A Girl Becomes a Comma Like That Read online

  Finally Alma turned around and looked at Georgia. She put a hand on her hip and said, “Your father doesn’t know this is his bedroom anymore, Georgie.”

  “But it is his bedroom,” Georgia said, her voice flat.

  “You said yourself that he’s been wandering into the den and sleeping on the sofa. Don’t just sit there looking at me like that.”

  “Like what?”

  “So judgmental,” her aunt said.

  “You could always take Kevin’s room.”

  “Where’s he going to sleep when he comes home for the weekends?”

  “He doesn’t come home for the weekends,” Georgia said.

  “Well, he might, and if he does, where would he sleep if your old Aunt Alma was in his room?”

  “In the den.”

  “Your father likes it in there.” Her aunt was emphatic.

  “I just don’t think it’s right,” Georgia said.

  “So judgmental, Georgie,” her aunt said. “You certainly didn’t get that quality from our side of the family.”

  When the boy came into the yogurt store, she made his cone smaller than usual, but really it was standard and weighed what it was supposed to weigh, what it should have been weighing all along, the three fat swirls Mrs. Yates had demonstrated for her that first day on the job. He took the cone from her hand and looked at it, obviously disappointed. “I guess you’re not coming out to the car anymore,” he said.

  She watched as he lifted the yogurt to his mouth, as his tongue went around and around in a circle.

  “What did I do?” he asked.

  And Georgia didn’t say anything, just turned away and began stirring the fudge, which was hot and steaming, and she let the steam hit her face, inhaled, and didn’t even turn around when she heard the sensor’s little song, when she heard the bells under the mat outside ringing, which told her another customer was gone.

  Rachel Spark

  2000

  Blur of a Girl

  1.

  It had been three weeks since my visit to the dingy clinic on Sepulveda Boulevard, and the cramps had mostly subsided, but the bleeding continued. I was standing in the kitchen in a black T-shirt and jeans, wearing two maxipads. I moved from sink to cupboard to stove, aware of the stacked pads between my legs, shuffling around like a very old woman. My hair was on top of my head in a messy ponytail and I wore my mother’s apron, which at one time, years ago, said Elizabeth in black felt, but which now said simply abeth. She was in bed, too tired to cook the dinner she’d promised Gilbert Wolff earlier in the week, and I was attempting her specialty: eggplant with peanut sauce over pasta. If I cooked while she rested, I was hoping she’d be able to join us at the table.

  My mother’s skin was so slightly yellow that it was still something the two of us debated and questioned, but the fatigue was undeniable. She’d been sleeping twelve hours a night and taking multiple naps during the day. My mother was leaving me, letter by letter, and as I stood in the kitchen looking down at the open cookbook, I touched the remaining letters on the apron with a fingertip and imagined the fabric across my chest blank and white, those final five letters coming loose, falling to the floor or getting lost in the dryer.

  In the last week she had stopped shopping, teaching, and going out with Gilbert, which is one reason the dinner invitation came about. If my mother couldn’t go to him, she wanted him to come to her. She’d called the school district three mornings in a row for a substitute teacher, but refused to give up her classes completely. She’d promised the kids she’d be back as soon as the medicine kicked in. On Monday she’d be starting a new chemo, a drug that came from the yew tree, and if it worked, the doctor promised her at least a few good months.

  I closed the cookbook and decided to rely on her instructions instead, which she was trying to shout to me from her bedroom. Her voice no longer carried down the hall, so I shuffled out of the kitchen and into her room. I stood above her with a notebook and a pen while she listed the ingredients: peanut butter, soy sauce, ginger, red pepper, and orange marmalade.

  “You’re wearing my apron,” she said. “I love that apron, even if it only has half of my name on it.” She was smiling.

  “I don’t remember you using jelly.”

  “It’s not jelly,” she said.

  “Can I get you anything?”

  She shook her head.

  “Are you sure about tonight?”

  “Yes,” she said.

  “Because I can call Gilbert and cancel for you.”

  “He’s on his way, Rachel.”

  “I’ll call his cell phone.”

  “I’m fine. Let me sleep ten more minutes, and then I’ll come help you.”

  I shuffled back to the kitchen. I opened the refrigerator and hunted around until I found the jar of marmalade. I measured out a tablespoon. I banged the spoon against the bowl and watched the marmalade fall.

  I’d met Gilbert several times before, but only in passing—the two of them always rushing off together. Tonight was supposed to be the next step in their relationship, the getting-to-know-the-family step. I was the family.

  He arrived in a tweed sport coat, black button-down shirt, and jeans. He handed me a bottle of wine and a bouquet of irises. “I’m not supposed to drink—doctor’s orders, so the wine is for you,” he said.

  “Thanks,” I said.

  “I couldn’t decide about the flowers,” he told me. “I was thinking about roses or lilies, but when I saw these—”

  “They’re beautiful,” I said.

  My mother was right; Gilbert was dapper and stylish, especially for a man in his sixties. He certainly didn’t look like someone with advanced cancer, but I knew his ruddy cheeks and big smile were misleading, that inside of him terrible things were happening. I told Gilbert that my mom was in her room sleeping but that she wanted him to wake her.

  When he headed down the hall, I set the flowers on the table, put the wine away, and searched for a vase. I arranged the flowers, stood back a moment and admired them, then followed to see if he was having any luck rousing her. I stood in the doorway, unnoticed, and watched them. He was sitting on the bed next to her, planting tender kisses on her cheek. He whispered something in her ear. My mother’s eyes were open. “So handsome,” she said. “Look at you all dressed up.”

  I saw it then: my mother was a dying woman in love with a dying man. I felt dizzy suddenly and held on to the door to keep my balance. I cleared my throat to make my presence known.

  “Give me ten more minutes,” she said to both of us. “Just a little more sleep,” she said.

  We gave her fifteen minutes. We sat across the table from each other, our conversation stilted and unnatural.

  “How’s school?”

  “Fine, fine.” I was nodding like an idiot.

  “Good.” A long pause.

  “How’s the tree business?”

  “Things are okay,” he said. Another long pause. “How’s the poetry business?”

  “There is no poetry business,” I said, and we both laughed.

  We gave her thirty minutes, then went to her room together to try again. My mother shook her head, shooed us away, and the two of us returned to the table rejected.

  We gave her forty-five minutes, and Gilbert pushed his chair away from the table and got up. He walked to the window and looked out at the black ocean and lone oil tanker. He pointed at the cement patio ten stories down. “Your mother told me there was a suicide here a few years back.”

  “Yeah,” I said.

  “She said you saw the whole thing.”

  “It was awful.”

  “Said the girl didn’t even live here, that she lived in a house across town.”

  “This building is famous.”

  He turned from the window and looked at me.

  “It’s the tallest building in the city,” I said. “The woman next door has lived here for thirty years, and she told me—these are her exact words—it’s just something that happ
ens now and then.”

  “Like an earthquake,” he said, looking back.

  “Yeah, something like that.”

  A foghorn sounded in the distance. Gilbert turned from the window and came back to the table. He sat down with a sigh. I looked at the empty chair and wished my mother were sitting in it. I looked at the place I’d set for her: the plate, the knife and fork and spoon. I wondered if I’d be like those crazy, grieving women who continue setting the table for a dead son or a daughter who jumped off the tallest building in the city.

  We gave my mother a full hour and then tried her a final time. He sat on her bed and rubbed her back. I stood at the door. “Gilbert brought you irises,” I said over his shoulder.

  She opened her eyes, then quickly closed them.

  “Want me to bring them in here?” I asked her.

  “I’ll get up in a minute,” she said groggily.

  Gilbert watched the clock on the dining room wall, his stomach growling so loudly that I could hear it. He was obviously hungry, and I was too, but we didn’t want to eat without her; it would be giving up, admitting all the dinners to come that she wouldn’t enjoy. I used his growling stomach as a cue to get up from the table and go to the bathroom to check the pads. The blood was darker, richer than any menstrual blood. It was thick and surprising. I rolled up the two soiled pads and dropped them in the wastebasket, then covered them with toilet paper. I leaned over, reached under the sink and thought about doubling up again, but decided that one pad would have to do.

  I washed my hands.

  I washed them again.

  I stood for a moment, holding onto the doorknob before moving into the hall. My steps were met with sharp stabs to my lower stomach, which made me want to open the bottle of wine Gilbert had brought with him. I imagined drinking a glass on my own, him watching me and wanting one himself, and decided against it.

  I returned to the dining room and sat down at the table. “Well…” I said.

  “Let’s eat,” Gilbert said. “We’ll let your mother sleep and have some dinner together.”

  He twirled the noodles on his fork, gave me a sad smile, and I was wishing that she’d met him years ago.

  “I love eggplant,” he said. “It’s meaty without being meat—not that there’s anything wrong with meat. I told your mother how I feel about eggplant and she promised me this dish. And here you’ve gone and made it for me. What a good girl.” He lifted the fork to his mouth.

  “I’m sorry,” I said. “It’s sort of dry.”

  “Nonsense.”

  “It tastes much better when she makes it. She’ll make it for you another time, I’m sure.”

  He was chewing and nodding appreciatively.

  “When she makes it—”

  But he cut me off. “It’s delicious, Rachel,” he said. “You’ve made a nice dinner.”

  “No,” I said. “I didn’t watch her enough in the kitchen. I didn’t watch her enough anywhere.” I felt my eyes welling up.

  He put down his fork. “I want to tell you something.”

  “Don’t” I said.

  “Listen,” he insisted, “you’ve got to get ready, prepare yourself.” His voice was soft.

  “I’ve been getting ready for years. Since she was diagnosed, I’ve known what was coming.” I picked up my fork again and stabbed at a piece of eggplant. “And still I’m not prepared. How can anyone prepare?”

  He shrugged.

  “I thought I was preparing, imagining the inevitable scenario, seeing myself at her bedside, getting through it—holding her hand, the fucking morphine drip—I’m sorry,” I said, losing my appetite completely and putting down my fork.

  “Don’t be sorry.”

  “I shouldn’t say fuck in front of you.”

  “Hogwash. Fuck is a good word,” he said.

  “It’s certainly better than hogwash,” I said, smiling.

  “Monday’s chemo will probably work. It’s from the yew tree. And your mother will have a few more months. Good months.”

  “It’s just postponement,” I said.

  “What isn’t?”

  I thought about that a moment and then said, “Taking the elevator to the roof and jumping.”

  “Yes, well,” he said. “Everything except that.” He paused. “Let’s have some wine with this dinner.”

  “But your doctor said—”

  “Hogwash. I mean, fuck it.”

  “You’re sure?”

  “Absolutely. I want a glass. Or two,” he said brightly.

  I shot up from the table and went to the kitchen. “Is red okay?” I called out.

  “Merlot, Chianti—whatever you want. Open the Bordeaux I brought, if you like.”

  I brought the Bordeaux and corkscrew to the table, then turned to get the wineglasses. “Your mother is the love of my life,” he said to my back.

  “Mine too,” I told him.

  “She wishes that weren’t so.” His voice was serious.

  “It is what it is,” I said, placing the wineglasses on the table.

  Gilbert shook his head. “You’ll have other loves, different loves.” He picked up the corkscrew and began opening the wine. He was quiet while he twisted, a look of concentration on his face. “She told me what you went through—that man who left the country,” he said finally.

  “He didn’t leave the country,” I said.

  “Oh?” He pulled, and the cork popped out.

  “He was just here visiting. It’s not like he lived here and then went away.”

  Gilbert nodded, splashing wine into our glasses.

  “He’s on a farm,” I said.

  “A fucking farm,” he corrected me.

  “A fucking farm,” I said, lifting the glass to my lips and taking a sip. The wine was delicious—dry and bold and fruity. My appetite returned and I joined Gilbert in eating the dinner I had prepared. It tasted okay, not as good as hers, but better than I had anticipated.

  We drank one glass. We ate our dinner and drank another glass. And then another. We opened a second bottle, and poured one more. Gilbert moved to the couch and I moved to the chair across from him. I was telling him about the tree outside my classroom window, how I thought the tree was sick.

  “I’d take a look at it,” he said, “but we’re too drunk to drive.”

  “Angela! Let me call my friend,” I said.

  By midnight the three of us were standing on campus. It was dark and mostly quiet, except for the occasional burst of laughter coming from the dorms across the street. Gilbert was several feet away, busy with his black bag on a picnic table, searching for equipment. Angela scratched at the new hives on her chest and I told her to stop. She dropped her hand to her side, then leaned in to scold me. “I can’t believe you got fucked up with your mom’s boyfriend,” she said.

  “We’re just buzzed.”

  “You tripped coming up the hill, Rachel—twice.” She scratched some more and I decided to let her. “He seems like a good guy,” she said.

  “I wish she’d met him earlier.”

  “And not bad-looking for sixty-five. Does he have any sons?”

  “Daughters, two of them,” I told her.

  “Damn,” she said. “All the good ones are taken, gay, or daughters.”

  Gilbert pulled a flashlight from his bag and came over to us. “Lead the way,” he said. The three of us walked across the campus, passing the administration building and student union, up three flights of steps and one more hill. I didn’t trip once and brought that to Angela’s attention. “See, I’m fine,” I said. And then the hiccups started.

  “You don’t sound fine,” she said.

  “I get hiccups even when I’m not drinking,” I said, hiccuping.

  “Please.”

  We stood in front of my classroom, our backs to the door. Gilbert handed me the flashlight and I pointed the light at the tree. “It’s sick, right? I know it’s sick. I had a feeling,” I said.

  “What do you know about trees?” A
ngela said, looking puzzled.

  I shrugged.

  “Let him do his job.” She was scratching madly now.

  “Stop scratching. You’re going to start bleeding. You’ll scar.” I hiccuped, raised my hand to make her quit, but she sneered at me and quit on her own.

  “Don’t fight, you two.” Gilbert held a metal wandlike contraption and moved toward the tree.

  “We’re not fighting. This is how we talk,” Angela said.

  “Then don’t talk.” He turned around and grinned at us.

  “Your chest is red,” I said.

  Angela rolled her eyes and zipped up her sweater.

  I hiccuped loudly.

  Gilbert was inches from the tree now, looking closely. He used the thin metal tube to dig into the tree’s trunk, pulling out sap. He held the end of the tube to his fingertip. He opened and closed his finger and thumb, like scissors, then lifted the finger to his nose and inhaled. Finally, he touched his tongue and tasted the sap. “This tree is fine,” he said. “It’s going to outlive us all.”

  By the time Angela dropped us off in front of the building, Gilbert and I were nearly sober and my hiccups had disappeared. “I want to come up and kiss your mom good-bye,” he said at the elevator.

  He went to her bedroom and I carried the dirty dishes to the kitchen. I was loading the dishwasher when he came up behind me. “She’s yellow,” he said. He leaned against the stove with his hands behind his back, his face drawn and tired.

  “It’s the lighting in that room.” I turned from him and picked up a plate. I held the plate under the running water and shook my head.

  “No,” he said. “It’s not the lighting.”

  “I’m sort of yellow in that room,” I insisted.

  “Come with me. Let’s look at her.” He took the plate from my hand and set it on the counter.

  Gilbert stepped into her bedroom first and flipped the light switch. I stalled in the hallway. When he looked back and motioned for me to join him, I moved into the room. My mother slept on her side and was snoring softly. I stood with Gilbert and looked at her skin, her left arm outside of the blanket, her shoulder, neck, and cheek. He was right. It wasn’t a tint, but a color, something true happening—a yellow from a child’s box of crayons, a deep yellow, vivid and undeniable.