Dear Hearts (10 page)

SIXTEEN

Elena

"What about the
TV?"  Her voice is like the one always zigging and
zagging
its waves through my chest.  Like semen, those bulbous headed creatures,
relentless in their swimming.  I'm thinking semen and the baby appointment
we have scheduled later today.  And I'm also thinking "heart
beat" because there Ronnie is in the corner with her bug eyed child,
pecking in a circle with the other mothers who keep sneaking peeks at me.

"Mommy?"
  I look at
Wren and her face is still saying "TV," and I tell her
it's
fine.  It's still in storage and no, we still
don't need to tell Daddy.  She thinks everything is good, that Mitch and I
have made up, which we have to some degree.  I don't like thinking about
last weekend, where he was, who he was with.  So I hold on to that tiny
speck of power I have left, the TV. 
My one thing.
 
But Wren wants me to come clean about it because that's what people do when
they make up. 
When they're in love.

"Do
I look okay?" she says, and I nod because it's time to herd her with the
rest of her class near the stage.  Tater tots.  It smells like tater
tots and juice dried on the concrete floor.  And it's ten in the morning,
so they haven't even fired up the stoves yet which means this smell has just
been doubling over on itself through the weeks and everyone has these slick
lipsticked smiles, like the fact that old tater tot oil seeping through their
beautiful clothes doesn't faze them for a minute.  I guide Wren by her
white coated shoulders, a pharmacist's coat that Pam sewed and Wren drowns
in.  It's career day and St. Bonaventure Elementary had this fantastic
idea of hosting it during the day, so I can't even stand next to my husband,
shield myself behind his shoulder so I don't have to look at Ronnie's
lipsticked mouth and hear Principal Geyser mispronounce
"cardiothoracic" because someone's little offspring wants to be a surgeon.

The
tater tots.  They go to my head when I look at Wren and how she's
unfortunately standing next to Trudy but fortunately, I'm sandwiched between
Marlene, Bud's mother who smells like fermented apples and Allie's father
because he got laid off from Tyson and everyone tries and pretend something
like that is not the end of the world. 

But
then there's the other smell.  Bleach.

I
did it this morning when Wren was asleep and when Mitch woke up, I had sprayed
half a bottle of body splash but he still knew.  He kissed my cheek and
the "I love you" seeped like the saliva on my skin.  The word
"but" was there, but I didn't say it.  You love me but you
cheated on me.  You love me but you left last weekend.  You love me,
but, but, but...

"It
will be okay.  We'll go to a meeting."

He
thinks it's about the alcohol.

"My
name is Wren Reynolds, and I want to be a pharmacist."  I wait for
the silly grin like the ones delivered by the five kids who went before her,
but her lips knead into one another and her eyes are only good for
searching.  And I still don't get one when she finds me. 
Just a nod.
  Just a "thank God she didn't
leave."

It's
Trudy's turn, a mini-marine biologist. 
Stupid.
 
We don't live anywhere near the ocean, and I'm sure that kid's first reaction
to seeing water would be drowning.

I
feel Ronnie and that feeling turns up my heart.  Wren's okay.  She's
okay and doesn't need me and soon I think about the faucet and then quicker
than my feet can shuffle, I'm in the girl's bathroom, the faucet in the tiny
white sink turned up so hot I have to muffle my yelp.

In
a storage unit, there's a TV I own.  And at work, my boss is pissed
because I took the day off to be with my daughter. 
And
in my gut, the whiskey burns, breakfast of champions.

And
my husband cheated on me with a man.

I
splash the hot water on my face and it hurts.  It blurs my eyes, mascara
melting into my lashes and I blink hard but everything is black in the tiny
mirror.  Even Ronnie's face when I look up.

~

"I
like you, you know.  I still do."  The A/C is frigid in Ronnie's
beamer and I love the feeling.  It dries up my blurry face.  And the
new car smell has replaced the tater tots so my heart slows down a bit and
finally, I can open my eyes.

"You
must have a thing for bitches," I say.  She snorts and shrugs, taps
out a Virginia Sim from the pack she keeps hidden under the seat.  We're
parked at the side of the church. I think of my husband high in the sky and let
the sun stab my eyes.

"I'm
a cunt," Ronnie says, blows the smoke straight into my nostrils.  I
want to say smoking is bad for babies, but Ronnie knows that.  She's on
numero dos so no need to remind her.  Plus, I have bleach and whiskey
bottles back home that sit a little lighter this morning, so I'm in no position
to point out the obvious.

"No. 
It's not your fault."

"Yes,
it is.  I guess, I didn't think it through.  The toll it must take on
you. I shouldn’t have dumped the news on you like that."  Looking her
in the eyes is as bad us staring at the sun, so I look at the vent instead,
take on that puff of air like the one the optometrist shoots into your
eyes. 
A toll.
  Yes.  It's a toll, a
burden I've tried to wash clean with the bleach. 
The
whiskey.
  But the real thing is the guilt of knowing I'm trying to
start over.  I'm wishing on one hand that Wren never existed, that I would
have chosen another life, and I'm wishing on the other that I never existed
because then I wouldn't have these monster thoughts. 
Because
deep down, it's not about growing our family.
  It's about erasing
reality and dulling the point of a new pencil.

"I'm
happy for you."  I wait a beat. 
"And sad
for me.
 
But for other reasons, too."
 
Today, Ronnie is wearing a sheath dress, geometric patterns the color of
salmon.  My side eye concentrates on those patterns as my words click
together.

"Mitch
cheated on me."

"Oh, sweetie."
  The words
drip with smoke and now my chin is on her shoulder.  She hugs me hard and
I look out her window to the edge of the woods and there tucked back behind a
scattering of tree trunks is a wide-eyed doe.

"With a man."
  That
shuts her up.  There's a difference between
fun
and dysfunctional, I know that's what Ronnie's thinking.  But when I look
at her, past the smoke and swirling salmon circles, Ronnie's face is how my
heart feels.  Hurt.

"Tell
me," she says.  So I do.  I tell her about this morning, that's
where I start.  How Mitch left, how I dropped of Wren and headed back home
for an hour or two before career day started.  I told her about my secret
job and how I'll probably be fired because Hattie's a REAL
see-you-next-tuesday.  I tell her about Tanisha and Tanisha's hoop
earrings.  I don't know why I tell her that part.

Oh
yes, I do.  I tell her because my tongue is as scared as my heart, and if
I say the bad thing out loud then it's true.  It was there, I
suppose.  I think about faggot rock that some of the boys from school
threw through Mitch's window and how his mother wanted him to keep it, his sins
in stone as a reminder.  And I remember thinking, horse shit.  This
is all just a bunch of horse shit contrived by a bunch of scared boys and
drilled in by a mother who doesn't know how to love her child.  But it's
bleeding into to me, motherhood, hate, disappointment, bed wetting,
the
child in the pharmacist's coat that's one size too
big.  My hands still sting from the faucet's hot water.

"This
man rings the door bell.  Says his name is Aaron," I say.  I was
barefoot when I answered the door which still pisses me off.  You need to
be dressed, prepared for an attack like that.

"'I
should be at work.'  That's the first thing he says like I know who the
fuck he is or what the fuck he does for a living.  Then he gives me his
hand, and I shake it and there's a little part of me that dings in my head,
that warning bell.  You're alone Elena. 
Strange
man at the door, Elena.
  But then he starts crying, and goddamnit
Ronnie, if there's one thing I can't take in this world, it's a man
crying."  I snort, laugh a little because my insides are turned out,
and I'm afraid they'll stain the leather.  She draws again on the
cigarette and I take a deep breath of dirty air.

"'I
love your husband.  And he was going to leave you, but he didn't. 
And that's ruined everything in me.'  He whispered that part, the
ruined.  And then he says he just thought I should know, and then he walks
to his car and drives away.” I choke on words and teary phlegm. “You know the
worst part?"

Ronnie
dips her head at me, says "What?"

"I
didn't even have the satisfaction, that small moment of thinking, “
This
guy's mental and he has the wrong house.'" 
He was wearing a t-shirt, flip flops. 
Pajama bottoms.
 
It was like he was wearing a sandwich board that read "Mitch Reynolds has
Fucked My Shit Up!"

"So
what are you going to do?" she asks and again her face.  My eyes are
no longer dried and the mascara pools up again.

"Ronnie,
I think I might kill him," I say.

"Which one?"

I
haven't decided.

SEVENTEEN

Mitch

She
cancelled the baby appointment.  Of course I didn't actually know that
until I drove all the way to Little Rock just to be told I could go home,
there'd be no need helping us conceive a second child today.

And
I didn't call her either.  I just drove home numb because there was
something wrong, and I prayed it wasn't my worst fear.  But that's an
irrational thought.  She will never know about Aaron.

Because I called him last night.
  And he
promised me.

"I've
known men like you, Mitch.  But Jesus Christ, I didn't think...I'm just so
fucking stupid," he said.  It rained last night and my hand was so
slippery, I nearly dropped the phone twice.  Two in the morning, hoofing
through rain puddles. 
Going nowhere.

Elena
was asleep when I left, konked out from our pillow talk. 
Promises of another AA meeting this week, a therapy appointment the
next.
 
The constant living with and loving each
other for Wren's sake.
  And I thought about the slippery phone in
my hand and Aaron's pain on the line and the selfish growing urge to hit the
"end" button.

"I'm
sorry.  Okay?  But, come on, Aaron.  I mean.  I mean,
Goddamnit, did you really think it would work out?  Did you think
springing that damn ring on me was a good idea?"  Slap-slap-slap in
my work boots that I had thrown on in our garage. 
Water
flashing at my ankles in spurts and an angry belly growl of thunder up above.
 
"You're right.  Maybe you are stupid," I said, but I didn't
really believe what I said.  What I believe is this: there's perfection in
Aaron and me, but that perfection exists in another time and place. 
Just not this one.
 
Never this one.

"Fuck
you.  Fuck you, Mitch, and your secret doll house life.  Something
bad will happen.  When people keep living their lies something always bad
happens."  Now the angry growl boils in my chest, leaks up my throat
like acid.

"You
can't, Aaron.  I'm sorry, I know you're angry, and you have to believe if
I could, I'd leave this instant and be with you, just you forever.  But I
can't do that to her."

"Elena."

"No,
Wren."  I was in a work shirt, a clean one I struggled over my head
before bed and my gray sweatpants, blackened with rain and a moonless
sky.  He went quiet, understanding, because Aaron isn't heartless. 
Quite the opposite.
  He was given more than his fair
share.

"Okay,"
he says.  "Okay, you won't even hear from me again," he
said.  I nodded and then remembered to talk into the phone.  I said,
"Okay," and mumbled, “I'm sorry,” and the angry growl boiling my
chest cavity was screaming "I love you!" in my ears.

I
hit "End" and then there was that moment when the pad of
the my
thumb knew my reality before my head could wrap
around it.  It was over.

So
today was all about going through the motions.  Kissed Elena on the cheek,
hugged Wren so hard I think I heard a joint pop.  Picked up Jimmy and
repaired a new leak at Jugs McCormick and stood idle as Jimmy shoved himself
between me and any possible view I could get of the dancers on stage.

"Don't
want you getting any ideas," he joked, jaw open and whispering,
"Well, shit," as a ginger-haired stripper slid down the pole with her
legs in the air.

I
think about it now, bloodless knuckles wrapped around the steering wheel how
she didn't mention the appointment this morning like she normally would. 
No “Don't forget!” or “You better be there!”  And I didn't think to say
anything because maybe on some level I did want to forget.  I didn't want
to be there.

And
now my tires creep up the driveway and I click the garage opener and the door
goes up too slow.  I need to take a look at it some time, I think and then
I start crying.   Because there Elena is, my beautiful Elena and a
bucket full of bleach, scrubbing the garage floor on hands and knees.

This
is what I've done.