Читать книгу Looking Backward in Darkness - Kathryn Ptacek - Страница 8

LITTLE CONTRASTS

You really have never understood me, Randy. Not from the beginning of our relationship, not through twelve years of marriage, not even now.

I think it’s more—much more—than the usual male-female misunderstandings, too, although that’s involved to some degree, of course. Everything we do or think or experience is tainted—if you want to call it that—with the nature of our sexuality. No matter how much “they” try to change it, it’ll still be the same. Men will be men, and women will be women. Maybe we can change a bit, but you can’t buck a million years of genetics.

Excuse me while I reach across you and get into the glove box. I always keep the spare napkins there. Remember how we always used to go to the old drive-in on the other side of town when the kids were really little? They’d be in their jammies in the back—kind of like they are now—and we’d have all these little packets of mustard and ketchup in the glove compartment, along with straws and napkins and plastic forks. We were better stocked than the concession stand!

I hope you don’t think I’m being real rude. I’d offer you a sip of my soda, but...well, you understand. My, that tastes so good. I just wish they wouldn’t put so much ice in these cups.

It’s hot in here. It’s supposed to hit over a 100 today, maybe get as high as 105. I know I’m sweatin’ like a pig. My mother always said ladies never sweat, they perspire; shows you how much she knew.

Maybe I should run the air conditioning for a while. All this heat makes everything kind of ripe, and it does smell in here. There’s nothing you can do about it, hon. Rotten shame.

I’m sorry, Randy. I shouldn’t laugh. Not really. It’s not nice. I shouldn’t say, “rotten”, either. I mean...well—

Now what was I saying before I got sidetracked?

Oh, yeah, the male/female thing.

Everything is just so...polar, isn’t it? Black...white...leftist...rightist...innie or outie...navels, that is.

We’re all divided into two groups, no matter what. Rich or poor. Black or white. Left or right. Liberal or conservative. Strong or weak. Girl or boy.

Is that what everything in life comes down to? A girl thing? A boy thing?

East is east, and west is west, and never the twain shall meet?

The strong and the weak...I know that’s how you thought about us. You were strong. I was weak.

And thinking that, why did you marry me?

Everything I did or said or thought—everything that was the essence of me—you seemed to despise or at the very least disapprove of and want to change.

And they say women are always trying to remake their men. Ha! I think you saw in me what I could be, or at least what I could be in your eyes. You know, sweetie, you really should have waited longer for what you really wanted and not settled on me.

What the hell did I know about these things? I was practically a kid when I met you. I just thought some great guy had fallen for me.

But I see that we were never very compatible, not even from the beginning.

I liked country, you liked jazz, and neither one of us was willing to listen to the other’s musical choices. God knows I tried, but whenever I asked questions about some jazz piece, you always made fun of me in that condescending way you have. Had.

Oh, you didn’t know you were condescending? Please. It’s your number one personality feature. Or maybe your bossiness is. Oh, wait. In a man “bossiness” becomes “assertiveness.” That’s right. It’s only bossiness when it comes to a woman. That’s another one of the weird boy/girl things.

Oops. Sorry. I shouldn’t have burped. That’s another thing women don’t do, my mother always said. But the word she used was “belched.” “Burp” to her was so vulgar. Vulgar. Honestly, I can’t even begin to think of things in terms like that. Vulgar. Ladylike.

I shouldn’t try to laugh and swallow my drink at the same time. Now I’ve dribbled soda down my front. That’s certainly “unladylike.” It’s so dark on the material...looks almost like blood, doesn’t it?

Guess I shouldn’t bring that up, huh?

You didn’t like my friends much, either. But you got rid of them fast enough—you were rude to them, or came on to them and embarrassed us all, and after a while my girlfriends stopped coming by, quit calling, and effectively you had me all to yourself. You always thought I was a hick. Maybe I was, but I didn’t see anything wrong with it. I don’t see that all your so-called worldly ways and expensive education got you very far. Some ambition in there would have helped, I reckon.

You laughed at me when I said I wanted to go to college. What did I need a degree for, you wanted to know, when all I’d ever be was a housewife? When I took community college classes, you made fun of me, and asked me if I was taking underwater basket weaving. You even visited a few of the classes in an attempt to ridicule me. The professor asked if I would drop out, because you were disturbing the other students.

Every time I tried to better myself, you knocked me down—figuratively-speaking, of course. I’ll say this, Randy, you never laid a hand on me. I would have left you the minute you had. Or at least that’s what I hope I would have. Plenty of women leave their men when the hitting begins. Too many don’t, though.

But you didn’t have to hit me with your hand. You hit me in other ways. Mentally, psychically, emotionally. The bruises were inside.

So, you despised me and my likes, and when I tried to change, you despised me all the more. You wanted to mold me, mold me into what, I don’t know.

I may have been young when we married, but I wasn’t mindless. That’s what you needed. Some mindless little bimbo or groupie type who would have hung on every word you spoke, who would willingly have done anything and everything for you.

You knew from the beginning I wouldn’t.

And maybe that’s what intrigued you, maybe that’s what made you want me all the more. Kind of like a rider who sees a wild horse he’s got to tame.

You tried to tame me, you really did. Or rather—break my spirit. It almost worked. Almost.

You despised me because you despised yourself. You were a no-talent, barely-get-by type of guy with zilch ambition. Only you had everyone fooled with your good looks and your charm. Those qualities can go a long way, but not everyone is fooled by them.

And the older you got, the more you realized that—just how empty you were, and how full I was. Empty...full...there’s another one of those little contrasts.

And so it wasn’t bad enough that you were a total bastard toward me. You decided to turn the kids against me. Every chance you could you ridiculed me in front of them, you told them how dumb I was, how stupid, how this or that, and all the time you were talking about yourself.

Of course, kids listen to their dads, and after a while, they began to see me the same way. No matter what I did, they thought I was dumb.

I almost walked out then. But I wanted to give our marriage a chance, I wanted to give the kids—and you—a chance.

I should have left, Randy, should have cut my losses then.

Then the kids could have seen just what sort of a “hero” you were. I’d like to have seen you try to fix their lunches, and do their laundry and make dinner for them after you’d been at work all day. But I forget...you wouldn’t have done that...you would have found some housekeeper right away, or you would have gone around, looking like such a sad sack, “betrayed” by his wife—and before long you’d had some other little girl-woman taking care of you. Your kind never does without for very long.

God, I’m tired. I’ve been cleaning the house from top to bottom. I’ve been going room by room, and it’s amazing how much you can get done if you really put your mind to it. Of course, there’s just me now in it, no one else to track mud through the just waxed kitchen floor, no one to spill soda or fruit juice on the carpet, no one to leave toothpaste gobs in the bathroom sink. I mean, I know I’m a little messy now and then, but I swear, hon, that I think you used to do it on purpose. I would just get something clean, and you’d go and drip something gooey on it, and I’d have to scrub it again. I know you got a big kick out of it—sometimes, even with my head down as I scrubbed, I could see you out of the corner of my eye, and you’d be grinning this big old grin. Yeah, that was a big kick for you. Really got your rocks off on it, didn’t you? Just another way to keep me under your thumb. Of course, the times I decided not to clean, not to sweep up after you and the kids, the place became a real pigsty, and I got worried for their health. Not yours, mind you, but theirs.

Not that it matters any more. Nothing much matters any more, I guess.

Except that I have a very clean house.

And I can sleep in as late as I want in the morning. No one demanding to know where their lunch is or their schoolbooks, didn’t I iron a shirt, why didn’t I do that, just as if the three of you couldn’t do a lick of work yourselves. I guess it was just easier to sit in front of the tube and have good ol’ Mom run your errands and wait on you like I was your maid.

That’s pretty much a pattern in my family, so I shouldn’t have been surprised. My mother waited on my father hand and foot, and even though he’d be sitting closer to something, he’d ask her to get it for him. And she’d do it. Her mother did it for my grandfather, too. I hated that when I was going up; I hated my father for using my mom like some work animal, and I hated her for going along with it. Never once did he thank her, or say, sit down, Bess, you’re tired, I’ll get my beer, I’ll make myself a sandwich, hey, do you want something too? Never. Not in over thirty years of marriage. She resented him, of course, and it would come out in little ways, tiny pettinesses, as if she were getting back at him for everything she’d ever suffered. I don’t think he ever noticed, though. My mother was too much of a “lady,” though, to ever publicly complain. She never said a word to me, either, just pressed her lips together whenever she heard him calling her from the front room.

I vowed that when I got married and had children I’d make them do things for themselves. There’s nothing wrong with fetching something for someone—if you’re up already or whatever, but to expect someone to do everything for you...well, they abolished slavery over a century ago, you know.

Somehow all my good plans went awry. All of a sudden, it seems, I found myself getting your cup of coffee, then leaping up during a commercial to get another cup for you so you wouldn’t miss your show, and then the kids came along, and I was doing this and that for them when they were too little, and suddenly they were bigger kids and still demanding too much from me.

But when I got sick last week and was too tired to do anything for anyone, you all got so belligerent with me. What the hell did I think I was doing? Who did I think I was? And the unkindest cut of all: didn’t I love you all anymore? For God’s sakes, I was sick! I was puking up my guts half the night, running a fever, and all you did was peevishly demand to know why I hadn’t done the laundry. I could have shit the sheets, and you would have just stood there and complained about the smell and not lifted your hands to change them.

I was getting real worried and wanted to go to the doctor for some medicine, but you kept saying there wasn’t anything really wrong with me, that I was just being lazy. Lazy. Right. I think I almost died I was so sick. I was out of my head with fever most of the time.

I guess that’s when I began to see things a lot more clearly. Maybe the fever helped. I don’t know. I just know that I started to feel a lot different after I was back on my feet.

And you were still pouting, still whining that I didn’t love you or the kids.

Of course, I did, but you can love someone almost too much. You can’t smother them, can’t do everything for them; kids—and adults—have to do things on their own. It’s how they become real people.

I’m still tired, you know. This illness really took it out of me. Let me close my eyes for a while. I just want to rest them. That’s what my grandmother always said. We used to tease her about it.

There now. I’m closing them. I’m resting. I’m....

Oh, God, did I doze? Jeez, I guess so. It’s nearly two. Excuse me, while I yawn.

You know for a moment there it was almost like old times. You and me and a drowsy do-nothing type of afternoon. You remember how we use to lay on the bed upstairs, with just the whisper of a breeze coming in the window, stirring those gauzy curtains I’d picked up at the flea market? We would talk for a bit, then drift off to sleep, then wake up again, to finish our conversation, just like minutes hadn’t passed. That was fun.

There were fun times, you know. Don’t think I’ve forgotten them. I haven’t. And there are many more memories I cherish as well.

It’s just that there were so many more bad times, and in the past few years that’s all I’ve had—bad times with you and the kids.

Sorry, Randy. Yawned again. I think I’m going to go to bed early tonight. I’ve got a lot of errands to run tomorrow, and I want to get them done before it gets too hot.

Boy, I wish we had a swimming pool. It sure would be nice to strip and take a swim. The best time would be at night, though, feeling that cool water against my warm skin. Lying in the moonlight, then taking another dip.... We were always going to put in a pool, remember, but somehow we never got around to it. There was always something else for us to spend our money on. The truck, the boat, the cabin at the lake. All the things that you enjoyed. Few of the things that I like.

Well, I guess that’s water under the bridge, or something like that now, right?

Just where did all our hopes go to, hon? What happened to that eager young woman, that attentive man? When did we become the people we are today?

I don’t know. I really don’t.

Maybe it all began to change when the kids came.

Everything changes in a marriage, they say, when you have kids. I didn’t think it would. Not really. I certainly didn’t think our situation would get worse. But it did. The kids might as well have had just one parent for all the help you gave me. If they saw you at all in the first year I’d be real surprised. But boy, when we were out, you sure took all the credit, just like you’d carried them yourself for nine months.

You know, I just never realized how much you envied me. It wasn’t just for having the kids, but for a lot of other things. Things I couldn’t see before. And here you always told me I was the empty vessel, waiting to have something poured in it.

You were wrong. Dead wrong. You were empty.

And that’s all I’ve got to say on the matter. Maybe I’ll be in a better mood tomorrow. Maybe not.

I gotta go.

There. Locked the car doors. I’d crack the windows, Randy, but you understand...the smell and all. I don’t want someone just happening by and getting a whiff of that.

Oh, the air out here is so nice and fresh. It is going to be a scorcher. That sun is so blistering—I knew I should have worn a hat. Oh, well, it’s not that long a walk back to the house.

You know, when we first moved here, I wasn’t sure about living in the country, but you told me that it’d be a good thing. You said it was better that we didn’t have neighbors for miles and miles. Who wanted noisy Parkers coming over any old time?

Well, hon, I think you’re right. Yes, I’m willing to concede on that point. I like being out in the middle of nowhere, with not another soul around for miles and miles and miles.

And this old shed proved to be perfect. It’s nice and remote, and I can keep your car here. And here I wanted to tear down this crummy thing—I mean, it’s so ugly, being metal and all, but no, you said we could store things out here.

You were right.

Damn, that’s twice, Randy. I’ve gotta watch that.

You understand why I didn’t want to use my car—it’s up at the house, by the way. C’mon, you know why...stains. And I just had it thoroughly cleaned inside and out, you know. You were always so picky about your car—there couldn’t be a blade of grass or scrap of paper in it, or you’d pitch a fit. That’s why we always had to take the kids in my car; little children leave gummy fingerprints on everything, and barf, and just generally make messes, and you couldn’t have that in your precious automobile. And you were forever washing it; I’m surprised the paint didn’t come off from all the waxing and polishing you did.

You know, I think you paid more attention to your car than to your kids or me.

This must just drive you nuts.

Oh, now, c’mon, you can sob all you want and try to scream, but you know you aren’t going to be heard with that gag. It’s real secure, and so are those handcuffs and the rope. If you don’t struggle, you won’t get choked by the noose. See, it’s a slip knot. My brother was a Boy Scout, and he taught me all the knots when I was a kid; he said he never saw anyone learn so quickly. I just hope you don’t chafe yourself too raw. You might bleed all over that precious leather upholstery. Besides, as you always pointed out, there’s no one for miles and miles to hear you or the kids.

I’ll just give the old trunk a thump—ah, yes, they’re still conscious. Hush, you two, be a good boy and girl. Daddy doesn’t like noise, you know, and you really ought to try to be nicer to him now that you’re all having this quality time together.

I’ll be back tomorrow, Randy, regular as clockwork. I haven’t missed a day in the past week, have I, although I reckon it won’t be much longer. I hear it’s supposed to get up over a 100 again tomorrow, with no let up in the temperature at all through the weekend. All this heat...and not a lick of wind. This old tin shed is a real oven.

I know I shouldn’t laugh, but here I was talking about all this two groups stuff, and it all comes down to this, Randy: alive.

Or dead.

See you tomorrow.

Maybe.