Commuters
A Novel
To my parents
Winnie
Rachel
Avery
Winnie
Rachel
Avery
Winnie
Rachel
Avery
Winnie
Rachel
Avery
Winnie
Rachel
Avery
Winnie
Rachel
Avery
Winnie
Rachel
Avery
Winnie
Rachel
Avery
Rachel
Avery
Winnie
W
INNIE
It was a small-town June wedding, and the bride was seventy-eight.
From the church balcony where she sat alone, Winnie could see how it all looked, without her: rows and rows of dark wood pews, the flutter and ripple of the guests who filled them, twin thumb-sized bursts of yellow and white gladiolas set before the altar. She was supposed to be downstairs, in a small lounge off the vestibule; it was the place young children were rushed to when their fussing threatened to interrupt the service. She should have been admiring herself in the mirror, in this tea-length wedding gown of cream silk; she should have been conserving energy. But her face was as fixed as it would ever be, and she couldn’t rest anymore.
It seemed there was something she needed to know, something she could only discover from this vantage point, so Winifred Easton McClelland—soon to be Trevis—had slowly climbed the stone stairs and found her way to a front-row seat, above the place where the ceremony was about to begin.
Sixty years ago, she had stood in the foyer of this same church, in an itchy, off-the-rack suit. It was a modest Wednesday morning wedding; it matched everything about marrying steady, quiet, reliable George, her first husband. Winnie’s father had been uncharacteristically distant and preoccupied, on that windy November day, as they waited together for their musical cue. But he had a lot on his mind, as Hartfield’s station manager.
Those trains don’t run themselves,
he used to say. Or was he worried about what this was costing him? She had tried to find something they could talk about, together in the chilly hall.
“You don’t have to,” her father had said abruptly, staring at a spot above her head. “A wife doesn’t, I mean. Every night. Even if
he
wants to.”
Well. Winnie now felt a slow flush of heat rise within her, right there in the First Presbyterian balcony. No one was around to give her such advice now, nor did she need it. She thought of Jerry Trevis, her Jerry, and the way he would touch her—the anticipation was part of the pleasure. She knew enough from their few evenings alone together, to guess how their bodies would join and respond to each other: with a lively ease, with recognition. No, she wasn’t at all the same bride that she had been, on the day her father gave his wedding-night counsel.
Is that why she was sitting all the way up here, alone? Winnie wondered what she could discover, given a clear line of sight and a moment’s reflection. What was different, what had changed, in the years between that first wedding and today.
The shoes, for one thing—or her ability to choose them. Winnie raised one foot and sighed, studying the compromise heel, which was a good inch and a half lower than that impossibly flimsy
pair in which she had teetered for twenty minutes at Nordstrom, even as she knew what her daughter would make her buy instead: something expensive, subdued, sturdy.
Old-lady shoes. On my wedding day.
Nor did she have illusions about the sentimentality of this occasion, those unnecessary details that probably most of the guests—and some from her own family, even—would see as trivial or self-indulgent. Winnie didn’t need all this: the ring, the dress (but oh, she loved how she looked in this dress), the lavish reception to come. She knew how it looked. Winnie’s social circle was composed mostly of other long-time widows, and there was a history of light jokes about the phenomenon of two older people coming together late in life. She knew all the usual arrangements, all the wink-and-nudge euphemisms—those “companions” or “special friends.” Why bother with anything formal, anything official?
But when a man like Jerry Trevis said he wanted to get married, he meant
married
. He hadn’t moved to tiny Hartfield from Chicago for anything else. And there was this; Winnie ran her palm across the smooth surface of her dress. The truth was, she wanted this day too—the pomp and show of it, the public display. She had married once because it was a good match, mostly for her parents and his; that was how things were done, and she hadn’t argued with it. But now she found herself about to do something that felt like the first thing she’d ever done on her own. And maybe that called for a lot of witnesses, the gratuitous flowers, a tiered and too-sweet cake.
She was marrying a man for the delicious and wicked and simple reason that she wanted to.
Not that everyone saw it that way. Earlier in the day, Win
nie and Jerry had posed together for a photograph on the sloping lawn in front of the church, next to the welcome signboard where their own names were spelled out in white plastic letters, below today’s date. (Above that, for the morning wedding, another couple’s names were listed, which only slightly ruined the effect.) For the occasion, Winnie had agreed to be interviewed by a reporter from the local paper—she often was, a frequent obligation, part of her role as the daughter of what many considered to be the town’s founder, the man who had linked little Hartfield to New York City. Dutifully, she gave her quotes when asked, and had learned not to argue with young people’s fascination with the past—especially those awful railroad aficionados. Relentless. But she had hoped for more, this time. She wanted to explain what it was like, meeting Jerry just three months ago. How she had never expected to be in love again, and what it took to upend your placid and settled life: the one you led with dignity, the one people expected of you.
“At times, what I feel is closer to regret than anything else,” Winnie had told the reporter. “Maybe that’s inevitable. After all, most of my life will have been spent without Jerry, and getting married now keeps bringing that to mind. So then all this happiness actually—”
“Yes,” the polite reporter said, nodding. Her pen hovered over the pad, unmoving. “So interesting. Can you tell me exactly how old Mr. Trevis is? And confirm your birth date?”
And so, little by little, there on the soft church lawn, Winnie discovered the reporter’s agenda: a fluff piece, a throwaway. Something to warm the heart. She and Jerry were meant to be a symbol—of hope springing eternal, and all that. How could it be
otherwise? She and Jerry couldn’t be themselves; they had to be much bigger than that. They were the
human interest
.
Below her, most of the guests had been seated by now, although there was the usual waving and rearranging of places as people called to each other and organized themselves. The front of the church, though, by the altar, was still empty. Jerry and the minister would enter from one of the side doors—if she saw that happen, Winnie thought, she’d really have to hustle down there. Still, she sat and watched.
That minister—a nice young man. About thirty-five, maybe forty. Nervous and a little overeager, he’d met with them a few weeks ago to discuss the order of the ceremony: what hymns, in which order, and who would do the readings. At one point, though, she couldn’t understand what he was going on about—he was explaining something quite earnestly, with grave import. Finally she gathered that the minister was letting them know that the phrase “promise to obey” was now commonly omitted from the vows, and the various reasons, and so on. He seemed quite intent on the point. And he was a little disconcerted when Winnie couldn’t help a short burst of laughter, Jerry’s hand in hers. She understood the changing politics that made this seem necessary, to a younger person. But what did this minister think he was protecting her from? She had no qualms about promising to obey Jerry. In any case, so much of marriage was unspoken, was made up of two people striving for kindness and respect, in a countless series of actions and gestures, day in and day out. It was touching, the way the minister wanted to get these mere
words
right. Well, all right, she had told him. If it makes you feel more comfortable.
Footsteps, behind her: green-robed Helen Ryan came in si
lently and took the cloth cover off the wooden handles of the tower bells. If she was surprised to find the bride up here alone, she didn’t show it.
“You’ve got a few minutes yet,” Helen said, clicking on a small light and turning a page of music. “In fact, I believe there’s a saying…”
Winnie smiled. “They can’t start without me.”
“Congratulations, by the way.” Winnie started to thank her, but Helen went on. “We hear you’re moving.”
Winnie flinched. She had lived too long in a small town to pretend surprise at the way people heard things, before the ink was dry, almost. She could tell herself that she hadn’t said anything to her family yet because of the rush and flurry of this wedding. Plus, it had all happened so fast, what she and Jerry had planned—what they had done, actually, as of yesterday morning. But the truth was that Winnie just hadn’t been able to bring herself to explain the house to anyone, especially her daughter, Rachel, who lived in Hartfield too, and whose reaction would be…complicated.
As Helen began to send music from the organ pipes lodged in the church stone above, stately chords designed to warn any last-minute lingerers that they’d better hurry, Winnie searched the pews below. She knew she really ought to go downstairs, but she had to find Rachel first. She scanned the crowd, now a blurry mass, with no luck. Where was she? Where could she be? For a moment, not being able to see her daughter cut Winnie’s breath short. But then her son-in-law’s head gave it away: that thick white scar on his bald head caught the light. And so there was Rachel next to him, in a pale pink dress, her long limbs in their usual restless motion. And there were her girls, Winnie’s grandchildren: sitting up
straight and serious, those lovely girls. Winnie started to examine the tiny figures across the aisle—most of all, she wanted to catch a glimpse of Jerry’s grandson, Avery, as she’d heard plenty: drugs, fights, dropping out of school. But when the guests grew quiet and expectant, she forgot all that. Jerry. He was there now, at the steps in front of the altar, with his dark suit and bristly white hair.
His gaze raked the crowd, and though it was hard to be sure, she thought he might be frowning. Jerry usually frowned when he stood for any length of time, the only outward sign of his chronic spinal pain. In Korea, in one particularly heavy firefight, an explosion had thrown Jerry from the bunker, breaking three vertebrae that never fully healed. But Winnie knew the details only partially; he angrily dismissed any references to his injury. She was sure that the pain was worse than he let on, even today, and this above all made her want to get the ceremony started.
The organ music swelled; the notes were wide open and strong. Winnie put a hand on the pew in front of her, fighting off a surge of exhaustion. It was suddenly unbearable to be this far from him. She watched Jerry and saw his gaze travel up slowly until he seemed to be looking right at her. He put a hand over his eyes, as if to shield them from the light. Winnie raised her own hand.
Yes, it’s me. Here I am.
Even though she was used to the way weakness could now suddenly overtake her, Winnie still hated it, and no more so than now. How would she manage those stairs? But now one lone portly figure was walking purposefully back down the aisle; it was Daniel, her son. She’d been found; she would be rescued. Helen let the hammers fly, their ancient handles rattling in the wood. And though the time had come, Winnie remained where she was, waiting.
Something was growing inside her, a thought should have been taboo to a mother, to anyone who had loved and raised up children—but it was a thought as clear and true as a sharp intake of breath.
Everything begins now.
Yes.
Her son Daniel’s voice came from the stairwell; he was calling her name—no, not her name, he was calling for his mother, calling
Mom
. He would be up here any minute, to collect her, to walk her gently down the aisle. It would be her son’s job this time, not her father’s. Helen must have finished—the knocking of metal on wood was silent now, although one last full bar of music unfolded itself outside, across the June-green lawns of Hartfield’s town square. And even though everything within her strained toward Jerry, Winnie held herself still.
Not yet,
she thought, and then said it aloud. She wouldn’t be given this kind of moment again, Winnie knew. Her life had arrayed itself before her, in offspring and friendships assembled below—in the surrounding hills and houses she’d known since childhood—and now it waited politely for her to reappear and change everything.
Oh, not just yet.