One more thing that should have been simple and was not
Daylight shining through the blinds shadowed bars across the beige carpet. Air conditioning and the smell of detergent made the house sterile and over-clean and ready for guests wearing silk dresses and tailored pants.
Mary ironed tablecloths, rubbed streaks from wine glasses, and set out the wedding-present crystal. She placed a bowl filled with jasmine-scented potpourri on the bathroom sink.
Before she wiped the mirror, she traced her face’s outline in the glass. She smeared her finger along the reflection of her lips, pale as a seashell’s empty, pink inside. Lipstick and blush would fake some color, but the tiny lines rooting at the corner of her eyes were beginning to betray her. Her eyebrows, which had been waxed two days ago, were thin, precise arches.
As she swallowed two white pills, Mary listened to “Gertrude’s Dream Waltz,” internalizing each note as the music played again and again. The repetition soothed her. In the kitchen, she folded cloth napkins and stacked them on the marble countertop. She counted the beats in the song’s measures: one, two, three. One, two, three. She added Kahlúa to her coffee and finished it in two doses.
She folded cloth napkins and stacked them on the marble countertop. She counted the beats in the song’s measures: one, two, three. One, two, three. She added Kahlúa to her coffee and finished it in two doses.
That morning the sheet had been stained by her blood. She had cried as she doused the cotton material with bleach. Shoving the sheet into hot water, Mary slammed closed the washing machine lid. She rinsed her hands, but the yellow, chemical smell of bleach hung around her. Opening the machine lid again, she banged it shut two more times.
One more thing that should have been simple and was not. The pills and liquor would not matter now.
Mary called his phone. “Extra wine,” she said.
“Thread’s around my finger,” he said.
“Everyone’ll be judging.” She turned on the kitchen faucet, placed the empty coffee mug under the water as it began to steam.
“Already got the promotion.”
“Don’t be late.” She could see him leaning back in his office chair, running a hand through his light hair so that tufts of it stood out from his head.
“I’ll be there with bells on,” he said.
“I want everything to be perfect.”
“Hopeless,” he said.
“This is for you.”
“For us,” he said. “To celebrate.”
“Right,” she said. “This is what you wanted.”
“Hon, don’t start again.”
“No, not again,” she said. “Love you.”
“Phone’s cutting out,” he said. “I’m losing you.”
“Yes,” she said.
When he came home, Mary gestured at the crystal vase sitting on the hall table. The flowers delighted her. Their silky, dark petals had just started to blossom out of tight buds.
“Black roses,” she said.
“Black flowers don’t exist.” He tugged at his tie and pulled it from around his neck.
“Right here.” She pointed at the roses.
“Dark red—an illusion.” He picked up the vase and held the bouquet to the light. “Only seeing what you want.”
“You always ruin my ideas.”
“They’re impossible,” he said.
“I want you to be wrong.”
“Can’t always have what you want.”
She tried again. “Black tulips?”
“Deep purple.”
Mary dropped her head so her blonde hair, bobbed just above her shoulders, fell forward across her face. He held out his arm, but she was out of reach. Turning, she walked to the kitchen and started arranging crackers on a circular tray. She counted them by threes, placing them in a downward, inward spiral.
Stepping behind her, he circled his arms around her waist. He rested his chin against the back of her head. She kept arranging the crackers.
“Okay,” he said. “There can be black flowers.”
“Liar.”
“But does saying so make you feel better?”
“No.”
Dropping his arms, he walked over to the refrigerator and took out a can of beer. He opened it. The snap of aluminum and the carbonated hiss that followed filled the space between husband and wife. “We live all kinds of lies,” he said.
Mary tucked stray strands of her hair behind her ears. “It doesn’t matter,” she said. “Does it?”
In the bedroom, she folded and refolded the quilt on the edge of their bed. She fluffed the pillows and straightened their shams.
Mary caught his glance in the bathroom mirror as he stood before it and ran a comb through his hair. He opened the medicine cabinet. From its shelf, he picked up a prescription bottle of pills. It was almost full.
“When’d you last take these?” he asked. He shook the bottle at her. She wondered if she could guess the exact number of pills rattling against the plastic.
“Today.”
“Before that?”
“Don’t remember.”
“Won’t help if you don’t take them.” He put the bottle back on the shelf and shut the cabinet. The mirror shook, and the image of the bathroom and bedroom bounced in the glass.
“Birth defects,” she said.
“Thought we agreed—not until you’re better.”
“You agreed.” She turned her back to him and smoothed her hands across the bed spread. She tried to stop a laugh. “Define better.”
“Can we do this later?”
“You brought it up.”
“People will be here soon.”
“Don’t worry.”
“Sounds so easy,” he said.
“Try the pills,” she said.
The guests—his colleagues at the firm—came with gifts of wine and champagne and chocolates in gold-colored boxes. She put their wraps and coats on the guest bed. She repeated the word grace in her head and offered drinks and fruit and cheese. Classical music played from the living room stereo. Against the white wall, the black bouquet seemed a single half-note on an otherwise blank music sheet. Everyone smiled and shook hands and laughed choppy, stilted laughs.
Mary moved around the room, matching names with faces, and telling guests she had heard so much about them. She wore a dress with a white skirt that layered like spilling cream. Its black top fit tight against her waist.
Her husband stood with a group of people and leaned against the mantel. A woman with long, cinnamon-colored hair slicked into a ponytail, placed her hand on his white sleeve as he spoke. She laughed and patted his arm.
He waved Mary over. He held her elbow as he introduced her to the woman with the ponytail. The woman’s smile made her cheekbones appear more angular.
“How’re you liking the firm?” Mary asked.
“It doesn’t leave me much time.” The cinnamon-haired woman sipped from her glass of water. A lime slice floated on ice cubes.
“She’s more driven than anyone,” her husband said. “Doesn’t even smile at the office.”
“Nice gets me nowhere,” the woman said.
“You’re smiling now,” Mary said.
In the kitchen, Mary reached into the freezer for a tray of ice. Her husband’s boss came up behind her. He carried an empty wine glass and smelled of stale nicotine and green, musky cologne.
Her stomach, empty except for a few sips of wine and three crackers, churned. “You’re the reason I never see my husband,” she told him. She smiled. She offered him a crustless, cucumber and cream cheese sandwich.
He took one and put the entire triangular wedge into his mouth. “We can’t all stay at home and cut the crust off slices of bread,” he said as he chewed.
Mary laughed, but it was just noise and her lips made a thin, straight line. Backing away from him, she bumped into the counter and winced. “I’ve got to get back to the party,” she said.
“Ah, priorities—your husband understands his.” He was shorter than she was, and he stood straight like a gymnast as he stepped closer to her. Brushing his arm against hers, he reached across her to the counter and picked up a wine bottle. He filled his glass.
“He’s promised to be here more,” Mary said.
He laughed, sipped his wine. “The mistake of a taking a fake promise,” he said.
Mary left him in the kitchen and went into the bathroom to reapply her lipstick. She found the woman with the cinnamon-colored hair wiping her face with a washcloth. Mary remembered how the woman had refused wine and then champagne. She knew then, and she was jealous. She wanted to pull the woman to the tiles by her long straight ponytail and kick her in the side.
They stood almost shoulder to shoulder as the woman straightened. Neither looked at the other; they interacted with eye contact and answers directed at the images in the mirror.
“Are you all right?” Mary asked.
“I’m fine.” The woman pressed the damp cloth against her neck.
“It usually gets better.” Mary stared at the floor. A dead lady bug lay on the white tiles.
The woman with the ponytail turned and faced her. “I’m sorry.”
“Is your husband here?”
“My boyfriend—I haven’t told him, yet,” the woman said. “Complicates things.”
“It would’ve gotten complicated anyway,” Mary said as she looked sideways at the open medicine cabinet. She felt she should explain, defend herself—somehow. She pointed at the prescription bottle. “I’m not taking those anymore,” she said.
“You should.”
“He won’t know,” Mary said. “He won’t care.”
“It’s you that’ll care.”
“I already do.”
“He cares too,” the woman said.
“He tells you?”
“He doesn’t have to.”
Mary thought that they might have been friends. Call each other, meet for coffee, spend an occasional night at a bar remembering the past and planning the future.
“Do you want tea?” Mary felt a need to protect the cinnamon-haired woman. Maybe they could still be friends; they might need each other one day. It was not so simple as it was precarious.
“Thanks,” the woman said. Her ponytail swung against her shoulder. She smoothed her dress over her belly.
Mary made the woman tea. She mingled with more guests. She side-stepped away from her husband’s boss who winked at her as she passed.
She walked into the hallway. Light reflected off the glasses of bubbling champagne and red and white wine. The candles on the mantel flickered, and the jewelry hanging from the women’s necks and ears glittered at her.
Mary’s husband saw her from across the room. When their eyes met, he went over to her. She stood by the roses. Their color was dark and impenetrable—they could have been black. Her dress floated around her, seemed to be sweeping her away.
“I’m sick of nothing being right,” she said.
“What’s wrong?” he asked.
“Nothing,” she said.
She picked up the vase and dropped it on the floor. The crystal splintered and water splashed them. The crash echoed.
The party in the living room paused. Voices vanished and faces looked at her. Bits of vase shone against the puddle of water and roses strewn on the tiles. The buds looked drowned, weighed down by unforgiving, sharp-edged crystal. The flower’s sweet scent drifted through the hall. Beethoven played in the background.
She picked up the vase and dropped it on the floor. The crystal splintered and water splashed them.
Turning from the broken glass, Mary opened the front door. She stepped outside and shut it behind her. She ignored the sound of the door opening again as she pulled off her high-heeled shoes and ran across the lawn to their neighbor’s yard. The grass was cool and damp and scratched her bare feet. A gauzy fog gave the sky a bluish hue.
At the base of the neighbor’s oak tree, Mary stopped. She heard him walking through the grass. She dropped her shoes and grasped the wooden ladder leaning against the oak. Climbing it, she crawled inside the tree house built into the thick branches. The wood planks were uneven, warped by weather. A splintered edge caught her dress.
He reached the tree and called up to her.
“Hon, come down.” He picked up her shoes by their straps.
“At least use my name,” she said.
“Jesus,” he said.
“Try again.”
“Tell me what happened.”
“The woman with the ponytail—” she began.
“From the office?”
“Made me jealous,” she said.
“Nothing’s between us.”
“I know.” She stuck her head out of the tree house and looked down at him. He was climbing the ladder.
“Then?”
“Wanted to know if you’d be here.”
“Mary,” he said.
“You do know it.”
“It’ll be all right.”
“Liar.”
“But if I say so does it make it better?”
“Close enough.” She took his hand as he reached his arm toward her.
Together they walked into the living room. The guests seemed to have forgotten them. They clustered in groups and drank more wine and champagne. Someone had cleaned up the broken vase and drowned roses. Someone else had brought the white chocolate cake from the refrigerator and placed it on the dining room table. It had dark chocolate shavings piled in the center.
“Still sick of it?” he asked.
“Never mind,” Mary said.
“Dance with me.” He took her hand. “Gertrude’s Dream Waltz played.”
She knew it inside her and did not have to think as he led her in easy steps. Her white dress brushed his black pants. He pressed her to him.
One, two, three. One, two, three. Everything counted and nothing mattered.
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