Real Life

by Sharon Butala

  One summer afternoon, years earlier, she’d been passing with Jeff in his stroller and Janice holding onto the handle, when a woman, looking to be slightly older than Beth and wearing shorts and a T-shirt, had come out the back door, knelt in the flower bed at the side of the house, and begun weeding. A moment later a boy of about ten, also wearing shorts and a T-shirt, came out and stood beside her. It was their faces that held Beth—their expressions contained such misery that she couldn’t look away. Just as Beth and the children were almost opposite the house, the front door opened, a man came briskly out, his face set grimly, and strode to where the woman knelt and the boy stood at the flower bed. He reached toward the woman, the boy stepped between them, there was a wordless struggle, the woman starting to rise, the boy grasping his father’s forearm, the man shoving the boy to break his grasp so that the child fell hard, full-length, onto the lawn, and then the husband stepping over the boy and striding away down the other side of the house.

  Beth hadn’t known what to do. Call the police? Call to the woman and the boy to ask if she could help? Instead, appalled and full of some emotion she couldn’t quite identify—fear? shame?—she averted her eyes, at least partly not to let woman and boy know there’d been a witness to their humiliation, and kept going.

  The house had changed hands a couple of times since then, and she’d never seen that family again. She hoped the woman had had the sense to take her son and leave before worse harm was done. But remembering the look on her face, the way she seemed less afraid than terribly sad, and yet somehow resigned or patient about what was happening, Beth knew that the woman would never leave. But she often wished that she’d walked up the sidewalk to the two of them and offered help.

  At least Duncan had never abused her. That was what she’d told people whether they asked or not, over the years. He never laid a finger on me, she’d told her parents and her siblings and her friends—later, when she began to have friends again. But she wouldn’t think about it; it was stupid to still occasionally catch herself thinking about it.

  At dinner that night she broke the news of Janice’s divorce to Hugh. For a long time he said nothing, seeming stunned by it, and she watched his face grow slowly old, lines that the low light of the dining-room chandelier had faded reappearing in his forehead and around his mouth.

  “I thought they were happy,” he murmured, and raised his eyes to meet Beth’s across the half-eaten casserole, the salad bowl, and their empty wineglasses. She had a sudden intuition that he had wondered if some fatal flaw of Beth’s, who was already divorced when he met her, had surfaced in their daughter. She could see him erasing the notion as quickly as it arrived.

  “She says they aren’t happy together, that it was a mistake, nothing else,” Beth told him, her voice gentle, as if she were explaining something sad about life to a child.

  “Nothing else?—” he said. “A marriage is nothing—”

  “I was glad,” Beth said. “I don’t want her to suffer, and if she’s not suffering—”

  “If she’s not suffering,” Hugh said, “either she’s lying or there’s something wrong with her.” When Beth didn’t respond, he went on. “Remember the wedding? Remember?” His voice was louder now and colour was returning to his face. Beth remembered now too: the long intimate gazes into each other’s eyes, their hands clasped tightly together, the endlessly long kiss at the altar, and at the head table during the reception, kiss after kiss, while the guests clapped and laughed and clattered spoons against their glasses.

  “I always said,” Beth remarked, “that no matter how much people think they do, no one knows what goes on inside a marriage.” Before she could stop herself, she was back inside her own first marriage, Duncan browbeating her over something she’d said or done that she herself wasn’t even able to remember. Or, she thought now, that had never happened, that he invented because he seemed to hate me so much.

  “What’s wrong?” Hugh asked.

  “It’s just—Janice and Gerry,” she said, not looking at him. But she could feel his eyes held on her face.

  “It’s natural that old memories would surface at a time like this,” he told her gently. Beth lowered her head, unable to look at him.

  “I think you should go to her,” he went on, lifting his fork and setting it down again against the pale tablecloth.

  “But I offered to. She was adamant that I shouldn’t come, that she doesn’t need me.”

  “Never mind,” Hugh told her. “Go anyway. Go tomorrow.”

  “I’m supposed to work at the nursing home tomorrow afternoon.”

  “Get somebody to work for you.”

  “It’s just that she said—”

  “I know,” he said. “But how clearly can she be thinking? Go to her and see for yourself.”

  As soon as she arrived at the bus station in the city she called Janice at work to give her a little warning.

  “I’m staying at a hotel,” she told her. “I don’t want to be—I don’t want to make matters worse.”

  “Don’t be ridiculous, Mom,” Janice said, sounding like an exasperated parent. “Gerry’s moved out. Come to the apartment. I’ll leave now and meet you there.”

  The apartment had been half emptied of furniture. There was still the sofa and coffee table, and a small television set standing on a folding TV table instead of the elaborate wall unit that had been there the last time Beth had visited, and there were a couple of whiter rectangles of space on the white wall where pictures had once hung. The kitchen looked much the same, although now there were only two chairs at the small maple table instead of four, and the wedding-present microwave was missing from the counter.

  “I told him to take it,” Janice said, noticing her mother glancing at the empty spot framed by crumbs. Janice and Gerry both had careers, they had little time for housekeeping. “This weekend I plan to take stock. I might even move. You can help me figure it all out,” she said to her mother, casting a smile at her over her shoulder as she opened the fridge door to put away some of the few groceries Beth had brought. Beth had barely registered the briefness of the smile before the fridge’s emptiness, its gleaming white walls, struck her with a pang of grief. She’d arrived alone in this very city with only her clothing, a couple of paintings, some books to be unloaded into three bare, white-walled rooms like Janice’s, but hers without so much as a bed in it or even a chair to sit down on. And Duncan’s cheque in her purse that she couldn’t bear to look at. She had been too numb even to cry, and that pain in her chest had spread and spread until it filled her throat and her abdomen …

  “Mom! What’s wrong?” Janice was staring into her face with a worried expression. “You’re not sick, are you?”

  Beth said, “I came here to make sure you’re all right,” and she laughed, embarrassed, turning away, taking off her coat and going to the closet at the front door to hang it up.

  From the kitchen Janice called, “Should we just have omelettes for supper? And you brought a bottle of wine. Great!”

  That night, sleeping on the wide living-room couch, refusing Janice’s insistent offer of what was now the only bed in the apartment, Gerry having taken the one in the spare room, Beth had a dream; a strange, confusing dream that, although it wasn’t a nightmare, troubled her enough to wake her, and for a long time she couldn’t go back to sleep.

  In the morning, trying to tell Janice about it, she found she couldn’t get its images clear or convey its impact, which had been considerable.

  “I was walking in a jungle, I think it was, or a forest like in Stanley Park in Vancouver.” Janice said, “Mmmm,” glancing at the newspaper folded on the table beside her. “It was very dark and I couldn’t see my way. There was somebody with me or behind me, I think. A man. I think it was your father, or else maybe it was my first husband—Duncan.”

  “Duncan,” Janice’s voice overlapped Beth’s. “God, Mom, how old is that marriage anyway? And you’re still dreaming about him?” Flustered, Beth laughed in
embarrassment.

  “I’m sorry,” she said. “I’m supposed to be here to check you out.” She smiled apologetically at her daughter. “Your father wants to make sure you’re okay.”

  “Do I look like I’m in trouble?” Janice asked. She glanced down quickly, before Beth could read anything in her lively brown eyes, so unlike Beth’s own, which were hazel and deep-set, and which she knew often held a puzzled, faintly worried look.

  “Would you tell me if you were?” For a long moment Janice said nothing. Beth could see some resistance leaving her, her face grew softer, and her shoulders lowered barely perceptibly.

  “I miss him,” she said. “And I feel—bad—you know? Because we thought we really loved each other, and it’s so … empty without him.” She lifted both her hands and pressed their heels against her eyes. “Tell me I’ll get over this,” she said, her voice muffled. Beth wanted to hold her daughter against her breasts, to smooth her gleaming dark hair and kiss away her tears, but she knew better than to move. Janice put down her hands. “You’re still not over Duncan—”

  “I was married to him for eight years,” Beth said gently. “I left my home, my job, my family and friends, I moved into his community. On the farm we could never escape each other. We were both there, all the time. And he—” “He was cruel to you,” Janice said, softly. “I’ve never said that,” Beth said.

  “You never said anything,” Janice said, suddenly sharp. “But we always knew, all of us, when you were thinking about him. He was part of all our lives, even though none of us ever met him.” She laughed in a surprised way, as if she’d just realized this, and found the realization amusing in a woeful, world-weary way. “And Dad used to say, ‘Leave your mother alone, give her some space.’”

  Beth could feel a flush rising up her neck, and her knuckles, newly slightly arthritic, began to ache, a faint, low-level pain that was, nonetheless, a kind of suffering. She wanted to be angry, she thought how good it would be to be angry, to break dishes and scream terrible things, maybe even obscenities, if she could think of any, but she never had done any of these things, and now seemed hardly the time to begin. She took refuge in getting the coffee pot and refilling both their mugs.

  “It’s Saturday, you don’t have to go to work. Let’s go shopping for a microwave and a new TV stand.”

  “Let’s go to the big mall,” Janice said. “I haven’t been there since we got married. Gerry hates malls and especially that one, it’s so noisy and crowded.” She pulled her thick hair back from her face. “Maybe I could get my hair done, something new. Mmmm?”

  “We can have lunch there, make a day of it,” Beth said, forcing gaiety into her voice, as she knew Janice had just done.

  Beth’s dream had been weighted with such mystery that, simple as it was, she couldn’t forget it, nor go back to sleep: night in an enormous, endless forest of huge, tall trees, so that she made her way in darkness, yet without stumbling on protruding roots or undergrowth. And a man following her, a husband, although she couldn’t be sure which one it was, or even if it was one of the men she’d been married to in real life. About three a.m. she got up quietly, intending to make herself a cup of herbal tea. A shaft of light glowed under Janice’s door, and seeing it, Beth knocked softly. She heard a murmured “Come in.”

  “Can’t sleep?” she asked.

  “I’m having trouble these days,” Janice admitted. Beth could see the dark smudges under her daughter’s eyes and a tight sheen to her cheeks that made her suspect she had been crying. “You’re not sleeping either?” Janice asked Beth.

  “I think it was American Beauty,” Beth answered ruefully. In the late afternoon they’d passed the mall’s movie theatres and, their feet and legs aching, and in unspoken agreement of their disinclination to return to Janice’s desolate apartment, they’d bought tickets and gone in. “What an ending.”

  “I think in real life he’d have been more likely to shoot himself,” Janice said in a thoughtful tone.

  “I hated the way the Annette Bening character was treated,” Beth said. “Like all the ills of Amercan society are the fault of women. She was the only character you never got to empathize with.” Beth had sat down on the chintz-covered armchair next to the bed. At its foot she could see the square indentation in the rug of a missing bedtable. Janice set her book down on the white eyelet quilt and pushed her pillows up against the headboard, pulling herself to a sitting position. She was wearing a blue T-shirt with a faded, unreadable message across her small breasts and Beth’s heart gave a little lurch, so that she looked away, quickly, before Janice noticed.

  “I think I’ll make myself a cup of tea. Want one?” Janice asked.

  “I’ll do it,” Beth said, but neither of them moved. They sat on in drowsy silence, each thinking her own thoughts. Outside, in the city, there was only a deep, lulling hush, as if in all the world only they two were awake.

  “When I was married to Duncan,” Beth said, conscious of the way that Janice was suddenly perfectly still, listening with her whole body, “I used to do the public health flu shots in some of the rural communities around the farm. One time I had to go to the farthest-away, most-isolated hamlet in the whole area. The nurse who usually did that community was sick, so they sent me. I was supposed to be finished by five and home by seven, but it was winter and a storm came up and I couldn’t leave.” She was staring at the rug and, without noticing she was doing it, she pulled her dressing gown more tightly across her chest. “So an older woman who’d been helping me—she wasn’t a nurse, she was making coffee for the people who came in for shots, and showing them where to sit, and if they were really old, making sure they were okay before she let them leave—she said I’d better stay overnight at her house.” She turned her head to Janice, explaining, “The village was so small there wasn’t a hotel or a motel and the blizzard was blowing so hard you couldn’t see across the street. And there were snowbanks everywhere, it was getting dark—” She stopped and drew in a long breath through her nostrils, mouth closed, and went back to fingering her dressing gown, her eyes returning to the rug.

  “Mom—” Janice began.

  “And so I went to her house. It was a small, old frame house, but very neat and well kept. We went into the living room. It was an ordinary room, hand-crocheted afghans covering the sofa and chairs, lace doilies on the coffee table. A little worn, maybe, but very clean. Her husband was reading a book in an easy chair, in the lamplight. She introduced me to him. He was a nice-looking man, maybe in his sixties, he said hello, but he didn’t get up. We two women cooked supper together and the three of us ate. Then we all went back to the living room and sat down. I remember we didn’t put the television on until it was time for the news. We just sat there and tried to make conversation. As soon as the news was over I went to bed. I didn’t sleep much. In the morning the storm was over and I went home …” In the pause she could feel the intensity of Janice’s listening. “A couple of weeks later Duncan and I were eating breakfast and the radio was on and the announcer said that there’d been a murder-suicide in—in that little village where I’d stayed overnight. And Duncan said, teasing me, ‘You were there a whole day. Who was it?’ And I said—I named that couple I’d stayed with. I was just half joking, you know?” She turned to Janice. “But staying there had been—awful—just awful, the woman was so afraid of the man, she hardly dared to speak to him, and when she did he wouldn’t look at her, but he’d cut her off. And she’d get this little rim of sweat around her hairline—”

  “Mom—” Janice began again.

  “Just these little beads of sweat,” Beth said, touching her own temple. “And it turned out it was them. He’d shot her and then, I guess when he realized what he’d done, he killed himself.” Janice gasped.

  “How horrible!” She hesitated. “But how weird that you should have been there.”

  “I can’t explain that,” Beth said in a serious voice, as if Janice had expected an explanation. “I often think of it, alth
ough I’ve never been back to that village. Not once.” Tears had crept into her eyes and now they spilled down her cheeks. “I never told Hugh that—I mean, that I was there—or anybody else that I can remember,” she said. “I don’t know why not.”

  Janice spoke carefully, as if she were afraid that this was a question her mother might not like. “How long was it after that before you and Duncan split up?”

  “What? Oh—” Beth thought. “It was the same year. That was in the late fall and I left the farm this time of year, after Christmas.” Realizing why Janice had asked this, Beth turned quickly to her. “I was never in danger of being shot by Duncan. I certainly never thought that I was.”

  “Still,” Janice said, “he did you serious damage, I think.”

  “It wasn’t all his fault,” Beth said. “I thought when we got married that I didn’t have to be a person any more, or else that he’d show me how, or something. He had such … charisma, such fearlessness. Things I didn’t have myself and didn’t know how to get. I mean, I gave myself over to him. I gave him my whole life, I kept nothing back. And that was stupid and wrong. It took me a long time to figure that out.”

  “If he mistreated you, how can it be your fault?” Janice asked, the hint of exasperation returning to her voice, so that Beth knew that Janice hadn’t understood, or didn’t want to understand what Beth had just told her. “You weren’t cheating on him or mistreating him in any way, I’m sure. I know you, Mom. You’d never do anything like that. So if he mistreated you, it wasn’t your fault.” But then, Beth thought, if after so many years of struggling, I finally understand that myself, I also know that understanding isn’t enough, that there has to be more for me to figure out about how I was then. And the dark forest of her dream returned to her, so that she put her hand against her eyes and then put it down again.