by Molly Giles
Francis lay on top of a twin bed, eyes closed, his glasses still on. His face looked pale and beaky. His hands were folded across his chest, his stocking feet were crossed at the ankle. Afraid to touch him, Kay said, loudly as she dared, “Dad?”
“Run along,” Francis said, his eyes closed.
“You sure? Mother’s still up.”
“Not at all.”
“You can get her to bed?”
“Absolutely.”
“She’s on the commode.”
“Righto.”
“Well. Okay. I’ll call Zabeth, and I’ll call you, you know, later this week, about the TB tests.”
“No problema. Look forward to it.”
She noticed his bathrobe hung over one chair, his slippers on the floor, an overflowing ashtray on the table beside him. He must sleep here often, she thought. When it’s too cold to spend the night in the Porsche.
“Dad!” she said louder. “I’m not going to leave until you get up.”
“Kay?” His voice was mild and even. Eyes closed, he groped across the table for his cigarettes, lit one, inhaled. “Why don’t you mind your own goddamned business?”
Fine. That was fine. What was her business? Two drunk parents, one stuck on the toilet, the other smoking in his sleep, but they’d made it this far without her, they could make it a little farther. She turned and walked to the door, then stopped and turned back. “This is how Mom falls,” she warned. “This is how she hurts herself. She’ll try to get herself to bed and something else will break. A rib. Her hip.”
Francis sat up and Kay took a step back. The look he gave her was small and direct, a straight shot of pure dislike. She raised her chin, said, “Well, good, you’re awake, I’ll leave then,” and, heart thudding, backed out the door.
Neal and Nicky were sitting in the warm car, listening to the radio. Nicky smiled and hugged her neck when she settled into the front seat, but Neal stared straight ahead. “Sorry,” she said, kissing and releasing both of Nicky’s hands. “But it’s hard to just leave them like that.”
“Got to leave them somehow,” Neal said. He kicked the gas and backed out the driveway with a rough twist of the wheel. He aimed down the dark hill, taking the curves with a squeal of the tires. Kay leaned her head against the seat and looked out. If he wanted to kill them that was fine with her. “You know what?” she said to Nicky.
“What.”
“We forgot to eat the peach pie.”
Nicky considered this. “Well,” he said at last. “It wasn’t really a dessert night.”
“No. It sure wasn’t.”
Six
“Notice how I do it,” the horse instructed. He reared, brought his front hooves together, and waltzed unsteadily on his two back legs. “One two three one two three.”
“I’m not going to notice anything.” Ida lay still as he lurched and lunged around the bedroom. Either two hours or two nights had passed since Francis had come in, lifted her off the commode, made her blow her nose, tucked her in bed, and passed out beside her. “Go ahead and make a fool of yourself if you want to.” She turned her head on the pillow but after a minute shot a look to see if his penis showed. It did. God. Was it blue? It was. And huge. “You better not wake Francis though. You know how he gets.”
The horse laughed. Sparks flew from his hooves, bright sprays of gold and silver that flared like little fires. It smelled like fire in here. Ida turned her chin to her armpit and inhaled. That was it. Her own stinky, sweaty, food-stained self. Fever, and then she’d been smoking too much; she smelled like a barbecue pit. She turned to look at Francis; he was lying like the saint he’d been named for, his two hands templed on his chest, his nose pointed toward the ceiling, his lower lip fluttering as he snored.
“I know how he gets,” the horse breathed darkly. “He gets posi-tive-ly pug-il-is-tic.”
Ida narrowed her eyes. How did the horse know that? Had he been observing them privately for years? Did he know other things about Francis as well? He probably knows more about that little architectress in New York than I’ll ever find out, she thought. Francis will never confess. He always says I make things up to make myself miserable. Still, I know he slept with her. And I know he slept with Peg Forrest. And no matter what he says, I know he’d like to sleep with Mimi Johns, Sunny-at-the-Office, and stupid little Stacy. She studied the horse. “Where did you come from?” she asked at last.
“Where do you think?”
“Hell?” She waited. “Is there a hell?”
“That’s for me to know and you to find out.”
I had better get baptized then, Ida decided. Just in case. Francis had been baptized Catholic and although he hadn’t gone to church in fifty years he always bragged he had his “ticket punched.” If he was going to heaven she’d better go too. You never knew.
“No, you don’t,” the horse agreed. “Look out,” he added, “company’s coming.”
She covered her eyes with her arm just as the two demons arrived, plunging down on the bed beside her and starting to pump into each other as if she didn’t exist, didn’t matter, never had. They were sobbing, but what good did that do? They were sorry, but so what? Her own body rose and fell with their heavings and her ears rang with the sickening smack of their flesh upon flesh, but her eyes stayed closed, the damn horse could torture her until he was blue—even bluer—in the face but nothing could make her look. She lifted both arms and pushed.
· · ·
Francis felt a push on his shoulder and woke up punching the air with his fist. It was already five-thirty on Monday morning, lots to do, no time to waste, up and at ’em. He groaned, sat up, and thought, Well what do you know: I’m still dressed. His belt was buckled, his watch was on, there was change in his pocket. Not the best way to start the week but nothing a shower, some coffee, and a total blood transfusion couldn’t fix. He pulled his glasses down off his forehead, picked up the notebook he’d left by the bed, and reviewed the day’s list through tired eyes. He had a meeting with a tribe of rich Iranians at eight; that would be easy, give them a design that faced East with a bell tower or two. He yawned, put down the notebook, and peered over at Ida. She always slept pretty. Here she was with one arm thrown up, hospital bracelet still on, her eyelashes spiky with last night’s war paint, looking like a little rose. Who had she gotten to cry last night? Besides, of course, herself? Stacy? Kay? Hard to keep track. Today should be good; she’d have Greta to push around. Old Ida, he thought. The Scourge of the Suburbs. “Wild thang,” he mouthed.
He said it again when he saw his own face in the bathroom mirror. Zabeth was getting him some of that Swiss stuff—Eterna-Something—it was made out of Novocaine, guaranteed to keep you looking young, should that be your cup of tea. The young people he had observed last night, Kay and Victor, were pretty sad examples of the species. He turned his face from side to side as he clipped his mustache, yawned again, and stepped into the shower. Zabeth was supposed to bring something else too: some wonder drug her pharmacist friend had cooked up, something to help Ida when the time came to help Ida. He’d have to sell some stocks to pay for a quart of that stuff. So, he thought: Call my broker.
Soaping, he continued to add to the day’s list in his head: meet with Jim Deeds, pick up Coco’s Elizabethan collar at the vet’s—she was biting that hot spot on her back again—take Ida’s Volvo in for an oil change, figure out something to tell Neal when he saw him. Neal looked like a man who had heard “No” before. Poor guy. But what could you do? He wanted to turn downtown West Valley into the boutique center of the world or something, who knew? Neal was a dreamer, plain and simple; he had no more idea of what it took to develop property than a giraffe did. Even if he had an ounce of business sense, it wouldn’t work. It was a bad idea and a bad idea was a bad idea.
Francis stepped out and pressed into the towel, disliking, as always, that second of darkness as he dried his hair. His brother Mick used to lassoo him like this, catch him off guard, hold him down, and sla
p his nuts for being—what was the word Mick had used?—stuck up. “You think you’re so smart?” Mick would ask. “You think you’re better than me and Kip and Harry and the rest of us?” Well yes. Anyone would be. “I’ll teach you respect,” Mick had promised. But Mick, poor Mick. Couldn’t teach a dog to piss. Respect, Francis thought. Put that on the list.
“Francis?”
“Be right there. Hang on to your horses.”
The low thick laugh lurched into a cough. “That’s exactly what I’m trying to do.”
Kay felt Neal lift the sheet and edge back into bed. Sex? she thought. Now? After seven weeks and two days? To what, she wanted to ask, do I owe this great honor? What’s the fucking occasion? Keep your mouth shut, she counseled herself. She forced herself to swallow her giggle and lie still, pretending to sleep.
Neal was still damp from the shower and his hair, as it brushed across her nose, was wet enough to make her sneeze. “Bless you,” he said, and his voice, too deep, too kind, was a giveaway; he must already have a hard-on; he did; she could feel it bob and poke against her. Something thrilling must have happened in that shower. If only she could feel a thrill about something herself. All she felt was hung-over. Her headache pounded, her eyelids were crusted, her breath reeked of last night’s meat and tobacco. She bit back a bubble of bile to see if it would stay down; it did. So, she thought, go with the flow, get it while you can, caveat emptor—no!—carpe diem—no!—mea culpa. Trying to shield Neal from her breath, she slipped her leg up and over his damp hip and nestled close. “Do we have time before you open the shop?” she whispered.
“Fifteen minutes,” he assured her.
Fifteen minutes. Wow. They could do it three times. Stop. Be nice. He drummed his fingertips along her spine in a brisk marching cadence, then lay still. End of foreplay. She knew he could lie there for the full fifteen minutes; he could even fall asleep—he had done that before—if she didn’t act now. Follow-through was her job. She reached down and touched him. His erection was a sleek bouncy thing, much nicer than the rest of him, simpler, with a friendly, happy attitude. She loved the way it fit in her hand, alert and amiable. Neal nuzzled her neck and shivered. He smelled aggressively of toothpaste but when he smiled that blind, sweet, trusting smile, he was Neal, her beloved buddy Neal, gentle friend and helpmeet.
“Want to come in?” She opened and lifted. She wasn’t ready but she probably wouldn’t be, at this rate, perhaps because she was frigid or perhaps because she was out of practice or perhaps because they only had fifteen minutes. It didn’t matter. She’d be ready once he got in. If he got in. He was still bumping bone. She guided him once, twice, and at the third knock he entered. “Oh I love that,” she smiled. “Hi, honey, I’m home.”
Neal nodded but didn’t answer. He didn’t like talking. It spoiled his concentration. Neal needed total concentration. His strokes were long and deep but difficult for her to catch; as soon as she adapted to one rhythm he changed to another; oh well, they were both lousy dancers. After a few false starts he stopped altogether and began to fumble for her clitoris with his hand. Now how could he miss it so often? It was like when she told him there was food on his chin, and he wiped it off and it was still there. Still, he was trying and even though he wasn’t succeeding, even though he was in fact failing, it felt good, to be held. She remembered to lie still as the bed rocked and creaked. Neal had abandoned the clitoral hunt and was coming in to the home stretch. Any movement from her, he once confessed, “made it worse.” Bouncing limply up and down on her back, she wondered where the velvet spread had gone to. Neal had kept it in his back room, at the shop, a thin stained soft thing they used to stagger toward and fall upon, in the old days, when they first met. How long ago had that been? Only twelve years? How she used to come on that red velvet spread, all of her naked and open and hot. How she wished she could come now. She should touch herself like the books said, she shouldn’t just let him go on without her. But it was already too late. “Oh boy,” he was saying, and then, a second later, in that same surprised, faintly outraged voice, “Oh boy,” and that was that, and even though her own body felt quiet, her crotch humming to itself like a child left to play alone on a swing, still it was good, to hold him close another minute, and today there was a little shiver, not exactly an orgasm, but a little shiver of almost-there before he slipped out and sat up.
“That was a treat,” she said.
“Was it? You felt sort of far away.” Neal was already reaching for his clothes. “You had a wild night last night.”
“I did?” The bubble of bile rose again and tasted, when it popped, of blood. Neal left her, padded into the bathroom, closed the door, and stepped into his second shower. He can’t even go to work with my smell on him, Kay thought. He has to wash it off. She grabbed a pillow and hugged it tight, then raised it up and punched it hard.
“Hon? My comb?” Neal came in with a towel around his waist. He was smiling down at her as if he had a funny secret. “Did you take my comb again?” Clutching the pillow, she watched him rummage through her purse and extract the old white comb with its three broken teeth. “Second time this month,” he said.
“But who’s counting.” Kay swung her feet to the floor and stood up. He very carefully did not look at her naked. He was smelling his socks; the same socks he’d worn the day before and the day before that. She watched him slip them on. Another day, she thought. Another dolor. The phone rang.
“That’s your mother.” Neal looked at his watch. “She’s late.”
Ida usually phoned at seven, “But I slept in,” she said gaily. She wanted to thank Kay for a wonderful time. It was so nice having all the family together. Wasn’t it? It was good for Francis to see everyone and have a chance to visit with little Nicky. He was such a dear child. Wasn’t he? Even though Greta was not being paid to put mah-jongg tiles away. And speaking of putting things away! That pie! Greta brought a big piece for breakfast on her bed tray and it was the best thing she had ever tasted in her life! And guess what! It had given her a bowel movement! A big fat yellow one! The second in two days!
That was Monday.
Tuesday Ida was blocked up again.
Wednesday she called to say she couldn’t talk. She’d fallen out of her wheelchair, stupid thing to do, but it was Francis’s fault for making martinis for the Junior Bentleys and Jim Deeds was going to be furious when he saw her on Thursday.
Thursday she called from the hospital, in tears, she was sick of these damn tests, it wasn’t fair, everyone treated her like a white rat, and it wasn’t more X-rays she needed for Christ’s sake it was a decent dentist and some human contact not that she’d ever gotten anything like that from her own, her only, daughter.
On Friday she called three times. Once to say she was sorry she had shouted the day before and to please forgive her; the second time to shout that she would shout if she wanted to; and the third time she simply cried for five minutes, while Kay, cradling the phone against her shoulder, tears running down her own cheeks, took late fees at the return desk at the library.
On Saturday she asked to speak to Nicky and when he took the receiver from Kay she shouted Boo! so loudly Kay could hear it across the kitchen as she was making Nicky’s breakfast. “Halloween’s not until tomorrow, Grandmère,” Nicky said politely.
“I may not be alive tomorrow,” Ida said, and hung up.
On Monday she called to say she’d been prophetic. She had cancer.
Kay was at work. She stood at the back office of the library watching raindrops bead and necklace across the top of the window. The hills were dark khaki against an olive-colored sky. The old orchard behind the library, like everything else, had recently been sold to developers. The library was slated to be sold soon too. She watched a crow rise from a parked tractor and flap to a bare tree standing alone in the field made mud by construction. Her eyes burned, either from studying instruction manuals all morning so she could explain the new computer system to her supervisor, Mrs. Holla
nd, or from lack of sleep. Last night had been bad. She’d awakened to Nicky’s nightmare screams and by the time she’d rocked him back to sleep, she’d felt wildly awake and had sat on the couch in the dark until dawn, worrying about her smoking and her drinking, and her marriage, and her mother. The word “cancer” seized her now with a cold thrill. It seemed a word she’d been waiting for. She felt her lips part in a terrible smile and pressed the phone to her ear. “What?” she said.
“I’m not going to say it twice.”
“You have cancer?”
“I mean it, Kay. I’m going to hang up if you don’t behave.”
“Where is it?”
“Everywhere. You name it. My lungs. My lymph glands. My bones. And—get this—my brain. Which at least explains the damn horse.”
“I can’t believe this,” Kay said. She backed into a chair and sat down, the phone to her ear. Her heart was beating very fast. She felt alert, excited. What is this? she thought. Am I happy? Tell me the truth, she heard Zabeth say. Don’t you want her to die?
“I know.” Ida was silent. “It’s the limit, isn’t it.”
“It really is.”
“They say it’s because of cigarettes.”
“You mean if you hadn’t smoked you’d be all right?”
“No I mean if I hadn’t smoked I wouldn’t have cancer. Do you have your thumb in your mouth, Kay?”
