While He Was Away

by Karen Schreck

  “Is there anything you need, Penna?” Bonnie gives me a sad smile. “Now that you’ve cleaned practically my entire kitchen?”

  I start to shake my head, but then I change my mind. “Can I use your bathroom?”

  She nods. “Upstairs. You know.”

  Of course I know. I know the way like the back of his hand. I know the worn plaid fabric on the couch cushions and the smell of the cinnamon-scented broom by the fireplace and the array of pictures of David set at strategic angles on the mantelpiece. There is the one of little David in his baseball uniform. There he is with braces and zits—on the verge of hot, probably just realizing that girls exist. And there he is last December, standing in front of Killdeer High after his last day of classes, an official graduate, with his arm around me.

  Upstairs I walk right past the bathroom and into David’s room. I shut the door behind me. I look around, taking everything in.

  If the rest of Bonnie’s house is a mess, David’s room is pristine. It’s like a museum. A shrine. Same soccer-star posters. Same drafting table, with a drawing placed carefully in the center. Same computer. Same Boy Scout vest, hanging from a dowel like some indigenous weaving. (I wonder if Ravi still has his.) Same bookshelves packed with thick fantasy and sci-fi novels, manga and comic books. Same tower of CDs. Same empty fish tank filled with the dinosaur, cowboy and Indian, and army guy diorama that took over in sixth grade when the fish died. Same pictures of me, on the swings at the playground, sitting on the back of his motorcycle, standing under the viaduct by the mural.

  Same picture of the two of us together, standing on the front steps of the art museum in Oklahoma City, the day we fell in love with the same paintings and each other and kissed under the statue of Geronimo in the sculpture garden. A museum guard snapped that photo. He was a big old guy with a thick, gray mustache, and he didn’t want to be bothered until David got down on one knee and begged. He barely looked through the viewfinder then, but still somehow he managed to catch what was best about that day—our crazy happiness. Standing in front of this abstract painting that “hummed,” I said (and David agreed), we have our arms flung around each other. It’s one of my favorite pictures of us too.

  Relief. That’s what I feel. Here, everything is the same. Nothing has changed. When he comes home, he’ll be the same too. Nothing will have changed for us.

  In this room it’s like David never went away.

  I lie facedown on his bed and breathe him in.

  After a while I get up again. From the window I can see the backyard and also David’s dog, Mars, sprawled on his side in the shade. Mars doesn’t look so good. He’s panting hard. He looks kind of mangy. Little big dog, lost without his master. If I weren’t afraid he’d tear my hand off, I’d go outside and pet him.

  Instead I go to David’s dresser, open the drawers, and touch his carefully folded T-shirts, socks, jeans, shorts. I open the door to his closet, part the hangers, and slip inside. I draw the closet door closed. In the darkness I hide in David’s clothes.

  If I’m not careful, I’m going to make a mess of things. I open the door and step back into his room, blinking against the light.

  I stumble over to David’s drafting table and look at the drawing there. It’s my superhero Manga David, the drawing he did for his tattoo, complete with the heavy artillery and the circle of barbwire and tumbleweeds. I pick up the drawing. I run my fingers over its back just to feel the indentations David left using his favorite 0.50 millimeter Rapidograph pen.

  That’s when I see the drawing that was hidden beneath this one. It’s my Manga David again. Only he’s not packing heavy artillery. He’s not jumping around like he’s half crazy, his mouth open in rage. He’s holding hands with a wavy-haired manga girl that looks like me. The two of them are surrounded by a wreath of hearts and flowers and killdeer, and the letters of our names.

  We’re smiling at each other. Sparks fly from our bedazzled eyes.

  It’s a beautiful drawing. It’s a beauty.

  But David chose the other one.

  •••

  No one can stay shut away this long.

  I have to come out.

  I make sure David’s drawings are exactly where I found them on the drafting table. I take one last, long look around, one last, long breath of him. Then I cross the room, open the door, step into the hallway, and go back downstairs.

  I find Bonnie in the kitchen, staring into her glass of iced tea. She looks at me. Feel better? her eyes ask.

  I don’t answer, not even with my eyes. I put those yellow gloves back on and get to work on the stove top again. Never mind the chemical inhalants. I’m not going to leave a job half finished. Bonnie and I chat about this and that—school starting up again, the weather. I work quickly. Working quickly keeps my mind off that hidden drawing in David’s room. I can’t think about it now. I will think about it later, when I can find a way to be okay with the fact that he chose the other one instead.

  When the stove top is sparkling, I rinse out the rag for the last time. I tell Bonnie that I should go.

  “Come back soon,” she says. “Come back when Beau’s here. Come for dinner. I’ll make something decent, I promise.”

  Closing the front door behind me, I nearly run smack into Ravi.

  We draw back from each other.

  He is not in worker or skater mode. He is wearing a trim, blue polo shirt, baggy khaki shorts, and yellow flip-flops.

  He cleans up real nice.

  He’s holding a manila folder, which he now lifts like a kind of offering. “Same old, same old.”

  “She’ll love them.”

  He nods. “I thought I’d deliver them on my way over to the high school. I’ve decided. I’m definitely going.”

  “I’m glad.” I smile at him, and he smiles back—a wide, square grin. I hear the O’Dells’ door open behind me, and Bonnie says, “Well, if this day just doesn’t keep getting better and better. You’re just in time for lunch, Rav.”

  Rav? I mouth at him.

  He shrugs, then looks at Bonnie in such a warm, familiar way that I see the little boy she once knew so well. “Sandwiches?” he asks.

  Bonnie laughs. “You know it.”

  To me, Ravi says, “Bonnie makes a mean sandwich.

  “It even surpasses my lasagna.” Bonnie puts her hand on my shoulder, and now we stand in a tight little circle, my boyfriend’s mother, my boyfriend’s friend, and me. Bonnie gives my shoulder a squeeze. “You want to stay too, Penna? I’m sorry I didn’t think to ask before.”

  I shake my head. “Gotta get ready for work.”

  “Next time, then. Is turkey on wheat okay, Rav?”

  He nods. Bonnie hugs me good-bye all over again, then playfully snatches the manila envelope from Ravi’s hands and goes back inside.

  Ravi looks at me. “So.”

  “So.” We’re standing too close. I edge away. Better. Though the sun is really hot, I suddenly realize. I wipe sweat from my upper lip. “You see Bonnie a lot now?”

  “Second time.” Ravi smiles. “She does make a good sandwich.”

  “When she’s on, she’s on.”

  “And when she’s off, she’s off.”

  We laugh.

  “Penna,” he says. Then he says my name again. “Next year—I’d still like to talk to you about it.”

  “I’ll be working a lot. And going to school.” I say this quickly. I sound defensive.

  “Me too. My schedule will be crazy.” Just as quickly, just as defensively, Ravi says this.

  For a moment we stand there.

  “Well,” I say.

  Ravi blinks. “Yeah.”

  “Wait.” I find I’m shaking my head. “Listen.”

  He waits. Listens.

  “Tonight,” I say. “I think I’m going out with some friends after work. You could come, if you want.”

  “I’ll be working,” he says.

  “Oh. Yeah.”

  “I could meet you tomorrow morning, thou
gh, at the viaduct.”

  I shake my head. “I don’t really like going there that much anymore. I’m kind of over it, you know?”

  What I don’t say is that place is feeling more and more like Ravi, less and less like David. Next time I go there, the only company I’m going to have is my camera. I’m going to take a picture of me in front of the mural and send it to David. Just like he asked.

  I don’t want to do the playground either. Same reason.

  “How about breakfast?”

  Ravi looks surprised, like I’ve asked him for a date. Which I haven’t.

  “Okay.”

  We agree to meet at ’Round the Clock, the only diner in town.

  David and I only went there once. He didn’t like the place. Said they couldn’t even make a decent piece of toast.

  •••

  Home again, I sit at the kitchen table and draw David on his motorcycle over and over again until I get him right. Mythical. That’s what he looks like. This drawing could go in my portfolio for college. It could help get me where I want to go.

  Only when I’m in bedroom, slipping the drawing into one of the plastic sleeves of my portfolio, do I realize that for the first time since I met David, I didn’t think something like, This drawing could help me get where I want to go with him.

  Justine seems to be watching me from the photograph.

  I need to find her.

  Thirteen

  That night, work is a blur that passes bearably.

  “You might be getting the hang of this,” Caitlin says at one point.

  I smile. I like Caitlin, I realize. I appreciate her. I mean, she’s covered my butt.

  “You still want to go out tonight after work?” she asks.

  I’d been thinking about biking around Killdeer in the dark, looking for…what? Signs? Clues? Hints of Justine?

  A little pointless, I guess.

  I nod.

  Caitlin cocks her head. “So that’s a ‘yes’?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Awesome. You’ll come over to my house. Jules’ll meet us there, and then…we’ll see what the night holds.”

  Caitlin darts away to take another drink order. She’s added purple streaks to the pink in her hair. She reminds me of a bright, exotic bird, flitting from table to table, plucking up shiny, round objects and wrinkled, green slips of paper to take back to her nest, wherever that may be.

  I look over at the door, which has just swung open. A slew of people stand there, middle-aged folks mostly, with a few little kids thrown in for good measure. Looks to be five big tables at least. I feel my heart racing, the adrenaline kicking in. From behind me, Tom says, “You better get going.”

  Craziness ensues, but it’s not nearly as bad as it used to be.

  When the shift ends, Caitlin and I clean up and settle up as quickly as we can, and then we scram.

  We climb into Caitlin’s car, a white beater parked right beside Linda’s VW and drive off into the night. We listen to music on the radio. Loud. Louder. I haven’t listened to music since David left. I hardly listened to music all the time he was at OSUT either. The songs that reminded me of him—some girls might want to go there, but I couldn’t. It hurt too much. The songs that didn’t remind me of him felt empty.

  We listen to rap for a while. Tonight, with the windows down and Caitlin rapping along beside me, never missing a word, it feels just right. It hits me right in the heart. Hard. Makes me feel like I’m receiving CPR or something. In a good way.

  “Find something else,” Caitlin finally says, turning down a tidy little street. “Something quieter. There are folks down this way who throw a fit when they hear a bass beat. And rap’s no good soft.”

  We’re in a part of town that I don’t know that well. David and I came here a couple of times to play tennis at the YMCA. But neither of us like tennis that much, so we didn’t come back. Other than the YMCA, this part of town seems to be made up of streets like this, lined with rows of neat, little brick houses.

  I turn down the volume and troll up and down the dial until I light on an oldies-but-goodies station.

  “…one of the most popular hits from nineteen forty-five, ‘It’s Been a Long, Long Time,’ by Harry James and his orchestra, featuring Willie Smith on alto sax and the very pretty Kitty Kallen on vocals,” the announcer is saying.

  I sit back. Caitlin cuts me a look. I tell her I’ve got to hear this.

  Justine and Owen would have heard this.

  A trumpet swoons, the notes filling the air around Caitlin and me. The orchestra moves like smoke behind it, the strings rising—Justine and Owen might have slow-danced to this—and then Kitty Kallen starts singing, something about words not sufficing.

  The song takes my breath away. When it’s over, the announcer starts talking about a favorite little number from 1939, and I turn the radio off. I don’t want to hear anything else. I don’t want anything to confuse my memory of that song.

  “You okay?” Caitlin asks, turning the car into a gravel driveway.

  I nod.

  “Good.” Caitlin puts the car in park and turns off the engine. She drops her keys in her bag. “Come on in.”

  Caitlin’s house is small, cluttered, dark, and quiet. She puts her finger to her lips, and we tiptoe down the narrow hallway, past the single bathroom and four closed doors that I assume must be bedrooms, and into the cramped kitchen. Caitlin shuts the kitchen door behind us. Only then does she turn on the light. When it flares, I blink. I hope she thinks it’s my eyes adjusting versus the surprise I’m feeling, seeing plates and glasses and bowls and pots and pans stacked on every possible surface. Some things are reasonably clean, but others are…not. There are open boxes of cereal, crackers, and cookies on the kitchen table, and an open carton of milk sitting on top of the refrigerator. It’s worse than Bonnie’s house.

  Caitlin sighs. She takes down the milk and puts it inside the refrigerator, closing the refrigerator door quickly before I can see inside. She looks at me then.

  “I know. It’s a mess. There are a lot of people in my family, and I seem to be the only one who got the cleanliness gene.”

  She tells me then that she’s the oldest of seven. Her parents both work long hours to make ends meet. Until the past few months, when most of the other kids could manage without her, she’s always spent a lot of time caring for her siblings.

  “I love coming home late like this when everyone’s asleep,” she says. “They sleep like logs, all of them, unless one of the little ones has a nightmare. With the kitchen door shut, I don’t have to worry about making a little bit of noise. Sometimes I’ll clean like crazy. Other times I’ll just sit on the back porch and listen to music. Either way I get to do what I want, alone or with friends. And that, Penna, is the ultimate in my book.”

  With friends like me, I think. The thought makes me astonishingly happy.

  Caitlin grabs two spoons and a carton of chocolate ice cream from the freezer and leads me through the back door to the porch. She asks if I want music, and I say the quiet is fine. She shrugs, okay, whatever. We kick off our shoes and put our tired feet up on the porch railing. We don’t say much as we dig into the ice cream.

  For the first time since David’s been gone, I feel almost relaxed.

  After about fifteen minutes, Jules texts Caitlin to say she’s finished baby-sitting. She’s on her way.

  So much for being relaxed. I dig for more ice cream, but it’s gone.

  Caitlin gives me a sock on the arm. “Chill. Jules is great.”

  I look out over Caitlin’s tiny backyard. There are toys and bicycles everywhere. “It takes me a while to get comfortable with people, that’s all. Maybe it’s an only-child thing.”

  Caitlin snorts. “Or maybe you need to get out more often.”

  I sigh. “Maybe.”

  From inside the house comes a faint wail.

  “Oh shoot.” Caitlin leaps from her chair. “That’s Connor. He’s five, the baby. If he has a bad dream, f
orget it. He’ll wake the whole house. And if he gets too worked up, he won’t be able to go back to sleep. Then guess who’ll be spending the rest of the night singing lullabies?”

  Connor cries out again. Louder.

  “Stay put. I’ll be right back.” Caitlin goes inside the house.

  I set the empty ice cream carton on the porch floor. All of a sudden I’m warm with worry. I strip off my socks and rest my feet on the railing again, but I can’t relax now. I don’t want to compare army-boyfriend notes with a stranger. Only with Justine.

  Something tickles the bottom of my foot and I yelp, nearly falling from my chair.

  From below me comes the sound of laughter. I look through the slats in the porch railing to see a tall girl with long blond hair. She’s about my age. When she sees me, her eyes widen and she stops laughing.

  “Sorry! I just saw your foot! I thought you were Caitlin!”

  I shrug in a way that I hope looks casual. “Penna.”

  “Oh! I’ve heard a lot about you.” She flicks back her hair, and it ripples in the moonlight. “Jules.”

  “I’ve heard about you too.” I clear my thought. “Not a lot, but, you know. Some.”

  Jules comes up the porch stairs and flings herself into the chair that Caitlin just vacated. She picks up the ice cream carton, frowns into its empty depths, and drops it again.

  “Is Caitlin consoling the masses?”

  “Connor.”

  Jules nods. “A drama king in the making. This whole family’s got a lot of drama. It’s not just Caitlin. But you watch. Caitlin is going to burst through that door any minute, saying, ‘Get me the heck out of here.’ She’s so fed up with taking care of those kids. I don’t blame her. I have only one brother. He’s older than me. I’ll tell you what, when I come around here, I’m extra glad about that.”

  I shrug. “I’d take a brother or a sister. Younger or older.”

  “Oh, I guess it can be nice to have someone to talk to. Just not six someones who treat you like you’re their second mom.” Jules cocks her head and looks at me. “Your boyfriend’s serving, right?”

  Here it comes. Here I go.