Queen for a Day
Page 22
When we got to Jack’s, they were all out of the carts, but then I remembered that the discount luggage store down the street carried the same cart.
“I think they’re selling them for five dollars more, even though they’re supposedly a discount store,” I told her.
“That’s nothing,” she said. “My man takes good care of me.”
I told her I would bring her to the luggage store. I was in one of those moods that my feelings of desperation can lead me to sometimes, where life can seem so meaningless that there doesn’t seem much point in forcing myself to spend every minute of every day doing something productive.
Renee told me again that she would give me her black cart if she found a red cart to replace hers, and I told her again that she didn’t have to do that, but the fact is I was obsessed with getting that cart, for reasons I will now explain. For one thing, I thought that having a functioning cart would release me from the tyranny of the useless set of wheels that had been lying on the bookshelf next to the computer for the past five years as a reminder that the world is full of broken promises and deceit. For another thing, it would have the advantage of eliminating a source of irritation to Jake, who was always accusing me of being a hoarder and recently had been getting very aggressive about making me throw out things I treasured (the brass coffee table missing its glass top that used to stand beneath the piano, a wicker chair that used to sit in the hallway, blocking the coat closet, my collection of twenty-year-old spices, my collection of Tupperware with mismatched tops, et cetera). Also, I wouldn’t have to walk the streets of the city wheeling around a handicapped cart that required great skill and dexterity to maneuver.
But best of all, I loved the idea of some random stranger giving me her cart, just like that. It had a value to me far greater than the cost of the cart itself, for not only would it put the story of my broken cart and all that it represented behind me but I would also have an object that I would treasure for the rest of my life. The cart would be much more than a cart to me; it would be a symbol of the generosity and the potential for goodness that exists in every human heart, and when the time came for its wheels to break, too, as I knew they would someday, I only hoped that I would have the fortitude to simply bid it a fond farewell and go out and buy another one to replace it.
And so, it was with all this in mind that I took Renee down the street to the discount luggage store on 32nd Street. My heart sank when I saw that there was no red cart in sight, although the store manager said that he would look for one in the back. It was at this point that I decided to take stock of myself. How likely was it that the merchant would find a red cart? I asked myself. And how likely was it that this stranger who believed in the afterlife had any intention of giving me her cart? And how much more time should I invest in this venture? And wouldn’t it be a sign of mental health—not to mention self-respect—for me to cut my losses and simply give up? And so I wished Renee the best of luck and told her that it was very nice meeting her, and she told me we should get together sometime and that she would give me her number and I should give her mine and that’s what we did.
After an awkward embrace, during which our two carts collided, I made my way back to Jack’s, where the entire time I was filling my shopping cart with bags of dried chestnuts for Danny and jars of pickles for Jake and three packages of Jack’s ninety-nine-cent bread, which was still a bargain at a dollar twenty-nine, and a package of bobby pins to supplement my lifetime supply of bobby pins, a gigantic laundry bag to add to my impressive collection of laundry bags and sundry cheeses that were due to expire in less than a week, I harbored the secret hope that Renee would find the red cart she had been looking for at the luggage store and that she would surprise me by leaving her cart in front of the store for me, and sure enough, as I walked down 32nd Street with my superfluity of purchases in tow, I could see standing off in the distance like a figment of my imagination, Renee’s practically brand-new black cart waiting for me, and as I got closer to it, I noticed that there was a little piece of paper attached to it—a note for me—I was certain, it was a note for me. Scolding myself for having judged Renee so harshly, I felt a rush of love for her, and it was with a light, repentant heart that I bent down to read the note, which had been impaled on the buckle of one of the pockets (a lovely feature I hadn’t noticed until now), and there in the handwriting of a child was written: This is for you, cheap white bitch.
The juxtaposition of Renee’s note and the gift of her cart made me happy. They seemed to imbue my day with such thematic resonance, such irresistible roundedness, that I decided to leave the coveted cart right there on the curb, with the note attached to it, for curious passersby to look at and wonder about. I couldn’t wait to get home to tell Jake all about my day. I would let it unfold exactly as it had, and save the story of the cart for last.
That was the best part of it—the whole experience was so exhilarating that I completely forgot that I hated Jake and that he hated me and even when I remembered the long big hate I didn’t feel it anymore and I knew that when I came home to Jake with love in my heart he would forget that he hated me, too, because that was the way it always was with us, it only took one to make the first move and the other would follow.
And so as I worked my way back through the rush-hour crowds at Penn Station, to the A train, I felt happy—happy that Jake was my husband and that together we had created a strange and wonderful creature like Danny; happy that it was summer because now we could take Danny to the beach and make him into an octopus again. I could smell the seaweed and the saltwater and the sun. But then I felt the flood of sadness that would always overtake me whenever Danny emerged out of the sand, his octopus arms disintegrating around him, reminding me that this was ultimately all we were: just sand. But now I told myself: Wake up, Mimi! Is this how you want to be? Seeing misery in every grain of sand? And furthermore, I told myself that it was dishonest and unfair of me to blame Danny’s autism for everything, because the darkness that was in me had been there long before he was born.
And then I remembered a time, when Jake and I were first going out, and we were walking down Broadway and I was complaining about something. In response, Jake, out of the blue, turned himself upside down and started walking down the street on his hands.
“This is how we should live our lives!” he told me as his keys, his wallet and all his change spilled out of his pockets and his T-shirt fell over his face. I had known long before this moment that Jake, and only Jake, could give me the peace of mind that had always eluded me, and it made me feel so grateful to hear him put the words “our” and “lives” together in one sentence that I felt I could do anything he told me to do, even be happy.
I was thinking about this and realizing that there existed an eternity in the love that was in my heart for my husband and my son when a man with a briefcase called me a clumsy bitch for accidentally rolling my cart over his foot. My first instinct was to call him a fucking asshole, but I wanted to rise above all that now, and so I simply told him, “I’m sorry, sir, but you see, my cart has only one wheel.”
Acknowledgments
The writer Marian Thurm took it upon herself to send my manuscript around, and she refused to give up until she’d found a publisher. If it weren’t for Marian, I don’t think Queen for a Day would have been published. I am also grateful to Marian for helping me navigate the final stages of the publishing process.
Virginia Bones, Joe Olshan’s assistant editor at Delphinium Books, recommended my manuscript to Joe, who edited my work with skill, sensitivity and respect. In addition to deciding to publish Queen for a Day, Lori Milken gave me valuable guidance. Joan Matthews did a meticulous job of copyediting the manuscript. And whenever I feel unsure about something I have written, I can always rely on Pidge Claener to tell me exactly what she thinks.
By far my harshest critic is my husband, Phillip Margulies, who is also a fiction writer. No one’s praise
will ever mean as much to me as Phil’s. Nor will I ever take anyone’s criticism as seriously. Next to his love for our daughter Sammy, our son Benjy and me, Phil’s greatest love has always been good writing, and his appreciation is all I have ever needed by way of reassurance that there was value in what I was doing.
I would like to thank the following people for having helped me in my work and in my life: Roland Smiley, Maureen McSwiggan-Hardin, Vicki Sudhalter, Nicole Van Nortwick, Mary Clancy, Marsha Ponce, Ann Slavitt Gordon, Mary Somoza, Margaret Puddington, Meredith Maddon, Sarah Morgridge, Joan Hauser, Luellen Abdoo, Hannah Button, Katelyn Snyder, Becca Jane Rubenfield, Angela Sullivan, Eseosa Aiwerioghene, Michele Aquino, Kat Hooper, Michael Curtis, Sarah Shapiro, Hannah Kantor, Pamela Weinman, Beth Rosaler, Ruth Rosaler, Betsy Jaeger, Jordan Pola, Sami Robbins, Marina Catallozzi, Nancy Elkes and Kinsey Keck.
About the Author
Maxine Rosaler’s fiction and nonfiction have been published in such magazines as Glimmer Train, the Southern Review, and the Green Mountain Review and her stories have been cited in editions of The Best American Short Stories.
All rights reserved, including without limitation the right to reproduce this book or any portion thereof in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of the publisher.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, events, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fi ctitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
Copyright © 2017 by Maxine Rosaler
Cover design by Greg Mortimer
978-1-5040-5457-7
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