This is Your Life, Harriet Chance! (8 page)

U
h, well, ummm, yeah. Hello? Hello? Nudge, nudge. We’re frozen here. Looks like we’ve tilted, Harriet. Didn’t see that one coming. How about a replay, how would that be? I’ll stake you to a few credits. How about we just pull back the old plunger and give it another go, let her fly, and see where we end up? Yeah, let’s do that. Ding-dong-ding, 1973. Nudge nudge, no thanks. Ring-a-ding-ding, 2012? Nudge nudge, forget about it. Click click, nudge nudge, dong-dong-dong, summer of 1965—now that’s more like it.

Who’s that smiling mom with the short, sassy hair, the relatively slim one in the pink one-piece and the fake Armani sunglasses, soaking up the rays, while her freckle-faced son with the peeling forehead frolics nearby in the sand? Why, of
course, it’s you, Harriet Chance, with adorable little Skipper! And it’s no small wonder that you’re smiling: you have so much to be happy about. Never mind that things are heating up in Vietnam, never mind those fires still smoldering in Watts, the future looks bright, at least from where you’re lying right now, on the shores of Lake Washington, the sun beating down on your attractive face.

In a couple of weeks, Skip starts kindergarten, and you, Harriet, can finally rejoin the workforce, at least part-time. Oh, you don’t have the same expectations this time around, heavens no. You’re not looking to make a name for yourself, you just want a life outside of the house and a small measure of independence from your family. You miss the sense of purpose and the vitality of downtown. You miss lunching at the Continental. Most of all, you miss having a career, some other yardstick besides household cleanliness by which to measure yourself.

In a month or so, you’ll have all that. Look at you, controlling your own destiny! You’ve done your work: typed those letters fastidiously (eighty words per minute; you haven’t lost a beat), licked those envelopes, delivered those résumés (in person, dressing the part perfectly). You’re giddy with anticipation. Any day now, that phone will start ringing and your new adventure will begin. Yes, it’s been a fine summer, Harriet, a mild, uneventful, leisurely summer, full of barbecues and bikinis, ambrosia salads and dry martinis. But be honest, fall can’t come soon enough.

Let’s talk about the cherry on top: the fact that Bernard is behind this move one hundred percent. He kisses you on the head, pats your fanny, and says he’s proud of your initiative. Yes, you married a decent man, Harriet. A little bossy, perhaps, a little stubborn, a little awkward with his emotions. But he’s got his strengths, too: Dependability. Integrity. Good hygiene. He has your best interest at heart, he really does. And even when he’s at his worst, his most ragged and impatient, when he storms out of the house and doesn’t come home, he’s always good for that rose in the morning. When has your husband failed to support you? In what decision has he ever failed to back you up? Yes, you might have asked for more, Harriet. But c’mon, he’s no mind reader. It’s not like you’ve been lobbying for your needs these past six years. No, Harriet, Bernard is not big on charm, he’s not Cary Grant, not even Russ Tamblyn. And God knows, you won’t find him leading the charge for women’s lib, but he’s as good, if not better, than most husbands.

And that, Harriet, is just one more thing to be grateful for as you hurtle toward thirty.

This is your life, going in a welcome new direction.

A
nd while we’re discussing new directions in life, let’s say we zip ahead (ding-dong-ding, flip-flip-flip) to the fall of 1989, where you’re just getting settled in the banana belt, and the change is a welcome one. You adore your new home. Living in that drafty old house on the north end, you never dreamed of such an abode. The views are spectacular. Already, you can name every peak and ridge of the North Olympics, visible from your patio: Deer Ridge, Hurricane Ridge. Blue Mountain. That little one there is Lost Mountain. You could spend the rest of your days sitting on that flagstone patio, admiring the views, or in your spacious kitchen, chopping vegetables by the window, or tending to your spectacular garden.

So it hurts you just a little bit that Mildred never comes over. She’s never been past the driveway, never seen the open floor plan, or the views, or seen Bernard in his natural environment, puttering in the garage, drinking coffee from an ancient thermos, listening to baseball on his transistor radio. The fact is, Mildred has only met him a few times in church basement over crumb cake, and that was before she stopped going to St. Luke’s.

It’s true, Mildred’s house is grander than your own. A sprawling Tudor with trained ivy and a three-car garage. But then, Clark is a wealthy man. The one thing he hasn’t bought much of the past thirty years—to hear Mildred tell it—is time with his family. The views from the bluff are equally spectacular, if not more so, than those from the Carlsborg house. So, you really can’t blame Mildred for wanting to meet at her house (again), where you customarily sit on Adirondack chairs at the very edge of the bluff, the very edge of the world, it seems, two hundred feet above the strait. From this perch, you watch the occasional cruise liner or container ship inch past. You listen to the chorus of ravenous seagulls and the distant percussion of waves pounding the shoreline.

And you share, though not always in equal measure.

Listen to you eagerly confide in your new friend, as though you’ve spent the past thirty years marooned on an island, which is what being married to Bernard sometimes feels like. Let’s face it, he’s not a conversationalist. His idea of repartee includes a lot of hmphs and hmms, yeses and nos, nodding,
sighing, and the occasional guffaw. He’s from Lutheran stock. Midwestern. Conversing with Bernard reminds you of talking to your golden retriever, all those years ago. A tilt of the head, a wag of a tail, a snarl—it’s about all you can reasonably expect.

So it’s no small wonder you open up to Mildred. The fact is, you’re sharing things with Mildred that you’ve never before given voice. Such as the fact that you still frequently think about the law, still cast yourself as the brilliant trial attorney in daydreams, dressed smartly in flattering business attire. That you sometimes think of your lost life, that you’re still tracking that alternate you, as though your paths diverged at some distant juncture and went their separate ways.

The you that you could have become is everything that you’re not: frank, unsentimental, uncompromising, to the point. The you that you could have been is funny, tough, adaptable. A little more like Mildred.

You sometimes wish you could ask the other you for advice, or guidance, or clarity, or at the very least a little perspective on the life you’ve muddled so badly. If only that other you could take you by the hand and walk you back through the misbegotten paths of your life—the botched decisions; the cowardly retreats; the circumstances you might have controlled, avoided, or otherwise been spared—to the very beginning, where it all started going wrong. You sometimes wish the other you could tell your story.

Wouldn’t that have been something.

But let’s not be maudlin, Harriet. We’ve so much to celebrate, as it stands! Your beautiful new home, all cedar and sunlight, your faithful new friend, kind and considerate, and let us not forget your reliable husband, as steady and predictable as the tides.

W
hen Harriet regains consciousness, she’s flat on her back, lying on the bed, ears still ringing. Propping herself up against the headboard, she stretches her legs out and stares dully across the room, registering nothing. Her first thought—before how could she possibly have been so oblivious or how could her entire life have been a lie—is how could another woman have possibly loved Bernard for that long?

And who was this dashing Bernard in the letter? And why did Mildred get him while Harriet got the bruised ego and the short temper, the irritable Scrabble opponent, the endless lectures on rust prevention. Since when had Bernard ever been “quietly strong”? Loudly strong, maybe; stubborn and determined, without a doubt. But quiet? And “troubled by the
ways of his own heart”? What did that even mean, exactly? Headaches, yes. Back pain, frequently. Constipation, always. These things troubled him, and he was by no means “quietly strong” in bearing them. In fact, he could be downright mean. Taciturn. Worst of all, critical. When troubled by anything, Bernard was likely to turn the crosshairs of his anxiety outward, usually aiming them directly at Harriet. Grumbling and snapping about her constant nagging, her irrationality, her cooking, her lack of in-touchness with reality.

How was it fair that Harriet had given everything she had to loving a man who poured Miracle Grow on her character defects and meanwhile Mildred got some swashbuckling poet, just for the asking. “Irresistible”? How was that possible? When was it ever “effortless” to love Bernard Chance? Perhaps, in 1970, when he was still hale and hearty. But what about 1993, after the second botched back surgery? Or 1999, after the heart attack? Or 2013, when the real downward slide began? And where was Mildred when Bernard could no longer care for himself, let alone drive himself to one of their clandestine “couplings”?

Where did they do it?

How could they pull it off for so long?

How could she miss all those signals?

Did the children know?

Though the questions are manifold, and seem to multiply exponentially, Harriet begins to arrive, through the throng of complexities, at certain logistical reckonings:

The long days at work.

The off-site lunches.

The trade shows.

Later, the veterans’ retreats and the coffee klatches.

And alibis aside, there was the arduous nature of their own infrequent intimacies and the springiness in his step upon returning from his veterans’ functions. There were bouts of inexplicable cheeriness, which Harriet had always viewed as Bernard’s way of apologizing for being an insufferable brute much of the time. All of it began to add up to what should have been obvious all along.

Then it hits her like a donkey punch to the stomach. Alaska. Just like Dwight said: Mildred tried to get Clark to take her to Alaska for years. Harriet’s stomach rolls. This blasted cruise, it was never intended for her and Bernard, it was intended for Mildred Honeycutt and Bernard!

Air. Harriet needs air. Cautiously, she swings her legs off the bed, takes hold of her water bottle, and lowers herself to the floor, inching her way toward the veranda. Leaning on the rail, Harriet sips her water as the dazed bumblebee of shock buzzes slow circles inside her skull. When she runs her hand over her head with a sigh, the band of her Bulova watch gets tangled in her hair. She finesses it for a moment, trying to liberate herself before yanking it free. Tearing the watch from her wrist, she wings it overboard into the harbor.

Yes, Harriet, your cruise is yet to begin.

F
or months, the slumbering giant has been venting steam, opening fissures, seething restlessly beneath the surface. A bulge has formed on the north face. Magma roils in the depths. Lately, the town is quaking like Jericho.

And when Mount St. Harriet blows, look out.

Recall, Harriet Chance, the evening you catch your daughter stealing from you for the first time. You lost it, for sure. But before we judge you too harshly, let us consider your defense: the Chances are experiencing a rough patch, of late. Work is monopolizing Bernard’s time. His hours are all over the map, even weekends. When he’s home at all, he’s distant, tired, less than inquisitive. Communication is breaking down. You have no idea what his life looks like outside the walls of
your home. All you know is that those walls feel like they’re closing in on you and that you’re a long way from your idealized self.

Caroline is walking all over you lately. You have no control over her. At thirteen, she comes and goes as she pleases, where, you do not know. What you do know is that she dresses in rags and is developing a foul mouth to go with her incorrigible attitude. She’s recently pierced her nose. She wears headphones wherever she goes, tuning out the world around her. Her new best friend, Kat, is the stuff of legend, you’ve never laid eyes on her. Caroline comes home smelling of cigarettes, raids the refrigerator, and leaves a mess in her wake. Bernard is too busy to notice these changes, and that’s giving him the benefit of the doubt.

Even with Skip out of the house (though he’s home every weekend and most evenings to ravage the kitchen, leaving a mess of his own), your entire life, it seems, is spent in service. And yes, you’re being cheap with yourself, Harriet. It’s second nature, at this point. Thank God for boxed wine, or you’d never take the edge off. Lately, you’ve taken to stowing the box in the lower cupboard with the crab pot you never use. The minute they’re empty, you cart them to the garbage, stashing them under trash bags. You tell yourself you’re getting them out of the way. What you don’t know is that Caroline has been nipping at your stores.

In your defense, it’s hard to blame you for losing your cool, when you’ve had such little help in raising Caroline. Bernard
offers practically nothing in the way of guidance or discipline. Summoning his name doesn’t even make for a good threat. “When your father gets home . . .” What? He’ll read the paper? Turn on the news?

Anyway, before the defense rests, let’s talk about motives (yours, not Caroline’s). Caroline stole cash from your purse; she filched your mother’s pearls, your diamond earrings from San Francisco. You caught her red-handed rummaging through your vanity. And after all she’s put you through. After all you’ve done for her. One good slap in the face deserves another, right, Harriet?

Okay, so maybe you overreacted. God knows, you didn’t mean to, God knows the pressure had been building for months, years, really. But twenty-four megatons was a bit much, don’t you think? Slapping her not once, but twice, pulling her hair, scratching her, pushing her against the wardrobe—that was a bit much.

The verdict is guilty, the sentence suspended indefinitely. Now, everybody, please, just get over it, and move on with your lives.