Above The Thunder

by Renee Manfredi

  Charlie stood. “I’ll take care of it, Dad.”

  They all watched as Charlie approached the man, who squared his shoulders, held out his hand. Charlie nodded, gestured toward the house, and the two of them walked to where the VW was parked.

  “He must be the one who called,” Hugh said, and looked at his watch. “I told him seven-thirty.”

  In a few minutes Charlie came back in. “He’s interested but wants a test drive.”

  “The keys are in the junk drawer in the kitchen,” Hugh said.

  Anna heard him rummaging around in there, through the heap of old keys and scissors, appointment cards and coupons that Anna clipped but then forgot about. “He’ll never find those keys,” Anna said. “There’s a whole marriage worth of junk in there.”

  “I’ll get them. I know what they look like,” Poppy said.

  Anna watched the stranger standing in the yard. There was something about him that made her uneasy, a cold spot at the base of her spine and the top of her head.

  She wrapped herself in a robe. Some part of her knew, understood that this man would not just walk up, drive off with their old bus, and disappear. Maybe it was that she sensed Poppy’s attraction to him. For whatever else he was, he was a gorgeous man: “There’s a textbook specimen,” Hugh had said, looking at him through the window. “A perfect bone structure.” The man turned his head just then as though he heard this, and Anna saw the right angle of his jaw, the elegant slope of his neck. His hair was dark, but with highlights the exact shade of the turning maples. Anna watched as he held his index finger and thumb the way children do when they make an imaginary gun, and tapped the side of his head. His lips moved slightly, as if he were counting. “You might want to wait until the check clears before turning over the title,” Anna said.

  Poppy walked into the dining room, held up the plastic daisy key ring.

  “Remember these, miniskirt Mama?” She dangled the keys in front of Anna, did a sexy swing with her hips. Anna laughed.

  Charlie held his hand out, smiled.

  “You know what, I haven’t been in that thing since I was about five. I’ll take him,” Poppy said.

  Charlie and Anna at the same time said, “No.”

  Poppy looked from one to the other. “No? And why not? Do you think he’s going to kidnap me?”

  Charlie shrugged, sat back down. Anna said, “Let Charlie take him, Poppy.”

  “Why?” She gave a surprised laugh.

  Anna couldn’t think of a why. She glanced over at Charlie who was taking a second helping of chili. “I don’t know. Do what you want.”

  “Don’t go far,” Charlie said.

  “Don’t speed,” Hugh said.

  “Be right back,” Poppy said.

  An hour and a half later the VW pulled into the driveway. Poppy and the man walked up to the house at a languorous, conversational pace. Even from the distance of the living room to the end of the driveway, Anna could see her daughter’s flushed face open with laughter. Poppy threw her head back and crossed her arms tightly as if holding herself together. Charlie glanced over the top of his newspaper. He wasn’t the jealous type, Anna knew: He gave Poppy a wide berth.

  “We’re back,” she called, as if this man were a houseguest or a visiting cousin. The man walked in, sat next to Charlie on the loveseat. “I’m Charlie Edwards, Poppy’s fiancé,” he said, and held out his hand.

  “Hello again, Charlie Edwards. I’m Marvin Blender.” He turned to Anna. “You must be Poppy’s sister.” Anna smiled tightly to show that she saw right through this; he might be able to fool a young woman like Poppy, but she had his number all right. “Are you interested in the bus?”

  “You bet. She’s a beauty. Great body.”

  Anna watched his face closely, waited for his eyes to so much as flicker in Poppy’s direction before she threw him out of her house. “I’d like to negotiate an offer,” he said.

  Hugh was resting, probably asleep, and she wasn’t about to disturb him for the likes of this man. “We won’t negotiate the price. We’re selling it as quoted in the ad,” Anna said.

  He shrugged. “Fair enough. Will you take a personal check?”

  “We’d prefer a money order or cash.”

  Poppy came in with two glasses of lemonade and handed one to Marvin, who smiled up at her.

  “I can do cash. I’ll need to go to the bank, of course. I’ll go first thing Monday. How’s that?”

  Anna did not want to see this man ever again. He could drive off with the stupid thing for free as far as she was concerned. “You know, you seem like a trustworthy young man. I’ll take a personal check.” Charlie stared at her like she’d lost her mind. “I’ll tell you what. Write me a check now. I’ll take it to the bank tomorrow morning and once everything is square, I’ll leave the keys in the newspaper box along with the title and registration.”

  Poppy and Charlie both looked at her curiously. Marvin said, “Fine. I understand.” He sat back, sipped his lemonade.

  Monday afternoon, after Marvin Blender’s check cleared, Anna left the keys and title in the newspaper box as promised, but it was two weeks before he came back to claim the bus and when he did he took her daughter with him. In retrospect, it wasn’t hard to see the course of it: Anna was working full-time and Hugh was at the hospital all day. Poppy was home most of the time, going to a class or two if she felt like it. She must have started seeing him then.

  The day Anna came home from work and found the note—Have decided to do a little traveling with Marvin. Will call from the road.—she knew two things: One, that this wasn’t just a whimsical road trip on Poppy’s part—flaky as she was, when Poppy made a decision it was with gravity—and two, that they’d lost Poppy in some irretrievable way.

  To her astonishment, Hugh and Charlie didn’t treat it as an emergency and dismissed her suggestion to call the police.

  “How can you be so cavalier?” Anna asked Charlie. “This is the woman you’re going to marry. The woman you love.”

  “She’ll be back,” Charlie said. “She needs to get some things out of her system. I accept that. Poppy knows I love her. That I’m here for her.”

  “He’s right, Anna,” Hugh said. “Her judgment’s off. She’s a bit erratic right now, but she’s a smart woman. She loves Charlie.”

  “Hogwash. You’re going to regret this,” she said to Charlie. “Either we act now or you’re going to lose her.”

  “Now, Anna, you don’t know that. There’s no need to be alarmist. She might be back home before dark, for all we know,” Hugh said.

  “I do know this. I’m certain of it.” She strongly sensed that Hugh would never see his daughter in the flesh again.

  “Anna, darling,” Hugh said. “She’ll be back. This is vintage Poppy,” he said with a false laugh, looking from Anna to Charlie. “Even as a young girl, Poppy had her own ideas about things. One time, when she was nine, she decided she wanted to go to Disneyland. Remember that, Anna? Somehow, she managed to get to the bus station on her own. She’ll be back.”

  It was a full year before they heard from her. For a while, Charlie still came over almost every night, sat with Hugh and Anna to the end of the evening news. He wanted to be there when or if Poppy called. Anna watched him sink into a depression, then into a kind of helpless fugue state.

  Finally a letter arrived from New Mexico. Anna tore it open and photographs spilled into her lap. Poppy and Marvin and an infant. She skimmed the letter. Marvin was some sort artist. They’d gotten married shortly after leaving and now had a baby. “I’ve never been happier,” she wrote. “Marvin is working full-time at his art and I’m doing this and that, going to school part-time and taking care of the baby, whom we adore. Her name is Flynn.”

  A year after this letter was another, one every year or year and a half for five years. When Hugh had fallen out of remission for what he and Anna both knew was the last time, Anna spent months tracking Poppy down. By this time she and her family were in Seattle. �
��It’s just a matter of months or weeks,” Anna said, when she finally got her daughter on the phone. “If you want to see your father alive you better come now.”

  “I’ll get a flight next week,” Poppy said.

  Except that she didn’t. Didn’t call or send a card or get in touch with her father in any way. Anna made the mistake of telling Hugh that Poppy was on her way. He perked up every time the phone or doorbell rang, asked for Poppy until he drew his last breath. Anna couldn’t ever forgive her daughter for this.

  She rinsed out the tub, hung up the wet towels, then walked back into her bedroom and replayed Poppy’s message. She picked up the phone and started to dial, then put the receiver back. What would she say? Yes, you can come. No, don’t bother, I never want to see you again in my life. Maybe she should just call and find out why Poppy wanted to visit. Anna picked up the phone again, but instead of dialing her daughter’s number, she dialed Greta’s. Her fingers found the numbers as automatically as they found F-sharp on her cello.

  Greta picked up on the third ring. “Hi, it’s me. Were you asleep?”

  “Are you kidding?”

  “Is he home yet?”

  “Not yet. What’s going on over there?”

  Anna suddenly didn’t want to talk about it. She and Greta never talked about her daughter. In fact, Anna wasn’t sure she ever told Greta about Poppy. Maybe once, when she first moved into the townhouse and gave her new friend a broad autobiographical sweep. An all-inclusive statement about burying her husband, the past, starting anew as nobody’s wife or mother.

  “I can’t sleep, either.” She paused. “Anyway, one of the doctors at school today asked me to pick my most compassionate student to lead a support group.”

  “Uh-huh,” Greta said, and Anna heard her exhale cigarette smoke.

  “Isn’t that a mystery?”

  “Why? What do you mean?”

  “How would I possibly know if someone’s compassionate?”

  “What do you mean? Of course you know. Someone is either open or they’re closed. They can feel another person’s trouble and anguish or they can’t.”

  Anna said that made sense, but deep down she suspected that this trait, along with the maternal one, had never been activated in her. She doubted if it was possible to understand someone else’s suffering. Even her beloved husband whose pain had become a private geography on which she couldn’t trespass.

  Anna listened to Greta’s lengthy examples of what compassion was. “Well,” Anna said finally. “I’ll be up for another hour or so grading papers so come over for tea if you want.”

  “Okay,” Greta said, and sighed.

  “And I might be calling you back to ask your opinion on whether you think forgiveness exists outside of biblical myths.”

  Greta laughed. “Oh, do tell.”

  “Nothing. It’s all crap,” Anna said, and hung up.

  TWO

  BODY OF THE BELOVED

  From the window of their Back Bay apartment, Stuart watched Jack down on the street corner talking to the tiny Italian shoemaker, Mr. Fabrizi. He seemed to have taken up residence in the coffee shop next to the Korean grocery where Stuart and Jack shopped. Fabrizi came racing out to say hello every time he spotted Jack. Stuart could usually get by the window with just a friendly wave, but Jack was a verbal hostage to the scenes and tribulations of Mr. Fabrizi’s life. Who knew why.

  Mr. Fabrizi was gesturing wildly, the way he did when he talked about shoddy workmanship or how he couldn’t break the habit of shining his wife’s shoes every day even though she’d been dead over a year. Jack was nodding continuously, shifting from one foot to the other.

  Stuart went into the kitchen to check the bread. Another ten minutes. He clothed the naked David magnets on the refrigerator with red panties from Venus. Stuart had been cooking most of the day. Their friends Leila and Jane were coming tonight to discuss what Jack called the Tykes for Dykes campaign: the women hadn’t actually declared their desire for a child, only that there was something they wanted to talk about. Jack insisted it had to be about conception.

  “Why else does a lesbian couple want to have dinner with a couple of beat-up fags?” Jack had asked earlier.

  “Maybe they simply want our company. Friendship, Jack, remember that? People who you don’t necessarily work for, sleep with, or want something from.”

  “Right, sweetheart, what world do you live in and where can I sign on?” He’d grabbed his wallet from the hall table. The Korean grocery was just around the corner. “Saffron, a pinch. Anything else?”

  “No. That should do it. If for some reason they don’t have fresh saffron, don’t accept a substitute herb.” The last time Stuart was in there looking for fresh rosemary, he’d somehow been hoodwinked into buying chervil, by the owner, Mrs. Kim. She insisted it would do “miracles” for lamb if he beat it with egg whites and basted every half an hour. The meat had ended up with a texture like milk jugs and a taste like lawn clippings.

  “Back in a flash,” Jack said, holding open an imaginary coat.

  At the window, Stuart saw Jack was still at the corner, talking now to a young man. Jack held a brown grocery sack on his hip, which meant it was stuffed and heavy. He could never buy small quantities of anything. But if Stuart had sent him for saffron and coconut milk—which he could have used—Jack would be holding two bags. All of their household items were family size, huge bottles of shampoo that would be replaced with another kind before they’d used even half. When Stuart cleaned the bathroom last Saturday, he’d counted six bottles of shampoo, four conditioners—two deep, one daily, and a leave-in—and seven bars of soap. The cabinets and drawers were crammed with medicines for every possible ailment, foreign and domestic, including, Stuart saw with horror, Vagisil.

  “Jack, there’s very little chance either one of us is going to be afflicted with minor feminine itching.”

  “What?” Jack had called in from the living room.

  “What’s this Vagisil doing in here?” The package, thank God, was unopened.

  “I bought it, what do you think?” Jack said.

  “Why?”

  “It was in the sale bin at Rite-Aid.”

  “Oh, Jesus wept.”

  “Crocodile tears,” Jack called back. “And it’s not inconceivable that we could have female guests. My sister could come to visit. Don’t throw it away, Stuart.”

  “Really, Jack. What are the odds that your sister would visit, first of all, and second, arrive with an itchy booty?”

  “Itchy booty.” Jack laughed. “Your talk of itchy booties is lost on me, darling. I can’t tell one Japanese car from another.”

  Stuart took the bread out of the oven and set the table with the good china for their guests—he knew Jane would appreciate the Wedgwood plates. Jane was the first to befriend them when they moved from San Francisco a year ago. She was in personnel at the investment firm where Jack worked. Neither Stuart nor Jack had really wanted to leave San Francisco, but the Boston office had offered to double Jack’s salary and it seemed foolish not to take it. Both agreed that if either one of them didn’t acclimate well to New England they would move back. So far, Stuart didn’t like it much here. The general atmosphere of the city struck him as distinctly unfriendly, one of suspicion and distrust. Partly it was that he missed his studies, the routines of academia. He’d been enrolled in the Ph.D. program at San Francisco State, working on an interdisciplinary doctorate in anthropology and art—specifically, the relationship between color and design patterns in Incan pottery and the culture’s rituals and habits. His preliminary thesis linked human sacrifice and geometric landscape patterns on bowls. Stuart’s theory was, the greater the culture’s strife, the more intricate and beautifully bright the pottery. In the Bay Area, there was a private anitiquities collector who trusted Stuart enough to give him a set of keys to his loft. Stuart came and went as he pleased, sat for hours in front of ancient grain bowls and ceremonial chalices.

  Stuart hadn’t y
et found a doctoral program in Boston that seemed like the perfect match, but B.U. offered enough courses to keep him interested until he figured out where he wanted to study. Things would work out if he was patient. Jack was thriving, and for now, that was enough.

  This coming October would be their ten-year anniversary. They’d met in a twenty-four-hour Walgreens in San Francisco. Stuart had run in for nighttime cold medicine. In aisle one, an obese woman flanked by two policemen was praying to Saint Cecilia and opening packages of curlers. “You know you have to buy those curlers,” the policemen kept saying, but the woman went on rolling up her hair and shooing them away. In the pharmacy, the pharmacist was banging on the bulletproof Plexiglas and shouting at three boys who were stuffing their pockets with vitamins. By the time he’d come around and unlocked the door the boys had run out of the store, right past the cops guarding Saint Cecelia’s acolyte. Stuart hung around the medicine aisle pretending to study labels so he could see how the commotion would turn out. A man dressed in a pink bathrobe and scuffy pink slippers, hair slicked back under a scarf and a fully made-up face, wheeled his cart past Stuart. He shook his head. “This place is getting so crazy,” he said, nodding at the woman with the curlers. His cart had nothing in it but cosmetics. Stuart chose a bottle of NyQuil then stood in line while the pharmacist gave a description of the boys to the cops, who had the curler thief in handcuffs. Pink Scuffy wheeled up behind him, humming, and opening his package of press-on nails. The man in front of Stuart turned around to see who was behind him, then smiled at Stuart.

  They exchanged small talk. He said his name was Jack. He was the handsomest man Stuart had ever seen in his life. By the time they left the store, Jack had mentioned a relay-for-life walkathon the following Saturday, a benefit for the Bay Area AIDS association. Maybe Jack would see him there. At this point in his life, Stuart had considered himself bisexual. For the past three years, he’d been living with a Japanese woman he thought he would marry. He loved Roberta, loved their camaraderie and ordered life, but it wasn’t until he met Jack that he realized how being in love truly felt. Before now, he’d scoffed at claims of passion, thought anyone who blamed desperate or extreme acts on being in love was mentally ill at worst, too dependent on Hollywood depictions at best. Certainly, he felt pangs of tenderness when he was away from Roberta. But seeing Jack again had engendered a whole new feeling, as though his skin was electrified and stretching away from his muscles and bones, his body instinctively making a space for what he didn’t know, until now, was love.