On one of those days looking through boxes and memorabilia, I happened upon an old letter hand written to Bobby with a cancelled stamp dated June 1, 1980. Bobby’s name and address was written in a pen I would soon come to know well. The letter was from Vanessa. The date was years before we met and married. When I realized what I’d found a thousand feelings flooded my mind, questions, you know. One question that rang in me was why he would hold onto a letter from his ex-wife for so long. It wasn’t some long- felt proclamation of love or bitter words from a recent argument. The letter was more, how shall I say, informational. She was relaying a story from her childhood, a specific event that happened long ago. After I read it the questions weren’t resolved in the least. In fact, it created more questions for me. This is what it said:
Dear Bob,
I don’t quite get why you care or why you want to know about this. But, here you go. When I was only eight years old, Terrence and I talked and threw rocks at a saguaro while Uncle Joe and father would hunt dove and quail.
“Stay here and don’t wander off or you’ll get shot!” Father warned us as they disappeared into the brush with rifles at their sides.
The desert didn’t offer much shade that day only a few scraggly mesquite where we could sit if we dared! This wasn’t the first time Terrence and I went out with father and Uncle Joe. I remember many times during our outings we would have to shoo away a tarantula with a stick or see a rattler slither by. We’d scream ear-piercing shrills and father and Uncle Joe would run back to us out of breath. Like I mentioned, I was only eight and Terrence was seven. We were little kids and petrified of the dangers we might find in the desert. While we waited, we would talk and throw rocks.
I remember one time, father let Terrence hold and aim the gun. After much complaining about it, he let me too. I was a girl and back then, girls weren’t supposed to behave that way—at least, not while parents watched. But, I made such a fuss, father let me hold and aim it too. Then I did a most unforgivable thing. I pulled the trigger!
When it fired, I fell backwards. The kick of the gun was fierce and knocked me on my butt.
Father ripped the gun out of my hands and got in my face. He screamed at me and told me I was never to do that again.
My heart broke because he’d never yelled at me before, that was mother’s job, that and to threaten us with harsher action from father, that usually never came. This time he pulled me up by one arm, cracked my ass, and told me to go sit in the horse carriage. A few minutes later Terrence came to sit with me. I was still crying and he called me a big baby.
“I’m not a big baby! I’m not a big baby!” I jumped down from the carriage and walked up to father and Uncle Joe. I had my say to father and turned to walk back to the carriage. My father stopped me by grabbing me by my shoulder. That’s the day father and I had a ‘meeting of the minds’. We’ll call it that, anyway. That’s the day he called me ‘young lady’. For many girls back then that might have been a compliment. Not for me. I fumed. Turned around and hot-footed it back to Terrence.
I guess I’ve always been self-assured. A good trait, I guess, when you need it. You have to pick your battles—that’s my motto.
Well, Terrence laughed and laughed when I got my butt whipped because he felt mother and father normally treated me with kid- gloves (his words, not mine). Terrence had always been the one, how shall I say, put to the task! Ha! He’d get a beating at least once a week. Usually, on the weekends when he’d run off to the watering hole to swim. Not only did he swim but he’d smoke cubebs and drink homemade beer with one of the other boy’s whose parents used to make the stuff. He’d come home like a man on a night out with the boys. He’d say in his defense, “We was only drinking milk and smoking corn silk, Pa!” But, no milk I’ve ever smelled, smelled like that! He was just a boy, too. He hung out with some older kids and even though mother and father tried repeatedly to stop it, he’d still meet up with them one way or the other. They all turned out to be perfect gentlemen. They got newspaper jobs, riding bikes door to door delivering… and selling too for the local rag in Kingman.
That’s just one of the many memories I have about Terrence. Hope you enjoy.
Love, Vanessa.
As I said, the letter read like it was written to an old school chum, nothing inflammatory, except maybe for poor Terrence. Bobby never mentioned Vanessa’s family, his in-laws. The glimpse of Vanessa’s brother made me realize how little I knew about her—about how little I knew about many of the people I’d lived with over these years, here in Sunnydale. I guess maybe I always assumed Vanessa’s family was all dead, like mine. I guess I never really thought about it. I folded the letter, stuffed it back into its envelope and put it back into the box.
CHAPTER 4
Maybe it was a coincidence of wishes when I cursed him. We’d never really had any big fights, I think I mentioned that before and we’d been married for nearly fifteen years when it finally happened. For the past month, however, Bobby had been edgy, and out-of-sorts. He seemed more forgetful lately and he kept to himself. We’d just finished with an early Saturday dinner and I had the lasagna pan soaking. My hands were red from the hot soapy water—washing dishes and wiping down counters. Bobby pulled out the day’s newspaper, opened to the sports page and covered the entire freshly cleaned table with it. For whatever reason it irked me and I told him he’d have to wipe off his own ink smudges when he was done reading. He’d been off emotionally and physically, if you get my drift and seemed to be taking things out on me. For the past month, mind you, I had taken his slight abuses but tonight I got to the boiling point and popped my lid. After my spiel about recleaning the dinner table, he made some under-the-breath comment I could barely hear.
“What did you just say?”
“Nothing.” He grumbled.
“You did say something. And, dammit Bobby tell me what it was.” My voice began to quaver.
“I said, ‘you sound like Vanessa.’” He buried his head deeper into the paper.
I threw my wash rag at him and it hit him in the back of the head. I was getting teary because we’d not been seeing eye-to-eye for over four weeks. I stormed off and went into the bedroom.
He always talked about Vanessa in the kindest way, but lately I was hearing her name come up more and more like he missed her or something. We’d talk about going on a road trip and he’d say, “When Van and I were younger we used to…” Then, I’d bring up wanting to go to Phoenix too for a night at the symphony and he’d bring up the fact that they used to go to Laughlin to see shows there and Phoenix, but they always seemed to enjoy the Laughlin shows more. It seemed that every time I said something he’d get nostalgic about Vanessa.
He missed Roberta terribly. She’d pushed him out of her life after her parents split and he married me. It broke his heart. Roberta could be very cruel and vindictive. At first, he blamed it on her age and immaturity about married life. After years, however, hearing her snide comments and feeling her rejection, he began to go inside himself. Bobby laid down the law—we weren’t allowed to bring up Roberta even in passing light conversation. Her name was forbidden from our household. Still, we couldn’t hide from Roberta’s presence within our community.
Roberta had been on the fast-track in Sunnydale from the day she finished high school. She left Sunnydale to school in Las Vegas. She commuted three days out of the week for two years to go to the community college there. Then, after she transferred to the university, she moved there until she graduated. Her degree was in engineering like her grandpa. She’d scored highest in her class. She cut her long orange hair into a professional do to better suit her upcoming career. Her new boyfriend was in her graduating class as well and when she finished college, she moved back in with Vanessa and Bobby. After a year, the boyfriend, Rick, followed her from Vegas to Sunnydale, proposed and they bought a home here.
Roberta free-lanced and Rick went back and forth from Sunnydale to Bullhead City and Laughlin where he worked during the week
. His returns home were always a little tense but after a few hours of reestablishing their relationship Roberta and he slipped into their usual weekend routine.
It was only a couple of years after that Vanessa and Bobby got divorced and since that time, Roberta had treated her father like a pariah. Even though he acted tough on the outside, I knew his heart was crumbling because of it. He never missed an occasion to send her a card—her birthday, her anniversary, Thanksgiving, Christmas, Valentine’s Day, 4th of July—or write her a note to “touch bases” with her. Roberta never reciprocated. She was aloof and cold to her father.
He always blamed Vanessa and one day called her on it. Vanessa stood her own and told Bobby he was living a fantasy—that he needed someone to blame for his own actions and the only person who seemed the reasonable suspect was her, that’s what she said, anyway. He flung the phone across the room when he was finished talking with her and cried. That was the first time I saw him cry. He couldn’t blame anyone but himself, himself and me, that is.
As time lolled along, he began to feel the longing less but something seeped into our marriage so slowly that it couldn’t be seen or felt until it stood like a monolith before us. It just appeared one day—big as life. By that time, it was too late. We’d been at odds and hurt and pain will breed anger. I was hurting and needed my old Bobby back again. I attempted to reenact things we’d done when we first got together. I bought sexy lingerie, and body butter, made candlelight dinners, and read dirty books to him, I’d cook while wearing only an apron with spiked heels, and sit on his lap naked. We tried several times to make love but he couldn’t. It was me. Surely, it was me.
Lasagna dinner that night was basic. We were growing apart and I wanted him to leave—to go away, and only if he was to return, to return like his old self— those were going to be my terms.
After I stormed out and after throwing the wash rag at him, I came back in to tell him so. But, he’d already left.
He sat slumped over the sports page, blood dripped off the table and was pooling by the table leg, his arms hung flaccidly by his sides and there was no sign of Bobby anymore.
The 911 operator told me I had to quit screaming because she couldn’t understand what I was saying.
The paramedics made me stand away from Bobby while they proceeded to pump his chest, while they gave him artificial respiration, while they set up the portable paddles, while they shocked him repeatedly, even while they pronounced him dead on the scene at 6:07 p.m.
It’s interesting, you know. What’s funny was I needed to find out if he wanted to leave. I didn’t really want him to leave, not really. My emotions were out of whack. The thought was just that, a thought and nothing more. But, when you’re wishing, does the Grantor of Wishes understand this? That it’s only an impulse—a mental projection or a petty muffled utterance?
I didn’t want him to go. Not really. I didn’t want to
live without him, and now wished I had died before, long before, because the idea of living without him was unbearable, unimaginable. My life ended when Bobby
died. Was that coincidence?
CHAPTER 5
Early spring in the desert isn’t like spring in the cool northwest with tulips bending over a warming earth. Spring in the desert is a quick burst of life that fades as the heat swells. Early spring is cool in the morning and warm, hot even, in the afternoon. Temperatures can reach close to ninety degrees even at the birth of spring.
Heat baked a jasmine growing on an arboretum next to the white tent. Its pink petals steamed under a blanket of warmth and lazily plated the air. Bees flew wildly. They buzzed their disapproval of people in the vicinity that lingered too close. They were so near I could feel the batting of their wings drum against my skin like a butterfly kiss on your lips. A grackle rocked out a ragged caw-caw-caw to its mate who answered in kind. The bright sun clashed head-on with my mood at the moment. Just like the desert to fake you out, the oasis just out of reach. Others in attendance glanced at me in a plastic veneer I’d learned to recognize—to live with. Luckily, my hazy veil covered my swollen eyes and red nose. I wore black linen that day. A vague salty film covered my dry tongue when I finally swallowed. But, remembering to breathe was my only real responsibility. I just had to survive it.
The cool morning was churning into a hot afternoon by the strike of eleven o’clock. I arrived earlier than Vanessa or Roberta. The reverend greeted me with a pat on the hand and sad, sad eyes. He expressed his sorrow and led me to my seat where I sat alone for a while.
Then Vanessa arrived. Like a dethroned queen with her following. Roberta bumped into my leg when she passed me to take her seat as a family member along side the casket. She didn’t apologize.
Four chairs lined the gravesite for us. The minister spoke cautiously, sadly and lifted his head to god with widespread arms.
The bible sat in front of him on a spindled podium of cold tarnished steel with a gold ribbon slung between two open pages of silky thin paper. I could only imagine that our Lord Jesus’ words were in red and everything else written in black. A funeral jury stood behind us— to the sides of us, and in front of us—in judgment. They all stared and expected the worst. But, in my opinion the worst had already happened. Bobby had died.
Upon giving his final prayer, the minister turned to the five men of the honors detail. He nodded for them to proceed and in doing so, the uniformed men stood erect with rifles quick to their sides, and the lead man called out Attention! Half left. Face. Port arms.
Ready, aim, fire.
Ready, aim, fire.
Ready, aim, fire.
Present arms.
Half right. Face.
Taps blew slow and languidly while two of the men lapped and overlapped our country’s flag. The mournful wail of the trumpet caught in my throat like a rock—lapping, overlapping, once, once again, then twice. The horn blower soulfully repeated the last song’s phrase three times lapping, overlapping, once, once again, then twice until the man finished folding the flag. Red stripes, blue background to white stars all represented in part to the flag now a triangle of folded fabric. After the final note one man presented me with the flag in commemoration of Bobby and his service to the United States. I heard Roberta make a noise with her tongue, a tsk. Vanessa’s head was down the whole time and she didn’t twitch. I could see her from the corner of my eye.
The presenter took one step back from me and marched back to the others. He then toed and pivoted into line with his men and called out, Order arms.
At ease.
They stood with their legs slightly apart. My heart
still pounded in my chest from the sound of the guns. I watched them intently as they took their dutiful places. My face was wet but I don’t remember crying. Yet, I must have.
I had long since been hurt by people omitting my name from their guest lists. Even so, several of our diner’s patrons stopped by the house to check on me after the services. Vanessa held a wake at her home in honor of her ex-husband and his family. I wasn’t invited. But, Vanessa and Roberta couldn’t hurt me anymore by leaving me off their party list. My days of mourning had long since begun. Bobby’s collapse over the sports page marked the commencement of me grieving.
CHAPTER 6
Anymore, pulling into my driveway left me with mixed feelings. It hadn’t been but less than a month since the funeral and I still expected to see Bobby at home. It’s funny, death. You forget for moments at a time the person you’ve lost is gone. You think you can still pick up the phone or call out from the kitchen window to get their attention and you honestly but briefly believe you’ll hear their voice answer back. Then, your mind whirls into a vision and you feel an awful pit in your gut –a constant reminder of the day he died—the paramedics trying so desperately to revive him and then yelling, “Clear!” Noticing their faces as they looked around at each other, shaking their heads, clocking the time they stopped trying, the newspaper strewn in sections across the floor, the cat rubbing aga
inst my leg, my knees cracking against the wood when I lost the strength to stand any longer, seeing the wet washrag lying on the floor beside the chair.
Then, your mind reels in a fast-forward motion to scenes at funerals, mother’s, then Bobby’s, imagining the gathering you weren’t invited to at Vanessa’s—a conjured scene, a comment, a sneer. And, it all happens so fast like someone hit you with a slingshot because you’re still in the car pulling up into the drive when your mind snaps back to reality. It’s exhausting.
Instead of seeing Bobby, Gangster went scurrying off with another ‘catch’ in his mouth. I threw the car into park and jumped out screaming, “Gangster, you stop right now!” He had made his way to the front door and had a baby rabbit in his jaws. “Drop it!” I walked hard in his direction and he did exactly what I instructed him to do.
He was very well-trained, almost like a dog.
“Good boy,” I told him. You see, baby rabbits are about the size of small rats but they’re much cuter. I picked up the poor little thing but too late as it turns out. By then, the bunny was lifeless. “Gangster.” I whined his name irritably. But, he thought he’d done a good thing… again. He purred loudly as I held the dead little thing in my hands. I’d heard somewhere that cats will bring you their kill as a gift. It’s their way of saying thank you and Gangster was a smart cat that could find a nest of anything and steal the babies out of it. So, I said “Thanks, Gangster,” with a furrowed brow and proceeded to go out back by the garden where all the rest of his prey lay dead, under a branchy mesquite and under a pile of dirt, and to give the poor thing a proper burial. I hadn’t even gotten into the house when I was grabbing the shovel and digging another hole. Lately, my life—up to this point—had become one stream of funeral services. Similar future burials flashed before my eyes. What an unbearable existence it seemed at the moment.
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