pressing me to his chest; his left hand stuck between us to
cup my mouth as though he expected me to scream. It might have been a good time for tears, but none came.

  *

  All the next day I sat in my corner of the living room and barely went into Mama’s room. I could hardly face her, knowing I had exposed her wretchedness to someone outside the family, especially to someone whose good opinion she wanted. More terrible than having sex when not married was violating family secrecy. Before last night, I’d felt grown up, brave and powerful. Now I was reduced to a guilty six-year-old. I’d thrown away a lifetime-perfect record of keeping my own counsel. The pattern, engraved since childhood, of confessing and taking my medicine seemed the only path to relieve the guilt. I listened all day to the smack of Ernest’s hammer, nailing the walls onto his canoe. Finally, by nightfall, I knew what I had to do.

  Around midnight I stood in the dark living room and watched the motorcycle cruise silently up under the elm trees. Every time before I’d watched for him with such longing, but tonight the sight of him washed a wave of nausea over me. I forced myself to walk out onto the porch and down the front walk. As I drew closer and could see his white shirt, the sleeves turned up on his beautiful forearms, I gritted my teeth. “I can’t come,” I said.

  “Aw. Well.” He looked down at the handlebars of the cycle, then glanced up, squinting. “Everything okay?”

  “No. I mean, everything’s fine.” I stared at him, wishing he would do all this for me. Nothing was fine. If I confessed to Mother that I’d talked about her, she would say that I’d told information that wasn’t mine to tell. I absolutely could not stand to hear that from her. I had to straighten this out on my own. “Everything’s fine, Tom,” I whispered.

  “There isn’t anybody leaning on you, is there?” He reached across the cycle and drew a finger lightly down my arm. “Is there?” His touch, so gentle and yet magnetic. I teetered, wanting to fall into him, to let him carry me away. His white shirt was open at the collar as usual—the little cup of his collarbone where I’d seen the sweat pool—“Patty?” he whispered.