Читать книгу What To Keep - Mary Schramski - Страница 12

Magnolia Hall

Greensville, NC

June 2000

I’m staring at Grey Alexander’s picture. Weird, I know, but after I spent a half hour trying to convince Tildy I can’t let her work here because I have no money to pay her and there’s really not much for her to do, I came into the library, picked up the picture I found yesterday. Maybe I was trying to center myself or some damned thing.

The centering thing isn’t working. I honestly thought Tildy would agree when I explained there was nothing that needed cleaning. But when she said she couldn’t possibly leave me all alone in this house, I knew I wasn’t making any headway. Then she told me she could dust the baseboards, mop floors, wipe out the cupboards, cook and, with a big smile on her face, she announced she wanted to keep me company!

I’m still wondering what “keeping me company” means to her. However she brought coffee, cream, sugar with her. She made a pot and the first sip was heaven.

Finally, I gave up trying to convince her to go home. She was blabbing on about family and my father, how he grew up here and she was so fond of him. Maybe that’s why I wandered into the library and picked up Grey’s picture.

“Your head hurting you?”

I look toward the door, and Tildy’s voice. “No, I’m fine.”

“Your forehead’s all wrinkled up like you have a headache.”

“I didn’t sleep well last night.”

“Mr. Grey never had trouble sleeping. Something bothering you?”

“Not much.” I laugh. “I’m only in a strange house, in a strange town. And I have no idea how I’m going to get the wall upstairs repaired so I can sell this place and get back to my life.”

“It’s gotta be more than that.”

“Isn’t that enough? Think if you had to go out to Vegas, didn’t know any one.”

“What you got there?”

“It’s a picture of Grey. I found it yesterday.” I stare at it. “He looks like my father—at least what I remember.”

“Yes, they do resemble each other. But they were different. Mr. Grey, why, he loved this house and the idea of family. He was a real Southerner.”

“And my father?” A wave of regret washes over me. I don’t want to know any more. My father left me years ago and I don’t know anything about him.

“As I recall, he always wanted to go away, travel. He joined the air force when Mr. Grey begged him not to. Mr. Grey even found a way to get him out of what he signed. Then he met your mama on leave in California. When your daddy came back with you and your mama, he just seemed restless, like he needed to get away again. And your mama was a mess. She didn’t like it here. Said she was homesick, missed the ocean. So off you all went.”

My mother was full of contradictions. Although she claimed to love the ocean, she never went back after she and my father split. She kept huge, full boxes that had been opened and closed too many times. Every Thanksgiving she would rustle through them, show me sparkling dresses, memory after memory. She’d hold up a blue velvet and sigh, then explain how pretty she looked when she wore it. I stopped asking questions because she’d never answer any.

Another cardboard box was filled with picture albums. Her fingertips touched the images and she’d say how she wished I looked like her. She never talked about my father, and if I asked, she’d stare at me with those soft blue eyes and shake her head, then mention a time before she married, when her life had hope. She’d hold up her yellowing souvenirs, make up pretty lies, then drop them back in their hiding places.

“Your daddy was different. Mr. Grey loved memories, loved his history.” Tildy’s words bring me back. “I remember how your mama and daddy used to sit out on the porch, right out there—” her hand kind of flutters toward the front of the house “—and talk about going home. California certainly wasn’t your daddy’s home. But he seemed to love your mama so much. I guess that’s why he went back.”

Love.

The idea of my parents loving each other is so foreign to me. When she spoke of my father or his family her voice was always brittle. Yet, I hold one image so clear. It was before they divorced. Right before my father was due to come back from a trip my mother would shower, comb her hair and spray Emerada perfume in a halo around her, then sit on the couch and look out the window, as if she couldn’t wait to see him. She always told me it wouldn’t be long until his plane landed and he drove up the driveway. Then months later, she packed our bags, climbed into the blue Oldsmobile and drove all night to Las Vegas, not saying a word, just the glow from the dashboard on her Grace Kelly cheekbones, her tight jaw like a cup, holding all her anger.

I look at Tildy. “I don’t really care about my father.”

A tiny gasp escapes from her. “Sure you do! He’s your family. And Mr. Grey loved family, loved this house, his things because they reminded him of family.”

I shake my head. “Right! Then why is the house practically empty?” I fan his photograph at her.

Tildy takes the picture, as if to protect it. “That’s a real long story. We’ll get to that.”

“There’s nothing personal of his…” I stop. Why am I saying all this? I don’t care.

“I cleaned up when he died. I knew you wouldn’t want to see his hairbrush, maybe find dandruff in it, his toilet items. He was a very private man. He would have wanted it that way. I wanted you to know the nice things about him, know how orderly he was.”

“Orderly! He didn’t even make a will.”

“He thought about living, not dying. Even when your daddy died and we took his ashes to the Greensville family plot, your uncle said your daddy was living in the trees, the grass, the wind. Right after he said those words, an airplane cut a path over us. Not one of those big jets but a little tiny thing, looked like it was just big enough for one person. We all looked up, even the preacher. Mr. Grey said it was a sign from God that James Alexander, your daddy who’d been a pilot all his adult life, was right there with us, and real close to the sky that was so blue.”

I try not to laugh but can’t help myself. Tildy’s big brown eyes widen.

“I’m sorry, that’s just so…silly.”

“It’s the truth.”

“I didn’t mean it didn’t happen. It was probably a coincidence.”

She steps back just a little, looks at me. “I thought you’d like that story.”

I feel like a shit for saying anything. “I did, really. It’s just a lot to take in.”

Her hand touches my shoulder then it’s gone.

“I know.”

“This is the first time I’ve heard anything about my father’s funeral.” I shake my head. “What the hell difference does it make? I don’t even care, really. I was young.”

“Yes, you do. Anybody would.”

“How many people attended?”

“Oh, honey, not many. Mr. Grey and Sara and Sara Lee, they’re old friends of the family. My Alexandria attended, made me proud. The preacher knew your daddy when he was a little boy, and he read that poem about flying. I only remember a few words—‘Oh, I have slipped the surly bonds of earth and’…my land, I can’t recall the rest. But it was beautiful.”

I close my eyes and remember the poem my father used to recite when he drove me to kindergarten. I look at Tildy, “‘Oh, I have slipped the surly bonds of earth and danced the skies on laughter-silvered wings.’”

“That’s it. I thought it was appropriate.”

I wonder what it would have been like, standing in a graveyard, watching what was left of my father go into the ground and hearing that poem read by someone else.

“Your daddy would have wanted you there.”

“Maybe not.” My voice sounds so small. I think about my mother telling me, weeks after my father’s death, that he had died. I was fifteen, sitting on the couch by the window, painting my fingernails with Pink Puff Maybelline Fast-Drying Nail Polish. She walked into the living room, stood in front of me, her arms crossed.

“Don’t get that on the couch.”

“I won’t.”

“Your father—” she took a long breath “—died.”

I looked down and thought, who? When I glanced up, she was gone. I could hear her in the kitchen, filling a glass with ice, then vodka and orange juice. I swallowed hard, told myself I needed to cry but couldn’t. I felt dead inside. It was as if Peter Jennings had announced one of the cast from a black-and-white sitcom had passed away. I knew the character—but not really.

“Sad things happen in life,” Tildy says.

“Did anyone cry?” I imagine myself crying, the wind blowing through my hair, the early May sun practically blinding me as I look up, watch the airplane cut the blue sky.

“I did. Your daddy was nice when we were children. My mama always went on about how Mr. James picked up his clothes and was neat as a pin in the bathroom.”

That day my mother told me about my father’s death, I got off the couch, heard my mother place the vodka bottle back on the top shelf above the silky green ironstone dishes. I walked into the kitchen, my hands in my pockets, nail polish sticking to my soft blue cotton shorts. I needed her to say something to me.

She was leaning against the white counter, the small of her back pressing against it. The glass rim rested against her red lipsticked lower lip, her eyes dull—flat.

“What should I do?” I asked.

“Nothing. Not one goddamned thing. He never came around, and the funeral is over anyway.”

“Mr. Grey didn’t believe in death,” Tildy says, breaking into my memory. “I don’t think he ever accepted Mr. James or Miss Charlotte’s death.” She studies my uncle’s picture. “This was taken a few years back when Mr. Grey used to go out. That was the night of the Sons of the American Revolution annual dinner.”

“Sons of the American Revolution? They still have groups like that?”

“Yes. Mr. Grey, he was big into his groups. Liked to carry on the family name. When he got cancer his life was just sliced away, little by little. Every step was a big shock to him and I think up to the very end, he believed it wasn’t happening—like maybe it was a bad dream. Magnolia Hall held him tight, but then she had to let him go.”

Tildy takes my hand and pats it. “Don’t worry. I knew him all my life. He would have wanted you to have this house. You’re family. It’s like giving it to your daddy—no, more like giving it to his sister, Charlotte. You have to trust in what has happened.”

My mind is swimming with all the memories, stories. “What I need is a drink.”

“Can I get you some iced tea?”

I laugh, realize my chest aches. “I was thinking about something stronger.”

“There’s no liquor in the house.”

“Maybe that’s why my mother was crying.” I laugh again, I guess to combat the uneasiness I feel.

Tildy gasps then covers her mouth.

“My mother was an alcoholic. I came to grips with that a long time ago.”

Tildy hands me the picture, and I look at it again, feeling like a ship without an anchor.

“There’s more of your father in you than your mother,” she says.

“Well, he was pretty much an SOB, too.”

“You’ll find out different. Maybe we shouldn’t be talking about this right now. Have you had anything to eat this morning? All that caffeine and no nourishment can make you say things you don’t mean. Just like my daughter. Goodness alive, doesn’t anyone take care of themselves anymore?”

I lay the picture on the bookshelf. Her hand brushes my elbow and before I can take another breath, the woman guides me to the kitchen.

“It’s been a month of Sundays since I had somebody to cook for, take care of. Feels good.”

She goes to the kitchen sink and looks out the window. Recognition flashes through my mind. I watched her in this room, years ago, right before we left for California, right before our lives came unglued.

“I’m gonna cook you something real Southern, something so sumptuous your little mouth is going to water—”

“You don’t have to cook for me.”

Tildy shifts, rests her hands on her lush hips. “I have cooked for everyone in this house. You aren’t going to be any different. No arguing. What did you say you did in Las Vegas?”

“I’m a blackjack dealer.”

“Well, my, my. You don’t look like a blackjack dealer. If you wore glasses, maybe a librarian. They have libraries in Las Vegas?”

I laugh. Everyone from the outside thinks Las Vegas isn’t a real town. “Sure.”

“So why didn’t you become a librarian or a teacher?”

“I don’t know.”

“Mr. Grey, he loved books and the room he kept them in. So did your daddy.”

“It’s not much of a library.”

Tildy’s smile slips away, which makes me feel bad.

“I mean, it’s a nice room, and all, but there’s only a few books.”

“It was a wonderful library long time ago. Every shelf full with all the classics, real comfortable chairs and a sofa that was covered in a beautiful green brocade—don’t you remember?”

“No. What happened to all of it?”

“After he got sick, doctors took a lot of the money. He’d let his insurance lapse. The state helped him a little with social security. But to get all the benefits he would have had to give up Magnolia Hall and he wouldn’t. So he gave things away.”

“Gave them away…how would that help?”

“That’s what we called it.”

“What? Why?”

“The last Saturday of each month, Mr. Grey had me take something up to an antique store in Mocksville so people around here wouldn’t find out.”

“So he sold them?”

“We like to think of it as giving them away. The man had his pride. After a while, the owner came down here with a truck, every third Saturday of the month. It was so sad to see bits of Mr. Grey’s life slipping out that door, like ham on a cutter—one thin piece after another. I don’t think he died of the cancer. Giving up all his family possessions was what really killed him.”

“Maybe he would have been smarter to sell the house, buy a nice condo, go on vacation. Not worry about this place, his memories.”

Tildy looks around like she’s not listening. “It’s a better day with you here. Don’t you worry, this house is gonna be just fine. It always survives.”

She’s serious. “As soon as I get the bedroom wall fixed, I’m going to list with—”

“I told Mr. Grey he shouldn’t put off fixing that wall. Said he’d do it when he had time. Then he didn’t have no more time, no more money.”

“Do you know anyone who might repair the wall?”

“I can check around, but, honey, Magnolia Hall’s never been sold. Any of your mama’s family out there in Nevada? Or a boyfriend that might help you?”

“No and no.” I make check marks in the air with my right index finger.

“Then that’s not much of a home to go back to.”

“But it’s where I live, work. I can’t deal blackjack here.”

“You have a house here. You could do something else.”

It seems like years since I stood at my apartment window and looked over the parking lot, read the pink slip from the Golden Nugget.

“What did your mother think of your husband?”

I look at Tildy. She’s smiling. It’s amazing how her mind slips from one subject to another. Maybe she does have a screw loose.

“Ex-husband. And she died before I met him.”

I met Bill one night with some people from work. We went to the Paris Hotel to eat at the buffet. The Paris is supposed to make visitors feel like they’re in France. Bill was dealing blackjack. The man had great hands, a great body. As he was shuffling the cards, he looked at me, winked. Twenty minutes later on his break, he walked around the table and started talking, and that was the end of my life as I knew it. Before Bill, I paid the rent, the gas, the lights; after, my overdrawn checkbook tells the story.

We went out the next night and Bill told me he was dealing blackjack until he could get his computer company started. Claimed he had a degree in computer science. Right!

Three months later we were married. He charged things on my credit cards, didn’t pay one goddamned bill, then split with everything I owned.

“What do you think she would have thought of your husband?” Tildy asks, smiles again.

“Who?”

“Your mama.”

“She probably wouldn’t.” I look around the kitchen. “My mother didn’t have much use for husbands.”