Early Morning Riser

by Katherine Heiny

  “I think you should have a talk with Jimmy,” Jane said to Duncan one afternoon as they weeded the flower bed. The girls and Jimmy were inside watching Finding Nemo for at least the seven-hundredth time, and Patrice was brushing Glenn’s hair. Patrice loved anything that had to do with grooming Glenn—brushing her hair, putting calamine lotion on her mosquito bites, massaging her cuticles. Jane thought Patrice would make a very good gorilla. But then Jane would make a good gorilla, too, or maybe a wolf: she could scent the air of any room and tell which family member had passed through most recently. She could smell not just their shampoo and soap, but the personal odors they seemed to emit—Duncan’s trace of hickory smoke, Glenn’s tang of peppermint, Patrice’s hint of bitter lemon. They all had a very faint smell of pencil shavings.

  Duncan threw some weeds in the old white bin they used for yard debris. “What sort of talk?”

  “About sex,” Jane said. “I’m sure he doesn’t know the first thing about it.”

  Duncan didn’t say anything for a long moment. When he spoke, his voice sounded tight. “Jim knows about sex. A little, anyhow.”

  Jane stopped weeding and looked at him. He looked very serious, very solemn—sober in the nonalcoholic sense. “What do you mean?” she asked softly.

  Duncan sighed and leaned over to turn on the spigot. He picked up the hose and fiddled with the nozzle setting. “A long time ago when he worked at the feedstore, the cashier there—a girl named Chantilly—took Jim home with her after work. She wanted to make her husband jealous, though she didn’t tell Jim that. She got him to drink most of a bottle of rosé and then led him into the bedroom and they got into bed together and they had sex.”

  “Actual sex?” Jane asked. “Honest-to-God sex?”

  Duncan nodded. “Her husband was out playing poker and she wanted him to come home and find her in bed with someone else.” He began to water the flowers. “Chantilly—Chantilly—from what I heard later, she wanted to be on top so that when her husband got home, he’d see she was doing it willingly, that he wouldn’t think she was being raped and shoot Jim. Nice girl, huh? Nice of her to look out for Jim. So anyway, her husband comes home and sees them, and he didn’t shoot Jim but he roughed him up quite a bit, blackened one of his eyes.”

  Jane’s hand rose to her mouth. “That’s terrible.”

  “Chantilly’s husband threw Jim out in the yard and threw his clothes after him,” Duncan said. “Jim had to go to a neighbor’s and call his mother to come get him. Word was all over town by the next morning.”

  Jane couldn’t speak. She could only stare at the faint rainbow that had appeared where Duncan was spraying water. Odd how rainbows could go on appearing when there was so much evil in the world that Jane could barely comprehend it.

  She left Duncan standing with the hose and dragged the waste bin out to the curb, her mind spinning. The air seemed to flicker in front of her.

  This was almost certainly why Duncan hated rosé, had hated it since before she met him. Jane sighed and wiped the moisture from her face with the back of her hand. But maybe—maybe what had happened before was actually a good sign, in a cosmic sort of way? It couldn’t be that Jimmy would go all his life having terrible things happen to him, could it? Not someone as kind and loving as Jimmy. The universe would not allow it, and neither would Jane.

  * * *

  —

  Jane’s mother visited every year on the last weekend in June. She said the rest of the summer was too hot for her liking, and the winters were too brutal, and she’d never cared all that much for the autumn. So every year, Duncan drove the three hours to Grand Rapids and picked her up, and then drove all the way back to Boyne City. The official reason for Duncan doing this instead of Jane was that Jane got carsick if she drove for that long, but the actual reason was that Jane dreaded her mother’s visits so much that she probably would have turned the car around before she got to Cadillac. Jane didn’t know how Duncan could make the drive so willingly. He was such a good husband, so much better than most people realized.

  “You’re so nice to do this,” she said now, leaning down to kiss him as he sat in his armchair in the living room.

  “I don’t mind when your mother visits.” Duncan pulled her onto his lap. “Because it means you and I have a lot of sex.”

  Jane frowned. “What are you talking about?”

  “What are you talking about?” Duncan said. “It’s always been this way. You have a lot of sex with me before she gets here and for however long she stays. I think it’s your way of softening me up.”

  A silent film clip ran through Jane’s mind then, an odd flickering vision of college boyfriends and later lovers who had always seemed to look forward to her mother’s visits with puzzling eagerness. Well, everything in life had a price, she supposed, and you were constantly paying it.

  Duncan left the next morning and returned with Jane’s mother in the midafternoon. Jane and the girls came out to the driveway to greet them.

  Jane’s mother struggled out of the van, hitching her purse strap up on her shoulder. She was in her mid-eighties now. Her hair was whiter and more finely spun, her face had taken on the texture of wrinkled paper, she had broken capillaries and liver spots, and she moved more stiffly—but her personality, her essential self, remained the same (unfortunately).

  “Hi, Grandma,” Glenn said.

  “Hello, Glenn,” Jane’s mother said. “Hi, Patty.”

  Patrice began chuffing softly, like an animal getting ready to charge.

  “She really, really prefers to be called Patrice,” Jane said.

  “Well, she needs to learn the art of compromise.” Jane’s mother slammed the van door shut. “The world doesn’t always work the way you want it to. You have to be flexible.”

  Duncan was getting Jane’s mother’s suitcase out of the back of his van, and he smiled sardonically at Jane when her mother said that.

  “Did you bring us presents?” Glenn asked. “Grandma Harriet brings us presents.”

  “Goodness, no,” Jane’s mother said. “It seems to me that you girls have more than enough possessions already.”

  Some people speak to children like they’re adults and it’s charming and respectful, and then there was Jane’s mother.

  Glenn paused delicately. “It’s just that we really like presents.”

  “Well, you can’t always have your heart’s desire,” Jane’s mother said.

  Duncan tossed his keys from one hand to the other. “I’d better go to the shop and see how Jimmy’s getting along.”

  Jane knew that Jimmy was undoubtedly playing solitaire at the shop, and Duncan would either join him or take a nap in the back room, but she was so grateful to him for driving her mother up that she just smiled.

  She and the girls led her mother inside and helped her settle into Jimmy’s room. (Jane’s mother could no longer climb stairs easily and said it would be a fine mess if she fell down the stairs and broke her hip and had to stay three months while she recovered. She could be oddly persuasive.) Jimmy was going to sleep on the couch.

  Jane was touched by how excited the girls were to have her mother visit, although she suspected Glenn was still hoping for presents. If only more people brought presents with them! The world would be a better place. But Jane’s mother did seem to be making an effort and agreed to play Life with the girls while Jane did the lunch dishes.

  Jane’s mother played much like Gary. “Recycle trash!” she said, squinting at the board. “What if I don’t believe in recycling?” And “Adopt twins! I would never sign on for twins. Don’t I have any say in it?”

  The girls giggled, and Jane’s mother seemed to be enjoying herself. Maybe, Jane thought, you could only like playing Life when you didn’t actually have much of one.

  “Car crash, pay fifteen thousand dollars if not insured,” Jane’s mother read. �
��Goodness, it must have been serious.”

  It seemed to Jane that the sunny kitchen cooled for a moment, chilling her. The accident that killed Jimmy’s mother could never be left behind. It followed her everywhere.

  “Grandma, do you want to go to Kilwins and see Jimmy’s girlfriend?” Glenn asked.

  “Heavens, Jimmy has a girlfriend?” Jane’s mother sounded startled.

  “Yes, she works at Kilwins,” Glenn said. “And she has the most beautiful peacock-feather earrings.” The girls thought Raelynne was gorgeous and exotic and had the dream job.

  “Of course, I’d love to meet her,” Jane’s mother said. “Let’s go on down and have a look-see.”

  Jane dried her hands on a dish towel and came out to the living room. “You can’t say anything to her, though, Mom.”

  “Like what?”

  “Like anything.”

  “How’m I going to order a cone?” her mother asked in a jolly voice. “Sign language?”

  “You can order a cone,” Jane said patiently, “but you can’t say anything about Jimmy.”

  “Oh, honestly, dear, why are you always so sure I’ll embarrass you?”

  Because she always did. But Jane didn’t say that. Instead she loaded everyone in the car and drove to Kilwins. Maybe coming to look at Raelynne would be a thing she did with visitors now, instead of going to the South Pier Lighthouse in Charlevoix.

  Kilwins was busy, as always. Raelynne was working in the candy section, but she saw them and came over to the counter when it was time for them to order.

  “Hi, Jane!” she said. “Hey, girls.” She was wearing the same khaki shorts and magenta polo shirt as the other employees, but on her the colors seemed lusher, richer. Her blue eyes were enormous and her lips were like plump pink pillows. “What can I get you all?”

  “Now, let me see,” Jane’s mother said. “I’m in the mood for something sweet, but not bland. What do you recommend?”

  “Oh, for heaven’s sake.” Jane gave her a hard look. “Just get Peppermint Stick like you always do.”

  “I’m looking to expand my horizons.” Jane’s mother was using that jolly voice again. “Can I try the Butter Pecan?”

  Raelynne was helpful as always, handing Jane’s mother various tiny tastes and remembering that Patrice wanted the kiddie scoop but would start yelling if anyone actually called it a kiddie scoop. Jane’s mother decided she would have Peppermint Stick after all. Raelynne flipped from beautiful to ugly and back again twice while ringing up their purchases. It was very disconcerting.

  As soon as they were outside, Jane’s mother said, “Her facial features are too large. She looks like a marionette.”

  “Mom, honestly—”

  “Also, she didn’t strike me as terribly bright.”

  “You exchanged five sentences with her!”

  They began walking back to the car. Her mother continued in a reflective tone. “I suppose the lack of intellect wouldn’t be a drawback as far as Jimmy’s concerned. I imagine you’d love for him to get married and move out.”

  “Jimmy’s not going to marry Raelynne,” Jane said irritably. In the past she had occasionally imagined Jimmy getting married and moving away, had imagined a life with just her and Duncan and the girls, but it had been years since she’d thought about that and it annoyed her now to be reminded. Anyway, marriage was not the goal here; she just wanted Jimmy to know love, to have love reciprocated.

  “No, I suppose he’ll live with you forever,” Jane’s mother said cheerfully. “It was bound to happen anyway.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Well, his mother was old and in poor health long before the accident, wasn’t she?”

  Jane frowned. “I can’t really remember.” She wondered if that was how her mother justified things to herself—that Mrs. Jellico had been hovering on the brink of death anyway, so what was the harm, really?

  “It seems to me she was,” Jane’s mother said. “And after she was gone, someone would have had to take Jimmy in eventually.”

  Jane stopped walking so abruptly that Glenn stepped on her heels.

  “Keep walking, Mom,” Glenn said. “And Patrice is getting chocolate all over herself.”

  “I am not!” Patrice cried, furious. “Just on my shorts and shirt and shoes.”

  Jane scarcely heard them. She had never realized before that Jimmy’s mother would have gone on to die of natural causes. She had thought—however unrealistically—that but for the accident, Mrs. Jellico would still be living in the dingy green house, making Jimmy’s lunch in the ancient yellow kitchen. How had she never thought of this before? Would Jimmy have eventually come to live with her and Duncan anyway? Was it possible that Jane’s whole life didn’t lead back to that one event?

  “I myself believe I’ve lived so long due to my lifelong avoidance of alcohol,” Jane’s mother said. “That, and I always vote for whichever presidential candidate seems most likely to win. It has saved me untold disappointment.”

  * * *

  —

  After dinner that night, Jane put the girls to bed and took a shower while Duncan and her mother sat out on the back deck. She was still awake and reading when Duncan came up to the bedroom. He dropped onto the bed and leaned back, not even bothering to take off his shoes. His head hit the pillow heavily.

  “Your mother is getting scarily candid,” he said, staring at the ceiling.

  Jane put down her book. “Please don’t tell me things I can never un-hear.”

  Duncan ignored her. He continued staring at the ceiling in a dazed way. “She told me menopause was the best thing that ever happened to her, and that it would be for you, too. Said it was positively liberating to be free from the mood swings and the bloating.”

  Jane stroked the hair back from Duncan’s forehead. “I’m so, so sorry.”

  “She told me in later years her ‘flow’ got very heavy,” Duncan said, still in that soft, almost marveling voice. “Her ‘flow,’ that’s what she actually said.”

  “Oh, sweetie.”

  “She said it wasn’t the blood itself she minded so much, it was the smell,” Duncan continued. He had the bewildered air of a natural-disaster survivor. “I honestly think I may never be the same again, and the back deck is ruined for me now.”

  It seemed to Jane that Duncan was different—diminished somehow, weakened. She doubted it was permanent, but she understood how the world (especially in the form of her mother) caught up to you sometimes, and left you frail and defenseless.

  She got out of bed and eased Duncan’s shoes off his feet. She turned off the lights and helped him undress, and then she made love to him, softly, gently, in silence. Partly to remind him that he was resilient and loved and essential to all their lives, and partly because, you know, her mother was visiting.

  * * *

  —

  Jane’s mother went home two days later, on Sunday. Duncan drove her and although he seemed to be his usual cheerful self, Jane noticed that he left right as the Tigers game began and told her mother that he wanted to listen to it without interruption all the way to Grand Rapids.

  Jane and the girls began their summer in earnest. And in the three weeks that followed, they did all the usual summer things—beaches and playgrounds and parks and McDonald’s—and other, more unique outings, too.

  Raelynne had suggested they go to the Kilwins Chocolate Factory Tour in Petoskey, where Patrice turned out to be the ten-thousandth visitor. A little sort of siren went off when she handed in her tour ticket, and at the end of the tour, the factory owner presented her with a special gift basket of chocolates and a teddy bear. Channel Nine was there to film it. The teddy bear turned out to be blue—a boy’s color—and Patrice had a meltdown on local television. (The chocolates sure were good, though.)

  They went to Avalanche Bay wate
rpark on a rainy day, and Jane chased doggedly after the girls—splashing through tepid water, sweating profusely in the tropical atmosphere, head aching from the sound of rushing water—amazed, as always, that she actually paid money to do so. This year was the first year Glenn was tall enough to ride the Vertigo Cannonbowl, which she did while Jane watched, cheering proudly, and Patrice watched, pouting jealously.

  They went to tumbling class, where Glenn graduated to Level Two, and on the way home, Patrice let out a wail from the backseat and cried out, “I’m trying to be happy for Glenn, but I just can’t do it!”

  They drove to Williamsburg to visit the Butterfly Garden and an orange sulphur butterfly fluttered down to land on Patrice’s outstretched hand. The butterfly was the same bright hot amber color as Patrice’s eyes, and its wings beat slowly, almost in time with Patrice’s blinks. After a long moment, it flew away and Patrice called softly, “Good-bye, beauty!”

  Some occasions were magical, like that, and some occasions were the opposite of magical, whatever that is. Real, Jane supposed. (Life with small children is often real in a visceral, corporeal sense that people without children know nothing about.) This was like every summer, with times Jane thought she was the luckiest woman alive to be able to spend the summers with her children, and times she wished school were in session year-round.

  But mainly she was happy to devote her days to summer pursuits, happy to see Duncan when he came home in the late afternoons, happy to have leisurely mornings when she didn’t have to flog the girls over the getting-ready-for-school hurdles. She enjoyed the mornings so much that she began rising earlier than usual to make complicated breakfasts for her family in the bright, pine-paneled kitchen. But before she went to the kitchen, the first thing Jane did every morning was creep quietly to Jimmy’s room and peek through the door to see if his bed was occupied. It always was, and Jane always felt a pang of disappointment. She supposed it was the opposite of what she would feel when Glenn and Patrice were teenagers; then she would want nothing more than to know they had returned in the night.