Social Blunders

by Tim Sandlin

  I came to the warm springs mainly for the dirt. Winter in Jackson Hole may be beautiful and spare beyond the Eastern Time Zone conception of beauty, but several months with no sight of dirt leaves me weird.

  So I sat on the clover with my fingers in the dirt, watching tiny goldfish dart around the shallows’ muck, my energy at an all-time low. I was too exhausted to be depressed. The truth is I’m only good for one intense, spine-wrenching emotional blowout a year, and when the scenes come stacked up on one another some sort of morphine response kicks in. My brain goes numb; my muscles fill up with lactic acid.

  The high whine of a snowmobile wafted in from back along the fenceline, and I realized I’d been holding my breath, waiting for it. Maurey arrived in a powder blue snowsuit, gold metal-flake helmet, and her father’s old Mickey Mouse boots. I averted my eyes as she dismounted. I heard her shake out her hair and wade down the snowbank, then felt her sit beside me. Neither of us spoke for a while. I underhand tossed a pebble into the water and we both took what life lessons we could from the concentric, spreading ripples.

  “You knew I would come,” she said.

  “Yes.”

  Our shoulders were a half-inch apart. I sat cross-legged while Maurey stretched her legs in a V. She leaned back on her hands and said, “Remember the day I fell in the creek and went into labor?”

  “I’ve never been that scared since.” Maurey broke her leg, Shannon was born, and I became a father three weeks before my fourteenth birthday.

  Maurey exhaled a sigh. The fog from her breath looked like punctuation. “Sam, it’s time we got a divorce.”

  I said, “I know. It’s a pain in the ass.”

  Maurey pulled off her left glove and laced her fingers into mine. “You think you’re incapable of loving a woman, and you blame Lydia, but maybe the problem isn’t her, maybe it’s my fault.”

  “You’re honest with me, I’m honest with you. How could there be a problem?”

  “There’s worse things than dishonesty, Sam.”

  My automatic response was cynical, but I clamped down before it got out.

  Maurey said, “Ever since we were kids, we’ve had each other, so neither of us has had to learn how to take care of ourselves.”

  A flock of small black birds twittered through the willows across the creek, making the bushes seem to crawl in a DT effect. I looked from the birds to the fish to Maurey’s hand in mine.

  “I have this test I give myself,” I said, “whenever I fall for a new woman. I pretend she and I are about to be married. The families are there in their best clothes, the minister stands with his back to the cross, the organist breaks into the ‘Wedding March,’ and you telephone to ask if I want to go out for coffee.”

  “Why wasn’t I invited to the wedding?”

  “If I say no to you, I don’t want to go for coffee right now, it proves I’m serious about the woman. Falling for her is for real.”

  There was a moment’s quiet, then Maurey said, “That’s either silly or sick. Give me a minute to decide which.” She used her right hand, the hand I wasn’t holding, to brush hair behind her ear. “Tell me, how many have you married in this fantasy?”

  “None. Not even the two I married in reality.”

  “That is not silly. It is definitely sick.”

  A face appeared in the steam over the spring—a face with high cheekbones and a freckle between the bridge of the nose and her right eye. I said, “Gilia.”

  “What?”

  “I’d rather marry Gilia than go to coffee with you.” I tossed a handful of pebbles, many concentric and overlapping circles. “But I blew that one.”

  Maurey and I went into our respective funks. It seemed to me that we were embarking on something inordinately stupid. We were chopping up our one dependable crutch. Friendship is so much healthier than other crutches—alcohol or TV or religious fanaticism. One healthy crutch shouldn’t be against the rules.

  “What exactly does this divorce mean?” I asked. “Are we still friends?”

  She squeezed my hand hard, then let go. “Of course we’re still friends. It just means we’re no longer next of kin. We no longer save each other every time there’s a crisis. The next woman breaks your heart, you have to handle it without me.”

  “There won’t be a next woman.”

  “Yeah, right.”

  “I’m finished with romance.”

  “You could no more do without romance than air.”

  I decided not to fight with her. This would be a conversation to dwell on in my old age. I didn’t want to dwell on a fight.

  “What else?” I asked.

  Maurey leaned toward the warm springs. “I can’t accept any more of your money.”

  Dothan’s ugly taunts ran through my mind. The gossip I’d heard and ignored. The fears I’d been afraid to think.

  I looked at her. “Is money all you used me for?”

  Maurey swung her right arm and punched me in the face.

  “Ow!”

  “How dare you say that, you snot. When Daddy died and Dothan took Auburn, I’d never have survived without you.”

  “I didn’t mean it.”

  “This split-up is just as hard on me as it is on you, you stupid jerk.”

  I held both hands over my nose. “You hurt me.”

  “I meant to hurt you.”

  “Is my nose bleeding?”

  She tipped my face to view the damage. “Six stitches should do it. Maybe seven.”

  I looked down at my hands. No blood. “Before we go apart, would you do me one last favor?” I asked.

  “It better have nothing to do with sex.”

  “Let me pay Pete’s bills, the doctors and funeral.”

  She frowned. “Wouldn’t that be hypocritical? To say ‘No more—after this last time’?”

  “It’s as much for Pete and Chet as it is for you.”

  She regarded me with her blue eyes. The first time I saw Maurey I was amazed at her blue eyes and black hair—like Hitler. Twenty years of history passed between us as we stared at one another. Twenty years of shared parenthood. I couldn’t believe it was over, we would be casual from now on.

  Maurey nodded once, to herself, and smiled. She said, “Okay.”

  8

  A letter arrived the next morning:

  Dear Mr. Callahan,

  Rory Paseneaux returned to claim his position as head of the household and he is PO’ed because me and Babs named you as the father of our babies. He went so far as to talk to the woman at the hospital and she told him it is too late to change the papers.

  Rory has said we can not have any more to do with you, even me, and if you come around he will kick your butt.

  We also can not cover for you with your girlfriends any more. We have to call Sam and Sammi by their middle names which are Lynn and Babs.

  So that is that. I thank you for what you did for us and I know Babs would too if she was allowed.

  With respects,

  Lynette Norloff

  P.S. Rory Paseneaux did allow one thing. He says your lawyer can keep paying our rent.

  Something kind of nasty happened before Pete’s funeral. I was standing outside the Episcopal Church, on the sidewalk that had been cleared by a snow blower, talking to Chet and three of Pete’s friends from New York City while Maurey and Pud parked the Suburban. The friends were nice-looking young men in New York City suits and shoes. I got the feeling they had been Ivy Leaguers because I couldn’t tell them apart.

  Dothan Talbot drove past, slowly, with the Denver bimbo scooted so close she was behind the steering wheel. He stared at me in this challenging look of his where he lowers his pointy chin and glares out the tops of his eyeballs. That look used to make Lauren Bacall incredibly alluring, but it did nothing at all for Dothan.

  I ignored
him and went on talking to the New Yorkers about the color of snow in Manhattan and the odds of them seeing a bear. One of the guys said it’s not the temperature that makes you cold, it’s the humidity. Chet lit a cigarette. Pretty soon Dothan cruised back the other way. The bimbo had a possessive scowl on her face, probably because married women fooling around are the most jealous creatures on Earth. I didn’t envy Dothan a bit.

  He eased his truck up to the curb next to me, got out, and slammed the door. The three New Yorkers instinctively sensed tension and leaned away. I doubt if Wyoming men would have been that sensitive to the possibility of ugliness.

  Dothan’s voice dripped with smugness. He said, “I always knew you’d end up with the fairies.”

  I glanced at Pete’s friends to see how they handled being called fairies. Their faces had gone mask. I said, “Who are you trying to insult, Dothan, me or them?”

  “I’m not trying to insult anyone. I came to pay my last respects to Maurey’s queer brother.”

  I slugged Dothan in the stomach. He doubled over and I hit him in the face, then he was down on the snow and I was kicking him.

  I lost control, which is something I’d never done before. A kidney stomp immobilized him long enough for me to go for the head. There was a rush of memories—of Sonny and Ryan beating me up in October; of Dothan beating me up in the seventh grade; of him fucking Maurey when I couldn’t; of Maurey, Shannon, and Lydia dismissing me. I kicked the living bejesus out of that bastard.

  Then hands were pulling me off him and the bimbo was screaming. The New Yorkers looked aghast. I guess they weren’t used to personal violence.

  Chet was saying, “He’s not worth it, Sam. Back off.”

  Maurey was saying, “You split your stitches, tiger.”

  She borrowed handkerchiefs from the New Yorkers and wrapped my hand tightly. I watched Dothan’s woman hold his head in her lap and pat his lips with snow. His eyes blinked, but didn’t focus.

  As we walked into the church, Maurey said, “I wish you’d let me get to him first.”

  “It was my turn.”

  ***

  “Blessed are the dead who die in the Lord; even so saith the spirit, for they rest from their labors.”

  The priest, whose name was Father Jack, held his arms out about sternum high, with the thumbs and forefingers made into Os. Blond beard, thinning hair, thick forearms—Father Jack looked like Edward Abbey in a ghost costume.

  “The Lord be with you,” he said.

  Chet and a smattering of people at the back said, “And with thy spirit.”

  “Let us pray.”

  Chet kneeled and after a few false starts, the rest of us followed. Chet was Episcopalian, which was why we were having the funeral service in the Episcopal Church. That, and AA met in the parish hall, so Maurey knew Father Jack. But the rest of us in the family’s pews weren’t Episcopalian, or much of any other denomination, so we were lost when it came time to sit, kneel, or stand. On top of saying good-bye to his partner, Chet must have felt like he was leading a very slow aerobics class.

  The church was a dark log building with two lines of pews wide enough for four people or five if they scrunched up. Pud sat against the north window with Roger at his side. Then it went Auburn, Maurey, Chet, the aisle, me, Shannon in her new outfit, and Toinette. Dot Pollard was behind me, with the three friends from New York behind her.

  The rest of the church was maybe three-quarters full of Pete’s high school friends and people who go to funerals to prove they’re not dead yet. I heard sniffling from the far back and sneaked a look to see who it was—Ron Mildren, being glared at by his wife, Gloria.

  Pete was in the bois d’arc box with ivory inlay on top of a walnut table a few feet in front of Chet. My theory that dead people know what’s going on around them for four days after they die applies just as much to ashes as bodies. Pete knew what I was thinking, so I’d best be careful.

  Father Jack announced he was going to read to us from the Book of Job. Not my favorite book. God tests Job by killing his children, then says, “You passed. Here, have some more children.” If God killed Shannon, then said, “That was a test, I’ll replace her,” I would say, “Forget it, you jerk.”

  As the Father read, “And though after my skin worms destroy this body,” I leaned forward to check out the front pew’s handle on the grief process. As usual in groups, I felt responsible for everyone’s peace of mind. Roger sat pale and unblinking; Auburn was restless. Chet was tremendously sad, yet he had dignity. He didn’t jump up and bash the priest in the mouth, which is what I probably would have done.

  Maurey looked both beautiful and beat up by life. Her eyes were muddy and the scar on her chin seemed whiter, but she was still concerned about the others. One hand touched Chet’s shoulder and the other arm extended over Auburn and rested on Roger’s leg.

  Shannon’s shoulder touched mine; I leaned my weight toward her in case she needed support.

  Job’s part ended and Toinette went to the front with her viola. She played a wonderfully wistful song I’d never heard before, which she told me later was a “Romanze” by Max Bruch. Toinette’s face was golden and her belly was huge. When she ran her bow across the viola strings, they seemed not so much to weep in the tragic keening of a violin, but to cry out a deeper, more elemental pain. The viola mourned not only Pete, but all loss everywhere. After Toinette finished, she gave Father Jack a shy smile and walked to her pew, and he sat there on his bench, looking poleaxed.

  Shannon put her fingers over my good hand.

  After that, Father Jack read another Bible verse, this one from Revelations, the book hippies used to quote in North Carolina. I tried to follow, but when he read the part about no more death, sorrow, crying, or pain, I drifted off. I’m not sure a world with no pain at all would be that desirable. The boredom would be debilitating. I could write a novel about it sometime.

  When Maurey and Pete were kids their mother drove them into Jackson to the Baptist Church every Sunday while their father went fishing or hunting or read detective stories by the woodstove. If anyone asked Buddy where you go after you die, he always said, “San Francisco.” It was a family proverb: Stick by Mom and spend eternity in heaven or stick with Dad and go to San Francisco. His version made as much sense as heaven. What good are streets of gold?

  Shannon jabbed an elbow in my ribs. Everyone was looking at me. Maurey mouthed, “Go on up.”

  The eulogy. In the excitement of the last couple of days, I’d forgotten the eulogy.

  Father Jack said, “Mr. Callahan.”

  ***

  I was careful not to touch anything because my hand was starting to throb and I was afraid blood might ooze through the handkerchiefs and stain the oiled wood of the pulpit or the cloth that hung over the top. I said, “I met Pete Pierce the day President Kennedy was killed.”

  Chet stared at me, unblinking. So did Roger, but his unblinking face sucked in light while Chet’s glowed with emotion. Like the difference between the moon and a black hole.

  Nothing to do but plow ahead. “Pete must have been six or seven. He wanted to watch cartoons, but they weren’t on because of the assassination coverage. He and Maurey got into a fight and she smacked him in the nose.”

  Maurey was frowning. It seemed awfully important not to disappoint her in this, which meant the story had to go somewhere, mean something.

  “I realized then how a family works; the members of a family may fight like cats and dogs, and they almost never understand what the others want or feel, or who they are, but that doesn’t matter. What matters is the love that flows without reservation. Without doubt.”

  Father Jack shifted his weight on the bench. I wondered what he thought of us behind that beard. Was it just another day’s work for him, like me at the golf cart plant?

  “What else do I remember about Pete?” I asked myself and th
e congregation. Had to be something. “His mother. When Pete’s mother was sick all those years, he took care of her. Pete loved his mother very much.”

  The people looked up at me, expecting more. I hadn’t yet said enough to quit. “After she died, he went to New York City and got a job in the theater, managing lights for plays and musicals.”

  Chet had stopped watching me and was staring at the box of ashes. His eyes were striking. They showed more than the grief of separation. You could see that he’d received something permanent from Pete, something I had never felt with a woman—friend or lover. It came to me that the funeral wasn’t for Pete; it was for Chet.

  “Pete Pierce was gay,” I said.

  Maurey moved her hands into her lap. The three guys from New York rustled in their seats. I could tell from some faces farther back that not everyone had known. Instead of addressing the group, I spoke directly to Chet.

  “Pete was proud of being gay, and I think that pride is why he chose me to say words about him today. He knew I wouldn’t pretend he was someone he wasn’t. He knew I wouldn’t skip over one of the central elements of his life.”

  Almost imperceptibly, Chet nodded. I knew I was going in the right direction.

  “We can’t talk about who Pete was without acknowledging his love for Chet, here. They were partners, mates. Lovers in every sense of the word.”

  Chet’s lips parted in almost, but not quite, a smile.

  I said, “His love for Chet was the truth that made Pete feel unique.”

  I looked at Pud over against the window. His face was turned ever so slightly toward Maurey’s, and hers toward him.

  “A person would like to think his or her life has significance,” I said.

  Shannon’s face was turned to the window, as if she were listening to something outside the rest of us couldn’t hear. She was daydreaming.

  “To me, significance means to love, and to be cherished, and to impact creatively the world—large or small—that one occupies. Pete found significance. Through his work and his love he left a legacy that will live into the future with each of us he touched.”