As she began to climb the stairs, she was amazed to see that even the steps were littered with junk: piles of old tax forms, a box of winter hats and gloves, a couple of bottles of scotch with the holiday ribbons still knotted around them, a pair of dirty socks, stacks of books. It was as if Arthur couldn’t be bothered to find a home for such mismatched objects. At the top, she was confronted by a continuing path of rubble. Large stains marked the beige hallway carpet that led to a bathroom that might as well have been condemned. Crap pocked the upper edges of the toilet bowl, and the rusty water inside was rimmed with muck.
At that moment, Maggie realized a certain horrible truth: her dad had been living in squalor. And she hadn’t even thought to suggest he hire a cleaning lady. She’d assumed when he explained that a neighbor lady stopped by to help out from time to time, that he was set. What on earth was wrong with her? Her dad had never cared about such things. Why would he when Gloria left? Still, the vision that greeted her was incomprehensible, her childhood home transformed into an unsightly, behemoth dump.
But it was when she opened the door to his bedroom that she fell to her knees. The floral bedspread lay askew across the mattress, the sheets soiled. An acrid smell attacked her senses and she covered her nose with her sleeve, nearly gagging. She felt tears spring to her eyes as she cast about the room, more piles of junk lurking in every corner. How, oh, how, could she have been so clueless? There had been plenty of signs—Arthur’s absentmindedness, the collection of trash he’d started at her house, his overstuffed car—but she’d written them off as typical for a slightly scatter-brained older man. Clearly, though, what Arthur had been dealing with was much more serious than a handful of quirks. She’d refused to see what was right in front of her. Only when the teakettle lit up like a volcano had it finally dawned on her, on all of them, that Arthur needed help. But by then it was too late.
Nothing, not a thousand Hail Marys, could pardon her from such a sin of neglect, of abandonment. She quickly left the room, closing the door behind her.
Where to begin?
She poked her head into the two extra bedrooms, one her father’s study and the other now a guest room, her and Jess’s old bedroom. The guest room was relatively free of clutter, but Arthur’s office teemed with books and boxes. It could have been an aisle in Walmart or Target. Huge cases of paper towels, toilet paper, and other staples hugged the walls. Near the door sat several cases of fruit punch juice boxes, Luke’s favorite, and miniature packages of Goldfish crackers. It was as if her dad had been expecting them to show up any day and wanted to be prepared. She could hear him talking, as if perched on her shoulder. See, Maggie. I was ready for you. I was waiting for you. The thought flooded her with despair. She closed the door and slid down the wall to the floor. There was something terribly cruel about the juxtaposition of a life filled with so much junk and a life irretrievably lost. Arthur had died drowning, but he’d been drowning long before that.
She pushed up to her knees and crawled along the hallway, keeping her head down as if trying to avoid fire smoke. Suddenly, she was eager to be free of the house. She hurried down the stairs, knocking over the piles. She rushed out the front door, and then—she ran. Down the road she’d traveled earlier. And on. And on, until finally her throat burned so sharply that she had to stop. She bent over, hands on her knees, and drank in the fresh air like cold water.
She dug in her pocket for her cell phone, but it was in her bag back at the house. She needed to talk to Mac. Somehow he would make this right and explain to her why her dad had chosen to live this way. She gazed up, lovely cumulus clouds wheeled across a bright blue sky. Gradually, she found her way back to the house. The door was still ajar, daring her to step foot back inside. She didn’t want to. But she had to. Had to grab her bag and get supplies.
She inhaled deeply, plugged her nose, and darted into the living room, where she’d dropped her purse. She grabbed it, then hurried back outside, closing the door and locking it behind her. In the car, she tried to calm her thinking. They certainly couldn’t stay here. Maggie would have to book them rooms at the nearest hotel. And then she tried to remember how to get to Home Depot. She needed supplies, multiple provisions, a whole army of cleaning products. Hell, what she needed was the National Guard.
Jess
When Jess and Virgie set out for Maine on Wednesday, something nagged at Jess, though she couldn’t put her finger on what exactly. She’d stocked the house for the entire week and had posted the various doctors’ and dentists’ numbers on the fridge. Tim’s mom was on board to watch the kids. The assistant principal could pick up the slack at school. So what was it? Then it dawned on her: the strange sensation was missing Tim. The physicality of him. The comfort of him. He’d been remarkable the week after Arthur went missing, helping out at the summer house, talking to lawyers, cleaning out the mess that was Arthur’s car. It was almost as if her husband, after a long hiatus, had come back to her and the kids.
And now Tim had encouraged her to go to Maine and help her sisters organize Arthur’s affairs. Everything is under control here, he said. The old Tim would have never uttered such words. The old Tim would have whined with impatience, demanding to know why it took three sisters to sort through Arthur’s things. The old Tim would have sulked the night before instead of making gentle love to her.
The other night, just back from the Cape, she’d spotted Cole sitting out on his porch with another woman, much younger than Jess, with long, thick blond hair. They cradled wineglasses in their hands. Jess walked by briskly, pretending not to see, hoping not to be seen. All she could think was what an idiot she’d been. To have imagined that she was special! She was no different from the parade of women Cole entertained on his deck. She heard him give a deep laugh while he chatted with his date, and Jess thought, Yep, joke’s on me. Good one, Cole.
What would Arthur have said, she wondered, if he’d known about her brief affair? Would he have read her the riot act or would he have understood? It bothered her that even after all this time, Jess didn’t know. Damn you, Arthur, she thought. You were never there for me; why should I be there for you now? She gasped, the words springing to mind unbidden, as she gripped the wheel.
Because he’s our dad. She could almost hear Maggie whispering in her ear.
But it was Virgie, saying, “This reminds me of Dad.”
Jess was startled out of her reverie. They’d been driving for hours, listening to country-western music on the radio. The sharp coastal air cut through the car’s open windows as they pulled off the highway onto her dad’s exit. She’d meant to discuss Virgie’s diagnosis on the long drive, maybe encourage her to get a second opinion, but the moment she’d brought it up, Virgie had closed her eyes and said, “Can we please not talk about it right now? I don’t have the energy.” And so, what choice did Jess have but to crank up the radio a little louder?
Jess’s mind had been churning, thinking about how crazy it was that Arthur was no longer in their lives. She hadn’t even had a chance to have it out with him, to work through all those issues that daughters were supposed to with their dads before they passed away. What would she have said to him if she’d had the opportunity? I wish you would have been around more when we were kids. Why did you always seem to like Virgie the best? Did you really think your books were more important than us? Why don’t you like Tim? The thing was, she didn’t think any of Arthur’s answers would have been particularly illuminating. Perhaps it was enough to know that he’d loved her, loved all of them, even if he hadn’t always been able to tell them.
As for Virgie, Jess wanted to grab her sister and shake her, tell her to get her things and move to Boston. There’s no sense in going back to Seattle, she wanted to yell. Don’t be stupid! Who will take care of you there? But she’d done an admirable job of refraining, she thought, for the entire ride up to Maine. She and Maggie had talked the night before (you won’t believe the mess that’s here! Maggie warned) and agreed that pushing Virgie to make
any kind of decision right now would be the worst possible tactic. Let’s let her sit with the diagnosis a bit, Maggie advised. Let her figure out what she wants.
And now there was this other little wrinkle: Virgie had informed them that Jackson was flying out on Saturday. He wanted to be there for Arthur’s memorial service on Sunday. It was a touching gesture, but personally Jess thought that Jackson was only further mucking things up. Virgie didn’t need the distraction of romance right now. What she needed was her sisters, who could help her through this stressful time. She needed her family.
“What reminds you of Dad?” Jess asked now.
“This.” Virgie gestured with her hand. “The air, the smell of balsam mixing with the ocean.” They followed a winding road that curved back into a wooded area, limber firs stretching skyward to form a canopy above. “I miss this place,” Virgie remarked. “I haven’t been here in ages.”
“Me either,” admitted Jess. “Is that terrible of us?”
Virgie shook her head. “When Dad and Mom divorced, the center of our family shifted to Maggie’s house.”
“I think you’re right,” reflected Jess. Though for a brief moment she considered why it hadn’t shifted to her house. But Maggie’s house was bigger, friendlier—the natural meeting place for everyone over the holidays.
They drove by old farmhouses and dilapidated barns the color of smoke, the beams bent and breaking. Silky milkweed pods tumbled along the roadside. Jess thought back to one summer when a population of monarch butterflies had landed in a nearby field, blanketing the milkweeds in orange and black. Arthur woke the girls at dawn to watch as the sun warmed the butterflies’ fragile bodies into motion, and then, just as quickly as they’d appeared, they were gone, a thrumming flock suspended against a blue sky.
She was saddened to think that Teddy and Grace would never be a part of this simpler, breathtaking world once they sold the house. She’d forgotten how much she loved it up here.
Eventually, the car wound around the bend leading to Arthur’s house.
“Wow,” whispered Virgie when the place came into view. “Look at this.”
In front of them sat their childhood home. It looked, however, as if it had aged fifty years since her last visit. Paint curled on the front shutters, the walkway and front steps were cracked, and weeds and oversize rhododendrons swarmed at the front. Jess’s mind shot back to Boo Radley’s house in To Kill a Mockingbird. Maggie’s old Subaru sat in the driveway.
“Incredible,” she said as she pulled the car up next to Maggie’s and killed the engine. They climbed out just as Maggie emerged on the front steps.
“You’re here!” she exclaimed, running over. Her jeans were rolled up to her knees, and she’d wrapped a pink bandanna around her head. A paper breathing mask hung around her neck. “I can’t tell you how glad I am to see you guys.” She slipped Virgie’s purse strap over her shoulder. “Come on. You won’t believe this till you see it. It will blow your mind.”
Virgie and Jess exchanged glances. Virgie went first, while Jess grabbed her shoulder bag and followed slowly. Maggie slipped her free arm through Jess’s elbow as they walked up the path. As soon as the screen door slammed behind them, Virgie yelped.
“Holy crap!” she shouted. “What happened here?”
Virgie
Most of her adult life Virgie had guarded vigilantly against germs, slathering on antibacterial lotion. What a cruel, ironic joke then that her own body had turned on her, attacking her very cells. Still, that didn’t mean she was eager to confront the various species of bacteria and mold lurking in Arthur’s house. She gladly took the cleaning supplies that Maggie handed her: a bucket, a pair of bright yellow dish gloves, a bottle of Windex with ammonia, sponges, dust masks, paper towels, and a box of trash bags.
She and Jess tackled the kitchen first, where they scrubbed and cleared trash for several hours. It was all Virgie could do not to go running from the place. She’d never guess this was her childhood home to look at it now. She remembered walking down these very stairs to meet her date for senior prom, recalled meat loaf dinners at the kitchen table and watching Saturday Night Live with her parents on the old rabbit-eared television. She’d already crept upstairs to her old bedroom, now Arthur’s study, and had rediscovered the faint pencil marks where, each birthday, Gloria had faithfully recorded her height along the closet doorframe.
She couldn’t quite believe that her dad had let things get so bad. What had he been thinking? She’d once done a story about a hoarder in Seattle, the man’s house filled with old appliances, like broken coffeemakers and toasters. But unlike Arthur, that man had been a recluse, severing all his ties with family and friends. No one had seen him in years. Arthur wasn’t like that. He’d been out and about, socializing, working at the library, traveling to the Cape. He could still entertain a crowd with his stories. And yet, he’d managed to keep his obsession, for that’s how Virgie thought of it—an unhealthy obsession—a secret from them all.
It was eleven o’clock on Thursday, and already they were knee-deep into cleaning. Like a drill sergeant, Maggie had woken them at the hotel at 6:30 to drive over to the house. So far, the dent they’d made in her father’s mess was negligible. At this rate, it would take them a month to get the house ready to sell. Maggie had called a local company and enlisted a dump truck and the help of a few burly guys to lug out the heavy stuff. They’d filled fifteen overflowing trash bags, carted out her dad’s leather chair, the ancient television and its rickety stand, and thrown out a good number of boxes stacked up against the walls.
“Aha! I found it!” Maggie shouted out midway through the morning. It was their parents’ floral couch, navy blue with magenta roses running over it that had been hiding under so many boxes and books they hadn’t been able to locate it when they first launched Project Clean-Up.
“Oh, I remember that couch,” Virgie said wistfully. “Daddy and I used to sit on it and read the paper every Sunday morning.”
“I remember all the bad movies we watched on it when we were kids,” reminisced Maggie.
“Yes,” said Jess, looking over her shoulder. “Remember when Dad rented The Shining and neither you nor I could sleep for a month?”
Maggie hugged herself. “I was so freaked out by that movie. Every time I went in the bathroom, I was sure I was going to see REDRUM written in lipstick on the mirror.”
Virgie waved her gloved hand in the air. “You guys are crazy. I never knew you were off your rockers. And here the whole time I was thinking you were my cool big sisters.”
“Us?” Jess laughed as she threw old papers into a trash bag. “Well, maybe Maggie. But never me.”
“What are you talking about?” Virgie said. “You were the one who always wanted to save the world. Remember when you took all the money in your piggy bank and sent it to the starving children in Africa? You saw some weepy ad on TV.”
Jess laughed. “You’re right. I completely forgot about that.” She thought for a moment. “Grace is the same way. She wants to make the world a better place.”
“Good for her. The world could use her.” Virgie tossed a pair of brand-new men’s sneakers into the Goodwill bag.
“Is all this stuff going?” One of the guys from the dump truck company stood at the front door and gestured to three large trash bags. He wore jeans, a T-shirt streaked with dry paint, and a Red Sox cap turned backwards.
“Yep. All of it,” Maggie confirmed. “That’s all trash.”
They worked in silence for a few minutes. Then Maggie said, “What on earth was Dad thinking, saving all this junk?”
Jess shook her head. “Clearly, he was not well.”
“But did you have any idea? Did you, Virgie? You spoke to him all the time.”
“No,” snapped Virgie. “What’s that supposed to mean? That I was the one who missed something because I checked in with Dad?”
“Of course not,” Maggie murmured. “But I didn’t have a clue. So, I’m wondering if everyone i
s as surprised as I am.”
“Make that two of us,” volunteered Jess.
“Three of us,” said Virgie.
“I guessed something was a little off,” Maggie continued, “when he kept forgetting things, but I chalked it up to old age.” Her voice cracked, and Jess stopped cleaning to glance at her sister.
“Hey, don’t beat yourself up, okay? None of us knew anything about it. We all thought he was doing fine.”
Maggie nodded, but Virgie knew what she was getting at. There had been some signs, like Arthur’s car, which was a junk mobile, and, of course, the forgotten teakettle. She’d been feeling guilty, too, as if if she’d just taken the time to fly out and visit him once during the past year, she would have stumbled upon the muddle that his life had become.
“What about Mom?” Virgie pressed. “How could she not know? Didn’t she and Arthur talk all the time?”
Maggie sighed. “Who knows? I think you really had to visit the house to get any idea of the extent of the damage here.”
They continued to cull through beat-up cardboard boxes, a motley assortment of pots and pans, books, Tupperware, old mail, and stacks upon stacks of newspapers. One box housed a bunch of old, rusty tools, probably from another yard sale, Arthur transferring one hoarder’s stash to another’s. “This is starting to look a lot like gluttony,” Jess commented, pulling out a rusty socket wrench.
“Eew, this is what I’ve been smelling.” Maggie winced and held up a moldy white carton at arm’s length. “Old Chinese food. That is so disgusting. Honestly, how did Dad stand the stench?”
“Where is Mom, anyway?” asked Virgie. “Didn’t she say she was coming to help?”
The Summer of Good Intentions Page 23