Luck (20 page)

“That’s what it looks like, wouldn’t you say? All this over a pronoun? Come on.”

“Oh, good work,” Philip said dryly as they watched the results on the late TV news. “That should calm everything down.”

What she should have said was something more like,
Look at the different kinds of beauty and love in my work. At the potential beauties of faith, too—shouldn’t they include and be everyone?
Also,
See how humans fall short in practice. Why is that? Shouldn’t we ask?
Instead, she finished up with a bright smile and another wave of the hand. On TV the smile looked exceedingly glittery, the wave rather frantic. Oh well.

Philip was right, in a way: in the longer scheme of their lives here, the uproar didn’t last long. Demonstrators’ interest dwindled on the fourth Sunday, when just one camera and notebook showed up. On the fifth Sunday there was an early-spring ice storm, which damaged a tree at the front and killed a couple of shrubs and prevented activity at the gate or anywhere else. And after that, barring occasional bags of shit and unpleasant phone calls, it was over.

Much got broken in a fairly brief time. Not Nora’s will, certainly not, but some trust, some affection. She wasn’t about to take the inhabitants here on faith, as it were, any more, that’s for sure.

She’s not sure about Philip either, and whether something may have been broken there too. He did his best for her but honestly, his heart didn’t feel totally in it. Now the question arises: did the strain of straddling the fence, not to mention painting and repainting it, wind up months later killing him? Not that alone, of course not. But it was an anxious, strenuous time.

That doesn’t, at the moment, bear considering.

How fortunate Nora has been in her important men: Uncle Albert, who commanded “Draw the story”; Max, who urges always” See more, look harder”; and Philip, who pulled her close and said, “Don’t worry, you just go ahead and do what you see,” but who also said, “They’re frightened. We
ought to be able to understand that, whether they understand what you’re doing or not.”

What is she going to do without that voice? And the rest of him.

What if she decided to see him after all, one last view, as any normal widow would do? And while she was at it, what if she also ruled out cremation in favour of keeping him perfect and whole? She could still do any of that, there’s always at least a couple of days when widows have power, and there must be better farewells than a leap out of bed and a scream.

But already he is not perfect and whole, and already she has seen him, that last encounter when she turned to him in their bed. Better to concentrate on his head thrown back with laughter, pushed forward with anger, all his range of expressions and postures, the tilt of his shoulders in one mood, the slant of his hips in another. Long ago she did quite a few portraits of him: a focus on musculature from the waist up, barrel chest, taut forearm tendons, straining neck, that sort of thing; and from the waist down, those marvellous hip-slopes some men have, like arrows, and those long thighs, those planted feet. Somewhere out in the world, Max may know where, there are also renditions of his face, done back when she was practising the hard discipline of the portrait. “Let me see, let me see,” Philip would demand, and when she did he would say, “My God, aren’t I gorgeous,” and they would laugh.

Now she lays her head on the table. Right in front of Sophie, as if they are friends and have no secrets, Nora puts her head down. She feels Sophie’s hand on her forearm. The gesture is kind. It’s a moment. It is, in fact, a surprisingly comforting, almost tender one.

They hear the front door open and close, and light steps in the hall. Nora raises her head, Sophie leaves her hand where
it is. Here is Beth in the kitchen doorway; but what an unfamiliar Beth, with her fluff of angel hair plastered with sweat and darkened by dust, her floaty dress dirty and limp, her feet and legs grimy. Grubby once-white sandals dangle from her fingertips. “Heavens, what’s happened to you?” Sophie asks.

“I went for a walk. Out along the highway. What are you doing?” Beth’s eyes are on Sophie’s hand, on Nora’s arm.

“Looking at the paperwork from the funeral home. Come join us if you like.” And strangely, instead of going upstairs to get cleaned up, Beth does sit down at the table. There’s a hot outdoorsy, musky sort of smell to her, and dust puffs out of her skirt. “Why were you walking?” Nora asks.

“I got restless.” Does she mean bored, could she be bored by a death in the house? Ah well, doesn’t matter, it’s Beth.

“Do you think,” Nora returns her attention to Sophie, “many people will show up for the service?”

“Quite a few said they hope to, but it’s hard for a lot of them on short notice. Did you get hold of what’s-her-name? His first wife?”

Nora laughs. “I certainly did. I can’t say she’s warmed to me over the years. But at least she knows, so that’s done.”

“Do you want to talk about some of the details? There are some questions about music we’d like played, and Hendrik—the funeral home guy—says he’ll do his best to find whatever we want, or we could take music with us tomorrow. He has a minister he uses, too, somebody sort of non-denominational, is that okay?”

“I suppose so.”

“He wanted to know if anybody else would be speaking. He says I can phone him later about that sort of thing if we want. Then I guess we’ll have a few days afterwards to pick out the, uh, the urn, and decide what we want done with it.”

Nora notices another slippage: that Sophie speaks of
we
, not
of you.
As with sorting through Philip’s possessions, Nora will have to decide at some point which incidents and expressions and moments to carry with her for the next twenty, thirty, forty years. This may require an enquiry into at least a few facts, just so she doesn’t go forward wrong-headed. Only, not yet.

“Hendrik says relatives or friends often say a few personal words. Will you want to, do you think?”

“Me? Heavens, no.” The thought of having to be coherent about Philip, for one thing; but also, what business is it of anyone’s how Nora feels about him, and what sort of man she saw him to be? “Would you?”

“No,” Sophie says sadly, “me neither.”

They do not ask Beth. And yet of the three of them, she might be the most eloquent. For sure, she’s the most experienced when it comes to speaking in public. Also, it’d be easiest for her because she was unattached to Philip, and might bring some joy to the proceedings by pointing out the way to the future, the happy side of events.

“Max might, I suppose,” Nora says. “He was fond of Philip, I think.” One more thing to be unexpectedly uncertain about. This is exhausting. “Oh, God, I’m so tired. I can’t think. Why can’t I wake up?”

“I’ll make tea, shall I?” Beth asks brightly, and the other two roll their eyes, but nod, and then bend, heads together, over the forms, and start talking about music of all things.

“Tom Waits,” Nora suggests.

“Tom Petty,” Sophie counters. Mysteriously this causes them to giggle again over “some Tom, anyway,” and who laughs about funerals? Not Beth, who is very seriously trying to come up with some combination, quite tricky, to promote
energy and tranquillity and letting go of history and being awake to new prospects—all that in one teapot?

This comradely moment is broken, Beth’s concentration is disrupted, they all jump, at the unlikely sound of the doorbell. Opening the door has sometimes been an unpleasant business, but here’s something they’ve forgotten about the place: kindness and old customs. That there are some good people, generous or courteous ones.

When Sophie answers, with Nora hovering behind in the hallway, there’s a boy on the doorstep, maybe ten or eleven years old, dark-haired and chunky, holding a cake box which he thrusts into Sophie’s hands. “This is for you. My mum says to tell you she’s sorry.” His mother must be the woman out on the sidewalk—bravely or cravenly offering up her plump son, however watchfully, to dubious appetites.

“Why, thank you,” Sophie says, and, “What’s your name?” but the boy is already off the porch, down the walk, out the gate. “Thank you,” Sophie calls more loudly, waving to the woman, who waves back in a
You’re welcome
gesture.

Back in the kitchen they open the box to find a carrot cake, it looks like, or banana, iced in white. “I’ll be damned,” Nora says. “Who was that?”

“I don’t know. I’ve seen the mother around, but I don’t know who she is.” They are as astonished as if this were the miracle of the loaves and fishes. The story of yet another, very recent painting, as it happens, a late addition to the series, not yet seen by anyone beyond the house, not even Max. In this one, Beth-bones are stripped nearly bare on a platter, her fishhead-eyes glassy, tattered baguette clenched in her fish-jaws, multicoloured thin fabric fingers reaching ravenously in from the edges. A grim piece, although it didn’t start, and wasn’t actually intended, that way.

More miracles. Sophie answers the second time the doorbell rings too. Nora still hangs back, wary, and Beth has at last gone upstairs to shower away the effects of her lengthy, unlikely walk. Her tea was fine, they’ve certainly tasted far worse, but Nora and Sophie have now opened a bottle of wine.

This time it’s a casserole, its bearer Joy Geffen, who runs the only fabric store for miles. Both Nora and Sophie are familiar with her, and Nora moves to the door beside Sophie. “I’m so sorry for your loss,” Joy says. “And I’m sorry about being so late to bring something over. I didn’t hear till this morning, and this is the first moment I’ve had. I hope you like macaroni and tuna?” Comfort food. This is like the old days, when Nora and Philip moved in and people showed up bearing whatever—cakes, casseroles, advice, information—they thought might be useful to newcomers.

No advice now, though, just food. “Thank you, Joy, this is kind of you.” So it is. Nora is remarkably touched, she’s afraid she suddenly has tears in her eyes, how excessive.

“It’s nothing, really. I’m sorry, that’s all. I just made extra of what we’re having for dinner. I hope you like it, we always do.”

“We’ll get the dish back to you as soon as we can.”

“No hurry, no hurry,” and like the boy and his mother, Joy is gone, and Nora promptly loses some, although not all, of her gratitude. Because the question remains: where was Joy Geffen when she was needed? Where was her voice, and all the other voices, of the appalled, the offended, the upstanding citizens who would tell those self-righteous thugs and lunatics to go home and mind their own philistine business? Who would say,
This is not us, and does not represent our community or our views or our behaviour or, for that matter, our faith.
Nora does not recall Joy Geffen doing
anything beyond continuing to sell her the fabrics and needles and threads she continued to order.

The third person to appear is the wife of one of Philip’s poker pals. Susannah and Dave Hamilton are a few years older than Nora and Philip, early fifties, both lawyers although with separate practices. “We have enough trouble figuring out who does what at home,” Dave said back when the four of them had occasional dinners. “We’d be a disaster if we tried working together.”

Philip said if he were ever charged with a crime—what crime did he have in mind?—he’d hire Dave to defend him; whereas if he and Nora were ever talking divorce, his aim would be to get to Susannah’s office before Nora could. Another joke, of sorts. Philip said, “He’s sharp, she’s cutthroat, that’s a good range of talent.”

Susannah phoned Nora several times during the mess. “I feel so bad, let me know if there’s some way I can help.” Philip reported that Dave offered to be “right on top of it” in the event of actionable libel or slander. Was it unreasonable to wish, again, for defenders at the actual gate, to feel anything less was inadequate to the cause?

“Dave and I,” says this woman on the doorstep with the grave, round face, mop of curly grey hair, small angular body, “we are just devastated. Dave’s running late in court today or he’d be here to say so as well, but we’ll be at the service. Tomorrow afternoon, isn’t it? But I didn’t want to wait till then to tell you how upset and sorry we are, and I figured yesterday was too soon to bother you. Anyway, there’s nothing sensible to do, is there? I couldn’t think of anything but food, so I picked up pasta salad, and here’s a box of cookies. Also bought, I’m afraid.”

The box says the cookies come from Mavis’s Old Town
Bakeshop. Oh dear. But there are no more rules, all bets must be off. “Thank you, Susannah. It’s all very strange.”

Susannah nods. “It must be. So sudden, and he always looked the picture of health and vitality. His heart?”

“Yes.” In a way.

“Is there anything I can do? Call anyone, organize anything, get something you need?”

“No, we’re fine, thanks. Sophie’s taken care of the arrangements.”

“Well, you call if you think of something. I have to go back to the office for two or three hours, and then I’ll be home, so either place, just phone. And otherwise we’ll see you tomorrow, okay?” Nora nods. Susannah and Dave seem to be good at offering help as long as somebody specifies what form help should take. Left to themselves they come up with vague offers of legal advice, pasta salad and cookies.

She is too harsh. People offer what’s within their characters and definitions to offer, and that’s that. “Thank you,” Nora repeats, and smiles at Susannah because she has, actually, located a morsel of gratitude. “If I think of anything, I’ll be in touch.” She won’t, but there’s something to be said for ordinary customs and courtesies, she can see that.

When they close the door Sophie says, “Isn’t that great? Now we don’t have to worry about having food in the house. Is anybody else hungry yet?” Sophie has her own customs, all of which, in response to either happy situations or sad ones, evidently involve eating. Nora rather admires Sophie’s frank appetites, although would prefer to suppose they apply only to food, which they may or may not.

At dinner even Beth nibbles at the casserole and the pasta salad, then has a sliver of cake and two—two!—giant chocolate chip cookies. She is oddly jumpy, gives off an impression
of something thrumming under her skin, but maybe that’s just the sugary effects of dessert.