Long Division (29 page)

“This is great,” I said. “You didn't have to. But thanks. I'll use it. I'll enjoy it.”

“I don't care much for cheese, and Pete's really more of a beer guy.” Jenn had relaxed now that the gift was well received. We all said good-byes, Jenn rambled off several more apologies, and Pete whispered something into Gus's ear right before they turned and evaporated into the darkness of the side yard.

Gus and I returned to our chairs, and I flipped the gift certificate around in my hands.

“Wow,” I said.

“No kidding,” Gus said.

“What did Pete tell you when he left?”

“He said that he'd taken Helen's—um—remains and placed them in a cedar cigar box. And if you don't want to bury it or anything, he said you can just throw it away.” I knew that this was the type of kindness that melted Gus's heart then nearly bubbled it out of his chest. He was grinning so hard, but trying to fight it back like he was worried I'd find his smile inappropriate. I laughed.

“That's incredible,” I said, giving him the green light to let his cheeks flex freely. “I bet it's the cigar box from his wedding night.” And then Gus jumped up from his chair.

“Hold on a second,” he said and bolted toward Helen's coop. He bent down to the handle that pulled the drawer-floor-egg-retriever out from the bottom of the house. He looked at me. “Annie, do you mind?” I shook my head. Gus pulled out the drawer slowly. He placed his hands on his knees and leaned his face in close to the shavings—a dangerous proximity to an understandably rank blend of smells. And then I heard him sigh. Not a defeated sigh, but a quick, relieved, almost surprised sigh. He returned to the patio and squatted before me, his face serene, almost blank.

“Miss Harper,” he said with his hands pressed together in a gentle bowl, cradling the smooth brightness of Helen's final gift to me.

“Her last egg,” I whispered, not taking my eyes off it. It was perfectly shaped and glowing. Like Helen had gathered all the sunlight of the day and condensed it into this ultimate creation. I looked up at Gus, who was smiling now: half sad, half happy for me. “How should I cook it?” I asked. We both crunched our faces up for a minute, silently going through egg preparation methods, analyzing them for levels of tastiness, beauty, and respect. I couldn't decide.

“Wait,” Gus said. “Don't. Don't cook it. Let me take it home, and I'll bring it back for you tomorrow.”

“Why?” I was too tired, too semidrunk, and too brain-dead to even wonder what Gus had in mind.

“Just trust me, Annie.” And I did. I thanked Gus for coming over, and he thanked me for letting him help. We picked up the beer bottles and I noted how the clanking sound would normally cause Helen to skitter around in her coop. Before he left, Gus asked me if I'd read much of
Annie Harper's Journal
yet. I told him that I had not, but I would do so soon. He seemed rather anxious about it. Then he went home.

I couldn't sleep for a while. I kept thinking about how not sad I was about Helen. When I thought about her brutal, violent murder, my stomach turned and my chest tightened, but when I thought about her being dead—being gone forever—I didn't actually feel too bad. Sure, I loved her. And I know that she helped me tremendously over these last few months. It was like Helen was her own kind of war victim. A veteran who served with honor, loyalty, and pluck. But she was a
chicken.
I almost feel ridiculous writing this. Maybe it's glaringly obvious, but my sadness for her loss is nothing like what I feel over the loss of Flores—of Brother Alden. If anything, her death reminds me of the travesty that is theirs. And I didn't even know Flores and Alden! I have no real excuse to be sad about anything! David, the Flores family, BHH Barbara, Alden's adoption-balking mother, and anyone else whose loved ones actually die in actual unlucky ticks of the universe, now they have the right to shed buckets of tears. I wonder how David is doing with it. I wonder why I don't know.
¹²⁸

 

I spent the next day over at my parents' house helping my mother in the garden. We both wore large-brimmed hats, and we chatted during the commercial breaks of
This American Life
on NPR. Both of my parents were very sweet about Helen's death. My mother hugged me and said things like
Oh, sweetie. And you've already been through so much.
And! It didn't bother me. So my mother and I share a similar penchant for melodrama. She says out loud all the same things I kind of think inside.

“Don't think for a second, Annie, that this is your fault. Accidents happen. Helen had a good life.” Awww, my sweet mother. If she only knew of my other failures. I should really talk to her more. As if there aren't enough slimy layers of guilt in my life, spending the day with my dear parents reminded me of how little I've used their proffered support over the last year. Not that I don't value the relationship I've fostered with Loretta, but why did I open up to her when I had them? They are also smart. They are so openly loving. I guess my intentions with Violet Meadows were originally rooted in escapism. I thought being with Loretta would take me away from my own life, but then I went and turned it into another wing of the Annie-centric Universe. Jeez Louise.

My dad offered to come over and help me tear down the coop if I wanted. I told him I wasn't sure yet and that maybe I'd get a new chicken in due course. My parents didn't note the absurdity of the whole thing. They thought that Pete and Jenn seemed great and were so glad Gus was there to support me. We grilled a lovely piece of salmon. Ate it at the kitchen table with the windows open, the omega-3 pumping through our bodies, lubing up our innards, and moistening our eyes while we talked for a bit about Alden and what kind of kid he might have been. For once it was nice to be around my parents while emotionally troubled. They somehow made it easy to pretend that I'm actually fine. And they were so good at supporting and loving me in my fineness that I almost believed that the fineness was real. It's easy to be the old me around them. The one who was a devout wartime girlfriend. The one who believed she loved David Peterson loads and loads and loads and loads.

 

When I got home there was a small box on the welcome mat of the front door. From the driveway, I thought it was Helen's cigar-box coffin, but I soon realized it was cardboard and far too cubelike. I took the box inside and set it on the kitchen table. It was unmarked, and the flaps were taped down with clear tape. I ran a knife across the tape and the flaps popped open. The box was stuffed to the brim with popcorn—white and unbuttered.
¹²⁹
I ate a few pieces and carefully brushed the top layer aside, digging into the box gently with my fingers. My thumb brushed against a thin plastic cord and I grabbed it. Pulled it up.

It was so magnificent, I gasped. Painted blue with daisies and irises blooming up from the base. On the top of the egg was a golden sun with orange rays swirling down the slopes of the sides. Two of the rays wove together and bonded in an elegant cursive scrawl.
Helen,
it said. Not too big to distract from the aesthetic of the design, but not small enough to go easily unnoticed. The surface was shiny, smooth, and sturdy: obviously the product of a careful shellac job. There was a tiny hole on the bottom and two others on the top where the cord was attached. I imagined Gus's gangly hands, smashed together in still concentration, gripping the tiny eye of a needle. I could see his full lips tenderly pressed to the shell, his cheek muscles tense, his lungs lightly blowing the yolk and the white into a small glass bowl. Affixed to the top of the cord was a mini plastic suction cup. It confused me for a moment, but then I understood. I stood up, dangling Helen's last egg between my thumb and forefinger. I carried it to the window by the sink and cautiously pressed the suction cup to the glass. I felt my cheeks pinch into a wide, healthy smile before dropping abruptly. And then I cried.

And cried.

And cried.

 

And cried.

T
oday I'm calling my book
What I Did on My Boyfriend Vacation
, and it's a five-paragraph essay handwritten on wide rule. There are three spelling mistakes and one unfortunate incident of subject-verb disagreement. Go ahead. Fail me. See if I care.
¹³⁰

 

David calls two days after Helen dies, and I tell him the whole story. When I'm done, this is the first question he asks/thing he says:
What kind of dog was it?
I don't know! I shout this at him.

“Aren't you supposed to say you're sorry for my loss first? Aren't you supposed to be comforting me? My pet was just murdered, David.” I'm genuinely annoyed.

“Sorry, babe. I was just curious. You didn't seem too upset when you told me. I mean, it's just a chicken. It's not like some animal with high brain power and the capacity to love.” And I want to say
What do you know about chickens?
or
Don't tell me about the capacity to love.
I want to say
Gus understands Helen
or
Gus feels bad; he made me a magical, beautiful commemorative fucking ornament about how bad he feels bad.
But I don't say any of those things.

“David. I didn't mean to pick a fight. It just doesn't seem like you're sad about it.”

“Annie. I'm
not
sad about it. You think with everything I'm going through and everything I'm seeing here, that I'd be
sad
about one slaughtered chicken? Thousands of chickens are killed every day. It's a
chicken!
I'm sorry. I'm just not sad.” Oh, how he has a very good point! But I can't help it; it bothers me.

“But Helen was
my
chicken,” I say in my small, whiny child voice. I almost add
and so you should be sad for me.
But I don't say that either. I tell David I know I'm being ridiculous. It's just that it was stressful for me, and that just because my stress is drastically different from his stress, it doesn't mean I'm not entitled to have it. However trivial it may be. And then I say something about how I don't really know what he's going through and therefore, I don't know how absurd my whining is by contrast. He acknowledges the validity of my points and starts telling me how one of his buddies just got the first season of
Da Ali G Show
on DVD and that they've been watching it every night and that it's sooo funny. Yawn.

 

I'm holding Loretta's hand when I tell her about Helen. I don't tell her about the feathers being everywhere because I don't want her to think Helen died after a miserable struggle. It's not the kind of thing you emphasize when discussing death with the ancient.

“Oh, Annie. I'm so sorry, dear.”

“It's okay. I'm fine. Helen was a great chicken. She brought me a lot of joy and taught me so much about being the best me.
¹³¹
And I definitely owe you for it. She
was
your idea.” Loretta lets go of my hand, flips both of her wrists at me, and settles them in her lap.

“Stuff-a-nonsense,” she says. “I owe
you
for putting you both
¹³²
through this.”

“Loretta, you're crazy. It's nobody's fault but that silly dog's. And maybe mine for not having a more secure yard.”

“Why is everyone always calling me crazy?” Loretta squacks, and we both laugh a bit. Later when she's sitting in her rocker and I'm on the bed—both of us playing video poker on mute
¹³³
—we talk about Flores for a while and how it's such a different type of loss.

“It's like how jars of salsa come in different levels of spiciness, but essentially it's just varied degrees of the same flavor,” I say. “Once I tasted the zing and the sharp punch of Flores's death,
¹³⁴
the loss of Helen was rather mild. Sad, but gently so.” And then I stare out the window for several long moments and think about how much I sound like Gus.
The unmistakable fl avor of grief. The pasty hands of boredom.
“Hey Loretta,” I say when I snap out of it. “There's something I want to show you.” I tell her the story about how after Pete and Jenn left, Gus found Loretta's final egg. And then I reach into my purse for the small Tupperware container and carefully lift out the ornament for Loretta's inspection. And approval. She smiles, obviously, because it's so damn pretty. Her eyes narrow and she hands it back to me gingerly.
¹³⁵
Our fingertips touch for a moment in the exchange. Loretta looks at me: two parts seriousness, three parts knowing, two parts happy.

“I see now, Annie.” She folds her hands in her lap. “What the dickens are you going to do?”