This One and Magic Life

by Anne C. George

  “That white bird? That thing nearly scared me to death.”

  Father Audubon lifts his head up and looks at the sky. “Thank you, God,” he says.

  “It was special?”

  “So special that not many people have ever seen one. You remember that, May. You’ve seen a whooping crane. That makes you special, too.” He sits for a few minutes looking in the direction that the bird disappeared. Then he jumps up. “I’ve got to go make a phone call,” he says. “Right now.”

  “I’ll come up in a few minutes,” May says.

  “Okay.” Father Audubon starts running down the beach. “Remember!” he shouts back.

  May takes the slices of bread she has brought with her and walks toward the water. She tears the bread into pieces and throws it to the two herons. They grab it before it ever touches the sand. They bump into each other, squabble. May laughs. “You’re special, too,” she says.

  Mariel answers the phone. The ringing awakens Dolly who can tell by the angle of the sun across the floor that it’s late afternoon. She’s sitting on the edge of the bed when her mother comes in.

  “It’s Bobby,” Mariel says. “I told him you weren’t feeling good and I didn’t know if you were awake or not. You want to take it?”

  “I’ll take it.” Dolly reaches over to the nightstand and picks up the phone. “Bobby?”

  Mariel hesitates for a moment and then leaves. She still doesn’t know what the relationship is now between Dolly and Bobby. All she knows is she’s got a hurt child in there and by damn, that Bobby Hamrick better not hurt her any more.

  “Hey, Dolly. I was out of town and just got your message about Artie. I’m so sorry. You okay?”

  “I’ve been better.”

  “Your mother said you were sick.”

  “Sinus. I’m okay.”

  “When’s the funeral? I’m coming down.”

  Dolly’s chest is hurting. She sits up straight, pushes her shoulders back, and tries to breathe deeply. “No, Bobby.”

  “I won’t bother you. I swear, Dolly. I just want to say goodbye to Artie.”

  “It’s too late, Bobby.”

  “The good Catholic family?”

  “Something like that.”

  There is silence for a moment and then Bobby asks, “And you, Dolly? Would you welcome me? I’m straight and have been for two months.”

  Tears are streaming down Dolly’s cheeks. “Don’t come, Bobby,” she says and gently replaces the receiver on its cradle.

  She goes into the bathroom and splashes her face with cold water. She shivers; she must still have fever. A glance in the mirror is not reassuring. She puts on her robe and stretches out on the bed again.

  Mariel sticks her head in the door. “How’re you feeling?”

  “I’m not sure. Bobby said he was coming to the funeral tomorrow. I told him no. He still may come, though.”

  “I hope he’s got enough sense not to.” Mariel lays her hand on Dolly’s forehead. “I’ll get you a cold washrag,” she says, “and some ginger ale with lots of ice. Dave Horton called while you were asleep and said for you not to try to go to the rosary if you still have fever. But he said if your fever has broken, you can go to the funeral and he’ll see you there.”

  Dolly catches and holds her mother’s hand. It’s cool and dry. “Mama,” she says, “why are you having the funeral when Artie didn’t want one?”

  “You know, I decided this afternoon I wouldn’t. I was up in Artie’s studio and thought if she doesn’t want a funeral it’s her business. I even told Father Carroll we weren’t going to have one, but he came barreling over here to see what was wrong, poor old fellow barely able to get around, wanting to know what was wrong. And God help me, I told him it was all a mistake, that, of course, we were having a funeral. I think he thought I’d lost my mind.” Mariel slips her hand away from Dolly’s. “So don’t ask me why, Dolly. I don’t know.”

  “It’s okay, Mama.”

  “I don’t know whether it is or not.” Mariel goes to the bathroom for the washrag; she comes back holding it against her own forehead. “But I know this. It’s not that I’m all that religious or anything. It’s just that when people die, you need to have funerals for them. And Artie should have given us some warning. She should have at least told Donnie.”

  She hands the wet washrag to Dolly. “I’m babbling. I’ve had several drinks of bourbon over the course of the last hour and I feel it.”

  Dolly takes the cloth and lays it across her forehead. “Why do you think she wanted to be cremated, Mama?”

  “Lord knows. I never knew what made Artie tick.”

  Dolly smiles. “Yes, you did. She was an artist.”

  “Huh. A lot of sense that makes. Artists are just folks who think they can get away with more than the rest of us.” Mariel sits on the bed and adjusts the cloth on Dolly’s forehead. “I was always jealous of you and Artie, you know.” Mariel is surprised by the confession, but Dolly isn’t.

  “I know. I needed you both, though.”

  “I was jealous of her and your father, too.” What is this? The bourbon?

  “He needed you both, too.”

  “I suppose so.” Mariel looks down the beach where she sees two figures she thinks are Delmore Ricketts and May walking at the edge of the water.

  “Artie was jealous of you, too,” Dolly says.

  “No. She didn’t like me very much, but it wasn’t jealousy.”

  “Sure it was. She would have Reese and me help her clean up the house before you’d get here, and she’d change clothes.”

  Mariel thinks of some of the outfits she has seen Artie in and wonders what in the world she had changed from.

  “Things weren’t always great for her, Mama.”

  “I know that. But she gave the impression they were. The paintings and the traveling and the fame. It seemed easy. And then, of course, she had my husband for her twin and you for her daughter when she wanted you.”

  “A surrogate daughter.”

  “I suppose so.”

  Dolly folds the cloth across her forehead. “Mama, don’t be so hard on yourself.”

  “That’s what my psychiatrist says.” Mariel looks at Dolly and sees nothing of herself. “I’ll get you some more aspirin, honey,” she says. She starts toward the bathroom door and turns. “I love you, Dolly.”

  “I love you, Mama.” Dolly turns and burrows her face into the pillow that smells of Artie’s almond sachet.

  Bobby.

  Lying on the bed where, though she does not know it, her father and Artie were conceived (Hektor was conceived on the beach after a midnight swim), she allows herself a whole memory of Bobby, of loving him.

  They had gone to Stone Mountain and taken a picnic lunch. It was October, and the trees were beginning to turn. The sky was as clear blue as if someone had Windexed it, and Bobby was wearing a blue shirt. When he kissed her, he had tasted like apples.

  This is what she will remember of Bobby, she decides. None of the bad things. Just a day colorful as patchwork and a kiss that tasted like crisp fall apples.

  She is young.

  TWENTY-SEVEN

  Thomas and Sarah Sullivan, August 5, 1946

  THERE IS A MOMENT EACH AUGUST WHEN THE WORLD TILTS toward fall. Its signal may be a certain slant of light or the fall of the first acorn. Usually it has nothing to do with the weather which is always hot and humid with late afternoon thunderstorms. The moment is discernible, though not the same for everyone. Which proved Einstein’s theory, Thomas thought, looking out of the bedroom window at the day which, for him, had suddenly shifted toward fall.

  His eyes felt heavy, clogged with sleep. He rubbed them. He was not an afternoon nap man and yet he had slept for two hours so hard he had been confused when he awakened, thinking it was morning.

  The fan drew strips of coolness against his bare back as it oscillated in the afternoon stillness. Where was everyone, he wondered. Then he remembered the twins had said they were going
to a swimming party. Hektor was probably at the pier fishing. But how had Sarah managed to leave the bed without awakening him?

  “Come,” she had said, taking his hand after lunch. And they had gone upstairs, and she had locked the door and made love to him. She had been the aggressor and his body had responded to her as always.

  “Thomas,” she said. “Thomas, I love you.” And he had known it was true. It had always been true.

  He put on his shirt and went down to the kitchen. It was empty. He poured himself some iced tea and walked out into the yard. Sarah, dressed in white shorts and a blue shirt, was sitting in the swing. She was not swinging, just moving slightly, making patterns in the sand with her sandals. Her hair, always lighter in summer, hung across her shoulders; her face was in shadow.

  “What are you doing?” Thomas asked.

  Sarah looked up and smiled. “Swinging.”

  “Lazy man’s swinging.” Thomas sat down by the tree. Sarah went back to her pattern-making.

  “Something’s going to happen,” she said finally.

  “What?”

  Sarah shrugged. “Just got the feeling in my bones.”

  Thomas got up and began to swing her gently. “Nothing’s going to happen we don’t want to.”

  “A lot has already.” Sarah suddenly jumped from the swing and fell forward on her knees.

  “You okay?” Thomas helped her up.

  “Sure.” She brushed the sand from her knees. “Let’s go sailing, Thomas.”

  “Right now?”

  “Right now.”

  “Well, let me go get some shoes on.”

  “Don’t bother. Let’s just go.”

  “The sand’ll burn my feet.”

  “Okay. But hurry. I’ll wait for you on the beach.” Thomas watched her as she disappeared around the house. She moved like a girl, the same girl from Montgomery who had captured him and never let him go.

  He went inside, put on a shirt, and slipped his feet into his boat shoes. By the time he joined Sarah on the dune, he was sweating.

  “It’s too hot to go sailing,” he complained.

  “That’s when you go sailing,” Sarah said. “To cool off.”

  “We’ll just sit there in the hot boat not moving.”

  “Nonsense.” Sarah ran down the dune toward the boat, Thomas following. “There’s a breeze. Feel it?”

  “No.” But Sarah was already pushing the boat into the water.

  “Get in!”

  Sarah was right. There was more of a breeze than Thomas had realized. As they moved out into the bay, they saw Hektor on the pier and waved.

  “I hope he’ll be all right,” Sarah said, watching their son hold up a large fish for them to admire. “He’s too sensitive.”

  Thomas smiled. “Haven’t you noticed? The girls are already lining up to watch after him.” He thought for a moment. “If you want to worry, Sarah, worry about Artie.”

  “I’m not going to worry about any of them.” Sarah stood up. “I’m going swimming.” And she dived off the side of the boat in her clothes. By the time Thomas had tacked around, she was swimming hard toward the open gulf.

  “Come on, Sarah,” he said, maneuvering as close as he could.

  Her answer was to sink under the water. “Sarah!” Thomas called. But there was no sign of her. She was gone as if she had never been there. Not even a ripple of waves marked where she had disappeared. “Sarah!” Thomas screamed. But she was gone.

  He didn’t dive in after her. The thought never occurred to him. He just sat in the boat while the afternoon sun beat against him.

  “I’m here,” she said. She had surfaced as quietly as she had gone under. Her hands were grasping the boat’s side.

  “Yes.” Thomas helped her in. He wrapped her in a towel, held her against him; his breath came in short gasps.

  “I wanted to keep swimming.”

  “I know.”

  “But I saw the boat up here. And you.” She leaned against him. “I’m so tired, Thomas.”

  “So am I, Sarah.”

  They stayed like this for a long time, drifting; perhaps they slept. A sudden gust of wind made Thomas look up. A thundercloud towered over the western bay. It was moving swiftly. As he watched, lightning arced from water to sky. “One and two and three and four,” he said as thunder rolled over them. “We have to hurry,” he said, moving Sarah from his arms, reaching for the sails.

  “No,” she said. “Please, Thomas.” She turned and looked directly at him. “Let’s ride it out. You and me.”

  Thomas looked toward Harlow, toward the house already shadowed by the cloud. “The children,” he said.

  Sarah leaned forward. “You and me, Thomas. Just us.”

  Her eyes were the greenish gold that bordered the thundercloud. Thomas looked into them and saw darkness, saw himself reflected in the darkness. “I love you, Sarah,” he said.

  By the time he decided what to do, the decision was not his to make. The storm roiled over them.

  “Thomas,” Sarah said, reaching for him. And in that one word was all the love he had ever longed for.

  This is what their son, Hektor, believes happened that day. Some of it is true.

  TWENTY-EIGHT

  One Life to Live

  TWO DAYS HAVE PASSED SINCE ARTIE’S DEATH AND THE WORLD goes on as before. The heat of August hovers over Harlow, darting into air-conditioned buildings when doors are opened, collecting in pools in parked cars. The breeze from the bay has given up; Spanish moss hangs limply.

  The beach has been cleaned as much as possible. Still, swimmers avoid the water; dead fish can still be spotted floating on its surface. Flies and birds are having a field day; tourists leave.

  Along the main street of businesses, nothing much is happening. Two ladies sit on stools in Elmore’s looking at patterns for school clothes. Five dollars for a pattern. Whoever heard of such. They are trying to decide if it wouldn’t be cheaper to go to the new Wal-Mart on 98. Mr. Patterson in the Harlow Pharmacy fills the prescriptions people bring in from Dr. Horton. Nothing serious. Days like this, he wishes he still had the soda fountain. There would have been people to talk to. He can’t remember exactly why he decided to do away with it. It seems it was his wife’s idea. He thinks of the people congregated at the Dairy Queen and resents his wife. Sure, help was hard to find, but anybody could make a banana split. She could help him out instead of playing bridge all the time. “Chicken salad again,” she always says. “And no cards. I think I had two face cards all day.” And he thinks Big Deal and opens the Mobile Register to read about the California gangs that are selling dope in Alabama now. Turn on TV, it’s just as bad. His wife has talked him into getting a gun to keep behind the cash register. Just knowing it’s there gives him the creeps. He has bought a small TV to put on the counter and has become hooked on One Life to Live.

  Next door to the drugstore was once a movie theater. Now part of it is a dance studio. Every afternoon a few little girls in leotards are dropped off by their mothers for Miss Angie Jemison to turn into ballerinas. Never mind that Miss Angie is batting zero. She was Miss Alabama 1946 and was in the top ten in Atlantic City doing an interpretative dance. No one is sure what she was interpreting as this was before the days of television, but a certain glory still attaches itself to her. Miss Angie wears wine-colored leotards with skirts to hide her belly and her sagging butt. She swears all her competition in Atlantic City was padded. “You could stick a hat pin in their derriere and they wouldn’t even flinch,” she tells each group of aspiring ballerinas who also yearn to be Miss America. On Tuesday and Thursday nights, she teaches ballroom dancing to the junior high school crowd. “One, two, cha, cha cha,” she chants, nudging reluctant boys into place with a surprisingly painful yardstick.

  At the Cash and Carry, Bear Barganier has just helped stack a load of lumber into the yard. Now he sits in his office, sweating, a nitroglycerine tablet under his tongue. He feels the pain in his chest begin to ease, but his head begin
s to pound. He thinks he will be the next one to be buried in the Harlow cemetery. He is wrong; it is one of the reluctant ballroom dancers who will hit the sandy shoulder of the road on his way home, lose control of his motorcycle, and sail headlong into a live oak tree.

  Father Carroll is having an early, cold supper, tuna salad and fruit, and a large glass of iced tea. He wishes he hadn’t drunk the bourbon earlier. He would have liked a glass of white wine but knows, usually, when he’s had enough.

  Mothers are calling children in to clean up for supper. The commuters from Mobile are beginning to line up at the stop sign. On the bay a few sailboats sit, waiting for a breeze to move them. Many of these people will be at the rosary service tonight or at the funeral tomorrow in spite of hearing the services are to be private. In Harlow they assume that means nobody from Mobile unless they are invited.

  Donnie Sullivan drives down Main Street on his way to Artie’s. Beside him, on the front seat, is the plastic container with Artie in it. He hadn’t wanted to leave her in Mobile by herself on his mantel. The container’s presence, however, has made him nervous. He doesn’t know what to do with it. Artie is trapped inside it like a genie. At the stop sign, he should open it, let her come smoking out, granting wishes. “I want it to be the summer of 1948,” he will say and just like that he and Artie will be having a banana split that Len Patterson has fixed for them at Hawkins Drugstore. Mr. Hawkins will be watching Len to see he doesn’t give Artie extra nuts and whipped cream. But Len will sneak some extra in, anyhow, hopeful for one of Artie’s beaming smiles. Her brothers knew her smiles well. There were three that she practiced before the mirror: the slight smell of shit smile (Hektor’s name for it) which she would demonstrate to her brothers by slightly curling her lips, the butter is melting smile with the tip of her tongue run across her bottom lip, and the beam. Each had been known to throw the boys of Harlow into semi-catatonic states. Even Donnie and Hektor weren’t immune, though they knew exactly what she was doing. Her slight smell of shit smile would send them scurrying to find out what they had done wrong. And her beam would make their day. She wouldn’t have to say anything, just brush her reddish blonde bangs to the side (also practiced) and smile.