A Perfect Life nd Other Stories (15 page)

“What about you?” Jackie asked. “Did he get down on one knee?”

He? She didn’t know
.

“She—actually—didn’t go quite that far, but there were candles and
dinner involved.”

“Nice.” Jackie nodded her approval. “Have you set a date?”

“Not yet,” Natalie said. She folded the receipt and stood to leave
so she wouldn’t have to elaborate.

On Saturday, driving to visit her dad, she practiced.

“Dad,” she said to the car in front of her, “you know Ginny is a
good friend of mine, right?” She’d never lied about being friends with Ginny,
and when she’d moved in, she lied only by omission when telling her dad why. He
had said she was being very practical and that he was happy to get his house
back, though Natalie worried about him being alone at his age.

“Ginny is more than a friend.” Natalie tried to picture her
father’s reaction. She couldn’t. Years ago, her therapist had suggested that
she allow her parents the same amount of time to get used to her being a
lesbian as it had taken her. She assumed her dad was too old. There wasn’t
enough time. How was she to know he’d still be around fifteen years later
despite decades of smoking and poor eating habits. Her mother, twenty years
younger than her dad, was still working on acceptance. Being two thousand miles
away helped.

When she pulled into his driveway, she slipped the diamond ring
off her finger and tucked it in her jeans pocket. One step at a time.

Throughout the evening, every time she formed the thought to begin
the conversation, her heart raced and her hands shook. This must be what
jumping out of a plane was like. The brain screaming in instinct, don’t do it,
you’ll splat! So she changed the subject to calm down. Finally, after dinner,
after washing the dishes, during a commercial for an arthritis drug with more
side effects than benefits, she muted the TV, turned to her dad, and spit it
out before her heart or hands could catch up.

“Oh, your mother told me that years ago,” he said, staring at the
silent TV. “I was tempted to say something, but wanted it to come from you.”

The roar in her ears quieted, her rampaging heart slowed. “You
don’t mind?”

“I didn’t say that. But I know your mother said it out of spite,
so I won’t give her the satisfaction.”

“That’s not exactly comforting.”

He turned to her, but she couldn’t bear to look into his eyes.
He’d slipped his watch off and was winding it. A mindless motion he’d repeated
thousands, millions of times. “I want you to be happy. Are you?”

Am I?
“Yes, Dad, I am.”
I am.

Wedding planning kicked into high gear, and on the big day
Natalie’s dad walked her down the aisle, her mother weeping in the front
pew—Natalie wasn’t sure if they were tears of happiness or disappointment—and
Ginny followed on the arm of her own dad.

MONTHS PASSED AND the odometer rolled through the 60,000-mile
service (spark plugs and PCV again, transmission fluid, and another tire
rotation). Despite Natalie’s recommendations, Ginny wouldn’t take her car to
Jackie. She leased a new one every two years, so said she didn’t see the need.

WHEN, AT 65,336 miles, the Corolla’s muffler dropped to the
roadway on I-95, Natalie called AAA. It hadn’t fallen off completely or she’d
have tossed it in the trunk and kept going. It was dragging on the ground.
There was no way to drive with it like that. She waited two hours in the
breakdown lane while cars whizzed by, people rushing to get somewhere
important, meet someone special. She called to cancel the appointment she’d
been heading to. Once the AAA guy arrived, he took only ten minutes to wire the
muffler back up. She drove over to Jackie’s.

When she pulled in, she spotted Jackie through the window, sitting
at her desk, chatting with a customer. The woman’s back was to the window, so
Natalie could see only Jackie’s expression. She smiled and laughed, leaned in
confidentially. Then she glanced to the side and spotted Natalie. She froze for
a split second, then glanced at the woman and back to Natalie. Maybe it wasn’t
a customer. Maybe it was her wife. Or a friend. Or a lover. Jesus, Natalie
scolded herself. Get a grip. Jackie waved at her to come in. The woman stood to
leave, taking keys from Jackie. A customer.

Jackie remounted the muffler and reminded Natalie that she’d told
her it would fall off before it rotted. “They don’t make them like this anymore,”
she’d said. And it was true.

Natalie slumped on the couch while Jackie worked on the car. She
didn’t have the energy to go out to the bakery for a cup of coffee. The ficus
had taken a turn for the worse and most of its branches were bare. She was in
no rush to get home. Ginny was working late. Again. Associates have no control
over their workload, Ginny had explained. What good was the salary of a lawyer
if there was no time to spend it?

The paintings behind Jackie’s desk caught her eye. Examining them
closely, she could see that they were indeed sand dunes, but flowed in sensuous
curves.

“Like them?” Jackie stood in the doorway to the garage, wiping her
hands on a soft rag.

Natalie pretended she didn’t feel like a kid caught looking at
porn. “Very much. Where did you find them?”

Jackie tapped her head. “In here.” She smiled when Natalie
furrowed her brow in confusion. “I painted them.”

“You paint?”

“Don’t sound so surprised.”

“It’s just . . . how do you find the time?”

“Nice save.” She paused to look at the
paintings, like she hadn’t done that in a while, then sat at her desk. “It was
a long time ago.” She punched numbers into her calculator, changing the
subject.

Natalie got out her checkbook. “I don’t know why, but I keep
hoping each repair will be the last.”

“I thought you liked me,” Jackie said. “I’m crushed.”

“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean—” Natalie stopped when she saw Jackie’s
teasing smile.

“Cars are all about entropy,” Jackie went on.
“From the moment you drive them off the lot, they lose value. They are in a
constant state of falling apart.”

“Isn’t everything?”

Jackie nodded silently and ripped off the receipt.

Instead of going home, Natalie drove over to
her dad’s. The plus side of Ginny’s workload was being able to see him more
often. The downside was being able to see him more often. She’d been urging him
to get more help at the house—cleaners, Meals on Wheels, rides to the senior
center.

“I don’t want to sit around with a bunch of old people,” he had
complained.

Tonight, she found him asleep on the couch, TV blaring, no food in
sight. She clicked off the TV and microwaved a bowl of stew.

“Dad!” she shouted, not from anger, but for hearing.

He snorted awake. “Jesus, what’s wrong?”

She helped him to the table. “You need to eat
more.”

“I’m not hungry.”

“Try.”

“My teeth hurt.”

That night she stayed up till Ginny came home. “Dad can’t live
alone anymore.”

Ginny flung off her shoes and stripped off her suit as she crossed
the bedroom. “Can we talk about this some other time? I’m beat.”

“You’re home. There is no other time.”

“I’ve had a crap day.”

“So have I,” Natalie said to the closing bathroom door. An
electric toothbrush whirred. She thought of the paintings at Jackie’s. She
could use a weekend at the beach.

“What do you think?” Natalie asked when Ginny crawled under the
covers beside her.

Ginny yawned. “One of the partners specializes
in geriatrics. I’ll ask her for nursing home recommendations.”

“I don’t want to put him in a nursing home.”

“He’s not coming here.”

“Why not? We have a spare room.”

Ginny lay still for a long moment then rolled over. “We’ll talk
about it in the morning.”

By the time Natalie woke up, Ginny had left for work.

THE AIR CONDITIONER gave out at 72,727 miles.
For three days, Natalie ignored it. She didn’t need it for her dad anymore. Six
months ago, she’d found her father on the couch again. When she couldn’t wake
him, she worried he’d had a heart attack or a stroke. His living will
stipulated no extreme measures should be used, but they hadn’t discussed in
depth potential circumstances. What did “no hope of recovery” mean? A full
recovery? Able to speak and think? To walk? None of that mattered
as she groped for his
pulse, his neck cool and dry, no
beat of
life throbbing against her fingers.

“Fix him!” she wanted to scream at the ambulance driver.

“I’m very sorry for your loss,” the funeral director said. He said
that every day. That was his job. She only had one father. This wasn’t a loss.
He wasn’t a sock, misplaced in the laundry.

All her fears about having to pull the plug transformed. If she
had stood up to his refusal to leave his home, to Ginny’s refusal to let him
move in, this wouldn’t have happened. He shouldn’t have died alone. She should
have been with him, holding his hand, telling him he could go, that she’d be
okay.

Her mother didn’t come for the funeral. “He was your father. I’m
sorry you loved him and that I don’t.”

“Didn’t,” Natalie corrected. “You can’t not love him anymore. He’s
dead.”

Ginny held her while she cried. Went with her to pick out the
casket. Arranged for the cemetery plot. The only thing she didn’t do was say
she was sorry.

“It must be a relief in a way,” Ginny said over coffee one morning
a month later.

“How so?”

“You don’t have to worry about him anymore.”

“I wouldn’t have worried about him if he’d been living here.”

“Really? You’re still on that? People don’t live forever, Natalie.
He still would have died. He was old.”

“Fuck you.”

With no AC, driving home from work felt like sitting in a sweat
lodge without the cathartic religious experience. When she cranked down the
passenger side window, she spotted the burn mark. Her dad had put out a
cigarette on the armrest in his haste to hide it from her.

Natalie didn’t think Jackie fixed air conditioners, but she asked
anyway.

“I don’t, usually,” Jackie said over the phone. “But I’ll do it
for you.” Two little words. “For you.” When was the last time she’d heard that?

Day two of a heat wave with the triple-H: hazy, hot, and humid. On
the radio, the weatherman warned of high ozone levels, hazardous conditions for
anyone with breathing problems. The asphalt in front of Jackie’s shimmered,
like it was molten. Her bay door was open. Her office, however, was a cool
oasis. The sweat that had dripped between Natalie’s breasts chilled her.

Jackie came in wiping her face with a paper towel. “Can you
believe it?” she asked. “Hell of a time to lose your AC.”

“Any other time, I probably wouldn’t care.”

She waited while Jackie checked the car, hoping it would be an
easy fix, like Freon or whatever they used these days. The ficus was gone, just
a brown stain on the floor where it had stood.

Fifteen minutes later, Jackie returned with the bad news. “Needs a
new compressor.”

Jackie continued talking, but Natalie heard
only snatches—some hundred dollars—the sound growing fainter. Her vision
blurred and she began to shake. Her last straw didn’t snap, the entire straw
house went up in flames. Her face scrunched into a silent agony and she burst
into deep sobs.

“Are you okay?” Jackie asked, her voice still tinny. “Do you need
a drink of water?”

Natalie gasped for air and nodded as she sank onto the couch.
Jackie held out a mug and sat beside her, her right knee touching Natalie’s
left. She gripped the mug with both hands, like a life preserver. After a few
gulps, she set the mug on the table and wiped her face.

She inhaled a stuttering breath. “I’m so
sorry.” She stared straight ahead. “I, uh, it’s been a rough time for me
lately.” She glanced at Jackie. Her expression didn’t indicate any
embarrassment or impatience.

“I was afraid of that. You don’t seem yourself.”

Myself? How can she know what I’m usually like? This woman I see a
couple times a year
.

“My dad died. A few months ago. Not yesterday or anything. I’m not
sure where this came from.” She indicated her eyes and the tears.

“That’s rough. You were close?”

“As close as you can be to a horrible, bigoted curmudgeon.”
Natalie dug through her purse for a wad of tissues and blew her nose.

“They can be the worst to lose.”

“Why?”

“No chance for redemption.”

“My wife thinks I should be relieved.” Natalie balled up the wet
tissue.

“Oh?”

Jackie smelled of something nice through the background of grease.
Soap? What was that the soap her dad used to use after working on his car?
Lava. She almost started crying again. “Are you close to your dad?”