by Lisa Samson
Jody winked, took off his cap and ran a hand through his thick, blond hair.
“Whatever I can do to make things a little easier.” I felt my chin drop to my chest, hoping that with maybe yet another selfless act I might partially redeem the deeds of the past.
Maybe New England would be nice. With the leaves changing and all.
I slowly made my way to the bedroom to change into my scruffies, avoiding the dresser mirror as I did so.
Five
Jack and Jill went up the hill to fetch a pail of water.’ ” Mildred LaRue’s voice skated gracefully around the notes of the old Glenn Miller tune with Olympian expertise. “ ‘Jack fell down and broke his crown, because he boogie-woogied with the farmer’s daughter.’ ”
Miss Mildred’s phrasing spoke to me. And the little twitter of a vibrato she sometimes employed at the end of a verse bordered on magical.
The party atmosphere of the boathouse soaked into my skin as if the mottled flesh was nothing more than tattered Kleenex found in a winter coat pocket during the season’s first wear. The smell of silk and linen and perfume embraced the odor of emotions heightened for various reasons: wheeling and dealing, partying hearty, or prowling unashamedly. Citizens “in the mood” circulated with the September breeze that slid off Lake Coventry like one of Mildred LaRue’s plunges from middle C down to D-sharp.
Good-bye summer. Amen and amen. Better than socializing with the upper classes once again, better than sipping champagne, a certain relief hovered over the room. Even eating the strawberries that rotted serenely by an ice sculpture of a three-masted schooner at full sail paled in comparison to the fact that we all could breathe a little more freely.
I sipped my drink and watched the dance floor. The locals were jumpin’ and jivin’. Gyrating with color, these folk around Mount Oak had money so old they didn’t need to dress in black to prove themselves. As a general rule, I’ve always found the Southern gentry to be colorful. The octagonal pavilion that jutted out into Lake Coventry like a covered cul-de-sac vibrated with the pounding feet of the swing dancers. The older set, jitterbugging with a bit more panache, a comfy shuffle, and a bounce on the downbeat, seemed proud to have started the whole craze in the first place, although both feet never left the floor at the same time these days.
The church maven of Highland Kirk, the fearless typo-hunter herself, Miss Poole, wore long diamond earrings and a silver Nehru jacket quite the same color as her hair. She enthroned herself majestically at the head table closest to the ladies’ room. This arrangement was certainly unusual for most gatherings, but Miss Poole’s overactive bladder took precedence. I guess when one owns a veritable castle on Poole Point, one has a right to a basic enthronement of one’s choice at the boathouse.
Miss Magda Poole owns more of Mount Oak than anyone else, and that includes the Broomhellers who own the IGA, the A-1 Dry Cleaners, and Krazy Kid Karts and Games out near the mall. Her “very late” father amassed compound millions with “his little trucks and trains” as she calls Poole Refrigerated Transport. She rules the Highland Kirk with a proverbial iron fist, or as I would say, with an understated but well-manicured claw. The tyrant.
Until Duncan arrived.
And all is not well with the world there. I love it when Duncan takes a stand.
Trying to be supportive of my husband’s ministry, hoping my “I’m not at all resentful” mask wouldn’t slip, I smiled and waved at the woman who reminds me of my own mother. But with a lot more money and hipper taste in clothing.
She motioned me over. I hear and obey.
“How did the executive committee meeting go last night?” she asked.
I had been dreading the thought of this conversation, yet thankfulness that it was happening in a very public place filled my soul! “Well, someone suggested giving Mount Zion Christian a break this year with the Boston cream pies.”
“And you volunteered Highland?”
Nodding, I rushed to say, “I know it’s going to be more difficult than steak-on-a-stick, but since our church is so far out of town and all, I was just trying to be helpful, boost up our profile a bit.”
I may be mistaken, but I thought I saw a flicker of approval in her eyes. Yet her words revealed the opposite. “I guess I’ll know next time to go myself come flood or famine.”
I don’t have to hang around for this, I thought and turned to go. “Excuse me but I need to find Duncan.” Miss Poole waved me off. I hurried to my seat before someone took it. It was the best people-watching seat in the house by far.
Tuxedoed young bucks serve up double martinis and triple sec with a quadruple portion of happy sighs, commemorating the fact that we all actually survived another summer without a major lawsuit or loss of life or limb. Tomorrow the swankier, more exclusive enclaves such as the Coventry Meadows Resort or Tuckaway Manor Bed and Breakfast, for the more creative types, will begin preparing for the foliage viewers, a kinder, gentler sort of tourist. Then the Christmas lonelies who have no family to celebrate with arrive, or maybe they have families but regard a frigid lake as a bit more inviting.
Nibbling on a very sweet strawberry to freshen up my dark red lipstick, I watched Mildred LaRue intently. Miss Mildred who helps down at Creator’s Corner on Thursday mornings has been a good friend for two years now. The woman weighs no more than a leg of lamb and stands at least five foot ten inches tall. Tonight she looked as if someone took a delicate African figurine and zapped it life-size with an expando ray gun, then bedecked it in a gown of iguana green sequins with a feathered neckline and tight-fitting chiffon sleeves. The feathered cuffs swirled and jumped with each flicker of her hand. And flickers abounded, palms flat toward the audience, all fingers pointing up like pickets in a privacy fence, thumbs relaxed, elbows bent, arms as fluid as the opening notes of Gershwin’s “Rhapsody in Blue.” Her hair, as black as it was ten years ago when she hit retirement age, flowed back from a broad forehead, pulled up in a high French twist thanks to Shamika down at the Braid Brigade, who can relax a bedspring if the price is right. Miss Mildred swears she doesn’t color it, but I have to wonder. Even the most holy women aren’t above a little Lovin’ Care. Mildred loosened her vocal chords, slipping out of the peppy Glenn Miller number and rolling right into “All of Me.” I swear Billie Holiday sung it no finer.
“ ‘All of me. Why not take all of me?’ ” she crooned, as if anyone in his right mind would even need to be asked.
I’ve been inwardly asking that same question of Duncan for years. Duncan is so gentle and sweet, for the most part, and sometimes I just want him to take me like he feels he would die without me. But Duncan never wants me like that. Maybe Monday nights have become an obligatory occasion for him as well.
“Still keepin’ the faith?”
I whirled around at the familiar greeting. Chris Knight, born Christine Anne Vandervere, raised Chrissy Vandervere, and voted by Mrs. Walston’s second grade class as most likely to rotate a complete 360 degrees on the swing set at Hampton Elementary School, stood at my elbow. If Mrs. Robertson the principal hadn’t decided to keep a vigil during our recesses that year, I know Chrissy would have gone where no boy from the sixth grade down had ever gone before. Chris had been like that then. She could run faster than anybody and stood mighty strong, mighty proud as the last kid out in Greek Dodge because she could catch Buddy English’s hard throw without flinching.
Years ago, Chris had willingly taken on the role of wife to Gary, my favorite cousin and the new pastor over at Mount Oak Community Church: seeker-sensitive, contemporary, complete with a drama ministry, a heated baptistery hidden during regular services, and a coffee cart proudly serving Java Jane’s finest. Normally she wears sundresses or jumpers and flip-flops, but tonight she had shimmied her way into a white, tea-length chiffon dress, accordion pleated, with an empire waist above a square, rhinestone buckle, surely an atrocity on anybody but Chris. I would be willing to place a sizeable bet that Chris had worn that very dress to her junior/senior banquet at
the small Christian school she graduated from in 1972. Not that I went there. My parents, Fidge and John Heubner had me fully ensconced in a high-priced, mediocre school by the seventh grade. But, hey, they had horses there.
Chris’s new, black church shoes still probably pinched the tiny corns on her smallest toes because she had taken them off, and, of course, looked utterly enchanting strolling around the pavilion in bare feet and a sloppy French twist.
“Hi, Chrissy.”
“I hear the shrimp balls are wonderful.” She set down her drink next to my tonic and lime.
“They are. I’ve eaten two dozen of them already.”
Looking at this vision, the beautiful one of this best friendship, I wanted to fold myself up right then and jump into one of Duncan’s tuxedo pockets. Instead, I swung my legs under the table, folding my arms into an x to hide my upper body. My hands, stretched by bony knuckles, seemed much too large just then, and why in the world had I chosen to go sleeveless?
“Have a seat,” I invited, hating the way I always compare myself to Chris like that, especially considering that surely Chris never does that to me, that Chris would lay down across train tracks in front of the Cannonball Express for me. “Where’s my Josh?”
Chris sat down and took a sip of her ginger ale. She reported the whereabouts of her only child. “Oh, he’ll be here any minute. He was doing the final tear-down at the rental place, then he went home to shower, and he’ll be here as soon as he can. Is Paisley coming?”
“Hardly. She’s home on the phone while Mitch is trying to convince her to get back together with him.”
Chris was too polite to sigh with relief regarding Paisley’s absence, but I knew she wanted to by the way the small hands relaxed suddenly and the grayish green eyes cleared. She did take her job as second-cousin-in-law seriously, however. “How’s Mitch’s band doing?”
“The same.”
“Any body parts newly pierced since we talked after lunch?”
“Nope, still going strong at twenty-five extra holes as far as I know.”
No further updates needed. Chris always knew everything. Except about Jody. It was the only thing about me no one knew. Except for Jody.…
Joe. Yes, he knew all about The Masquerade.
The cabinets remained doorless, and the slate floor felt cool to my bare feet when I entered the kitchen early that morning in my pajamas to find him already at work carving something on the island. He smiled sheepishly at the sight of me in my white satin tap pants and camisole, and I thought maybe I should put on a robe. But I had stepped on this bridge in my mind, a bridge spanning from behind me where Duncan stood with a laptop strapped around his neck like a cigar/cigarette tray to Jody in front of me, only Duncan looked really small and sickly and ghostlike, and Jody stood there like Spartacus or something with his feet apart, all muscular and with a pulse raging, looking at me in my tap pants and camisole. I placed a hand over my stomach and walked over and laid a hand on his arm and said, “What are you doing?” He shrugged, placing his youthful hand over mine and squeezing and keeping it there and said, “You said the woodwork beneath the granite was too plain, so I decided I’d carve you a couple of sparrows right here beneath the vegetable sink.” I began to cry, and Jody quickly said, “It’s a gift, I promise I won’t charge you for my time on it. I’m just doing it because …” Then he stopped talking just as I looked up to see his beautiful face as he gathered his tools and left the room. So I kept my tap pants and camisole on all that day, and late that night before Duncan was due to steal quietly in, I turned on soft music, burned some candles, and I cried out to Duncan to see me, to save me. But when I awoke the next morning, the radio still played; the candles had burned down to nubs; and as I cleaned up the lumpy piles of wax on my dresser, my tears bounced off their contours. His side of the bed had been slept in, but Duncan was already gone. The next night I slipped into an old T-shirt and athletic shorts and fell asleep in front of reruns of The Mary Tyler Moore Show.
Three years ago, Jody married a sweet, supple thing from Worthington Valley. I still remember his fine anklebones and the way his hair bleached out to white only on the patches beside his forehead. Sometimes, before my brain can catch itself, I think it was worth it, most times I don’t. I know that all of our sins nailed the Savior to the cross and that He would have died for the smallest of transgressions. But when I ponder my adultery in regards to the Crucifixion, I see a blow to the head that drives the crown of thorns deeper into flesh like mine, a place where a golden diadem should have rested instead.
“So Josh leaves tomorrow,” I said.
“I can’t believe it.” Chris shook her head, the French twist sliding lower toward the nape of that long neck. “All that time and money we spent to conceive that boy, and he’s already leaving us.”
“Well, Johns Hopkins isn’t all that far.” I tried to be encouraging, but I have three children, not just one, and all of them inhabit the bungalow as of now. Not that Paisley’s departure can happen soon enough.
Now that thought had guilt built right in.
Not a thought, according to The Proper Christian Ladies’ Handbook, one should admit out loud. One should talk about her children as though everything were fine. Although, one was free to use words like “challenging” or “God must have some kind of plan for this one!” Up-speak allows for some measure of truth, but with a saving, optimistic slant.
Chris rolled her eyes. “It’s a good five to six hours away, Popp. Besides, it’s easy for you to say. You’ve still got Rob around.”
Robbie had already begun his third year at the local community college, burning away the final dross of general education requirements and procuring an associate of arts degree in something absurdly general. Then next year he’d go on for his B.A. at some school out of town, out of state, out of the country, or perhaps off the continent of North America if he had his way. He’d talked about St. Andrews in Scotland for months, which of course made Duncan drag out the Fraser kilt and plaid while he prepared to make tatties and neeps and haggis which we all hate, except for Paisley, although now she doesn’t touch the haggis on principle. The university accepted him for next fall, but he doesn’t know yet if he is called to be a civil engineer or a youth pastor. I reason by the title alone they sound much like the same thing. But he applied to Covenant College as well, making sure to cover all the bases.
“Has Josh decided on a major yet?”
Chris began peeling apart the splits in her soft fingernails. “I think so. He said he’s going to go with premed, and then he can just stay at Hopkins for med school.”
“You’ve got to be proud of him, Chrissy.”
“I am! But I’d trade that all in a second to keep him home with me. I heard there was an opening up at the hydroelectric plant. But with that lacrosse scholarship …” She deposited her chin into her hand. “I guess it’s silly of me, Popp, but I feel as if I’m giving him away. Like it’s his wedding day or something, only he’s the bride, and he’s going to a new house, getting a new family, and leaving us behind forever.”
“That’s not silly.”
“Yes, it is. It’s too strong a feeling.”
I rubbed the spot between Chris’s protruding shoulder blades in a small circular pattern. I know that spot better than I know my own hands. “We’ll go see him the weekend after classes start. I’ll get my parents to watch Angus at their place, and we’ll do the town together when Josh is busy. We’ll see the sites, go down to the Inner Harbor, and we can even stay at one of those inns in Havre de Grace.”
Chris frowned. “Poppy, I can’t afford that.”
I lifted my brows. “I’ll take the money from the stash. Duncan won’t mind.”
“Are you sure?” Chris’s eyes suddenly had the amazed look of a parent watching her kindergartener actually sing in the Christmas concert for the first time.
“Hey, we’ll be out of town with nobody from around here to see us.”
“Okay, I guess. You
sure you want to use the stash?”
Those two words held great significance. Great riches. Literally. Well, maybe not great riches as in Sam Walton, Bill Gates kind of riches. But that account contains the money we made from the sale of our house, the sale of Duncan’s computer firm, and my proceeds from my art. Also in the account sits the Jaguar convertible I’ll never have, the vacation house in the Outer Banks I’ll never have, and the membership to the country club we sold when Duncan got the call to minister.
“I’m sure. It’s for a good cause. And if we were really all that altruistic and self-sacrificing and truly trusting God, we’d have given that money away a long time ago. Instead it’s there, growing arms and legs and fangs, not to mention 12 percent interest, and because we drive around in a beat-up old van and haven’t bought new clothes in years, we act like it’s okay.”
Chris put up her hands. “Yikes, Popp. Don’t feel you have to beat yourself over the head for my sake. If anyone knows where your heart is it’s me.”
“That’s truer than even you’d like to admit.”
Chris lifted her glass in a small toast. “Faults and all.”
“You said it, lady.”
Then why am I always so jealous of her? No one loves me like Chris does. Not even Duncan. It is a clean love. A love with little expectation. A voluntarily blind love. Clean and neat and mature. And it is right here in Mount Oak.
Six
I don’t know how Robbie managed to talk Duncan into buying a ski boat when we moved to the shores of Lake Coventry. Robbie emerged from the meeting “behind closed doors” with the smug grin of victory stretching his youthful male jowls. Duncan refused to talk about it, not one easily given to defeat however genial his demeanor. Duncan normally acts so happy and bright, and he’ll do all the little things that I ask him to do. I never have to remind him to haul out the garbage or lug that pile of winter wear down to the cedar box in the basement. I never have to tell him it’s mulching time or the van needs gas. But those big matters! He loathes losing. He hates it when his little patchwork quilt of a world sews a renegade square. Obviously, Robbie somehow stitched an appliqué of a speedboat over some preexisting log cabin motif.