Fairy Tale Blues

by Tina Welling

  Could I arrive at that place by spring break?

  A good night’s sleep, another round of journal writing, knitting, walking and eventually my thoughts spread beyond my fury and dismay with Jess. I recalled the rest of my life. I remembered the fun our family always had with Daisy and Marcus, knew we’d all have a good houseboat vacation together. I let myself hope Dad would somehow be restored to his old self, though Dr. Jack and the specialists suggested that was an unrealistic hope. Yet Dad seemed happy and content during my frequent calls. Daisy reported that he had shifted his box of Teague Family Sports caps to the back of his golf cart and was sailing them out to everyone he passed in the neighborhood.

  That morning when I phoned him between classes, he said he was, “Getting up and taking nourishment,” a line that came from his grandmother. Throughout the years, he had turned it into a family joke. I felt absurdly pleased he remembered that.

  As my anger toward Jess lessened and my balance was restored, I realized Hadley should be part owner. Her contribution over the years had earned her that. In the past she hadn’t expressed long-term interest in the business, and made frequent remarks that suggested she was uncertain about her future. I understood now that she had been referring to her unstable marriage and the future she’d imagined she’d have to spend in a more affordable part of the country. Teton County was no place for a single woman in her fifties without financial means.

  When Hadley had called yesterday, she knew that Jess had betrayed my trust; and with her joke about the fresh powder on the slopes, she had let me know she understood his motivation as well as I did, and held his offer lightly. I did not hold Jess’ offer lightly, but I knew part ownership was Hadley’s solution . . . and mine. I wanted her to know as soon as I did. I phoned, trusting Jess was out skiing again.

  “Hadley, I second Jess’ offer of part ownership, and I hope you will accept it. I see it as the perfect answer for each of us.”

  I told her we’d have our lawyer draw up formal papers with an arrangement that worked for all three of us. When I hung up the phone, I decided that I would use this opportunity to take the separation of finances a step further than I had originally intended. I would legally separate my one-third ownership of the store from Jess’ third, as well as separate the earnings from my share. Jess should realize he had instigated this as well with his rash offer to Hadley.

  To be fair, Jess often acted rashly and just as often it turned out to be an intuitively genius resolution to a given situation. As this was. Still, did it excuse him? And what did he care? He was skiing.

  There was another facet to his unthinking response: the passive-aggressive stinker was still angry at me for taking a marriage sabbatical.

  One more thing I wanted to do today. I needed to thank Daniel for the favor he had done in contacting his lawyer friend on behalf of Hadley. Will Waggoner had accepted her case. I knew his friendship with Daniel fully accounted for that. I checked my watch: three o’clock. Daniel should be back at the pier if he’d taken the boat out, cleaned up from his day of fishing, ready to relax. As I gathered my things—money, cell, leash—Bijou leaped high in the air all around me, thrilled she was getting two outings in one day. Not as rare as her behavior suggested, but she always lent a festive air to our activities.

  Daniel joked that Burl Stocker needed more exercise, so we walked with our dogs in the park. And he wanted to talk without worrying about listening devices. Ahead of us, Jeter ran from tree to tree, leaving his scent, and Bijou followed, pausing behind to watch the ritual. I understood something about the stress Daniel was under. While he was trying to convince the feds that he was clean, Parson Fields was pressuring him into one more job with the threat that he’d disclose his identity to the local drug cartel. And Daniel had suggested before that the cartel had ways of punishing uncooperative players from the past.

  “I’m in a bad place and it’s getting worse.” Daniel walked beside me. “I’ll have to make a move soon.”

  “But move where? There doesn’t seem to be any safe direction for you.”

  “I have a couple options. I can return to India, spend another year or so helping Jamie in her clinic. Parson isn’t strong enough to wait me out too long. But that’s Jamie’s life, not mine. I’d like to clean up this mess, make a home in the States, enjoy my work again. So I might just disappear for a few weeks, then relocate.”

  I stopped walking and turned to Daniel. “You’re trying to save Parson Fields from himself, aren’t you?” I railed at him like I would Jess. “That is stupid.” I reminded myself that I was not married to Daniel and had no right to talk to him like that. I took a big breath. “Just alert everybody.”

  “There is nobody to alert, Annie. No illegal action has occurred yet. Parson did me no favors in the end, but . . . he’s damn sick. I’d like to keep him out of prison for his final months of life, is all.”

  I heard Daniel’s struggle and it was easier to respond with compassion. “I know this isn’t the black-and-white issue it seems. But you’ve worked hard to restore your reputation and self-respect. Please don’t jeopardize your life for this guy.”

  “No, I don’t owe him that.” He looked away, took a big breath.

  “You don’t owe him anything.”

  Daniel looked down at me. “You’re right.” We began walking again. “Tough world out there.”

  I stopped him, laid my hand on his arm. “Your world is tough, Daniel. Not all worlds. And with the act of removing yourself from this, you’ll be inviting another, better set of circumstances to become your world.”

  We stood looking at each other. I dropped my hand from his arm.

  He said, “That’s why I fell for you, you know. I want that other world . . . with you in it.” I thought he was going to kiss me; he wanted to. I wanted him to . . . but I couldn’t sort out the reasons why. Out of fury against Jess? Because Daniel was opening his heart to me? Because he was a man consciously making his decisions and I longed for a man like that?

  I couldn’t draw Daniel into my confusion; he had enough of his own. But my eyes filled and I turned from him and began walking down the path. He joined me, and when the clenching in my throat cleared, I said, “I think I just represent that other, better set of circumstances to you.” My eyes may still have been red, but I looked at him.

  “Had a whole life I could see for us.” His voice sounded husky.

  We walked close beside each other, though not touching.

  I said, “That tells me and should tell you what you really want, what you are capable of creating for yourself.” My words might have sounded harsh to him, but I went on. “You knew all along I was unavailable.”

  He didn’t respond and I didn’t look at him. But I wanted to press home what I thought was the important part of what he had disclosed. I said, “Now that you can imagine this other way of living, and feel that it can bring you qualities you want in your life—fun, love, relationship, engagement with someone special to you—you know what to go for.”

  Daniel said, “I thought I’d sent out that invitation already with my move down here. And things are better; I’m not alone with this. Will Waggoner advises me and I have trusted friends in the coast guard who are aware of my circumstances.”

  I was relieved to hear that.

  Daniel said, “I’ll have to leave in the next few days or so.” We’d both stopped walking. He looked off, then back at me for a long minute.

  “First, let me meet that guy you’ve been so true to all these months. Bring him by before you head for the Keys, would you?”

  I promised I would, told him Jess wanted to meet him, too.

  Daniel grinned, said, “I bet.”

  I was exhausted. It seemed the past two days had been spent wringing my heart and mind for drops of truth, finding that the truth took strength to accept and act upon. The truth here was that I cared so much for this man, but what I had said to him was the reality, as far as my mind could foresee the path ahead. And before I
acted against that wisdom, succumbed to his vision of us, I knew I needed to leave Daniel.

  I said goodbye. I probably wouldn’t see him alone again, and we both knew it. I headed toward town with Bijou on the leash, but before I crossed the parking lot, I thought: what about Jeter? If Daniel needed to leave abruptly, temporarily or not, wouldn’t he need someone to care for his dog while he was gone?

  I checked my watch—four thirty, two thirty in Wyoming; I gave Jess a quick call on his cell. He was between runs, down at the base, in line for the Bridger Gondola.

  “So let’s see, one small dog, one big dog, a bird . . . Annie, I’m flattered. You keep missing me like this, we’ll have to move to a ranch when you and your menagerie return.” His voice sounded light and happy. No worry there about giving away part of my ownership of the store.

  But for me, in the background between us, was his undisclosed offer to Hadley. I knew Jess; he would never bring it up on his own, just let it seep into reality however it accidentally occurred. I decided right then: I wouldn’t bring it up, either. Let him create his excuses, or work at forgetting, or minimizing, whichever of his unconscious responses he chose to pull out of his dark sack. It was no longer any of my business to call him on his behavior, but to take care of myself the best I could in the face of his unpredictability.

  I had kept Jess filled in about Daniel all along, so he understood that I wanted to help him, and Jess agreed about Jeter. Who knew how much of that was guilt on his part for giving away a third of the store, or gratitude for Daniel’s help with Hadley?

  I walked back toward the marina, called to Daniel from the dock, not wanting to board his boat. He stuck his head up from below. I beckoned him off the boat so we could talk.

  “Jeter,” I said. “What about Jeter?”

  I offered Daniel my plan to care for his dog. I’d take him whenever Daniel decided to leave and keep him for as long as needed.

  I could tell it eased Daniel to have a plan for Jeter’s care. To make that plan appear normal, and not a signal to Burl Stocker and the other watchers later when I took Jeter for Daniel’s escape, we decided I’d pick up Jeter for occasional overnight visits, starting right then.

  Thirty-four

  Jess

  I heard from our lawyer that Annie had asked for a formal agreement to be drawn not only to legally secure Hadley’s share, but to legally secure her own share, apart from mine. And to separate out the income that was generated from her share.

  I called her on the spot, mad as hell. When she answered, I said, “What the shit is this? You don’t need a legal agreement with me. I’m your husband.”

  Annie let a long, long pause spread over the phone lines.

  Finally I sighed and said, “Okay. But it’s your fault. You weren’t here—”

  She finished the sentence. “To protect myself from you.”

  Another long pause.

  “I called to tell you about today’s headlines.”

  “No, you didn’t, Jess. You called to complain about my legal action.”

  “Okay, maybe I shouldn’t have given Hadley a share without talking to you about it. And you shouldn’t have given those orders to our lawyer without talking to me about it.”

  “If that’s your apology, it lacks quite a lot. Sincere regret, for one.”

  “Look, Annie, I’m sorry. But it’s done now. And I think it’s going to work out for all of us.”

  Another silence.

  I felt like slamming the phone down, but I hoped to change her mood by telling the good news I’d been saving for her. “Wolf No. 9 has denned.”

  “Really?”

  Normally Annie would have yelped with glee. “They can’t tell yet whether she has a new litter of pups or not. And we won’t know for a month or so, till the pups are allowed out. But she was spotted digging a den and may have given birth.”

  “Gosh.” Her voice lifted. “That’s pretty big news.”

  “This will be her sixth litter of pups. That’s the most any wolf has had in Yellowstone.”

  No reaction. I gave up and said goodbye.

  Hadley lived on the phone lately. In between talking to her two lawyers—Will down in Florida, who was handling her divorce, and our lawyer, Philip, here in the valley, who was drawing up the papers for TFS—she was calling in orders for next year’s ski season and the coming summer season. My job was to scramble around, keeping the staff happy and the store managed. These final weeks of ski season our attention was geared toward unloading the inventory. Everything we couldn’t carry over into summer was drastically discounted, since next year would bring a whole new line of equipment and clothing. We constantly rearranged to keep the store looking interesting as the stacks of goggles and skier fleece dwindled.

  I looked forward to leaving for Florida in a few days, then closing for the off season a couple weeks after my return. Most of April through mid-May we shut the joint up and typically headed for warmer places with no mud. Around here everything dripped, snow turned to slush, icicles dropped off roofs, creeks broke up and the shelves of ice, piled along the banks like shards of crockery, loosened and ran fast and dangerously downstream. We called it mud season, and this year I’d be sloshing through it, instead of escaping it. I might work on a project I had in mind, a big present for Annie.

  A customer pushed through the door of TFS, greeted me in a foreign accent I couldn’t place. I smiled back and shuffled through the remaining face masks, grouping them by size; we wouldn’t be selling many more of these this year. We were into spring skiing now, with temperatures in the low thirties most days, threatening our snowpack. I called to Saundra to mark the masks half price when she got a chance. Right now she was twisting her hair and staring out the window; every once in a while she dipped for candy stored in one of her vast pockets.

  Lizette and Todd pretended it took two to fold T-shirts, and Casey was online planning his off-season trip to Costa Rica. Hard to keep energy and interest high at the end of the season. They’d all be out of here if we didn’t offer a big bonus for staying to the very last day. Time to lift spirits. I pulled out the sign and hung it behind the counter where only the employees could see it. It said:

  WHY Is It CALLED TOURIST season IF We can’t SHOOT THEM?

  I nodded to the foreign fellow again just to let him know someone was awake and available, in case he needed anything.

  He nodded back to me and said, “I’m just watching.” Guessed he meant he was just looking. Saundra and I exchanged amused glances. Then she went back to staring out the window. We all wanted to be outside. The air was soft; the sky was blue. When I’d driven to the village that morning, untracked snow in the fields on either side of the road had sparkled like a tray of jewels. This valley held extraordinary beauty cupped within its circle of mountains. There was no place like it on earth.

  Now more customers wandered into TFS. It was nearing time for the lifts to close that afternoon, when it always became busy in the store. I moved to the fog cloths, another thing that wouldn’t sell well the rest of the season. “Saundra, mark these half off, too.” I added again, “If you get a chance.”

  Might do some fishing during off season. Time to get out my pale morning duns and blue-winged olives. Might try my hand at making some dry flies of my own. I’d lost interest in working with fleece; Malden Mills was selling out anyway and good quality stuff was harder to come by. Besides, my present for Annie entailed giving up a good share of my workspace. I’d need it to store all the gear I now had in that little cabin in the backyard.

  I stuck the marking pen in Saundra’s pocket so that the next time she dipped in for M&Ms she’d grab hold of it instead. That girl had a big fantasy life and I hated to intrude. I checked the stack of mail. There was an envelope typed on a typewriter. Didn’t see that anymore. Opened it and found a letter written by a woman describing a product she made by hand. I crochet small ducks in all colors. A tie beneath the chin allows it to be filled with M&Ms (Saundra might like th
is). Then with a squeeze in the middle of the duck, the candy will come out from a hole beneath the tail.

  I should take this letter with me to Florida to show Annie. She would howl. I lifted my head and savored how good it felt to know that I’d be with her soon. But I worried, too. Annie used to make what I called State of the Union addresses. And she made them far more often than our president did. The union, of course, was the two of us. What would she have to say now?

  Thirty-five

  Annie

  I drove to the Orlando airport to pick up Jess and the boys. We would spend a night together in my apartment before meeting the rest of the family in the Keys. My feelings about seeing my husband after more than two months were conflicted: part anticipated pleasure, part protective self-armoring. As I drove across inland Florida against the slant of late-afternoon sunshine, I realized the patterns of my marriage had risen into high relief against this background of time and distance. That was my purpose in taking a marriage sabbatical, so I drove to this meeting with Jess, feeling confident about the necessity of leaving my marriage in order to save it.

  Still I grieved.

  I would not be returning to the same sanctuary I had entered twenty-six years ago. Never again would I live in such sweet, destructive union. I had left that dark womb, emerged from the sea of marital soup, and from now on, though we were mated in love and faithfulness, our lives would be furnished with more than “his” and “hers” towels. There would be “his” and “hers” money, friends, space, power, values.