Still Life

by Christa Parrish

  “Kate?” Robin asks.

  “I’m going home.”

  “Wait—”

  She doesn’t.

  Will’s truck is in the driveway. Katherine figures he’s home to eat lunch and does find him in the kitchen, but he paces, tapping a wad of rolled-up paper against his leg. He sees her and says, “Why aren’t you answering your phone?”

  “It’s dead,” she tells him.

  “You think, by now, you’d be able to remember to keep it charged.”

  “If you want to talk to me like I’m an imbecile, I’m going upstairs to lie down.”

  Closing his eyes, he says, “It’s just that I’ve been driving all over, looking for you.”

  “I’m here now. What is it?”

  He shakes the pages open, bends them backwards; they crackle like the finger joints of an old man. “Have you seen this?” It’s People magazine.

  “Enough of it.”

  They’ve been living in the almost of the crash, both of them, but it isn’t enough to push them toward the change both honestly want. Almost too easily becomes not quite, which slips into barely, which is effortlessly shrouded in routine and familiarity. Barely can be ignored.

  Now, however, they’ve both put her face into those photographs. It doesn’t matter that she never set foot on the airplane; the pictures transport her there, sharpening the focus on what could have been. And the guilt Katherine lives with, knowing she had been saved by choosing her lover over her family, swells with the images of those who did not have any choices to make.

  She has to tell him about Thomas.

  They are not a religious family. Yes, they go to church many Sundays, if there’s nothing else more pressing to do and if they’re all up on time. It’s the same Methodist congregation they’ve been attending since Evan was five. They didn’t attend out of faith, but because of desperate promises both she and Will made to a vague notion of some supernatural higher power while Evan was so sick. God, if you’re out there, please save our baby. Evan lived, and there was an obligation to at least appear to make an attempt at living up to their end of the bargain, just in case this God really did exist and, if not appeased, would snatch back their son’s health from him. Throughout the years Katherine, and probably Will also, continued to make moral decisions based on some twisted do ut des. No cheating on taxes, or only within the bounds of what was deemed acceptable by the general population and the IRS. No unethical business practices. Volunteer work here and there, donations to the food bank at Thanksgiving and Toys for Tots at Christmas. Shuffling the boys back and forth to confirmation classes.

  The affair surprised both her and Thomas, though that’s what people always say when they’re having one. We didn’t want it; it just happened. In their case, it began with a five-hour stint at the hot dog stand during the annual Boy Scout fun fair. She’d known Thomas for years—scouts, birthday parties, play dates, sleepovers—but rarely had any sort of lengthy conversation with him. Small talk. A wave from the car. She knew him as the busy but doting father, handsome, professional, and making enough to live in one of the nice, new subdivisions advertising homes from the mid-$300s.

  Most of the things Will was not.

  Susanna, she thought many times, was lucky.

  Between slapping relish and mustard on buns, Thomas listened to her prattle about work and the boys. He asked questions and seemed interested—those things she wanted but didn’t get from Will. So when, six weeks later, she saw he had agreed to work the can drive from ten to two, she signed her name right under his. She smiled too big when she saw him. His touch lingered too long on her waist as he moved behind her to get more trash bags. She wasn’t surprised when he showed up at her office with take-out Thai on a day he knew, because Katherine had told him—wink wink, nudge nudge—Robin had a doctor’s appointment and wasn’t coming in.

  He’d had a business trip in Cleveland, and since her sister lived there, he asked her to come. Jennifer enthusiastically agreed to cover for Katherine because she was a seize-the-moment, do-whatever-makes-you-happy kind of gal. Will didn’t suspect anything and probably was happy for three days without her.

  The news may destroy her marriage in one verbal blast. But it’s been decomposing a little each day for years, and whether love dies fast or slow, there’s still a corpse in the ground eventually.

  “Will—”

  “Me first,” Will says. He looks at her, pulls a stool out from the island. “You should sit.”

  “No, I’m good.” Katherine’s head suddenly aches. She removes the clip from her auburn hair and shakes it loose, then rubs the back of her scalp where the ponytail has been fastened. Her follicles sting as she manipulates the strands.

  “I don’t know how to start.”

  “Just say it.”

  “Okay. I’ve been having an affair. It’s over. I ended it after the crash because I . . . I realized . . . God, this is hard.”

  The room tilts; she wriggles into her corner, grips the edge of the counter. This isn’t right. Will is speaking her words.

  “I realized it was a stupid thing to do and I wanted . . . us . . . instead. If there still can be an us. These pictures . . .” He holds the magazine by one thin page. Shakes it. It convulses, dark and glossy, reminding her of a dying bat she once saw as a child. The paper rips and the bundle of pages falls to the counter, slips to the floor. Will mauls the remains still in his hand, squeezing and crumpling and rolling them through his fingers. “Everything is more real now.”

  Katherine’s fatty places—upper arms, thighs, buttocks—tingle with a cold, menthol-like shock. “Who?” she asks.

  “Does it matter?”

  “I don’t know yet.”

  “Rosie Rimes. And then Meghan Parker before that.”

  “Both from work.”

  “Yeah. I don’t know what I was thinking.” He opens his fist and shakes the shredded magazine onto the island, gently, sowing seeds of regret. “You’re going to leave.”

  “No.” She scrunches her hands into fists and runs her thumbs over her fingers. Her wedding set cuts into her skin. “Because I was about to tell you the same thing.”

  He snorts. “Don’t do that.”

  “I’m not joking.”

  He looks at her. Swears. “You are serious.”

  Katherine nods.

  “Who?”

  She hesitates, not because she wants to lie, but because of the families’ close ties. A couple of coworkers Katherine may possibly see once a year at the company Christmas party is one thing. A man Will sits next to during scouting events multiple times a month is another. She doesn’t want a confrontation, or even a conversation, to take place between the two men. “I’ll tell you if you want, but—”

  “Tom Bailey.”

  “Yes.”

  “You know, I . . . when Seth told Evan his dad was in Ohio on business the same time you were there, I thought . . . and then it was, ‘No way. Not Straight Kate.’ ” Will chops at the bridge of his nose with his hand, shakes his head, and chuckles without humor. “You stayed the extra day for him?”

  She nods.

  “I guess screwing around can save your life.”

  “Don’t do that.”

  “You’re the one sleeping with him.”

  “Was! And you seem to be forgetting what you just confessed to me.”

  “You’re my wife!”

  “You should have remembered that when you were in bed with Rosie Red Lips.”

  They’re shouting. Again. Always.

  Will kicks the magazine; it skids over the vinyl, lodges beneath the refrigerator. “I can’t talk about this now,” he says, slamming the back door. His truck engine starts and revs, and then fades away as he speeds off down the street. Katherine doesn’t care if he comes back or not, though she knows she’ll see him again in a few hours, when the boys are home. He won’t make her explain his absence. Neither wants their children to come face-to-face with the sins of the parents.

&nb
sp; Katherine washes her face and changes from her clothes, all of them. Clothing holds memories for her. She remembers what she wore when going to the hospital for each child, when Will proposed, when she earned her real estate license, when she purchased her first vehicle—at thirty-six—with her own money, when her father died.

  Her white coat.

  She won’t be able to wear these things again: the ivory cashmere sweater Will bought for their last anniversary; burgundy micro-wale corduroys that make her size twelve bottom look at least a ten; the socks, a stocking stuffer from one of the boys, probably Evan since they’re colors she likes and he’d notice those things before his brother. She crams them in a Price Chopper bag. The panties she tosses in the hamper. They’re white Fruit of the Loom bikini-style and she has dozens of the same. Once they’re washed she won’t know the difference. She pauses with her bra in hand. Her favorite. Cold, naked, she adds it to the bag and triple knots the handles. Redresses. Then she hides the bag beneath the others in the large trash can and drags it out to the curb. Pickup tonight, thank goodness. She doesn’t have to wait for her misdeeds to be hauled away.

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  The doorbell rings while Ada lies on the floor and she ignores the sound at first, focus shifting from one uncomfortable pressure point to another. Her hipbone, grinding against the wood. Her shoulder, twisted beneath her weight. Her neck contorted in an obtuse angle. She tries to feel all these pains at one time but her body won’t allow it. The ringing comes again and now she moves because it’s the only reason she has at the moment to get off the ground. The magazine sticks to her face; she wipes it away and kicks it toward the wall as she lurches forward, grabbing the doorknob for support.

  She squints through the peephole. It’s Wright, from the airline. “Mrs. Goetz. Please.”

  Ada cracks the door. “Why are you here?”

  “Let me come inside.”

  “No.”

  He does anyway, gently, reaching his arm inside and taking Ada by the elbow, steering her away from the door so he can move through it. She does nothing to stop him because, despite her words, she hasn’t any no inside her. It was never allowed growing up. Hesitation brought a riding crop to the bare backside, five or ten whacks, dependent on who did the whacking. Outright disobedience garnered blue welts on the skin, cracked lips, loose teeth. The wages of sin are death, the prophet told them. This is nothing.

  “You’ve seen them,” Wright says.

  “How could you?” She’s crying, finally, for the first time since learning of Julian’s death. Her thin form quivers and Wright stands, helpless, seemingly so far away from her, though if she reaches out her arm she can touch him.

  “We didn’t release the photos, I promise you. They were stolen. Leaked. We’re doing what we can to find out who did it. It’s a short list. He’ll be caught.”

  “Why would someone do this?”

  “Money.”

  Ada can’t comprehend. “Please, go.”

  Wright looks at her. “Can I at least help you inside?”

  She shakes her head. “Go.”

  He hesitates. A kind man, grandfatherly, he doesn’t want to abandon Ada in the entryway alone in her current condition. And she knows, again, that she’d be unable to refuse him if he led her to the couch, tucked her under a blanket, soothed her with a cool washcloth on her forehead—all things she needs. But he’s also an intelligent man, and the airline doesn’t need any more problems, least of all a lawsuit from a dead passenger’s wife who says a stranger refused to leave her home. Wright grimaces, his lips screwed up all sideways on his face. “Call if you need anything,” he says, closing the door behind him.

  Ada’s trembling shakes her to the floor and she crawls, tears dripping from the tip of her nose, to the area rug in the living room. She can’t manage to swing her body onto the sofa. She does try, but the leather is too slippery and her arm too gauzy, and her skirt twisted too tightly around her knees. She gives up, curling up on the floor instead, with her back against the legs of the couch, and pulls a cushion down to hide herself, the weight a comfort on her soul.

  The lamp beside the chair flicks on, and she blinks at the pick-toed boots at eye level. Ada rolls her eyes upward, following the slick patent leather, the skinny jeans, the patterned blouse. Hortense. She reaches down and hooks Ada in the armpits, hoisting her with a grunt, easing her onto the end of the couch. Then she replaces the cushion, forcing it into position with her knee. “You should answer your phone.”

  “I don’t even know where I put it.” Ada’s face cracks with dried tears.

  “That Wright guy called. From Union North. He said you might need me.”

  “Have you seen them?”

  “Ada, the entire universe has seen them.”

  “Not everyone,” she says, thinking of her mother. Her sisters. The women of Abram’s Covenant weren’t allowed to use technology, unless it was a phone, or the cash register at the farm store. They could type on the computer in a word-processing program if instructed by a man and overseen by a man—for their own protection, of course; the weaker vessels must be shielded from anything that may disrupt their purity. They couldn’t drive, or bank, or manage money other than making change for customers.

  Unless her father decides to show the photos to her mother, she will not know of them. She won’t know Julian’s dead. She won’t be thinking of Ada, alone and full of mourning. But Ada thinks of her. She wants her mother.

  She has no one else.

  All those around her now are here only for Julian’s sake. Mark and Hortense. Sophie. Pastor Ray and the fine, fine people of Holy Zion. Even the representatives from the airline. She wants someone to love her. Without Julian, all she has left is her family.

  “I think I’m going home,” she says.

  Hortense drops an afghan on Ada’s legs, stretches it around her. “This is your home.”

  “Home, home.”

  The microwave beeps. Hortense abandons the blanket, leaving Ada’s frozen toes peeking from under it. She moves, tucking the edge beneath her feet, winding it over her shoulders until only her head is exposed. Hortense returns with two mugs of tea on Julian’s rosewood cutting board. She sets the makeshift tray on the side table and takes one for herself before perching on the arm of the opposite end of the couch, the mug clenched between her wrist bones. She raises it to her lips. Winces. Then she balances it on her thigh. “When I was born, my parents were stunned, to say the least. The doctor who delivered me thought there could be more wrong with me than just my hands, things that couldn’t be seen yet. He said I probably wouldn’t be any smarter than a mongoloid baby, if I lived that long. Yeah, his exact words.

  “They named me Hortense and told me they chose it because it was a family name. My father’s great-grandmother. And that’s true, but the reality of it was that my mother didn’t want to waste her favorite girl’s name on me.” Hortense snickers. “In some grand cosmic justice, she never got pregnant again, never had the perfect child she wanted. She just had me, the handless freak with the ugly name. My father regretted it, I know. He’s tried to make it up to me over the years. But I think to this day I can say with certainty that my mother doesn’t love me at all.”

  “Why are you telling me this?”

  Hortense picks up the mug again, rolls it between her forearms, transfixed by whatever it is she sees on the surface of the tea—the ripples, her reflection, the hovering steam—Ada can only guess. “Julian told me a little about your life . . . before,” Hortense says. “Don’t do it. Don’t go back.”

  Ada’s tea grows cold, untouched; she’s yet to remove her arms from beneath the afghan, a granny-square pattern Sophie made for Julian. If he noticed the flaws, he never mentioned them to Ada. She knows crochet and sees them all, had planned to make Julian another blanket for their first Christmas together, not to compete (although part of her had hoped he’d see how much more skilled her handiwork was) or replace this one but to begin piecing together
a life, a history, of their own.

  The television—the one Mark brought the night Julian died and hadn’t taken home yet—pops on. Hortense holds the remote between her knees pressing the up arrow, over and over, until one of Julian’s airplane images flashes on the screen.

  “Stop,” Ada says.

  Throughout the night they bounce from cable news station to local news station, to late-night television. The debates rage over Julian and what he did. Angry family members of the victims decry their loved ones’ privacy in their last moments, feel violated by the photographs they could not help but see. Others are grateful for one last chance to see their friends and family, no matter the situation. Media specialists question ethics and integrity and the bounds of journalism.

  “How is this any different than taking pictures in a war zone? During a riot?”

  “An airplane isn’t a public space. People have purchased the right to be there.”

  “Are you then saying all people in public spaces can be photographed without permission? I know parents who would vehemently disagree.”

  “Julian Goetz wasn’t given a chance to get waivers signed. No one knew the plane would crash. Perhaps he planned to speak to passengers when the flight was over.”

  “He didn’t know his pictures were going to be stolen, either.”

  “Come on, people. He was a Pulitzer-winning photojournalist. What would you expect him to do?”

  That Ada understands. As death closes in, everything is stripped away until each individual’s purpose on this earth remains, and their authentic self is laid bare. No more lies. No more façades. The brave risk their lives. The cowards hide in dark corners, eyes squeezed closed, holding their breaths so no sound will give them away. The generous give. The stingy withhold. Those filled with hate spill their emotional sludge onto the clean carpet, where it oozes over the toes of anyone standing too close. Those who love radiate love. For Julian, it was more than clicking off photographs. He was a truth-shower. In the end, he could be no other.