Pearl (11 page)

Roy’s head jerked up from the fallen paper. “Why would you do something like that?”

Pearl swallowed hard. “Just for a change, I guess. But I wanted your opinion first.”

“My opinion is no.”
 

“Who knows, maybe you would like it,” she pressed.

He reached up and tucked a golden strand behind her ear. “But I like it now.”

She rested her cheek in his palm.

“Baby, don’t go and get all crazy and changing on me.” He smiled. “You want me to like what I see, don’t you?”

She urged a smile back.

Granny passed away the week before Thanksgiving. She had been laid up in bed with pneumonia, once again refusing any medical care. She died in her sleep as Pearl dreamt away in the attic above her. It was Vernie who found her the next morning. As if she’d known the end was coming, Granny made one last request the day before she died that Pearl and Roy marry so they could live in the trailer, free of sin, and Darren and Cindy could take over the farmhouse. On the following Monday, Roy took the day off from work so he and Pearl could be wed at the courthouse, Vernie as their only witness.
 

The day before the wedding, Vernie surprised Pearl with a large white box wrapped in ornate pastel ribbons. Pearl tore away at the paper in eagerness. The smile on her face gleamed as bright at Vernie’s. She could already feel the delicate cloth buried beneath the tissue. She giggled in delight, knowing it had to be the wedding dress she dreamed of that she had recently pointed out to Vernie as they passed the Bridal Corner. Yet as the last bit of tissue fell from the box, her eyes filled with tears, not from joy, but disappointment. Instead of the dreamy white sheath gown she had imagined, with pearl beading on the heart-shaped strapless bodice, she pulled out an aged puff of what she assumed was once an ivory dress.

“It was the dress I married Eddie in,” Vernie said proudly. “It will look even more beautiful on you than it did on me.”

Pearl lifted the heavy garment out of the box and did her best to smile at Vernie.
 

“It’s so very nice of you to let me borrow it,” Pearl attempted.

Vernie waved her away, standing Pearl up and pressing the dress against her skin. “Nonsense, we’re family now.” Vernie smiled. “Let’s try this on.”

The dress had to weigh twenty pounds. Pearl’s shoulders drooped forward due to the weight. The body was plastered in taffeta, with lace covering the length of the long sleeves all the way up to the high neck trim. Pearl thought she was going to suffocate. It was about six sizes too big, giving Pearl an unflattering bulge at the waist.

“I was a lot smaller back then,” Vernie said with a wink. “Still think it needs to come in for your skinny bones. Nothing a few safety pins can’t fix.”

Pearl refused to look herself in the mirror; instead, she let the tears flow down her cheeks without bothering to wipe them away.

“Oh, dear,” Vernie said giving her a hug. “I am so delighted you are happy. You look just lovely. Roy will be pleased as plum pie.”

On the day of the wedding, Pearl made her peace with the hideous dress. To Vernie’s disapproval, she wore her hair down and straight, feeling a little more like herself, and knowing Roy would prefer it that way. He stood next to her with a proud grin on his face as he wore his favorite pair of Levi’s and one of Darren’s faded black blazers. He slipped a gold band on her finger, promising to be faithful and true forever, then kissed her deeply until the judge finally cleared his throat. After the ceremony, Pearl changed into a more comfortable dinner dress, and she and Roy headed out to the finest steak restaurant in town. She beamed at his attention over dinner as he nestled up beside her, caressing her leg under the table and whispering sweet desires in her ear. He whisked her off her feet, carrying her into the house and up the stairs to what now was their room. She reached for him in the dark, anticipating her dream of their passionate wedding night. It was over before his pants touched the ground. He pushed himself off her, heaving like a fat dog that had run a hundred miles.
 

“I’m hungry,” he said, tossing his jeans to the corner. “I’m gonna go make a sandwich.” She made sure to fall asleep before he returned to bed.
 

Roy was back to work on the farm by Tuesday.
 

Pearl wrote her father about her beautiful intimate wedding. She said she wished both he and Billy could have been there, but with Granny on the brink of death, they had to rush to make sure she would still be around to see it. She described the gorgeous white strapless dress Vernie had bought her from the Brides Corner, and the complementary pink roses that flowed from the bouquet in her hand. She told him how thrilled she was when Roy surprised her with a three-day vacation to the beach, where they watched for whales and ate salty clams out of a bucket. She missed them terribly, and hoped to come home soon to visit. But there was so much to do with getting settled into their new home.

The trailer was a mess. Mold sank deep into corners that had been neglected for years. The floor, which had once been the color of sweet butter, now looked as if it was made to be a muddy brown with smudges of black. Pearl never took her shoes off, even after she vacuumed over the same area twenty times. Darren offered to leave their furniture until she and Roy made enough money to buy their own. It disgusted Pearl to even sit on the couch. She covered it with a sheet she took from Granny’s. She missed her rose-colored room that smelled of fresh lilies, and the clean hardwood floor and unsoiled furniture seemed like heaven compared to this hellhole she now called home. Roy would come in from work, the winter mud still on his boots as he walked through the house, not caring that Pearl had spent hours scrubbing away at the floors. He ate supper in front of the TV instead of at the table as Pearl waited hungrily for him to finish so she could eat her own. The few nights a week that he wasn’t out, he invited friends over to play poker, leaving Pearl locked up in her room listening to the loud roars of drunken men. On some of these nights she sneaked away to Vernie’s to sip moonshine and smoke on a Virginia.

“That boy is a fool for leaving you all alone,” Vernie said. “I raised him better than to be a drunken imbecile.”

“Were you happy?” Pearl asked. “When things were good in your marriage, I mean. Were you ever happy?”

Vernie shrugged. “I thought I was. Now, who’s to say? That damn man was a coward for walking out on me. He all but left me for dead.” She took a drag. “No, I’d say we were never happy.”

Pearl was silent a moment, sipping on her drink.
 

“My mom walked out on me.”
 

Vernie sighed, understanding in her expression. “Is that why you never speak of her?”

Pearl twirled the ice in her glass. “Mostly. I guess there really isn’t much to say. I don’t remember her as well as I wish I did. I have these dreams…” She paused to look at Vernie, who was nodding for her to continue. “I have these dreams where I see her like the day she left. It’s the only way I remember her. I can’t even picture her face any other way.”

“Do you not have any photographs of her?”

“One. But when I look at it, it doesn’t seem like it’s her. Like my dreams are more vivid. Is that strange?”

Vernie shook her head. “No, it’s not strange.”

“I know her voice.” Pearl bit her lip, treading on an untouched subject. “She’s a singer, that’s why she left. I have her CD.”

Vernie’s eyebrows rose. “You have her music with you?”

Pearl nodded. “I listen to it all the time.” She sat back in her seat, looking out on the stormy night through Vernie’s kitchen window. The wind whistled in the trees as the rain crashed down on the small cottage roof.

“It’s how I know she’s real.”

Vernie wrapped her arm around Pearl’s shoulder. “What a gift she has given you. I would love to hear it sometime.”

Pearl leaned into her embrace. “Sometimes I miss her so much I can’t breathe, and sometimes I feel like I don’t know her at all.”

“That’s the heart and the brain at war, dear.” Vernie gave her shoulders a light pat. “Usually the heart wins out.”

Vernie pulled back to look Pearl in the eye. “Let me make something very clear to you,” she said firmly. “It is she who is missing out on your life. Not the other way around. She is a spineless woman to leave such a precious gem. And I know that wherever she is, she is thinking about you.”

Pearl smiled though her tears. She walked home that night when the rain eased up, feeling a surge of happiness and sorrow that she had more of a connection with Vernie than she did with her own mother. She was grateful to Vernie for filling the void that had appeared in her heart all those years ago.
 

She returned to the bustling trailer, which reeked of stale beer and men’s horrendous body odor. She slipped in, unnoticed, and down the hall to their foreign bed. Sometime in the middle of the night Roy crawled in beside her as she lay fast asleep, the smell of sour liquor on his breath as he kissed her awake. He was rough while fondling her soft body with his coarse hands. She would moan from agony more than from pleasure as he pushed himself into her. Silently she would weep in the dark, his heavy body dripping from sweat on top of her.
 

Each day that passed was another day Roy drifted farther from the man Pearl thought she had married. She hardly recognized this forceful, inebriated commander and missed desperately the boy she had run away to be with. The fiercer he became, the happier he seemed, and Pearl began to sink deeper, pulling her shell over her head. She grew fearful of him and his impending temper. While he stomped around the house, berating her for every last flaw, Pearl hid herself in the corner, waiting for someone to save her.

CHAPTER 10

Christmas came and went as though it were no holiday at all. Money was tight on the farm. Granny’s inheritance went mostly to Vernie, with a small percentage each for Darren and Roy. More money was being spent keeping the farm running than was coming in. The stress took a toll on Roy. His quick temper increasingly became shorter. He spent most nights out, leaving Pearl frightened, and home alone in the dark. When he returned, liquor oozed out of his pores. Alcohol turned Roy into a beast, his hands quick to react at any unpleasant response from Pearl. She did what she could to please him, doing everything perfectly so as not to set him off. She knew that if only they could get on solid ground, they would be okay. A little more money, a little less stress, and she would have her old Roy back. She told him she would do anything to help. Roy suggested it was time for Pearl to get a job.

Sammie helped her out with a waitressing position at Vinny’s. She was taking over the night shift, wearing fat Patty’s old uniform, which was three sizes too big. Roy worried over her being gone at night and proved it by calling every hour to check in.
 

Vinny’s was a small diner on the back side of Mullington, across the railroad tracks, filled mainly with teens hiding away from their parents, who traveled the main road looking for them. The place reeked of smoke, grease, and over-fried eggs. Sammie was there with Pearl most of the nights she worked, showing Pearl what it took to make good tips.

“See that guy over there?” she asked, leaning on the counter, her breasts popping out of her unbuttoned top. “I bet I can get twenty bucks from him tonight.”

Pearl shook her head. “No way. Twenty-dollar tip on coffee and a donut? Impossible.”

Sammie lifted her brow with a smirk. “Give me your wedding ring.”

Pearl swallowed hard. “Why?”

“’Cause guys love a girl they can’t have.” Sammie took Pearl’s finger, slipping the gold band off, replacing it on her own hand. Tossing her dark wavy hair over her shoulder, she looked the man right in the eye as she swayed her hips toward him. Pearl couldn’t hear what Sammie was saying, but from the man’s smile she could tell he was eating right out of Sammie’s lusty grip.

Sammie winked at Pearl as she walked her way, the man’s eyes glued to Sammie’s bouncing short skirt. “It’s in the bag,” she whispered. Later, after the man left, Pearl noticed a twenty-dollar bill sitting on his table. She asked Sammie for her ring back. Yet at the end of the shift, she only counted up eight dollars for herself in tips.

“What’s going on with you?” Sammie asked, coming up behind her as Pearl reached her car.

“I don’t know what you mean,” Pearl said, not turning to face her friend.

“You know exactly what I mean. You’ve changed since you’ve gotten married. I thought married people are supposed to be happier.”

Pearl lifted her face to Sammie, showing her forced smile. “I am happier, Sammie. Very happy.”

Sammie eyed her friend for a moment before nodding and walking away.

 
Pearl took a ragged breath, wiping the tears from her eyes as she carefully buckled her seatbelt.
 

The next evening the rain returned after a few days of unusually dry weather. Pearl had missed the rain. She had become so attached to the sound of the water pounding on the plastic roof top that she found it comforting. She hummed to the melody of the shower as she waited patiently for Roy to return, supper warm on the table. He had promised her a romantic night in after the fight they had last night. She made him cream corn and meatloaf, a specialty of Granny’s she had perfected just for him.

Forgetting the homemade buns, she hustled from the table, standing a little too quickly, her breath catching from the sharp pain in her ribs. She lifted her blouse above her chest, where the black and blue cloud had spread below her breasts. It wasn’t his fault. She was late getting home from work, and the worry it caused him inflated the wrath he hurled on her. She should have called, and she should have not stopped to talk to Sammie. She knew he would agonize and fret until she was safe at home. She eased a deep breath, feeling the pressure in her chest. She had been hurt worse than this before, like the time Billy pushed her off the swing set and her head cracked against the wooden post. Billy had cried for days, feeling much worse than she did. It was always harder for the one who felt guilty.