She Poured Out Her Heart

by Jean Thompson

  Bonnie, meanwhile, had become, in a local sense, something of a well-known figure. Crisis intervention was very up and coming, an important tool in urban policing. “As opposed to, say, just shooting people,” Bonnie said. Jane’s parents were impressed that she’d been interviewed on one of the Chicago news programs, and they’d taped it to show Jane. They cued it up in the family room and Jane’s mother brought out coffee and Christmas cookies. Bonnie murmured that it wasn’t really a holiday classic. But here she was, looking cool and savvy in a white shirt and a leather jacket, a streetwise professional talking knowledgeably about demographics and distressed populations and the new skill set required of officers in the field as they adapted to changing conditions, etc. “You’re so articulate,” Jane’s mother said, and Bonnie and Jane traded weary looks, since it was a habit for both their mothers to find in the other those remarkable virtues that their own daughters lacked. Bonnie’s mother liked to point out how polite Jane was.

  A time or two a case Bonnie had been involved in landed in the newspaper. She sent these along to Jane, and Jane read the heartbreaking, infuriating details of people who did not seem willing or capable of even the lowest common denominator of responsible behavior. Not every crisis was resolved happily, of course, and Jane thought that would be the hardest part. When crazy, or crazy drugs, or a vicious, unfettered mind won out, in spite of your best efforts. She thought it would have to take a toll, if you did it long enough.

  For her Atlanta visit, Bonnie made Jane promise not to go to any trouble, and Jane said that was easy enough to comply with. Especially since there was no other place to put the potty chair except in the bathroom that Bonnie would be using. Bonnie said she guessed she’d meant, more along the line of entertainment, but no matter. Jane made up the guest bed in the spare room—she had not yet begun to think of it as a nursery—and put out a stack of fresh towels. She scrubbed down the kitchen and sorted and folded the backlog of laundry as Robbie threw the pieces of his educational puzzle toy one by one at the glass patio doors. Perhaps she could project an air of cheerful television sit com havoc.

  Bonnie had insisted on taking a cab from the airport so that no one would have to pick her up. Jane watched Bonnie shut the cab door, hoist her suitcase, and roll it along the sidewalk. “Nice place,” she said, when Jane opened the front door. “We’ve got to get you out of here.”

  Robbie was still at an age where he was fearless around strangers. He squealed and crowed when Bonnie picked him up and swung him around. “Roberto. The jig is up. There’s a new sheriff in town.” To Jane she said, “Go lie down and take a nap.”

  “But you just got here.”

  “And I’ll be here when you wake up. Go on, I’ll call you if I need you.”

  Jane made a few noises of protest, but the unexpected reprieve and the gravitational pull of her bed were too strong to resist. She closed the bedroom door behind her and lay down. “All right, kid,” she heard Bonnie saying. “What do you have to drink in this joint?”

  Jane was instantly asleep. She woke just as suddenly, as if she had slept no time at all, but the room was full of shadowy evening light. She panicked: where was Robbie? But he was with Bonnie, and then she panicked all over again, swinging her legs over the side of the bed and rushing into the bathroom because of course she couldn’t live another minute without peeing.

  She heard voices, one of them Eric’s. Had he come home early? Or no. It wasn’t early. Still fighting sleep and dread, she hurried toward the light and commotion of the kitchen. The three of them were sitting at the table, Eric and Bonnie and Robbie in his booster chair, surrounded by sandwich wrappers and paper cups. And even as she was greeted with noisy enthusiasm and Eric stood to kiss her and Robbie clamored to be picked up and held, she knew that all she’d had to do to bring about this scene of contentment was to leave them alone.

  She could not shake her sense of dislocation, as if everything in the room had been arranged so as to mimic the perfectly normal. “Great timing,” Eric said, showing her the plate set out for her. “We just this minute started. It’s still hot.”

  Bonnie said, “Eric brought barbecue. From world famous something or other.”

  Jane checked the clock. It was almost seven, and she’d slept for most of four hours. “I guess I was really out of it.”

  “Or really tired. Here, I got you a mac and cheese, and a pulled pork sandwich. Is that OK? There’s ribs too. And slaw. You want iced tea?”

  “I was going to cook dinner.”

  “And we’ll let you. Tomorrow. Here, I made sure they put the hot sauce on the side.”

  Who could ask for a better husband? How deftly, and with what a light touch, he skated over her shortcomings, smoothed the way for her. Every so often he gave Jane an encouraging smile. Jane sat down with Robbie in her lap, trying to arrange him so that he did not kick her in the stomach. To Bonnie she said, “How did you manage with him, did he run you ragged?”

  “Nah. We reached a negotiated settlement.” Bonnie was in on it too, playing the part of the fast-talking babe in the screwball comedy. “We ran race cars. He’s a competitive little dude. Aren’t you? Ticklish, too.” Bonnie made a mock-lunge for Robbie, who squealed, enamored, and hid in Jane’s shoulder. “Are you ticklish? Huh?”

  “No-ooo!”

  “Not ticklish. Good to know. Let’s see, then we had peanut butter and crackers and orange juice, and we watched Jeopardy, and we did a little target practice in the bathroom. Don’t worry, everything’s all cleaned up.”

  “Bonnie, I didn’t mean for you to do—”

  “Stuff you do every day? Chill. It was no biggie. Since I don’t do it every day.”

  “Well thank you, Mary Poppins.” She shook her head to get some of the sleep strangeness out of it. To Robbie she said, “Let’s eat some dinner now, all right? Can you sit up and eat your sandwich like a big boy?”

  “I want play my cars.”

  “After you eat.” Jane reached for the chicken sandwich he hadn’t touched. “Here. Make sure you chew it enough.”

  “Don’t you get to eat?” Bonnie asked.

  “In a minute.” In fact Jane was hungry, but the smell of the red-brown meat was unpleasant, almost swampy to her. She would have liked something clean and persnickety, like cucumber and watercress sandwiches with the crusts trimmed. She had the most useless pregnancy cravings, there was never any hope of satisfying them. “Drink your milk,” she told Robbie. “Another big bite.” He was good and wound up from his adventures with Bonnie. Bedtime would be a challenge. “How about we play with your cars in the bathtub?”

  Once Robbie had been fed, bathed, and put into pajamas, Jane came back to the kitchen table, where Eric and Bonnie had switched to bottled beer and were chatting companionably.

  “Daddy has to kiss him good night,” Jane announced. She sat down and started in on the cold mac and cheese.

  Eric drained his beer bottle and got up. “We’re very child-centered around here. The child insists.” He patted the top of Bonnie’s head on his way out.

  Bonnie said, “What’s it going to be like with two?”

  “At least the baby won’t be running around for a while. Other women do it. Other women put their kids in day care and go to work every morning.” She must look even worse than she felt, for the two of them to be so solicitous. It irritated her, in an unworthy way, as if she could do nothing without supervision and care. Jane had second thoughts about cold mac and cheese; she got up to put it in the microwave. “I’ll be all right.”

  Eric came back in. “He’s down but not out.” From the hallway came Robbie’s mournful, imperious cry: “Mom-mee!”

  “Go to sleep,” Jane called. “We have bedtime issues,” she told Bonnie. “Because Daddy and I are, believe it or not, one heck of a rousing good time.”

  “She didn’t used to be sarcastic,” Bonnie informed Eric.
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br />   “Clearly, I’m a bad influence.”

  “Mom-mee!”

  “Honey, it’s bedtime.” She was going to have to go in to him, but she wanted to get some food in her first. She took Robbie’s half-eaten sandwich apart and started in on the bun. She saw the other two watching her. “I ate a very balanced breakfast and lunch.”

  “Maaa-mee!”

  “I’m coming.” If she didn’t go to him, he’d get himself out of the crib and then they’d have to start all over. “Just put everything away, I’ll eat it later.”

  Jane headed back to tend to Robbie. It came as a relief to get up and leave. She was still out of sorts, and there was something discordant about the three of them together in a room, as if any two of them would be a better idea.

  She stayed with Robbie until he fell asleep, rocking him in the rocker, rocking the new baby also, the three of them heavy with sleep and warmth and there were these moments too of perfect contentment, the boundaries of her body blurring into theirs, the weight no burden, and love, for once, coming easy.

  By the time she lifted Robbie into his crib, and tried to arrange his arms and legs into some peaceful position—because even in sleep he looked ready to land a haymaker punch—the others had gone to bed. The guest room door was closed. Her own room was dark, and Jane undressed and put on her pajamas without turning on a light. She left their door ajar in case she needed to hear Robbie. Eric snored breezily. When she got into bed on her side, he woke up enough to send an arm in her direction, draping over her.

  Jane said, “I know you called and told her to come.”

  It took him a moment to swim up through his sleep and be able to speak. “Was that such a terrible thing?”

  “You could have asked me about it.”

  “You would have said no, it was too much trouble.”

  “You don’t know that.” Jane heard her voice rise, then damped it down in case Bonnie was awake and listening. “Anyway, why was it so important?”

  “I thought she’d cheer you up.”

  “And why is it so important that I get cheered up? I’m doing the best I can, Eric. I try not to complain, because then I’d be complaining the whole time, but this is not easy.”

  “You never want anything I can give you.”

  That stopped her, and by the time Jane came up with something she might say to him, he was asleep again.

  In the morning, Eric left before anyone else was up. Jane got up next, fed Robbie his breakfast, and plunked him down in front of a Disney movie while she ducked into the bathroom for one of her three-minute shower routines. By the time Bonnie woke, she’d started the day’s second pot of coffee. She’d tried doing without caffeine early on. Even Eric agreed she was better off drinking it.

  “Good morning,” Bonnie said, playing peekaboo around the door frame. Robbie was instantly in the fun zone, ready to pick up where they’d left off. He pounded across the floor to Bonnie and tackled her around the knees.

  “Whoa there, killer. Can I get a little coffee before we get rowdy?”

  “No!”

  “Welcome to my world,” Jane told her. “Robbie, why don’t you go get your cars? You left them in your bed.”

  Robbie took off down the hall. “Quick, medicate me,” Bonnie said.

  Jane poured her a cup of coffee. “Are you hungry? We have Cheerios, toast, and . . . Cheerios. Orange juice.”

  “Just coffee. Eric’s at work?”

  “Eric’s always at work.”

  “Huh.” Bonnie wrapped her hands around the coffee mug as if in prayer, and drank it down with an intensity that Jane found theatrical. Really, it was just coffee. Bonnie still wore her hair long and mussed, and she still slept in what she called her Whore of Babylon nightgowns, limp, satiny things trimmed with lace scallops. This one was peach-colored. Its slightly draggled bottom hem was visible beneath the terrycloth bathrobe Jane had loaned her.

  Bonnie saw Jane looking at her. “What?”

  “Nothing,” Jane said. She had been wondering who Bonnie had bought the nightgown for.

  “I guess you pretty much have to be a big workhound if you’re going to be a doctor. I mean, some of the stuff he’s up to is pretty amazing.”

  “It’s good you’re here for him to show off to. There’s no point in him trying to impress me anymore, I’ve made all the adoring noises I can.”

  “Huh,” Bonnie said again.

  Robbie came running back with his cars, and Bonnie did a good impersonation of yesterday’s enthusiasm. She and Jane carried on a conversation punctuated by Robbie’s instructions and demands. No, they had not yet told him about the b-a-b-y. They were waiting until it got a bit closer. Did they have names picked out yet? Still deciding. Grace was on the list, as were Sophie and Anna. Jane said that maybe she and Bonnie could go out and buy a few things for the new you-know. Pink things, girl things, so that she didn’t have to wear all hand-me-downs, and Bonnie said sure, they could do that.

  “You’re being an awfully good sport,” Jane said, accusingly.

  “I am. Sorry. I’ll stop.”

  “There’s this whole commercial enterprise built up around pregnancy. You’ll see. It’s like the military industrial complex, but with babies.”

  They went to Target and Babies R Us and then to a boutique store that felt, Bonnie said, like the inside of a decorated womb. Everything on display was fuzzy and precious. They looked at baby dresses embroidered with ducks and with rosebuds, at petal collars and fairy wings, at tiny socks and bloomers and flower headbands. Robbie, confined to a stroller, had fallen asleep. “Just as well,” Bonnie said. “It’s not his kind of store.” There were acres of pink, in tones of cameo, cherry blossom, flamingo; there were stripes and checks, frilled garments and sporty ones.

  Jane bought two sleepers, one yellow, one with a pattern of pink sprigs, and a pink ruffled bubble dress. Bonnie insisted on buying accessories: lacy socks, a sun visor, and a pair of soft leather mary janes. “Thanks,” Jane said. “She’s ready for a night on the town. That’s really going to happen, isn’t it? She’ll be a teenager and she’ll want to go out with horrid boys.”

  She meant it to sound lighthearted and humorous, like something Bonnie would say, but it came out with too much force, as if she meant it, as if she planned on being one of those impossible mothers who made daughters’ lives miserable. Maybe she was already a bad, an unnatural mother, she’d just managed to hide it so far. Then Robbie woke up and started fussing, and there was no time to decide what she’d meant or had not meant, except that of course you worried all the time that you were doing everything wrong.

  Bonnie was staying for five days, and Jane had to admit, it was a help to have her there. Bonnie was always forgiving about household messes, or more likely, oblivious to such things, and so Jane didn’t worry about the litter of toys or the wet towels hung up in the bathroom drying into deformed, cardboard wrinkles. Bonnie played with Robbie, with varying degrees of patience, true, but anything that soaked up some portion of his energy was a benefit. She ate what was put before her, she took her turn at washing dishes, she was as grounded and matter-of-fact as a box of dirt. Jane felt herself relaxing by inches. Eric might have gone about it wrong, asking Bonnie to come, but it hadn’t been the wrong idea. Maybe she had been spending too much time alone, that is, without an adult presence. Maybe her white room episodes were just some inexplicable, boo-hoo, hormonal weirdness. Anyway, it was now her fifth month. She was ready for things to get easier.

  In the afternoons Robbie napped, while Jane and Bonnie sprawled in front of the television, watching ancient black and white movies, or soap operas with the volume turned down so they could make up the dialogue. (“It’s no use, Axel. Ever since the accident, I only want to have sex with vampires.”) Bonnie retreated to the front porch to make phone calls to the man she said she was through with. Jane watched her bending
over the phone, intent on her conversation, clutching at handfuls of her hair as she talked.

  “Who is he anyway?” Jane asked, when Bonnie came back in, looking morose. “You never exactly said.”

  “I met him through work.”

  “A cop?”

  “Please. I am so through with cops. I can’t even watch Law and Order anymore.”

  “So who? He’s in mental health? No? He’s not a client, is he? Bonnie!”

  “Not technically,” Bonnie protested. “That would be unethical. He’s more like, a friend of a client. We were both trying to get Hector into treatment. Now don’t be judgmental. We didn’t have much in common, but it was fun for a while. Don’t. I know you think I’m an idiot.”

  “I just wish you could meet somebody you might want to keep around.”

  “I always do want to keep them around,” Bonnie protested. “At least at first. Well, not this one. He was more of a fling-ette. But listen, I’m so done. From now on I’m all chastity and good works. The Sisters of the Gutter Rose.”

  “You shouldn’t demean yourself, even as a joke,” Jane said. She was tired, she realized, of Bonnie being Bonnie. Her dumb moves that she talked wise about, her delight in her own bad behavior. Just as she was tired of being herself: poor, exhausted, neurasthenic Jane, needing to be jollied along, needing allowances made for her, like some beloved but limited household pet. For both of them, identities that had been formed and sealed back when they’d first encountered each other.

  Or no. Formed, but not sealed, because weren’t there other possibilities, other Janes, or other Bonnies? Other paths they might have taken? There must be. She didn’t believe in fate, or doom. She believed, halfheartedly, in coincidence, and even more so in accident. She had just happened to meet Eric, it wasn’t the hand of God or anything. And one thing had led to another and here she was. She’d had some vague and shapeless regrets when she’d married, that sense of avenues now closed off to her, but she’d thought everyone must feel such things, and besides, she’d been convinced she was a slightly second-rate person, gawky, comical, slow, who might, with luck, fit into some ordinary life.