by David Bergen
“Oh, I don’t think so. I’m not a good mother.” Then she said, “We have to help you.”
Lily was surprised. “How? And why?”
“You’re stuck.”
“Oh, I’m not stuck.”
“You wouldn’t know if you were stuck, would you? Is Frantz making eyes at you?”
Lily blushed. Shook her head.
“And you wouldn’t know that either, would you? He’s a single man. He might be ugly, but he’s a sweet talker.”
“He’s not very handsome, that’s true.”
“That’s kind of you. The fact is he’s ugly. Poor fellow.”
“His heart is beautiful. And his words.”
Dolores smiled. “It’s a dangerous thing to shun a girl like you. Stop talking to Lily, lock her away, and she’d end up thinking the neighbour’s cow was worth bedding.”
“Auntie.”
“You should want to have sex. It’s only normal.”
“Oh, I want to.” She said this so emphatically that she was embarrassed.
But Dolores didn’t seem to notice. She said, “I used to like it. Very much. And then I had that therapy, and now I’m on pills, and everything’s shifted. My world has shifted considerably.” She sighed. “Poor Henry.”
“He took me shopping,” Lily said. “Frantz.” She ducked her head and then looked up to see if her aunt was surprised or shocked. Dolores was sipping at her coffee and waiting.
Lily said that Frantz had taken her into town for some milk and butter and flour, and on the way home he’d stopped at Reidiger Clothing and they’d gone in together where he’d picked up a shirt and socks and while in the store he’d suggested that she might need something for herself. He would pay. And he insisted she try on a pair of jeans, and she had done so, had even come out of the change room and showed them to him while the salesgirl watched, which was strange because it felt like the girl was watching her and judging her. Frantz said that the jeans were perfect. But she didn’t know where or when she’d ever wear them, and he said that she would wear them. For sure. And so he bought them for her, and he bought a short-sleeved blouse for her that was a solid black colour. “It’s quite short, the blouse, and if I lift my arms my belly button shows. I have no reason to wear it. It mostly sits in my drawer. Along with the jeans. Though sometimes I wear them in the house, under my dress.”
“Frantz should know better. He’s using you to get at his brother. That’s what’s wrong here. You didn’t do anything, Lily. You have to stop being so frightened. You have your own mind. Your own body. It’s no one else’s. You know that, don’t you?”
“I think so.”
“Those brothers,” Dolores said. “I’ll have a talk with Frantz.”
“Oh no. Don’t. He hasn’t done anything.”
“Still. Listen. If he tries any tricks, you let me know. Okay?”
To this she had no answer.
In the morning, standing at the sink washing dishes, she saw a bird fly directly into the windowpane and disappear. She was shaken, for it was a large bird, and it made a thud and there was a smear of blood on the pane where the bird had hit. She leaned forward to see if the bird was lying on the ground. It was. Black against the white snow. She watched the bird struggle for breath, and then it stopped struggling. And died. Certainly a broken neck.
She missed sex. She missed the anticipation as much as the act itself, in fact it had always been that way. That the thought of sex was more fun than lying down and doing it. She found herself thinking about others and how they had sex and if they had sex and if so how often. She imagined that Mrs. Gerbrandt had sex with Mr. Gerbrandt, simply because Mr. Gerbrandt was highly sexed, and she knew this because he had said a few things to her in private, odd things, about her hair, and about her looks, or how the dress she wore looked on her, and one time he had touched her back while passing her by, for no necessary reason, and she knew that he wasn’t stopping himself from falling, he was a strong capable man, and it doesn’t take much as a young woman to know when you are being touched in a certain way. She didn’t give it much thought back then, and it didn’t worry her, for Mr. Gerbrandt was clean as a whistle, or sort of clean with maybe a bit of spittle in the whistle, but still, she was off limits. This she knew. And she wondered if Mrs. Gerbrandt had touched Mr. Gerbrandt’s penis, or if he asked her to, and with that same thought came the thought of Frantz and she wondered how many women had touched him down there. And had they touched him with their mouths, or just their hands?
The slide towards Frantz took place over the winter, specifically on Sunday mornings when the family was at church, and Lily and Frantz were left alone. They worked together in the barn, gathering eggs. They spoke in the refrigerator room, sorting the eggs. One morning he made her coffee and brought it to her. She took it from his hands. She said thank you. She asked if he had eaten breakfast. He hadn’t. She said that she would prepare him something. She left to go back to her house and he appeared half an hour later and sat at her table while she served him toast and eggs and fried potatoes. They were both aware of the clock, and they were aware when the family would return, and so they were in cahoots. Though they did not talk of it. She sat across from him and watched him eat. He was more delicate than Johan, who held his fork as if it were a shovel, and used his left thumb to push the food onto the shovel. Frantz ate slowly, and he talked as he ate, so much that she worried his food might be getting cold. But he didn’t seem concerned about this.
At first he didn’t seem curious about her. He talked about himself, about his travels and the various jobs he’d had after he’d left home, some of them back-breaking and some of them easy. He had for a time travelled in Central America, where he’d lived in a small coastal town on the Pacific side and learned to surf and spent his days languishing. He said the word languishing and he laughed, as if it went against every tenet he’d been raised with. He said that there was a whole wide world out there that his people were afraid of. That she might be afraid of. He lifted his head and looked at her and smiled.
She said that she wasn’t afraid of what was out there. She said that he was single. He was free to do as he wished.
“You’re free,” he said. “Look at you. I don’t know another girl like you.” He cleaned his plate and said that she was a good cook.
“Just eggs,” she said. “Nothing special.”
Then, as if this was a continuation of some other conversation, she said that she often read things that she didn’t understand. “Or I think I understand, but I wonder if I’m missing something.”
“You’re smart enough,” he said. “Truth is, stupid people don’t get shunned.”
She smiled again. “I don’t think we should talk about this,” she said. “It’s wrong.”
“That’s exactly what they want you to believe. They want you to accept. They want you to not think. To not ask questions. To be humble.”
“Humility is a good thing.”
“Is it? Are they humble? Is Johan humble?”
“He’s trying his best.”
“Are you happy?” he asked.
She said even if she wasn’t happy now, at this moment, she thought that she might be happy again. Soon.
“I told Johan that he would lose you.”
“You shouldn’t have said that. It isn’t true.”
On that day—this was before everything that followed—he stood and carried his plate to the sink, and as he passed her by he placed his free hand on her shoulder and held it there for a moment, and so this was the first time he touched her. She was aware of the touch, and how it was a message, though she did not know if it was a message of consideration, or pity, or seduction. In their world, the touch would have been considered a form of theft. She saw herself as an empty house, with a locked door, and she wondered if Frantz might be waiting for the key to open that door.
&nbs
p; Over the next while, in the egg room together, or simply standing in the yard, their breath pluming into the cold air, they argued about God. And doubt. And right and wrong. He was scornful of everything they had been taught. Not in a mocking manner, and not to upset her, but he just didn’t believe, and she couldn’t believe how it was possible not to believe. She felt sorry for him. And wished him a clear head. And a clear heart. So that he might believe again.
Two weeks later, on a Sunday morning, in the egg room, he told her of a trip he had taken down to Central America, and of the people he had spent time with. He spoke of a woman he had met, and he said her name, Annalee. He said they had travelled to a place called Santiago, and in the market he had seen a man preaching. The man was dressed in a suit, and he held a Bible, and he had a beautiful voice. Frantz said that the man turned in a slow circle as he spoke. He said that there were two boys with the man, his sons certainly, and they were about eight and ten. The boys were dressed in suits as well, and they stood at the man’s side, and as the man turned, so did the boys. Sometimes the boys looked up at the man, and then looked down at their feet, and then looked at each other and nudged each other and smiled. As if they had a secret. Or as if they were relieved to have one other person share their shame. For they must have felt shame. There they were, standing in the market while their father called out the sins of the world and the path to redemption as the indifferent crowds flowed past. “I saw myself,” Frantz said. “And I saw my life. I recalled going to town with my parents and my brother and my younger sisters, and I recalled being seen in a certain manner, and I recalled the looks strangers gave us. We had been taught, not through words, but through actions and comportment, to be proud of who we were. It was a form of pride. We were better than other people. Except that I knew that this was not true. I knew that we were just odd and I didn’t want to be odd. I wanted to go unnoticed. And when I saw those boys, I saw myself, and I saw how I would have been seen by strangers. I tried to explain this to Annalee, the woman I was with, but she didn’t get it. She thought the boys were cute. She said that the boys seemed happy. She saw the preacher, and she saw the boys, and she saw what might be called a carnival. A circus act. A barker in a travelling show. I saw something very different. I saw the triviality of my ancestors. The insignificance of myself. I saw obscurity.”
He stopped talking. And then he said that he had not meant to give her some strange confession.
Lily’s feet could not move. All that Frantz had said was true. The story he had told was her story, even though his story was more exotic, and hers was dull. She had not been in a market. And she had not been with a lover. And she had not been far from home. Still.
She said, “I understand. Your story. What you felt. I understand. The insignificance.”
“Of course you do,” he said.
She stepped towards him and took his face in her hands and she touched his eyes and his mouth and his jaw and his nose. She touched his neck and his ears and she felt stubble on his chin. She had to reach up to touch him, for he was tall. What was surprising to her was his effort to help her. He crouched slightly and bent towards her and the whole time she was touching him he kept his eyes open and looked at her. They said nothing the rest of that morning. They worked side by side, and they stacked the flats of eggs, and at noon they went to their separate houses.
That day, for supper, she made a rice casserole for Johan, and she served it with canned corn and a Jell-O salad. A bowl of ice cream for dessert. She made coffee and poured it for Johan, and in the silence she heard the movement of his tongue around the ice cream.
She took a pen and a piece of paper and she wrote on the paper: I need money.
Johan wrote back: Why?
For tampons, she wrote. And underwear. She wrote: Now.
He stood and left the room and returned with a ten-dollar bill and placed it in front of her.
She wrote: I want money each week. Enough for me to buy my necessities.
He wrote: Ask me when you need it and we’ll see.
She wrote: It’s our money.
He wrote: You have no money.
To this she had no response. For it was true. She had nothing.
She stood and cleared the dishes. She ran hot water in the sink and buried the dirty dishes in the water and she put on her rubber gloves and she washed the dishes and the cutlery and the glasses. She scrubbed the Corning Ware of the food that was stuck, and then she removed her rubber gloves and she dried the dishes.
That night, after Johan was sleeping and snoring, she rose and dressed and went downstairs on tiptoes and put on her parka and boots and stepped outside and felt the cold air on her bare head and she walked across the snow and knocked on his door.
He wanted to touch her and he asked if he could and when at first she said no, he said that he understood. She said that she shouldn’t have touched him as she did in the egg room. But she had been curious and she had been impulsive. She was sorry. Two weeks after that, on a Thursday night, at three-thirty in the morning, she removed her clothes and lay down beside him.
And they talked. And talked. And it was everything to her. She wondered sometimes if she didn’t visit him simply to hear his voice. When Frantz spoke to Lily, she spoke back. When she spoke back, they became conversant. When they became conversant, they spoke more intimately. When they spoke in this manner, intimately, she approached him as a possibility. And he saw the possibility in her. He spoke. She spoke. They spoke. They pushed each other away, and fell back together, like a bottle tossed against the shore and then pushed out again, and then back against the rocks.
One time they spoke of God and faith and her shame for having slipped away from the church. But when he asked if it was true that she felt shame, and would she go back to the church, she said no, she wouldn’t. And so the shame was made up, or convenient, or necessary. He said this, and she thought about it. She said that she didn’t know where his ideas came from. So contradictory. So different. Not normal, she said.
“Oh, no,” he said. “You’ve become so accustomed to abnormal thinking that you don’t know when thinking is clear and strong and good. For example, you are burning for something else.”
“What else?”
“Words. Real words. Ideas. The church you and I grew up in is bereft of ideas. In fact, they are afraid of ideas, because ideas might sow doubt, and doubt is dangerous. They want certainty.”
One time they spoke of dancing. He had learned to dance in Nicaragua, on the beach where parties went all night. “At first I was embarrassed. Self-conscious. And when you dance, you can’t be self-conscious. It is like making love. It is better to not think. To feel is good. That is dancing.”
She said that she had danced with the children at Gretchen’s. The family had taught her. And so she was now like him. Except that she hadn’t danced on a beach. “Did you dance with girls?” she asked.
He laughed and said yes, of course. And boys. And older women. And men.
She asked him how many girls he’d had. She wanted to know. He said that a number meant nothing, though there were a few, but those girls had offered him little clarity in his life, not that he’d been looking for clarity, ha, but now he was clearer. He was finding himself now. She said that she had not yet found herself. She didn’t know if it was possible. She said that sometimes she caught herself standing in one place, and she realized that she had been standing there for a long time, for her feet were cold, and her face, and time had passed and she had forgotten what direction she was going in. She said that other times she was aware of moving physically through her house, but she was standing above herself, and she was watching herself, and it was odd to watch from above. In those moments it was as if she had passed from here to there, and her soul was above her body. One time when this happened she was acutely aware of the shape of her head, and she could see her mouth moving, and Johan was there, but he wasn�
��t paying attention.
They spoke of an afterlife. She believed in one. He didn’t.
He said that she just had to say the word and he would go away with her. “You wouldn’t even have to take anything, just yourself.”
“I couldn’t,” she said. “I can’t.”
She was shaking. He said that she could do whatever she liked. He had no possession of her. It was just an offer.
“I’d lose everything,” she said.
He asked her what she had now and she had no answer.
In the morning, she was aware of her hands plucking eggs from the troughs in the barn, and she was aware of her breathing, and she was aware of her forearms in the cooler, the down of her hair and her small wrists. She felt bad for wanting sex. She had felt the same way with Johan, guilty for making sex important. And then it had stopped with Johan, and she missed it terribly.
Always, when she visited him she wore jeans and a blouse, clothes that they had bought together that day in town. And she’d known then that the secrecy of that moment in the shop was a giant step into a quagmire that might sink her. But she didn’t care. Or perhaps she cared too much. And so it came to be that when she visited him in the night, she wore the blouse and the jeans and she loved the way the clothes held her, and she loved the act of removing the clothes, the jeans especially, the rushed pulling of the legs downwards so that they inevitably came off inside out and had to be turned aright later, and the bone-coloured buttons on the blouse, buttons that were delicate and small and required extra care, and it was difficult with shaking hands, for her hands often shook in those moments, and she didn’t know if it was excitement or fear.
“Look at your little hands,” Frantz said, and he took them and held them and then he covered her with his body. Wild, she was. She frightened herself so. But he kept opening the door. Come in. Come in. Come in. And so she did come in.
The body of course was an envelope that held the soul, which is what she had been taught from an early age, and it was crucial to not adorn or love the envelope too much, but now she saw that this was simply a lie, and she used Frantz as a test, to see if there were limits. One time as he read to her—he was insisting on reading a book she had never heard of and found frightening for its story of jealousy—she listened and then told him to stop. Enough, she said. She was naked, and she stood and kissed him on the mouth and she walked around his room, touching the objects on his desk, and at his small table. Then she paused before him and asked him to touch her and to name the parts that he touched. To use words. Vulgar words. Real body words. He did this. And touched her as he did so. And she was thrilled by the combination of the words and his touch.
