From that night on, Stella could only evoke partial images of Harriet. The thick fur of her legs, a pleasant curl in her tail, stripe of impossible white on her underbelly. But all memories of her head disintegrated. Whenever she thought of the dog, chasing gulls up and down the beach, racing beside Leander, licking Robert’s sticky face, there was only a bobbing shadow where her head might have been. Layer upon layer, she had gradually willed it away. The crimson spatter, dislodged eye, blue jutting tongue, protective paw up. Gone. All washed clean. Harriet Edgecombe was no more.
Stella dug the grave herself, hid it from the children. When they returned from a night with Nettie and the cousins, she told them their father’s dog had run away. Likely she was old, and ready to die. Yes. It wasn’t fair. But sometimes dogs do that. Run off without warning.
They asked none of the obvious questions. Instead, Robert eyed his mother in a sideways glare, kicked the dirt, and wandered down towards the wharf. Elise darted over to Fuller, who was seated on the step of the stoop, his forehead like a storm at sea. She buried her face in the soft cotton of his shirt, steadied herself on his plump lap, arms looped around his neck. He placed one arm around her girlish waist, and through her tears, she smiled when he pressed a warm peanut butter kiss into her mouth.
“Mother?”
Stella looked up from the book.
“She’s asleep. You can stop reading.”
“If you don’t mind, I think I’ll finish.”
“And why on earth would you do that?”
“I was enjoying the story.”
“I can give you something better than a book about some kid and his stupid dog.” Elise rolled her eyes. “You know, the older you get, the queerer you get. When will it end?”
The conclusion to their relationship was on the horizon. November 17, to be precise. They were not yet married a year.
Stella had been visiting Nettie when a wind rose up, hefty flakes patting the windows, tumbling down to the sill. By the time she was halfway home, she was practically blinded, moving through a million icy veils. Stopping just outside her gate, Stella looked upwards, eyes closed. The world made a slishing sound, as though a pair of unearthly scissors were cutting the sky away. She sensed the weight of the snow on her lashes, and for a romantic moment, she longed to stay there, gobbled up by the blizzard. But she could not give in to desire, plodded up the icy sheet of rock towards home.
When she reached the storm door with its wooden Z, her entire body looked as though she’d been rolled in flour. Behind her, the harbour had disappeared, Nettie’s golden yellow house no longer glowed on the hill. Everything, save her small home, was gone, lost inside the storm.
Snow caked her coat and scarf, and dropped in mushy puddles around her feet when she stomped in the porch. Out of her boots, her feet felt naked and cold. She glanced about for her slippers. They were not by the woodstove, and she remembered placing them beside her dresser earlier as she’d tugged on a pair of woolen stockings. Stella rubbed stiffness from her neck, went to the hallway, but stopped short when she saw Elise rapping at her bedroom door.
“I wants to come in,” Elise whispered, shoulder and head leaning against the frame.
Stella could not hear the response.
“Please?” Elise rolled ninety degrees so that her entire front was pressed against the door. Mumbling, then a giggle, and, “She won’t. I knows she won’t.”
When Elise noticed Stella, she skittered across to her own room, quietly closed the door. Stella tore down the hall, rapped her fist against Elise’s door, cried, “Don’t you come out of there, miss. Don’t you come out.” Then she burst into her own room to find Fuller, squat overtop of a bucket, brown trousers around his ankles, suspenders draped across his thighs. As her reluctant eyes moved over him, she caught sight of his backside, the colour of death, and realized he was using the miniature wooden bathtub that Leander had made as an oversized chamber pot.
“What are you doing?” Her voice vibrated in her throat.
Twisted his neck around, shoulders still square. “What do it look like, maid? My business.”
“But, that’s a wash basin. For a baby.”
“Don’t see no babies ’round here. You got some stashed away or something?” He pulled his bottom lip in over his teeth. “What is you staring at?”
“My tub.”
“For the love of Jaysus, I could get lost out there. Is that what you wants? Who in God’s name would take care of the load of you?”
“I managed.”
He chuckled now, and his backside pressed deeper into the tub, pair of fat dinner rolls squeezed. “We all seen how you managed. Acting like a mad woman down to the harbour trying to bust up the ice with a dull axe. Never seen such a sight in my life.”
Stella could feel her heart beating behind her eyes, inside her jaw. “Elise. What did she want?”
“She’s at me. At me all the time. I don’t know what she wants. Ask her yourself.”
Stella whipped up her slippers, clutched them to her chest. Face crinkled with the sour stench, and she strode to the door.
“Hey.”
She stopped. Hand still on the doorknob.
“What.”
“Arn Tuck brought in some steak to the store. Killed his cow. Made good on his credit.”
“Oh.”
“Cook it up right. I don’t want to see no pink. If I sees pink, you’ll be doing it again.”
“I knows how to cook it.”
“Pink meat’ll kill you, you knows.”
“Pink meat’ll kill you,” she repeated.
On the kitchen table Stella found a beige bowl, crackled glaze, chipped white plate over the top. Inside was a thick slab of meat, two-inch border of membrane and fat, pool of watery blood. She opened the door to the cellar stairs, retrieved the frying pan from the hook on the wall, an onion from the braided bundle dangling beside it.
Deep even breaths as she chopped the onion, leaned her eyes over top of it as excuse for a few tears. How had this happened? She knew, she knew, she knew. But it was so tough, insufferably tough to admit. She was afraid of Fuller. Right down to the inside of her bones. She was afraid of him.
Growing up with Percy and Amos, being married to Leander, they all allowed her to be strong and opinionated, encouraged her to fight back. Something of a luxury, this was now clear to her, as a single slap, a single fist pounding upon a table might have turned her inwards. But they often seemed amused with her snarkiness, came to expect it, even though it was all a ruse, a childish mask that covered her insecurity. Gradually, though, her insides were growing, fusing with that crisp outer shell of resilience. The woman she was had begun to transform into the woman she wore. All this, before she married Fuller. When the rules changed.
During that first night, she fought over the dog. Fought hard. But banging against him, she was nothing more than a bird striking a sunlit window. He never budged. Wouldn’t listen. Her anger soon tempered into alarm when she looked in his eyes, something there, long fermenting, finally uncorked. Lips curling, teeth clenched, hand like a rake driving into her shoulder, he said slowly, as though to ensure proper communication, “I’s the man of this house now. Don’t. You. Ever. Cross. Me. You got no idea what I can do. No idea at all.” And with those few words, he had plucked that mask from her reddened cheeks, exposed the frailty that lay beneath.
One Sunday after church, she had hinted to old Mrs. Hickey about the dire circumstances of the marriage. The farce of it. The continual undertone of aggression. (She would never admit that she was frightened.) But Mrs. Hickey dismissed her concerns, said tritely, “Contrary to popular belief, no union is picture perfect. Everyone’s got their faults. You make your bed, then you lie in it.” She stared down at the opal brooch pinned to her left lapel, ran her hands over her chest. “Besides, we all knows that poor man was under the thumb of his mother from the day he was born. A wife might expect a bit of belligerence, if you asks me. It’ll die down.”
“Die down?” Stella replied.
“Or die out. Whatever you says nowadays.” Mrs. Hickey had unclipped the brooch, moved it to her right lapel, then hunched a little less, shook her gullet. “Now,” she had said, eyes on Stella. “Don’t that look better? ’Twas bothering me all service.”
Stella stood in front of the stove, waited until a slice of fat pork sizzled, coating the pan in a thin layer of grease. Generous sprinkle of salt, and she laid the steak in the pan, fried and flipped, fried and flipped, until the meat was as tough as hardtack. Onion strewn over top of the meat, a final turn for good luck, and she dumped the entire works on a plate. Large glass of crimson Purity syrup and water beside it.
As always, Fuller pinched himself in around the back side of the table, chair pressed against the wall. He said eating made him hot, and he liked the coolness from the draft that came in around the window. Table pulled in just underneath his breasts, and Stella had to move the armchair around to the front of the table so that she could serve him his meal.
In the meager times that had descended upon the whole community, a steak was a rarity. Stella thought he might savour it, but he sawed enormous morsels, jammed them in his mouth, his cheeks. Talked around the ball of meat, even while his tongue floated in syrup. “I minds my mother saying to me, I loves to see you eat. Was one of her pleasures, I believes. Watching me poke food into my face. When she used to feed me as a youngster, she’d nearly throttle me though. Did I ever tell you that?”
Flat, “No.”
“Well she did. Used to clap her hands together when I managed to swallow.”
“Oh.” Stella sat on the very edge of the daybed, hands folded on her lap. She had sewn her skirt from an old pair of Leander’s tweed wool pants, and this gave her some sly pleasure, to know that Leander was covering her now.
“Fed me for years, she did. Years.”
She stared at Fuller as he plowed through the plate-sized slab of meat, then looked away. How could he talk so cordially like that? Sharing quaint stories about his life as though the two of them were friends. Instead of corralled enemies. Stella never gave it much thought, only recognized that it was his unpredictability that made him dangerous. One moment, he was a lamb, next, a mammoth boar, trapped in an undersized pen. She did not care what pain was behind it all.
A sound from the table, a gasp of sorts, sudden suction, and she looked up at Fuller. His hands were coiled around his throat, temperature rising in his face. Eyes bulging, he reached for his drink, chugged a mouthful, but the candy red liquid shot out his nose, spattered on the cream-coloured tablecloth. He stomped his feet, shook his fists at her, then whacked the steak from its plate. Alistair Fuller was choking.
Up, he tried to rise. But he was squeezed in so tightly, he lifted two legs of the heavy table off the floor, and it knocked him backwards. He tried again, but in his panic, he was unable to free himself, and then he gripped the edges of the table, rolled his head, shook his head, banged his head against the window behind him. Threatened the glass.
Stella plugged her ears, sealed her eyes. In her mind, she tried to see and name every colour that she had ever seen. They flashed in rapid, vibrant succession. “Pink, rose, red, green grass, periwinkle, lavender, honey, honeycomb, white, white, pink, white, lilies, black, of course, can’t forget black, pink, pink, blue, pink, pink. No more pink. Please, God, no more pink. I’ll have to do it all over again.” She shook, bent over at the waist, nose trying to catch any of the long lost scent of Leander in the fabric of her skirt. Nothing but fried fat and onion. Any moment, she thought she would feel fists on her, his roar in her ears. “Just go,” she whispered. “Leave. Please, God. Make him leave.” And that was all she had to say. After eternity, the banging stopped. The marriage bond dissolved. Only dead quiet in the kitchen.
Stella opened her eyes. Mound slumped on the kitchen table, hair like tufts of grass trying to escape the earth. Shards of broken plate scattered everywhere. Strings of onion stuck to the wall and rocking chair. She stood, tiptoed a few feet forward, bent down on a single knee. Resting on the worn floor in front of the sink was the steak. Motionless. True, at that moment, she had expected it to move. She watched as her white hand, strangely calm, reached out and lifted it. Then, with her other hand, she ran her fingers over the mark where grease had blemished the wood. And she stared at the shiny stain, this reminder, and knew it would never lift. Knew her floor was changed forever. It would never be clean again.
“Mother?”
Stella couldn’t avert her eyes from the tall trees outside the window, the wind blowing through them, lifting whole heavy branches, letting them drop. They swayed and shuddered, moving towards her, then drawing back. She was certain the wind was searching for a voice, using the leaves for vibration, creating a set of organic vocal chords.
She didn’t want to hear what it had to say. She would not listen. There were no words. Of any consequence.
“Mother?”
“Yes, dear.”
“What were you doing, gone off into space like that? Looked like you was having a stroke or something.” Fists jabbing her hips. “Well, not on my watch you won’t. You can save that for when you visit Robert.”
chapter fourteen
As she was driving her Rambler over the smooth pavement, Summer Fall Lane glanced at her watch. Mickey Mouse glanced back at her, his head cocked, skinny arms and fat white gloves locked in a five-after-one sideways cheer. Hurrah! The watch was a gift from her father, who now resided in Florida with his wife and her two daughters. His second wife. A woman he’d met at some sort of convention for the service industry. With little effort, she had stolen Summer’s father away with the promise of fatter oranges, winters without dampness, a pancake breakfast any time of day or night. It didn’t take much for him to transplant himself. A few words, some papers, a worn leather suitcase. A breath or two, and he was gone.
When Summer summoned an image of his face that last night, she could not recall the slightest hint of pain in his eyes or chin or forehead. She remembered the weather too, greedy winds, sheets of rain that distorted the headlights of his car as he backed down the drive. She thought the ferry might not leave port. Thought he might come back. But he never did, and she’d felt ashamed of herself for hoping, ashamed of waiting up just in case.
Out of habit, Summer shook her wrist, stared down at Mickey. The watch was broken, had been for a considerable while. But she never took it off. Even though she derived no pleasure from wearing it, she liked to believe she never dwelled on it either. That watch was just a habit. Nothing more.
Hand over hand, she turned her car (nicknamed Betty Blue) up a street, noticed a loose string hanging from the sleeve of her peasant blouse. Leaning forward, she caught the thread in her mouth, severed it with her teeth, spit it to the side. Her blouse was worn, practically falling apart, and this matched her brown corduroys, knees and backside about as strong as tissue paper. Her pants were held onto her skinny frame with a leather belt, so old and stretched that when it lay flat, it grinned. Though she wore these items frequently, her favourite article of clothes rested on the seat beside her: a crumpled navy pullover she had pilfered from a box at her grandmother’s. It had once belonged to her Uncle Robert, she was told, and even though the elbows were nearing disintegration, she wouldn’t think of giving it up. She sensed there was righteousness trapped inside the wool (righteousness being in short supply these days), and besides, wearing it made her feel invisible.
Though Summer was quite comfortable with her worn look, her mother never tired of complaining about it. “Couldn’t you please, just this once, wear something decent?” “You look like a streel.” “Who do you belong to? Surely to God ’tis not me.” Whenever her mother’s friends dropped by, Summer was shooed out the back door or down into her basement room. Occasionally Summer would sit on the top step, listen to the drivel, and close her eyes as she felt their superficiality drift past her. “Elise, darling, where is that curious daughter of y
ours?” “Oh, Elise, darling, couldn’t you coax her into trying on a little colour?” “So pale. My Jessie says she saw your Summer last week, and she was, well, looking more like winter thaw.” They spoke of her as though her clothes and her clean white face were all that she was. All that she’d ever be.
Summer took one hand off the wheel and held the end of her braid, felt the bound mass of split ends prick against her palm. How different they were, she and her mother. Difficult to believe they had once been joined together by a tough cord. While her mother struggled to isolate herself from any hint of blandness, Summer wanted nothing more than to twirl downwards, root herself, like a hardy tree. Her mother never seemed to crave attachment, while Summer lived with a nagging feeling that she was constantly soaring in someone’s uncertain hands. And, at any given moment, that someone was going to let her go. Drop her. And she was going to fall, fall, fall, her life forever changed. She told her mother about feeling dizzy in the darkness, and her mother had curtly replied, “Nothing that fresh air won’t cure. Why don’t you try poking some of that into your lungs for a change?”
Summer pulled up in front of Sunray Towers, the apartment building where her grandmother lived. It was a brick structure, tall and sharp and boring, and her grandmother always called it Sardine Towers. “Because everyone lives on top of everyone else,” she said.
One afternoon, when Summer had been high, she’d replied, “More like Celibate Towers. They might live on top of one another, but they don’t do nothing.”
And her grandmother had twittered, nudged her and replied, “You’d be surprised now. I sees all kinds of ladies coming and going to 316. A widower lives there.”
Summer had stepped back, fingers to her chin. “I’m surprised you even know what that means, Nan.”
“I haven’t quite been around the block,” her grandmother had whispered, glancing sideways, “but maybe I ventured out for a stroll once or twice.”
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