My Wife and My Dead Wife

by Michael Kun

  And I say, “Sweet Potato, I can’t see what you’re doing,” but I know what she’s doing. I even know what she’s holding in front of her face. It’s the Good Housekeeping magazine she has on the nightstand beside the bed. It has a picture of Heather Locklear on the cover. She’s one of Renée’s favorite actresses.

  Renée says, “I wasn’t doing it for you. I was doing it for me, to re-enact the crime, like they do on that TV show.”

  And I say, “There was no crime. Just an honest accident that could’ve happened to anyone. If he covered his eyes, it was to be polite. It was—“

  And then Renée interrupts and says, “Right, it’s not nice to stare at fat people. It makes them self-conscious.”

  And I say, “No, that’s not what I mean. I mean, well, he was probably very embarrassed. That’s an embarrassing situation for a man to be in, I’d bet. Take me, for instance. Let’s say I’m at Macy’s and I go to the dressing room to try on some clothes. I’m not paying attention, and I push open the door to one of the dressing rooms, and there’s a woman standing there naked. Well, of course I’d be embarrassed. I’d probably turn beet red. It’s natural.”

  “They have separate dressing rooms for men and women so you couldn’t walk in on a woman. In fact, that’s exactly why they have separate dressing rooms, so things like that won’t happen.”

  And I say, “I know, Renée. I was just offering that as an example.”

  And she says, “It’s a bad example.”

  There’s a pause before Renée says, “You know, Ham, you’re supposed to be on my side.”

  And I say, “I am, but there really are no sides.”

  For several moments, neither of us speaks. Renée huffs deep breaths into the phone as if she’d been running, and I start to sew a button.

  “Stop working when I have a problem,” Renée says.

  And I say, “I’m not working. Renée, listen.”

  Then she says, “Don’t tell me to listen. I’m twenty-nine years old, Ham. I don’t have a job. I can’t sing. I just sit around all day eating and eating. It’s not my fault.”

  And I say, “Sweet Potato?”

  And she says, “Yes?”

  And I say, “Sweet Potato, you’re not twenty-nine years old. You’re thirty,” which is true. She turned thirty in August. We went to dinner at her favorite restaurant, Camille’s, where they serve Italian food. Then we went to the movies..

  Renée starts to laugh, then stops.

  “Oh, yeah,” she says.

  “Thanks for reminding me,” then she sniffs.

  And I say, “You’re welcome.”

  Then she says, “Darn it, Ham, the gas company knows what I look like naked.” Only she doesn’t say “darn.”

  I say her name again.

  “The gas company,” she says. “The goshdarn gas company.” Only she doesn’t say “goshdarn,” either.

  The next few days are horrible.

  Renée stays in bed all day crying. Her nose is red like she’d been ice skating. I bring her soup and sandwiches for dinner, but she doesn’t eat them.

  Two more envelopes come back in the mail marked “RETURN TO SENDER.” I throw them in the trash without telling her about them.

  Palmeyer and Broom Hilda play their “Do you remember” game every day, all day.

  The radio plays big band songs.

  The worst part about that is that it plays the same songs over and over and over, which makes sense: there aren’t any new big band songs.

  I would quit the job except I need to support myself. I need to support myself and Renée.

  x

  Renée isn’t the same after the gas man saw her naked. She finally gets out of bed, but she doesn’t laugh at any of my stories, and she doesn’t even play the guitar at all anymore. It sits in the bedroom closet, propped against the wall.

  I’ll say, “Renée, why don’t you play me a song?”

  And she’ll say, “I don’t think so.”

  And I’ll say, “Come on, just one song.”

  And she’ll say, “Ham, you don’t understand. There’s no such thing as a fat singer.”

  I don’t know how to respond to that. If I say there is such a thing as a fat singer, if I say that OPERA singers are fat, she’ll take that to mean I think she’s fat. And if I agree with her, she’ll only feel worse. So I don’t say anything at all.

  And the guitar stays in the closet.

  With the tape recorder.

  And the microphone.

  And the suitcase with the stickers on it.

  Although Renée sometimes jokes about her weight—puffing her cheeks out and saying, “Give Big Mama a kiss” is the one example that comes to mind—more often than not I’ll come home to find her in the bedroom, in front of the full-length mirror. I’ll catch her looking over her shoulder and smoothing her slacks against her rear end, or plucking at her hips or her waist, or slapping at the undersides of her arms.

  “Cassie,” I heard her saying to a friend on the telephone, “Cassie, I have underarm dingle-dangle. I’m turning into my grandmother.”

  Or I’ll find her in front of the television set in a pair of my sweatpants, following along with an exercise show, kicking up her legs, and twisting, and flapping her arms as if she were swatting flies. One night, I hear her say in her sleep, “No, I’ll have a salad.”

  Though she’s a good cook, she’s stopped eating dinner. Instead, she’ll set the meal on the table for me—a meatloaf, roast beef, spaghetti and meatballs—just setting a glass of ice water in front of her chair or chewing a stick of gum while I eat.

  There are no more cakes or pies or cookies.

  “Are you embarrassed to be seen with me?” she asks me one night as I climb into bed. She’s holding a magazine to her chest.

  And I say, “What?”

  And she says, “I said, Are you embarrassed to be seen with me because I’m so fat?”

  And I say, “Sweet Potato.”

  And she says, “I mean, you always look so disappointed when I take my clothes off. You think I’m fat, I can tell. You know, I used to be an interesting person. Thin and interesting. Now, all I do is read stuff like this.” She waves the magazine in the air so I can see the cover. There’s a picture of some movie actress knitting a sweater beneath the word Redbook. “Now I’m even reading magazines for fat, old housewives. Articles about 1) cooking and 2) sewing and 3) needlepoint. I’ve practically turned into Miss Redbook. Just some fat lady who stays home all the time.”

  I say, “Sweet Potato, that magazine’s not for fat women. It’s just for women, period.”

  “Well, just the same, I’m fat.”

  “Sweet Potato,” I say, “you’re not fat.”

  She says, “Yes, I am fat. I have more chins than a Chinese phone book. My shadow weighs fifty pounds.”

  “Renée, please stop making jokes about yourself like that. You’re not fat.”

  Then she says, “Then why don’t we ever go out anywhere where people can see us? Why don’t we ever do anything? People go places and do things, Ham. I know there are places to go—I’ve seen maps. And there are things to do, there must be?”

  The answer is that we don’t have any MONEY. We can’t afford to go anywhere. But I don’t want to say that, so I don’t say anything.

  After a while, Renée says, “Remember when we used to do things together? Remember? Maybe that’s why I’m fat, Ham. That’s what it says in the article I was reading. It says that a lot of women eat, not because they’re hungry, but because they feel neglected. It’s like we eat to fill ourselves up. Listen to this.” Renée takes a magazine from the nightstand. There’s a pencil marking her place. “It’s an article called `The Truth About Fatness.’ It says—and I quote—`You are not alone in taking solace in the fork and knife. Many people do, men and women alike, and for many it’s a sign that something is missing in their lives.’” She closes the magazine and returns it to its place, then repeats, “Something missing in their
lives,” in a tone that you normally hear people use in church.

  So I say, “Renée, people eat because they’re hungry. It doesn’t mean anything.”

  And she says, “This is in a MAGAZINE, Ham. It’s proven. Remember when we used to go to the movies? I didn’t eat as much then. Remember when we used to go up to the Tara to see a movie, or we’d go over to the Screening Room on Piedmont? Remember how we used to go play miniature golf, or watch the Braves play baseball, or watch the Falcons play football games?”

  And I say, “The Falcons stink, Renée.”

  And she says, “I know that. I was just giving examples of things we used to do together. Football games. Movies. Baseball games. Shopping. We used to go on trips, remember? Remember when we drove to Florida?”

  And I say, “Renée, please. I don’t want to talk about that. I’ve just had a rotten day, and all I want to do is to relax and have a little peace and quiet.” Before she says anything, I add, “And be with the woman I love.”

  Only Renée says, “But I’ve got things I need to talk about.”

  And I say, “I’m listening. I just don’t feel like talking about things that happened a long time ago. I’m just not interested in ancient history. I’m interested in the here and now.”

  “It wasn’t that long ago,” Renée says. “Florida, I mean.”

  I know what she’s talking about. She’s talking about the time we drove to Florida, about how we went to Sea World, how one of the dolphins snatched a fish out of her fingers, and how I’d laughed because I was nervous.

  Renée says, “You always make it sound like we’re a hundred years old or something. And besides, time is just a relative thing. What’s long ago to you is nothing to someone else. To me, Florida seems like it was just yesterday.”

  So I say, “Well, it wasn’t yesterday. It was a long, long time ago. I was working at the furniture store still. That wasn’t just yesterday.”

  And she says, “I know, but it is to me. Remember the dolphin, honey?”

  And I say, “It was just some ordinary fish, Renée. Some ordinary fish from a long time ago.”

  There’s silence, and Renée looks at the ceiling.

  Renée begins again. “I remember everything like it happened yesterday,” she says. “I remember the day my family moved here like it was yesterday. I remember the day I graduated from high school like it was yesterday. I remember the day we moved into this apartment. See, honeypie, I remember everything like it was yesterday.”

  So I say, “Well, yesterday was yesterday, and nothing happened yesterday. I went to work. You went grocery shopping. That’s it. Everything else happened a long time ago.”

  Renée looks at the ceiling again.

  That’s when she says, “I remember when we were driving to Florida, how it was raining so hard that we couldn’t see and we had to sit in that truck stop for four hours until the rain let up. Remember that, how we ate hot dogs until it stopped raining? I even remember the name of the place. It was called Stuckey’s—remember?—and they sold fireworks and little games for the car and pecan log rolls. Remember, we bought some pecan log rolls to eat in the car and I fell asleep and when I woke up one of them was stuck to my leg, and when I tried to pull it off it ripped some of my skin off with it?”

  And I say, “I don’t want to talk about Florida, Renée. I just want to go to sleep.”

  Only she doesn’t hear me. She says, “Remember how you got sunburned on your eyelids, and we had to put that white stuff on them? Remember, zinc oxide from the drug store?”

  And I say, “Please, Renée.”

  And she says, “Remember Sea World? How could you forget Sea World?”

  “Renée!” I say her name in a burst, louder than I’d intended, and you can tell it startles her. For a moment, she seems to lose her breath.

  “That’s one of the biggest differences between us,” she says, “how I’ve got a good memory and you don’t.”

  How could I forget Sea World?

  It was impossible. I couldn’t forget about that. I just don’t want to talk about it.

  The way the girl in the Sea World shirt picked Renée from the crowd and led her to the edge of the pool.

  The way everyone applauded.

  The way she called up, “Ham, if I don’t make it back from this alive, you can finish my orange juice.”

  The way everyone in the crowd laughed at what she said.

  The way I held both of our orange juice containers on my thighs.

  The way the Sea World girl held Renée’s hand and guided it into the bucket.

  The way she pulled out a fish and it danced in her hand, but she kept squeezing it. Not like the man at the two o’clock show. We stayed for that one, too, and that man let go, and the fish just plopped into the water, just like that.

  The way Renée squeezed the fish. She wasn’t going to let go.

  The way everyone laughed.

  The way Renée held it out over the water, her arm extended, her head tipped back slightly.

  The way the black shadow of the dolphin approached.

  The way everyone gasped. They gasped.

  I remember the way I felt when the dolphin sprang out of the water, toward Renée’s tanned arm, her little browned hand. The way I was more afraid than she was. It may as well have been my grandfather’s shark, it seemed so big.

  Renée is still looking at the ceiling. Finally, I say, “You’re right, we should do things. Miss Renée, will you do me the honor of accompanying me to dinner tomorrow evening? It’ll be your day. Whatever you want to do, we’ll do. What do you say?”

  Only she says, “No,” then turns her face away.

  And I say, “Renée?”

  And she says, “No,” very loudly.

  So I say, “Why?”

  And she says, “Ham, weren’t you listening to a word I was saying? I’m fat. That would be the worst thing in the world for me, to go out and have a big dinner. That’s the worst thing in the world for a fat person to do. To go out and eat all those calories.”

  “Renée,” I say. “Sweet Potato.”

  And she says, “Ham, I’m fat. Let’s stop kidding ourselves.”

  When I put my hand on her hip, she pushes it off. She opens her magazine and starts reading, or pretends to. If she’s reading it, she’s reading it very fast. She’s reading it like one of those ladies on the speed reading commercials that used to be on television, whipping the pages.

  I close my eyes and try to go to sleep. I listen to Renée turning the pages of her magazine.

  I have to admit to myself that it’s true, though: Renée has put on some weight since she lost her job at the hospital. Not much, but enough. Enough that you’d notice. Enough that sometimes I feel as if I’m looking at her through someone else’s reading glasses. Enough that some days I’ll wake up and look at her asleep beside me and think, Who are you? What have you done with my girlfriend?

  CHAPTER 9: MARIO LANZA WAS HERE

  Palmeyer and Broom Hilda are at it AGAIN.

  “Do you remember spats?” she says.

  And he says, “Yes. My father owned several pairs.”

  Then she says, “Do you remember Mario Lanza, the singer?”

  And he says, “Sure, I do.”

  And she says, “Do you remember how he died?”

  And he says, “Yes, it was very sad.” Then, without pausing to take a breath he says, “Do you remember when the Lindbergh baby was kidnapped,” as if that had anything to do with Mario Lanza. As if there were anything in the world connecting the two. To my knowledge, there wasn’t.

  And Broom Hilda says, “Oh, yes. Wasn’t that terrible?”

  And Palmeyer says, “Just terrible. Kidnapping is a horrible crime.”

  And she says, “How about when the Japanese invaded Pearl Harbor? Do you remember that?”

  As if the Japanese had anything to do with the Lindbergh baby. As if anyone else in the world has conversations like this other than Palmeyer and Broom
Hilda. As if anyone else in the world has to listen to it other than me.

  It goes on and on and on like this all morning. They talk, and I work, sewing this, that and the other thing. I put a stretch seam in a skirt for a woman named Callahan. I sew a new plastic molded zipper into a ski jacket for a man named Fellman. The only time Palmeyer and Broom Hilda stop talking is to answer the phone. The first few calls are people checking to see if they can pick up their clothes. When it ends up that one of the calls is for me, they both look at me as if I’M the one who hasn’t done any work all day.

  “Hello,” I say.

  And Renée says, “Is it still my day?”

  I don’t know what she’s talking about, so I say, “What?”

  And she says, “Last night, you said that today was my day, that we could do whatever I want. So what I want to know is, is it still my day?”

  And I say, “Of course it is, Sweet Potato. I’ll be home to pick you up at seven. Whatever you want to do, we’ll do.”

  And she says, “Good. I’ll see you at seven.”

  And I say, “Seven.”

  And I hang up the phone.

  And Palmeyer and Broom Hilda look at me as if maybe I’M the one who kidnapped the Lindbergh baby, which I wasn’t. I wasn’t even alive then. And I wasn’t alive when Mario Lanza attacked Pearl Harbor, either.

  Maybe I should start looking for a new job.

  That’s what I think about the rest of the day.

  Maybe I should find a new job, a better job.

  x

  I don’t have enough money to take Renée out to dinner. I have eighteen dollars, which won’t be enough if we go somewhere nice; it would barely be enough if we went somewhere rotten. I could ask Palmeyer for an advance on my paycheck, but then I’d have to interrupt him and Broom Hilda while they’re reliving the entire Twentieth Century. Instead, I decide to ask Carl for another loan, only there’s no way I’ll be able to get downtown to his office in time. No, if I get out of work at six, I’ll have to go to his home, which is exactly what I DON’T want to do, because it’ll be embarrassing, his wife and his kids standing right there while I’m asking to borrow money. Again. But I don’t have a choice. When you have to take your girlfriend to dinner, you have to get enough money to take her somewhere nice, no matter how much you might embarrass yourself.