Songs in Ordinary Time

by Mary McGarry Morris

  She wondered if Omar was down there in the middle of all that yelling. What on earth did he want here? she wondered as she brushed her hair. Did he think this was the way families were supposed to be? Didn’t he know that in normal homes the sofa and easy chairs matched and the lamps had shades and the windowsill plants grew in clay pots, not rusting coffee cans, and a family’s only anxiety sitting down to dinner might be bones in the fish, the boiled heat of gravy, or a nick in the glass rim, and not the sting of their mother’s gasp when the phone rang, fearing another bill collector’s ultimatum, or worse, their weeping father’s thin wet love, his slurred vows to return as lethal a blade as his sorrow.

  God, this was all so humiliating, having to go up there with a priest to beg her father for money she knew he didn’t have. But her mother was convinced he was hoarding some fortune from her—as if he’d ever had a penny of his own. She slipped on her dress, then groped in the dust under the bed for her white shoes. With every wobbly step the heels squeaked, a painful reprise of graduation night. She twisted her hair into a bun so tight it pulled her eyes into slits. She looked older now. Her father would be shocked to see how quickly time was passing, how much of her life he was missing.

  “Say it!” her mother demanded downstairs. “Say it!”

  “Leave me alone,” Norm moaned. “Just leave me alone.”

  She wound a cord of plastic violets around the nub of hair, then yanked it out. Damn it! What would she and a priest ever talk about on the long ride up and back. She could have taken a bus. She should have said no to him and to her mother. But she never did, never said no. That was the trouble, always letting people get in between the Alice they saw and the real Alice. The real Alice slept nude, touching herself under the sheets, drawing her fingers up between her legs, always stopping short, afraid of what she would find in there, even though she knew the nuns told lies and she wouldn’t go crazy or suddenly bald, but afraid that she might like it too much. Last night at the A+X Carla had insisted that was the way lesbians got started—first they did it to themselves all the time whenever they felt like it, and got so much of it that they had to have it all the time that way, and only from women.

  Two nights ago, Carla had shown everyone the pictures Mr. Coughlin hid in his office. The pictures showed nude women kissing and fondling one another. The pictures. She shuddered, ashamed of this raw ache in her belly every time she thought of the grainy breasts pressed nipple to shriveled nipple. It frightened her to think that might be the strangeness, the unattainability, that had repelled every other boy before Lester, and now, oddly enough, attracted Blue Mooney. He had even started wearing his Marine uniform to the lot now when he picked up Anthology. Everyone said it was to impress her. Oh God. She ripped the bun out of her hair and pulled it into a ponytail. She put on bright pink lipstick, and sprayed perfume down the front of her dress and up under her skirt. There was no real Alice. There couldn’t be.

  Norm sagged over the table, his forehead braced against his fist. His shirt was wrinkled and grass-stained, and he smelled. Her mother came into the kitchen, staggering under the weight of the bulging laundry basket that she hauled onto the table. Norm winced at the thud.

  “Oh I’m so sorry!” she said, leaning over him. “Forgive me, Prince Charming, I forgot!” She glanced at Alice. “His condition! He’s feeling just a little…delicate this morning. Hotdogs. Too goddamn many hotdogs!” she said with a poke at his back.

  “Mom!” Alice said, seeing his head tremble. “He’s sick.”

  “‘Oh, he’s sick,’ says the princess in all her finery while the servants shuffle around her,” her mother said. She was sorting the dirty clothes into piles on the floor.

  “Mom, you know why I’m dressed like this!” she said, but knew from the grim flick of her mother’s eyes to say no more. She made toast and sat down across from Norm.

  From outside came the sounds of digging, a metal shovel scraping grit and stone, rocks hitting a pile.

  “Do you know what happened last night?” her mother asked.

  “I heard,” she muttered, head low over the dish.

  “Along with everyone else.” Her mother was flinging clothes faster and faster now into white heaps, blue, red, and black heaps, and swirling pastel heaps that grew to table height. The smell of foot sweat and body musk burgeoned with the piles. Alice bit into the toast and chewed dryly.

  Her mother paused, gesturing with a pair of Norm’s undershorts. “Of course what they don’t know is how thoughtful he is. How after he threw up all over my car and ruined the Klubocks’ precious lilac bushes, crushing and killing their dog in the process, how he didn’t want to disturb his mother, so he crawled into the garage, where Mr. Klubock found him with his pants half off.” She smiled down at Norm, whose eyes were closed. His mouth twitched. “My dear thoughtful son passed out on the dirt floor.” She threw the undershorts at him and they landed on his shoulder.

  He whipped them onto the floor. He turned and stared up at her. “What can I do to make you shut up?”

  Alice stopped chewing. She didn’t dare swallow.

  “Say you were drunk!” her mother said through clenched teeth. “Say it! Say you’re a lousy, stinking, selfish drunk and you’re only sixteen years old. Say it and I’ll shut up!”

  Norm hung his head.

  “Say it!” She grabbed his arm and shook him. “Say it! Say it!”

  “Mom, what are you trying to do?” he whispered, his bloodshot eyes bulging with tears. “I told you I’m sorry. I’m sorry.”

  “Say it!”

  “I was drunk,” he said softly.

  She leaned over him. “I’m a lousy, stinking, selfish drunk, and I’m only sixteen years old,” she commanded, her features so contorted she almost seemed to be smiling.

  “Lousy, stinking, selfish drunk, and I’m only sixteen years old,” he mumbled.

  “And if I don’t watch it, I’ll end up like my father!” she hissed.

  She is, Alice thought. She’s smiling.

  “And if I don’t watch it, I’ll end up like my father.”

  Alice could barely hear him. She did it, she thought. She always does it. Grinds and grinds and grinds until there’s nothing left.

  Norm stared at his coffee cup, his shoulders hunched in a strangulated sob.

  “Jesus Christ,” came her mother’s muffled gasp. Her hands covered her face. “Jesus Jesus Christ.”

  The back door flew open and Omar entered, grinning, a greasy doughnut bag in his fist.

  “Good morning, lovely people.” He shook the bag. “Sweets to soothe our sour spirits.”

  Norm didn’t look up. Alice watched her mother’s head lift and shoulders straighten, as if she were reassembling herself for Omar.

  “You left. I thought you wanted to help them clean up out there, and then I saw you leave,” her mother said, with a sickening breathless urgency.

  “Well, I offered, but Harvey wants to bury the dog before his little boy sees it. Messy, I guess. All them guts and goo balls,” he said as he arranged the doughnuts on a plate, taking great care with the alignment of the second tier. He tapped a jelly doughnut into place. “So anyway I went and got bakery for them and some for us. Jessie offered us coffee, but I promised I would later when I help poor old Harve with that lilac bush—well, patch, I guess you’d call it now. Here you go,” he said, sliding the doughnuts in front of Norm, who covered his nose and mouth and looked away. “They are very nice people,” Omar said, going to stand by her mother at the sink, where she peered out the window from an angle so she wouldn’t be seen.

  “Hypocrites,” she said under her breath.

  “You should see that man’s hands, the knuckles all swolled up big as butternuts. I don’t know how he’s out there digging. Matter of fact, I don’t know how he can use a butcher knife to any degree of accuracy.” He leaned over the sink. “Now there’s a man, I bet, just looking for an investment opportunity. He’s…”

  “I can’t have people ri
ght next door to me selling the exact same product I am!” Marie interrupted. “I mean, think of it! That’s ridiculous.”

  “Whoa! Whoa there! That’s what I call jumping the gun, little lady. I was speaking generally. Theoretically, of course. I was about to point out, before I was so summarily interrupted, that the world is filled with Harvey Klubocks, which means…” He lifted her chin and smiled. “Opportunity.”

  Her mother glanced back, her uneasy gesture drawing Omar’s attention to the table. “Well, well, well, look at you, Alice! This is the way you should be dressed every minute of every day.” He sat down and pulled the doughnut plate close, studying it intently. He was sweating. The cuffs on his sleeves were zigzagged with grime. He smelled stale and yeasty. He chose a doughnut, then examined it closely before taking a bite. He closed his eyes, sighing as his teeth shattered the sugary glaze. “You know,” he said between bites, “Presto is looking for a model right now. They are looking for a symbol, some clean-cut, pure, wholesome, shining American face to put on their labels. A face that says”—he stared up at the ceiling and thrust out his armsand thrust out his arms—“ ‘Buy me, use me! I am pure!’” He looked at Alice. “And you know something, you’ve got that look, Alice. I mean it, now, don’t laugh! I’ve been in marketing long enough to know what sells a product and what doesn’t.”

  Her mother clutched a stiff red sock to her chest, her eyes darting between them like a bird’s among a surfeit of crumbs.

  “Just the other day, Jim Perrine down at the main office…I gotta tell you about him, Marie, remind me sometime, a real fine gentleman. Anyway, Jim had these photos all over his desk of girls they been considering, and I tell you this in all honesty, Alice, without an ounce of prejudice, that yours is the face they want!” He slapped his forehead with the heel of his hand. “And it never occurred to me until now. What an oversight! Like they say, you can go around the world searching for a thing of beauty, and nine times out of ten, you ain’t going to find it in but one place. Right in your own backyard, in your own kitchen. Sitting here right at your own table. Marie, could I have paper and pen, please? I hope it’s not too late. I’m going to have to write this down so it doesn’t get lost among all the other memoranda swimming through my brain so fast lately that I sometimes think I am drowning in details. Thank you, Marie.” He bent over the paper, holding the pen stubbily, tightly in his fist as a child might. “There! Consider it done!” He took another doughnut, then pushed the plate close to Norm. “Have a doughnut. Put some food in that poor stomach of yours.”

  Norm grunted and shook his head. There were goose bumps on his arms.

  “He can’t,” Marie said. “He’s too hungover.”

  Norm covered his eyes.

  “The boy’s suffered enough, Marie,” Omar said softly. “He really should sleep some.”

  “He can sleep,” she said, staring down at Norm. “After he cleans his mess out of my car.”

  Groaning, Omar smiled up at Marie. “Your mother’s a hard taskmaster, son. But someday you’ll be thanking her. Take my word for it.”

  Father Gannon was knocking on the front door. Marie rushed at Alice, pantomiming instructions. Go to the door. Quick. Go straight outside. Don’t let him in. Don’t! Goodbye. Hurry up! “Nosy priest!” she hissed from the kitchen doorway.

  Alice opened the door on the young priest’s eager smile.

  “All set?” he asked.

  “All set!” she said, trying to slide out quickly, but the door was being pulled wide open from inside.

  “Good morning, Father,” Omar boomed, sticking his hand out so Father Gannon had to step inside to shake it. “I’m Omar Duvall, a friend of the family’s, and it’s a real pleasure meeting you, Father. Mrs. Fermoyle here tells me you’ve taken quite an interest in her little family.”

  “How do you do, Mr. Duvall, it’s nice to meet you,” Father Gannon said, looking confused as Omar closed the door.

  “We should go,” Alice said, but no one seemed to hear.

  “Omar, please. Just Omar. Could we offer you some small repast before your mission of kindness? Some coffee? A doughnut?” he urged as he led the priest into the kitchen. Alice and her mother exchanged accusing glances.

  Father Gannon thanked Omar, but explained that he had just eaten. He smiled when he saw Norm. “Hey there, how’s it going?” he said, patting Norm’s shoulder.

  “Great, Father. Just great.” Norm forced a smile and Alice cringed. There was congealed blood on his front teeth. There were yellow stains on his shirt, and he reeked of stale liquor. Her bra dangled from one of the piles in this foul sea of clothing. A big black ant labored up the front of the refrigerator, slowly, slowly, while outside, the sounds of digging went on, and on. She wanted to die, just die.

  “Sure now, Father? I used to be something of a preacher myself, visiting the jailed, the sick, and the infirm in my younger, more spiritual days, so I know it sometimes takes more than faith to fuel the soldiers in God’s army.” Omar winked. “Go ahead. Have one,” he crooned, holding out the plate.

  Father Gannon waved his hand. “Really, I—”

  “Oh go ahead. One’s not gonna hurt,” Omar said, laughing.

  “He doesn’t want one!” Alice blurted. She looked at her mother. What was he trying to prove? That he was host here, the master?

  “Omar,” her mother said. “I don’t think Father Gannon wants a doughnut.”

  Omar winced. “Oh I’m being a pest, aren’t I?”

  “No, no,” Father Gannon protested, blushing. “As a matter of fact, if you don’t mind, I’d love to take one for later.” He picked up a jelly doughnut and the powdered sugar drifted onto his sleeve.

  Omar patted his belly. “I guess I just assume everyone’s got my appetite.” He followed them to the door. “You be sure and come again,” he called as they went down the walk.

  The Klubocks paused to watch Father Gannon turn the Monsignor’s car in the driveway. In the far corner of his yard Harvey leaned on the shovel and wiped his glistening brow. Still in her frilly housecoat, Jessie was raking broken branches into a pile. Alice looked up, surprised by a face in her mother’s bedroom window. It was Benjy looking down at the burlap-covered mound next to the garage.

  “He seems like a real nice guy, that—what was his name, Homer?” Father Gannon said, as he drove down Main Street.

  “Omar,” she said, low in the seat so she couldn’t be seen. The jelly doughnut slid down the dashboard. It had already rolled off once, leaving a trail of white powder on the plush burgundy floor mat.

  “Homer,” he said, and she didn’t correct him. “What was the last name again?”

  “Duvall.”

  “Duvall. Homer Duvall. I have the worst time with names. Drives the Monsignor crazy.” He laughed. “In fact, first time I met your father I thought his name was Termoyle. Sam Termoyle.”

  Turmoil. Was he being sarcastic? She just looked at him. All this cheeriness and gusto seemed not only forced but oddly fragile. He was telling her everything he had done so far this morning. The six o’clock Mass, two nursing-home visits, forty push-ups, a bacon-and-egg breakfast; he had called the Chancellery to verify his appointment with the Bishop, and then with the time left over had decided to shine his shoes. While he was at it, he figured he might as well do the Monsignor’s, but somehow polish had gotten on the soles. When he left, Mrs. Arkaday had been on her hands and knees trying to scrub the black streaks from the light gray carpeting. He told her to leave it, that he’d take care of it when he got back this afternoon, but she said by then it would be too late. The stain would set. He glanced at her. “You’re awfully quiet! Or am I just being my usual garrulous self?”

  “I don’t function very well in the morning,” she said, wondering if garrulous meant annoying.

  “I was like that at your age.” He chuckled. “But then you find out, moodiness can be a real drag in the real world.”

  Moodiness! Typical priest. Say three Hail Marys, the sin’s gone
. Smile and the pain’s gone. The real world! As if he had the slightest idea what it was all about.

  “Is it that obvious?”

  “What?” she asked, thinking she had missed something he’d said.

  “That I’m a jerk.”

  “I…”

  “It’s okay. I mean I know I am. I just usually do a better job of hiding it, that’s all.”

  She smiled weakly, then looked out the side window. The winding road carried them past tidy farmhouses and weathered barns. Cows stood swishing their tails in scorched hummocky pastures. This might be the day it finally rained. The sky was low and gray.

  Father Gannon lit a cigarette, then stepped down on the accelerator as the mountain’s climb gave way now to a brief stretch of straight road. “You don’t want to be here, do you?” he called over the motor.

  “Not really.”

  “Your mother didn’t seem too happy about the idea, either.” He put his cigarette in the ashtray. Smoke drifted into her face. “I could tell she was upset.”

  “It wasn’t about that.” She fanned away the smoke.

  “Well, that’s good.” He picked up his cigarette and smoked the rest in silence. A few minutes later he looked over at her. “So where’s that what’s-his-name, that Homer from? Sounds like the South.”

  “I guess so.”

  “What’s he do for work?”

  “I don’t know, some kind of salesman or something.”

  “Does he live in town?”

  “Yah.” She stared at him. He wanted her to say: he lives with us now, sleeps on our divorced mother’s couch, and uses our divorced mother’s bathroom.

  “What’s he sell?”

  “Soap.”

  “Seems like a nice enough guy.” He flushed under her scrutiny.

  “He’s my mother’s boyfriend.” She wanted to shock him, but the word made her squirm. Her face was red.

  “Does that bother you?”

  “No, why should it?” She folded her arms and crossed her legs. She wiggled her foot up and down.