Precious

by Sandra Novack

  “Of course I don’t mean to tell you what to do, or how you should run your house. But you’d have to be blind not to see things. Sissy was alone most of the summer. I’d see her go off down the road, and I’d try to stop her, call out, but she’s flighty, she doesn’t listen to me. I’m not her mother. What with everything that’s happened—” Milly pauses. “I don’t suppose Eva cared at all, and God knows no one else was watching.”

  Natalia feels the itch travel from her scalp down to her neck. She tries to keep her expression perfectly neutral. “I know all about this,” she says. “My family is my concern. I don’t know why people are interested in other people’s houses.”

  Milly’s fleshy hand encircles Natalia’s wrist. “I was trying to help. Ask yourself: If we weren’t keeping an eye on your children, then who was when you were gone? It wasn’t Frank, working all the time. It was us, the women who were home, the women out and about every day. Your nosy neighbors.”

  “I never said I thought you were nosy.”

  “You didn’t have to. It’s obvious you don’t like us.”

  Natalia ignores this. She inhales, smelling something vaguely new and plastic. She pulls her arm from Milly and scratches her neck. “We’ve taken care of it. I know all about this already. I watch and see, too.”

  “Fine, then,” Milly nods. “Fine.” She turns and wanders down to the end of the aisle, her fat rump pushing against people. She stops by Ellie Green and Jenny Schultz. The women try to find matching pairs of water glasses. Natalia hears them strike up a discussion about crystal and has a vague sense that everything is wrong. She leaves to find a new pair of loafers for Frank, even though twice he expressly said to not spend the money, but he can’t just walk around with a hole in his heel. Upstairs she finds a simple pair marked down more than 60 percent. Her hand runs over the scratch in the grain of leather as she goes to the checkout line. She hears the women call to her, their voices drifting from somewhere behind.

  “More news?” Natalia says turning with a desolate look.

  “As a matter of fact, yes,” Milly responds. Her manner is smug. She fiddles with her curtains. “I’ve decided—we’ve decided—that we’ll have a picnic tomorrow at my and Mr. Morris’s house. Nothing fancy. For Ginny, really. She’s got to know people are around her, worrying that she hasn’t been out of the house in weeks. When is she sneaking out to get her groceries, I might ask. In the middle of the night? Maybe she’s starving herself. I know of people who have done that sort of thing, starving themselves in grief.”

  “Most parents would do that, if it would mean their children’s well-being,” Natalia says.

  “Most would,” Milly agrees.

  “Maybe Ginny wants to be left alone.”

  “No one wants that,” Ellie says, her voice full of certainty.

  “I wouldn’t want to be alone,” Jenny says. “Not with that much trouble.”

  “Some people do.” Natalia picks up her bags.

  “You’ll come, though, won’t you?” Jenny asks.

  Natalia feels tired, exhausted in the space of an hour. The women wait while she hesitates and then finally agrees. With that, Milly takes to delegating responsibilities. She is to be in charge of invitations and phone calls and agrees to shoulder the responsibility of calling Ginny and persuading her by force if necessary, something she isn’t looking forward to, she informs the women, but something that should properly be done by the host. Ellie offers to make ambrosia, while Jenny is assigned the task of deviling the eggs, and Natalia volunteers potato salad. As they talk, Natalia makes her way along the checkout line, barely listening while Milly reminisces about those long-past get-togethers—uproarious occasions when her children ran about the lawn with same-aged cousins and friends, and Milly’s sisters and aunts and old uncles would talk for hours at the picnic table. Probably, Natalia realizes, the woman has no one left, really, but her husband and the neighborhood. Her children, grown and living in Florida, probably shun her overbearing ways, her presumption to give advice, her inability to relinquish control. She is surprised to find she feels momentarily sorry for Milly. She can’t say she likes her—she’s not sure she’ll ever be able to say that, exactly—but at least, in this moment, she understands the way Milly pushes forward with things, her busy resolve. What else is there to do, she thinks, when you find yourself mostly alone?

  At home, the haze of smoke still hanging in the kitchen, Natalia takes two more aspirin and contemplates taking more. She could walk into her house backward to undo time. She could rub vinegar on her temples to quell the pain. She could light a candle and let it burn down, to rid the nebulous air of the negativity she feels all over her. Her head throbs even more, not only from the cheerless interaction with Milly and the women but from the car ride home and Sissy’s incessant pleading about this silly circus. She’s been nipping at Natalia’s heels, tagging along behind her back, literally pulling at her clothes. Natalia takes a piece of paper from the drawer and makes a list of things to accomplish before Milly’s party. There will be the task, of course, of getting Frank to come at all, at least to create the appearance of a unified front. She’ll have to call upon his friendship with Ginny his responsibility to Ginny though this thought makes Natalia bristle with jealousy. And there will be the task, too, of getting Eva to come, particularly after the night before, and this morning, when Eva, drinking coffee, was as silent as a stone, and Natalia thought to ask her what Eva meant by her taunts and rebukes—to the men, more so to Frank—but somehow couldn’t bring herself to form the words.

  Natalia concentrates on what can be easily accomplished. Pie pan and apples, extra cinnamon, a bag of potatoes. Celery they have, but no bacon. Eggs are covered. She doesn’t know how, in the end, she was assigned both the salad and a pie, but she agreed anyway, so eager was she to be on her way. In back of her, she feels Sissy’s stare bore into her muscles and bone. “You’re so negative” Sissy is saying, and in this, Natalia hears Eva, her thin impatience, her accusations. “You’re so awful. How often does a circus come to a town anyway? Once in a million years? And we’re going to miss it? Is that what you’re saying?” With that, Sissy lapses into the reasons why she must go, how in a few dreary weeks school will resume and everyone will still be talking about the big top, how she will be left out from coveted conversations, and how, worse, when Mr. Chero has them write on the topic of what they did for summer, Sissy will have a blank page. She will have to stand in front of the class and make something up entirely. “I’ll have to lie,” she says.

  Natalia writes through all this, her back turned. Absentmindedly she agrees, saying, “Hm.”

  “You never listen! You never listen to Eva or me.”

  Sissy’s tone is shrill and cuts into her. Natalia turns and regards her daughter. “What, were you at the top of the stairs last night?” She speaks as softly as she can, not because she isn’t vexed by temper tantrums today, but only because her headache is made worse by loud noises that reverberate like cannon fire in her skull. “I can’t listen, not when you’re whining, no,” she begins. “When you’re whining, I can’t listen to you at all. We have a picnic tomorrow at Mrs. Morris’s house. I told you that. I told you that ten times.”

  “Two days,” Sissy says, disgustedly, spreading her arms out. “It’s only here for two days. Eva’s right. Living with you is the worst thing on earth. You’re never there when we need you.”

  Natalia snaps like a brittle branch. She yells, “Eva, always Eva, yes?”

  “I’ll run away if I can’t go.”

  “And where will you go?” Natalia asks harshly. She grabs Sissy’s arm and pulls her closer. “How will you earn money to live? Will you run away to the circus? I hear they want girls who complain that their life is so horrible, that their parents are so mean. I hear they want little girls who don’t think of anything or anyone but themselves.”

  Sissy casts a hateful look, one that is pure and piercing. Natalia can feel it, how it judges and holds thing
s against her. A flash of contempt, cold and pronounced. It is a look that, in Sissy, she has never seen, but in Eva is always present. It is a look that at once annihilates Natalia, the rules of the house, a look that accuses Natalia of her own hypocrisy, her own mistakes.

  The Morrises’, situated halfway between the Kisches’ and the Andersons’ on Ellis Avenue, is a two-story with gabled dormers and white trim and a row of granite rocks lining the front garden. On the shed situated to the right of the house, a large stuffed bass hangs, its mouth angled toward the street in a wide O greeting, its once vibrant colors faded from weather and age and from the fact that Milly Morris won’t let that awful-looking fish be displayed in her purple house with its new pink curtains. Late afternoon, the house runs ablaze with activity, and all along the street, families emerge from their homes at sporadic times, carrying baked goods and covered steaming dishes and plates of brownies and watermelon. Jim Schultz, Jenny’s husband, calls their schnauzer in before opening the gate and puttering along in shorts and woven flip-flops. Jenny strides behind him, dressed simply, tiny compared to her hulking husband, her famous deviled eggs in hand. Upon arriving at the house, Jim salutes the fish and then ambles into the backyard. The yard appears more verdant than most, and some speculate in whispers that it’s more to do with the sprinkler than the shifting weather and sporadic rains. Still, Jim puts aside small grievances and immediately sets to helping Edward Morris determine the proper number of feet between stakes, for quoits. The men have a good-natured argument about whether it is twenty or thirty feet between the poles, and settle, finally, on twenty-five feet as a neighborly compromise. A size-twelve shoe, Jim carefully draws out the distance, one foot pressed against the other. Edward follows, mallet and stakes in hand. He pounds the metal into the ground while the women who have gathered by the picnic table send up complaints about the ruckus. Mrs. Brandt, Laura Landing, Edna Stone, Jenny, Ellie, and Natalia help Milly set out refrigerated items from the kitchen. They emerge in succession, a parade of women with trays of deviled eggs set on ice, macaroni and potato salads, ambrosia, and corn on the cob. In her hands, Natalia’s pie cools, the thick butter and Crisco scenting the air. She sets the pie on the picnic table, next to beefsteak tomatoes and onions cut so thin they appear translucent.

  Everything is warm and there is an air of pleasant cooperation and tolerance so vital to community gatherings. On days such as this, Natalia tries to be grateful for simple things—for the casual conversations between the women, for the bright checkered tablecloths and the homey sizzle of the grill, the seared burgers and chilled beers. She tries to see goodness in the everyday—in the trees and gardens, in the scattering children and calm breezes—no matter what else she might be feeling.

  Edward and Jim play quoits while the other men sit in lounge chairs, beers sweating on their knees, their hairy, pale legs stretching out over the lawn. In the back of the house, toward the alley, Eva stalks the perimeter of the yard before finally stopping to talk with a girl from school who is a few grades behind her, a freshman this year. Sissy stands at the side of the house with a noisy cluster of neighborhood children, taking turns filling water balloons. She’s already stripped off her shirt and shorts and stands eagerly waiting, her silver bathing suit pronounced against her tanned skin. Sissy screams and then runs and tries to climb up Milly’s apricot tree to avoid getting doused by the Massit boy, a bulbous, shaking balloon held in the boy’s hands. There are more screeches, scuttling bare feet, muddy tracks through Milly’s kitchen, mothers telling their children to behave.

  Amid all this, the topic of Ginny Anderson arises in conversation— lightly, tentatively at first, and with a surprising sympathy and fondness. Ginny has yet to arrive, but even this hasn’t managed to upset the host. Milly only checks her watch occasionally, while the women, gathered at the table, plan how they might help, one offering to invite Ginny to her book club, another volunteering to sit with Ginny each day if she wishes. The women become like those caregivers who are entrusted with the task of vigilance over sickened or dying bodies, their desire to bear a type of witness and help as they can. Natalia listens as they fret and talk and is surprised to hear a note of genuine concern that she has previously missed on those occasions when she shuffled away from the conversation too soon.

  “Can you imagine the guilt?” Ellie asks Natalia. “We need to tell her it wasn’t her fault. It could have happened to anyone.”

  “She’s probably shy about coming,” Milly says, checking her watch again. “I had to march over there and practically crawl through the window to get her to let me in. She promised. She gave her word. I told her, ‘When things get bad, you need other people, whether you like to admit it or not.’ ”

  “I can’t help but wonder what’s worse, knowing or not knowing?” Edna Stone says. She tidies the containers, her wrinkled hands diligently working the Tupperware.

  “Not knowing,” Natalia says. “It’s always the worst.” From where she sits, she can see Frank flip burgers and make small talk with Jim and Edward. At this distance, she can’t help but feel her love for him again.

  “Things better?” Ellie asks, noticing Natalia’s stare. Ellie pushes her big sunglasses up into her hair. Her eyes, Natalia notices, are a brilliant shade of brown.

  “Of course,” Natalia says, nodding.

  Milly leans in, her sides spilling off the bench. “You know, Natalia, I left my first husband once—the one before my Edward. This was back in the forties, during the war. Markus had flat feet, you know, and couldn’t join the military. He was a miserable man because of it. I swear he spent his entire life wanting to kill someone.”

  “I’m glad I’m single,” Laura Landing says, sipping a gin and tonic.

  “My advice,” Milly says, pointing a fork, “is always find a man who wears polyester. It’s a fabric that you can trust on a man.” She tells everyone a story, then, about how Edward refused to wear blue jeans because when he was a boy his mother forbade him to wear them. “She told him when jeans became popular, the country went downhill. How’s that for love and premonition?”

  The women, including Natalia, chuckle. She listens as the women lapse into stories about their husbands and first loves, their years of marriage, their gloomy days and happier ones. She thinks of Frank again, remembers him as a boy who lived in trees, who picked fruit with an easy heart and courageous howl. She closes her eyes and sees him in moonlight, arms reaching out across the branches, full of intention.

  “When we were young, Frank was so sweet he used to pick apples for me,” she says quietly. She’s surprised when the women stop and look at her for a moment. She smiles.

  “Frank?” Milly asks, not unkindly. An amused look crosses her face.

  Natalia is surprised to find her eyes well with tears. “Yes,” she nods, her hand to her heart. “My kedvesem. My loved. My Frank.”

  “It’s a giggle show,” Mr. Nealy says, licking his lips. He grabs a beer and sits down. Mr. Nealy is always one of the last to arrive to any neighborhood function; it takes him a good hour to put on his best shirt and slacks and tie. He presses each beforehand, letting his hand guide the iron to create perfect pleats. He points now. “The women over there, they’re plotting.”

  Wearing his plaid shorts and new loafers, Frank shifts and mumbles an agreement he does not necessarily feel today. A quoit loops around the metal stake and spins, and he calls out to the men: “A ringer around a tomato is worth double the points.”

  “Good Lord,” Edward says, pushing his hand through his gray hair. He acknowledges defeat and plops down in a chair, panting. “Don’t let the missus hear you say that.”

  “Too late,” Milly yells from the table. She points her fork accusingly. “You ring my plants, and I’ll ring your neck.”

  Frank grins. “How’s work?” he asks Edward.

  “I own a toy shop,” Edward says, shrugging. “How hard could it be?”

  “Hard.”

  “Business could always be better,�
� Edward says. “Things go in waves. This weekend has been good, hope it gets even better. Long hours, though. The missus made me take off for the picnic. Got some kid manning the store today.” He pauses. “I heard about the layoff, read it in the paper.”

  Mr. Nealy turns and adjusts his hearing aid. “Plant’s been there ages,” he says. “No worries.”

  “That’s what they tell me,” Frank says.

  “Things good otherwise?” Edward wipes sweat from his brow. He sips his beer.

  “Burgers are good,” Frank says.

  “Not that,” Edward says, laughing. “Home, Natalia, the kids.”

  Frank surveys the yard, the fence and hedges, the children running about.

  “I’d be mad as a hornet,” Mr. Nealy says.

  Frank says, “I am. Not much going to change that, for a while at least.”

  “Sticking to it?” Edward asks.

  Frank catches a glimpse of Sissy, a flash of silver. She’s hiding next to the shed, bent down. Her head pops out, along with the top half of her body, before disappearing again. The children scream, too happy and excited to bother to eat. He looks for Eva and catches sight of Natalia instead, sitting at the table, talking to the women. She sends up a small wave, a questioning look. “Better together,” he says, “than apart. Better for the kids. Better for me, too.”

  “True,” Edward says. “Best call, I guess.”

  After she eats, Natalia finds Eva sitting out on the front step, sneaking a cigarette, her legs stretched out before her, an oversize T-shirt hanging well below her cutoff shorts. Eva squints into the day, out to the empty street, and seems to regard nothing in particular—the wilting hedges, the fire hydrant, the dribble of water snaking down its base. Natalia waits, debating what to say, but Eva ignores her and her offering of a plate of food.

  “A dirty habit,” Natalia says of the cigarette. She thinks of sitting down, but remains standing instead.