Three Story House: A Novel

by Courtney Miller Santo

  “They’ll be getting restless,” Rosa May said by way of a prompt.

  “To hell with field conditions. I’m taking them outside,” Lizzie said, thinking that after the recent rainstorm, there’d be precious little that would catch fire. “It’s wet, but maybe a little mud will do them good.”

  “Feel free to hose them off afterward,” Rosa May said.

  “Oh, I wouldn’t,” Lizzie said before realizing that Rosa May had been joking.

  The descent into silence when she returned to the room told Lizzie that the girls had been talking about her. None of the girls looked ready to practice; most of them had remembered to wear tennis shoes, but of course they were all untied with their laces dragging on the floor. She put two fingers in her mouth and let out a piercing whistle that had most of the girls covering their ears. “We’re going outside,” Lizzie said. “Lace up.”

  They grumbled. Outright refusal erupted with several girls flopping themselves down onto the grass the moment they stepped outside the community center’s double doors. Lizzie set the ground rules. They were going to run drills. Everyone was to participate. If someone didn’t participate, they’d run the drill until everyone did. A few of the girls lying on the grass got up. Sonja, Drayden, and the heaviest girl, Coraline, didn’t. Lizzie put them through their first drill, which basically involved jumping. They drew an imaginary circle around themselves and then she had them jump from the center of the circle to points on the invisible circle as if it were a clock.

  Lizzie did it with them, knowing she needed to strengthen her legs.

  “Get up, Sonja,” one of the girls yelled after the third time Lizzie drilled them. The weather was cool and Lizzie felt they could do this until their time together ended without a water break. She’d promised them a water break once everyone did the drill.

  Sonja rolled onto her back, the laces on her shoes still defiantly untied. “She can’t make us do this. She ain’t got power.”

  This was the way they talked to each other, dropping articles and deliberately taking up colloquial speech patterns. If Rosa May were out here, she’d move toward Sonja in a way that said she was going to beat the crap out of her if she didn’t get up. The difference was that they’d laugh at Lizzie if she tried that.

  But Lizzie had been a part of all sorts of teams. She’d been a thirteen-year-old girl and she remembered the insecurities, coupled with the dawning realization that adults truly couldn’t force you to do anything. What Lizzie knew that these girls didn’t was that a coach’s ability to manage egos was as important as her ability at a particular sport. She considered what she knew about Sonja and Drayden. The other holdout, Coraline, hadn’t gotten up from the ground and as Lizzie tried to work out a way to manage Sonja, she knelt next to the larger girl and explained in a low voice that if she wasn’t comfortable hopping from one point to another, she could step. Coraline looked at her sideways and without acknowledging their exchange, lumbered to her feet.

  “Again,” Lizzie called, explaining that the numbers would be out of order this time.

  “Y’all are idiots,” Sonja said, looking at her nails. Drayden covered her mouth and snickered. LOL, thought Lizzie.

  “Three o’clock,” Lizzie called, and then before they had time to think about what Sonja said, “Five o’clock”

  Drayden was one of the taller girls; thinking she was the right size for playing goalie, Lizzie called out to Whitney, who was also tall. “Look at Whitney’s reach. She’s going to make a fine goalie. I don’t think anyone can jump higher.”

  A few of the girls straightened their backs and put enough spring in their next jumps that they nearly fell over. “Six o’clock,” Lizzie called.

  From behind her, Lizzie heard Rosa May’s rich voice. “You don’t think Drayden’s taller? I thought she’d be a natural at goalie.”

  God bless that woman, Lizzie thought. Drayden sat up, knitting together her eyebrows and pursing her lips. There it was, Lizzie thought, WTF or maybe more accurately “the fuck you talking about.” That was how Lizzie would have said it if she were one of these girls, if she were Rosa May and had grown up in Orange Mound.

  Instead, she kept up the pace of the drills, and called, “Round Four.” More than one girl told Drayden to get up off her butt. “We’ll go odds forward and then evens backward.”

  With the grace of a puma, Drayden rose to her feet, stretching up to her full height, which Lizzie would have guessed was close to six feet.

  Coraline, who was huffing and out of breath, pushed herself and actually hopped during the first two numbers. Lizzie smiled and continued calling out even numbers. Drayden made a point of not waiting until Lizzie called a number, but jumped to her own rhythm and finished about thirty seconds ahead of the other girls.

  The next round, nearly all the girls shouted at Sonja to get up and join them, but it wasn’t until Drayden nudged her with her foot that Sonja rose. A collective murmuring of thanks rippled through the girls, and Lizzie called out the numbers on the imaginary clock at a rapid pace.

  Lizzie told the girls to go get some water and meet her back there in five minutes. She warned any girl who was late that she’d have to run an extra lap for every second she was late. “I think I’ll work with them outside from now on. Rain or shine,” Lizzie said to Rosa May.

  “You ever going to let it get around that you used to be something more than nothing in the soccer world?”

  “These kids don’t care about that,” Lizzie said.

  “Maybe not,” Rosa May said, “but they might start caring about it.”

  The truth was that Lizzie didn’t want to talk about it because it made her feel like a failure. She stammered some statistic to Rosa May about how much more successful girls who played sports were. The way Rosa May’s face pinched up made Lizzie think she already had a familiarity with that subject. She wasn’t going to let the issue of Lizzie’s semi-celebrity status go.

  “Maybe we should talk about why you’re keeping my brother at arm’s length.” Rosa May didn’t appear to ever shy away from tough subjects. “He’s not showy with his affection, but he likes you and I don’t think the occassional brunch is what he’s looking for.”

  “How can I get in a relationship? I could be gone in a few months if the renovation and kneehab goes the way it’s supposed to.”

  “Not being the right time is the worst excuse for not starting something up. You’re ending it before it even begins.”

  Not knowing what to say, Lizzie changed the subject. “It’s hard to believe they’re already pregnant,” Lizzie said.

  Rosa May arched her eyebrows. “Who told you that?”

  Lizzie started to explain and then realized that Dray and Sonja had wanted an excuse to get them out of practice and thought that claiming to be knocked up would do it. Rosa May laughed and then stepped back as the girls returned before their five minutes were up. Lizzie stretched her knee a bit before walking with them around the perimeter of the community center’s field. “Are you sure you should do that?” Sonja asked her, falling in step with Lizzie. “I Googled you.”

  She looked at the girl’s profile. “As long as I don’t land on it funny or somebody doesn’t slide tackle me I’ll be all right. It’s a wonder you aren’t worried about yourself, considering your condition.”

  Sonja blinked and then turned away for a moment. “That leg of yours why you’re not playing anymore?”

  Lizzie nodded.

  “I thought so.”

  Lizzie turned away from her and shouted at the girls to pick up the pace. She yelled at the ones still jogging.

  “When you’re done healing, will they let you come back?” another girl asked.

  Lizzie shook her head, trying to think of the girl’s name. It was an odd one, with an apostrophe in the middle—like a contraction. La’shondra, maybe. After the third lap, five of the girls started walking. “We’ll need to work on conditioning,” she said, urging on the walkers. When they finished the run,
it was nearly time for the girls to head home. A few of them had parents or older siblings idling cars in the parking lot. Most of them lived within walking distance of the community center.

  She started to explain to them about how they could put together a club team to play when she was interrupted. “I didn’t come here to play soccer,” the girl said. “They told us they was going to teach us how to get into college and stuff.”

  “We’ll do that too,” Lizzie said, thinking about how she could integrate academic work and study habits into soccer. “But I want to keep you out of trouble. That’s what’ll prevent you from going to college. And the only way I ever kept myself out of trouble was exhaustion. After soccer practice, I was too tired to fight.”

  They nodded, and Lizzie saw that she could win them over. Rosa May, who had continued to watch, walked over and indicated that she’d like to talk to Lizzie. Waving goodbye to the girls, Lizzie felt the familiar throbbing in her knee; she limped over to a wall and leaned against it. As she’d suspected, Rosa May had not forgotten about her earlier intentions.

  “I think you should give a motivational speech to all the girls, even those not in the soccer track. We might be able to get some press out of it.”

  The need for water attacked Lizzie’s throat. “Excuse me,” she said and made for the water fountain. Rosa May followed her in her sensible pumps. Memphis had the best water—she’d missed that when she traveled. In most cities the tap water either smelled like sulfur or tasted like feet.

  She wiped her mouth with her sleeve and offered up her cousin as a bargaining chip. “I could get her to speak to the girls. Isobel does all sorts of motivational speeches.”

  Rosa May nodded and then turned back to her office. “You don’t get the difference between the two of you, but you will. You will.”

  Near the end of March, Lizzie stood in the kitchen listening to Isobel with half an ear. She was thinking about the girls and whether or not they were ready to play another team. So far, she’d had them scrimmaging with each other. Which, although instructive, wasn’t improving their playing skills. They were too timid with each other—they needed to learn to play with their elbows up. Outside, a large yellow machine that Benny had hired for some unspecified purpose groaned and whined, sounding very much to Lizzie like a brass section warming up. She covered her ears and rolled her eyes at Isobel.

  “He’ll have to shut that down pretty soon,” she said. In preparation for the television crew that was coming to film Isobel for a segment of Where Are They Now?, she’d put her hair in Velcro rollers as large as toilet-paper tubes. She had also slathered on a home facial remedy of olive oil, honey, and avocados. It was hard to look at her without giggling.

  “Of course,” Lizzie said, turning down the corners of her mouth in an attempt to avoid laughing at her cousin. Isobel had only just told them that this was the opportunity she’d been talking about over waffles. She’d been afraid of jinxing it before contracts had been signed.

  “What room do you think they should film in? I told them to get exterior shots of the house for their b-roll. I think it’ll make for an interesting story—my agent said they were particularly excited when they heard I wasn’t living in Cali anymore.”

  “The cupola is the only place that isn’t torn all to bits,” Lizzie said, wiping at a few breadcrumbs on the counter. All around her the insides of the house lay exposed, the wires and ductwork reminding her of the roots of the many houseplants she’d repotted over the years as they outgrew their containers.

  “Or maybe on the edge of the yard, with the river in the background.”

  “I thought you said they wanted to film you working on the house.”

  “Oh, they will, but mostly I’ll talk about my new project.”

  Lizzie wiped again at the crumbs, which seemed to be moving. “What new project?”

  “Nothing too specific, I’ll tell them about wanting to form my own company that promotes films, but not just any films, ones that feature women prominently.”

  “Since when?” Lizzie asked, walking to the table to pick up her glasses where she’d set them earlier. She knew that Isobel had flirted with feminism over the years—blaming the paucity of roles for her on patriarchy, but most of the time, she talked about the house. For most of March, Isobel had spent her time on the second floor stripping the front room of its wallpaper and then the rest of the month peeling the layers of paint from the doors and molding that trimmed the floor and ceiling. She’d even ordered a specialty iron, which when placed on the wood essentially melted the paint to a consistency that enabled Isobel to wipe it away with a rag. Lizzie bent down and looked closely at the crumbs on the counter. They were moving.

  “There are plenty of people who’ll pay for ideas. There’s this Peter Taylor story where he talks about the Memphis Demimonde.”

  “Yeah. But that’s a story written by a man.” Lizzie didn’t read much, but she was vaguely familiar with the story—having had one of her English teachers rave about it and then take them on a field trip to the Old Forest, where the story was set. Mostly she kept looking at the crumbs that had turned out to be tiny yellow ants.

  “Demimonde.” Isobel pronounced the word as the French would have. “Isn’t that a great name for the company? And besides, the story is about women.”

  “Doesn’t it mean whores?” Lizzie asked Isobel. “Do you see this?” She followed the tiny yellow ants from the countertop to the cupboard below the sink and hesitated before opening the door.

  “Looks like ants,” Isobel said, leaving the table to stand next to Lizzie. “Translated from the French, it means half the world. It’s the idea that there’s a whole half of the world living contrary to what is expected of them.”

  “Just like us,” Lizzie said. The thought didn’t make her happy. She squished several ants with her thumb. “I’ll get Benny to use that spray stuff and squirt it around.”

  “I’d call somebody,” Isobel said, reaching around Lizzie and opening the cupboard. The trail of ants led to a small hole at the base of the hot water pipe. Isobel’s phone beeped, and she gestured that it was time to remove the facial mask. Taking a paper towel, Lizzie wiped away as many of the ants as she could and then sprayed the area with bleach before going outside to find Benny.

  As usual, their contractor was in his RV, which remained parked on the vacant lot next to the house. She banged on the door and waited a full five minutes for him to step outside. Lizzie had never been invited into his office space, and she suspected that she’d find it resembled a bedroom more closely than an office. Benny looked at her with half-closed eyes, then stretched and scratched his stomach before asking her what she wanted. His lackadaisical attitude infuriated Lizzie. “What’s the caterpillar for?” she asked, gesturing to the large backhoe sitting on the small patch of grass between their property and the trolley tracks.

  “Landscape,” Benny said, gesturing to the backyard. “I had to bring in more topsoil. Yours had been all but washed away, and I thought we’d give Isobel some sod for her big day.”

  She wondered how much he knew about their lives. “We’ve got ants,” she said. “Little yellow ones that seem to be living under the sink. Grandma had a guy that used to do all the pest stuff, but—”

  “Of course I can take care of it,” Benny said, reaching behind him into his trailer and rummaging around until he pulled out a canister of pump-and-spray pesticide. He looked at her and then smiled as if he’d remembered who she was. “I had my kid look you up on the Internet. You’re as close to an Olympian as I’ve ever met, and I don’t know why you’re wasting your time out there in North Memphis coaching those ghetto kids.”

  “Benny,” Lizzie said.

  He paused before putting a hand on her shoulder in an almost paternal gesture. “I grew up there. Didn’t used to be that, but it is now and you can’t tell me it isn’t.”

  “I’m not an Olympian,” she said, hoping he’d stop before he vocalized the racism she suspected
he was capable of. “We’ve been over this.”

  He nodded and banged the can of pesticide against his leg. “Almost is good enough for us,” he said and moved toward the house.

  Lizzie watched him walk away. He must have grown up when the neighborhoods up there were in transition from white to black. She turned her back to the house and watched the backhoe scrape the yard down to the sandstone that made up the bluffs. It took minutes for the machine to finish stripping the small yard of its grass. Benny’s men then moved in and started spreading topsoil that had been dumped in a large pile in the vacant lot. They transferred it to wheelbarrows and rolled it over. One man stood at the far corner of the yard and watered the soil as they spread it. As much as she disliked Benny, she had to admit that the outside of the house was much improved.

  She left the men to their work and walked around to the front porch. Benny had wanted to change the color of the house, but Lizzie had been adamant about its remaining the same color it had always been. Who would recognize the house if it weren’t obnoxiously yellow? Lizzie thought that the house ought to own its identity and that trying to hide behind some paler shade of butter yellow or—heaven forbid—cream would make the house look even more strange. Behind her the rumbling of a large truck caught her attention. Turning, she realized that the film crew had arrived.

  “We made good time,” a man in denim shorts called to Lizzie. “That airport of yours is tiny. I think we were the only ones coming in with bags.”

  He continued talking, but Lizzie waved at them and then hurried inside the house, calling for Isobel. She’d hoped to be gone when the actual filming happened, but now she’d been caught in the house and there were too many things to take care of before she could head over to the community center. Isobel yelled back to her from upstairs, but Lizzie couldn’t make out what had been said. She assumed it was something along the lines of she’d be right there. She squeezed down the impossibly narrow hallway and moved through the beaded curtain without parting it.