Plain Jayne

by Brea Brown

  “Just… stop it! Stop! None of that has anything to do with why I’m here!” I can picture him pacing the airy living room in efficient, long strides. “You’re trying to distract me, but it’s not going to work.”

  “I want you to admit, after all these years, that you broke that gravy boat—a family heirloom—and then tried to hide it from me. Or, at the very least you’re protecting one of the help,” she hisses.

  The help? I squirm in my chair and fiddle with the cotton ties on the red and white gingham seat cushion. Those two words seem to rest between Paulette and me like a racial slur. We’re both doing our best to ignore it so that we don’t have to acknowledge the subtle hierarchical differences that exist between even the two of us.

  “I’m not going to get into your unhealthy obsession with possessions in general and that hideous piece of pottery in specific. Unless you want to talk about this house, which I do. Because we had a deal, Caroline.” As his voice lowers, Paulette and I both lean closer to the wall that separates the two rooms. I’m practically hanging off the side of my chair.

  “Screw the deal. I changed my mind,” she says, sounding like a spoiled brat.

  He laughs the most unamused laugh I’ve ever heard. “Too. Bad. If you don’t want to keep up your end of it, then fine. As a matter of fact, great! I’ll have my lawyer call your lawyer.”

  Again, I have to struggle to keep from laughing out loud at all these TV-script lines creeping into his speech today.

  I don’t need to worry about anyone hearing me laugh, though, because it would be drowned out by the screeching, “Noooo!” that Caroline lets loose.

  Lucas doesn’t change his tone at all. “Yes. But it’s up to you. It’s an easy fix. I’m perfectly content to continue our agreement, exactly as we’ve been doing for the past two years. I get this house; you keep our marriage on paper and in public. It’s simple.”

  “You know it’s not simple!” She’s downright hysterical now, but she may as well be behaving like a rational person, based on Lucas’ reaction to her.

  “Yeah, it is. What’s more important to you? Using a house maybe three weeks out of the year or keeping your parents and so-called friends in the dark about the end of our marriage? It makes no difference to me, Caroline.”

  If I didn’t think I knew him better, I’d say he was being gentle with her. It almost sounds like he’s reasoning with a child in the throes of a temper tantrum over choices. Do you want to go swimming in the ocean or in the pool? You can’t do both. You have to choose.

  When she doesn’t answer him, he says more forcefully, “Come on! I have a life. And whatever you choose doesn’t affect it either way, but I’d like to get back to it. You want this house back, then we draw up the divorce papers. You leave here, I’ll pretend this never happened, and we go on like before. I’ll see you a few times a year at your parents’ house for Thanksgiving, Christmas, what have you, and I’ll make sure I sign the tax return and get it in the mail before the deadline each April. It’s not like I ever want to get married again…”

  Now it’s obvious he’s merely talking to fill the silence while she comes to the decision he’s almost sure will benefit him the most. It also sounds like he’s reciting something he’s said several times in the past. I peek at Paulette from the corner of my eye and see that she’s listening with her mouth hanging open, absent-mindedly rubbing her bottom lip with the tip of her thumbnail.

  “…And I do love this house,” Lucas continues. “It’s perfect for relaxation in the summer and solitude in the winter. But… it’s a small price to pay for being rid of you forever… Hmm… Now I’m not sure which decision I’d prefer you make,” he says, sounding surprised. “No house, bad; no Caroline, good. House, good; putting up with your bullshit theatrics for the rest of my life, bad.”

  “Fuck you!” she shouts.

  Now he laughs. “Uh… no. That was a major mistake. Moment of weakness not to be repeated… ever. Plus, don’t you have… people… for that?”

  “You… are… the… biggest… dickhead… on the planet!”

  In this moment, I can’t help but sympathize with Caroline. I know only too well how he can drive someone crazy with his smugness.

  “How can you joke about that?” she asks in a tortured voice.

  “About what?” After a pause, he says, “Oh, come off it! Surely, you’re not serious. You were the one who made such a big deal about it being wrong. I mean, I was okay with it. It was… well, not the best I’ve ever had, but it had been a while, so I thought it was… fun. Harmless, in any case. You went on and on about it being the biggest mistake of your life, and you weren’t happy until I agreed. You hounded me for a week afterwards, first apologizing and then begging me to tell you I was sorry. Even though I wasn’t. I mean, we are married. We used to do it all the time—”

  “Enough! Oh my God, my nerves are shot!”

  I hear the squeak of leather as someone sits on the sofa, followed shortly after by another squeak.

  “Hey, I’m sorry. I’m only joking… you know, trying to get you to make a decision. Remember how you used to like that?”

  “I never liked that, Lucas. You know it’s always made me furious. And don’t touch me.”

  “Oh. Well, it’s hard to tell the difference with you, sometimes. Anyway, what’s it gonna be? I need to know what to tell Jayne. She’s supposed to be here working, you know.”

  The ice is back in Caroline’s voice as she says, “Oh, yes. Your pet, Jayne.”

  “Don’t be an idiot.” More squeaking, and then his voice comes closer to the kitchen door.

  Paulette jumps up and grabs the first thing she sees (the teapot), carrying it to the sink, where she dumps out the dregs and makes a big show of looking busy and rinsing it. I remain glued to my chair, paralyzed by panic at the idea of being caught listening. But he stays in the other room, apparently standing on the other side of the door while he explains, “She’s just another writer. And a head case, at that.”

  Wow. Now it’s Paulette’s turn to pretend she didn’t hear anything. Frankly, I’d rather be called “the help” than a “head case,” no matter how accurate his description is.

  “I sent her here to get her out of my hair for a couple of weeks, and now you’re fucking everything up. As usual.”

  “You’ve never let any of your other authors use the house. Not even the good ones. Why is that, Lucas?” Her patronizing tone is insufferable. I can only imagine the pounds per square inch of pressure Lucas is exerting on his jaw. “Don’t try to bullshit me.”

  “Wouldn’t dream of it, Darling. Now, be a good girl and go pack up your things.”

  “No. I told you, they’re painting the house in town. I can’t stay there.”

  “Shit, Caroline!” What sounds like a punch rattles a shelf of collector’s teacups on the wall three feet away from me. “Do you know how awkward this is for me? I—”

  “I don’t care! It’s obvious your precious Jayne didn’t know you even had a wife, so I’m sure you have some explaining to do there, but I have bigger things to worry about than that.”

  Paulette rejoins me at the table. Twisting a dish towel between her fingers, she stares intently at the kitchen door as Caroline’s kitten-heeled shoes click across the wood floor.

  Lucas murmurs barely audibly, “As in…?”

  Tearfully, and sounding tortured, his wife answers, “I’m pregnant.”

  *****

  When Paulette was unable to hold back her bark of a laugh, and I fumbled the spoon I was mindlessly fingering, the crying came to an abrupt stop, and the door flew open. The two of us couldn’t have looked guiltier if we’d been stuffing the silver into a big black bag. I suddenly remembered how to use my legs, though, and took off with my laptop out the back door, practically running toward the gazebo, where I should have been the whole time, anyway. I didn’t even stick around long enough to hear how Paulette explained herself.

  Well, so much for staying here to finis
h my revisions. Even if Caroline magically changes her mind—not likely after catching me so obviously listening in on a conversation with her husband—there’s no way I can stay here. I’m mortified. Plus, now I know way too much about Luke-Ass’s private life. His messy, depressing private life. Ick.

  Not to mention, he thinks I’m a bothersome head case. I guess I already knew he thought that, but it’s another thing to hear someone come right out and say it.

  Abandoning the pretense of working on my book, I set aside my open laptop and cross the wooden gazebo floor so that I’m peering through the lattice at the beach below. The water looks hard today. Like the waves are slapping the surf, instead of caressing it. It’s not that the water is choppy—on the contrary, it looks as smooth as sapphires—but the waves are breaking with tremendous force, as if they’re trying to punish the ocean floor. I wonder what’s happening way out in the ocean, where these swells are forming. Is there a storm that’s not even visible this far away? Or is the cause something as simple as high winds? Whatever the reason, I can’t take my eyes off the waves, even when I begin to cringe as I anticipate their violent breaking.

  Here in Marblehead, it’s a blue-sky, puffy clouds day, the kind of day that epitomizes the word, “summer.” The weather doesn’t seem to have a clue that people like Lucas and Caroline Edwards exist or that their toxicity could seep into others’ lives. But the ocean… the ocean looks like it has experience with their type.

  The sound of footfalls on the gazebo’s steps alerts me to company. Expecting to see Paulette when I turn around, my expression is one of mutual sheepishness at our being caught eavesdropping. It quickly shifts to pure embarrassment, complete with blushing and perspiring, when I see that Lucas is my visitor. I was hoping that Paulette would deliver my things to me, with the request from my hosts that I leave as soon as possible. I would have been okay with that. I would have understood. And I would have been grateful not to have an uncomfortable confrontation regarding my gauche behavior.

  Before I can grope for the right thing to say, he sits down on the top step, turns mostly away from me and says to his feet, “I’m sorry you heard all that.”

  “I—Huhwhat…?” is the intelligent utterance that plops from my mouth in response.

  He’s rolled up his shirtsleeves to below his elbows, and the top two buttons of his shirt are undone. He slides off his shoes and peels off his socks, stuffing them into his shoes, which he sets aside on the steps. “I didn’t realize you were trying to have tea with Paulette in the kitchen.”

  I start to confess that we were only having tea in there so we could eavesdrop but hold back, barely, and say instead, “Don’t worry about it. Life is… messy… sometimes.”

  Glancing over his shoulder at me, he clarifies, “No. I meant… I’m sorry you heard us talking about… you.”

  That’s right… I’d almost forgotten that I had a bit part in their drama as the high-maintenance head case. Pretending I don’t care, I shrug. “Whatever. It’s not like I didn’t already know you feel that way.”

  Shortly, he replies, “I don’t, of course. Don’t be ridiculous.” He clambers to his feet and steps up into the structure. Sand rasps between his bare feet and the floorboards. At my skeptical glare, he says, “I only said that to Caroline so she wouldn’t jump to any insane conclusions of her own.”

  “‘Insane’ is right.”

  “Level-headedness isn’t one of her strong suits,” he replies, incorrectly assuming I’m referring to her, when really I’m talking about her insinuation regarding Luke-Ass’s relationship to me.

  I refuse to say anything bad about her. I hardly know her or their situation, for one thing. But more than that, she’s his wife. Sort of. And, apparently, the mother of his unborn child.

  I’m trying to figure out if it’s appropriate to congratulate him about his impending fatherhood when he narrows his eyes at me. “Why would I think you’re crazy, anyway? Is there something you’re not telling me? Because as far as I can tell, you’re remarkably ordinary.”

  He makes it sound like more of an insult than anything he said about me to Caroline.

  Compared to her, I do seem relatively normal. Who bickers about a gravy boat when she’s pregnant, her marriage is at stake, and her husband is enumerating all the ways he’s willing to continue to perpetuate the sham that it currently is? Lady, forget about the damn gravy boat!

  I’m more concerned with puzzling through this than responding to his questions. He eventually gives up on hearing an answer and says, “Well, I’m going for a walk on the beach.” He bends over and rolls up his trousers. “Being around Caroline always makes me want to walk into the ocean and never come out again.”

  I snort at his description.

  “You think I’m kidding. Anyway… I have to figure out how I’m going to get her the hell out of here. My usual bargaining chips are nothing in the face of what she said in there.”

  About that… He’s being awfully callous about it. I mean, I can understand that it may not be the best news in the world, coming from someone who makes you want to kill yourself, but I think you’d have to be incredibly jaded not to be moved by it. Even if it’s moved in a negative way. But show some emotion! He’s so… flat.

  None of my business, I warn myself sternly before calling him on his unemotional state. For all I know, he’s a wreck on the inside. He does strike me as one of those people who experiences strong feelings but rarely lets anything but anger show. And even when he lets his temper get the best of him (which is often), he usually rapidly recovers and then appears as if nothing happened. Maybe he’s crazy.

  At least some hint of my thoughts must be apparent in my expression, because when he straightens and glances at me, he sighs. As if explaining the situation to someone who spent much of her childhood eating lead paint chips, he says, “She’s not, you know. Pregnant. She makes this claim every time we’ve been… together. She had a full-blown hysterical pregnancy once, because she convinced herself so thoroughly of it.”

  “TMI,” I mutter before I can stop myself.

  “Pardon?”

  Blushing, I say quickly, “Never mind. I’ll pack my stuff and… and… Is there a bus stop nearby?” Marblehead doesn’t seem like the type of place to attract too many bus travelers, but it’s the first mode of transportation that springs to mind when I think, Get me the hell away from this dysfunctional nightmare.

  He looks down his nose at me. “No.”

  “Oh. Well, I guess I’ll call a cab…?”

  “I mean, no, you’re not leaving.” When I flinch at his firm tone, he revises, “Unless you want to, that is.”

  I gaze longingly down at my laptop, which was mere hours ago the instrument of some of the most inspired, free-flowing writing I’ve ever experienced. Ever ever. I don’t want to go. I want to stay here and finish my book. But not if Contemptible Caroline’s going to be hanging around, too.

  As if he can read my mind, he says quietly, “I promise I’ll get her to go away. Somehow. It may take a day or two, though.”

  “I don’t want to get in the middle of this… whatever… you two have going on,” I tell him for what feels like the thousandth time, “but… I was writing well before she got here.”

  He raises his eyebrows. “Oh? Anything you’d be willing to share with me? After my walk, of course. I desperately need to, uh, clear my head.”

  I’m loath to show him anything yet. Not until I’ve had a chance to proofread at least three times everything I’ve written today. “Umm… maybe. Maybe tomorrow?”

  “So you’ll stay?” he checks, backing down the gazebo steps and continuing his backpedaling through the grass, toward the beach.

  I nod and sit at the table, resting my fingers on my laptop keys. “Yeah. If it’s okay.”

  His smile makes a brief appearance before ducking behind his usual serious expression. “More than okay. And, please, don’t worry about this thing with Caroline. Concentrate on your writing, and I�
�ll take care of everything else. Without involving you at all. I promise.”

  Again, I nod, but I don’t know how he can make such a promise. Seems to me like Caroline’s the one in control, not him.

  Chapter Twelve

  Why did I agree to participate in this ridiculously awkward farce of a dinner? I feel like the sullen daughter caught in the middle of her parents’ rancorous divorce as I poke at my new potatoes and endeavor to get through the meal without uttering a single syllable. My parents in this analogy are arguing and insulting each other without saying a direct negative word.

  Lucas started it with, “Darling, make sure you eat your vegetables, especially that spinach. Folic acid is good for the baby, you know.”

  Caroline added a heaping serving spoonful to the current no-thank-you helping on her plate. “Yes, that’s right. And you should double up on your steak portions. Iron and protein will help with that little problem you sometimes have in the bedroom, Dear.”

  If I didn’t believe he was physically incapable of it, I’d say he blushed. “Oh, now don’t exaggerate,” he said in a cavalier tone. “That’s only ever happened in the presence of trolls posing as normal, sane women. It’s a brilliant manifestation of natural selection.” He smiled charmingly at her.

  Back and forth they go until I set my fork down with a clank, pick up my plate, and carry it into the kitchen. Paulette’s in here, busy cleaning up. At my entrance, she turns from the sink, where she’s scrubbing a broiler pan, and watches me plop into one of the chairs at the kitchen table.

  “Everything all right, luv?”

  I stab at my food. “Yes. Now it is, since I’m no longer eating in the same room as those two lunatics.”

  She snickers. “Oh, they’re passionate, that’s for sure.”

  “Passionate?!” I nearly choke on my food. After swallowing, I state, “They’re horrible. What even possessed them to ever get married?”

  Matter-of-factly, she answers, “Money, mostly, I’d say.” She goes back to scrubbing the pan. “Although I think they had an affection for each other at first. I know Luke was quite smitten with Caroline. But when you’re young, it’s exciting to be with someone who’s a little… wild. That excitement wears off once adult life sets in, I’m afraid.”