An American Marriage

by Tayari Jones

  I glanced across the street as I lowered the grate. No one was there besides the parking attendant, who pulled his hat down over his eyes.

  Roy

  When I was a kid, I collected keys. You’d be surprised at how many are lying around once you learn to notice them. I stored them in jelly jars on the top shelf of my closet. After a while, Olive and Big Roy started bringing me keys they found, too. Mostly, my collection consisted of tin suitcase keys and quick-cut keys that could be replaced for less than a dollar at the hardware store. Once, at a flea market, I bought a Ben Franklin key, long-shafted with two or three teeth at the bottom. But I didn’t discriminate, appreciating the idea of holding the means to open dozens of doors. I imagined myself to be in a movie or a comic book. In the fantasy, I would have to unlock a gate and I would try every key in my possession, finding the right one just in the nick of time. I probably kept this up from when I was eight until I was about twelve, when I realized that it was stupid. When I went to prison, I envisioned those keys every day.

  When I rolled into Atlanta, I entered the city up I-75/85 to see the skyline before me like the Promised Land. I know it’s not like seeing the Empire State Building in New York or the Sears Tower in Chicago. As far as I know, Atlanta doesn’t have any famous buildings. You might even say that there are no skyscrapers. Sky reachers maybe, not sky scrapers. Regardless, the city is as enchanting as my mother’s face. I lifted my hands off the wheel, rolling under the I-20 bridge with my palms to the sky like a brave kid on a roller coaster. I wasn’t from this city, like Celestial, but I was of it, and it was thrilling to be home.

  She told me that Poupées was in Virginia-Highland, exactly where I had suggested that she set up shop, back when we were only dreaming. It was the perfect location: in the city, where black folks could reach it easily, but in a zip code that made white people feel at home. I paid ten dollars to park my car in a lot across the street from her plate-glass window. She had done well for herself, I had to give her that. Her daddy’s money may have made it attainable, but she put in the work. The dolls in the window were of all shades—another one of my ideas. Benetton it up, I told her—and they looked to be having themselves a merry little Christmas. I stared at the display for fifteen minutes, maybe more, maybe less. It’s hard to mark time when your heart is a pinball in your chest.

  I thought I saw her standing on a ladder, attaching a winged doll to the ceiling, but that girl was too young. She looked like Celestial did when I first met her, when she wouldn’t give me the time of day. I watched for a while longer while the look-alike folded the ladder and disappeared into the back. Then Celestial emerged from behind a hot pink curtain, like she was walking onto a stage.

  She had cut her hair, not like a trim or a slightly different style. This new Celestial had almost no hair at all, rocking a Caesar, like mine. I stroked my own head, imagining the feel of hers. It didn’t make her look mannish; even from across the street I could see her big silver earrings and red lipstick, but she did seem more firm. I gazed, hoping to catch her eye, but she didn’t feel my stare. She walked around her store pointing at things and helping people choose gifts, smiling. I watched until I got cold, then I went back to my car, stretched out on the backseat, and slept like I was dead.

  When I woke up, I saw her again, but her look-alike was gone. She was by herself until a tall brother walked in, looking like a cross between Vibe and GQ. I watched Celestial chat with him, but then she pitched her gaze in my direction, and her smile slid away like it was greasy. I don’t exactly believe in telepathy, but I know that I used to be able to talk to her without talking, so I asked her to come outside, to cross the street, to meet me on the sidewalk. I had her for a few seconds, but she pulled away. I waited, hoping that she would restore the connection, but she returned her attention to the task at hand, suddenly clutching the doll to her chest. The brother smiled, and even though I couldn’t see, I knew he flashed a mouthful of flawless teeth. Without my permission, my tongue went to the blank place in my lower jaw. But also without my permission, my hand visited the key ring in the front pocket of my pants.

  The key ring was among the things I carried out of prison in a paper sack. The rubber-topped car key would fit the family-ready sedan. I didn’t know if Celestial kept it, but wherever it was, this key would turn over the ignition. The thick, toothless key used to open my office door, but you could bet dollars to donuts that a locksmith remedied that faster than you can say “guilty as charged.” The last key, a copy of a copy of a copy, matched the front door of the pleasant house on Lynn Valley Road. I wondered about that key more than I should have. Once or twice, I opened my mouth and stroked the jagged edge against my tongue.

  On paper, it had never been my house. When Mr. D deeded this property over to Celestial, the only string attached was that Old Hickey couldn’t be cut down. It was like the way movie stars die and leave their fortune to a French poodle. The tree was mentioned by name, but “Roy Hamilton” was nowhere on the thick stack of documents that sealed the deal. This “home,” she promised, was a wedding gift to us both. “The key is in your pocket,” she said.

  And the key was in my pocket now, but would it work?

  Celestial didn’t file for divorce. After the first year of no visits, I asked Banks if she could end the marriage without informing me, and he said, “Technically, no.” I know she Dear Johned me, but that was two years ago, when I was facing a lot more time. But two years gave her ample opportunity to divorce a brother if that’s what she wanted to do. And plenty of time to hire a locksmith.

  With the keys in my pocket tinkling like sleigh bells, I returned to the Chrysler, cranked the engine, and headed west. Pressing the accelerator, I kept my mind on one thing, the worn brass key, as light as a dime and labeled home.

  Celestial

  I know this house as I know my own body. Before I opened the door, I felt the presence within the walls the way the tiniest cramp in your womb lets you know to get ready even though it has only been three weeks since the last time. As I stepped into the vestibule, the skin on my arms puckered and pilled, sending rapid sparks crisscrossing along the pathways of my blood.

  “Hello?” I called, not knowing what to expect but sure I was not alone. “Who’s there?” I may see ghosts, but I don’t believe in haints. A ghost is a memory made solid, while a haint is a human spirit got free from the body but traveling this earth just the same. “Hello?” I said again, not sure what I believed in now.

  “I’m in the dining room,” boomed a man’s voice that was definitely of this world, familiar and foreign at the same time.

  There sat Roy at the head of the table with his fingers laced and fitted into the cave between his chin and chest. My arms were full of silly groceries for my planned evening with Tamar: lime sherbet, prosecco, chocolate blended with cayenne pepper, and Goldfish crackers for the baby.

  “You didn’t change the locks on me.” Roy rose from his seat, his face glowing with wonder. “After all of everything, you made sure my key would still work.”

  He took the bags from my arms as though it were the most natural thing in the world, leaving me standing there with nothing.

  “Dre is on his way to get you,” I said, following Roy to the kitchen. “He left today.”

  “I know,” he said, the bag of food between us like a truce. “It wasn’t Dre I wanted to talk to.”

  I rubbed my arms to quiet the tingling as he set the bag down on the counter and then spun toward me and spread his arms, grinning, showing the dark space in the bottom of his smile. “You don’t have love for a brother? I went through a lot of trouble to get here. Don’t give me that Christian side hug. I want the real thing.”

  I walked toward him on legs that didn’t feel like my own. He closed his arms around me, and I knew that this was my husband, not some sleight of mind. This was Roy Othaniel Hamilton. He was bigger now than when he lived in this house, his body harder and more muscular, but I recognized his energy, almost on the
verge of action. Unaware of his own strength, he grabbed me so hard that I felt a little dizzy.

  “I’m home, Celestial. I’m home.”

  He released me and I filled myself up with greedy gulps of air.

  Roy’s face was broader and more lined than when I last saw him, two years ago. I let my hand go to my own face, smooth with makeup, and then I remembered my head, almost clean shaven. I almost felt that I should apologize, remembering how he used to roll a single strand of my hair between his fingers. Sometimes he said out loud that Roy III should inherit his eyes but my hair.

  He was prepared for this encounter; the starch scent of his new shirt mingled with the sweet fragrance of barbershop ointment. I was caught flat-footed, looking and feeling like the end of a long day.

  “I didn’t plan on waylaying you like this,” he said.

  There should be a word, I thought, for this experience when you’re surprised but at the same time the moment feels completely inevitable. Sometimes you read about these sixties’ radicals who accidentally killed a cop, or maybe they did it on purpose, I don’t know. But they run away, get a new name, and lead a clean, boring existence. They put on weight; they shop at Macy’s. But one day, they come home and there is the FBI. Their faces, flat on newsprint, always look astonished but not surprised.

  “I missed you,” Roy said. “I have a lot of questions, but I need to say first that I miss you.”

  I could recite Andre’s speech like lines from a play, these words he and I determined had to be said. And wasn’t Gloria right when she said that telling this particular truth was a woman’s work? But I stood in the shade of my husband returned home, and I couldn’t bring myself to speak a single necessary word.

  He led me to the living room, like this was still his house. He looked around. “This room didn’t used to be turquoise did it? It was yellow, wasn’t it?”

  “Goldenrod,” I said.

  “All this African stuff is new. I like it, though.”

  Along the walls were masks, and on nearly every flat surface was a carving, all keepsakes from my parents’ travels. He picked up a small ivory figurine depicting a woman ringing a bell. “This is real, isn’t it? Poor elephant.”

  “It’s antique,” I said, a little defensive. “From before elephants were endangered.”

  “Not that this would make a difference to the elephant in question,” he said. “But I get your point.”

  We sat down on the leather sofa and looked at each other. We let the silence grow thick, waiting for the other to break the peace. Finally, he scooted so close that our hips touched. “Tell me, Celestial. Tell me whatever it is that you have to say.”

  I shook my head no. He carried my unguarded fingers to his lips and kissed them twice, then he rubbed my hands over his fresh-shaven face. “Do you love me? Whatever else is details.”

  I moved my lips as wordless as a goldfish.

  “You do,” he said. “You didn’t divorce me. You didn’t change the locks. I had my doubts. You know I did. But when I was on the front porch, I decided to try my key. It slid in easy and turned slippery like WD-40. That’s how I knew, Celestial. That’s how I knew.

  “I didn’t walk all over your house. I waited in here because I know you don’t use these rooms. Whatever it is, I want to hear it from you.”

  When I didn’t say anything, he said it for me. “It’s Andre, isn’t it?”

  “It isn’t yes or no,” I said.

  Then he surprised me by laying his head in my lap, reaching for my arms and closing them around himself like a blanket.

  Roy

  She wasn’t like how I remembered her. It wasn’t just her man-short hair or the spread in her hips, though these are things I noticed. She was different now, sadder. Even her scent was altered. The lavender endured, but behind it was something earthy or woodsy. The lavender was from the oils she kept in a crystal bottle on the dresser. The wood-chip scent radiated from beneath her skin.

  I recollected Davina, who welcomed me with accepting arms and a feast fit for a man home from the war. Celestial didn’t know I was coming, but I wanted her to sense I was on my way and prepare a table for me. I fell asleep in her lap, and she let me rest until I opened my eyes of my own accord. Night falls early in the winter. It was around eight o’clock, and outside it was as black as midnight.

  “So,” she said. “How do you feel?” Then she looked embarrassed. “I know it’s a basic question, but I don’t know what I’m supposed to say.”

  “You could say that you’re glad to see me. That you’re glad I’m out.”

  “I am,” she said. “I’m so happy that you’re out. This is what we’ve all been praying for, why we kept Uncle Banks working on it.”

  She sounded like she was pleading with me to believe her, so I held my hand up. “Please don’t.” Now I sounded like I was the one on my knees. “I don’t want for us to talk like this. Can we sit in the kitchen? Can we sit in the kitchen, talk to each other like a man and his wife?” Her face lost its softness as her eyes darted around the room, suspicious and maybe frightened. “I won’t touch you,” I said, though the words were as bitter as baking chocolate. “I promise.”

  She moved toward the kitchen like she was marching toward a firing squad. “Did you eat?”

  The kitchen was how I remembered. The walls were the color of the ocean, the round table a pedestal topped by dark glass. Four leather chairs were evenly spaced. I remembered when I assumed those seats would be occupied by our children. I remembered when this was my house. I remembered when she was my wife. I remembered when my whole life was ahead of me and this was a good thing.

  “I don’t have anything to cook,” she said. “Not over here. I usually eat . . .” She trailed off.

  “Next door?” I asked. “Let’s get this part over with. It’s Andre. Say yes, so we can go from there.”

  I sat in the chair that I used to think of as my spot, and she perched on the countertop. “Roy,” she said like she was reading a script. “I am with Andre now. It’s true.”

  “I know,” I said. “I know and I don’t care. I was away. You were vulnerable. Five years is a long time. If anybody knows how long five years is, it’s me.”

  I went to the counter where she sat, positioning myself in the V of her legs. I reached for her face. She closed her eyes, but she didn’t pull away. “I don’t care what you did when I was gone. I only care about what our future is.” I leaned in, kissing her lightly.

  “That’s not true,” she said as I felt the brush of her dry lips. “That’s not true. You do care. It matters. Everybody cares.”

  “No,” I said. “I forgive you. I forgive you for everything.”

  “It’s not true,” she said again.

  “Please,” I said. “Let me forgive you.”

  I angled toward her again, and again she didn’t move. I placed my hands on her defenseless head, and she didn’t stop me. I kissed her every way I could think of. I kissed her forehead like she was my daughter. I kissed her quivering eyelids like she was my dead mother. I kissed her hard on her cheeks like you do before you kill someone. I kissed her collarbone the way you do when you want more. I pulled her earlobe with my teeth the way you do when you know what someone likes. I did everything, and she sat as pliable as a doll. “If you let me,” I said, “I can forgive you.” Starting my circuit of kisses again, I made my way to her neck. She shifted her head slightly so I could touch my nose where her pulse beat close to the surface. But the thrill wore off fast, like the rush of a homemade drug, the way the cheap stuff hits you hard but leaves you hungry in an instant. I moved to the other side, hoping she would tilt her head the opposite way, allowing me access to all of her. “Just ask me,” I said, my voice barely more than a rumble in my chest. “Ask me and I will forgive you.” I held her now; she was limp, but she didn’t resist. “Ask me, Georgia,” I said. “Ask me so I can say yes.”

  The bell rang seven times, one after the other, with no break in between. I jum
ped at the first note, and so did Celestial, righting herself quickly, like she had been caught. She slid off the counter, all but sprinting to the front door, throwing it wide for whomever she might find there. It was the girl from the shop, the one who looked like the past. She was holding a baby who enjoyed mashing the doorbell. He was a plump little fellow, bright-eyed and pleased.

  “Tamar,” Celestial said. “You’re here.”

  “Didn’t you tell me to come by with the muslin from the wholesale place?” The shop girl stepped into the foyer as the little boy reached for her hoop earrings, the left one dangling a key like Janet Jackson’s back in the day. “Jelani, you want to say hello to Auntie Celestial?” She shifted the baby in her arms. “I hope you don’t mind me bringing him.”

  “No,” Celestial said in a rush. “You know I’m always tickled to see this little man.”

  “He wants his uncle Dre,” Tamar said, struggling with the squirming baby. “You okay, girl? You look stressed, like this is a hostage situation.” She laughed a merry little laugh, until she noticed me standing there in the hallway. “Whoa,” she said. “Hi?”

  Celestial paused before pulling me into the room by my arm. “Tamar, Roy. Roy, Tamar. And Jelani. Jelani is the baby.”

  “Roy?” Tamar scrunched her pretty face. “Roy!” she said again once she ordered the details.

  “Here I am,” I said, smiling my salesman’s smile. But then I noticed her eyebrow creep, reminding me that I was missing a tooth. I covered my face like I was coughing.

  “Nice to meet you.” She extended her hand, tipped with blue-green fingernails, the same as the shimmer on her eyelids. Tamar was more like Celestial than Celestial herself. She was the woman I held in my mind when I slept on a dirty prison mattress.

  “Sit down,” Celestial said. “Let me get you something.” Then she disappeared into the kitchen, leaving me alone with this girl and her baby boy.

  On the floor, she spread a quilt of various shades of orange and set the baby on top of it. Jelani arranged himself on all fours, rocking. “He taught himself how to crawl.”