Molly Gaudry
I’ll be fine. Say it. Say it like you mean it. Mean it. They will repeat themselves again and again, Are you sure, Yes, Mother, I’m sure, Is there anything else I can do, No, Aunt Martha, but thank you, Will you get some rest, Of course, Uncle Bill, Are you sure, Oh yes, I’ll be fine, That’s a good lass, Yes, thank you. And when they have gone, the last of them, Mother in her winter coat and looking smaller than you have ever seen her, Aunt Martha with her silk scarf tied beneath her wide chin, Uncle Bill in his galoshes, watch them, let them, go. Listen for Uncle Bill’s Chevrolet, which will start on the second try, and when it backs down the drive, its headlights sweeping over you in the garage, raise your arm and nod. Hit the button to close the garage door. Before the light clicks off, locate the hammer in the toolbox and grab a handful of nails. Go inside. In the kitchen do not think about how empty it is. Turn on the oven. Hammer the nails into the wall. In rows or randomly, it doesn’t matter. When you finish, pour yourself a glass of wine. Drink. Remove an orange from the nearest fruit basket and eat it because you did not eat earlier and nourishment is necessary at a time like this. Especially now, after your second glass. Or don’t eat it. It doesn’t matter. Just make sure not to throw away the peel. Leave it on the counter. Reach for an apple. Remove its skin with a knife. Careful with the knife, you’re drunk, but do whatever you like with the flesh. Peel another apple. Peel them all. And all the oranges, too. When you have done this, layer the strips on a cookie sheet and slip it into the oven. Then go all around the house and bring back to the kitchen the two dozen flower arrangements your friends and coworkers, your distant relatives and neighbors, all delivered to the funeral parlor. Give silent thanks to Mother and Aunt Martha for relieving you of the duty of bringing them back to the house. Dump the flowers into the sink. Gather them into small bundles and shake off the excess water before wrapping the stems of each bundle with rubber bands from the junk drawer beneath the phone. When it rings, do not answer because you’re likely to say something you’ll wish you had not said, drunk as you are. Hang the bundles upside down from the nails protruding from the wall. Remove the dried peels from the oven. Turn off the oven. Make sure you turn off the oven. Go to bed. Take a glass with you. Take the bottle. Unplug the phone and sleep as long as you want. No one will wake you. Sleep. When the new day’s sunny glare wakes you, get up and shut the curtains. Slam them closed if it makes you feel better. When the rod and curtains fall, sigh and stand there in front of the window looking out until a neighbor emerges from his back patio door to bring in firewood. When he looks up, jump back from the window and get back into bed. Get out of bed. Take off your clothes. Do not notice the spilled wine on the carpet or your reflection in the vanity, the mascara stains beneath your eyes. Take a swig from the bottle on your nightstand. Take another. Another. Close your eyes. Bury your nose into the crook of your elbow. Pull the blankets over your head. Roll onto your stomach. Get out of bed. Grab a corner of your comforter and drag it behind you as you retreat into the darkness of what used to be his bedroom. Slam the door. Yank the comforter all the way into the room that used to be his bedroom and properly slam the door. Wrap the comforter around your naked, freezing body and fall asleep on his twin mattress, his Thomas-the-Tank-Engine sheets. In the morning, when you’re ready to face the kitchen, step into a pair of jeans and be sure to wear layers. An extra pair of socks. Your hiking boots, definitely, because today you’re going to take a walk. But first, eat something. Aunt Martha’s pies are in the fridge. A slice will do. Force it in, one bite at a time, wash it down with a swig if you must, but realize your clothes are loose because you’ve had nothing to eat in days, since you found him. Just eat and don’t argue with yourself, just eat. Find a basket. If you do not have a basket, a canvas bag will do. If you happen to put a bottle of wine in the bag, no one will notice. Don’t forget your knife. Now go for that walk and every so often place a pine cone in your bag. If you pass a tree, slice off a twig or a patch of bark. Fill the bag. Once you’re home again and back in the kitchen, rinse out the bottle and open another. Reach into the cabinets for all the serving bowls you can find and place them on the counter. In the den, where just last month you wrapped his Christmas gift, Mother’s and Aunt Martha’s and Uncle Bill’s Christmas gifts, locate a few sheets of tissue paper and bring them with you into the kitchen. Crumple them and put them in the bottom of each bowl. Remove the flower bundles from their nails and slice the blossoms and leaves from their stems. Combine them with the bits of bark and twigs and pine cones and the peels from the oranges and apples and make each bowl look pretty. You now have potpourri. You now have so much potpourri your empty house will smell like potpourri for days, maybe weeks, maybe months. Sit on the floor. Get up. Go into the attic. Dig around until you find the corsage he gave you for Mother’s Day last year, the one he brought home from school, the one he made from tissues pulled apart. Put the corsage on your wrist. Back in the kitchen, arrange all the bowls in a circle on the floor. Open a bottle of wine. It will be your last. In the morning you will go to church even though you have not been to church since high school. You will stand beside Mother and Aunt Martha and Uncle Bill and when it’s time for communion you will take it. You will come home and Resolve away the spilled wine on the carpet, the mud from your hiking boots. You will replace the phone and answer when it rings. Between rings you will return all calls. Every one. You will say things you will not regret saying. You will be gracious and people will later say how gracious you were and what a trooper you were and how tragic it all was and they will hug you awkwardly when you see them at the market or at work, and speaking of work don’t forget to set your alarm extra early for Monday morning because your eyebrows need plucking and your legs and armpits need shaving and your greasy scalp will need a double shampooing and of course you haven’t done laundry so you will have to iron those gray slacks you never wear because they need ironing. But for now, just keep sitting. Lie on your side if it makes you more comfortable. Make a pillow of your hands. Look at his corsage on your wrist. Look beyond your wrist and see the circle of potpourri bowls surrounding you on the kitchen floor and do not think about tomorrow or Monday or any of these last several days but inhale. Just inhale because now that you have done all this what else is there to do.
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Molly Gaudry co-edits Twelve Stories and is the author of We Take Me Apart, a novella-in-verse (Mud Luscious Press, 2009). Find her online at her website.