All Good Women

by Valerie Miner

  ‘It has been six days since Soviet forces took Budapest and a jubilant …’ the radio announcer insisted.

  Teddy walked in with a tray and a tentative smile. ‘We ran out of cocoa, so I made tea.’

  ‘Fine.’ Moira patted the seat next to her. ‘Listen, I’m sorry, I-I-I …’

  ‘Don’t worry. Are you feeling any better?’

  ‘Yeah, some.’

  ‘It’s been a tough day.’ Teddy sipped the tea and regarded Moira carefully. The poor kid had been strung out all week. She knew that the worst thing was to ask what was wrong. Moira would have to reveal that in her own time.

  ‘Nice tea.’ Moira smiled formally. Oh, God, this was ridiculous. She should just start talking. Probably all these nightmares came from holding back. Her silence was a lie, itself.

  Teddy nodded, waiting for Moira to continue. From upstairs, they heard a low gurgling. They both listened carefully, but Tess did not cry. The gurgling stopped and the silence was more tangible between them.

  Teddy didn’t know why she felt frightened by the silence. She knew she should wait for Moira to say what was on her mind, but words spilled from her own mouth. ‘I have some good news. I was going to wait for a respectable time after the funeral, still somehow it seems proper to mention it now.’

  ‘Yes?’ Moira watched Teddy’s nervous hands, chopping the air to clear way for her words. These handsome hands always distracted her.

  ‘Well.’ Teddy pulled a manila envelope from her sweater pocket and slowly unfolded it. ‘It seems Mr Minelli left us the house.’

  ‘What?’ Moira couldn’t believe it. ‘I knew he liked us, well, I’ll be darned.’

  Teddy grinned.

  ‘Show me, will you.’

  Proudly, Teddy handed her the envelope.

  Moira skimmed the legal language and then stopped. ‘He left it to you, Teddy! He left it to you. What do you mean, us? Of course he was always fond of you. And you deserve it. That’s wonderful, wonderful.’

  ‘Ah, the name is just a technicality.’ Teddy shook her head. ‘It’s our house now. You can paint the outside that pale blue color you like.’

  Moira shook her head and set down her cup. She didn’t know whether to be amused or irritated. ‘And I suppose you see it as Wanda’s house and Ann’s too?’

  ‘Well, yes.’ Teddy drew back. ‘Don’t you? Maybe you feel it’d be too small with Tess here. But I’ve been thinking of a little room next to ours on the top floor. When Hank and Arthur get back, they could build it in a flash. I’d like to try my hand at helping. I’m sure we’ll all be fine again.’

  ‘Teddy, you don’t live in the real world. People’s lives change. Wanda has family responsibilities. When she wrote she didn’t say anything about coming back here after camp. And who knows what Ann’s going to do about Reuben? What about Wanda and Roy? Most girls do get married, you know.’

  ‘Most.’ Teddy tried to raise a smile from Moira. ‘But maybe our solution will be catching.’

  ‘Catching,’ coughed Moira. ‘More likely they’ll grow allergic and never talk to us again.’ She was getting exasperated. How had she considered talking about Randy? This was not the time to talk about anything. She just wanted to do the dishes, maybe drop her head in the sink with them. ‘Look, hon, it’s terrific about the house. But it’s important to remember that it says “Teresa Fielding” on that deed. To tell you the truth, I don’t feel much like talking. This week — with the funeral and all — wore me out. Washing those dishes might just work away my jitters.’

  Stretching out on the couch, Teddy closed her eyes. She felt paralyzed by conflicting feelings. Such sadness about Mr Minelli, but of course he was probably better off now than suffering through that dreadful loneliness. Teddy was very touched that he had left the house to her. Why couldn’t Moira share the excitement just a little? Sometimes Moira was like that about financial details — so Scottish about who owned what, when it really didn’t matter. She would be happy to add Moira’s name to the title. Of course Teddy assumed Wanda would stay with her mother and Betty until the family got settled, but why wouldn’t she return to the house eventually? It would take time for Roy to return, to make the wedding plans. Maybe Moira just didn’t want to get her hopes up? Maybe Moira missed the old days so much that she couldn’t face the loss again. She understood Moira better as she learned about that strained, solitary childhood. Moira never counted on a thing until three days after it happened.

  Moira was right — people did change. Teddy could see Ann getting more and more sober in her letters. But there was a loosening too. She wasn’t so fretful now that she thought she was doing important work. Maybe Ann wasn’t meant to be a scholar after all. Maybe she was meant to help people this way. No reason she couldn’t do that from Stockton Street. There were plenty of social causes in San Francisco, right in the neighborhood. Reuben, there was something in Ann’s tone that implied she had only so much room in her life. That reminded Teddy, she should call Mr Rose. They had neglected him this last week.

  Maybe Moira was right; maybe Wanda would be too angry to live with the Hakujin again. Teddy breathed deeply, thinking about the empty house next door. The Nakatanis couldn’t return to their old place. But the Minellis’ house was available. Well, she wouldn’t suggest it to Moira just yet. Teddy listened to the water running like fury in the kitchen.

  She picked up the deed and read, ‘Teresa Fielding’ with fresh pleasure. No one in the family had ever owned a house. Too bad Pop hadn’t lived to see this. Teddy shook her head and touched a familiar place of remorse. He had failed at so many things — the farm, the move, the dock job. Drinking was the only world where he could let go of his responsibilities and preserve his hopes. Surely he knew toward the end he was killing himself. After that much liver trouble you don’t keep up with the drink. Teddy sniffed, oh, they were all mixed up in her mind — Pop, Mr Nakatani, Howard — like Wanda wrote, they each died from the war in some way. She recalled that last conversation with Mr Minelli, the day before they took him to the hospital. ‘Your father must have been proud of you,’ he offered. ‘In a way, yes,’ Teddy answered to satisfy the old man. But she reckoned Pop was too busy being ashamed of himself to be proud of his children.

  One good thing — the deed meant she could send her rent money to Mom. That would let Mom drop one of the jobs — she hated taking in laundry — and just keep on waitressing. She would call Mom tonight. No, she would go over there tomorrow. She wouldn’t believe it unless she saw it with her own eyes. Teddy Fielding was twenty-eight years old and she owned a house.

  She sipped the dregs of tea, playing with the bitter leaves on her tongue, and thought back to that last conversation with Mom. Just the two of them.

  After dinner, they lazed around the kitchen, drinking the rich coffee Teddy had brought as a present. Mom looked tired, but satisfied as she described Jolene’s new job at the shipyard, Jack’s good grades in school, Susie’s geography project and the letters from Virgil. Teddy noticed how her mother looked younger than she had since they left Oklahoma. Pop’s dying had been terrible, but the death itself took a weight off his wife. There was a color to her cheeks and a lightness in her speech. Late in the evening, when they had run through everybody else’s life, Mom asked quietly, ‘So you happy alone in that big house with the other girl and her baby?’

  ‘Yeah, Moira and I get along real well.’

  She studied her daughter. ‘You don’t have no men friends? A girl your age’ll be thinking about marrying.’

  ‘Ah, Mom, I’m too busy. What with my job and the bond campaign and Tess, I don’t think I could add a husband.’ She concentrated an easiness into her voice, hoping Mom would drop the subject.

  ‘I don’t want to rush you honey, and God knows you didn’t have the happiest example of man and wife here, but I want to make sure you’re thinking of your future.’

  ‘I
’m fine, Mom, now when have you ever had to worry about me?’

  ‘That’s just it, Teddy, maybe I should have paid more attention. All these years you’ve been helping with the kids. And when did you ever get taken care of?’

  ‘When I got the measles. When I had my tonsils out. When you told Pop I had a right to typing school.’

  ‘All’s I want is your happiness. Somehow I been worrying about you. You really like that other girl?’

  Teddy smiled, looking for a deeper meaning in her mother’s face. Since she got all her own powers from Mom, the woman must know what was going on. Teddy had told Moira that Mom said little things that indicated she knew they were lovers. Moira said Teddy was crazy, that Mrs Fielding was as conservative as her own mother. But Teddy knew Mom must remember that conversation about her math teacher.

  ‘Yes, we really do care for each other.’ Teddy paused, waiting for a nod or smile, but her mother just sat watching. ‘We’re happy.’

  ‘That’s what counts.’

  Teddy slipped the deed back in the envelope and set it on the coffee table. She closed her eyes, listening to the clatter of dishes. Moira was slowing down; she could hear the radio again.

  ‘ … Forces, having crossed the Rhine …’

  She wanted to turn the damn thing off. She wanted to shut off the war — the shooting and burning and deaths and shortages and rations. Port Chicago and Normandy. She stared at the radio, willing it to say Virgil was on Iwo Jima and he was safe. Odd the way you listened to the news with two ears — one ear on the world events, one ear for relatives and friends. Like listening to a baseball game in which your family is playing, not caring about the score so much as about the individual players.

  Two weeks later Moira was still fraught. She ran the vacuum in short, jerky movements, considering how every last thing was making her anxious. The union was driving her nuts; Tess was getting a cold; she, herself, was verging on the chronic bronchitis which always accosted her in the drear of winter. Despite all this, because of it, Teddy remained full of cheerful support. Ever since she had inherited the house, she acted as if there weren’t an international problem she couldn’t settle. She refused to accept rent payments for Tess and herself. Moira explained her fears of debt. Teddy kept insisting it was their house. Moira felt a funny claustrophobia about the idea of Teddy keeping them. She loved Teddy, yet didn’t want to be beholden. She was so jittery that she even considered going to Los Angeles for a couple of weeks’ holiday. LA? she asked herself again and again. Well, the sun would do her chest good. Daddy had never seen Tess. Still, Moira knew something was very wrong if she were considering Los Angeles.

  At first she didn’t hear the phone over the drone of the vacuum cleaner. Then, for a split second, she thought she heard Tess crying. She switched off the machine and registered the ring, ring, ring. Pausing to ensure everything was silent upstairs, she reached for the receiver.

  ‘Hello.’

  ‘Long time no hear.’

  Moira was watching him dancing across the living room with Teddy … felt the warmth of his big hand on hers in the movie theatre … smelled the sweetness of his shaving cream.

  ‘Randy.’ Her voice was stronger by the second syllable. ‘How are you?’

  ‘Fine, just fine, and you, Moi?’

  How could he do that, call her Moi as if there were no distance between them? She sat down in the armchair and stared blankly across the room. The low afternoon sun played angular shadows on the ceiling.

  ‘Hey, Moi, you still there?’

  ‘Yes, Randy.’ Her voice was warmer than she intended. ‘Yes, I’m fine.’

  ‘Well, I was wondering why I didn’t hear from you.’ He paused. ‘You got my letter?’

  ‘I got one letter. Last month.’

  ‘I’m no poet. But I did want you to know that you’d be seeing me home, almost all of me.’

  ‘Thanks,’ she said, using her entire willpower to keep from asking about the wound.

  ‘Some greeting after those nights in the trenches I lay dreaming about you.’

  The trenches, she recalled the trenches from when she was first pregnant with Tess, when she talked him to sleep. So he had heard her. No, no, she needed to get a grip on herself.

  ‘Maybe you’ll warm up a little when you see me. When can we get together, Moira? How about I come over this afternoon?’

  ‘No, Randy, I don’t think so.’

  ‘Tomorrow, then?’

  What was the hurry. After all this time, he had to pop over right away? She reached down and pulled up her socks which were creeping around her ankles. Teddy was right; she shouldn’t wear these socks with loafers.

  ‘I don’t know, Randy.’ She hated the warm feeling of his name. Her voice grew distant. ‘I’m going down to Los Angeles to see my parents.’

  ‘Wonders never cease.’

  The bastard, playing on their old intimacy.

  ‘Anyway, I’ll be gone for a few weeks. Maybe when I get back. Will you still be in the area?’

  ‘In the area! I live here. I didn’t go to that Pacific swamp to set up a plantation or nothing. I was fighting a war. And now I’m back, grateful to be home, where I belong. With the people I care about.’

  Her throat tightened. The baby began to cry upstairs. Or was this her imagination? She put her hand over the receiver, lest he hear Tess.

  ‘Listen, Randy, I have to go. Maybe we can talk when I get back.’

  ‘What the …’

  ‘No, please, I really must go.’

  ‘There’s some other guy, that’s it.’

  ‘No, Randy. I have to get off the phone. I’m glad that you’re OK, that you’re safe.’

  ‘Gee thanks.’

  ‘Good-bye, Randy.’

  Tess was silent now. Moira sat with her head cocked, listening for her daughter. ‘Almost all of me …’ She was angry at herself for caring. She listened for Tess again and, suddenly panic-stricken by Dorothy’s story about crib death, she bounded upstairs.

  From the doorway, she could hear Tess’s quiet breathing. Moira tiptoed into the room. ‘OK, hon, you’re OK?’ she whispered. Tess breathed in and out, in and out. Moira looked at the mobile Teddy had bought last week: the blue and green monkeys danced restlessly through yellow hoops. Moira noticed the window was open a crack. Should she close it? How much fresh air did a child need? Would she get the bronchial condition Moira inherited from her own mother? ‘We’re going to Los Angeles, Tess. How would you like that?’ Moira watched her child, aware of a vague mutual protection. This baby was protecting her? Maybe Mother was right when she first heard about the pregnancy; maybe she was too immature to raise a child. ‘We’ll be fine, just the two of us.’

  When Teddy came into the kitchen that evening, Moira recounted some of the day’s events — that she had decided to go to LA — no sense upsetting Teddy about Randy, when she, herself, wasn’t sure how she was going to get him out of her hair. She knew she was risking her job by taking another sick leave. She also knew she could not stay here. She poured Teddy tea and talked about the warm Southern California beaches. She told herself again that the two weeks would give her time to make plans and give him time to cool off. It would save Teddy a fortnight of worry.

  ‘It’s OK with you that I go, isn’t it?’

  ‘Sure, it’s your health.’ Teddy watched her closely.

  ‘But more than that, I mean I have room to lead my own life?’

  ‘Room? Yeah, why not? Say, Moi,’ she reached over for Moira’s hand, ‘you OK?’

  ‘Of course I’m OK, why are you always watching over me like a mother bird? I have a little congestion. The sun will do us good.’

  ‘Us.’ Teddy bit her lip knowing that she was not included in the ‘us’.

  ‘Sure,’ Teddy said, ‘I was only worried about you.’

  ‘Y
ou’re always only worried about me. Or about Tess. Why don’t you worry about yourself for a change.’

  ‘Is there something to worry about?’

  ‘No. That’s not what I mean …’

  ‘Worrying about you is worrying about myself.’ Teddy paused. ‘I mean you are in my life.’

  ‘But we have separate lives too, don’t we? I need to know I have a right to move, to breathe.’

  ‘Sure.’ Teddy was baffled; however it didn’t seem safe to press Moira.

  ‘It’s just that we’ve been inseparable these last eight months. I need some time for myself.’ No matter how hard she tried, Moira couldn’t release the barrier. It would just get higher if she stayed in San Francisco.

  Teddy sat erect, fear holding open her eyes. She gripped the edge of the kitchen table. Staring at her white knuckles, she spoke deliberately. ‘Whatever is best for you, that’s what I want.’

  Moira cleared her throat. ‘Do you think you could take us to the station tomorrow?’

  Teddy returned from the station exhausted. She boiled some water, poured it into the tea pot to steep and set the kitchen timer. Then she stepped into the garden. Not bad for a winter crop: the cabbage and leeks and potatoes poked through the ground at different stages of green.