The Goddesses of Kitchen Avenue: A Novel

by Barbara O'Neal

  I flee. In my car, I spend ten minutes trying to get ahold of myself, but grief floods through me, leaks out of my nose and mouth and eyes. I tell myself that it will be better next year, that I’ll have gone through the rituals once without him and it won’t be so hard, but then I remember that Annie won’t even be around next year, and what the hell am I going to do with myself? And it just keeps pouring, snot and tears, and there’s nothing I can do but put my head on the steering wheel, hiding my face behind my hair, and let it come.

  When it’s finally spent, I find some fast-food napkins in the glove box and blow my nose. But that’s enough for today. I’ll finish another day.

  * * *

  Annie has been bugging me for days about the Christmas tree. We usually buy it somewhere in the first weeks of December, making a big ritual out of the whole thing—breakfast at Patti’s Restaurant, a homey diner downtown. Big breakfast—steak and eggs or huevos rancheros or biscuits and gravy. Then we’d make the round of tree lots on Santa Fe, then out to Blende, and circle around to the south side for the lots on Prairie. Annie had not participated in the ritual much the past couple of years, but she wants the tree, and as the days roll by, and the packages start piling up in the corner where I usually put it, she grows more and more antsy. “Mom,” she says one night after coming in from her work Christmas party, her nose red from the cold, “can I go get a tree with Travis? He said he could borrow his dad’s truck. Then all you have to do is help me get it up and I’ll do all the decorating.”

  Which makes me feel like the very worst mother on the planet. I tell her I’ll take care of it this weekend.

  She must have called Rick, because he shows up the Saturday before Colin is due to arrive from Berkeley. I am eating a bowl of granola, reading the paper, and quite happily listening to non-Christmas music on the college radio station when the doorbell rings. It’s a sunny, crisp morning, and he is wearing a flannel shirt. His hair needs cutting and the long strands brush his collar, the cap of it shining like a child’s.

  I scowl at him. “I told you to call before you come over.”

  He nods. “But you don’t answer the phone.”

  “I answer it. Just not if it’s you.”

  He spreads a hand. “You see the problem here.”

  “You could leave a message.”

  “Jesus, Trudy, I’ve been leaving messages. I wrote you a letter. I’ve talked to Annie twelve times the past two weeks. We haven’t been face-to-face since Thanksgiving.”

  My arms have somehow crossed themselves over my middle. “Did Annie put you up to this?”

  “Up to what? Trying to talk to my wife about the fact that my kid, who I haven’t seen in damned near six months, is gonna be here in four days and I might want to spend a little time with him?”

  I step back from the door. “Come on in. Want some coffee?”

  “Nah.” He shakes his head, his mouth still hard. I see the effort it takes for him to take a deep breath, blow it out. “Why don’t we go get some breakfast, Trudy? Go get the damned tree.”

  “That’s too much, Rick.” Unexpectedly, I feel winded and sink down on the couch. “I hate this, all of it,” I admit, my hands loose in front of me. “The whole Christmas game is depressing the heck out of me.”

  He sits down next to me. “Me, too.”

  We sit there in silence. I notice that he looks tired. “You never look rested anymore.”

  “Yeah, well. Such a quiet apartment and all.”

  Athena has heard his voice and comes running to whip madly around his legs. Her purr sounds like a Harley engine. Rick picks her up and tucks her under his chin, rubbing his goatee over her forehead. She swoons in delirium. “That cat misses you desperately.”

  “I miss her, too.”

  It’s quiet for a minute, the air thick with unsaid things. He looks at me. His eyes are as blue as marbles, eyes I have gazed into so many times it seems impossible that I will go the rest of my life without doing it again. “C’mon, Gertrude, let’s go get a tree. You know you need my truck to do it.”

  I nod. “Let me wolf down my cereal and I’ll get my shoes.”

  “Just go get your shoes. I’ll buy your breakfast. I know you’re not eating. Biscuits and gravy will stick to your ribs.”

  “Gravy,” I say, fishing my clogs from beneath the couch, “will ruin your arteries.”

  But he’s already picked up the bowl and carries it to the sink, Athena balancing on his shoulder, to pour the uneaten cereal down the garbage disposal. I step into my shoes, wait for him to come back, tear a sheet off the calendar, and see that it’s December 17. “Oh, damn, Rick, I just realized that it’s Joe’s birthday today.”

  He comes out of the kitchen, his mouth working. Athena curls around his legs, her tail trailing around his jeaned knees. He smooths his goatee, flips open the newspaper to the obituaries, and stabs the page.

  I hadn’t made it that far and look over his shoulder at the right-hand column, nearly every inch filled with tributes to Joseph Zamora, all with a different picture. A biker photo, with his beard wild and making him look like an old-time Cheech Marin, has a list of all his cousin’s names. His parents have used a smiling photo from a picnic. The photo at the bottom is one I’ve seen a thousand times, it pierces me straight through. It’s Rick and Joe at about twenty-two, arms around each other’s necks. Below the photo, it says, “Miss ya, buddy.”

  I blink. Touch Rick’s arm.

  “Pretty fuckin’ corny, huh?” But his forefinger lingers on the beloved face.

  “C’mon, tough guy. Let’s go get some breakfast, and a tree so your daughter will stop nagging me.”

  Angel is outside raking leaves, and I wave to him in what I hope is an innocent and casual way. He straightens in his lithe luxuriousness and smiles. Very slowly. Very knowingly.

  Or so it seems to me. I hope I am not blushing as I climb into Rick’s big red truck.

  “Who is that guy?”

  “New neighbor. He’s been there a couple of months now. This is the first time you’ve seen him?”

  “Yep.” He starts the truck.

  I fasten my seat belt, trying not to look around for evidence of anything. Do I think he keeps love letters in his truck? The thought annoys me, and I realize as my throat tightens that I haven’t ridden in the truck since five months ago, the day I shattered the windshield. Fighting the panicky feeling in my chest, I drum my fingers on the seat.

  “So, what’s his story?” Rick asks.

  “Who?”

  “The neighbor.”

  “Oh. His name is Angel.”

  “Shouldn’t that be Ann-hell?”

  I look at him, surprised by the edge in his tone. “I guess. He says it with the right accent, but somehow we all end up calling him Angel.”

  “Who calls him that?”

  “The usuals. Me, Roberta, Jade, Shannelle.”

  “What, are you guys all cozy with this stranger?”

  “Rick, what’s this about? You don’t get to play this game anymore.”

  “Are you seeing him?”

  “None of your business.” The words are out before I realize they’re the right ones to use.

  There’s a grimness around his jaw, and he works his way forward, peering over the wheel. “Well, he looks kinda sleazy to me. Might want to just be careful, that’s all.”

  I give him a suppressed smile, lifting my right eyebrow. Clear my throat.

  He shoots a glance my way, the Siamese-cat blue of his eyes so bright in the sunny day that I’m willing to forget everything. “Touché.”

  As we’re getting out of the truck at Patti’s, I touch the windshield. “They did a pretty good job on this, huh?” I grin ruefully.

  He touches my back. “You’re famous now, you know.”

  “Famous?”

  “Yeah. You’re like a proverb with the guys at the shop. If somebody’s screwing up, they’ll say, ‘Careful, remember Trudy, dude.’ ”

  “Oh, God. T
hat’s so embarrassing.” I cover my cheeks with my hands. “I’ve never been that mad in my whole life.”

  He lifts a shoulder, guides me into the restaurant. “You had reason, I reckon.”

  The hostess is the same woman it always is, and she smiles brightly. She’s an attractive, slim brunette in her late thirties, her hair fashionably cut in slightly messy layers. “Hey, I’d about given up on you two! It’s been ages. How you been?”

  I shoot Rick a glance as she leads us into the nonsmoking section without being told. “Must be getting your tree today, huh?”

  “Thanks, Vicki,” Rick says. “Who has the best ones this year?”

  “I got a ten-footer down in Blende. Ponderosa. Real fresh. Coffee?”

  “Please.”

  When she’s gone, I look at Rick. “Thank you for not bringing Carolyn here.”

  “I’d never do that.” He glares. “I’d appreciate it if you keep Ann-hell away from our usual haunts. And anybody else you get hooked up with.”

  I tsk. “God knows they’re lining up at the door.”

  “You’re a beautiful woman, Trudy.”

  Not beautiful enough, obviously. Instead of saying that aloud, however, I just look at the menu. If we are to develop a true friendship, post divorce, this is how it will begin.

  And once I make up my mind, it’s surprisingly easy to be with him. In a familiar place, doing a familiar thing. I can forget about anything that isn’t connected to this. He’s wearing a shirt I bought, a crosshatched blue-and-yellow flannel, with a T-shirt below, which says HARLEY RIDERS DO IT ON THE ROAD. There are no new nicks on his hands, no strange bits of paper sticking out of his pocket. We’re just having breakfast, as we’ve done so many times over the past twenty-odd years.

  There is one difference. His eyes are weary. Dead weary, and he keeps wandering back to Joe in his conversation. “Remember when he …?” and “On his eleventh birthday …” and a thousand other things like that.

  I have heard all the stories before. I know about the time they got stopped on their way to Las Vegas, carrying fake IDs as Rick Blaine and James T. Kirk. They were taken in for some trumped-up thing—this was in the days when Easy Rider was still showing in mainline cinemas, remember. When they got to headquarters in the little Arizona town, the sergeant was so annoyed with his deputy for not realizing the IDs were fake that he confiscated the counterfeits and sent them on their way.

  I have heard the stories so many times that I sometimes feel like I was there, too. Often, I was, later on. I finish my biscuits and gravy and take a sip of fresh coffee. “I miss him, too. Not like you do, obviously, but there are so many little things that get me. I found that little trike he gave Colin for his birthday—remember?”

  A half-smile.

  “And that bottle of wine he got at whatever auction it was—he was so proud of himself for bringing it to me. I never have drunk it. I keep thinking I’ll just open it in his honor some night, and—” I shake my head. “If I do, then I won’t have it in there waiting, from Joe.”

  Rick blinks. “You are the only thing he ever envied me, Tru, you know that?”

  I snort. One thing for sure is that Joe was never attracted to me. He liked hot, blond, and buxom. Mainly buxom.

  Like Carolyn.

  I almost forget my resolve not to say anything divisive, because I am suddenly, completely aware of the obvious, that Joe knew her, that he might even have been her lover in the past. And you’d think I’d be used to these humiliating recognitions by now, but this one stings just as much as any of the others, not the least of which is the fact that I am an idiot for not realizing.

  Before I can work myself up to a full snit, Rick says, “He envied the way we got along.”

  It hangs there so stark, black-and-white. “He was a smart guy,” I say dryly.

  “Yeah.” He fiddles with his spoon.

  To get to more comfortable ground, I say, “Remember when his cat Loki died? He cried so hard over that cat, I was worried about him.”

  It’s enough. He nods in acceptance. “I forgot about that.”

  The conversation sticks with me as we drive out to Blende, a farming community attached to Pueblo on the south side of the Arkansas River, the part that would have been Mexico, long ago. Seeing all the new shops with Spanish signs and Mexican goods now cropping up in the strip malls and storefronts, it seems oddly prophetic. At the Christmas tree lot, there is a family walking together, father, mother, two scrubbed girls with their hair in ribbons and braids, the son and father dressed exactly the same in matching jeans, boots, crisp striped shirts, and white straw cowboy hats. I smile as the little boy gives an explanation to his sisters in Spanish and it tickles me as it always does—wow! What a smart kid!

  The tree I choose—Rick is quite notably silent on the choice except to make sure the needles aren’t dried out—is a seven-foot Ponderosa. I pull the seventy dollars out of my wallet, and Rick waves it away. “I got it.”

  I can see that something about this is hurting, and say, simply, “Thanks.”

  We wait by the truck for the owner and his son to bring the tree over. “Did you get one for your apartment?”

  “A tree? Nah.”

  “Maybe you should.”

  He raises his head. “For what, Trudy? The only presents I’m buying are for you guys.” He shakes his head once. “I just don’t have much Christmas spirit.”

  “I bet you just need some tamales.”

  A slow, gentle Rick-grin spreads over his face, lighting his eyes, erasing the weariness around his jaw. “We should get some.”

  “Ugh! I couldn’t. I’m stuffed.” Then, without thinking, I hold up my hand to stave off the ribald comment that’s sure to bring. “Don’t say it.”

  The grin broadens and he almost sways toward me, almost in a kiss, before he stops himself. For an instant, our eyes meet, in memory and surprise and maybe even longing. I shift away suddenly, thinking guiltily of Angel’s mouth, and then I think that he must kiss Carolyn every day, and before I can stop it, my throat opens and spills out the words I know will ruin the day utterly for both of us. “Did Joe know Carolyn?”

  He straightens. Sighs. “What do you think?”

  Which is enough. And I’m right—it has ruined the day, because all of it comes rushing back, the fury and the sense of humiliation, and those are the ones I grab out of the mix of emotions because they protect me from sorrow.

  As we get back in the truck, Rick pauses with his hand on the ignition. “You know, Trudy we could have just had a day where it wasn’t about anything else but us seeing each other.”

  “Not as long as you’re seeing somebody else, we can’t.”

  “Like you and Ann-hell?”

  “It’s not like that.”

  “Yeah.” He starts the truck. “You’ve never given me a chance to even try to make it right, Trudy. You threw me out, just like that.”

  I suck in my breath. “So this is my fault?”

  “No. I fucked up. I know that. But you were pretty damned fast to get rid of me, like you’d just been waiting for an excuse.”

  I look at him. That’s all.

  “You never listen, you know that? You never hear anything but what you want to hear.”

  “You want a different outcome, stop sitting on the fence.”

  “I’m not on the fence. You threw me over it!”

  “Take me home, Rick.”

  We drive in seething silence. He unloads the tree and starts to take it in the house, but I say, “Leave it.”

  He starts to protest, and I take a deep breath. “This is too hard for me, babe. I can’t be just your friend. I wish I could.” I look right into his eyes, and let myself show through. I want, more than I want breath, to reach up, one more time, and touch his lean jaw, smooth away the haggard places, touch his glossy mustache. “I’m doing all right as long as I don’t see you, as long as I don’t have to think about everything that’s been lost here.”

  He looks
down, toes the ground with his boot, makes little waffle patterns in the damp ground. “Sorry.”

  “I know this is a bad day for you, and I’m sorry, but I can’t fix it. All the things that are tearing you up are things only you can fix.”

  With a piercingly broken expression, he asks, “How, Trudy? How do I fix it? Fix me?”

  And despite myself, I chuckle. In the land of therapy for everything, only a biker dude would ask that question. “You could see somebody.”

  “You mean like a counselor?” He doesn’t sound horrified, just surprised. The idea has never occurred to him. I laugh.

  “Yeah. A priest, a counselor. You never know. It could help. You’ve had a lot of losses the past few years.”

  “I’ll think about it.” He clears his throat. “I guess you want to stick to the original plan of bringing Colin home by yourself, huh?”

  “It would be like today, Rick, so much the same and yet so different. I can’t stand it. But you can go up to the airport to pick him up if you like.”

  “Nah. He’ll want to see his mom first. You go. He can call me when he gets in.”

  “Okay.” I turn away, turn back. “Thanks for all your help today.”

  “No problem.” He lifts a hand in farewell. Climbs in his truck as he’s done a thousand times. I look at his hands on the steering wheel, the grim look around his mouth. And for one minute, I think, How in the world did we come to this? How is it possible?

  SHANNELLE’S WRITING WALL

  If the writing is honest it cannot be separated from the man who wrote it.

  TENNESSEE WILLIAMS

  32

  SHANNELLE

  TO: naomiredding@rtsv.org

  FROM: chanelpacheco@hotmail.com

  SUBJECT: Harley Blue Trailer

  Dear Naomi,