The Super Ladies

by Petrone, Susan

  “It’s just that they’ve been sort of vetted by the community.”

  “What happens when you get to three hundred characters?”

  “Graduate school. Then you get like five hundred characters.” He went back to the phone, clicking on one of the icons. “One of the cool features is that you can major in different subjects. For instance, the Super Ladies feed links to the online comic, so one of our majors is art. Get it? So people looking for art-themed Icers can find us under ‘art.’”

  “Icers? I know I’m not what most people would define as ‘cool,’ but that’s a really lame name.”

  “Yeah, I know. That’s the only dorky thing about the site. Other than that, it’s pretty hip. And everybody’s using it. It’s growing faster than any other social media site.”

  Eli’s enthusiasm was so rare that she hated to say anything that might squelch it, but this also affected her life. “The strip and the IcyU feed—isn’t it all a bit much?”

  Eli looked genuinely surprised. “Mom, what you and Aunt Katherine and Aunt Abra can do is pretty amazing. I understand wanting some privacy—that’s why I made up those names for you—but, you know, this makes a really great comic. Nobody knows that it’s real.” Eli must have read something in Margie’s face because he asked, “Are you, I don’t know, embarrassed or something?”

  “No, not at all,” Margie said. It wasn’t the first time she had ever lied to one of her children. She tried not to feel too guilty about it. “So where did you get the idea for the arm wrestling bit?” she asked.

  Eli’s grin made him look like a giant, mischievous imp. “You haven’t see it?” He grabbed his tablet off the floor and called up a video. “Last night, I was Googling the word ‘indestructa.’”

  “Because you don’t trust your mother to give you the correct feminine Latin ending.”

  “Come on,” Eli said with mock exasperation. “I was playing around. And this came up. Here,” he said, putting the tablet into her hands. As soon as Margie saw the video on the screen, she knew she and Katherine would have a lot to talk about.

  ⍟ ⍟ ⍟

  Anna, Joan, and Grant were all on the Sea Monkeys Summer Swim Team together. Joan was on it because she liked swimming outside and winning her heats, which she usually did. Grant swam because baseball practice wasn’t until the afternoon, and he was starting to realize that being one of only a handful of eleven- and twelve-year-old boys on a team with a plethora of eleven- and twelve-year-old girls was an asset rather than a liability. Anna swam because she worshipped Joan as the big sister she didn’t have and wanted to be just like her. With their mornings occupied by swim team, none of the three ever complained about being bored during the summer, and they all slept soundly at night, so Katherine and Margie kept signing them up.

  Katherine had been late for practice, so the few good chairs were already snagged by the other swim team parents. She’d settled in next to Margie on a recliner that was missing a couple vinyl straps, so she had to keep shifting her weight to make sure one of her butt cheeks didn’t fall through the gaps. They were quiet for a few moments, and Katherine leaned back and closed her eyes, just soaking up the morning sun and listening to the rhythmic splish-splash of thirty-two kids swimming laps outdoors at the same time. There was a distinct but indeterminate hmm from Margie.

  “What?” Katherine asked.

  Margie looked up from her phone and coyly asked: “So what have you been up to this week?”

  “The usual.”

  “Out fighting crime or perhaps performing unusual feats of strength?” As she said this, Margie held up her phone so Katherine could see it.

  “What?” She scooted over to Margie’s recliner and squished in on the end so she could get a better look. There was the Super Ladies online comic with the Indestructa character arm wrestling a series of people. Eli had drawn each of her opponents progressively larger, which made the final frame of a yawning Indestructa looking at the nails on her left hand while slamming down a Hulk-like arm with her right even funnier. “I didn’t even tell him about this. How did Eli find out?”

  “He found an unusual video online,” Margie said. “I suspect that the backstory to this whole thing is fascinating, Indestructa Jones.”

  “I didn’t want to use my real name,” Katherine replied, trying not to sound too defensive. Watching the video in the light of day was disconcerting. The whole thing had been an experiment, not something to share with the world. The comic was one thing—that was an interpretation. The comic was great. A video was much more immediate. And it wasn’t an interpretation—it was a documentation of real life. Her life. She was glad she had worn the loud reading glasses. She hadn’t done that great a job hiding behind her hair, but half the comments focused on the glasses, not her. If she was going to do something like this again, she’d need the glasses. She had posted one or two things to the IcyU account for fun, not thinking that Eli probably checked it frequently. “He even got the pushing-the-car part.”

  Margie slid her star-shaped sunglasses to the top of her head. “That actually happened?”

  “Kind of. I helped this older couple whose car was stalled. I pushed it up Cedar Hill to a gas station.”

  “How did Eli find out about it?”

  “The Super Ladies posted it on IcyU.” Katherine called up the site on her phone and handed it to Margie so she could read: “IC_SuperLadies posted: One stalled car pushed up a hill. One more random act of kindness.”

  “Aw, that’s sweet,” Margie said. “That is kind of what we’re doing, isn’t it? Using our…”

  “Superpowers?”

  “That sounds freaking ridiculous, but yes. You’re helping people. That’s pretty cool.”

  “Thanks,” Katherine said. It was all pretty damn cool. Even if it felt like she wasn’t doing enough, she was at least doing something.

  Katherine liked to be doing something. The start of summer vacation always made her feel a bit restless. Once the school year was over, there was so much she wanted to do, so much to accomplish. People often said, “Oh, you’re a teacher? You only work nine months a year,” which really got her goat. They didn’t know that she was at school cleaning and planning lessons and holding meetings for a few weeks before school started and after it let out. Then there were the continuing-education and professional-development workshops during the summer, and the sixty-hour workweeks during the school year. Yes, her job did allow her to be here, right now, watching her kid swim at ten thirty on a Thursday morning in late June, but she had invested a whole lot of time and energy in order to make mornings like this possible. And watching swim practice still didn’t help her accomplish any of the personal goals she’d set for herself. She had a stack of books she wanted to read, the Natural History Museum had a lecture series she’d promised herself she’d attend, she had to complete at least one continuing ed workshop this summer, and she had vowed to finally strip the ugly striped wallpaper out of the small foyer by the front door and paint it. That last project had been on her list almost every summer since she and Hal bought the house twelve years earlier but had never risen high enough on the priority list to get done.

  The biggest thing was the garden. She’d done some simple cross-pollinating of a few different bean plants last year and saved the seeds. She and Anna started some of the seeds inside and planted everything else outside back in May, but her plans to track the plants’ growth wasn’t happening. She wasn’t much of a scientist if she couldn’t even keep track of her own experiments. Sometimes calling herself a scientist felt stupid. She wasn’t a scientist; she was just some high school biology teacher.

  She tried to keep her frustration at bay the rest of the day, even though Anna only worked in the vegetable garden with her for twenty minutes before growing bored. She managed to do some laundry and minimal cleaning while Anna played with a friend. At least the house didn’t look like a
complete pigsty.

  Hal called and said a few people were going out for a drink after work and would she mind if he went with them? It wasn’t a real question, just his passive-aggressive way of saying he’d be home late. She and Anna had a fun dinner on their own then settled down for a cut-throat game of Uno. When Hal got home, Anna jumped up from the living room floor and practically knocked him over. It was getting near Anna’s bedtime by then, but instead of starting to wind down, she wound right back up because she hadn’t seen her dad all day. Somehow it felt like Hal was intruding on their evening, like a guest who had overstayed his welcome rather than a member of the family. She knew that wasn’t entirely fair, but knowing didn’t change her feelings.

  Anna was happy to crawl into Hal’s lap and tell him about swim practice and playing with her friend Crystal afterward. “We did a lemonade stand and made seven dollars each.”

  “Wow, that’s great,” Hal said. He glanced over at Katherine. “Is that pure profit or gross sales?”

  “When you’re nine, you don’t have any overhead,” she replied.

  “We gave Mom free lemonade because she made it,” Anna offered.

  “That was very kind of you,” Hal said, giving her an extra hug.

  Hal truly was a good dad, listening to Anna’s circuitous telling of her day, adding in questions and exclamations at the right time. It was easy to see how much he valued Anna and her opinions. If nothing else, he was a great dad. Anna got to bed late because she wanted to stay up and talk to Hal, and Katherine knew the kid would be tired and cranky the next day.

  Eventually it was just the two of them in the living room, Hal watching the Cleveland Indians play the Texas Rangers on television, and Katherine reading a book on the Higgs boson. For every set of parents, it will eventually be just the two of them.

  “Do you realize that we are now closer to Anna’s going to college than we are to her coming home after the adoption?” Katherine asked. “That just boggles my mind.”

  Hal didn’t look up and didn’t respond, so she repeated the question.

  “I heard you the first time,” he said.

  “You didn’t say anything.”

  “There’s nothing to say. She’s getting big. I’ll worry about her going to college when she goes. Which will be around the same time I’m supposed to retire,” he added quietly as he turned his attention back to the game.

  “The world is not going to end when you retire,” she said.

  Hal paused the television. “Katherine, I’m sorry, but I’ve been listening to people all day. I’m tired, and I don’t have the luxury of staying home all day. I don’t get a summer vacation.”

  Katherine wasn’t quite sure how to respond to this. She took a deep breath and said, “This is one of those conversations where I’m not sure which one of us is being a jerk. Maybe we should change the subject.”

  “Gladly.”

  Katherine decided that Hal’s tone answered the question as to which of them was being a jerk. Even so, later, as they were getting ready for bed, she walked up behind him as he was undressing and finished pulling off his T-shirt for him. She wrapped her arms around his bare chest, gave the back of his neck a little lick, and then rested her cheek in the slight curve between his shoulder blades. “Hi,” she whispered.

  “Hi.”

  She moved her hands to his chest, he turned around. After a moment, Hal kissed her back. Maybe not with the full-on passion she might have wanted, but he was at least kissing back. This was good. They needed this. Not the sex so much as the connection, the intimacy. She unzipped his pants. “You don’t have to do anything. I’ll drive,” she said.

  Things were moving along for a moment then Hal jumped backward. “Ow, easy there!” he cried. “You aren’t starting a lawn mower.”

  “Sorry,” she said. “I got a little carried away.”

  “That’s okay. Look, honestly I’m really tired and I’m just not in the mood.”

  She put her hand back to work, more gently this time. “It seemed like you were getting in the mood.”

  Hal sighed. Truly, he looked pained, as though he knew he wasn’t giving his wife what she wanted but just didn’t have it in him. “No.” There was a finality in his voice that made Katherine realize that even her best moves weren’t going to have any effect.

  “It just seems like you’re always tired,” she said quietly.

  Hal gave her a quick kiss and said, “When you’re fifty-seven, you’ll understand.” Then he got into bed. I’ll never be as old as you act, Katherine thought, but managed to keep from saying it out loud.

  IC_SuperLadies posted: Sometimes you fight crime. Sometimes you go to bed early.

  Chapter Eighteen

  Even when Margie wasn’t working, it was too easy for the days to get away from her. There was a never-ending parade of children and appointments and errands and tasks that it seemed no one but she could do. For instance, she was the only one who realized it didn’t make sense to leave Eli’s dentist and eye appointments until the week before he left for college. The dental insurance only paid for cleanings at six month intervals; going now meant he could schedule his next cleaning for winter break. She was the one who marked the calendar for mundane things like giving Juno her anti-flea treatment because the one time the dog had gotten fleas, they practically had to fumigate the entire house. It was just a little pill that the dog seemed to think was a treat, but if she asked Karl or one of the kids to do it, they invariably forgot or didn’t put a check mark on the calendar to note they had done so, leaving Margie to go into the drawer and count the remaining pills. She kept trying to remind herself that her life was a blessing, that she was incredibly fortunate to be able to give her time to her family. But being held responsible for every last shitty little detail was driving her nuts.

  There was something more. There is always something more. She knew all about the problem that has no name and smart women sidetracking their own careers to take care of husbands and families. This wasn’t anything new. This annoyance and dissatisfaction and occasionally feeling that she was leading a life of quiet female desperation wasn’t anything new, but it was her annoyance and dissatisfaction and quiet desperation.

  She wasn’t getting hot flashes the way she used to. They still cropped up unannounced. She’d be going about her day when it suddenly felt like she was sitting and sweating in the sunshine on a ninety-degree day. Every older woman she had ever talked to about it said they came and went. Since she made the glass of water boil at Abra’s, she’d only tried to muster up a hot flash on her own once, and that was to open a jar of pickles. It was easier than holding the jar under hot water. That was about the only thing the epic hot flashes seemed to be good for. Stupid stuff. Not big things like righting wrongs and fighting crime. Plus she was still responsible for eight million other shitty little details.

  Grant’s twelve-and-under baseball league had games every Monday and Friday evening, which had raised some questions about whether or not he should stay with it, because Karl worried it would interfere with Friday night Shabbat. Growing up on the east side of Cleveland, Margie had had plenty of Jewish friends and exposure to the religion. But as an Italian Catholic, she had never really partaken in any Jewish rituals except for a few weddings and funerals and a Seder or two. It was only after she met Karl and started to see how his family melded ancient traditions with modern life that religion became real for her. That was why she converted.

  She and Karl were middle-of-the-road reformed. They went to synagogue on the High Holy Days but not every week. One thing they always did was celebrate Shabbat on Friday evening. That was nonnegotiable. It reminded Margie of the big Sunday dinners she had grown up with, when the entire family would get together. She loved the ritual of gathering her family around her, lighting the candles, praying, and sharing a meal. It was the one thing she insisted on. Except you were suppos
ed to light the candles before sunset and weren’t supposed to do any sort of work from sundown on Friday to sundown on Saturday. It was a day of rest. She and Karl took a more modern approach to the Sabbath than many of their friends, but they tried to keep to the work prohibition—no cooking, no cleaning, no homework. And in their house, no electronics on Friday night. Despite occasional pushback from one kid or another, having the entire family put away all their electronic devices one night a week was a blessing. Without the distractions of phones or tablets or televisions, her kids were reminded of their own humanity, of the joy and pleasure that comes with face-to-face communication.

  Grant didn’t want to give up baseball. He had launched an impressive argument that revolved around game time (six o’clock) and sundown during the summer months (anywhere from eight thirty to nine o’clock). “They still limit us to seven innings or two hours. I believe we can make this work,” he announced. Eli and, in a startling show of solidarity, Joan had backed him up. So did Margie. She had voluntarily converted when she married Karl but still maintained a somewhat loose interpretation of religious dogma. When Karl realized he was outvoted, he relented. Thus far, the family experiment in Friday evening baseball had gone smoothly.

  The Friday before July Fourth was rainy and cold. Margie hoped the game would be canceled and spent the day doing the semiannual Going Through Old Clothes, Sports Equipment, and Games For Goodwill. With Eli getting ready for college, it seemed like a good time to go through everything the kids had outgrown. When Grant told her the game was on, she hustled him out of the house to get to Forest Hill Park in time.

  Eli had taken to doing the five miles from their house to Forest Hill as a long run and then riding home with her after Grant’s games. Joan was at a friend’s house but texted and said she’d get dropped off at the park. As she ended up doing at most of her children’s sporting events, Margie sat alone, trying not to feel too resentful that it was her time, her life that was passing by while everyone else was leading theirs. Karl texted that he was running late because of an accident on the Shoreway but thought he would get to the park in time to see at least part of the game.