by L. B. Dunbar
“It’s water,” he snorted.
Sheepishly, I looked at the waitress. “Never mind.”
Turning to George, I immediately changed my mind about being out in this small town, in this bar, and in the vicinity of Jess Carter.
“I think this was a bad idea after all. Thank you for the invitation.”
“Thank you for the invitation,” Jess mocked again. “So polite, these big city girls.”
“What is your problem? Are you high?” I snapped, taking a hard look at him and my voice cracked on the final word. “This isn’t high school. Grow up,” I additionally stammered as I walked away from the table and stormed out the open door.
A hand eventually gripped my upper arm, tugging me to a halt.
“Whoa, whoa, whoa, slow down. What was that all about?”
George caught up to me, forcing me to sit down on a wrought iron bench along the sidewalk in front of a storefront a few doors down from the bar. River Street was well lit for a small town, and off in the distance I could hear the water rushing the rapids. A group of local teenagers crowded the street corner. The street itself was full of parked cars, and a couple strolled on a late night dog-walk.
“I don’t know. I don’t know what I did to that guy, but he hates me. He looks at me like I’m a pariah and talks to me like I’m an idiot. Then again, he really doesn’t talk to me at all. He’s so…so rude.”
George sat in silence for a moment before he let out a deep breath.
“I hate small town gossip. And I would be the last to spread it based on the pain it has caused me, but I think I need to give you some information.” He shifted his body to face mine.
“Jess Carter’s wife left him a few years ago. They were high school sweethearts and he was a smart guy. Debbie Swartz saw Jess as a way out of town, and she was a player. When Jess got a full ride scholarship for football to the University of Michigan, she was more excited than he was. He hardly played, but after the first year, his grades in engineering kept him in the scholarship range…”
“Engineering, but he…”
George waved me off from interrupting.
“Listen. He excelled so well that he got a full ride to complete his Masters if he promised General Motors his talent for years upon completion of school. Debbie couldn’t take it. She was still up here, claiming to pine away for Jess, while playing the field behind his back. When Jess broke the news to her his sophomore year about the extended schooling, she wasn’t happy, and somehow ended up pregnant. Jess married her, taking her with him to Ann Arbor for his final years.
“I imagine it was difficult being in college, having a pregnant wife unfamiliar with the area, and trying to keep those straight As for the scholarship. Jess pulled it off, though. Lucky son-of-a-bitch that he is, he always does. At 22, he graduated with a kid and a wife who wasn’t happy in Ann Arbor after all. Debbie began to enjoy the college scene a bit too much, if you know what I’m implying, even though she wasn’t a student. Jess started the graduate program and began the required internship with General Motors, but at some point Debbie left for Chicago.”
I gasped at this point, but George held up his hand to stop me again and continued.
“Eventually, his younger sister gave up a year of her life and went to stay with him, so he could try to complete the master’s program GM provided. Then his dad had a heart attack and died. His brother, Tom, wanted to start this business and offered Jess a partnership. Jess came home to support his mother and give her the distraction of helping him raise his daughter. Debbie, on the other hand, disappeared into Chicago not to be heard from again except through a blue file declaring divorce and relinquishing all rights to Katie.”
I continued to stare down at my painted toenails, exposed in my sandals, as George paused with a sad sounding sigh.
“It isn’t a pretty story. And I’m not telling you this to make you feel sorry for Jess, because truthfully, I could care less about him, but it’s the little girl I feel sorry for. Apparently, Debbie was gone a few hours before Jess came home to find Katie alone and no note. Supposedly, the girl never spoke after that day. Jess doesn’t know what happened. The sister who came to help Jess is now a teacher at the elementary school here in town. I think Jess feels comfortable leaving the girl with her even though she can’t talk, or refuses to. Otherwise, Jess and his girl are inseparable, and not many people understand Katie. I guess Jess gets her because he’s her father. I don’t know. I think Jess can be an asshole, but I give him credit for Katie.”
I still didn’t say anything. I had no words to express my feelings of sorrow for all of them. A few moments passed before George crooked out his elbow again and nodded his head in the direction of our homes. I allowed myself to be pulled upward by his hands, and barely noticed the smirk on his face at something over my shoulder. Turning to look in the same direction, all I saw were dark shadows in the small space between the store buildings. No one was there.
An old saying, but still relevant in our modern time.
“Matters of Manners,” 1971
SEVERAL IMPORTANT QUESTIONS weighed on my mind as George and I walked towards our respective homes.
“You seem to know quite a bit about Jess Carter and his daughter. Why?”
George was nervous as he scratched a spot on the side of his neck.
“I’m not really proud of this, but I offered to marry Debbie Swartz as well.”
“What?”
“I always had a crush on her. I thought she liked me at one point and I offered to take her away from all this small town shit like she wanted. But she wanted Jess Carter more.”
Embarrassed for George, I decided I didn’t want any more details about George and his possible relationship with Jess Carter’s ex-wife. Shifting gears in my head, I had more concern for the child.
“Please tell me Jess doesn’t do anything harmful to that child.”
“Oh no, on the contrary. He’s a loving father, dedicated to that child like no other, but think of the frustration at the constant silence.”
“I wonder if that’s why Sound System is the perfect place for him to work. All the music adds the noise he is missing. But on another note, what is he so mad at me for?”
“Who knows? I know there was some discussion this evening at dinner about the shock of Katie coming through your grandmother’s bushes to her yard. She hardly leaves his side unless she has to, yet she came through those shrubs and actually smiled, or so I heard.”
“So she smiled at me. Big deal? I wasn’t kidnapping her,” I added softly.
“Oh, I think it is a very big deal to Jess. Katie hardly smiles or responds to anyone.”
Thoughtful for a moment, I had one more question to ask, and I bit the inside of my cheek, considering its appropriateness.
“Why did you tell me that Jess would be at the bar? As if that was a positive?”
“I saw the way he looked at you throughout dinner. No one denies Jess Carter.”
“What in God’s name are you talking about? He didn’t look at me. He hates me!” I emphasized with a non-humorous laugh.
“Oh, I wouldn’t be too sure.”
THE NEXT MORNING, I replayed this conversation over and over in my head as I beat the dust out of the living room furniture. My grandmother had a funny looking tool with three wire hearts intertwined and attached to a handle. I had always thought it was a decoration, but it actually had a function for swatting the dust out of cushions. My fury was in full force this morning as the puffs of dirt flew into the air with each swing, slap, and smack of the old pillows. Next I vacuumed every corner of the furniture, the ceiling, and the windows. I wiped down the living room and the dining room furniture, swept the hardwood floors, and vacuumed the rugs on the first floor. I should have been exhausted from yesterday’s activities and last night’s information, but I was in overdrive, hyped up with displeasure at the way Jess Carter spoke to me despite his sorrowful history.
I knew the kitchen was next and
I attacked the kitchen sink knob so hard for a drink of water that the cold-water tap came right off the faucet. Water was spurting straight at me and soaking the room. My grandfather had tried to instruct Rosie and me in the ways of home-improvement, and we weren’t exactly good students, but I knew there were taps under the sink to control the water pressure. I ducked into the sink cabinet, turning each knob one way and then another before I finally had the water fountain stream shut down and only a slow trickle dripped into the sink from the cold-water handle. If I hadn’t been so jacked up with adrenaline, I might have cried at the mess, but I laughed in spite of myself and called out to Nana on the back porch.
“Nana, we have a problem in here,” I continued to laugh, feeling a bit of hysteria building. “I don’t know my own strength and I wrestled the cold water knob off the sink.”
Nana stared through the open doorway at the water all over the floor before noticing the handle in my hand.
“Oh, dear. John can fix it when he gets home.”
“Well, Nana, that might be a problem.” Oh no, I thought, please not now. “Is there someone else you know that I can call? Who could be here sooner?”
“The phone book is in the drawer under the phone, dear. I think I have the handyman’s card inside the cover.”
When I opened the ancient paper address book, I laughed again. Nana had literally meant “The Handyman” as the name of the company. I dialed the number from Nana’s landline and waited for an answer.
“Hello, the Handyman,” a familiar sounding voice spoke through the receiver.
“Yes, um, I broke the kitchen sink handle, and unfortunately don’t know how to fix it. Elizabeth Parrish suggested I call you.”
There was silence on the other end of the line and I thought I’d lost the connection. “Hello?”
“Yeah, I’m here.”
There was another pause and I thought I heard someone take a deep sigh.
“I can be there around 11:00 this morning.”
“Okay, is there anything I should do in the meantime with the sink?”
“Turn off the water.” Sarcasm dripped through the line.
“Did that,” I said, sounding proud of myself.
“You did?” The voice still sounded familiar and insultingly surprised. Then it hit me. If I could’ve run away, I would have right that instant. The voice became all too familiar with its condescension. Jess Carter.
“Oh my God,” I whispered into the phone. I knew I recognized that voice.
“What?”
“Nothing. 11:00 is great. Thank you,” I choked out the words and immediately hung up the phone.
I started wiping the floor with a new wave of fury. I knew I only had two hours, so I used hot water from the bathroom sink to fill buckets and scrub the kitchen ceiling, wallpaper, countertops, and windows. Every surface got a dousing of sudsy, lemon-smelling water. Thank goodness the area was small and I finished with time to spare.
I went upstairs to shower although I told myself I didn’t know why I cared what Jess Carter thought of my appearance. Having a limited supply of clothes with me for my weekend-visit-turned-working-vaca, I put on white shorts and a dark t-shirt. Finished with cleaning myself up, I walked into the other bedroom on the second floor, the one that had been my mother’s.
When Rosie and I came to visit Nana in the summer, we were given our mother’s original bedroom because it was bigger and there were the two of us, and our mother took the front room next to ours. This room was smaller, with a double bed pushed into the corner and a small wicker chair in the opposite corner by the front window. There was no room for a chest of drawers, but there was a small closet with shelves where our mother placed her things. I opened the closet, scanning the shelves.
When my mother passed away, many of her things were sold. Nana kept only a few special items and I had forgotten all about them being stored in this closet. On the top shelf was an old wooden jewelry box with a cardboard shoebox labeled “letters” next to it. The second shelf had a blanket and a sweater set in a plastic protective bag and a stack of books. Cinderella, Beauty and The Beast, The Littlest Mermaid, Snow White, and Rose Red were the titles of some of our childhood favorites. The binding was cracked on several of the copies from repeated openings and the covers were faded with love. I opened the first book slowly and read the inside-cover: For Mary Kate, with love, Grandma Sawyer. The books belonged to my mother, a gift from her own grandmother. Sadly, I couldn’t remember our mother ever reading from these books to either my older sister or me. Nana must have saved these treasures for the pure value of a mother keeping something precious that had belonged to her child and was a gift from her own beloved parents.
A knock at the front door startled me and I placed the books back on the old shelf. Closing the door slowly, I let my forehead press against it for a moment. It was not my responsibility as the grandchild to take care of the grandmother, I selfishly thought. My mother should have been here to take care of both of us. It was her duty as a daughter to care for her own mother, and her duty as a mother to care for her daughter. Oh Mama, I sighed as I rolled my head slowly from side to side on the hard wood and tried to recall her face, but I was pulled away from my self-pity when I heard Nana greet Jess and call to me.
Nana didn’t have to point to the kitchen, as Jess knew where it was from previous visits to the home, and he was already hard at work when I finally came down the stairs. Since the screened-in porch had two entrances - one through the kitchen and the other through the dining room - I snuck through the dining room and out onto the porch to sit with Nana. To my surprise, we had another little visitor.
“Hello, Katie,” I said softly.
Silence.
“Have you come to help your daddy or are you here on a social call?”
Silence.
“What a silly thing to say,” Nana replied. “Of course she’s here on a social call, not helping her daddy work.” Nana smiled at the child who looked back at her with that sad, stoic face.
“Well, I know just the thing for our little circle. What do you think about a book discussion, Nana?”
“Wonderful idea, Emily, dear.”
I knew right where to find the perfect books and I raced back up the stairs two at a time, and returned out of breath to sit on the faded outdoor loveseat. Nana sat prim and proper in her own chair. Upright and legs crossed at the ankles with her hands in her lap, she was the image of a Victorian educated woman. I, on the other hand, sat cross-legged on the seat and patted the cushion next to me while I looked encouragingly at Katie. Despite her hesitation, I wanted her to sit next to me and I waited patiently before I spoke.
“You can’t see the pictures as well from over there.”
Katie glanced toward the kitchen before looking back at me.
“Would you like to ask permission first?” I asked, uncertain if Katie would feel more comfortable asking her dad for permission to sit next to me. I wondered how Katie did communicate with her father, as I knew she didn’t use her voice.
Silence.
But Katie surprised me by choosing to sit near me in the opposite corner of the loveseat. I simply showed her several book covers.
“Which fairy tale is your favorite? Do you have a favorite?”
Katie looked at each of the titles and pointed to Cinderella. I asked if it would be all right with Katie if I read the story aloud, so Nana could hear as well. As I read the story, I held the book between Katie and me. I noticed Katie leaning over a little, stretching a little closer to get a better look at the pictures as I continued to read. By the time I finished the first book, Katie was sitting right next to me, touching my leg with her own petite elbow.
“You know what’s great about this story? In the end she gets the prince and a great pair of shoes. Girls love shoes.”
Katie looked at her own shoes. They were pink flip-flops with a giant daisy on the top of each one.
“Yes, you have beautiful shoes, too. Did a prince give
them to you?” I winked at Katie who didn’t respond other than to shake her head no.
“You know what I always wonder though is why does the girl always have to be saved by the boy? Can’t the woman save the man instead?”
“Oh Emily, dear, now don’t start that again. The prince saves the girl, period. Rags to riches.” Nana waved a hand in the air, pretending to fan her face as she dismissed my modern rant on fairy tales.
“Well, I like Cinderella. But I think she is extra lucky to have a fairy godmother and I think she helps that old prince so he doesn’t have to marry someone he doesn’t choose.”
Katie continued to look at me with big blue eyes.
“Um, okay. Never mind.” I realized I might have gone too far, glossing over the simple joy of the fairy tale.
“How about Beauty and the Beast? Do you know this one?”
Katie shook her head no.
“Oh my,” I exaggerated, “it’s my favorite.”
I tried to add extra emphasis to the story of a beautiful girl who cares for her father so much she trades places with him as a prisoner of the evil Beast. The Beast is under a magic spell and he is tempted by his servants to treat this girl as a guest instead of a prisoner. When the girl must return to her father who is ill, the Beast becomes so sad without his new friend that he grows weak. When the beautiful girl realizes she must return to the Beast to save him from his sadness, her love turns him back into the handsome prince he once was.
I sighed when I finished the story and hugged the book dramatically to my chest.
“I just love the Beast. He’s all rough on the outside, but soft on the inside once Belle gets past all those layers.”
Silence.
“But I also love Belle, because she is smart and pretty, and she is tough with the Beast. She doesn’t take his…Well, his abuse toward her.” I almost forgot I was speaking to a child again. Katie had the presence of an old soul.
Silence.
“Okay, how about a snack? And a check on the Beast?” I wiggled my finger towards the kitchen entrance from the porch. Katie smiled a little.