by McNay, Dan
“So where are we going?” she asked.
“Someplace you will like, I hope.”
She didn’t like this ‘trust me’ stuff. It made her feel like a little girl being dragged somewhere. If he was paying her, she would have demanded to know where they were going. They drove out into the farm land. She didn’t recognize anything until they turned on the driveway that led back to the old house. The mailbox at the gravel road was the same one that had stood there for thirty years, with the handwritten McIntyre in red letters on its side. It was her great-grandmother’s, her great-aunt’s farm. The one her mother had traded to Edward for her court case or whatever it was. Soybeans were planted up to sides of the old house. There was a lane that passed in front of the porch. Edward parked.
It was a little squeeze to get out the passenger side door even with him holding it. He wasn’t ready to step on any of his crop.
“It looks like your soy is doing pretty good despite the K problem.” She had mentioned it in passing to Sean a couple of months ago, so that he could explain it in detail to her.
“It was a hell of a lot of Epsom Salts the first year!” He stopped and eyed her and tried to smile. “Sorry. It just annoys me silly when things aren’t correct. I thought you might like to see the house.”
She nodded.
“There’s a nice spot down by the creek for a picnic. We could even throw a line in if you want.” The handkerchief came out to blow his nose. “The door isn’t locked.”
She went in. It was empty. And dusty. She wandered through the downstairs, the dining room, the parlor, the kitchen. There was no longer any glass in the window panes back there. Edward was waiting outside the front door as she came back and went upstairs. It was very quiet. She remembered it all, where the furniture sat, the old pictures on the walls. It was a quiet and lonely place back when her mother would park her out here. Her great-grandmother and great-aunt were old then. They mostly sat downstairs and watched television. Aunt Eunice would run an errand into town. Daydee remembered playing dress up in the extra bedroom upstairs. There were a lot of old clothes. Her great-grandmother had been a looker and a socialite type in the 1920s. She had kept all the clothes and the hats and the odd underthings and the shoes. And the two women were more than happy to ignore her for hours on end.
Eunice enjoyed making sly remarks about her mother’s antique clothes. She had never ever dressed up in anything. She probably would have worn men’s clothes if she thought she could get away with it. She never married. Daydee had a sudden appreciation for her difference. God, what it must have been like out here feeling trapped your entire life.
The house was still just a sad and lonely place. She went down. Edward was blowing his nose again.
“Sinuses?”
He laughed.
“Let’s go have lunch,” she said.
They drove on down the rutted road to where it turned and bordered a grassy mound and a shade tree by a creek. The water was low this time of year. Edward opened her door. Took a card table and two folding chairs from his trunk and set them up in the grass. She took a seat as he went back for the very traditional picnic basket. She was afraid of laughing if he tried to hold her folding chair for her. The only thing missing was the tablecloth. The lunch had been packed by a maid or a cook.
“Wow, did you do this yourself?” she asked.
“I had help.”
They nibbled. It was apparent that she would have to start the small talk.
“So what happened with Sarah?” she asked.
That took him off guard.
“I don’t know. We struggled to have a child. We worked hard to give him a good life. He went off to college and never came back. He was sick of us. He still talks to her. We decided to build a new house and she threw herself into that. She designed, planned and decorated and after two years when it was perfect, she packed and left me.”
“I told you, no wife and no grandkids yet?”
Edward just looked at the ground.
“What was it like?” he asked.
“What?”
“New Orleans?”
What did she want to tell him?
“Well, I used to ride the streetcar out to the old zoo, before they closed it. I was there before they redid it all. They just had old steel cages and sick seals. I took long walks around Audubon Park and the universities. I would wander over to the Tulane library and look at random books like I was a student or something. No one ever questioned me.”
“You didn’t enroll?”
“I wasn’t serious about it. And I didn’t have any money. It was a fancy private school.”
They sipped their wine.
“So, tell me about here. What have I missed?”
He laughed.
“There was football… There was an old store front pool hall on Main Street. It was run by an old man. It was open all day and late into the evening and that old man would just sit there day after day. The farmers might come in during the day on their way to the feed store or the hardware store for a game. The tables all had wicker baskets for pockets. And he had a real billiard table with no pockets at all. The summer before my senior year in high school I was in there every day. I smoked rum soaked cigars and had a whisky bottle in my car out back and would go have a shot every so often. That old man finally got off his stool and started to teach me how to really play.”
And she asked him about the football.
It poured out. He played and they won the State Championship two years in a row. He and Jack went to Indiana on scholarships. The first couple of years were good and then there were other younger and more talented players. Jack stuck it out. Edward quit the team at the start of his Senior year at IU. He was no longer the star and was looking at sitting, watching others play. He stayed in Indiana and went to Law School and worked at a restaurant across the street from the building where he studied and took classes. The owners were big football fans.
And then he just ran down, like his battery ran out.
He finished his glass and poured another.
“So tell me about your son,” he said.
Daydee was tired of this. There was no way to continue. And she was seriously interested in him.
“Edward, I’ve misled you.”
“What?”
“What I said to you in the restaurant that morning wasn’t true. I was trying to get you and your buddies to stop hassling me.”
His jaw set somehow. He looked at his wine.
“Winston had just told me why you three were so paranoid. I was pissed. I was pregnant when I got off the bus in New Orleans, but I got rid of it. I actually have no memory of that night you guys did me.”
“I see.”
He stood suddenly and began throwing everything from the table into picnic basket. He poured their wine glasses into the grass and put them away. He began carrying everything back to the trunk. This was a little frightening. She stood because she was afraid he would yank the chair out from under her. After everything was packed away, he held the car door for her. She complied. He drove her home without speaking another word. She didn’t say anything. When they pulled up in front of the house, she got out by herself as quickly as she could. And he was gone.
Chapter twelve
She had started a letter to John. It was still on her kitchen table:
John,
I’m so sorry I’ve not written. Things have been developing here at a very quick pace. I don’t even know where to begin. It looks like the child and I will be covered for money for a long time to come, so you mustn’t feel obligated to me or her (I think) for support in that way. I care for you and would think it better that you figured out where you belong and what you needed for a secure life, making enough money for you to live comfortably. There may be jobs for printers here, I don’t know. But they do know you in New Orleans.
I’ve been lusted after my entire life. What if you found a person that had been in love with you for twenty years without a
ny hope of being with you or even knowing for sure that you are alive? How would you treat that person? Would you shine them on? Tell them lies? There’s someone here like that.
What if you suddenly felt attracted to another man after a whole lifetime of being straight? I’m very confused these days. These are two different people. I don’t know what to do. I’m really sorry to burden you with this. You who can’t be here and I’m sure I’m upsetting you a great deal.
I’ve never ever hung out with women. Suddenly I was one of the girls – for a very brief time – it was fun. I had never thought it possible. I think it has been ruined, but it could happen again somewhere else. Could you even stand me as one of the girls?
I have never cried so much in my life. Late at night. Over TV commercials. Over the strangest thing that could have ever happened. It’s the pregnancy thing. I discovered my father, still alive, living the life of a crazy shopping cart seventy-year-old, out in the woods behind the cemetery…
She wadded it and threw it in the trash.
* * *
She was very jumpy the rest of the week. Edward could do anything. Tag her again. Come after her with some other thing. She occupied her time cleaning and fixing up the house and working on the cemetery books. Hardly saw a soul. She didn’t stay out at the office after dark, and with the time change, it was getting dark at 5:30 now. Parking the pickup in the yard behind the house made it invisible at night.
So when she came home Thursday just before dark and found the odd-looking woman sitting in a car before her door, she was scared and almost didn’t stop. She took a deep breath and pulled up behind. It could be a potential customer, or who knew what. She walked over to the driver’s side. The window was down. The woman was smoking.
“Hi, can I help you?” Daydee asked her. There was not a soul around.
“You Deidra?”
“Yes.”
The women got out. She had the dyke look going. Trousers with the key chain and work boots and the man shirt. Short hair.
“I’m Sarah’s friend from Effingham. I want you to stop seeing her.”
Daydee didn’t want to get hit.
“Sure.”
The woman scratched her head.
“You’re bullshitting me?”
“No. Not at all. I’ll stop. I’m having a baby. The whole thing is getting uncomfortable now. And the baby’s father is showing up soon.”
“Well, all right then. It was nice talking to you.”
She climbed back into her car and left.
* * *
Edward called her bright and early the next Monday morning. He wanted to meet for coffee and suggested the diner. She countered with the Tastee Freeze right after lunch. He hesitated, then agreed. She ran to bring her father lunch a little early. The brisk air worried her. She was going to have to get him inside for the winter somehow.
Edward was at the picnic table already, with coffee for her as well. He looked at her sheepishly.
“Coffee with cream, no sugar,” he told her.
“Thanks.” She took the lid off to let it cool. “So, what’s up?”
“You don’t exist in New Orleans.”
“You tried to find me out?”
“You weren’t there apparently. Where were you?”
“I was, but I had a different name. And a different life.”
“How do I believe you about anything?”
“Like normal people do. ‘So, what was that like?’ would be a good question to use.”
“Look, I don’t like being lied to. It drives me crazy.”
“So don’t ask me any questions that will make me lie to you,” she said.
“What the hell is that supposed to mean?”
Daydee smiled at him.
“Look, I kind of like you,” she said. “I understand you want to hang out with me now.”
He was looking away.
“A lie is just a polite way of saying it’s none of your business,” she said. “Think about it. Boundaries. It’s supposed to make me more mysterious,” she laughed. “More sexy.”
“Do you have any diseases?” he asked.
“Hepatitis A. From a restaurant in the French Quarter. Pregnancy. Oh, and a doctor told me I had a Histoplasmosis scar tissue on my lung. That’s supposed to be spores from chicken droppings, from guess where.”
“I want you,” he said.
“How about another dinner and some light dancing?”
They made another date.
* * *
It was dinner and a little dancing. The dancing didn’t last very long.
Edward escorted her to the car and they drove over to his house. There seemed to be an urgency to this for some reason she couldn’t quite understand. Was he afraid she would change her mind? There was an automatic gate that opened from a remote in the car. There was a block long curving drive up to the front door. The lights were on. It was two stories, a good old fashioned wood frame mansion with real window panes and a huge front door with a real knocker.
He didn’t say a word.
Inside was a foyer leading to a curving grand staircase. There were doorways and more doorways. He went from one to another and opened them for her to look around. A library. A billiard room. A dining room that could seat ten and a large kitchen. A living room that opened out on a deck with a pool. He preceded her without a word. The place was spotless.
“You have live-in help?”
He nodded.
“So how many bedrooms?”
“Six. Four bathrooms.”
“You never wait your turn.”
He smiled.
“When was the last time you saw the help?”
“This morning. Shall I introduce you?”
“That’s all right.”
After the tour, he brought her back to a room with the French doors that opened to the pool and they sat at stools at his wet bar and had another glass of wine. The silence was overwhelming. He took a little vial out and made a line of cocaine on the bar between them.
He offered her a little straw. She shook her head. He finished it off by himself.
“You don’t do much entertaining.”
“None at all. Sarah had friends. I have Jack and Winston.”
“I’m not sure I’m supposed to have penetration,” she said. “You know I’m pregnant?”
“There are other ways to have fun.”
“You’ll show me?” she asked.
“Surely.” He looked at her. “What?”
She smiled, shaking her head.
They wandered up to his bedroom after a little bit and undressed and started to make love on the giant bed. She liked this. Everything was soft and slow and gentle. There was all the time in the world. He was arousing her, but she didn’t seem to be able to get him working. She tried out different things but nothing was happening. He shined it on. He seemed to be all right with not getting aroused. She gave up and let him bring her to orgasm. Then after a little rest, she started in on him. Nothing at all. She had known men who got aroused and came without ever getting hard. She tried this strategy, but it just wasn’t happening at all. After a long-extended try, he told her to relax. It didn’t matter. They lay intertwined for a while and then he got up and brought back wine for them. She only sipped it, feeling guilty about the baby.
“Anything you want to tell me. This is make a wish night,” she whispered.
“Anything?”
“Well, until I say stop, ok?”
He nodded. He got up and went to the dresser and brought back silk scarves.
“You say stop and we stop,” he said.
“Ok.”
He tied her wrists one by one to either side of the headboard. Then blindfolded her.
“Not inside, all right,” she said.
“All right.”
Then there it was against her mouth gently. She took him in this way. And it was over instantaneously. He was a teenage boy exploding.
He untied her and took off the
blindfold and they lay together, with no urge to move or go. They slept. Sometime in the middle of the night she awoke to find him next to her, his head on his hand, just looking at her. She dozed again and didn’t wake until the sun was in the curtains. He was gone.
This wasn’t bad.
* * *
There was a letter from John:
Dear Daydee,
I haven’t heard from you for a while, so I thought I’d write to say hi. I’m glad things are looking up for you and you’ve made some new friends. Hope they can support you in your new lifestyle. I’ve made a few friends in here. We might go off and start a drug ring after I get out.
I’d watch out if I were you. Little town people were always the worse kind of people. They all have their own agenda and think like bigoted small minded people, which is why they stayed when the rest of us left.
Jesus walks those streets at night, looking for scared peoples’ dreams to haunt.
You have always been willing to step into the middle of shit and let people beat you up. I love you, for what it’s worth. Probably nothing. I’m sober now, hopefully for good. I could be a good man and a good husband. Black fingers and black soul thrown in for free. I could be a decent father. And you probably need somebody to cut the grass at that cemetery. Ask yourself if any of your new friends are willing to mow the grass. And that’s a lot of grass.
Anyway, I’m trying for early release. Thought I’d head your direction come hell or high water. If for nothing more than to see the baby. It sounds like you will be busy. I’ll try to be quick. Would like to know an offspring of mine is as beautiful as I could imagine.
I do love you damn it. And I could be good to you.
John.
She would have to write him.
* * *
She avoided Edward for the next two weeks. She would pick up the phone and wait for the other person to speak before she would answer. When it was him, she would hang up without a sound. He left messages. He was sitting out in front of her house in his car one afternoon when she returned from the cemetery and she turned before coming abreast of him and then drove around for an hour before trying to get home again. His car wasn’t there when she came back again. When he appeared at the cemetery, she locked the office door and hid inside the file room. She stood out of sight with her hand over her mouth as he walked around outside and called her name. It was only after his car started that she peeked out. He drove around the grounds once before leaving.