by Inman Majors
Asheville, North Carolina, birthplace of Thomas Wolfe.
Brixham, England, where William of Orange had first come ashore.
Arbroath, Scotland, where lions, poor things, would receive no physical affection, not even a friendly pat on the head.
To these standbys of Scots-Irish Protestantism and Tarheelian fetish, a photo had been added of Jackson Elementary, the school that Theo attended.
Penelope considered this addition but could make nothing of it. She moved on to MUSIC, which was, per usual, heavy on the southern rock and alt country: Wilco, Uncle Tupelo, The Avett Brothers, and his guilty pleasure, .38 Special. Penelope noted, however, a significant addition: Van Halen’s 1984.
This gave her pause. James liked Van Halen okay, but had in the past accused her of being a fan because of their association with boys she’d made out with in the backseat of muscle cars. The accusation was founded, of course, and she was perplexed as to how James knew. Maybe she reminded him of girls he knew in high school who did the same. But that was beside the point now. James had Van Halen front and center on his Facebook page, and that was no accident.
She thought of the woman at baseball practice. She was wearing a Van Halen T-shirt. This had to be more than coincidence. The universe was whispering in her ear.
Feeling hot on a new trail, she moved down to MOVIES, skimming over his kitschy favorites, Roadhouse and Point Break; his western classics, High Noon and Shane; his ode to sensitive boyhood and hunting; Where the Red Fern Grows, and stopping, aha!—on the new addition here: Mr. Holland’s Opus.
Mr. Holland’s What? With Richard Dreyfuss? Of course James did love the word opus and used it whenever discoursing on a favorite long book. For example, Thomas Wolfe’s Look Homeward, Tarheel was an opus. She’d heard him call it that many times.
But what was the story line of Mr. Holland’s Opus? Oh yes. Richard Dreyfuss as an inspirational teacher.
Her brain was a well-oiled machine. The eureka moment was at hand. A photo of a school. A movie about a teacher. And Van Halen’s classic 1984. Like a detective with that one nagging clue that doesn’t add up, she feverishly entered the relevant information into the search engine: Van Halen, 1984, song list.
Only to be delayed by another smiling, naked, monstrously bosomed woman popping up on the screen.
“Damn it, George,” she said, wondering if there was nothing besides unnaturally large breasts that he liked. Her mother was reasonably flat-chested. Men were weird. She clicked off the banner for Titty Tavern and was back on point. The search had hit home and she was soon on the Wikipedia page for the album. Trusting her gut, she arrowed right past all the history, etc. and settled on Track Listings:
Side one: 1984, Jump, Panama, Top Jimmy, and Drop Dead Legs.
Side two: Hot for Teacher, I’ll Wait, Girl Gone Bad, and House of Pain.
There it was, as plain as the bulge in David Lee Roth’s tights: James was dating a teacher. James was dating a teacher at Stonewall Jackson Elementary. James was dating Theo’s teacher, Ms. Dunleavy.
Granted, her mind was racing and she was jumping to conclusions the clues didn’t necessarily point to. He was dating a teacher. Any idiot could see that. But how did she know it was Ms. Dunleavy? She didn’t know, but it was. Her whole body was tingling with the factualness of this. Was this the real reason James didn’t want her to broach Theo’s bus situation? His ex and his current having a conversation would surely put James on edge, especially if he was trying to keep the identity of his Very Special Lady a secret. She glared one last time at the computer, then marched upstairs with Van Halen drums pounding in her brain.
7
In the kitchen, she opened the refrigerator door though she still wasn’t hungry. She shut the door. The bottle of wine she’d bought beckoned her, but then she thought of tomorrow’s shift at Coonskins and reconsidered. The lunch shift was bad enough without a raging hangover, and it was her turn to load the salad bar and have her hair smell like ranch dressing for the rest of the day. And those stupid bacon bits that always spilled everywhere. Maybe one of the guys would trade rolling silverware for salad bar. It was worth an ask.
Not sure what else to do, she poured a glass of water from the sink and gulped it down. James was dating Theo’s teacher. Was that even legal? Teachers could just date the fathers of their pupils? She knew they were banging their students left and right these days, but didn’t know the dads were in play as well. Wow. What a world they lived in. She was contemplating this, and trying to recall exactly how Ms. Dunleavy looked, when she heard the bedroom door open and then footsteps in the hall.
She hoped it wasn’t George. She’d be fine to see him in the morning. But not now, not after she’d just been run over by the melon truck. In fact, she rather hoped it was her mother. This was not a sensation she often experienced of late, this wanting to discourse with her mother. Mommy Dearest was just a little too interested in how Penelope was faring with modern dating on the Net. But at the moment she couldn’t wait to talk about James and his Very Special Lady. Her mother would be even more riled than she was.
A weird clicking sound was coming down the hall, one Penelope hadn’t heard at first for the TV blaring from the bedroom. And then her mother joined her in the kitchen. Penelope was about to launch into her recent discovery, planning on sparing no detail about her intrepid investigative work, but something stopped her short.
Her mother, a look of surprise on her glowing face, stood before Penelope in a short kimono robe as once favored by James. She’d not bothered to cinch the silk sash and it hung wantonly to either side.
Penelope was in the kitchen with her naked mother. Her naked mother who was wearing black heels and stockings as favored by the Boobie Bungalow lady. That was the clicking she’d heard. Her mother, in no hurry, casually fastened the kimono sash, but not before Penelope saw what she wished she hadn’t.
Her mother flounced to the refrigerator and stood there in her stockinged legs and high heels, without a care in the world.
This was the woman who brought her into this world, who changed her diapers and gave her Band-Aids and read her bedtime stories. And despite herself, Penelope had to admire both her still-firm legs and her fighting adventurous spirit. Her mother was humming a tune now that sounded like “California Dreamin’” and reaching for Penelope’s bottle of wine. The garden club seed and bulb sale seemed far from her mind.
Penelope noticed her phone on the counter, took it from the charger, and texted Rachel:
My mother shaves her bush now.
Rachel texted back immediately: For the garden club?
Penelope: No. HER bush.
Rachel: what?
Penelope: you heard me.
Rachel: you mean like trims it up? So what?
Penelope: no. all the way. BALD.
Her mother came toward where Penelope was texting about her nether regions. Penelope realized she was standing in front of the drawer where the corkscrews were and moved out of the way.
“You don’t mind if I have some of your wine, do you?” her mother said, reaching into the drawer.
“Of course not,” said Penelope. “Help yourself.”
Rachel: Bald?
Penelope: Bald.
Rachel: OMG.
Penelope: Got to go. The bald eagle is standing right here. She’s wearing a kimono btw.
Rachel: Like James?
Penelope: Hers is pink. But yes. Having bad flashbacks.
Rachel: Was James a shaver too? Maybe it feels silkier that way.
Penelope: Got to go. You’re making me sad.
Her mother had poured herself a healthy glass of vino and now took a long, satisfied sip. Simultaneously, a familiar scent came wafting down the hall and tickled Penelope’s nose. George had lit his pipe. All in all, the upstairs portion of the house seemed pretty pleased with itself.
“How was your day?” her mother asked, leaning against the counter, wine in hand, tapping a high heel on the linoleum, t
he sash loosening, devil-may-care, as she spoke. She was moving her shoulders too as if dancing in place.
“Okay. Normal. Tips were decent for lunch.”
“And how was Theo’s practice? Did he hit the ball?”
“Of course not.”
“Did he swing at least?”
“He did swing,” Penelope said.
“Well, that’s a start,” her mother said, turning and reaching toward the cabinet where they kept the prescriptions and first-aid items. “Can’t forget George’s heart medicine,” her mother said, pulling down a small bottle.
“No,” said Penelope with meaning in her tone, “you’d better not forget that.”
Her mother smiled and winked at this. Then she was swishing out of the kitchen, the sash of the kimono trailing coquettishly to either side in her wake.
Penelope was back in the basement, watching a bad reality show and trying her best not to think of what had just occurred in the kitchen. She was also pondering her interest in her ex-husband’s dating life and his suddenly sunny perspective, and telling herself that she shouldn’t care. She wasn’t in love with James and she wasn’t hung up on him and if he’d asked to get back together, she would say no. So who cared that he was dating and tactile and even smiling these days?
She did, actually. After all, he’d spent the last two years in a nonstop brood and all but saying she was the source of his displeasure in life. She was nice, she was fun, she was smart. When things got a little stale, she’d played along with his western-themed sexual fantasies, his Scottish Highlands fantasies. She’d not complained when he shouted out, Sweet Pocahontas, this teepee is hot! Or to lovemaking in match-ing kilts.
So what if she’d snatched his shorty robe?
She’d stopped flipping channels on the Home and Garden Network, where a handsome couple about sixteen years old was complaining about the paint scheme in the million-dollar house they were being forced to buy.
“Paint!” Penelope screamed at the television. “Just buy the color you want and paint it yourself. It will take like three hours!”
Now the man was saying something about the tile being dated. Soon he’d wax rhapsodic about open floor plans. Penelope switched the channel. Tonight she could do without arguments about the ocean view versus the awesome natural light in the master suite, walk-in closets as opposed to his-and-hers Jacuzzis.
And what was up with that guy’s fedora?
She sat in the darkened basement for a moment, contemplating life in sunny California with men in vintage hats and tank tops. She’d never lived anywhere but Virginia, and other than her two years of college, her whole life had been spent in Hillsboro. She’d rarely left the state, much less traveled to some exotic place like Santa Barbara.
Reflexively, not really even aware she was doing it, she pulled out her phone and went to Facebook. Friday nights alone were the pits. She wondered what Theo was doing. Something fun, no doubt. Go-Karts or mini-golf or a movie, all the things that felt like a luxury to her in her current financial straits.
On her newsfeed were the usual mixture of parents complaining about, bragging on, and making fun of their kids. The same people who always posted recipes that she would never try had posted recipes. The people who posted funny animal videos had stayed true to form. Two people she knew vaguely had posted vacation photos of beachy Edens she would never visit: lean, tall husbands with colorful drinks in hand. Wives with big sunglasses in bright sarongs by the pool. A joke, perhaps a loaded one, about couples yoga. A brief mention of a massage to die for.
Fuckers.
She sat there imagining these slender, rich-looking people doing all the things these people did on vacation. Windsurfing and scuba diving. Dining alfresco. Making athletic love without all the snuffling sounds James used to make on her neck. Without the hint of deer entrails from the HHR. Just the smell of cocoa butter and a salty breeze through the billowing curtains of the private cabana. The word prawns popped into her head though her whole life all she’d ever had was shrimp. Were they the same thing or not?
She clicked out of Facebook. Good for them, she thought. Good for those fuckers and their buttery prawns.
She went now to her LoveSynch page, thinking that this was a safer choice than checking out the hot dude on Divote again. Some older guy in a cardigan had messaged her. She was too tired at the moment to read over his profile, but he looked nice enough. She hadn’t had her account long and had never replied to anyone before. But what the heck. She messaged back:
Hey, how are you?
At least he had his shirt on. She went down the hall toward her bedroom, thinking that she really did need to work a double the next day. Maybe someone would give up their night shift. If she worked every double she could, the money would eventually start to accrue. That would mean less time with Theo, but getting their own place would be worth it. She had to think long term.
In her room, she found a letter waiting on the bed. The letter had been typed on the official stationery of the Hillsboro Garden Club. Communication of this sort always signaled official business, and this was no exception.
Penelope,
Aunt June and Doozy confirmed that they will come as planned June 28 and stay through July. I was afraid you might have forgotten about their visit and wanted to remind you while it was fresh on my mind. We seem to keep different hours these days and I’m being run to death with the fund-raiser. Remind me to tell you what Gladys Deerfield proposed (hand-sewn seed baskets, as if we had the time. Ridiculous!).
June said they could bring the camper and sleep in the backyard, but I nixed that. Can you imagine that big thing in the yard? We’d look like trailer trash, as if we don’t already with that old truck of George’s in the driveway. June is worried about Theo’s asthma and refuses to take his room upstairs. She’s also worried about imposing on you, but I don’t see any other options. It looks they will bunking with you downstairs. They offered to take the fold-out, but with Doozy’s back, I don’t think that’s a good idea.
I know this isn’t ideal timing for you, but June says Doozy isn’t sleepwalking nearly as much since he started the hypnosis sessions. The snoring, unfortunately, is the same. We’ll get you a fan and some earplugs and just hope for the best.
Love,
Mom
Penelope perused the letter several times, hoping that somehow the words on the page would be different on subsequent readings. She recalled the Fourth of July weekend spent in the RV, with Doozy pacing up and down, dead asleep, calling out menu options as if he was still a mess-hall cook. Apparently succotash had been often on the menu at Fort Benning and the soldiers were none too fond of it. Doozy would bark at the grunts to put a sock in it and keep the line moving. If some private back-sassed the slumbering sergeant, they were brusquely reminded that he could use his spatula for more than swatting flies.
His snoring, even before he deviated his septum via a night-walking collision with a grandfather clock, had been epic, voluminous, cacophonous, and comprehensive, shaking the recreational vehicle from steering wheel to chemical blue toilet water. It was the heavy logs being sawed, even more than the bossy cook with the spatula, that had frightened her as a sixteen-year-old.
She visualized the three of them—Aunt June, Doozy, and herself—cohabitating in the basement, the snoring and the sleepwalking and the commands to keep the line moving. Then she realized that not only would they be sharing a sleeping area but also the lone bathroom. The RV toilet shared with Uncle Doozy was a memory she’d suppressed until now.
She took the note and wadded it tightly before flinging it into the wastebasket.
She had indeed forgotten about the long-planned visit of her aunt and uncle.
8
On her way to Coonskins, Penelope took in the ambience of her hometown, the Walmart and Applebee’s and Target that had replaced the local employers of her youth:
Santeramo’s Pizza, where she was a smiling, eager hostess who could wear what she pleased.<
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The Sweet Scoop, where she dished out soft-serve waffle cones in a red and white T-shirt and cap.
The Pirate’s Cove, where she served seafood in a saucy black skirt and white blouse tied at the navel.
Even Jackie’s Gym for Ladies, where she’d folded towels and checked the pH level in the hot tub, was gone, left vacant in a deserted strip mall with the ghost echoes of synchronized clapping still ringing in the jazzercise room.
Oh, where art thou, little Richard Simmons?
Penelope’s current work uniform consisted of a denim skirt, white Coonskins T-shirt, and the black cowboy boots she’d had since high school. Her hair was pulled into a perky cowgirl ponytail and she knew if James could see her now, he’d be firing his peacemakers in the air and asking if she would mosey on to bed, little Pilgrim. She had to admit that she liked how easy the uniform was to throw on, how fast she could go from ignoring the fact that she was about to wait tables at forty to actually doing it, but there was no getting around the fact that the skirt flattened her butt. Why did everyone love jeans turned into a skirt? Who cared if they went with everything? Did you want a butt or not? Penelope did and made no apologies about it. Hers was powerful and firm and, thinking of it now, she gave it a couple of flinches, tightening one cheek and then the next in rhythm with the song on the radio. Yes, it was still there, despite the girdle all her friends swore by. Why couldn’t they face facts: the denim skirt could turn a pumpkin into an ironing board.
She arrived in the parking lot, got out of the car, and walked toward the entrance. She realized that her mind was on a weird topic—ironing boards and pumpkin butts—to avoid thinking about the shift to come and this one customer who always sat in her section and spent three hours on a Cobb salad and about four hundred glasses of sweet tea. She could see him now, shaking his glass at her as she walked by with a tray of ribeye sandwiches for another table, the last little chives and bacon bits stuck to the sides of his bowl, the lone remaining egg slice nestled against a fragment of avocado, all to be savored one dainty bite of Roquefort at a time.