I think of Gwen at the old, emptied-out house. I have to remind myself that she’s a grown woman, that it’s not my job to worry about her.
Because I wanted to keep things intact for the kids, I started taking the house apart yesterday when they left for school. I made several trips in my minivan with breakables, and the children spent the night at Suzie’s so they wouldn’t see everything torn asunder.
Yesterday afternoon as I carried out my last box of dishes, a stranger with a notepad got out of her car and came toward me quickly.
“Can I ask you a few questions?” she’d said.
She had black rectangular glasses and was dressed, from trench coat to shoes, in flat beige like the dead grass patches where snow had thawed on the lawn. She had a closed-off edge to her that stood out in our small Midwestern town, like a cappuccino machine in a cornfield. I wondered what she had already written on her notepad, and what she thought she could possibly add to it by talking to me.
“No you may not.”
“What’s Gwendolyn Golden really like?” she asked, standing close to me now.
“She’s very sweet,” I said, though I’d told myself I wouldn’t say anything. Then I hurried away from the woman, as if she was contaminated just by virtue of her job.
This morning the moving van and hired brawn brought all our heavy things the quarter mile to this house. With the kids at school again today, Suzie was my assistant as we directed the movers, hung all the pictures, made up the beds, and tried to make it feel like home.
“Do you think she’ll get lost in there, Mom?” Joy asks, having appeared again beside me.
“I think she’ll be okay. She’s a big girl.”
“But not a giant,” James adds.
My kids all have Blake’s dark hair and eyes, with incredible long, curly eyelashes. I could stare at these children all day long.
“Faces and hands, then teeth brushing in your new bathroom, then stories, and then…”
“Eat candy?” they ask, nearly in unison.
Listing out the tasks ahead is a habit we started forever ago. The kids’ job is to come up with some funny alternative to what really needs to happen. It’s usually June who thinks of it, but the twins jump on board if they can.
“No, then a trip to Disney Land,” I say.
“No! Bed!” Joy and James pretend they’re setting me straight. They never get sick of this game.
I know someday they will, though. Someday they might also decide it’s not necessarily a benefit to live in a house so small that we can always see and hear each other. They may one day also think it’s odd that their mom saves all their old artwork, and has three levels of backup for every photo and video of them, like she would make time stand still if only she could.
So I remind myself to enjoy this moment, every moment, while it lasts.
I have logged so many hours here already, and touched every inch of every room, either with a sponge, rag, broom, mop, sanding machine, or paintbrush, or some combination of the above, that there really aren’t any surprises left for me. At least not until I tackle the back yard.
I expected the kids to have a harder time adjusting to the newness. I thought they’d call me upstairs a few times to reassure them about new shadows coming from different streetlights than they’re used to, or a toilet flush that sounds slightly more or less rumbly than the toilets sounded in the old house.
They climbed straight into their beds, though. I was able to orient them like they were in the old house. I also painted their rooms the same colors they’d gotten used to, and utilized all the same linens, pictures, and rugs. When I kissed the kids good night they said the house felt like home.
Their bedrooms are so tiny here I had to put dressers inside closets. I removed the closet doors and hardware and stored them above the rafters in the garage. We were heavily furnished in our old house, and moving into this smaller space meant I had to get rid of all but the most essential furniture pieces.
Gwendolyn was happy to buy what I couldn’t use, but I almost wish she hadn’t. The painted chairs, shelves, and odd little items that had made so much sense as part of a whole just looked sad and lonely in the bare house when I left. Like streamers after a party, swaying in an empty hall.
I stretch my legs out over the ottoman, and rest my back more comfortably against the couch. Our new little family room is at the rear of the house, with windows facing the back yard. When it’s cleaned up it may even be better than our old one, because it leads to common land, so there are trees to look at instead of the back of someone else’s house.
I chose this moss green chenille sofa with down pillows when Gwendolyn Golden said on television that a high quality sofa was the most important furniture item one could buy, and it was worth the money. I now know she was only saying what someone else wrote down for her. The poor thing is getting a couch that will arrive in two pieces through the mail! I smooth the soft chenille arm with my hand and think that this sofa has held up well, especially considering what it has been through: coffee and grape juice spills, three kids climbing and jumping on it, and today’s move.
This sofa was a big splurge. I waited until it went on clearance, but it still cost a lot. I bought it back when perfection seemed attainable, when trying for it seemed to matter. In this little house that I have painstakingly made my own, the first time I’ve ever done such a thing without someone else’s bank account at hand, or following someone else’s instructions, I feel like I’ve come a long way.
It has been an endless few weeks, and I’m spent. I thoroughly expect another blink night when my head hits the pillow. I lean back and try to enjoy how my body feels in a silent, inert state. I shake my head and smile, because resting seems so alien. I’ve been running, and scrubbing, and lifting, and hammering for so long, it feels bizarre to simply sit.
I retrieve the stack of mail on the counter that I brought from the other house this morning. I sort the junk mail from the bills before I take the newspaper out of its plastic bag and open it up.
I’m soon sucked into a poorly written article about Gwendolyn. It includes a few pictures, one of which is a family portrait. I look at the faces, but they’re a bit blurred.
It’s sort of interesting to see Gwendolyn’s dad. He looks curmudgeonly and wizened. Gwendolyn is a few inches taller than him, and much taller than her sister, who doesn’t look anything at all like Gwendolyn. The woman resembles me far more than her famous sister.
I stop and look closer. I catch my breath and my heartbeat starts to pound in my ears as I study the photograph and read the caption. Megan Draves is Gwendolyn’s sister’s name. Her husband stands next to her, and in front of the group are their two children.
I can’t believe it. I don’t want to believe it.
Megan’s husband looks so familiar I can practically hear his voice. I sigh deeply as I picture his intense eyes, and remember the smell of his cologne, like clean earth and leaves. Memories wash over me that I’ve alternately tried to banish and conjure since the day they were formed. I feel the softness of his dark chest hair under my cheek, his hand lazily caressing my back. He dozes beneath me while I listen for the church bell on the corner to say that it’s time for me to go or I’ll be late to meet the school bus. I hear him ask, “Can’t you stay a little longer?”
For years Kyle had been a regular patron in the university library where I work, half an hour’s drive from Riveredge. He was ambling toward a Master’s in Education and asked me several reference questions over the years. I helped him find his answers, like I helped everyone else. Though he seemed to invite it, I never flirted with Kyle.
Not until I realized my husband was a cheat.
My face burns with shame and regret, and with a touch of longing, too. I think I’d been looking for validation that I was desirable, along with distraction from my anger, and maybe some revenge. I only visited Kyle’s place three times before breaking it off. I thought at fir
st I wanted to hurt Blake the way he’d hurt me, but I soon realized I didn’t really want to stoop that low.
Kyle still calls, though I have repeatedly told him not to. I don’t answer anymore. I want to forget about him.
Kyle had charmed me in ways I don’t think anyone else ever had. Something felt a little off about him, though. Certainly not his lovemaking, but something else. It seemed strange that he was in his mid-thirties but didn’t have a job, and still lived the life of a graduate student in his spare studio apartment. There were obvious reasons to walk away from Kyle: I’m married, and even though my husband has relinquished his claim on my loyalties, we still have three children together.
There were plenty of reasons to stop seeing Kyle, but looking at the photo in the paper, I realize that I didn’t know the half of them.
Chapter Seventeen
Smith
I try to ignore the reporter shivering on my front step. I wish she’d move on.
I wish a lot of things. I wish I had somehow managed to rescue Gwen last night instead of merely landing myself in the middle of her Riches to Rags story (which I wish wasn’t being called that). I wish I hadn’t blackened an eye and earned myself the promise of a very public lawsuit. I wish the whole surreal, made-for-TV fiasco would blow over, along with the bitter cold front that swept in last night and has settled deep into all my aches and pains.
It’s my physical therapy morning, which is a lucky break for me. If I ever needed to see Irene, it’s today. I call her cell phone.
“Can you meet me outside the hospital with a wheelchair?” I ask.
“Why? Are you okay?”
“I’m just a little rusty; it must be the weather. Hopefully you can get me oiled up like the old tin man that I am.”
“I’ll be waiting for you.”
If I were a soldier I’d want Irene alongside me. I first met her after the frightening aftermath of my accident had passed, when my internal injuries had been stabilized, my broken bones had been set, and I knew I would at least live. With one leg basically crushed, and broken bones in one arm, six fingers, and I would have to look back at the records to know how many ribs, I thought physical therapy would ramp up slowly. But Irene made me focus on what I could do, not what I couldn’t. She started working me the first time we met—working me hard. In a lifetime of challenges, I had never been challenged quite like that. I swore at Irene. I shouted. She was tough, upbeat, and dedicated. Ruthless, too.
“I’ll get you out of that chair,” she told me, “but only if you’re willing to work like you’ve never worked before.”
Two months later I was walking, such as it is. But there’s a limit to what even Irene can do, and I have learned more about my own limitations since the accident than I ever wanted to know. I’ll never walk any better than this, no matter how hard I work. The challenge now is to keep what I’ve gained and try not to backslide.
Safely arrived at the hospital, Irene makes it over to my car before I can even get out.
“I see this town has another superstar,” she says as I transfer into the chair.
“Please, let’s not talk about it,” I reply in a low moan as she wheels me toward the building.
My feelings about last night are all over the map. I’m glad we were there to help Gwen put an end to that hatchet job of an interview. Though I hate to lie even by omission, and the truth about my accident hangs over my head like a grand piano ten floors up, I couldn’t let Gwen learn it on camera from someone like Stuart Bolder. I enjoyed hitting the obnoxious, dimpled, metaphorical stand-in for every person who’s ever insulted Gwen, and perhaps me. I hated falling to the floor as a result. I know I would’ve loved seeing Taylor physically throw all the vultures out, if I hadn’t had to do it from my low vantage point.
When it was all said and done, it wasn’t like I got to sweep Gwen into my arms and carry her up the stairs or anything. Once I fell, I had trouble getting up again. Taylor had to help me into a tortuous wooden chair while I tore at my coat looking for pain pills. I would have let him piggyback me to the car if Gwen wasn’t watching. As it was, I had to wait twenty minutes until I could stand up and lean on my cane on one side, knowing Taylor would catch me on the other if necessary.
“I pulled something last night, Irene.”
“Certainly not a punch, if what I read in the paper is true. And here I thought you were a nice guy.”
She’s making light, but I watch her face while we wait for someone to enter the PT suite ahead of us, and it’s set like we’re under fire. I think Irene appreciates the fragileness of my body even more than I do sometimes. I hadn’t been really worried until I saw her expression.
“It’s on the back of my good leg, below the knee.”
Her forehead relaxes a bit. “Probably just a muscle. We’ll check it out.”
“It’s okay to say it hurts,” Irene tells me forty minutes later as she monitors the progress of one of the worst exercises. Sweat drips down my face and I want to scream. I’m afraid if I cry out, though, I might never stop. My leg is a crumpled shambles of collapsed nerves and misfiring signals. After years spent living with my amended self I can look at the damage without wincing, but I know it was worse when it was new to me. Being called Scar Face has been a reminder of how strangers see my body.
“How much longer?” I ask. I don’t want to say it hurts. I’ve never liked admitting something hurts.
Irene pulls my leg straight and massages all the painful parts.
“Let me get the knots out and you’ll be all done for today, Smith. Your pulled muscle will heal up just fine, but don’t do any more crazy heroics to impress your girlfriend.”
I try to smile, but can’t quite manage. I hate my goddamn limitations.
“You don’t believe she’s my girlfriend,” I say, sounding as defeated as I feel.
“Isn’t she?” Irene looks at me in a way that I find surprising. I remember women looking at me this way, but only before the accident.
Sometimes I think there’s a chance for Gwen and I, and other times it just seems impossible that she would go out with Scar Face if he ever gathered up the nerve to ask. “We’re just old friends,” I say.
“Well, in that case, I wondered if you wanted to come with me to the hospital fundraiser on the fifth. It’s next Friday.” She seems suddenly shy.
I don’t know what to say. Irene is very pretty. She’s kind. She pushes me to make the best of what I’ve got left. She has asked me out several times since I’ve known her, but I never thought she meant it. I assumed she was being sweet, being a friend. Today I can tell that she really wants me to say yes.
Before Gwen came to town, I would have jumped at Irene’s offers if I had thought that she meant them. I can see that she’s blushing; the scalp of her parted platinum blonde hair is pink. I haven’t been on a date since the accident, and for several months before that. I’m not even sure how long it’s been. Irene looks up and bites her lip.
“You really want me to?” I ask.
“I wouldn’t ask if I didn’t.”
“Do you get bonus points for bringing a patient or something?”
“If you don’t want to go, don’t torture me, just say no.”
“Me torture you?”
We both laugh. She takes an envelope out of her pocket and hands it to me.
“Here are the details. I wrote my address on there, too. Are we on?”
“I’d be honored.”
I’m surprised to see Gwen and my mom seated together near the enormous stone fireplace in the senior community clubhouse. It’s not shocking that they’re both here: my mother lives in the complex, and Gwen spends a lot of time visiting her dad. Here she can escape unwanted attention because it’s gated, and none of the residents would dare bother Gordy Golden’s kid. They look up together and notice me.
Gwen smiles and my first thought is that she should wear green every single day because she looks so gorgeous
in her emerald sweater. My second thought is that she’s studying me too closely, like she’s trying to figure something out.
I wish I could slow to a dramatic stop, suddenly drop my cane, do a forward roll, and pop up again like Gene Wilder as Willy Wonka. But I can’t. Gwen comes to meet me and holds my right arm casually as we go forward.
“I’ve been tracking you down. Jessie said you had physical therapy this morning. I waited at your office because she thought you’d be back, but you never showed.”
“How many autographs did she get you to sign?”
Gwen shakes her head, and I bet it was a lot.
“Your cleaner gave me quite a lecture,” she says. I picture Shirley with her mop in one hand and the other on her plump hip.
“I’m sorry.”
“She’s a big fan of Armand. I promised I’d get her an autographed picture. She said you usually have lunch with your mom on Fridays, so I thought I’d look for you here.”
I don’t explain where I went after my therapy appointment. I had to visit my attorney because of the very expensive lawsuit that will be filed against me. I know it’ll upset Gwen when she finds out. It upsets me, too. Throw Taylor’s suit in and it’s a goddamn double whammy, and not exactly my idea of a good way to spend part of a business day.
“Want to join us for lunch?” I ask.
“I wish I could, but my dad’s expecting me soon. He’s making pasta.”
“What were you two chatting about?” I ask, looking from my mom to Gwen. I don’t like the guilty look on my mother’s face.
“We were talking about your accident.”
I turn away for a moment and look out the window at the snow piled high along the parking lot’s edges. I don’t like to think about the accident, especially when I’m already in pain. I sometimes break out in a cold sweat and feel the aftershocks of the impact all over again. I wish they had been talking about my nice house, or my recent impressive sale of the 404 building.
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