by Joni Rodgers
“That’s great,” Kit said. “I’m really glad for her.”
“You know, sweetie, if there’s something wrong, and you need to come down—”
“There’s nothing wrong, Mama. Everything’s great.”
“In fact, why don’t you? Actually, it does sound like a good idea. You know, I really could use a hand, and I’d love to see you, Bitty Kitty. You know you’re always welcome.”
“I know,” Kit whispered.
“You and Mel and the kids are still planning to come down here next month, aren’t you?”
“I don’t know.”
“Well, I’m still planning on it! I’m looking forward to it. I told them all down at the torture chamber I was holding off that cycle—”
“No, Mama, don’t do that. The most important thing right now—”
“Yes, yes,” Vivica said, “I already got that lecture from the home health nazis, but this is my body, and I’ll decide where it goes and when it goes there.”
“I know, but—well, anyway ... We won’t be—I mean, we still want to come, but we won’t be able to spend the week like we planned.”
“Oh, now don’t you kids ruin your vacation plans on my account.”
“No, it’s not that. It’s just ... I mean, we were—we are concerned, and we just decided to make it sort of a ... a weekend thing.”
“Nonsense! Everybody knows you can’t do Disney World in one—”
“I know,” Kit hedged, “but I decided to take some time off from work, so you know, budgetwise...”
“Time off? What for? Are you feeling all right?”
“Yes, fine. I’m fine.”
“How much time off are we talking about?”
“All of it.”
“What?” coughed her mother. “You quit your job? Kitten, why?”
“Mama, please don’t start.”
“Kit,” she started anyway, “someone as intelligent and talented as you—”
“What? You don’t think it takes intelligence and talent to raise children and manage a household?”
“I never said that.”
“But you think it, Mama, you think it all the time. You think I wasted my whole life.”
“I most certainly do not.”
“Just because you chose to be—”
“I didn’t choose anything! I never had a choice! When Daddy died, he left nothing. I had to support myself and you girls, and I had to do it with an educational background of charm school and tap dancing lessons. But you had a choice, Kit, and you chose to be an artist.”
“Oh, artist shmartist! I faked and copied and stencilled other people’s art on tasteless little bric-a-brack and white elephant furniture. I hated that job!”
“Baloney. You loved that job, and you were damn good at it. I always said that if you’d gone to art school—”
“But there’s one more thing I failed to do. Go to art school and be a painter. Go to college and be a music teacher. Go to technical school and be a paralegal. Did you have any other great ideas for me, Mama?”
“Yes! Millions of them. I had hopes and dreams for you, too. So shoot me. Don’t you have hopes and dreams for your children?”
“Yes, but I’m not trying to shove it down their throats.”
“Oh, don’t even!” Vivica sounded wide awake now. “When you wanted out, you got out. Just like that. I never said word one about it. And not because it didn’t kill me to let you go! Sometimes—oh, I tell you!—when I think what the two of you could have accomplished—”
“Yeah, I know, I know. We could be opening for everybody from Wayne Newton to the Lord God Himself by now, but instead, I got married. And since Kiki has to do everything I do, she got married, too. So of course, it’s all my fault. I disappointed you. I’m just a big ol’, stupid ol’, fat thighs, unemployed disappointment.”
“Kitten Amaryllis Smithers.” Vivica could still send her to her room, even when Kit was in her own house a thousand miles away. “I don’t know what’s going on with you today, but I am really not up for this.” Kit curled up at the corner of the bed and rested her head against the wall. “Kit?” She didn’t make a sound. “Kitty, why are you crying?”
“I’m not,” she denied tightly.
“Sweetie, tell me what’s wrong.”
“Oh, God, Mama. I’m sorry.” Kit audibly dissolved. “I’m so... I’m so stupid!”
“You most certainly are not.”
“I am! I break everything. I hate myself! I wish I was the one with cancer! I wish I was dead!”
“Stop it!” Vivica said sharply. “Don’t you ever say that. Not ever.”
“I’m sorry, I’m sorry. I don’t know what’s wrong with me, Mama. Lately, I can’t—I can’t even—” Kit left off, crying harder, struggling to breathe.
“Honey, shhh. Calm down now. Try to relax,” Vivica soothed. “Kitten, what on earth is this all about? Is this about Mel?”
“No,” she choked. “At first I thought it was, but it’s not his fault. He always—he only does what’s right, and I always—I don’t know...”
“Kitty, what on earth is going on?”
But Kit just cried.
“Tell me what happened with your job,” Vivica pressed. “Honey, why would you go and quit your job?”
“Because they fired me!”
“Oh, dear.”
“And I m-miss K-kiki and I’m—I’m worried about y-you and we don’t have any money and everything is rotten and it’s—all—my—f-fault!”
“Now, wait a minute,” Vivica said. “I hate to interrupt the flagellation fest, but let’s just take a deep breath and look this thing in the eye for a minute. First off, you are not stupid, and whatever that damn Andrew—”
“Ander.”
“Whatever. It’s his loss. Nuts to him. You are talented and intelligent, and if that job was out there, there’s a better one right around the corner. Now that you’ve had nine years of experience—”
“I didn’t have nine years of experience,” Kit sniffed, “I had one year of experience nine times.”
“Well, then,” Vivica stood firm, “it sounds like you’re ready for something new. Just shake it off, honey. Now’s the time you’ve gotta keep your wits about you. You’ve gotta take that ram by the horns. Have you made any inquiries or applications?”
“Not really.”
“Well, there. You see? Once you start putting yourself out there, opportunities will crop up, I guarantee it. They’ll jump out and bite you when you least expect it.”
“Yeah, right.”
“I mean it! Just keep your eyes open. Stay awake, be ready.”
“Okay.”
“And in the meantime, enjoy being home for a while, sweetie. You’ve earned a little time off.” Vivica softened the coaching tone. “Funniest thing, down at the chemo ward? There are plenty of regrets, but I haven’t heard a single person say, ‘If only I hadn’t spent so much time with those damn kids!”‘
“Mama...”
“I mean it. Being a mommy isn’t the only thing you’ll ever do, but it’s the most important, Kitten. It’s the one thing in my life I wish I could have done better.”
“Mama, you did fine. You did... amazing.”
“All I’m saying is—enjoy it while you can.”
“I do.”
“I know, Bitty Kitty. You’re a wonderful mother. And you’re beautiful and smart, and Mel Prizer is the luckiest bastard on the face of this earth.”
“Mama, I should go. The kids are up, and they make a big mess if they end up getting their own breakfast.”
“Kitten—”
“Mama, would you tell Kiki to call me when she gets home? When she gets back, I mean? Gets there?”
“Of course. I’ll tell her,” Vivica promised. “Kitten, you know I love you, sweetie, and if you need to come down here—”
“I love you, too, Mama. I’ll... I’ll talk to you soon.”
Kit set the phone down and pressed her warm for
ehead and swollen eyes into the cool pillow. By the time the pillow sham began to feel damp and warm, she knew what she had to do.
It wasn’t even seven yet, and Mel was planning to work overtime till ten. Kit got up and pulled on jean shorts and one of his old T-shirts. In the kitchen, she opened the under-sink cupboard and pulled out rubber gloves, paper towels, and a bottle of all-purpose spray cleaner.
Starting at the back door, she worked her way around the kitchen, leaving everything spotless. She opened the refrigerator and took out every last item, scrubbed the shelves, and soaked the crisper drawers in antibacterial dish soap before reassembling the whole thing. She bent over backwards to scour at the grease and grime on the underside of the range hood until it shone as white as the top facade.
“You two go on out and eat your cereal on the patio,” she shooed Mitzi and Coo away from the table. “And shut that door! We’re not air-conditioning the state of Texas!”
She moved through the living room like a cyclone, creating a Mitzi pile and a Cooper pile to carry up to their rooms, stacking newspapers and magazines to jettison into the recycling bins, then vacuuming everything from the carpet up to the couch cushions and even the dust bunnies on top of the drapes and the cobwebs above the ceiling fan.
By the time she finished scrubbing both bathrooms from grout to showerhead, the sun was moving over the windowsill, and Kit was sticky with dust and sweat, but she attacked her and Mel’s bedroom and didn’t stop until every item was in its proper place.
Looking finally around the immaculate house, she was breathing hard, but feeling oddly heroic.
Yes, she was guilty, but she would atone. She would redeem herself. She would systematically eliminate every bad thought from her mind, expunge every stray image. She would reclaim Mel from the winter of obesity and indifference and chronic fatigue that had engulfed him by providing him a place of comfort, a tower of strength, meals fit for a god, and a toilet that shone like an ivory chalice. Arrayed in lace and stilettos, she would entertain him like a mechanical she-devil. She would be a good wife, and she would never, never, never question or break a rule or betray her husband again.
She put in a load of laundry, then took another shower. She tied her hair back with a yellow scrunchy, put on a summer dress, and hung little sunflower earrings on to match. She made Mel’s coffee and laid the Houston Chronicle on the table for him.
Then Kit sat on a kitchen chair, waiting for the grating garage door opener to trumpet the arrival of her destiny.
It struck Kiki as odd that the pictures were in color. Because in the movies, pictures of this sort were always composed of stark black/white contrasts and grainy telephoto grays.
But the blend of Xylo’s hand on her bosom was explicitly clear and actually more coffee and cream than black and white. His palm partially covered the rose-mauve tip of her breast, as if to safeguard her modesty, defend her honor. Her upraised eyes shone blue as pool water above her soft ruby smile, and the strap of the red silk dress trickled down her arm. In the second photo, her head dropped forward, spilling golden hair against the sea-green satin of Xylo’s shoulder. His hand had disappeared inside the dress, but now his full lips shielded her nipple from the lens.
“Well, Mrs. Daubert?” Wayne’s lawyer said, and Wayne just stood there grinning.
“Well what?” Kiki slid the eight-by-tens back into the manila envelope. “I don’t know what I’m supposed to say.”
She stared out at the patio where Oscar and Chloe huddled next to Mrs. Quintantilla on the pillowed chaise lounge.
“She doesn’t get it.” Wayne wasn’t even bothering to promise and plead with her like he usually did. He seemed disappointed that she wasn’t upset by the packet he’d presented to her the way Miss Calico might proffer a gory trophy. “She doesn’t know what we got here.”
“Well, I guess you got... I mean, this must be grounds for divorce,” Kiki said. “Don’t you want a divorce?”
“No, Kalene, I do not want a divorce,” he replied. “I want y’all to come on back home and get everything back to normal. I want you to settle yourself down and be just like you always were before this jigger-boo come along and put all kinds of ideas in your head, and I warn you, Kalene—”
“Wayne,” his lawyer mumbled and made a let-me-handle-this gesture. “What your husband is saying, Mrs. Daubert, is that he still loves you. He forgives you and is willing to take you back, if you’re willing to come home and work toward a reconciliation.”
“No. I’m not going home with him.” Kiki could see nothing in this man’s eyes that seemed open to her side of the story. “I told you, sir, he drinks, and he went off with another woman and he ... he scares me.”
“Scares you?” he said patiently.
“He ... hurts me.” She swallowed and straightened her shoulders. “He beats me.”
“Bullshit!” Wayne exploded. “You’re the one running all over the country, hangin’ out in bars, screwing around with that nigger—”
“Wayne,” the attorney repeated the gesture.
“If anybody’s gettin’ beat on here, it’s me!”
“Wayne. Please.” He sat down in the middle of the sofa and motioned the two of them toward the wingback chairs at either end of the coffee table.
“Now, Mrs. Daubert, it’s not uncommon for a woman to make all kinds of wild accusations, including infidelity and spousal abuse, in order to gain financial and custodial leverage in these situations, so please understand if I’m a bit skeptical here. How is it that you’ve never mentioned any of this before? I notice the grounds you cited for wanting a divorce were ...” He consulted some paperwork. “Ah, yes. ‘Irreconcilable differences.’”
“He knows what he did.”
“Do you have any evidence? Anything at all to back up these allegations? Photographs? Videotapes? Affidavits from any of these alleged other women? Hospital records pertaining to your supposed injuries?”
“Yes! I—I had to get stitches one time. There must be a record of that!”
“Your chart reflects that you told the attending physician,” he consulted the paperwork again, “that you ‘tripped over the cat and struck your chin on a cupboard.’”
“And—and another time, I had a broken finger—”
“And you said you closed it in the car door.”
“He knows. He knows that is not true.”
“Well, that would be for a court of law to decide.”
“And I... Last year, I had a miscarriage.”
“Kalene, you shut the fuck—”
“You know, Wayne Daubert, Jr.! You know what happened!”
“You shut the fuck up, Kalene!”
“Enough! Wayne, that’s enough. Mrs. Daubert, please.” The lawyer gestured them back to their chairs. “That’s enough. Both of you. There’s nothing to be gained by this.”
“Please, sir,” Kiki started, “don’t make me—”
But he focused his eyes away from hers. He dropped his pen and fumbled with his papers uncertainly for a moment, but then he smoothed them out over the top of his briefcase and nodded to himself.
“All right. All right now, Mrs. Daubert,” he said. “Of course we cannot nor would we want to force you to return to Houston against your will, but we have obtained a court order enabling us to take the children—”
“What?”
“—back to the home they know and love—”
“No!”
“—with the father who has always provided for them so well.”
“I won’t let you, Wayne.” Kiki stepped between him and the patio door, as if that would stop him. “They don’t want to go with you, and you know it.”
“Mrs. Daubert, these are minors, far too young to make their own decisions regarding custody and placement.”
“That’s right, sir. They’re young. They are. They need their mama.”
“Not if their mama is ‘unfit.’” Wayne poked his index finger toward her, proud of all he’d learned about legal
matters in just one plane ride from Houston to Orlando.
“Unfit?” Kiki repeated, not even knowing what to deny. “I am not unfit.”
“Mrs. Daubert, in addition to the fact that your income is extremely unstable, we have evidence that the children have been subjected to some very unwholesome influences while in your custody.”
“Dang unwholesome,” Wayne concurred.
“Wayne, why are you doing this?” She tried not to sound scared. “Why won’t you just let me go?”
“Mr. Daubert is simply concerned for the welfare of his children.”
“That’s right,” Wayne nodded.
“His children?” Kiki almost laughed, “Where do you think his children were while he was—”
“Do you or do you not routinely take them into bars and nightclubs?” Wayne’s attorney asked, his proficient calm feeding off Kiki’s intimidation and panic.
“No! No, of course not! Unless you ... well, just—just during ... See, sometimes while I’m rehearsing, but—but that’s always during the day, and they’re not even open.”
“And are they not routinely left behind without adequate supervision while you travel out of town for several days at a time?”
“No! Not—not several. Just... just two or three maybe, and they’re with my mother—”
“Who dumps them on her secretary while she runs a busy office.”
“No, she—sometimes they stay home because—”
“And where did you say your mother is today?”
“Well, see, she had a bad time with her chemo this month and—and her white count got too low, and she had to stay in the hospital for a couple days, but Mrs. Quintantilla—”
“Who doesn’t speak English.”
“Well, not fluently, but—”
“In addition to which you have now been photographed carrying on lewd behavior in a public place, openly engaging in a sexual affair with some transient lounge performer.”
“Lounge performer?” Kiki burst out. “He happens to be a blues impresario!”
“He also happens to be a convicted felon.”
“No ...” It took a moment for that to sink in. “That’s not true.”
“Oh, it’s true, I assure you, Mrs. Daubert. Your friend spent fourteen years as a guest of the state of Michigan, which I’m sure gave him plenty of time to work on his music, but tends to be very troublesome to a jury. And we haven’t even mentioned the ... shall we say, ‘cultural differences’ that may cast a very bad light on you.”