Local Souls

by Allan Gurganus

  Knowing that her other child was male, she could at least viscerally reregister the advantages all men have. Even little boys abandoned at birth.

  And somehow, as she went around disguised as a person middle-aged, the missing son began to rhyme with her father gone missing when she was a child. The numbers of her son’s age and her father’s seemed to average out at some central spatial meeting point. She knew this must sound silly to others; so she would trouble no one. Maybe this was how religions got invented? A set of beliefs built from admiring rumors about some local martyr; eloquent adaptations to all that was missing. And yet, her son came now to seem a new guardian-figure. He now accidentally defended his half-sisters’ rights and hers.

  —Fridays and Saturdays she even consciously allowed herself holidays. Two days a week, she would let herself feel less upset for being tricked into giving him away.

  He’d somehow survived that.

  He had somehow survived even her.

  ACT TWO

  PAINT ME SOMETHING ORDERLY ONCE, NOW THREE STEPS shy of a handsome mess. A family-house can overspill its margins in mid-June. Throw two girls’ bikes down willy-nilly against front porch steps. Near the garage, daub in too-blue a wading-pool. Stock it with seven Barbies floating pink, undressed. Make the home a mansion-scaled up-to-date “Colonial.” Paint it the new Benjamin Moore semi-gloss called “Heritage Barn-Red.”

  It scarcely differs from adjacent units but—at least in this one—at noon on a weekday, the young wife-mother and co-owner kept pacing right-angles, reading fiction aloud, atypically alone.

  In three hours, she’d leave 110 Pickwick Drive, Collonus Heights, Georgia, to fetch her elder daughter from summer school choral-society practice. Striding as wide as her own great room allowed, this solemn slender woman reopened a book of stories.

  As tonight’s moderator, she muttered test ideas aloud: “Chekhov being a doctor, his favorite phrase ran, ‘No one must ever be humiliated.’ Meaning what? Maybe he saw the world as symptomatic but still somewhat curable but . . . No, aw-ful, simplistic. You are not addressing idiots, idiot. And, note to self, your talk is to-damn-night, girl. You’ve really let it drift too late this time. They’ll finally all know.”

  She’d agreed to lead yet another book meeting. Why? So soon after getting an advanced degree in Russian lit, and this was all she’d managed? The doctor’s wife felt disgusted by her own recent successes. Hadn’t she become just the social leader her husband had specified? Too readily she seemed to quicken others’ minds. Shouldn’t that cost a person something? She already had so much darkness to answer for. But other educated women misread even that. “Always enlightening,” they said. “God, but you do delve.”

  Can one be a carrier of light without deriving warmth from it?

  Her literary insights often sounded, to their inventor at least, as surfacey as other ladies’ granite countertops and improved complexions—abraded into glowing.

  She recalled being the “new girl” at Georgia’s Herman Talmadge High. Its student body, long bored with itself after eleven years seated facing familiars, needed sudden blondness from elsewhere, nowhere. By simply walking in, age 15, she’d become what everybody sought. General kindness seemed easy after all she had privately endured: she saw each girl-classmate as a potential mother, each boy a dangerous unintended sump-pump dad. And yet, though she appeared the very definition of Desirable, she had pleased herself so little. Was this, she wondered now, not typifying female-behavior? Or not? Why her constant terror of subtraction? Why this daily fear of being at last found out?

  Mumbling concepts, the opening remarks she sensed Chekhov would not himself enjoy—it seemed she’d always settled. For whichever of her knacks drew most praise first. As a kid, she’d been assigned, not the silent noble Virgin’s role, but “Announcing Angel #1.” Then she’d spoiled religious pageantry with her tech mistakes. Even those got celebrated as comedy! Her humor proved accidental as her firstborn. Times, she felt innocent of having ever made one intended joke, one true choice.

  Something had befallen her when young. Everything since had leaked, dark, from one offshore mishap. Whenever she saw news footage of oil-smeared seabirds, she at once identified.

  • • •

  TWO LONG OATMEAL-COLORED sectional couches. Her proscribed indoor hike meant always encircling both. To mark her place within these Russian tales, she’d tucked a power-bill envelope. On it, scrawled:

  Plain not Vanil. Yog.

  (Less pinching ballet slppers for C.)

  Admit rental disc lost, just Pay!

  The pretty woman’s focus kept sliding from Literature, To Do, Literature, To Do. About Chekhov’s stories so much might be said. By anyone else. She told herself again, “Simply trust abundance.” Her last talk won much praise. This Atlanta commuter-community had been so recently settled, everyone felt “new here.” Even closest pals accepted only the history each woman opted to present. Whole girlhood starter-marriages, dank bisexual stints in the WACS, reductions of inherited hooked noses, so much went unmentioned. Atlanta, once burned by Sherman, that day became the capital for starting over. Southerners in need of anonymity favored it. Second and fourth tries, however sooty, were encouraged here, expected.

  Other women, literate and canny, felt drawn to their chairwoman’s wider experience. How wide they could not know. Even to herself she seemed overdetermined, annealed, fused too early by some smelter’s blast into being one thing only. And yet, within educated circles of exurban Atlanta, she was something of a natural star.

  Why? She was intelligent, yes, pleasant-looking even on her less-good puffy days. But the others most valued a certain edgy tone of voice she lately betrayed. It kept breaking through her smoothie book-talk insights. She had just confided to club members how her own costly new house seemed designed less by an architect, more by a brochure! Others murmured, “Mmnn,” nodded.

  Her smartness liked to undercut itself. That made it acceptable to a club like hers. She seemed doing penance for something: A love affair with her school’s headmaster? A husband in witness-protection? But, even during little aria diatribes, her mask-blank face maintained its continuing right to popularity. Others learned from that.

  Last month, discussing Jane Austen again, she’d admitted aloud that—like Jane, child of the clergy and niece to admirals—she, like the membership, had been the daughter of privilege. “An only child. Born up on a pedestal. With about that much privacy and floor space!” Her mock-irritation made others laugh, just as one of her stray cackles could send her daughters into spasms of shut-eyed giggling.

  Pondering January’s Jane Austen novel, she’d noted how this book also ended with the usual advantageous marriage. “Perfect, isn’t it? Our gifted Miss Austen, an unwed virgin, who died in her father’s parsonage at age forty-one, became, naturally, the poet laureate of happy wedlock!”

  This roused a bitter lasting group chuckle. Someone, nibbling almonds, actually choked. What the word “war” released in any American Legion Hall, “divorce” detonated here.

  Privilege meant a lady qualified for marriage. But that implied the iron neck-brace of expecting far too much. Though Austen’s last chapter “hitched” her heroine to one strapping duke with his own library and stables, the poor girl still seemed to always lack, what? “Bunny Mellon’s billions, Virginia Woolf’s brain, and Audrey Hepburn’s cheekbones!”

  (The ladies’ laughter came from so deep in, it almost rang bass-baritone).

  MEMBERS GUESSED: THE chairlady’s girlhood must have included serious daily study. Unlike theirs. In this set where dental assistants and surgeons’ receptionists had married their till-recently-married bosses, having a master’s in Russian lit leant some glamour. Tonight she would speak of Chekhov, whose serf granddad had bought his own family’s freedom. She would tell how young Anton C. then struggled to become a doctor and how he would use such skill to treat the poor for free.

  She’d confess this was part of why she depended on
him so. She would admit awaiting just such a humane calling, some worthy sacrifice. She would concede that: maybe her daughters’ weekly lessons in music, dressage and ballet, maybe her husband’s Sunday-dawn golf clinics, were “our form of agnostic worship.” Admit it, she’d tell them, even this, their favorite book club—might be another civic way to fill dry hours. Weren’t we, the luckiest of women, decorating Time instead of claiming it? Weren’t we paying secret penance for those grander starter-projects we’d abandoned far too early?

  Her landline, as it did eight to twelve times each bulletin-board morning, rang again as a male voice asked for someone with her maiden name then wondered if this might, in fact, be her. “Yes. ‘She.’ Why? Am actually in the middle of preparing something that’s, as usual, overdue. I’m afraid my husband and I only take personal calls on this line.” The gentled voice relented even as it kept quizzing her.

  Had she not been an expert steeplechaser as a girl? Did she not lead her pep-squad at a high school in Falls, North Carolina, during one specific tournament year? “Probably,” she said. “Some survey! Okay, but why?” His voice (upbeat and general as any announcer’s) went on: Had she not also known a doctor around age forty, had she not known him well?

  “Look, you, if this is your idea of a . . . You are so out of line. Why should I not hang up?” Pacing till now, she settled for six seconds on the third step of her home’s stair landing. Then she rose and—barefoot—commenced striding again.

  “But . . .” the caller hurried, had she not possibly also brought forth a child then given it up against her will (without ever seeing it or getting to touch it or being allowed to keep tabs on what sort of people got hold of her newborn)?

  Leaning against the foyer wall, she finally grew quiet, motions simplified, elbows drawn nearer her torso. “Yes.”

  Yes, those had been the agreement’s terms, right. She now admitted (to him, a perfect stranger) she had since endured tens of thousands of second-thoughts. But all adoptions were once handled that way.

  “Yes,” said the kindly voice. “Standard for then.”

  Besides, she added, at that time, she and her newly-widowed mother had lived in grief. The mother was especially strict, clear about placing the infant into a happier home than theirs could ever be. “But, true. All you said is so. About the child. I’ve felt terrible. My others, two daughters, don’t even know. What’d be gained? Past leaving them as sad as I (and my first) must be. But why’m I telling you this? What made you go off and research me, you? How’d you even learn this? Their codes are all encrypted. Firewalls. Believe me, for years I’ve tried. Wait, but I’m, wait . . . getting confused here. What’s all this sadness in reference to?”

  “JUST TURNED NINETEEN,” the baritone voice said. “Lucky I can scoot around the Web pretty good. Could be I’ve found you. God. Started to say you have no idea. But of course you do. You’re the only one does know. —Look, all’s I want is simple. You totally have nothing to fear. Don’t even think of being scared. Am barely asking anything. Would never force it. Whole deal shouldn’t take but about two minutes. (Having young kids, you must be super-busy.) I just want to see you, is all. Just look at you. Compare you with your picture. In my head, I mean. Then, hey, I’m gone. No strings. You’ll find excellent references. Online. Everything I can prove about myself’s online. Been holding down a regular ‘job-job’ at the Apple Store out our way. My main message to you is: you shouldn’t be scared about any of this. I been over it a gazillion times. Planned out what to say. And hey, I respect the decision they made for you. Giving up the baby. I found all the clippings: your dad’s dying in that bad way.

  —I just need to know what you look like. Your voice? is exactly how your voice should sound. Kind of husky, though. Hope that doesn’t mean you smoke, because you really shouldn’t, for a longer life. —Am I wrong to feel some interest in you, ma’am? Isn’t that my right, and natural? Haven’t I been picturing you every day for nineteen years?”

  She leaned against the wall. “This, this is going to be . . . awkward. Of course I would like to make it work and somehow will, but . . . I’m so . . . Which state do you live in, where are you?”

  “On your lawn on my cell looking in the window at you, Susan.”

  • • •

  SHE CARRIED HER receiver to plate-glass. There she saw, sure enough, standing near her drive beside an old green Honda needing bodywork, one tall young man, good-sized. He wore a suit also green, glen-plaid. Its cloth looked shiny, a recent purchase. His black necktie might be a good choice for your first job-interview. He’d likely dabbed product into his wavy hair. He appeared well-built, the juvenile lead. But, from this distance, he could be someone forty, playing young.

  • • •

  THE LATE-MODEL Honda showed one mismatched maroon door. Even that he’d waxed. The kid simply stood there. He appeared to have been waiting outdoors a good while. One fist held the cell phone to his ear. The left hand hung free. It looked manly, heavy, new. Wait. It clutched something—red foil, a heart-shaped chocolate box? Those usually get sold before Valentine’s. Today was June eleventh.

  He barely moved and yet his soft face looked so agitated with changing expressions, his mouth could not quite close. He seemed fearful to quite meet her gaze. Instead he focused on driveway asphalt—girls’ bikes there. He seemed all too aware of a home owner studying him. Eyes lowered, his head, under her attention, bent almost prayerful.

  She judged that, overlit by noon, the kid appeared roughly one-quarter too big. Professional-athlete-scale. If some male this size chose to come in here and harm her, he pretty much could. Nobody else home. He seemed fair-haired as she. Dye? She squinted. Against glass, she visored one hand. Yes, he had a squared-off reliable stance. Her own knees started losing confidence, usual spring. She felt a sharp needling stab at the center of her right breast. She sensed she might now teeter forward. She noted how his right hand clutched one red box; and hers? It held a book of short stories in Russian. Why?

  The boy, dressed as for a first funeral, appeared over-alert if peaceable. Phone to ear, the heart-shaped box held close against his side, he shifted around in shoes appearing too pointy-new. She kept hearing a kind of tidal to-and-fro and, slow, understood his cell was sending her the boy’s own nervous breathing. He stood awaiting a sign, formal clearance.

  If young, he slouched with the patience of some hard-living older vet accustomed to service delays. He was just there beside his dented car. He had stopped it short of one wading pool full of dolls before a terraced 4,000-square-foot home.

  Through her half-opened front door, she’d begun to judge and frame his features. Someone might think this stranger resembled her own missing father and a certain doctor (as he must’ve looked when just this age). The boy was even somewhat like her present husband. But finally her guest began to slowly appear—his dark evened brows and silver-blond hair—someone else. Of course, he was most like herself. But herself enlarged and re-plumbed male. She swallowed, keeping her own head as still as possible, matching his. That was it: this kid, he looked just like her.

  A velocity of unacknowledged merit hit her now, a blade. “So that’s why I’ve had this not-totally-unlucky life. That’s why they keep sticking me with speaking roles, chairpersonships. My God, I’ve been being fairly good-looking without once believing it!” And laughed. This is how she phrased the surprise of his beauty. Seeing his visual luck gave back some of hers.

  She at last spoke to the receiver, “Okay . . . you’re here. It’s open.”

  • • •

  SHE PADDED, SHOELESS, to her own front door. Now she felt any single step might send her off some cliff. She ducked back into foyer’s shade. She considered deadbolting the entry. Phone in hand, she wondered why the powers that be had picked the digits “911” when “111” would bring help a second faster.

  Somehow she didn’t want neighbors seeing a young man enter her marital home midday.

  The boy, having permission, fearing
retraction, advanced but as a sleepwalker. Or Dr. Frankenstein’s stiff-legged mistake. She could tell he breathed in shallow huffs, the very stage fright now seizing her. Against his jacket pocket he kept drying one damp palm, the other tightened on his chocolate box. At her welcome mat, he wiped soles of new shoes again, delaying. He behaved like a person never before invited into an actual human home.

  Through doorframe this stranger poked in just his head. From where she stood against one wall, he made a jagged silhouette. It was not too late to send him off. She could step into the drive, meet the uninvited guest there. Shake his hand in full view of neighbors. Ask the youngster for some grace-period, time to think this over. Would he please leave her a business card? He’d have to agree. What other choice?

  One actual person waited. He stood blinking half into the open door of a prospering radiologist’s commodious residence. Bikes of metals pink and yellow lay scattered against steps. Once spared midday light, his eyes took time adjusting.

  • • •

  “SUSAN?” THE VOICE rang down a dark hall. Too loud.

  “Yes, over here. —And, what is your name?”

  “Michael,” he stepped in, blinking. Adjusting to dimness, large hands wavering before him, the candy rattling in its box. The green suit was so new, sizing made it rustle. He edged nearer his goal. She guessed he’d purchased this outfit earlier today. Maybe, having scouted her home location, he’d driven downtown, spent freely. He had surely found the best Oxford-Cambridge glen-plaid suit available for a hundred and sixty dollars. Probably among the pawnshops and New York fashion stores of Old Town. Trying to quickly look “professional” so she’d agree to see him once. Let him see her.