French Poodle Fabric Article

Her husband kissing her cheek, then stepping outside and scooping the dog into his arms. How tenderly he lowered him to the truck seat, how nonchalantly he set the pistol on the floorboard before driving away into the night. The dog was a miniature black poodle named Peppy, and Richard had owned him before they were married. Peppy's muzzle was silver, like his paws. He had cataracts and he hadn't eaten in a week.

She lay in bed when her husband returned. She heard him wash with the garden hose, then enter the house and creep into their bedroom to unload his pockets onto the dresser.

"Where's your shirt?" she asked, then before he could answer, "Oh."

He sat on the bed, pulled off his boots. She touched his back.

"Where," she said.

"A field off Yorktown. A cornfield that's just been plowed."

"Did he-"

"Minnie."

"How much would a vet have cost?"

"Oh, I think the old boy deserved better than that."

He'd said this for a week, though she knew he also wanted to save money. Overtime had been slim lately, and they were seven months pregnant. In bed, she could smell the dark field on him, a mealy scent that promised he would handle such things. She whispered, "Are you okay?"

He stayed so quiet she thought he was weeping, or about to. He who never wept, he who always calmed her when she fell to pieces. She wanted his tears, though, wanted to drink and absorb them.

"Honey?"

He said, "My ears are still ringing."

Minnie Marshall didn't sleep the night before arranging her funeral. She stayed up in the den, smoking and watching television and applying a mud mask. Her foot kept time with the ceiling fan; September in south Texas. She thought of when they buried Richard, of course, thought of the long line of mourners, the poem Lee had read. She hadn't known he would read anything-hadn't known he even wrote poetry. Would he write one for her?

Before he returned home to care for her, Lee-thirty-three, unmarried, renting the bottom floor of a house in St. Louis, and writing his dissertation on, what, migrant labor?-had taught high school history. She had liked telling people this. Yet, lately, she often thought of him as the boy who'd run screaming from butterflies, as the infant who some nights would only quiet when Richard shredded rags beside the crib; the ripping noise awed him. Or she thought of the year he'd been stricken with rheumatoid arthritis, when they spent days watching cartoons and soap operas, or if his knee felt strong, going to the pond and tossing crumbs to ducks. The ducks had always cheered him. She had known him best then. High school and college seemed waves that knocked him away from her. After his father died, he'd visited more, but he remained distant, a guest who spoke only when spoken to. She'd learned not to pry on those short stays, but imagined that extended time together would foster conversations, wear thin his reticence. Now, home for a year, he seemed never to have unpacked his bags; he seemed to have layered himself in silence like winter clothes.

He said, "You can stay."

"Get 'em while they're hot," she said. Slowly, she brought a heaping plate to him. If she rushed, or forgot to pause after standing, she found herself light-headed and reeling, then on the floor, hearing Lee's frantic voice rushing to her. She fell often, far more often than he knew.

"Did you sleep well?" he asked.

She sipped her coffee. "Wonderfully. How about you, sweetheart?"

"I thought I heard you walking around last night."

"I wanted some chocolate," she said. "I drifted off watching a show about France."

He nodded and resumed eating. As in his youth, he still cut food with his fork rather than a knife. He mixed ketchup into his eggs, stirred sugar into his coffee. He sopped syrup and sausage grease with his toast. She loved watching him eat.

"There's more of everything," she said.

He shook his head, still chewing, and rose to rinse his dishes. He returned the ashtray. "How do you feel?"

"Full of energy," she said brightly. She lit a cigarette. "I thought we'd go to the pond after the appointment. We can get sandwiches for a picnic."

He smiled, even laughed a little, and looked at her as if she'd suggested sprinting to Houston. Probably he'd expected her to complain. "Have you taken your medicine?"

She held smoke in her lungs, then blew it over her shoulder, away from Lee. Sometimes she lied about taking her pills and spent the day worried he'd catch her, but this morning she was on her best behavior. "All done," she said. Then after a moment, "More cars are broken into at funerals and weddings than anywhere else. People forget to lock their doors because they're too emotional."

He set a ceramic bell on the table. The bells were all over the house. She would ring one if she fell, or felt pain or had trouble breathing, or if whatever was coming for her came and she couldn't bear to face it alone. The bells comforted Lee and shamed her.

She yawned.

"You should nap before we go. Or I can reschedule."

She waved her hand dismissively. After a moment, she asked, "Do you know what the French used to call the guillotine?"

"A little early for a beheading, isn't it?"

"The widow."

He swept crumbs into the sink. A jolt of guilt for not washing the breakfast pans stung her; she could almost remember washing them. In Lee's presence, she was acutely aware of tasks she'd not completed. She said, "Daddy spent some time in France before I met him."

He braced himself. No one else would have seen his inward tensing-a quick, panicky inhalation as if she were about to drag him under water-but she noticed. The water was talk of his father. She doubted that Lee avoided the discussions because they depressed him; rather he thought they grieved her. And they did. What she couldn't explain was how she loved talking about Richard, adored hearing his name. She felt happiest in those unforeseen moments when she turned and for an instant, thought she'd seen him; when she woke still believing he lay beside her.

She said, "My traveling days are over."

"Mama . . ."

"I wasn't going to say that." She snuffed out her cigarette then tried lighting another, but her lighter wouldn't immediately spark. She said, "Traveling just seems such a hassle now."

"You'd like France," Lee said. "When a person lights a cigarette, he offers everybody one."

Linda "Minnie" Marshall was fifty-five when the doctor said cancer. Her boys were both gone. Richard-husband and engineer, taker of early retirement package, reader of mysteries and griller of lobster-had died six years before; Lee had lived in Missouri since college. She worked as an accountant, owned a late model Oldsmobile and lived in the three-bedroom house the life insurance had paid off. She had seen the doctor because she'd been more tired than usual-her potassium was low again, she'd guessed. The exhaustion could have been a blessing; her body could have finally been adjusting to a life alone, settling into a routine without the boys, and if she honored the change, her days might bring her happiness again. If not happiness, at least less sorrow. But the doctor had sat heavily on the rolling stool, removed his glasses, and outlined options for treatment. Because he gave her a fair chance for recovery, she knew she would die.

She had considered not telling Lee of the disease, had considered letting it run its course untreated. He would be cowed by the diagnosis-she knew this as surely as she knew his name-and he would not understand how it could come as a relief. For years he'd beseeched her to move beyond his father's death, and now, finally, she would. Then, unexpectedly, she was mortified and needed him home. She needed his company in the chemo ward, needed to see him when the oncologist pressed the stethoscope to her back or pointed to x-rays where the tumor in her lung glowed like a star. She needed him to interpret what the doctors said; she did not want him to censor the information, but he lied and she knew it. When she asked him about the flashes of color in her peripheral vision, pinwheels and splotches and starbursts, he blamed the sun or tricks of light. When she asked about her ruined handwriting, he claimed to see no difference. When she asked how long she would live, he said you couldn't trust doctors.

Dressing for the appointment took over an hour. Breakfast had drained her, and now she was winded doing her makeup, weak-legged slipping into her skirt. Every button was a chore. How perfectly easy it would have been to stretch out and shut her eyes, but she pressed on because she'd already cancelled the meeting twice. She thought to take a nerve pill, but decided against it; she was bleary enough. For years she'd rushed to dress for work and get Lee to school, and now she wondered how she'd ever managed. A wave of pride rolled inside her. The doctors had said her memory would fail, and often she'd forgotten what she tried to remember, but the unbidden past returned vividly. The musky scent of Richard's hair gel; the sequined fabric she'd sewn for one of Lee's Halloween costumes; years later, the noise of him and his girlfriend in the shower, thinking she should be angry, but really feeling pleased; the mower still idling on the afternoon she found Richard in the half-cut yard; the thought thirty minutes before, I bet he's thirsty; the grass clippings on the glass of water she'd brought him. The memories assailed her, asleep or awake. She wore them like pearls.

Lee drove because she no longer could. She swerved and veered, sped and stalled. Twice she'd gotten lost a mile from home. Both of them blamed her medication, but she knew the pills were not the problem. Now she rode in the passenger seat, checking herself in the mirror. Half-circles hung under her eyes, her face gaunt and pale. Her makeup looked rushed. Her hair, though, was full-bodied and healthy. After the treatments, it had grown back thick and dark and lovely, another woman's hair.

"I feel like we're going to a museum," she said. "We're all dressed up."

Despite the sun and humidity, she wore heels and a long-sleeved satin blouse. The sleeves hid the bruises that dappled her arms; the softest bump scarred her. Also, she was always so cold now.

Lee said, "Too spiffy for ducks. I vote for lunch and a matinee."

"We can change clothes. I'll want to sit in the sun after this."

Then a thought occurred: "But don't dress me like this, okay? Just jeans and a T-shirt. Sneakers. No makeup."

"Okay, Mama."

"And no jewelry. The morticians steal it."

Lee adjusted the rearview mirror. As with talk of his father, he refused to discuss her dying. Yet she needed him to know these things. Because she'd botched the past year of his life, she strove to spare him her burial. The dementia would set in soon. No one had said that outright, but she saw it coming. Poor Lee. Listening to her babble and watching her body falter, feeding her soup and waiting, waiting, waiting for her last breath would be torment enough without fretting over her jewelry and car, her house and clothes and last wishes. In the recliner at night, she devised ways to slip information into conversations, but the ideas evaporated with the sunrise. Her ideas were dew and mists.

"The last time I wore this, Daddy took me to The Nutcracker," she said, though suddenly the memory seemed slippery, possibly completely wrong. "Nothing like that had ever come to Corpus. He bought tickets for Christmas. Your father looked so handsome in a suit."

"And you look fabulous in red," he said, glancing at her blouse. "You should wear it more often."

That she would never again wear the outfit was palpable in the car, and she waited for the feeling to disperse. They passed a corner where people sometimes sold puppies from truck beds, but none were out. She hated the dogs being sold that way, but their absence always disappointed her.

"Here's a test," she said. "What was in Dad's car when I met him?"

Lee shook his head. Richard had strolled into the office where she worked as a receptionist. He wore a tweed jacket, a full beard. She had said just a minute, had said it in an abrupt, frenzied tone that made him chuckle, and he'd started calling her "Minute." By the time he left, he only called her Minnie and it had become her name.

"A poodle," she said. "A little black poodle I could see through the window. Isn't that something?"

He smiled at her.

They rode beside the bay, light glimmering on the marbled water. She said, "Isn't the weather gorgeous? We can walk a trail at the pond."

"You are feeling good."

She wanted to say Fit as a fiddle, but suspected the words might wound him, so she checked herself. And now that he'd acknowledged her energy, she was momentarily relieved of the charade. She was an actress between scenes, out of breath and nervous. Her heart raced. Outside, the blurred horizon seemed close enough to touch. She remembered going to the pond during chemo, Lee's hand on her elbow as she stepped over the exposed roots of live oaks. Now, he turned a corner and the sun blinded them. He lowered both visors, but she pushed hers back up. The heat felt glorious on her battered arms.

"Daddy used to fix pancakes for his poodle on Saturday mornings," she said, lighting a cigarette. "His name was Peppy. He died before you were born."

The minister beginning the last prayer of the service, Minnie regretting Richard being on a diet when he died. She wished she'd been able to cook for him that last month, to prepare one of her recipes he loved. What it would've been, she had no idea. Just as she had no idea how she would survive life without him.

Lee folded the sheet of paper with his poem on it and slid it into his pocket; she heard the paper crease.

Richard would have said she'd spent too much on his funeral-as he'd always accused about Christmas presents-and they would've argued over the receipts at the kitchen table. He'd always meant to plan his funeral, to save her the trouble and prevent her from spending what she'd just spent. He was fifty-eight, and the wet grass had kept bogging the mower. He'd said he would come right in; they were going to a movie that night. She hadn't cried during any of this, not in front of anyone, not even Lee. She was proud ofthat. Maybe Richard would have been proud, too.

"Amen," the minister said, raising his head and opening his eyes.

Shrimp, she thought. He might have wanted my fried shrimp.

In the funeral home, she wanted a nerve pill more than ever. The high ceilings and tall windows and Spanish tile floors made her anxious. She sat on a plush couch while Lee registered with an old woman behind the reception desk. How the woman stood it, Minnie couldn't imagine; how the water trickling in the stone fountain didn't drive her mad. Behind her, heavy oak doors opened into the chapel, and down the hall were viewing rooms, the refrigerated floral displays. All of it nauseated her; she fought off a shiver. A slow, tinny music whispered in the speakers. Among the headstones, you could hear and smell the ocean less than a mile away, but inside there was only the incessant gurgle of the fountain, the smell of frozen flowers.

"Won't be long," Lee said.

"That's a lousy thing to say."

His eyes shut, a short exhale. "You know what I mean."

She rocked forward and straightened his shirt, something she'd done all her life; just then it seemed she could list every instance. She said, "Look at your collar. We can go shopping after our picnic."

He leaned back, his standard response. "How do you feel?"

"Tense," she said. "They'll try screwing us into every little thing."

"Let's hear what they say."

"They'll say, 'The more you spend, the more you care.'"

She heard shoes clacking on the tile, but only connected the sounds with the approaching man when he loomed over her. She began levering herself from the couch, cringing and struggling in the cushions until finally Lee supported her elbow. Her head swam in dizziness and she worried she'd already exposed some vulnerability, forfeited an advantage. When she recovered, she flashed Lee and the man a smile. Their eyes were waiting for her to fall.

She said, "Haven't keeled over yet."

Lee adjusted his sleeves; the man chuckled politely. In a voice like a doctor's, he said, "Mrs. Marshall, I'm Rudy Guerrero."

At first, she liked him calling her Mrs. Marshall, but walking to his office, she suspected the formality was a tactic to flatter widows, a calculated plea to trust his wet eyes and dark, expensive suit. She steeled herself. A large mahogany desk crowded the room, and she caught Lee admiring it. The Windberg painting on the wall was the same as in her oncologist's office, but she still liked it very much: a deer drinking from a creek, gauzy morning light shafting through vines. She was staring at the painting when Guerrero unbuttoned his jacket and sat in the deep leather chair. He opened an embossed folder, patted a handkerchief to his brow.

"Does a person absolutely have to be embalmed?" she asked.

Guerrero folded his hands together, glanced at Lee. "Well," he said, chuckling again. "State law doesn't require-"

"Perfect. Let's skip that."

Lee exhaled. Guerrero twisted the ballpoint of a heavy silver pen into place. Nodding, he said, "A tough customer, I like it." Minnie heard the pen skimming across the desk. She glanced at Lee but he averted his eyes. Somehow, she'd expected him to be pleased.

She arranged to draft monthly payments from her checking account, then if necessary, her life insurance would cover the rest. More than anything, she wanted to pay off the funeral. She and Richard had never discussed this, but there seemed a tacit agreement that whoever lived longer would sacrifice for Lee. Her last duty was to be thrifty with her dying. The practicality buoyed her. But as she deliberated between grave vaults and cement casing, between a church funeral and a graveside service, Lee voted against her. She wanted a plaque where he wanted a monument. He sighed and shifted in his seat. She suggested compromises when she could, but nothing satisfied him. Maybe a mother's funeral could never satisfy her son.

Then, so swiftly that she worried he'd overlooked something, Guerrero closed his folder and ushered them from his office. In the hall, she tried to touch Lee's cheek-a gesture to say, We're doing fine, Good job, It's almost over-but lifting her arm nearly toppled her and he had to grab her waist. Guerrero opened a door past the floral displays and stepped demurely aside. He said, "I'll check back shortly."

The chilled air smelled of oak and lilacs, and it almost buckled her knees. She felt dizzy, tasted bile in her throat; her stomach dropped. Three coffins-two open, one closed-rested on pedestals in the middle of the room. Sections of others, their hulls and sides, were affixed to the walls and illuminated by individual brass lamps. She had spent an afternoon in the showroom when Richard died, but had insisted Lee stay home. Now, he looked stunned, lost. She turned away to gather herself, feeling as though they'd happened upon a car accident. She imagined sitting beside the pond, heard herself telling Lee, "At least that's behind us." If they could only survive this, if she could hold it together, she thought Lee would reward her among the mesquite trees that hemmed the water; she plied herself with ideas of him shedding his layers of silence and talking with her in the sun.

She got her legs back slowly, the vertigo subsided. She made her way around the displays, fighting off the fearful reverence the room demanded. The poplar and maple and tucked satin seemed such a waste. The champagne-colored velvet and taffeta interiors were expensive and worthless. And the pillows! She'd forgotten coffins came with those. Who needed a pillow? Her heels clicked on the floor, like hammering in a church. When she moved into the steel displays-20 gauge, 18 gauge, stainless, what did it all mean? what did it matter?-she saw herself reflected on the gleaming surfaces. She winked at Lee in her reflection, but his eyes darted away. She touched the firm, stitched padding; he clasped his hands behind his back.

"Now it feels like we are at a museum," she said. "We take a step and stop, then step and stop."

"It's a regular Smithsonian."

She laughed, though he gave her a cross look and she realized he'd not meant to amuse her at all.

"Did I tell you what the French call guillotines?"

He nodded, inching back toward the oaks.

"The guillotines turned wives into widows," she said. He leaned to study a cherrywood casket. She said, "I like this one. It looks comfortable."

Basic steel, the shade of blush. Small gardenias, the same cream color as the satin lining, trimming the lid. A thin chrome bar along its side. She couldn't have cared less for it.

Lee said, "It's the cheapest."

"And the prettiest."

"What about this one? You love pine."

"Oh, it's beautiful, but you could fit three of me in there." She wanted him to laugh or at least smile-please, please-but he just paced forward, arms still behind his back. She said, "You look like a security guard."

Maybe she'd glimpsed a small grin forming, but he squelched it and slid his hands into his pockets. If he were a child, she could have aped silly faces or ripped rags to cheer him, but now he was gone.

"Daddy's poodle used to bark at waves. At the beach, we'd-"

"The price doesn't matter, Mama."

"I know, honey. I just love this one, really. The gardenias are precious."

"You bought Dad a nice one."

She almost blurted He deserved a nice one, but refrained. She crossed the room and pretended to consider the more expensive caskets. Lee said nothing. He'd turned callous and unreachable. She tried to remember which model she'd bought Richard, but couldn't. It had brass bars like saloon banisters, but none with bars looked familiar. Maybe the style was discontinued, but she felt certain the failing was hers. If she ruined everything else, shouldn't a widow at least remember her husband's casket? So much about her would disappoint him, her fear and depression, the burden she'd become for Lee, and the slow, sorry withering that now denned her life. Perhaps she was getting exactly what she deserved.

"Hello?" Guerrero stepped inside, hesitantly. "How are we?"

Minnie looked at Lee, then back at the man.

"Never better," she said. "I'll take this one."

Lee wanted to rest before their picnic. Her choices had disheartened him, and though Minnie thought it better to eat lunch and get their minds off everything, she conceded. At home he retired to his room and left her to stew. Maybe he wanted to spare her his anger, but his silence was more punishing. And more exhausting. She had meant only to relax briefly then start washing laundry, but in the recliner, the waking world receded. A patchwork of images-Guerrero's meaty hands and the painting behind his desk; Lee dropping her at various entrances to save her energy, then parking the car alone; Richard at the beach, holding a conch, saying Hey, would you look at this; a cakewalk from her youth, the music stopping precisely when she stepped onto the winning star-then she slept. In her dream, Richard appeared as a stranger, but she nonetheless recognized him as the man whose absence choked her heart, and his voice poured like water. Sleep felled her and when she woke, the windows were black.

"Someone was tired," Lee said.

The light in the kitchen burned her eyes. She pulled a chair out from the table, and the legs scraping across the tile rankled her. Her lighter would not fire. She tried for what seemed minutes, then just as she resigned herself to getting a light from the stove, smoke filled her lungs. She exhaled with her eyes closed. Her mouth tasted clammy, sour. Lee was leering at her, she felt him. She hung the cigarette on her lips and went to the refrigerator for a Coke. He smiled as she crossed the kitchen, but she concentrated on not stumbling. Her head was clouded, her body more drained than before, sapped specifically of patience.

She held the bottle toward him: "I can't open this."

He twisted the cap, and the ease of the action seemed accusatory. In the garage, the washing machine buzzer sounded. She winced.

"Headache?" he asked.

"We missed the ducks."

"Maybe tomorrow. Maybe you'll feel better."

"I felt fine today," she said. "Besides, I have things to do tomorrow."

She half-hoped he would call her bluff and argue (an unfamiliar, yet powerful feeling), but he just went to change the laundry. Her legs were restless, small spasms jerking and knotting in her calves. Her stomach ached from not eating. All of her nerves felt exposed, stung by the light and air.

"Why didn't you wake me?" she asked when he returned. "I wanted to talk over lunch."

"We'll have a nice supper. We can talk now."

She dragged on her cigarette and stabbed the butt in the ashtray. In the window, her reflection appeared even more diminished than it had that morning.

"You just didn't want to go," she said, trying to light another cigarette.

"You needed rest." His tone was stoic and confident, meaning he thought he was right. Before it had always comforted her; tonight it grated. He said, "How does cream of chicken sound?"

"What would have been so terrible about a picnic? The money? How much would we have spent? Twenty dollars? Can't we afford that on a day like today?"

"I'm not the one so concerned with money."

"A bronze grave vault is a bit excessive, Leiland."

He pinched the bridge of his nose, shut his eyes. "Is this the kind of night we're going to have?"

Maybe, she thought. She felt destitute of courtesy and tact, suddenly unconcerned with doing the right thing. Nothing had panned out as she'd wanted, nothing. She'd pinned her hopes on talking beside the pond, believing it would restore them, but now everything was dashed. She wanted to strike out, to be cruel, and nothing was worse than feeling this way toward him. Usually when he wanted to argue, she yielded. Yet before she knew she would say it, when she only knew she felt compelled to say something, she said, "I want to be cremated."

He put his hands on the window frame and gazed into the backyard. Or maybe his eyes were closed, maybe he was taking deep breaths, counting to ten. He said, "You need a nerve pill."

"No, Lee, I don't. You can't just dope me up all the time."

"Me? Me dope you up?"

"I can't talk to you. I can't even talk to my own son."

"What, Mother? What do you want to say?"

What did she want to say? Suddenly, nothing. Before there seemed so much, but now, everything had vanished. She said, "Sell the house, don't rent it."

"Oh, Jesus," he said, something she'd never heard him say.

"Sell the car. Take my jewelry to a jeweler. Not a pawn shop."

"Mother."

"Donate my wigs and clothes. That's what I want."

"Mother."

"I don't want you to be sappy. I want you to invest the money. If I want to be cremated, that's my choice. And if I want to have a picnic at the goddamned pond, the least-"

"Mother!" His voice rattled the windows, filled the room. Then silence filled it. When he spoke again, his tone had softened, as if in apology: "The pond is gone."

She shook out another cigarette. Her fingers trembled. "That's absurd."

"It's been gone for two years, maybe three. It's a car wash now. You sent me the newspaper clipping."

She shrugged. She flicked her lighter, and shook it, but it wouldn't catch. She tried and tried, but got nowhere. She tossed the cigarette and lighter onto the table and held her face in her hands. Lee sulked into the hall. Her throat tightened; wet pressure welled behind her eyes. Hadn't they gone to the pond during treatment? She understood none of it, neither her son nor herself, their silences, their arguments. She no longer knew his role or hers, what was required of her and what would handle itself. She didn't understand how to die. Lee ran water in the bathroom. She wanted to chase after him, to scream for help or ring her bell. She wanted to beg him not to shut himself in his room, wanted to dispense with the lie that today, or any day in the last year, was normal. Before, the charade seemed necessary for him, but now she realized she had depended upon it more than he ever had. He would survive this, rebuild a life that she would never see: a life, simply, without her. And shouldn't this please rather than terrify her? She wanted to admit she was terrified, terrified to sleep or be awake, and she wished she'd lived a life different in every way except for him and his father; she wished she still had a chance. She wished she could bear to buy a beautiful coffin. She wished Richard was still alive, so Lee wouldn't have to drive her to the funeral home and watch her come undone. She wished, for all of their sakes, that she would've died first.

He returned to the kitchen and said, "Just wait a minute. I'm going to the store."

She was trying the dead lighter again. He patted his pockets for his keys and wallet. She hated him driving to the store because undoubtedly he thought if she didn't need lighters and cigarettes, she wouldn't be dying. He resembled his father, his light hair and sloped shoulders and even his reticence, and as he checked the cupboards, the likeness was too much. All of it was too much, too much. As the tears came, she wondered what else she'd forgotten or would forget, what else he was withholding. She wondered where the ducks had flown after the pond, if he remembered how much he'd enjoyed them as a child. She wondered if he would ever have children, who would be their mother and what they would know of their grandmother. She wondered if they would get any of her features. The only trait that seemed worth passing on was her new lovely hair, which, really, wasn't hers at all.

In a month the den would become a sickroom. A hospital bed would be delivered, tubes from the oxygen machine would snake over and behind her furniture; her furniture would be buried under hospice charts, hospital gowns, packages of diapers. Nurses came and went. She held guarded conversations with them-as she had with Rudy Guererro-but soon pockets of forgotten information devoured her speech. She would forget Lee's name. Though never who he was. Through that long, slow fade there always remained a silky, durable cord of memory that connected them, a child and his mother.

She woke in the recliner with the television on and Lee reading on the couch. Her mouth tasted dry. A new lighter, a pack of cigarettes and a chocolate bar lay beside the bell on the end table. She did not remember Lee settling her down or helping her into the recliner before going to the store. She remembered the fighting, and hoped it was over.

She said, "Good morning, sunshine."

He leaned forward, smiling in the lamplight. "It's almost midnight. I'll warm your soup."

She smoked as her eyes adjusted. Her body felt less fragmented, her thoughts less scattered. She was satisfied with the funeral arrangements and relieved to have them behind her. A tough customer, Guererro had called her. After a few minutes, it occurred to her that she felt marvelous.

Lee returned with juice and soup and her nighttime medication, eight pills she had to swallow two at a time. He kissed her forehead, a gesture she adored but never admitted for fear he would stop. He lay on the couch and hooked his arm over his eyes, crossed his ankles. As she ate-when had he learned to make such delicious soup, soup so good it made her hungrier to eat?-she noticed he wore socks she'd bought from a catalog. Sometimes just seeing him mystified her. Every night, he stayed awake long enough to make sure she wouldn't get sick. Every night she dreaded the moment he went to bed.

She relit her cigarette, drank more juice. She said, "Are you awake?"

"Okay," he said, startled. He raised his head, then lay back. "Yes, I am."

"Do you know what the French call-"

"The widow." He lifted his arm from his eyes and winked at her, smirking. Briefly she felt ashamed for repeating it-how many times had she told him?-then she let herself off the hook, because he had.

She said, "You're right about the pond."

He nodded, his elbow over his eyes again.

"And I don't want to be cremated."

"I know."

Four pills still waited beside the ashtray, though she recognized none of them. Lately, she remembered only the shapes of her muscle relaxers and nerve pills, the tablets she reached for most often. They bathed her in a perfectly warm, perfectly weightless oblivion, and as she melted, she wondered if the cottony nothingness enveloping her was how it would finally feel. She hoped so. In her darkest moods, she'd considered emptying the bottles and chasing the pills with vodka, but that would cancel her insurance. If Lee had to act as her nurse, she could at least pay for his trouble.

"'Let's see if the ocean's still there,'" he said, suddenly.

She flinched. She thought he'd drifted to sleep. Then she heard the words as if in an echo, and her heart lurched.

"Dad used to come in my room and say that. I remembered it today."

Her skin tingled. How many times had she heard Richard say that, either to her or Lee? The words lifted her, sent her memory reeling, as if in a second's time she'd gotten delightfully drunk.

"You'd still be in bed," he said. "We rarely went to the water, though. Usually he'd find some road to get lost on."

"Sounds familiar," she said. Maybe it sounded familiar, maybe not.

"So we were probably lost, but one morning he showed me where he'd buried Peppy."

She drew on her cigarette. A wave swelled beneath her. The tingling on her skin was replaced with a trembling in each nerve, an expectant hush.

"He said he'd convinced the vet to let him do it."

"What a thing to remember."

He uncrossed his ankles, then crossed them again. "I'd never seen him cry before. I must have been six or seven. I didn't know what to do."

She cleared her throat, quietly. "And?"

"I just waited," he said. "Eventually he quieted down and started the truck."

He was lying, of course, just as he had to explain the splotches in her peripheral vision, her illegible signature. Or he was exaggerating, suddenly committed to calming her. Perhaps now he couldn't ignore what was imminent, inevitable. Perhaps because she could no longer keep anything from him, he longed to resurrect and recast what he could for her. Probably he'd contrived his father's tears that afternoon or as she slept, but maybe he'd not imagined them until now. And what was he saying? That he was sorry? Or that he too would weep privately but eventually recover? None of it mattered; he was exalting her, filling her every cell with breath. She listened as she would to an opera, hearing not language but just his voice and its lament of time and love and doomed hopefulness. Oh, the surprise and absolute mystery of a child.

He said, "We'd go all over, those Saturday mornings."

It was as if he'd just returned from a long absence, or was a skittish animal finally coaxed into approaching. She turned to him, slowly, careful not to scare him away.

"Tell me," she said, putting out her cigarette. "Tell me where you've been."

BRET ANTHONY JOHNSTON has received three consecutive honors in the Atlantic Monthly and has been shortlisted 2002 Prize Stories: The O. Henry Awards. His fiction has appeared in numerous magazines including Southwest Review, Greensboro Review, Black Warrior Review, Mid-American Review, and Shenandoah. New work is forthcoming in New Stories from the South: The Tear's Best 2003. His writing has been included in Scribner's Best of the Fiction Workshops 1999 and his collection of stories, Corpus, will be brought out by Random House in spring 2004. He holds an .A. from the Iowa Writers' Workshop and currently teaches fiction in the .A. program at Northern Michigan University.