“No . . .” I shake my head.
“Oh yes, we did,” she says. “Come and see!”
They all pile out of the car and I sit there in stunned silence. “But . . . this is the Morganthalers’ house,” I say meekly. “They live here.”
“It was their house, Jennifer. They moved. Now it’s your house. You live here!”
“No . . .” I groan.
Brad tugs me out of the car and I lose my grip on Ace, who wakes up and springs happily out of my arms, tumbling after Ed Keller through the front door. I’m lost in a daze. Speechless. It’s like a slowly unfolding nightmare. You want to wake up, a voice in your head keeps repeating, It’s not true, it’s not true . . . yet it is true, and waking up is not an option. I find it’s all freakishly, inexplicably true. We have a nasty dose of reality here; it’s undoubtedly a good thing that I’m too jet-lagged and exhausted to voice my opinion too clearly. It’s enough just to wrap my gerbil-size brain around the situation. The Kellers bought us a house . . .
The house right next door.
Kill me.
You could lob a ham sandwich from our front door to theirs, if you wanted to. Or a bomb. We tour the airplane-hangar-size monstrosity and find all our belongings have already been moved in. All our books, clothes, pots and pans—even our toothbrushes are there, sitting in engraved silver toothbrush cups in the master bathroom. Mother Keller did it all while we were on our honeymoon.
“Mom, this is incredible!” Brad says. “Hon, isn’t this incredible?”
“Incredible . . .” I smile weakly.
Mother Keller went ahead and decorated the whole house herself. She picked out all the pastel furniture, the flocked wallpaper, even the porcelain figurines and dried flower arrangements. After all, we didn’t own nearly enough furniture to fill up this place. Trying to fill this behemoth of a house with our scrappy belongings would be like trying to fill the Titanic with the contents of a rowboat. Unfortunately the furnishings Mother Keller chose are more to her taste than mine. The place is all sweet and pastel-y and frilly. It looks like a gynecologist’s office mixed with a Christian Science Reading Room, slammed inside a Céline Dion video. I hate it.
The front hall has white marble floors polished to a high liquid shine and a sweeping spiral staircase that twists up around a large, low-hanging chandelier of queer citrine yellowy-green crystal. The living room is douche-commercial peachy pink and dominated by huge peach upholstered couches and brass accent lamps. In the kitchen I find a copy of Cooking for Dummies and a plaque on the wall that says LORD BLESS THIS MESS! Upstairs in our walk-in closets, I find all of our clothing hanging up or neatly put away in drawers. I burn with shame and the distinct memory of leaving a pair of dirty underwear on the floor in the cottage. Dear God, I hope Mother Keller didn’t see them. The tour’s almost over, and I’m contemplating suicide by way of skewering a brass fireplace poker into my eye socket, when Mother Keller flips on the lights in the dining room and my whole family leaps out shouting, “Surprise!”
I nearly have a heart attack. My first thought is, What’s wrong with you people? which isn’t fair, because they’re only trying to congratulate us on our amazing new house. They’ve been silently waiting there in the dark, even Hailey and Lenny, who took a taxi from the airport. Dad hugs me, Mom kisses me. They take turns holding Ace, who’s nearly hysterical with joy. He bounds up and down the staircase on three legs faster than most dogs can go on four.
Everybody congratulates us on our new home and they all start asking questions about the honeymoon. I don’t even get to lie about it, because idiot Hailey is already there blabbering away. “They had a honeymoon from hell!” she hoots. “They had diarrhea all week!”
“It’s always something,” Mother Keller says.
“I told you to pack Imodium,” Mom says with a sigh.
“That’s a doozy of a honeymoon!” Ed laughs out loud.
“Oh!” Mother Keller yelps suddenly. “Jennifer! The dog is peeing all over the house!”
“Ace?” I look around, bewildered.
“Oh my, what a mess!” she says, blotting the carpet. “Quick, grab that napkin. Oh, Jennifer, really. You’re not here two minutes and you’ve already turned your house into a mess.”
My house. What a joke. I feel like I might faint.
Brad’s older sister, Sarah, arrives and she starts in immediately. She tosses back her shiny auburn curls and says, “Diarrhea on your honeymoon? What a loser my brother is! It’s always a disaster when he travels with women. Always. Like the time he went on spring break with what’s-her-name. The Asian one. Anyway they both got gonorrhea.”
She gives me a big saccharine-sweet smile.
That’s Sarah for you. A Prada-wearing piranha.
“All right then!” Ed says. “I’m getting everybody some apple cider! Hey, Bill here?”
Sarah says her husband is outside. She made him repark the car.
Poor Bill.
Being married to Sarah must be like marrying a black widow spider. The question isn’t whether she’ll kill you, it’s when, and how much of your dry husk will remain. Mother Keller offers to show my parents the new snow blower in the garage and I’m alone with Sarah momentarily. She turns and whispers conspiratorially. “Did you know Dad’s retiring?”
“I heard he was thinking about that.”
“Oh, I’ll bet you did.” She winks. “Bet you want to know who’s the new president too! Don’t assume Brad’s becoming president.”
“No, he hasn’t even mentioned—”
“Oh, of course,” she snorts. “My brother never tells you anything, does he. Poor thing. Always in the dark. Don’t you just wonder what secrets he’s keeping from you?”
“Not really . . .”
“He probably has a harem of Asian hookers somewhere. He’s always had Egg Roll Fever, you know.”
I choke-chortle awkwardly, wanting to punch her in the face.
Her eyes dart around the room quickly. “I’ll tell you something, Jennifer. I’ve worked for years and years at the company. My brother just got here. While he was off fucking up his life and drinking himself into whatever stupor my parents found him in, I was right here the whole time. You know? Working and waiting for my turn. Now Brad thinks he’s in line for the throne?”
“No, I don’t think he—”
“You know what? I’ll tell you what. No way am I handing over the helm to my idiot-dipshit little brother. Not without one motherfucking hell of a fight. Got it?”
I nod, afraid she might sprout fangs and eat me right there on the spot.
We hear a child shriek in the front hall and my eyes go wide with fear.
Trevor?
Demon Trevor speeds around the corner full-tilt, arms open, and slams painfully into me, grabbing my legs and hanging on like a koala bear, his hands sticky with something.
“Auntie Jen! Auntie Jen! Guess how old I am.”
“Forty-seven?” I say. “Forty-six?”
“Seven and three-quarters!” he shouts at me.
“Trevor!” Sarah grabs his arm. “You have candy. Why do you have candy? I said no candy! Give me that candy.”
“No!” He sticks his hands behind his back. “Daddy gave it to me.”
“Oh, I’ll bet he did,” she says. “Give me that candy this minute, Trevor, or I’ll tell Santa Claus that you get no presents ever again.”
He looks at her.
“I mean it,” she growls.
Trevor lets go of my legs and stares up, his lips trembling. “Santa?” he says, and I want to call child services.
“Did you hear me?” Sarah shouts at him. “Give them to me . . . now!”
Trevor thrusts two peppermint candies out and starts crying.
“Go wash your hands,” she says. “They’re filthy!”
Weeping, he trudges toward the kitchen, head hung low. I swear, there is not enough therapy in the world to fix that kid. “You know,” I say carefully, “a little candy isn’t tha
t bad . . .”
“Bill?” she shouts as her husband walks in. He still has his coat on.
“What?” he says. “I was parking the car. Oh, hey, Jen! Welcome back.”
“Bill!” Sarah snaps. “Did you give Trevor candy?”
“Oh. Yeah. It’s . . . that sugar-free stuff your mom got. For him.”
Sarah rolls her eyes in disgust. “He doesn’t know it’s sugar-free, Bill. He’s got to learn about healthy eating habits or he’ll end up with weight issues like his father!”
Bill sighs. “All right then.” He nods. “Better go wash up.” He disappears to the kitchen.
Poor Bill.
“God.” Sarah shakes her head in disgust. “Men! Can you believe that?”
“Nope.” I sigh. “I really can’t.”
Ed returns with our burning peppery handmade apple cider, which I gulp down, or try to, and Mother Keller returns with my parents, who are mightily impressed with our snow blower.
“That’s some snow blower you got out there, honey,” my dad says. “You should make sure that snow blower’s on your home insurance.”
Mother Keller announces dinner is served, directing us to the stack of plates on “my” sideboard, where a banquet of her most vile dishes awaits us. “Eat your clam blankets before they cool,” she warns us. Somehow all her dishes always sound vaguely and specifically sexual at the same time. Clam blankets are baked clams and bacon. There are also codfish balls, which are diced cod, potatoes, and egg pressed into balls and baked. Mulled fishwives are sardines soaked in sherry. Meat jelly is exactly what it sounds like. For dessert there’s prune whip: Take unsuspecting prunes, soak, and chuck in blender with heavy cream. Puree until they sing and the rest of us weep. I mournfully survey the buffet table.
Hailey winks at me. “We stopped at McDonald’s on the way over,” she whispers.
“Not fair!” I whine. “Then why is Lenny eating?” I nod at my brother-in-law, who is heaping up a big plate of grub. Hailey shrugs.
“I don’t know,” she says. “He’ll eat anything.”
“Damn this looks good!” Lenny grins. “Shit, I’m hungry enough to eat the balls off a low-flying duck.”
We sit at the table and Brad raises his glass for a toast. “To Mom and Dad,” he says. “You’re the best.”
Mother Keller basks in her son’s glow. “It’s our pleasure, dear,” she says. “Your father and I realized you couldn’t stay in the guesthouse and raise a family.” My cheeks turn pink. I hate it when she starts in about Brad and me having a family. She’s always insinuating that I don’t want a baby, or worse, that I can’t have one, and I do want one and I can have one. She never gives me a chance to tell her how much I want to have a baby, she just starts harping on how we better hurry up and start trying before my ovaries are like dried-up beef jerky. I have half a mind to tell her that I deliberately stopped taking birth control even before Brad proposed to me. That might shut her up. Then maybe she’d finally believe that I want to have her son’s baby.
Ed leans over. “Have I ever told you how much you look like my cousin Ada?”
I nod at him. Ed’s told me many, many times that I remind him of his cousin Ada. Almost every time he sees me. Ed has this weird relationship with his cousin Ada, and every time he mentions her, Mother Keller gets very quiet and looks like she does right now. Like she swallowed a bee. “Ada’s a real beauty,” Ed says. “And a wonderful cook.”
Mother Keller stares down the table at him. “A wonderful cook?” she snaps. “She once set fire to the stove on Christmas morning.”
Ed ignores her. “Ada can sing too,” he says. “Did I ever tell you about Ada’s voice?”
“You did, Ed.” I smile politely. “You definitely did.”
Suddenly the swinging door opens and an ancient-looking woman shuffles in. She has dark yellow skin that’s deeply creased and wrinkled. Her face looks like dried apple. She’s wearing a black burlap sack; the waist is tied with a piece of yellow cord. We all look at her and the table falls silent. “Heavens, I nearly forgot about little Bi’ch,” Mother Keller says.
“Who?” I sit up. It sounded like she said “little bitch.”
“Bi’ch!” Mother Keller repeats. “Since poor Jennifer here has no experience running a house properly, I wanted to make sure she had enough help.”
“Help?” I repeat.
“Your maid,” Mother Keller says. “Everyone, please meet Mrs. Bi’ch Fang.”
The woman’s last name is “Fang,” as in wolf fang. Her first name is “Bi’ch” and rhymes, unfortunately, with “ditch.” She’s Hmong; she came from the Bridge Program at church, which Mother Keller says relocates displaced immigrants looking for a new home. Bi’ch will be our maid. “Oh, I don’t need a maid!” I say. “Thank you, but . . . it’s not necessary!”
“Oh my, yes it is.” Mother Keller smirks. “Bi’ch is going to help you keep your house in order. For once. I had to get you a maid, Jennifer. We all know how you keep a house!”
The whole table chuckles together happily as I glower.
“But where will she . . . live?” I ask gloomily.
“Right here,” Mother Keller says. “In the little guesthouse out back.”
“She’s going to live here?”
“Of course. It’s all been arranged.”
So there it is. The super-awesome cherry on top of my super-surprise sundae. Not only has my mother-in-law decided where I’ll live and how I’ll live, she’s even selected who I’ll live with. A woman who looks like her last position was cleaning up the prehistoric cave of some Neanderthal man. Fine. At least she won’t be afraid of Brad’s laundry. Some of his socks stand up for themselves. Literally. Especially the ones he masturbates in.
Nine million years later, everyone’s leaving. I’m so tired, I feel like I might pass out. “It’ll be so wonderful having you all right next door,” Mother Keller says, air-kissing me good night. “We’ll get to see you all the time.”
After everybody leaves and we’re finally alone . . . we’re not alone. The strangely shaped Bi’ch clanks and shuffles around in the kitchen. As Brad and I lie in bed, I fight back tears. I don’t want to ruin my first night back, especially since we’re both worn out and exhausted.
I finally break down though, and my shoulders heave as I start weeping. Brad asks me what’s the matter and I tell him everything. How I’m distraught about the honeymoon and feel like a complete failure. Now we come home and his parents have picked out our house? It feels claustrophobic, manipulative, and overbearing. I wanted to get away from his parents. I wanted to start our own life. Now we’re trapped here . . . for how long? Forever? Brad works his jaw and says this is a fine way to thank his parents, who shelled out $3.2 million for a house.
“Our house,” he says, looking around the room. “You see them here? No. Because this is our house. Not theirs. There’s a lock on the door, Jen. Use it.”
“That’s not enough, Brad. You shouldn’t have said we’d take the house. You always let your mother run your life. You never ask me what I want to do.”
“We always do what you want to do!”
I look at him, aghast, and have my ammunition ready. My eyes well up with tears. “You . . . left me!” I cry.
He looks around, confused. “I left you where?”
“At the airport! You took off running without me!”
“I didn’t leave you,” he snorts. “Jen, I told you to run.”
“You told me to run? Am I a child? Am I a German shepherd?”
“Jen, what are you talking about?”
“What are you talking about, Brad? One minute you’re swearing to honor and protect me, the next minute you’ve abandoned me at Miami International Airport! I find that concerning. I really do.”
“Come on, the Miami airport? It’s perfect for you! It’s got stores and massage chairs, and I saw at least two Cinnabon joints. You’d be set!”
I stare at him and grab my cell phone off the nightsta
nd. “I actually timed you, Brad. I timed you to see how long it took before you looked for me.”
“You timed me?”
“Yes I did.” I frown grimly at the imaginary numbers on my phone’s screen. “It was not good, Brad. Not good at all.”
“How long did it take?” He leans over, trying to see my phone, but I turn it off and shake my head. “Let’s just say that in the amount of time it took you to look for me, I could’ve been kidnapped by Norwegian sex traffickers.”
“Aw, Jesus.” He shakes his head. “What is it with you and the Norwegian sex traffickers?”
I start to cry in earnest.
He comes and sits by me on the bed. “Babe, please. Don’t. I’m sorry I made you run at the airport. I am, but you gotta understand there was never, ever a single chance in hell we were sleeping in Miami that night.”
“I know.” I wipe my eyes. “Because you have to win. You have to get your way. You were determined to get the last seats out of Miami. God forbid anyone else did, screw any old people or orphans who needed them. Well, congratulations. You won and I got to spend my entire honeymoon with no luggage.”
“But . . .” He shrugs. “I had to get you on a plane that night. Don’t you get it?”
“No, Brad, I really don’t.”
“It was our honeymoon. Babe, did you really think I’d let you down on our honeymoon? Just scrap our plans and find some hotel in Miami? I would’ve chartered a private jet if I’d had to. I would’ve built a bamboo raft and rowed you to Saint John myself if there was no other way. Jen, nothing could’ve stopped me from getting you to Saint John that night . . . you know why?”
I smile and shake my head no.
“Because we just got married, babe, and that was our honeymoon . . . and you? Honey, you are my wife!”
“Oh, Brad . . .” I whisper.
He kisses me on the forehead as tears spill down my cheeks. “Screw the orphans and the old people,” he says. “Only the best for you.”
We make love. Sort of. We’re both exhausted and still a little queasy from the food poisoning. I lie there in his arms afterward, recounting everything that’s happened. “I’m sorry I got mad about the house,” I tell him. “Just promise me you’ll fix it, okay?”
Jennifer Johnson Is Sick of Being Married Page 3
