by Julie Frayn
~~~~~~~~
Mazie sat in the living room, a cup of tepid tea on the side table. She stared at the television, her thumb on the remote, and flipped through channel after channel, her mind on autopilot.
She’d tucked Ariel into bed after they’d worn each other out, dancing and singing and filling the house with laughter. The second she flicked off the light and clicked her daughter’s bedroom door closed, the light-heartedness evaporated and the burden of what was to come smothered her.
With the sound of every engine that roared by and every footstep that clopped on the sidewalk as someone passed out front, her heart raced.
She waited in the incandescence of the floor lamp, the three-setting bulb on its lowest wattage. The streetlamp on the corner threw its orange glow into the room, the decorative window bars casting a checkerboard shadow over the family portrait that hung on the opposite wall. The cuckoo clock ticked and tocked, ticked and tocked. Its hollow marking of time echoed in the empty kitchen.
Her head hurt. She was tired of waiting for him to come home. To tell her what to do, what to think, who she was or wasn’t allowed to speak to.
Her chin dipped to her chest, her eyelids thick with sleep. The roar of Cullen’s truck jolted her awake. She jumped from her chair and scurried into the kitchen, stripped cellophane from the plate of cold meatloaf, mashed potatoes and steamed carrots, all smothered in dark brown gravy. Six beeps of the ‘quick cook’ button and his dinner was on its way to hot while she threw out the plastic, polished off the droplets of condensation it had left on the counter, and fetched a fork and knife from the cutlery drawer.
He walked in the door and sat at the table as the microwave announced that his food was ready. She slid the hot plate in front of him and stood still, just to his left.
He barely breathed between the forkfuls of food he shovelled into his mouth. Hops and barley emanated from his pores.
“You pick her up from school?” He spoke through a mouthful of potatoes.
“Yes.”
He paused, his fork mid-air, turned and raised one eyebrow at her. “I told you not to spoil her.”
“I was already so close. Why make her take the bus?” She stared at her feet.
“Because she’ll expect it, that’s why.” He shook his head. “Stupid.”
His work boots sat in the back landing, one on its side near the closed door, the other right smack in the middle of the tile. She armed herself with paper towels and a spray bottle of all-purpose cleaner, aligned the heels of his boots against the wall and placed them on the rubber shoe mat. She wiped the dust and polished the tile.
When she was finished and the soiled towels were safely in the garbage, she took his plate. He had tossed a napkin over what little remained of the meal, his silent cue that he was finished and she should hurry up and clean up after him.
She turned her back, scraped and rinsed the plate, placed it in the dishwasher, and set the machine to wash.
She took a deep breath and turned to face him.
He held out his hand.
She pulled the grocery list and receipt from her pocket and handed it to him, along with the change.
He ran his finger down the receipt, compared it to the list she’d written out. He counted the change, nodded and pocketed it, then ripped up the papers and handed them to her.
She slipped the garbage into the bin under the sink.
He looked her up and down, “C’mere.” His voice was raspy from too much beer and nicotine. He reached out and grasped her wrist and yanked her into his lap. He wrapped his arms around her, crushing her in an embrace, her arms pinned to her sides. The smell of the cigar bar oozed from his hair and clothes, a sickly sweet stench like gym socks dipped in fake vanilla and lit on fire. Her head spun and her stomach lurched. One of his hands slid between her legs, the other up her shirt and under her bra.
She shivered and swallowed the bile that rose in her throat. The calluses on his hands scraped against her soft skin. There’d be fresh scratches under her breasts or across her backside after he finished with her.
She squirmed. “I … I have my period.”
He stiffened. “Shit. Again?” He pushed her off his lap.
She reached for the counter, caught it with one hand, the other hand on the linoleum, and steadied herself. Better than landing on her ass on the floor. She used the countertop as leverage, stood and turned to him.
He was already halfway up the stairs.
~~~~~~~~
Earls restaurant buzzed with the anonymous conversations of dozens of strangers. Mazie sat in the booth, Ariel at her side. Cullen sat across from them, the birthday crown Ariel had made him out of gold construction paper askew atop his head.
“Can I get you another beer?” The skinny blonde server with the micro-mini-skirt sidled up to him and put one hand on his shoulder.
He grinned up at her. “Sure. The birthday boy deserves another brew.” He gunned the third of a pint still left in the Albino Rhino glass and handed it to her.
“And you, ma’am? More water? If you’re the DD, I can get you some pop or iced tea, on the house.”
Mazie shook her head. “No, thanks.”
The server cleared the empty plates and smiled at Cullen. He watched her walk away, his gaze firmly planted below her waist.
“You want your present now, Daddy?”
“I didn’t see a box or bows. What present?” He smiled at his daughter, his eyes alight with the game. Same game, every year. He bought tickets online, paid for them himself, printed them out and handed them to Mazie to give to him for his birthday. As long as he got what he wanted, he didn’t mind not being surprised. And he always played along with Ariel, who was none the wiser.
Mazie slid the envelope to Ariel under the table. She pulled it out and handed it to him. “Happy birthday.”
He ripped the envelope open and grinned at two tickets to the Calgary Stampeders’ game in June. He nodded at Mazie and Ariel. “Thank you, my ladies.”
“Can I come?”
Cullen’s brow creased. “To a football game? I always take Jerry.”
Ariel sank in her seat and looked at her lap. “Okay.”
Mazie slid her hand across the leather of the bench seat and patted Ariel’s arm.
“Happy Birthday, to you,” a crowd of wait staff gathered beside their table and sang the birthday song. Skinny Girl placed a large piece of warm chocolate banana cake ablaze with a sparkler in front of Cullen and handed him a fork.
His toothy smile lit up his face, his laughter lit up Ariel’s. Mazie grinned. It had been a fun night, light and easy. For the most part.
When they finished singing, applause popped around the room, other patrons joining the fun. “Thank you, thank you,” Cullen called out to the nearest tables and waved.
He leaned across the table and took Mazie’s hand.
She flinched.
“Did you hear the pipes on the tall dude with the long hair?” he whispered. He looked around the room, pointed at a young man taking orders three tables over. “That guy.” He turned back to her, squeezed her hand. “He sounds a lot like I used to, don’t you think?”
Mazie nodded. “I guess so. It’s been so long since I’ve heard you sing.”
“Yeah, well, that life is over.”
His phone chimed and a red light flashed. He picked it up, grinned at the screen and ran his thumbs across it. Seconds later the phone chimed again. He let out a small laugh and responded.
Mazie sipped her water, hacked off a bit of cake and stabbed it with the fork then handed the fork to Ariel. “Yummy cake, eh?”
Ariel nodded with her mouth full.
Cullen texted back and forth with someone who did a better job of making him happy than Mazie was doing. After the fifth chime, she sighed.
He glanced up at her. “What’s your problem?”
She looked at the table. “Nothing.” She took a breath. “Just that, whoever it is, maybe the texts could wait un
til after dinner?” She lifted her eyes to his.
His one eyebrow shot up and he squinted. Mazie looked away.
“Daddy, can we get ice cream on the way home?” Ariel to the rescue.
He smiled at her. “Sure we can. It’s my birthday, after all.”
Ariel slid the side door of the van closed, chocolate ice cream stained her upper lip and dripped from a waffle cone.
Mazie clicked the passenger door shut and waited for Cullen to pass in front of her before falling into line behind and heading for the front door.
“Evening, Reynolds clan.” Rachel’s husband, George, stood on his front lawn in checkered shorts and a ratty old T-shirt. He held the garden hose and sprayed a fine mist over Rachel’s beloved rose bushes.
Cullen ignored him.
“Hi, George.” Mazie waved.
Rachel jumped out through the front door. She was like a damn jack-in-the-box and Mazie’s presence was the hand crank. The second she was in range, surprise! Rachel popped up.
“Beautiful evening!” she yelled. “Ariel, want to come play with Polly?”
Cullen spun around. “No, she doesn’t. It’s my birthday and she’s spending it with me.”
Rachel cocked her head. “Well, sooorry, birthday boy. I didn’t know this was the day the world was graced with your presence.” She jerked her chin at Ariel. “Maybe another day that isn’t so special, ‘kay sweetie?”
“Okay, Mrs. Simpson. Thanks.”
Ariel took her ice cream into the living room and turned on the television.
Mazie clicked the front door shut. “Don’t drip on the carpet, bug.”
Cullen went straight to the cupboard over the fridge and pulled out the bourbon. He sloshed a few ounces into a tumbler and turned to her. “I swear, one day I’m gonna kill that bitch.” He kept his voice low.
Mazie placed her purse on the kitchen table. “She’s snoopy, but harmless.”
“And for future reference, who texts me and when I choose to reply are none of your damn business.”
She looked at her feet. “Sorry. We don’t get many nights out. Just thought it would be nice to focus on that.”
“I don’t care what you thought.” He snatched her purse and rummaged inside. “Let’s see who you’ve been texting, huh?” He pulled her phone out and slid his grease-stained fingers all over the screen. The same thing he did at least once a week. He pressed his lips together and threw her a withering look. “Good. Just me.” He tossed the phone on the table, took his drink, and joined Ariel in front of the television.
At ten, he sent Ariel to bed. At ten-thirty, he took Mazie by the arm. She followed him up the stairs, her wrist aching in his grip.
In the bedroom, he stripped and tossed his clothes on the floor.
Mazie got undressed, hung her pants in the closet and put her shirt and underwear in the clothes hamper with the other dirty laundry. She picked up his clothes from the carpet, along with his filthy work shirt and jeans that lay where he’d dropped them after work — shag the colour of applesauce had seemed the right choice thirteen years ago — and tossed them into the laundry basket she kept in the room for his things. Kept them away from her clothes so his filth didn’t infect her.
He stood by the head of the bed, hard and anxious. “Hurry up already.”
She approached from the other side and lay on her back.
He crawled on top of her, ran his sweaty, stinking, sticky skin all over her. She closed her eyes and turned her head. He wouldn’t care. He never kissed her on the mouth anymore.
He pushed her legs apart with his knees and forced himself inside. The weight of him knocked the breath from her.
She clamped her lips closed, shut her eyes, and imagined an idling river, a quiet meadow at the base of the mountains, the scent of daisies and pine needles. Ariel played in the distance. Molly, their golden retriever, frolicked in the grass. The dog she’d always wanted. A dog they’d never owned. Ariel tossed a stick to Molly and the dog fetched and returned flawlessly.
Cullen’s breathing became laboured. He shifted his body until he loomed over her and encircled her throat with one hand.
As the air left her, she opened her eyes to glare at the monster he had become.
He grunted and groaned and thrust into her harder and harder, his grip on her neck tightening with each creak of the bed, each thud of her head against the headboard, the headboard against the wall.
Creak, thud, gasp, thud, creak.
Sparks of light exploded in her periphery. She clawed at his arm.
“No! I’m not done fucking you yet.”
Mazie gasped for air, prayed for his grip to falter, to allow just one small slip of oxygen through. Her vision blurred and she closed her eyes. He was going to do it this time. She was going to die. Tears dripped onto the pillow.
His body went rigid and his grip relaxed. He toppled onto her and breathed garlic and liquor onto her cheek. “Oh yeah.” He rolled off. “That’s what I needed.” He swatted her thigh with the back of his hand. “Go shower. You’re disgusting.” He turned off the bedside lamp and stuffed his pillow under his head.
Mazie slid from the bed, her movements robotic and stiff. She clicked the bathroom door shut and opened the one drawer that was hers and hers alone. He would never peer where tampons and pads and hair removal products lived, nauseated as he was by the whole ‘woman thing.’
She pushed the contents aside and tugged the false back away. The Polaroid camera lay at the ready.
She ran the shower, inched the door open a sliver and peeked out. He was unconscious. Bourbon-fuelled snores grunted from his nostrils.
She snapped two photos of the fresh hand print on her neck, the cumulative damage redder and brighter than before, the contrast against her ashen face a stark reminder of why her drawer was full of scarves. When the pictures popped out, she wrote the date on the white border of each and returned everything to the drawer, replaced the false back and slid the drawer shut.
She stepped under the near-scalding shower. The loofah found every inch of her skin. She ran the bar of herbal soap over her body again and again, lathered her fingers and slid them inside herself, stroking and rubbing to purify where he’d stained her. Masturbating in the shower used to be a relaxing, exciting, release. But this wasn’t masturbation. It was cleansing. She felt no pleasure. Only relief to know that as much of him as possible was out of her body.
When she was as clean as mere soap and water could get her, she sat in the tub and wept. No matter how hot the water, no matter how long she scrubbed, no matter how many bars of soap she went through, she could never wash him off.
She climbed into bed and turned her back to him, the slice of mattress between them a glacial chasm. She fell into a fitful sleep, her body on the brink and her arm hanging, fingertips pressed into the carpet. They were all that kept her from going over the edge.
Like any normal day.
~~~~~~~~
Mazie perched on the edge of her chair and sipped her sweet tea. The dinner dishes were washed and dried and put in their place where they belonged. The lingering comfort of roast pork pulled at her senses, quickly losing the aroma argument to the yeast of too many lagers poured down Cullen’s throat.
Ariel sat on the carpet, her face too close to the television, its glow illuminating her black tresses with strands of neon blue. Mazie reached out with her foot and gave Ariel a gentle poke in the butt. “Time to get ready for bed.”
“Not yet!” Ariel swiped at Mazie’s foot with one hand. “My show’s not over.”
“Ariel!” Cullen pushed his newspaper down, crumpling its pages. “Do as your mother says and get your ass upstairs.”
“Daddy, please? It’s almost finished.”
Mazie winced at the whine in her daughter’s voice. “It’s okay. She can finish watching.”
“It is not okay.” He slammed his beer bottle on the table and tossed the paper aside. He stood, grabbed Ariel’s arm and yanked her to her feet
.
Mazie’s legs went cold.
“Ow, Daddy that hurts!” Ariel gazed up at her father. Fear and defiance glinted briefly in her eyes before the tears came.
“Then do as you’re told.” He threw his hands open. Ariel stumbled backward.
Mazie stood. “Cullen, leave her be. She’s just a child.”
He turned to her, eyes squinted, upper lip trembling.
Ariel rubbed her hand over the giant red fingerprints on her arm.
“She’s not a child, damn it. Look at her! She’s got tits for Christ’s sake. About damn time she grew up.”
Mazie took a step back and guided her daughter away. “I just don’t want you to hurt her. It’s not her fault.”
“It’s not her fault.” His face twisted and his voice raised an octave. “It’s not her fault, it’s not her fault.” He put his hands on his hips and laughed once on a heavy exhale. “You’re right.”
Mazie hesitated and looked back at Ariel.
She was right?
Ariel gaped at her father and inched toward the stairs.
“Yup. You are so right.” One side of his upper lip lifted in a sneer. He took two steps and poked her collar bone with one finger. “It’s your fucking fault.” He raised his right hand across his chest.
She closed her eyes.
The back of his hand slammed into the side of her face.
“Daddy, no!”
He swung around and stepped toward Ariel. She screamed and ran up the stairs.
He turned back to Mazie and punched her in the stomach.
The wind left her and she doubled over onto the floor. She gasped for air and willed her dinner to stay put.
“Get that little bitch in bed now, before I give her a real lesson in behaving.”
Mazie crawled to the staircase and looked up to the landing. Ariel stared at her mother, her eyes red with tears and double their normal size.
Mazie grasped the railing and forced herself to stand. She smiled at Ariel. “It’s all right, honey. Mommy’s all right. Come on, I’ll read you a story.”
She looked back at Cullen. He was hidden behind the newspaper, his beer near-empty. She climbed the stairs, gripped the railing for balance.