Soul's Road: A Fiction Collection (17 page)

Jump and I are at Fort Worden for the residency portion of our MFA—like a week of adult summer camp for creative eccentrics—jam-packed with writing workshops and advisor meetings. Late nights we drink beer and play ping pong, debate the future of literature and speak way too enthusiastically about the inventive use of footnotes in our writing. We are wounded warriors and now I've earned my badge, too. We are the hopped-up, geeked-out retro queer. We are the stylie-crooked, the soft-spoken esoteric tree huggers, the mild alternatives (that’s me!) and the one and only black man on campus who refers to himself as the Black Jedi. We are twenty-five and fifty-five years old and everything in between; we are drinkers and AA-goers, we are monogamous and polyamorous, and most importantly, we are writers sharing the common love of mashed up words on a page. For the rest of the four-month semester, we read and write at home, alone in artistic insanity, mimicking the real life of a writer.

The next night, in a Victorian house two doors down on Officer’s Row, the seniors (if we had such titles) host a salon where we listen to compositions read aloud from our MFA brigade. Before grad school, I'd never heard of salons, which began in France as a means for intellectuals to disseminate ideas and social strategies. Before grad school, I enjoyed "beach reads." Tonight, we have a happy hour spread. Tortilla chips and store brand salsa, boxes of wine and local-brewed bottled beer set up in the dining room. I'm pouring a glass of red wine and Carrie is standing next to me. I haven't spoken to her before, only smiled in passing, but now we feel like kindred souls. You see, Carrie's dad died the day before last semester's residency. In addition to our losses, Dana went to visit her mom, who lived in the same town as residency, and found her dead. We got sucker-punched in the face last residency. "I'm really sorry about your dad," I say to Carrie, which I've been meaning to tell her all week, but took me until now to garner the courage to give my condolences. "My mom died two weeks before last residency," I add.

"Oh," Carrie says, "you're the one who didn't tell anyone."

Is that what they think of me: I'm the reticent high-kicker refusing to surrender my smile?

I find a spot on the gray rung carpet in front of my buddy, Nathan. He'll let me lean against his shins for back support; we're going to be here awhile. The rest of the forty or so other students gather around in the way kindergartners do when the teacher reads Dr. Seuss. Our first story-teller perches in front of the fireplace in the octagonal living room with its white walls and mismatched flannel couches. Two sconces, so outdated they're almost back in style, flank the fireplace where a picture of the Fort, when it was actually a fort, sits atop the mantle. We begin. The readings by several students proceed for the next hour. I love these people, but I'm super uncomfortable. My face clenches involuntarily like I have to fart. It's not gas. I'm being blown back in waves of “The rape…” “The rape…” “The rape…,” which seems to be the oratory theme of the night. I thought the readings would be funny (or at least arousing) because tonight’s salon topic is
Sex and the Semicolon
. But this. What is this? Too many horrifying stories in a row and most of them probably true.
Memoirs
, I’m sure. Intermission couldn't come soon enough.

In the kitchen, I escape the assault lingering in the living room. Jump walks in the back door. "Hi Jump. You missed a whole lot of stories about sexual abuse," I say. "I might be the only person who hasn’t been raped." (Oh no! I’m making obnoxious comments like my mom. This has been happening lately. Ever since she died, I can't keep a muzzle on it. My mouth spews faster than my brain has time to filter.
Jeez Paula, way to be sympathetic.
Now that sounds more like me.)
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______________________

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Pauler wasn’t raped cause I taught her right:
poke him in the eyes and knee him in the balls.
My Pauler’s not insensitive, she just hasn’t personally encountered anything like this. Sometimes, you need to share it to know it happened, so you can move on. That way it becomes a story outside of your memories. I know, I know. This goes against everything I said I would do. I’m supposed to be telling you funny stories like when Pauler was away at summer camp and we didn't want to tell her that her beloved pet bird Peachy died, so we propped it up in the cage and took pictures. And then mailed the photos to her. Or about the time I gave Pauler a jewelry box filled with chopped liver for Chanukah. What? There was a necklace underneath. It was in good fun. I told you she was too serious.

But I can’t tell you those stories right now. I need to tell you something that gives you perspective into my “character.” My daughter thinks it demonstrates why I was always making light of everything.

I was coming home from the Queens Oldsmobile car lot where I sold used hunks of junk. It was late and Mr. Jensen told me to lock up after my paperwork was finished. I hated that building, stark and square, two big for the metal desks that littered the perimeter of the room. In the middle of the showroom one shiny new car that wasn’t even for sale. On the walls, Mr. Jensen hung framed posters that said
Dedication
and
Commitment
and
Responsibility
with scenic backgrounds. Like that was gonna make us work harder. It was a dead-end job with dead-end employees. And the dealership always smelled like lox, eggs and onions. Mr. Jensen told me he gave me the job because women can sell cars. People trust women, he said in his patronizing voice, and he’d wet his stubby fingertips with that fat pink tongue of his and smooth his mustache. He was a crotchety man with thick wandering hands and if you couldn’t tell, I hated him too. He’d act surprised like he didn’t mean for his arm to graze my breast. Oh, sorry 'bout that, he said, which was obviously not the same as giving me a pat on the shoulder.

Mr. Jensen loved to make a fat joke. I’d hear him in the back office with the door closed telling his male employees that fat girls were easy because we only wanted someone to love us. I’d pretend to be on the phone when he’d walk onto the showroom floor so he wouldn’t know I could hear him. He’d give my cheek a quick pinch and wink at me as he waddled towards the front desk to remind me of his goodwill. Mr. Jensen knew my father back when Harry was still around. Now that I was almost nineteen, and Harry was long gone, I guess he was doin’ me a favor by giving me the job. I mostly hung in the back garage with the Puerto Ricans who were tinkering under the hoods of our no good cars. They loved big women and showered me with compliments like I was their second comin’ of Madonna. Rico and Jose, they were good guys, but Mr. Jensen called them Lazy Mexicans—to their faces—not realizing there was a difference between PRs and Mexicans. At least Mr. Jensen never called me a fat ass to my face. Jose called me
asmigas
, I’m probably not pronouncing that right, but he’d say it affectionately like we were real friends making a difference to change the world—one Boricua-Jewish friendship at a time.

As I walking home that night, two older guys pulled up in a car. Both wore suits and one was balding, reminding me of my dad, Melvin, who thankfully came along soon after Harry took off. The other man had a handkerchief tucked into his jacket pocket with the initials R.J. embroidered on it. They sounded concerned that I should be walking alone,
fatherly
almost, and my typically keen instincts parted ways with me. My feet were flattened turkeys under a Mack truck from the heels Mr. Jensen required me to wear. So I said, yeah, I would love a ride. Where did you go to high school, they asked me after I got in the backseat, a cushy beige leather that was almost as big as my bed at home. I had never been in a car that nice. I answered them about my high school and they asked if I was going to college. I tried college for a few months at New York University, but school wasn’t my thing, I told them. I’m great at selling. I could sell you guys anything. Oh really, the bald one said. Could you sell me a good time tonight? and they laughed at his joke. No way. I’m not that kind of lady, I said. Lady, ha. You look like a big girl in need of some love. I wanted to get out of the car right then, but it was moving fast down the dark roads of a neighborhood that didn't look familiar. I could handle this, I was tough. Open that door as soon as the car stops, I told myself. I tried to focus on the dimly lit brownstones we were passing, but R.J. was fiddling with something on the floor near his feet. The car pulled into an alleyway. I yanked on the handle, but the doors were locked and R.J. maneuvered into the backseat, stuffing his sock in my mouth before I had a chance to
poke him in the eyes and knee him in the balls
as I’d practiced so many times alone in my bedroom. The sock reeked like rotting skin and when I gagged it only pulled deeper into my throat. My eyes were glued to the radio, hoping it would turn into a time machine and get me outta there. I even tried to defecate, which I’d heard detracts your assailant, but I couldn’t get myself to go. I told my daughter this trick too, and you know what she said, "Ew Ma, you’re so gross. Don’t tell me these things." "Pauler," I told her, "you might need to help yourself one day and you’ll thank me."

Those pricks left me on the side of the road, bruised and missing my underwear. I was really upset because they were my best pair. We didn’t have much then, but I had saved up for a lacy set with the matching bra. And go figure, I considered them my lucky panties.

I didn’t go into work the next few days. Mr. Jensen called and said maybe it would be better if I didn’t come in again. Fired me just like that over the phone. Had the nerve of asking if I wanted to meet him next week at his place, his wife was going to Florida to take care of her ailin’ mother, and that we could have an intimate chat about my future. I could set you up with a few business associates that are looking for secretaries if you do
me
a few favors, he said. I told him he was an ugly jackass. Harry was right for leaving you and your mother, Mr. Jensen said. You’re both no good tramps who had it comin’ to ya.

At first, I wanted to keep the baby. But my mother said she couldn't have me pregnant in her house; I'd bring shame on the family. Shame? Who was she kidding? Like the neighbors didn’t notice how quickly she moved on after Harry. It was pretty obvious she was involved with Melvin before my father left us. It didn’t matter how I pleaded or that Melvin took my side—not that he ever got his way with Evil Edie—my mother sent me to Bellevue, the infamous psychiatric hospital. There were no facilities back then for pregnant teenagers; it was the only option.

Most of the day I spent in a ten by ten room, which was bigger than my bedroom at home, but at Bellevue I shared the “cell.” My roommate’s name was Dora, a schizophrenic who seizured every few days. The male staff in white jumpsuits would glide in on their white leather shoes and hold Dora down while the nurse injected her with god knows what. Dora lay comatose the rest of the day, her eyes fixed on the fissures in the ceiling, her mouth askew, drool dripping from the corners of her lips. Dora would wake the following morning with no recollection of what occurred. Some company she was.

A few months later, I went back to my parents’ home. Michael held my hand while I lay on the cold countertop in the kitchen, my parents on my other side. The doctor inserted a long metal rod. In order to leave Bellevue, I agreed to an abortion. The cops never did find baldy and R.J., but I don’t think they were lookin’ too hard either.

I'd met Michael a few weeks before the assault at a bus stop in New York City. He looked so powerful in his blue pin-striped suit, but later I found out the schmuck only had the one. He was wonderful to me at first, sending me letters while I was away at Bellevue. Our relationship moved quick after all that drama, and we got a studio together in a brick building in Flushing. It was the first time I felt real freedom, likely because it was the first time away from my mother. We were poor, but not nearly as hard up as when we had the three boys. By then, although we lived in a two-bedroom apartment, all three rambunctious boys under the age of seven were in one room. And we only had one bathroom. So if Michael was occupying the toilet, the oldest boy peed into a bucket, which I’d dump out in the sink. The other two were still in diapers. Not disposable. Cloth. I had to schlep loads of diapers to the basement to clean them in one of the two washer machines. If someone was already using both, I’d bring the laundry trunk back up the stairs so no one would steal it.

I didn’t think of that before: why would anyone want to steal
dirty
laundry?

I return to the living room with another glass of wine and the rest of the evening livens up. Jon reads one of his Penis Sagas—a tale of a wife running off with her husband’s joystick so they can confabulate happily ever after about their favorite authors, Tolstoy and Dostoyevsky. Jon claims he doesn’t have a phallic fixation, but I’m not so sure—

I choose not to read tonight although I have several stories about Ma. They aren't witty or expressive enough; they were written when she was alive. I worried too much back then; didn't expose myself on the page; didn't have the guts of a writer; wasn't wounded enough. I wonder even now, having lost my mom, does it qualify me as part of the club? Is this a tragedy or is it a part of life? Am I just another girl who lost her mommy? Maybe the answer doesn't matter. What does is that I am changed. Ma's death has bestowed upon me a freedom from myself and unfortunately-slash-fortunately will make her book better. It's as if Ma is willing me with her Shakespearean mantra she repeated so many times throughout my life—
Cowards die many times before their deaths, The valiant never tastes of death but once.
It's suddenly so obvious. Do what Ma would do: tell it like it is.
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