This One and Magic Life (20 page)

“Well, fix the tea party. I'll go see about her.”

“I'm fat,” Sarah exclaimed as Thomas walked into the bedroom. “I'm hot. I'm ugly.” She was lying on the bed crying. Thomas sat down and gathered her to him. She sobbed against his shirt. Welcome home, Thomas, he thought, smoothing her hair and looking out at the water that glittered in the afternoon sun.

I NEVER INTENDED TO MARRY CARL. I DID, THOUGH. JUST LIKE
everybody expected me to. White dress, veil, the works. Sweet Carl. I still see him standing at the altar waiting for me. He has on a tux too large for his skinny neck and his long forehead is shining in the light from the stained glass window.

“I'm marrying Fred Astaire,” I whispered to Donnie. But he didn't hear me which was just as well. We both would have started giggling.

For years I would close my eyes and see Carl waiting for me. It was as if my mind snapped a picture of him, knowing I would need it later. I even remembered how he smelled when he leaned to kiss me. Mainly like Old Spice but also like Ivory soap and Juicy Fruit gum. And little boy sweat.

Carl. I loved him.

“I want us to have a baby,” he said. But I wasn't
sure. I wasn't sure of anything at the time. I was eighteen when I married Carl.

“Soon as you get back from Korea.” Why did I feel safe saying this? As if I had given him a talisman. You have to come home so we can make a child.

Carl. Sometimes he still comes back and we dance on the bluff at Harlow. Carl Jenkins smelling of Ivory soap and Juicy Fruit gum.

“Don't leave me,” I say.

Right after he died, he was everywhere. He sat at supper with Hektor and me. He followed me to bed. He held my hand while I tried to paint. So one day, I took down a suitcase and said, “Carl, I have to go away. Please don't follow me.” He turned and walked down the stairs. I watched him go over the bluff and to the beach.

I had never been farther north than Lynchburg to visit some of my mother's family. But I drove right through Virginia, all the way to Salem. I saw where Papa had grown up. I saw where my grandparents were buried. I saw Carl standing by a gravestone.

“Go back to Harlow, Carl,” I said. And he turned and walked away. No one else was in the cemetery. I wondered where the Salem witches were buried. I didn't ask, though. Whatever it was I was looking for wasn't there. I left the same day.

I drove to New York and sold my car. People kept asking me, “What? What?” when I talked to them. You would have thought I was from a foreign country. I found a place to live and a job filing in an insurance office. Mama would have died. There were roaches at both places.

I felt better than I had in a long time, though. I bought some canvases and started to paint again, signed up for a class at the Y.

“Come with me to Europe,” Jerry Whitley, the instructor said. “You won't believe the light in Greece.”

“I don't have any money.”

“I do.”

So I packed my suitcases again. We rented a little house overlooking the Aegean and Jerry was right about the light. It was so clear, you could see the colors that it was made of. Some days there would be more yellow, or blue. You could see it.

Jerry was principally an abstract artist. He seemed to be playing with color, throwing it against the canvas. But the most beautiful pictures evolved. It was amazing, intimidating. I worked on the porch, trying to capture the way the sun reflected from the water. In other words, doing what I'd always done, beach scenes.

“What is that?” Jerry asked one day, pointing to one of my canvases.

“A barge.”

“No. The green at the edge.”

“A live oak tree.”

He laughed. “Get real, Artie.”

I am real, I thought. I looked out at the Aegean and then back at my painting. Mobile Bay.

I stayed with Jerry three years. They were learning years, but we also cared for each other. We knew when the time came to say goodbye. Jerry wanted to go back to New York; I was still looking for something.

The night before he left, I made a pot of Mobile gumbo. “We need jubilees here,” I said.

“What's a jubilee?” Jerry wanted to know. I couldn't believe I hadn't told him about them, how exciting it was to have the fish and crabs come swimming up on the beach.

“You're homesick,” he said when I got through tell
ing him, showing him how you had to carry the heavy buckets, describing the fun, the parties.

“I'll go back,” I said. And I knew it was true. But not yet.

 

“Hey, Artie!” I was walking down the street in Rome and couldn't believe I had just heard an Alabama voice. “Artie!”

I looked around and saw a large, redheaded man coming toward me, grinning.

“I can't believe I actually ran into you,” he said, enveloping me in a hug.

I pulled away and looked up at him. He looked familiar, but I wasn't sure who he was.

“Hey, you don't recognize me, do you? It's me. Bo. Your cousin, dummy.”

“Little Bo?”

He laughed. “They had to drop the ‘little' part.”

“Bo?” I hugged him and jumped up and down at the same time. Here was Bo, my Aunt Mary's Bo, right here in Rome.

“What are you doing here? And what about Aunt Mary and Uncle Bo and lone? Are they okay? And have you heard anything from Harlow? Donnie? You know he got married. And Hektor? You seen any of them?”

“Hey, wait up.” He looked around and spotted an empty table at a sidewalk cafe. “Let's go get some coffee. I'll tell you everything I know.” We got to the table just as another couple did. “Excuse me,” Bo said politely, sliding the chair around for me as the other woman dived for it.

“That was a neat trick,” I laughed. And he grinned.

“The last time I saw you, you had braces,” I said. “Is it really you?”

He chomped his straight, even teeth together. “One
and the same. Now it's your turn to say, ‘My, how you have grown, Bo.'”

“My, how you have grown, Bo.”

“You too, Artie. Do you know the last time I saw you was at Grandmama's funeral? How old were you? Sixteen?”

“I guess so.” The waiter came and we ordered coffee. “What are you doing here, Bo?”

“Putting space between me and Huntsville mainly. Mama's decided it's time for me to settle down. Picked out the girl and everything. Nice girl. But God!” He stretched and looked around. “I like it here.”

“But are you working or anything?”

“I work for Daddy. They gave me a trip to Europe when I graduated and I didn't take it then. Said to give me a rain check. Well, when Merry Calhoun started showing up for supper every night, I decided it was time to cash the check. Swore I would call on every potential customer for Hardemond Mills. So far, I've seen two.” Bo smiled at me. “I was sort of hoping I might find you, too. I had your last address.”

“I moved.”

“I know.”

“I'll show you around.”

“Great.” He reached over and took my hand. “I knew I would find you.”

“Tell me about Ione,” I said. But I didn't move my hand. It was warm and comfortable enveloped in Bo's.

What is this, I thought. What is this? I drank the strong coffee; I smelled the diesel fumes from the cars that darted by just inches from us. I listened to Bo and knew I had been waiting for this. Waiting for my cousin Bo, for the reddish blonde hairs curling on the back of his hand. For the sound of his voice.

The first time we made love was as if we had al
ways been together. “Artie?” Bo was staying with me. Visiting cousin.

“Artie?” He had just come in and I was in the bathtub.

“Lord!” he said, standing in the doorway. And then he was out of his clothes and in the tub with me, one of those deep tubs you have in Europe that you have to climb out of. My head hit the faucet. Clunk.

“Are we sinning?” I asked.

“Probably.” And we were rolling in the tub, splashing water, laughing. The next day we each had bruises. But we stayed in that tub a long time, adding hot water when we got cold. When we finally got out, there wasn't much we didn't know about each other.

“I didn't expect that,” Bo said, toweling me dry. “I hope to hell you aren't pregnant.”

“Not to worry,” I said, “I have my diaphragm in.”

“Witch! Seducer!” He popped me on the behind with the towel. I ran for the bed.

“Harlot! Scarlet woman!” He dived on top of me.

“Lover,” I said, my face pushed into the pillow.

He rolled me over. “What did you say?” He loomed over me like something I had dreamed.

“Lover.”

He sighed and stretched out beside me. I pulled up the quilt and we slept. We got up and ate supper, made love again, and went back to sleep. Sometime during the night, I felt him restless against me. I turned and held him. “Donnie,” I whispered, startling myself by saying my twin's name.

If Bo heard what I had said, he never mentioned it. But I stayed awake the rest of the night remembering that it was my birthday, mine and Donnie's. We were thirty-two years old.

AS PROMISED, THE LADIES OF THE CHURCH BRING LUNCH AFTER
the funeral. Food fills the dining room table, and other dishes are in the kitchen waiting to be brought out when space opens up. Mrs. Randolph is kept busy handing out freezer tape. “Put your name on your dishes. Be sure and put your name on your dishes.” Jerry, the cat, is traumatized by all the commotion. He is hiding under Artie's bed. When May comes looking for him, he slides behind some empty Christmas boxes that have a layer of dust on them.

Dolly, who has gone to the funeral, brings Naomi a plate of food to the porch. Naomi is sitting in one of the wicker rockers fanning herself with an envelope.

“Why don't you come inside, Nomie, where it's cool?” Dolly asks.

“Too hard to get up.” Naomi takes the plate. “Thanks, sweetheart. What have we got here?”

“A little bit of everything.” Dolly hands her grandmother a napkin and a fork and then kneels beside her.

“Have you had anything to eat?” Naomi asks.

“Some congealed salad.”

“Good.”

“I think the antibiotic's kicking in.” Dolly looks out at the bay where a large freighter is heading toward the Mobile docks. Her parents come out and sit on the steps with plates of food.

“You okay?” Mariel asks as they go by Dolly. “Mama, you got everything you need?”

Dolly and Naomi both nod yes.

“Nomie,” Dolly says, “I've got a lot of decisions to make.”

“I know you do, honey.” Naomi takes a bite of squash casserole. It must be Mrs. Daniel's. She's the only person in Harlow who puts sage in squash. The woman's never learned that cornbread dressing's the only place for sage and precious little there. It reminds Naomi: “Whatever happened to that cookbook you were writing, Dolly?”

“I'm still working on it.”

“Don't put sage in the squash.”

“No ma'am. I won't.” Dolly settles into a more comfortable position. “I need to ask you something, Nomie.”

Naomi puts her fork down and looks at Dolly. “What is this? You want some advice from me? Some words of wisdom from the elderly?”

“I guess I do.”

“Okay, Nomie's words of wisdom for grandchildren: Don't ever take yourself too seriously.”

Dolly grins. “I'll try not to.”

“And forgive yourself a lot. You're not carrying the world on your shoulders.” Naomi looks over at Mariel who is handing a piece of chicken to Donnie. “I don't think I impressed that on your mother enough.”

“I've got a specific question, Nomie. If you could do it over again, would you marry Grandpa Will?”

“You thinking about your Bobby?”

“I guess so. He called again this morning. He's been out of rehab for a couple of months and he's clean.”

“Dump him.” Naomi spears a bite of ham.

Dolly is startled. “But Nomie, you didn't dump Grandpa Will.”

“No. I ended up carrying him which was a terrible thing to do to him. To all of us.”

“But you had your children, Nomie.”

“Yes. I did.” Naomi puts the ham into her mouth and chews. “Good ham. I'll bet it's one of those honey-baked ones that's already cut.”

Dolly looks at her grandmother. Naomi looks up and smiles. And in that smile, Dolly sees the truth. She rubs her shoulders which suddenly feel lighter.

“You feeling okay, Dolly?” Dave Horton, who has been talked into staying for lunch, stands over the two women with a full plate of food in his hand.

“Much better,” Dolly says.

“Then come keep me company. That swing looks mighty comfortable. Can you spare her, Mrs. Cates?”

“Sure. There'll be another grandchild along in a minute. The place is crawling with them.” Naomi takes another bite of squash casserole. Now why in the world did Jessie Daniel put that sage in there?

“Have you had any lunch?” Dave asks as they settle in the swing. He's pulled off the jacket he wore to the funeral, and has loosened his tie. Dolly sees how golden the hair on his arms is, the tiny freckles.

“Some salad.”

“You need to eat something taking that antibiotic.” Dave hands Dolly a roll.

“Yes, Doctor.” She takes a small bite and forces it
down. On the steps, her mother appears to be feeding her father. Mariel has on a pale blue dress that Dolly has never seen before. It looks like something Artie would have painted, she realizes.

“We never really know people, do we,” she says to Dave Horton.

“Probably not. Not completely.”

“Do you know, sometimes I've wondered why my parents married each other. It's always seemed like such a strange relationship to me.”

Dave looks at Mariel and Donnie. They have been joined on the steps by their cousin Bo Hardemond who has come from Huntsville for the funeral. “Doesn't look strange to me.”

“That's just it. Look at them. It's weirding me out. I asked Papa one time why he married Mama.”

“What did he say?”

“He made me mad. He said he married her because she had a great butt.”

Dave laughs.

“It's not funny.”

“Well, maybe he just found it hard to put into words.” Dave puts his plate down between them. “You want some of this chicken?”

Dolly shakes her head no.

Dave nods toward the steps. “Who's the man with them? He looks like he should have been the twin, not Artie.”

“Our cousin Bo from Huntsville. His mother, Aunt Mary, was my grandmother's sister. She wasn't able to make the trip.” Dolly looks at Bo Hardemond and her father. “They do look a lot alike, don't they? Those Harvey genes are potent.”

“They sure are.” Dave stretches. “I'm getting full as a tick.”

“This is the only place where I've ever heard people say that.”

“Makes you homesick, doesn't it?”

“Not exactly.”

“Well, I'm sure I could think up some other sayings that might work. How about my telling you that one of my patients is half a bubble out of plumb?”

“Only one? Is that what you wrote as the diagnosis?”

“Sure. Had trouble with the insurance company, though.”

“I'll bet.” Dolly watches as Donnie hands Mariel something from his plate. “My God, would you look at that. My father's actually feeding my mother stuff. I must be sicker than I thought. I'm hallucinating.”

“You know, maybe he doesn't know why he married her,” Dave says. “Happens all the time. It seems to have worked out okay, though.”

“But it hasn't. My mother stays at her psychiatrist's and Papa's the workaholic of the world. I don't know. I've decided I don't know anything about relationships.” Dolly takes a carrot stick from Dave's plate. “Last night I was thinking that Artie was only twenty-two when she was widowed. Twenty-two. Now how could she have had the love of her life by twenty-two? Lots of Artie's men were talked about at our house, believe me. But why do you suppose she didn't marry and have children? She loved children, I know.”

“Maybe all her creativity went into her painting.”

“Maybe.”

“And she had you.”

“Which made my mother jealous.”

The two of them smile at each other. “Families,” Dolly says.

“Families,” Dave agrees. “Wait till you hear about mine.”

Mrs. Randolph sticks her head out the door. “Dolly, you got a phone call.”

“I'll save your place,” Dave says.

Mariel tells Donnie that she bets Dolly's call is from Bobby, that he's already called a couple of times.

“I hope she doesn't get messed up in that again,” Donnie says.

“I'm scared she will. She says he's straightening up.”

“Dolly's husband?” Cousin Bo asks. His arrival this morning had been a nice surprise. When Mariel had called and talked to Merry, his wife, she had said that Aunt Mary's days were numbered and she didn't know if Bo would be able to make it to Artie's funeral or not.

“Hell, all our days are numbered,” Bo had told Merry when he came in and heard the news. “I'm going.” Then he got in the shower and cried for Artie, his beautiful girl.

“Ex-husband,” Mariel says. “They weren't married in the Church, thank the Lord. He was connected somehow with the dance company Dolly works for. A nice enough guy—we all liked Bobby when we met him, didn't we, Donnie? Of course, we didn't know he was screwed up on drugs. What gets me is that Dolly did know it and married him anyway.”

“Maybe she thought she could straighten him out,” Bo says.

“I suppose.” Mariel takes Donnie's hand. “Try not to worry. She's a grown woman.”

They sit looking out over the bay. They see Hektor walking along the water's edge.

“Hektor said he had Delmore Ricketts say a mass for Artie last night on the beach,” Donnie says.

Bo has been told the truth, but he already knew Artie wanted to be cremated. They had talked about it. “A regular funeral mass?” he asks.

“I don't know how much they followed the ritual, but Hektor said it made him feel better.”

“Just like I felt better having the rosary last night and the funeral mass this morning,” Mariel adds.

“And I needed to do what she wanted,” Donnie says.

“I'm just glad it's over with.” Mariel lets go of Donnie's hand and rubs her tense neck. “Too many people knew Artie wasn't in that casket.”

“But in a way, it was like she was.” Donnie watches Hektor holding out his arms for May who is running down the beach toward him. “I don't think it matters, anyway.” He points his fork. “Look at that Hektor. Who would ever have thought he would get so wrapped up in a child.”

“I would have,” Mariel says. “He didn't surprise me going to get Father Audubon, either. There are depths in Hektor I think you've never give him credit for, Donnie.”

“He's my little brother.”

“Who could buy and sell you ten times over. And you've always put that down as luck. Well, some of it might have been, but Hektor took his luck and ran with it. He's a shrewd, complicated man, Donnie. And kind.”

“Lucky,” Donnie says. He watches a barge coming down the waterway.

“I want to live in this house. I've always wanted to live here in this house with Artie.” Bo puts his face in his hands and begins to sob.

Surprised, Donnie and Mariel look at each other over Bo's bent head. As tears begin to seep through Bo's fingers, Mariel presses a tissue into his hand.

Long married, Donnie and Mariel need no words for the ensuing conversation.

Donnie, do you think? Bo and Artie?

Don't know. Guess it's possible.

Her first cousin who, incidentally, looks just like you?

Don't read too much into this, Mariel.

But Donnie knows. Oh, my precious girl. My other half.

 

Hektor and May are trying to locate the tiny mound where Artie's ashes had been placed. As Reese had predicted, the tide had come up during the night and erased all signs of it.

“That's as it should be,” Hektor says. “Earth to earth.”

“I think it's nice,” May agrees. “We got her up to heaven.”

The early afternoon sun is blistering hot. “We better go in,” Hektor says. He and May wave at the barge that blows its horn in reply. “Would you like to live here, pumpkin?”

“Sure,” May agrees. “Just find me a mama.”

“Nag. Nag.” He takes her hand and they walk to the bluff steps.

“Did you eat lunch?” Hektor asks.

“I ate a whole lot. I never saw so much food in my life.”

“That's the way the Harlow people do when people are in trouble. They come bringing food. They're saying, ‘Let us help you.' It does, too. Help.”

“Mrs. Randolph said she'd pack some in a cooler for us to take home. Are we going this afternoon, Papa?”

“Well, I don't know of anything else we can do here. And I need to get back to work. And Audubon
needs to get back to his fishing. We can come over any time Donnie or Dolly needs us. Okay?”

“Okay.”

Hektor turns to look at the beach again. He sees Artie setting off with her crabbing nets. Wait for me. Thomas and Sarah set out for a sail. Wait for me. Wait for me. I love you.

“Go get your things together,” he tells May. “And find Father Audubon and tell him we'll leave in about an hour. I think I'll walk down the beach a few minutes.” The child runs by her Uncle Donnie and Aunt Mariel and the cousin sitting on the steps.

“Whoa,” Mariel says. “Give us a hug.”

May hugs them hard and goes on into the house, unaware that her father is standing at the foot of the bluff crying. Sunrise, sunset.

There's one more thing Hektor needs to do before he can go back to New Orleans. He wipes his eyes and starts walking down the beach. He's not surprised when his mother, Sarah, joins him in her black dress, nor when his father, Thomas, in his blue seersucker suit appears beside Sarah. Artie in her peach dress smiles and takes Hektor's hand. This is not a surprise. What is a surprise is when Donnie takes his place beside Artie.

“You okay, Hektor?”

“They're here with us, Donnie.”

“I know.”

“Artie has on her peach-colored dress. She was a pretty girl, wasn't she, Donnie?”

“Not beautiful like Mama, but cute and pretty.”

“What did you think of Mama, Donnie?”

“Like I said, beautiful. But I felt sorry for her and I'd get mad at her.” He pauses. “And I loved her.”

“Me, too.” They walk in silence for a few minutes, the tiny waves slapping at their feet.

“Tell me the truth,” Hektor says. “What do you think happened the day Mama and Papa died?”

“I think Papa sank the boat. I think he did it out of love and that it took a hell of a lot of courage.”

“I think it was an accident.”

Donnie nods. “Just telling you what I thought.”