Fiona Range

by Mary McGarry Morris

  “No I’m not.” Elizabeth looked up slowly. “I’m just very tired and . . . very . . . sorry for all the pain and all the trouble I’ve caused. You see, I was always too connected to George, and him to me. So I came back to make sure it was over, but then Rudy came too, so I knew it had to be over. And I thought it was until I saw George and you, and then it all got so confusing. But now I know, and the other night I told George what it was. That it was a connection, like a long, deep habit between us. But that it wasn’t love. And that I knew what the right thing was to do. I told him I finally knew what I had to do, that if I didn’t marry Rudy I’d hate myself forever.”

  “Why?” Fiona asked through clenched teeth. She could barely breathe in the trapped, dead air. The radiator under the window was clanging. “Why would you hate yourself?”

  “Because he’s . . . he’s so good and . . . and . . .” Elizabeth was crying again.

  “And because you love him? Because you love him so much?”

  Elizabeth nodded, and the trembling between her sunken cheeks seemed more a leer than a smile.

  Fiona stood up. She had to leave before she said something she would always regret. When she got to the door, the light went off, and Elizabeth sighed. Fiona turned suddenly. “Yah, go ahead, Lizzie, stay in bed! And then you can have everything the way you want it!”

  “What? What do you mean? Fiona!” Elizabeth called as the door closed.

  It took every effort not to slam it. Returning to the den, Fiona forced herself to sit with her aunt and uncle, answering questions about work, how her car was running, her apartment.

  “Oh, and by the way.” Her aunt glanced up mid-stitch. “That was so nice of George to spend all that time fixing the stove the other night. Uncle Charles said he tried to pay him, but George wouldn’t hear of it, so we were thinking of maybe sending him a gift certificate to a restaurant he might like. You know, some really nice place the two of you would enjoy. So, do you have any ideas?” She shrugged uneasily. “Or suggestions?”

  “No.”

  “Well, my first thought, naturally, was the Orchard House. My favorite. But Uncle Charles seems to think young people don’t like it there, which I don’t necessarily agree with. I mean, I see young people there. I see them all the time!”

  “Occasionally, yes,” Uncle Charles said. “But nothing like it used to be. Now just about everyone in there’s our age!”

  “I wonder what happened,” Aunt Arlene mused, looking at him.

  “Well, for one thing,” Uncle Charles leaned forward and said, “all the older people we knew have died.”

  Their cheery banter was oddly comforting. She knew it well, words to fill the gaps in the barricade, its very banality meant to convey the richness and depth of their union. Surely if this was their greatest concern, then they were without cares and above most common woes. They had made a great success of their life together. Upstairs their daughter sat in darkness.

  “And?” Aunt Arlene prodded. “What’s the other thing?”

  “We’re the older people now!” He chuckled and picked up his paper.

  “Oh, Charles!” She looked at Fiona and shook her head in mock dismay. “Well, in any event, we’ll just pick out some nice place. Which I’m sure will be fine, since George Grimshaw never did have a fussy bone in his body. He’s never changed, has he? He’s always the same, always so sweet and dependable. Such a dear young man.”

  “One of the best,” Uncle Charles added with a wide-eyed look at his wife.

  “Oh, Fiona, before I forget!” Aunt Arlene said. “You’re probably not interested, but I told Lucretia Kendale I’d ask. She wants to know if you might like to drive her down in her car to West Palm Beach and stay—”

  “No,” Fiona said. “You were right. I’m not interested.”

  “Yes, well, that’s what I thought.” Aunt Arlene took a deep breath.

  “She wants to go right after Thanksgiving,” Uncle Charles said. “It’s a brand-new car she’s got, a Cadillac, and I know you don’t like the winter too much . . .”

  “I never said that.”

  “Well, not in so many words maybe, but, I mean it’s so cold up here, and I know how hard things can get when you’re not making all that much, especially with an old car and—”

  “What do you mean?” Fiona interrupted. “What are you really trying to say?”

  “Just that! I just think it’s a wonderful opportunity, that’s all,” he said.

  “Well I’m not interested. Not in the least.”

  “But you should at least consider it, Fiona,” he said, the old irritation nettling his voice. “There comes a point in life, you know, when opportunities like that are very few and far between.”

  “Driving down to Florida with Lucretia Kendale? You think that’s an opportunity? Are you serious? An opportunity for what?” she asked, trying not to sneer. “Early senility?”

  “An opportunity for a fresh start!” He stared over his glasses.

  “God, you’re insulting!” Before she could stand up, her aunt caught her hand and held on to it.

  “Oh, Fiona, please. That’s not at all what your uncle meant. Did you, Charles?”

  “I know what he meant,” Fiona said.

  “No, you don’t understand,” he said.

  “I’ll tell you what I don’t understand, and that’s how you two can just sit down here and pretend nothing’s wrong with Lizzie.”

  The flames reflected on their face as they stared at the fireplace. The enormous log sizzled and spit.

  “Lizzie’s having a bad time of it, we know that. She’s exhausted. She’s just overdone everything,” her aunt finally said.

  “Rudy thinks it’s more than that. He wants her to see . . . someone,” Fiona said, so conscious of her uncle’s darkening eyes that she couldn’t bring herself to say ‘psychiatrist.’

  “I know.” His jaw clenched.

  “Well, of course, if she’s still feeling like this tomorrow or Tuesday,” her aunt said. “In any event, Rudy’s coming by later tonight to check on her,” she added. “Maybe by that time she’ll even be up and about. You never know with these viruses.”

  “Tell him to call me,” Fiona said, enjoying her uncle’s watchful silence.

  “May I ask why you want him to call you?” he said, folding the paper he’d been holding.

  “So I can tell him how I think Lizzie’s doing.”

  He took off his glasses and bit the stem. “How’s that? How do you think she’s doing?”

  “Not good,” she said with blade-point enunciation of each consonant as they stared at one another.

  “Fiona!” Her aunt leaned forward and angled her head as if trying to locate something in the fire-stirred shadows. “What’s that?” she asked, rising from the chair, hand outstretched. “That locket. Where did you get it?”

  Fiona held it out taut on its chain.

  “Oh my God,” her aunt said, bending to open it. “Yes. This was my mother’s. She gave it to Natalie. These are our baby pictures.”

  “I know. That’s the other reason I came. I wanted to show it to you. I almost forgot.” She drew in her chin to see the locket in her aunt’s hand. “I think it’s so beautiful.”

  “Yes,” her aunt said. “Natalie did too. She wore it all the time. Sometimes she’d forget and wear it swimming. She said it wasn’t the reason, but I know that’s what happened to the pictures, how they got so cracked. Did you just find it somewhere? Don’t tell me it’s been upstairs all this time.”

  “Patrick gave it to me.”

  “Patrick? Why would he have it?” her aunt asked, shaking her head in bewilderment.

  “I don’t know. I guess he just happened to come across it.”

  “Where?” her uncle asked.

  “He didn’t really say. In his house, I guess.”

  Aunt Arlene closed the locket, then eased back into her chair. She picked up her needlework, but did not slip the needle from the canvas. She stared forlornly, as if
she had just seen a flaw in the half-stitched petals but hadn’t the heart to rework it.

  “She probably left it there once. It probably got wedged down behind cushions or something,” her uncle said.

  Fiona realized he was speaking to her aunt.

  “That was thirty years ago,” her aunt said quietly.

  “Yes, and knowing Patrick, there’s probably very little that’s been changed there in all that time,” he said.

  “Excuse me,” her aunt said, getting up. She went into the kitchen.

  Fiona rose to follow, but her uncle asked her to wait.

  “Fiona, how did Patrick happen to give you that locket? What exactly were the circumstances?”

  “I don’t know what you mean. He found it, and he gave it to me.”

  “It was that simple? That uncomplicated?”

  “Yah!” She wasn’t about to admit what had really taken place.

  Her uncle continued to look at her with a kind of horror—as if he already knew.

  “Why?” she demanded. “What other reason would there be?”

  He stared up at her, head back on the chair, his gaze flattened and empty. “None, I would hope. But with Patrick you never know.”

  “He’s always been pretty up-front with me.”

  “I’ll say what I said before, Fiona. He’s unstable and he can be very cruel.” He was almost whispering.

  “But it’s more than that, isn’t it? You don’t trust him, do you?”

  “No. No, I don’t.”

  “So is that why you pay his taxes every year? What is it, some kind of payoff so he won’t admit he’s my father?”

  “He didn’t say that, did he?”

  “Not in so many words, no.”

  “Well I would hope not, because it’s really quite simple. From time to time Patrick has needed help, and I’ve given it to him when I could.”

  “Why? Why would you?”

  “It’s a difficult situation. He’s so filled with anger and bitterness and self-pity he can’t seem to ever help himself for long.”

  “Well, do you blame him? I mean, not only does he get fired his second week on the job, but then you tell him he can’t ever even go near the courthouse again. Do you know how humiliating that is?”

  “He’s lucky that’s all that happened. They almost arrested him.”

  “Arrested him! Arrested him for what?” she said, unable to hide her irritation.

  “For assault.” He explained that Patrick and his supervisor, John Zender, had argued and then Patrick had pushed him. Seeing her shrug, her uncle added that Zender had a club foot. When Patrick pushed him he fell halfway down the stairs and hurt his back.

  “Patrick said it was an argument. In fact he said the other guy shoved him, but because of you he just walked away from it.”

  “Well.” Her uncle sighed. “What can I say, Fiona? Why would I lie about it? What would be the point?” The flames glowed on his face as he leaned forward to retrieve a newspaper from the pile.

  “I just feel so bad for him,” she said. “He’s so lonely. I hate seeing him so alone.”

  At this, all her uncle’s features contorted, mirroring the contempt in his voice. “He made his own bed, now let him lie in it.”

  “What does that mean?” she asked weakly, not really wanting an answer.

  “He doesn’t deserve your pity. And he certainly doesn’t deserve your good heart.”

  There was nothing to say back to that, nothing she could do, but try not to smile on her way into the kitchen. A good heart. She had no idea her uncle thought that of her.

  Aunt Arlene was peeling oranges and grapefruits. She cut them into chunks which she put into a glass bowl. Fruit salad was the one thing she could always get Elizabeth to eat, she said. Part of the reason she had gotten so run-down was her diet. She hardly ate anything. “I think that’s part of her trouble with Rudy,” she confided. “She was falling back into her old eating habits. And she couldn’t fool him, of all people—I mean a doctor, for goodness’ sake! So she started, I think, avoiding him. Which of course she will hotly deny and blame it on all her school commitments. But I’m sure it’s all tied in. She just pushes herself too hard. She always has and I don’t know why. I’ve never understood it. I don’t think there was that much difference in the way the two girls were raised. And why Elizabeth thinks she has to be such a perfectionist is beyond me.” She put the cutting board and knife into the sink and turned on the faucet. In the light her wiry hair was silvery gray. Her hips and rib cage were no longer defined by any discernible waist. She leaned forward to scrub the cutting board. All she had ever wanted was her family’s happiness.

  “Maybe that’s just it,” Fiona said softly. “I mean, the more trouble she saw me get into, the harder she tried to be good.”

  Her aunt turned. She wiped her hands on a towel, then threw her arms around Fiona. “Oh, I didn’t mean you, hon. I meant Ginny, so don’t go thinking you’re the cause of any of this. Elizabeth just has to learn to relax and pace herself a little better.”

  Once again, however benignly, her aunt had managed to accentuate her flimsy status here. Fiona said she’d better be going. Her aunt told her to be sure and come early Thanksgiving Day. As Fiona said she would, her aunt’s eyes shifted to the locket.

  “Have you ever gotten another phone call?”

  It was a moment before Fiona realized what she meant. “No.” She hesitated. “Aunt Arlene, I made that up. I’m sorry. My mother never called me. I think I was trying to get attention or something. I never thought how it’d make you feel.”

  Aunt Arlene smiled and assured Fiona that she understood. And of course she wanted attention. “Don’t we all at one time or another?” She sounded almost lighthearted now as she filled a plastic container with fruit salad for Fiona to take home. “Thank goodness I never had to worry about your eating habits. You’ve always had such a wonderful appetite.” She handed Fiona the container and her gaze fell to the locket.

  “Does it upset you, that I’m wearing it?” Fiona asked.

  “Oh no! Of course not! It’s just such a surprise seeing it again after all these years, that’s all!” She patted Fiona’s cheek.

  “Here.” Fiona reached back to undo the clasp. “You should have it. It was your mother’s, and it’s got your picture in it.”

  “No,” her aunt said, stepping back and shaking her head. “It was your mother’s and your grandmother’s, and now it belongs to you.”

  It was Tuesday morning.

  “Congratulations!” Maxine cried from the front of the dining room as Fiona came through the swinging door, tying on her apron.

  “Hey, what’d I win?” Fiona looked around. The three seated parties were all smiling at her. “Okay, then what am I having, a boy or a girl? Twins? Who’s the father? And when are we getting married?”

  “It’s your uncle Charles!” Maxine announced loudly enough for everyone to hear. She leaned on both arms over the newspaper and read aloud. “Yesterday Governor James Proctor announced the appointment and elevation of the Honorable Charles H. Hollis to the Superior Court bench.” The article listed her uncle’s many accomplishments, professional affiliations, and went on to say that he would be sworn in after the first of the year. Fiona peered over Maxine’s shoulder as she read, following her magenta fingernail from line to line. “Judge Hollis is married to Arlene Range Hollis, and he is the father of three adult children, John Hollis, Virginia Hollis Fay, and Elizabeth Hollis.” Maxine looked up, pouting. “But your name’s not here!”

  Fiona laughed. “Because I’m not an adult!”

  “They should have a retraction,” Maxine said, scanning the article again to be sure she hadn’t somehow missed it.

  “Correction, you mean,” Fiona said, reaching under the register for an order pad.

  “Yes!” Maxine said, slapping the page. “And they should put your name in! I mean, the Hollises brought you up with their own kids. You were raised like one of their own and
. . .”

  “Maxine,” Fiona said quietly.

  “. . . my lord, I mean, the judge comes in here all the time to—”

  “Maxine!”

  “What?”

  “I already know this. Who are you telling, me or them?” she asked, rolling her eyes in the direction of the quiet dining room.

  “Well I just think your name should be here too,” Maxine insisted with genuine disappointment.

  “Well it’s not,” Fiona whispered. “And if I don’t give a shit, why should you?”

  Maxine’s face drained of color.

  For the rest of the morning Fiona worked quietly. Customers kept congratulating her.

  “Thanks, but I didn’t do anything,” she said each time.

  “It’s just everyone’s so proud of him,” Reese Fogarty, the pharmacist, said, grinning over the BLTs she’d just served him and his clerk, John Dale.

  “And the really neat thing is,” John Dale added, “most good people, people like Judge Hollis, never get any recognition at all.”

  “Especially when there’s politics involved,” Fogarty was saying as she headed back into the kitchen. Her aunt and uncle must have known when she’d been there Sunday night that the announcement would be made the following day, but neither one had said anything. It was so typical of them. Never call attention to yourself. Keep a low profile. Don’t rock the boat. She’d heard versions of the same message all her life. Their reserve was incredible, even with one another. In all her years at home she couldn’t recall ever hearing them argue, though she was probably still the only person who could make Charles Hollis raise his voice.

  She wondered if Elizabeth had felt well enough to go back to school. Not the most fortuitous time for the judge’s daughter to be flipping out, she thought, as Chester put up her orders. When she came into the dining room two more parties were waiting to be seated.

  “Fiona!” called a man’s voice from the last booth. “Come here come here come here quick!” Larry Belleau panted. He was hunched so low his chin was almost touching the table.