Читать книгу November Road - Lou Berney - Страница 11

While everyone else gathered around the television in the living room, Charlotte inspected the dining table to see what she might have forgotten. She’d been awake since five-thirty that morning, baking and basting and grating and mincing. And last night she’d stayed up until almost midnight, polishing the silverware and ironing the Irish-lace tablecloth that Dooley’s parents had given them for their wedding.

Had she slept at all? She wasn’t entirely sure. At one point, lying on her back in the darkest hollow of the night, she’d felt the dog’s whiskery muzzle twitching close to her mouth, making sure she was still breathing.

Dooley’s mother, Martha, popped into the kitchen. “Need any help, Charlie?” she said.

“No thank you,” Charlotte said. “I’m just about ready.”

“You’re sure?”

“Yes.”

Both Martha and Dooley’s father, Arthur, were lovely people, gracious and unfailingly kind. If Charlotte had left the silver unpolished, the tablecloth unironed, if she’d forgotten the rolls or the cranberry sauce, they would have made a point not to notice.

Which made it worse somehow. Charlotte wished that her in-laws were less gracious, less lovely. Better a pair of cruel snippers, icy snubbers, implacable adversaries she could never hope to appease. The searchingly earnest way Dooley’s father studied Charlotte, the way his mother would reach out, unprompted, to pat Charlotte’s hand—their pity, at times, was agonizing.

In the living room, the mood was hushed and grim. The television report showed a horse-drawn caisson bearing the president’s casket from the White House to the Capitol. A reporter broke in to confirm that Lee Harvey Oswald, who had been shot earlier that morning, was dead.

Charlotte saw that Joan and Rosemary had snuck back inside to watch the TV.

“Rosemary,” she said. “Joan.”

Rosemary prepared to deliver arguments for the defense. “But, Mommy—”

“But nothing,” Charlotte said. “I told you to go play outside with your cousins.”

The girls had already been exposed to far too many hours of disturbing television news for which they were far too young. They understood that a bad man had killed the president of the United States. They didn’t need to know all the gruesome details.

“But they’re playing fort,” Rosemary said.

“So?” Charlotte said.

“They said we can’t play fort with them because we’re just girls.”

Before Charlotte could answer, Dooley’s brother, Bill, handed Charlotte his empty beer bottle. “I sure could use another one of these, Charlie,” he said.

During grace, her eyes closed and head bowed, Charlotte’s thoughts returned to that eleven-year-old girl knifing her way fearlessly across the river seventeen years ago. The following winter Charlotte’s father—just turned thirty-two, the very picture of ruddy health—had suffered a heart attack and died. His death devastated her. For the first time, Charlotte learned that life’s currents were more treacherous than she’d thought, that she was not as strong a swimmer.

After that … what happened? Charlotte’s mother, a distant and timid woman, grew even more so. She discouraged Charlotte from taking risks, from standing out, from expecting too much. Before too long Charlotte proved quite adept at discouraging herself. She’d enrolled at the University of Oklahoma instead of at one of the smaller colleges closer to home (though her mother discouraged it), but the moment Charlotte stepped foot on campus, she was overwhelmed. She’d just turned seventeen, she’d never been away from Woodrow before, she knew not a soul. In October, only six weeks into the semester, she packed her things and fled back home.

She found a job at the bakery, which is where one afternoon she struck up a conversation with a handsome customer. Dooley was three years older than Charlotte, so she hadn’t known him well in school. But he was friendly, fun, and he didn’t take himself as seriously as the other boys in town. He asked her out, and soon after that they started going together. Soon after that she married him and they moved into a house three blocks from the one she’d grown up in. Soon after that she was pregnant with Joan. Soon after that she was pregnant with Rosemary. Soon after that was right now.

“Mommy,” Rosemary whispered. “It’s your turn.”

“My turn?” Charlotte said.

Her turn. If only life were like that, Charlotte thought, a game where every round you were allowed to spin the wheel again, to pluck a fresh card from the pile. Though who was to say that a new spin or a fresh card would improve your position on the board?

There’s always a bumpier road than the one you’re driving on, Charlotte’s mother had always cautioned her. Be content with what you have, in other words, because the alternative is probably even worse. Her mother shared this philosophy when, for example, Charlotte complained that the math teacher in eighth grade refused to let any of the girls in class ask questions. When her boss at the bakery followed Charlotte into the back room and pressed her up against the wall. When Charlotte began to worry that Dooley, her fiancé at the time, was drinking too much.

“It’s your turn to say what you’re thankful for, Mommy,” Rosemary said.

“Well, let me see,” Charlotte said. “I’m thankful for my two beautiful daughters. I’m thankful for the family that could be with us today. I’m thankful for this wonderful Sunday dinner.”

Dooley carved the roast. The knife in his hand was steady. Each slice of the meat flopped onto the platter perfect and glistening. Whenever his parents came over for dinner, Dooley limited himself to a single beer or glass of wine. Even though his parents knew, everyone knew, that five minutes after the last guest was gone, Dooley would be out the door, too. Claiming that he had to pick up cigarettes or mail a letter or put gas in the car, back in a jiffy.

Early afternoon, the light from the dining-room window stern and wintry and uncompromising. Interesting light. Rosemary reached for the salt, and Dooley’s father reached for the rolls, and Dooley passed the gravy boat across to his mother. The arms overlapped and interlocked, creating frames within the frame, each a perfect miniature still life. An eye, a pearl in a necklace, the stripe of a tie. Charlotte wished that she had her camera handy. She’d get down low, shoot up from the surface of the table.

“The world is going to hell,” Dooley’s brother was saying. “Pardon my language, ladies, but it’s the truth. Kennedy, Oswald, Ruby, civil rights. Women thinking that they can do anything a man can do.”

“But shouldn’t they be allowed to try at least?” Charlotte said. “What’s the harm?”

Bill didn’t hear her and charged ahead, lifting his fork higher and higher with each point he made.

“It’s a battle for civilization, just like in the movies,” Bill said. “Fort Apache. That’s what a place like Woodrow is like. We’re the only ones left to fight off the Indians. We’ve got to circle the wagons, protect what this country stands for before it gets turned upside down by people who are all turned inside out. The Negro, for example. What most people don’t realize, the Negro prefers a separation of the races just as much as you or I do!”

Dooley and his father nodded along. Charlotte was curious to know when exactly the Negro had confided this preference to Bill, but she lacked the energy—or was it the courage?—to ask him. Bill was the second-most successful lawyer in Logan County and had never lost a case. Dooley’s father was the most successful lawyer in Logan County. If Charlotte dared dip a toe in a discussion about politics, the men would genially and implacably expose the various flaws in her logic, the way one might pick every last bone from a fish.

Charlotte’s sister-in-law touched her arm and gushed about a new pattern—a free-line overblouse on a pleated stem—that she’d discovered.

“It’s a terrible tragedy, what happened,” Dooley’s father said, “but the silver lining is that Johnson is an improvement on Kennedy. Johnson isn’t nearly so liberal. He’s from the South and understands the importance of moderation.”

“I can’t decide between a thin plaid wool or a whisper-check cotton,” Charlotte’s sister-in-law told her. “What’s your vote?”

Charlotte glanced over and noticed that Joan was watching her. Seeing what? Charlotte wondered. Learning what?

After dinner the men retired to the living room, the children went outside to play, and Charlotte started on the dishes. Dooley’s mother followed her into the kitchen. Charlotte tried to shoo her away from the dirty plates, but Martha ignored her and began to scrape.

“How have you been, dear?” Which meant, Charlotte knew, How has he been?

“Just fine,” Charlotte said.

“Those girls are little angels.”

“Well. Accounts vary.”

Martha placed a plate on top of the stack. “We spoiled him terribly,” she said after a moment. “The youngest, you know.”

Charlotte shook her head. “No, Martha,” she said. If anyone was to blame for the man Dooley had become, it was Charlotte. As his girlfriend she’d been stupidly blind to his flaws. As his wife she’d indulged him because the alternative was too difficult to contemplate.

“We’d like to pitch in, Arthur and I,” Martha said.

Charlotte shook her head again, the familiar ritual. “You’ve done too much already, Martha.”

“We know how hard it can be for a young couple.”

Charlotte’s eyes welled without warning, a hot, stinging shame. She turned to wipe down the stove so that Martha wouldn’t see. So that Martha could slip the folded bills into the pocket of her apron.

“Really,” Charlotte said. “It’s not necessary.”

“We insist,” Martha said. “We just wish it was more.”

Thirty minutes later they were gone, Dooley’s parents and his brother and sister-in-law, their three boys, all of them headed home. Five minutes after that, Charlotte was filling the roasting pan with hot water and dish soap when Dooley strolled into the kitchen, his coat and hat and gloves already on.

“We’ll need some milk for tomorrow morning, won’t we?” He gave her a kiss on the cheek. “I better run up there before the store closes.”

“Your mother gave us another three hundred dollars,” Charlotte said.

He rubbed the back of his neck. Dooley preferred to enjoy the fruits of charity without having to acknowledge the tree or the picking.

“Well, dang it, Charlie,” he said. “I don’t want their money. We don’t need it.”

She wanted to laugh. Instead she turned off the hot water and stepped away from the cloud of steam. “She insisted.”

“Well, next time you tell her no, Charlie. You understand?” He started edging toward the door. “Anyway, I better run up and get that milk.”

“And you’ll be back in a jiffy,” she said, “right after you have just one drink.”

That stopped him in his tracks. His expression reminded her of the picture that had been on TV all afternoon: Lee Harvey Oswald bent double, his mouth a startled O as Jack Ruby fired a bullet into his stomach.

Charlotte had surprised herself, too. But in for a penny, in for a pound. “We can’t keep on like this,” she said.

“Keep on like what?” he said.

“Let’s sit down and talk about it, honey. Really talk, for once.”

“Talk about what?”

“You know what.”

His face darkened, a gathering storm of righteous indignation. When he was drunk, he swore that he would never in his life touch another drop of liquor. When he was sober, he swore that he had never in his life touched a drop.

“What I know,” he said, “I know the girls are going to need some milk for their cereal in the morning.”

“Dooley …”

“What’s the matter with you, Charlie? Why do you want to ruin Sunday for everybody?”

She felt her energy drain away. He would keep at this, keep at her, for as long as it took. When you stood between Dooley and a bottle, he was the surf pounding the cliffs to sand. Surrender was the only sensible course of action.

“Go ahead,” she said.

“Don’t you want the girls to have milk for their cereal in the morning?”

“Go ahead. I’m sorry.”

He left, and she folded the tablecloth. She swept up the crumbs under the dining-room table and checked on the girls in their room. Rosemary had no fewer than three different Disney True-Life Adventures books open before her. Prowlers of the Everglades, The Vanishing Prairie, and Nature’s Half Acre. Joan was carefully clipping squares from sheets of colored construction paper. The dog lay curled between them on the bottom bunk, his usual spot.

“What are you doing, sweetie?” Charlotte asked Joan.

“She invented a game,” Rosemary said. “She’s going to teach me how to play when she’s finished inventing it. Where’s Daddy?”

“He ran up to the store,” Charlotte said.

Joan lifted her head. A look flashed between her and Rosemary. Or did Charlotte just imagine it? They were still too young, surely, to understand.

“What are the rules of the game, Joan?” Charlotte said.

“They’re very complicated,” Rosemary said. “Aren’t they, Joan?”

“Yes,” Joan said.

“Mommy?” Rosemary said. “Is Mrs. Kennedy very, very sad because the president died?”

“I would think so, yes,” Charlotte said.

“What will she do now?”

“What will she do? I’m not sure. Do you mean—”

“Who will she live with?” Rosemary said. “Who will take care of her?”

The question surprised Charlotte. “Why, I imagine that she’ll take care of herself.”

Rosemary looked doubtful. Another look flashed between her and Joan. “Mommy?” Rosemary said.

“One more question,” Charlotte said. “And then I have to get the clothes off the line before it’s dark.”

“You’d be very, very sad if Daddy died,” Rosemary said, “wouldn’t you?”

“Daddy’s not going to die. I promise.”

“But you’d be very, very sad.”

“Of course I would,” Charlotte said, and she meant it. Dooley wasn’t a bad person—far from it. He loved Charlotte and loved the girls, and he’d never once lifted a hand to any of them in anger. And the drinking … Deep down, she knew, he genuinely wanted to quit. One day, perhaps, he’d manage to do it.

But suppose he did quit drinking. What then? Charlotte’s life would be easier, certainly, but would it be happier? The seconds and minutes and hours would continue to tick past. The weeks, the months, the years. The futures she might have had, the women she might have become, those ghosts would grow fainter and fainter in the distance until they disappeared altogether. If Charlotte was lucky, she’d forget that they’d ever haunted her.

And the girls. It pained Charlotte that one day Rosemary and Joan might ask the same questions of themselves: What will we do? Who will take care of us?

Rosemary had turned back to her books, Joan to her squares of construction paper. Charlotte lingered in the doorway. She thought about her initial reaction to the assassination, how permanently fixed in her life the news had made her feel. But maybe that idea needed amendment. No, her world would never change—not unless she did something to change it.

The tornado might have blown Dorothy from Kansas to Oz, but Dorothy was the one who’d had to open the front door of the farmhouse and step outside.

Charlotte’s fingers touched the money in the pocket of her apron. Three hundred dollars. She had perhaps twice as much in the girls’ college savings account, money that Dooley didn’t know about and couldn’t squander.

Nine hundred dollars. It wasn’t nearly enough. But Charlotte didn’t let herself stop and think.

“Girls,” she said. “Go pack your suitcases.”

“Are we going somewhere?” Rosemary said, excited. “When are we leaving?”

Every now and then, Charlotte dreamed that she could fly. She’d be skipping to school, a child again, and then suddenly she’d find herself gliding weightlessly over cars, over trees, over entire houses. The secret was to not think about what was happening to you, what you were doing. Pretend it was just an ordinary day or the spell would be broken and down you’d come crashing.

“Mommy,” Rosemary said, “when are we leaving?”

“Now. In five minutes.”

“Is Daddy coming?” Joan said.

“No. It’s just us girls.”

“What about Lucky?” Rosemary said.

The dog. Oh, good Lord. But Charlotte couldn’t just leave the poor thing here. Dooley might forget to feed him or to give him his medicine. He might forget that the dog even existed.

“Lucky can come with us,” Charlotte said. “Now, hurry, go pack your suitcases.”

“Can I bring one doll or two dolls?” Rosemary said.

“One.”

“Are two small dolls the same as one big doll?”

“No.”

“But Joan can bring one doll, too. And we can each bring one book.”

“Yes. Now, go.”

Rosemary bounded away. Joan considered Charlotte solemnly.

“Where are we going, Mommy?” Joan said.

Charlotte reached out to smooth the golden hair that never needed it. “Let’s find out.”