Jody hears about him again from one of the boys who used to steal eggs. It is Jody’s senior year. She has managed to persuade her parents to let her stay on until graduation. The idea of going back to Connecticut, even for a weekend, makes her sick. She is thinner than last year and much more careful. She has not made love with anyone since Andre, but high-school boys still vie for her even though she barely talks when she dates them. She is now included in a group of boys and girls whose common interests are fast cars and cutting classes. She often drags her friend Garland along, not because she feels sorry for Garland, who has fewer dates, but because she wants a chaperon. She has decided to remain true to Andre, even though he has deserted her. Whenever she calls and offers to babysit for Simon, Vonny says she’s much too busy with her pottery to go out. Jody is certain this is a lie. Andre is the one who doesn’t want her around, not that Jody intends to let that stop her. She can wait, she has time. And if a boy wants to help her pass that time, fine, but when he takes Jody out, he gets Garland, too.
They’re on their way to Edgartown, and Garland is forced to sit in the backseat next to Rosellen and Carl, a couple who can’t keep their hands off each other. When Greg, the boy driving, starts talking about the Giant, Jody doesn’t believe him. She flips down the sun visor, looks at Garland in the small mirror, and rolls her eyes.
“You people think off-Islanders will fall for anything,” Jody says.
“It’s the truth,” Greg says. “There were two nights when he tried to get me and I outran him both times. He’s almost nine feet tall, you know.”
“Creepy,” Rosellen says. She makes herself shiver.
Greg glances over at Jody to see if she’s impressed by his battle with the Giant. She takes out a comb and fixes her hair. As they pass by the farmstand she can see coffee cans filled with yellow chrysanthemums.
Carl untangles himself from Rosellen so he can lean forward. “Manute Bol of the Washington Bullets is seven foot six,” he says to Greg. “You want me to believe this guy’s a foot taller?”
“Are you calling me a liar?” Greg asks him.
“Hell, no,” Carl says. “A bullshitter.”
“Oh, yeah?” Greg says. He makes a quick U-turn, tires screeching. He’s still trying to impress Jody, and it’s still not working. When they’re parallel to the farmstand, Greg makes an even sharper U-turn that throws Jody up against the car door. Then he pulls right up to the farmstand. The motor idles loudly. The Giant’s house is set in a hollow behind a grove of locust trees, and all they can see of it is a slightly tipped chimney. Already the boy in the back seat is losing his nerve.
“We’re never going to get to Edgartown this way,” he says.
“Got the guts to take something?” Greg goads his friend.
“Come on,” Carl says. “What do I want with flowers?”
“Get the eggs,” Greg says. “We’ll attack the farmstand, then the Giant will have to come out.”
“They’re ridiculous,” Garland says to Jody. “Grow up,” she tells the boys.
“Well?” Greg says when his friend hesitates. Greg grins, then leans over the seat and pushes down on the door handle so that the back door swings open. Rosellen screams. Carl quickly grabs the door and slams it shut.
“Not me,” he says. “You won’t catch me out there.”
“Then you believe me,” Greg says. “Right?”
Greg is hoping he won’t have to get out of the car to impress Jody. The truth is, he’s shaking, just as he did when he was twelve and the Giant and some old man called out to him as he stole some eggs and an already decaying pumpkin. At least this time he has not peed in his pants. But of course, he has not seen the Giant yet.
“Let’s get out of here,” Garland says.
The sky is no longer quite so blue. The locust grove throws shadows on the already dark moss. They have all begun to whisper. As Jody places her pocketbook on the floor near her feet she is making a bargain with herself. If she doesn’t see the Giant, she’ll keep her mouth shut. If she sees him, and survives, she’ll tell Vonny everything. Andre will hate her at first, but he’ll get over it.
Jody snaps her door open.
“Hey!” Greg says. He tries to grab her arm, but Jody is already out of the car.
“Get back here!” Garland calls.
The weather has turned chilly. When a car passes wind rises up. The earth is dark and rocky, but a path has been worn from the side of the road to the farmstand. Jody keeps her eyes on the path in front of her. As she gets closer to the farmstand she can smell the rough pine boards and the slightly sweet odor of rotting vegetables. Jody would rather face a Giant than Vonny, but she will go to Vonny if she has to. She never breaks the bargains she makes with herself.
Greg is probably a liar, although he’s honking the horn like a madman to get her attention. If there is a giant he certainly won’t be caught sleeping with that horn honking. Greg doesn’t let up on the horn until Jody reaches the farmstand. And although he gets out of his car and watches her, he doesn’t have the courage to go after her.
Now Jody sees that the bunches of flowers are different shades of yellow, from gold to pale ivory. The stand fronts a dark, cool shed in which there are melons and squash. Jody reaches past the tin of money for a basket of brown eggs. Either she is so nervous her hands are hot or the eggs are still warm. Would she really break up a family? Maybe it would be a relief to everyone involved. Maybe Vonny wishes she were back in Boston. A confession might be an act of mercy. Jody follows the path down into the hollow. In the basket, the eggs hit against each other. She can no longer hear the idling motor of Greg’s car or traffic up on the road. The grass here is oddly soft and pale; it has never been mowed. She can see the house and it’s much too small for an alleged giant. All she has to do is get a glimpse of him and she can tell Vonny everything. She walks down to the house, which has a fresh coat of gray paint. The foundation is made of brown and red stones. The door, at which visitors never knock, is the color of blood. Jody peeks in the front window. Her breath is coming hard and it’s difficult to see; the window is old glass, the kind that distorts. She thinks she sees a stone fireplace, a blue couch, an old wooden table. She can hear the chickens now, and she follows their clucking behind the house. There is a sunny fenced-in area with several chicken coops. The chickens whose eggs Jody has stolen are red bantams. Their feathers shine in the sun. When a rooster crows the sound raises bumps along Jody’s arms and legs. She looks to the side of the henhouses and sees him. He has been frozen, unable to move or even breathe since she walked down from the house. He sits in a metal chair, a cup of coffee in one hand, a newspaper on his lap. He wears beige slacks and a white shirt. His hair, which he washed in the kitchen sink, is still wet and combed back, drying in the sun. The sleeves of his white shirt are rolled up. From where Jody stands it is impossible to gauge how tall he is, but the old workboots he wears are huge. He is, by far, the most beautiful person Jody has ever seen. He makes everyone else seem deformed. Unsteadily, Jody bends down and, still looking at him, she places the basket of stolen eggs on the ground. Then she turns and runs. She nearly loses her balance climbing back up the hollow. The Giant wishes he could help her, but he dares not stand up and let her see him for what he is. So he watches helplessly. A teenage boy comes to the top of the hollow and throws two sharp rocks at him, but the Giant remains where he is. At last she makes it up the slope. When she is gone, the Giant gets up and slowly gathers the eggs.
Here you are. The sky is blue and it is October. Your child, who will soon be five, has started school more than a month ago and you have not once driven him there. You have not been inside his classroom, you have not watched him on the playground. In the morning, you pack his lunch and smile. You fix bags of crustless sandwiches, iced raisin cookies, carrot sticks, seedless orange wedges. You wave from the back door like the best of mothers.
You have read about force fields in science fiction novels, and now this force you thought existed o
nly in fantasy has sprung up around you. If you come close to the force field, say walk out on the porch, a knot the size of a walnut forms in your throat. If you break through the force field by placing one foot on the porch steps, you are jolted back. You can feel the force field enter your body. You cannot go any farther. If there were a string of electrons that shocked you each time you tried to leave the house you could not be any more trapped. If you’re not careful you might begin to believe in evil spirits. What is free will if you can’t walk down your own road, if the idea of going to the market makes you so nauseated you have to lie down? You would trade your soul for a cigarette, which unfortunately you can’t have because you can’t get to the store. More than anything you fear that the circle will continue to close in on you. Can anyone exist on a couch? Can anyone be broken down and then stored in a wineglass, a teaspoon, a thimble?
Every day you tell yourself this day will be different. This is the day when you will kiss your husband good-bye and drive your child to school. You will admire his paintings taped to the classroom walls. You will chat with the other mothers out in the parking lot. On the way home you’ll roll all the windows down and cold air will sting your cheeks. You will stop at a store you have never been to before and buy a pack of cigarettes. If the sun is out you will park on a bluff above the beach. There will be no tourists at this time of year and it will be just you, only you. You will drive home the long way and honk the horn to let your husband know you’re home.
Since this day has not yet come, and since you still cannot leave your house, you will spend hours tying to figure out the cause of the force field. As a child you were like a little adult; if you could have gotten a driver’s license at the age of eight you would have driven clear to California. You have lived alone and with lovers in both the city and the country. You have had a child on a November night when the moon was orange and there was a foot of new snow. Of course, you were always afraid of bridges. If you try hard you can remember other times you were afraid, once on a crowded subway in Manhattan, another time when a boyfriend in Boston gave you a wrong address and you sat on an unfamiliar doorstep, a sudden terror making it impossible to move. When you were pregnant you had a morbid fear of slipping on ice or mud and crushing your baby. You will soon see that rehashing the past is worthless. It doesn’t matter what the reason is, there is a force field around you.
Unfortunately, you are married to a man who doesn’t believe in fear and who has, you can tell, already thought of leaving you. You keep your fears secret and when you are certain no one is home you will try to get past the force field. You will try to do what you are most terrified of. getting into the truck and driving somewhere. You will be sick all that morning. You will have three cups of coffee, then regret it. At last you will take the keys off a metal hook beneath a kitchen cabinet. Your heart will begin to pound and you are nowhere near the force field yet. When you open the back door you will hear a malevolent hum. You step out onto the porch and find that your lungs feel tight and sore. This makes you wonder if perhaps there is no oxygen in the force field. All you have to do is get past it, so you run. As you run you realize that the force field is not a long, vertical space, reaching from earth to sky. It is as wide as an ocean. It goes on forever. You are still in the thick of it when you get into the truck. You start the engine anyway, and hold one foot down on the clutch, even though your legs are almost too heavy to move. You get to the end of the dirt driveway, and then, suddenly, you cannot breathe. You throw the truck into reverse. If someone was standing behind you, you’d run him down without thinking twice. You see now, you will never make it. You don’t even know where it is you will never make it to because you have forgotten to plan a destination. When you park the truck, it lurches. You pull the keys out of the ignition and cut a long thin line along your palm with the sharp edge of your house key.
Then you run. You can feel the vibrating power of the force field recede. You can feel your legs growing stronger. In the kitchen, you bend over the sink, then drink a glass of cold water. It is nine thirty in the morning, and when you look out your window you will be amazed to see that the sky is still just as cloudless and blue as it was before you walked out the door.
Simon has actually begun to look forward to going to school. He is the hamster monitor all this week. He makes certain that no crayons or puzzle pieces are dropped through the wire mesh into the cage and, most wonderful of all, he will be allowed to take the hamsters home for the Columbus Day weekend. His parents have already said yes.
The other children in his class don’t seem to notice that Simon doesn’t look like the rest of them. As far as they’re concerned, the only thing that makes him different is that he’s very good at sharing. But out in the playground, some of the older boys have a nickname for him, Thumby. Even though Simon doesn’t realize that this is shorthand for Tom Thumb, the name makes him uncomfortable. He keeps to himself on the playground. Once he’s back in the classroom, Simon helps build roads out of blocks, he finger-paints and traces his hand on construction paper. A little girl named Tara, who is almost as small as Simon, has chosen him for a friend. In return, Simon lets her fill the water bottle for the hamsters. Though Tara is not half as interesting as Samantha Freed, whom Simon has not forgotten though he won’t see her again till next summer, Simon always sits next to Tara at story time.
Today the story is one of Simon’s favorites, and he knows it by heart. A small wizard named Fisher teaches a wolf good manners. The wolf, who looms above Fisher, sits in a wooden chair with milk dripping down his face. He wears a dunce cap while Fisher concocts a potion to turn the wolf into a gentleman. The children are hysterical when they see a picture of Fisher holding his nose as he prepares the potion in a blender, adding strawberry juice, cucumber peel, half a cup of salt water, one slice of pizza. Fisher is so tiny he has to stand on the table to reach the wolf’s mouth. Simon wonders what sort of potion he could prepare to make his parents happy. If he thinks about his parents too long he will begin to believe that what has happened to them is his fault. His parents act as though they were strangers. When Simon has a tantrum they don’t yell at him, they simply look tired and give in. Is it his fault that his mother cries as she cooks dinner? Is there some mistake he has made that has driven his father away?
After school, he and Tara race to see who can get to the parking lot first, but as soon as Simon sees his father he stops and Tara wins the race. When Tara calls good-bye Simon doesn’t hear her, and she yells, “Say good-bye to me, Simon.” Simon waves and considers ingredients he might use: orange soda, vanilla ice cream, a bluebird’s feather, Red Zinger tea. Simon used to run to his father when he saw him in the parking lot. Now, he’s more careful. He walks. After Simon has climbed into the truck he asks if they can stop at the market.
“What for?” Andre asks.
“Stuff,” Simon tells him.
They stop at Alley’s store and Andre follows Simon up and down the aisles. Andre pays for the orange soda and ice cream and picks up a pack of cigarettes for Vonny at the counter. While waiting for his change, he keeps one hand on Simon’s head. Simon needs a haircut, and although his hair is still silky, it’s starting to change, becoming a bit coarser, less like a little boy’s. On the way home, Andre asks about the hamsters and Simon tells him that on Friday he has to be picked up early so they can load the cage and the supply of hamster food into the truck. The ice cream is melting. As soon as they are in the kitchen, Andre puts it right into the freezer. Simon hangs up his jacket, puts his lunchbox on the table, then lets Nelson out. It takes a long time for Nelson to pick himself off the floor and Simon has to whistle several times to get his attention. Though he’s been practicing, copying the older boys on the playground, Simon’s whistle is still more breath than sound.
Andre can hear Vonny out on the sun porch. Sometimes she just pretends to work, but Andre hears the squeaking of the wheel as she throws a pot. At first he thought she somehow knew he’d been unfaithful. He has
heard this can happen; you smell betrayal on the other person. It is not so much that he regrets what happened with Jody, but more that it seems to have happened to another person. He has questioned himself ruthlessly: Does he want to be with her again? What he really wants is for him and Vonny to have just met. He wants that first night, when she came to his apartment and did not leave for three days. He wants to make love without talking. He wants to not feel so disappointed.
He has tested Vonny, bringing up Jody’s name, and getting no reaction. When Jody phones to ask if they need a babysitter, Andre listens carefully and doesn’t even hear suspicion in Vonny’s voice. One week he convinces himself that what has gone wrong between them has something to do with Vonny’s father’s rejection. The next week he guesses that worrying about Simon’s height has caused the rift between them. Always, he wonders if Vonny is disappointed, too. He has had to take a part-time job at a garage in Vineyard Haven. It is not what he planned for himself and, he is certain, it’s not what Vonny had hoped for. At work he barely speaks and he knows if he weren’t such a good mechanic he’d have been fired by now. He and Vonny never discuss the job. He disappears every morning and once a week brings home a check.
For a while he wondered if he was overreacting because he was so humiliated by his job. He’s tried to believe Vonny. She twisted her ankle. She has a headache. She doesn’t want to go out in the rain. He no longer believes her. He knows that she’s lying when she tells him she visited a friend while he was at the garage in Vineyard Haven. He’s checked up on her, and neither Jane nor Peggy has seen her since the summer. Each time they phone Vonny says she’s too busy to talk. Andre has been unfaithful, and she’s the one who’s lying. When he realizes that Vonny has not left the house for two months, he feels a surge of fear. He tries to tempt her, offering to take her to the movies, to a hotel in Boston for the weekend. He braces himself for her excuses. He sees that when she smiles at him she’s trying to charm him, as if he were an idiot who doesn’t know her any better. He’s afraid that if he confronts her, she’ll accuse him of sleeping with Jody. So he waits, hoping to catch her in a lie.
Illumination Night: A Novel Page 11