The Widow’s Husband

by Sheila Evans

  “I don’t know how you’d answer that.”

  “Especially with Tiffany sitting there, glaring from behind the bull’s-eye makeup. I said I had a daughter who’d not done those things, who could give blood.” I laugh, to show Amy it’s a joke, but she just stares. “Then she said this odd thing.”

  “Well, what! Don’t leave me hanging.”

  “She says my daughter, Emmett’s daughter, must take after me. If she’s that sensible and level-headed.”

  Amy sits up straight. “See! I told you Dad was weird.”

  “Weird. Just exactly what does that mean? Covers a lot of territory, if you ask me,” I snap. I clatter off with our plates. I want Amy to go. Nevertheless, I give her a chance. “What’s going on with you?”

  “Nothing,” she says, with that sly look. “You’ve had a hard day. I’m clearing out.”

  Hard day—Amy has no idea.

  Vi’s intent on the paperwork; otherwise, I’d ask her about the connection to Emmett. But I’ll have time later—there will be a later, as I seem to be getting hired.

  Vi awes me. She’s a no-nonsense executive type. Her short dark hair frames her face like a pair of parentheses; her makeup is understated, her earrings small pearls (in contrast to Tiffany, who wears what appear to be safety pins); neat figure in a dark sweatshirt and pants. Dressed up, she’d be the picture of self-assured success, like a model in an ad for a luxury car, a Lexus or Mercedes, on her way to preside over a board meeting.

  Vi shows me around. She points out my workstation, a sidecar thing next to Tiff’s desk. Then I follow her down a long dark hall to the conference room. Vi says, “I’ll get you started, the training session stuff, you know. But first, here’s the washroom, unisex, so lock up. The storeroom, a locker, place to keep your things.” Sotto voce, “Don’t carry cash, and watch your purse—Tiff and I have both been ripped off.” In a normal tone, “The warehouse.” She pushes on a pressure bar, we step into a large room, blessedly warm, the walls lined with boxed equipment, the receivers and parts for their new digital system.

  Above a hum of activity, Vi calls out, her voice echoing off high walls, “This is Peg Malone, people, new office person. Peg, Eugene and Al, installers. And Bruce, our chief troubleshooter.” Hard-hatted, safety goggled—I stifle the imagery around the word nerd—he’s barely recognizable as the guy at my garage sale. He gives me a grin and a thumb’s up. “And Helen, our all-around Girl Friday. That’s Zack back there on the ladder. Zack, king of the stacks, huh, Zack?” she sings out to a kid who looks like he ought to be in junior high. Her condescension surprises me. I wonder if Zack is aware of it, but all I can make out in the distance is the turned-around baseball cap, the big clothes. I smile and nod, offer to shake hands with one of the installers—Al? Eugene? but pull back and laugh self-consciously when I note his leather gloves. Then Vi closes the door, shutting out the noise, but the warmth, too.

  Back down the hall to the glassed-in cubicle, the conference room. “Coffee?” says Vi. “No? I don’t blame you. By this time in the morning, it’s vile.” She clears a place for me at a battered table, sweeping into a pile some papers, tucking in the top of a half-empty box of donuts, pushing it to one side; brushes crumbs into the trashcan, empties ashtrays. On a counter simmers the poisonous coffee, condensing into syrupy acid. “Moon River” plays softly through overhead speakers. “Just got time to get you started before I leave.”

  “You don’t work here?

  “No, I’m from the district office in Oakland. I come in once in a while to give Tiff a hand. Traffic was murder this morning.”

  “When you’re not here, she’s the boss?”

  “Yes, she’s a whiz. You’ll love her.”

  The flat green eyes, the makeup, the black outfit. Yeah, right, I’m going to love her.

  The training: I read through a loose-leafed binder, fill in an answer sheet like a junior high school worksheet. The section about company policy and/or philosophy is numbingly dull but understandable. The rest of it—graphs, circuitry diagrams, the specs, jargon, lingo, model numbers, charts of plug-ins, add-ons, modules, clock set-ups—might as well be in Urdu or Sanskrit, and runs together in a mishmash of confusion. I tell myself it’s not that bad, just hang tight—but I’m on the verge of despair. Then like an intervening miracle—the cavalry riding over the hill, the FBI cracking the code, the fairy godmother waving her magic wand—Vi sticks her head in and says go to lunch, an hour break.

  There’s a parking ticket on my car. I stuff it in the glove box, drive down to a Subway, collapse in a plastic booth with a BLT and a Dr. Pepper, trying to ignore a thin panic, a bubble of hysteria. Not the right job; I’m not right for it. But I always told myself I could do anything I wanted to, if I set my mind to it … although I haven’t done much.

  But that’s not true. Temp work is tough, demands adaptability and a range of skills. I’d been a success, had even liked some jobs. Working in the library, and at the main office of the school district. In the photo booth at Mountain View Mall. A blast, a kick, really. During slack times ungumming envelopes of developed pictures, seeing what people take shots of. Flower gardens, children, lofty scenery. And nudes and sex parties, drunken brawls—I stared at those people when they picked up their photos.

  Bad jobs, too. A stint at the VA office in the Mission District. On the sidewalk outside, stepping around pools of piss and puke; in the lobby over bundles of drunks and bums, some of them Vietnam vets. There, but for the grace of God, lay Emmett, and I puff up a bit thinking that I’d influenced him, kept him steady and centered. I give myself credit for that.

  At the beginning, sure, I wanted to do the hippie bit, decorate with beads and cushions on the floor, hang a huge poster of Richard Nixon on the bathroom door, the one of him saying, “I am not a crook.” But Emmett had shown deeper flaws. He was the one who lied to the property assessor, lied on our income tax. Lied to Amy, told her a bunch of bull about his parents, how gifted, cultured, discriminating they were (they died before Amy got to know them).

  I was the one with common sense, including a sense of what was right. He’d latched onto me, he’d installed me in his life as you’d install a stabilizer on a boat. I kept him level. I’ve shortchanged my impact on him.

  I’ve got a certain amount of steel in my backbone. Whatever the job, if I set my mind to it, I could see it out.

  And that’s the answer. Of course! Hold out until five o’clock, then go home and live my real life. I can do this, I feel determination developing in me, around me—like a hardening shell. Properly armored, I can get through a day at Mountain Valley Cable, one hour at a time, as Emmett had gotten through one hour at a time at Freeway Furniture. I recall one of his poems—and remark to myself how I’m carrying around his menopausal hogwash, when I can’t even remember my grocery list! It’s … infuriating, a curse, something I’ve got to get over, like a case of the flu:

  Here I am, Fortune’s pawn. I stand, then sit and wait.

  Blue with doze, I yawn. Stillborn at ten of eight

  As t’was before gray dawn. Where is the fucking freight?

  And then too much it comes,

  There’s never enough time.

  My shop runs red, it hums …

  And so I pass my prime?

  To stack and pack and strap,

  To ship and sort and send

  This crap all o’er the map?

  My labor will not end.

  It’s not so bad, I say,

  Onward I will fight

  To end this goddamned day

  March forward into night.

  For all’s in icy vain, Mammon’s wood will be done—

  My home I will attain, and then I’ll call this fun.

  He’d been caught between not enough to do, and too much. So what! Besides, what the hell could I have done about it? Jump out of a cake in the lunchroom at noon? Meet him at night by the garage door wrapped in Saran Wrap, a rose between my teeth, a cold beer in one hand, TV Guide i
n the other? The man pissed me off! What had gone on at Freeway Furniture was out of my control … besides, it must have been a romp compared to what I’m up against.

  Freeway Furniture has a showroom, but their main business is supplier to other outlets around the country, around the world, and this burden of shipping had been Emmett’s. Lately, though, more comes into the States from the Philippines, China, Indonesia, than goes out. Emmett had felt this narrowing, another vise grip—too much production for too few consumers. But the global marketplace was out of his control.

  Then onto his parched stressed landscape Maggie Quinn had sashayed, willing, ripe, ready, and he’d fallen. But I will not dwell on this, I will not. I give my Dr. Pepper a vicious slurp, then switch over to a new line of thinking that’s helping me these days. I am creating a new Emmett, adding parts, discarding others, making him into such a man as he’d never been. A new improved version, this numinous presence, my own private cheerleader, one I can turn to, confide in, depend on. The mental health of this maneuver I will not examine, not yet. I will, as soon as I’m able. Something has to happen first, and I’m not sure what it is.

  I glance at my watch … holy cow, I’m late. I grab my jacket and purse and drive back to Mountain Valley Cable. I pull into their lot, which is down an alley and behind the warehouse. I park in an EMPLOYEES ONLY slot. I am an employee, I belong. Take that, Emmett Malone!

  The first clue that things have changed: the music’s no longer mainstream; now it’s rap, Snoop Doggy Dogg or some such rot. It plays softly, a throb, like a low-grade fever, the words not quite comprehensible.

  “You’re late,” says Tiffany. “Lunch hour, get it?”

  “I know, I’m sorry. It won’t happen again. I’ll explain to Vi—”

  “Vi’s gone back to Oakland. I’m the boss now. Finish that manual, then get started.”

  I put my coat back on, take up my chore in the icy conference room, hunch over the loose-leaf spiral-bound notebook. More diagrams, charts, parts, tables of serial numbers. Undergo an almost fatal attack of sleepiness, take off my coat, am about to go for the poisonous coffee when there’s a stir in the outer office.

  “Who’s parked in my spot? A beige Ford Bronco?”

  I leap up, scramble out into the hall. “Sorry … I didn’t realize …”

  “Oh, it’s you, I should have known,” says Bruce, blushing.

  He blushes, mottled red creeps into his cheeks. I am alarmed. “That’s okay, sorry, I didn’t mean to jump.”

  “I’ll move my car.”

  “Oh, no, please. Sorry.”

  I notice Tiffany watching our exchange. The smile she’d incubated for Bruce is stillborn and the cold dead look comes back into her eyes. “You know Peg, our new clerk?” she says.

  “Yeah, well, no,” he says. “Just met her at a garage sale. Told her about the job. Glad you’re aboard, Peg. My fault, the parking. Spaces are not assigned. We’re just in a rut here, it’s me, not you.”

  “Well, don’t just stand there.” Tiff snaps her words, and her gum. “Finish that manual, get going.”

  “Oh, sure, sorry.” I retreat, gladly. Don’t want any part of office politics. She can have him; I don’t want him.

  I finish the blasted training manual, with no idea how it’s supposed to help me. Thus trained, I am theoretically able to take my place under the headset, which frees up Tiffany. With a sigh of relief, she goes back to staring into her computer. Despite Vi’s apparent disapproval, Tiff does think in ones and zeros, and a clone of her is what Vi should have hired.

  My main job, now, is to troubleshoot, over the phone, the new digital systems. People call in with questions. “What’s this OK stand for, this button in the middle?” “What happened to STRZ? It used to be right next to ENC, but now it’s gone.” “If the clock doesn’t work in that black box, will the programs be on at the right time?”

  At first I don’t have a clue. I hiss at Tiffany, “He says there’s nothing but static on HBO. What should I tell him?”

  “Really, you read the manual. Figure it out. Use your head.”

  Then again, “This woman says the sound keeps fading. What should I tell her?”

  A loud put-upon sigh. “You still don’t get it! No one’s going to do your job for you. Use some logic! What’s with you anyway!”

  So I’m on my own, or it’s me and the useless manual. The two of us, getting used to digital. But I learn to cope. Many elderly, not able to think in ones and zeros, have problems, and I can untangle their snafus by tracing which buttons they’ve pushed on their remotes. I flip through the manual to “cause and effect,” find the column labeled PROBLEM, then read across to SOLUTION. At first I’m just one step ahead of them, which is nerve-wracking. Then things ease up: I parry their thrusts with increasing comfort, and bullshit. In fact, I sort of like it, especially helping the older ones. “And then you go to the Main Menu … see if it reads AM or PM.”

  “Push the OK button every time, except after three digits. That’s right, not anything over Channel 100.”

  “Did you push both CABLE and TV buttons? Did you push POWER each time?”

  But some customers want their old systems back, with the simple components. Frustrated and impatient, they scold me. I sweet-talk, wheedle; I cajole. “Give it one more chance; this is no problem. Yes, I know you’re eighty-two years old, and you’re missing All My Children … Guiding Light … The 700 Club … this will be fine, and you’ll catch up. With the plot, or whatever.”

  It’s my job to wait on walk-ins, people who don’t trust the mail, or who want to complain. I know some of them. Larry comes in with his new girlfriend, guiding her with a proprietary hand on her back. In spite of myself, I stare. Amy will want to know. The girl is petite, a froth of a blonde with round blue eyes—Amy will not be pleased, and maybe I won’t tell her. “Mrs. Malone,” exclaims Larry. “Hi! Remember me?”

  “Oh, sure, uh—”

  “Larry Sturdevant, Amy’s … friend. How’s Amy doing? This is Amber? We want to sign up for cable, the deluxe package. Got a new place, new big screen TV, way better than that old one. We’re doing so good. Amber’s got a great job, she’s a photographer’s model, just got back from a shoot at Pebble Beach.”

  I smile, nod at Amber. I think this Kewpie doll will not willingly push the Hoover that Larry swapped Amy for the computer. I’d objected at the time because I knew my own vacuum would go AWOL, which it has. But Amy said she wanted to keep the computer and learn it, so, I give in, like always. The result is I’m continually loading my Hoover into Amy’s Mustang. Emmett would be having a fit, which somehow makes it easier for me to loan the vacuum. I am getting contrary, as difficult to get along with as … Tiffany.

  Larry rattles on about financial successes, both his and Amber’s. I know I’m supposed to carry this information back to Amy. I think, smiling into Larry’s sly brown eyes, into Amber’s empty blue ones, you can both go to hell.

  It’s also my job to deal with delivery people, to sign for whatever comes. Jerry, the UPS driver, stops every morning. I’ve seen him across the street delivering survival gear to Lyle, Frieda’s husband. Jerry takes to hanging around, shooting the breeze. A short jolly Santa Claus of a guy, I think he’s okay until one day he starts making passes. I think that’s what he’s doing. “I love your hair, it’s spectacular,” he mutters while I sign his clipboard. At Amy’s salon, I had it trimmed into a new asymmetrical shape, with a bleached foxtail in the front. “It’s dynamite with those earrings,” he says, complimenting the dangly pinecones.

  Another time Jerry leans in and breathes, “Oh, babe, you smell good enough to eat.” He’s complimenting the Bluegrass cologne I unearthed in the back of the bathroom cabinet, a bottle of scent I’m sure is older than he is.

  Again, “That color on you, it oughta be illegal, man, that shade of red.” It’s a new crimson sweatshirt with a hokey poodle on the front, bought because it reminded me of that sweet dream of creating balloon animals in the
dime store window.

  I don’t know what to do with Jerry. I can’t deal with his slippery compliments. I’d like to run and hide when I see him coming, but I have to sign his clipboard. I’m used to doing without, or with very little. Just a pat, a kind word, a smile—or not even a smile, just the absence of a frown, and I react naturally. But I’m helpless with Jerry. Vi or Amy or any experienced woman would know what to do. Just whisper, “Sexual harassment,” and that would settle him down, put out his fire. But I can’t do that. Why not? Because I was raised to be polite. Of course I know it goes deeper than that. I was raised to avoid giving injury, which means that I am self-effacing and submissive, especially with men, to the point of assuming blame whether it is mine or not. I was raised to protect men from themselves. This is an attitude I failed to instill in Amy, thank goodness.

  Tiffany watches these exchanges; she watches and listens. If she wants to flirt with him, why did she give me the chore of dealing with the delivery people? But maybe it’s the dog in the manger bit—she doesn’t want Jerry, until he goes for someone else. Nevertheless, I’m on guard, as uneasy with her attention as I am with his.

  Tiff watches me with the FedEx guy, Raoul. He appears in the afternoon, backs up his van, beep, beep, beep, and dollies case lots through the double glass doors, down the hall, into the warehouse. Raoul’s manner is polite but remote. His black eyes droop, his mustache droops, his whole face droops, as if he’s experiencing some terrific sadness, a tragedy that has knocked him for a loop. I imagine disappearances, border shootings, Green Card problems; I am intrigued, I’d like to crack him open like a clam, a nut, a jar of salsa. I make friendly small talk. “Hey, Raoul, you’re early (late, right on time).” “What’s going on (coming down, the good word)?” “You seen the price of gas (the game last night, the weather report)?” A glance from down-tilted obsidian eyes, a glimmer of white teeth under the Poncho Villa mustache; that’s all I get. It isn’t nothing, but it’s not much, either.

  Because he’s impossible, the project seduces me. I ache to get under his terra cotta exterior. He’s as beautiful and remote as an Aztec god, and I have a weakness for guys who withhold, are inaccessible. It, he, becomes a challenge, a game; and he wins, as I know he will—anything else would scare me, to tell the truth. He leaves with his secrets intact, his tragedies, his dreams, his dramas. Every day I watch him escape, swinging lithely into his door-less van. I imagine him swinging up the stone face of a jungle-shrouded ziggurat, a dagger between his teeth. But, I tell myself, he’s on his way to sacrifice a virgin, so get over it. I wonder if Tiffany ever had any luck.