Duet for Three (14 page)

What was important, and astonishing, was that he had some capacity for love. A bit of a blow, really, that the child was the end of his desires.

Now a bit of a blow that the end of Aggie's desires is in the hands of that child, grown up. Somehow, right from the start, Aggie's love must have fallen short, or been disregarded, and this is what it's come to.

TEN

Love, Aggie wanted to discuss? “It wasn't just your father, you know,” she said at breakfast with something, a certain wistfulness, in her voice. Or maybe only doubt. Maybe even she did not believe what she was saying. It's odd, though, what is remembered and how much must have been forgotten. And the older June gets, the less, it seems, she remembers. As if it were other Junes entirely who lived different parts of her life.

She recalls moments here and there: running to meet him at the door when he came home from school; how he picked her up and threw her into the air and caught her, until she got too big, and then he'd take her hands and whirl her around, feet off the floor, until they both were dizzy. “So what did my bunny do today?” he'd ask.

He took her to church on Sundays. Aggie wouldn't go. “You should, you know,” he said, but she refused. “I've gone enough in my time. I have other things to do.” What did she do?

Most often June went downstairs to the Sunday school in the basement, but sometimes he let her stay with him, in the high-ceilinged, dark-pewed cool and quiet church part. She loved the hymns, and their own two reedy voices singing. It was hard to sit still during the sermons, though.

When he left for school in the mornings, until she was old enough to go with him, she stood at the door waving goodbye. Sometimes she cried, and her mother held her back, shaking her, saying crossly, “For goodness' sake, he'll be back, he always comes back.” Aggie so often sounded angry. That and her rushing around: that's what June remembers. And being slapped once (although only once) when she got in the way as Aggie carried a load of wash out to the clothesline. Aggie tripped and the clean clothes spilled and got dirty and had to be washed again, and June got slapped.

Also, it's confusing, but she has an impression of her mother tightening over time, a drawing in of her lips, a thin tension, and that's funny because in fact she was getting bigger and bigger.

He told June his stories, from books and about his home. Aggie claims to have hugged June and read to her and sung songs, also, but June has no recollection of that. If her mother did those things, surely June would have some memory? Or if she did, maybe her heart wasn't in it, so it made no impression.

But June's eighth birthday party is something different. Half a century ago and there it is, real as yesterday; more real in a way, since it made things clear, whereas yesterday did not.

“You're getting all grown up, aren't you?” her father said one evening. “Pretty soon you'll be eight years old,” and he looked almost sad. She nearly said, “No, I won't grow up for a long time,” so that he wouldn't sound sad; the same way she never told him she didn't believe in Santa Claus any more, because it seemed it would hurt him. Her mother might say, “Eat up, June, we have to get some meat on your bones,” but her own desire was to stay small.

He smiled. “How would you like a birthday party? You could have, say, eight friends, one for each year, and whatever food you want, and games and paper hats.”

That was one of the things she loved about him: that he opened up such visions, possibilities.

“I could have anything?”

“Whatever you want. Just this once.”

She wanted hot dogs and soda pop, chocolate cake and ice cream.

This was during the depression. She didn't understand at the time all that meant, but she did know that even though her father had a proper job, extra care was being taken. When she went shopping with Aggie on Saturdays, she saw her studying the meat longer than usual, and buying cheaper cuts. Sometimes fruit was passed over, and when her mother baked, she used less sugar. The garden was expanded. Among June's friends, even those who had been prosperous, clothes lasted longer, there were more hand-me-downs, and lunches were more often tomato sandwiches than meat. There were rumors, whispered talk, of some families in trouble. A birthday party was a luxury.

Aggie was quick, of course, to point that out. She said a party would be frivolous, unnecessary. Her father, though, said, “Every child should have one, and this is as good a time as any.” He and June designed the paper hats she wanted. Her mother would buy the tissue and make them. June's would be tall and blue, with a glued-on golden star.

He went out and bought material for a birthday dress. Pink taffeta. Taffeta! June touched it with wonder. It was slithery and crackly, glamorous and grown-up. “I thought you'd like it,” he said.

“Taffeta!” Aggie cried. “For God's sake, do you have any idea how hard that stuff is to sew?” But while she threw up her hands and rolled her eyes and sighed and complained, he just stood quietly looking at her, holding out the material.

For what felt like hours, June stood rigid on a chair while her mother knelt, pins clutched in her teeth, adjusting seams and putting up the hem. Aggie bent over the sewing, the material slipping beneath her fingers, whispering small curses. “Damn,” June heard. “Oh, damn.”

Still, with whatever resentment the dress was made, every stitch ended up in place and each fold fell perfectly. June twirled in front of the mirror in her room, a vision of stiff pink, the tight bodice flaring into skirt, the matching bow splendid at the waist. When she wore it downstairs to show her father, he said, “Oh, that's nice, bunny. Say thank you to your mother.”

At school there was a certain competition for her invitations, whispers of who would be going and who would not. Because she was liked, or because she was the teacher's daughter, or because, in such hard times, a party was so rare? The reason didn't matter. What mattered was to be the centre of attention.

She saw herself at the party, perfect in pink taffeta, graciously accepting gifts, nodding at her guests, distributing hot dogs and cake. “Would you care for more?” she would ask politely. “Oh, thank you, do you like my dress?” and “What a lovely gift, how kind.” She rehearsed in her bedroom at night. “So glad you could come,” she said, nodding to invisible guests. “How nice.”

Aggie made the crinkly paper hats and bought the food. The day before the party, she set up games in the front room. On a piece of cardboard, she sketched a crude, cartoon sort of donkey and cut it out, and from another piece of cardboard she fashioned a long, full, drooping tail. She colored it purple with one of June's crayons. June worried about it a little: that her friends would laugh at it for the wrong reasons. Also, that they might laugh at Aggie herself, already overweight and somewhat sloppy.

But at the party there was Aggie, patting one girl on the head, putting an arm around another, distributing affection easily, even taking part in the games, letting herself be blindfolded and turned by the small hands of June's friends and laughing when she saw she'd pinned the donkey's tail to its ear. “Your mother's fun,” whispered a little girl. She
was
fun, too; just not anyone June recognized.

Her father, on the other hand, stayed mainly in the background. He smiled and spoke kindly but didn't join in, did not appear as the joyful man she knew. Of course, though, he was the teacher and these friends of hers were his pupils. A certain distance had to be maintained.

The house grew warm, the taffeta got a little limp, and she forgot to be quite as gracious all the time as she'd intended. The gifts, beyond the glittering paper, were something of a disappointment after all — a handkerchief here, a little cloth doll there. It was difficult to be enthusiastic.

Still, the party itself was a success. She imagined her friends talking about it the next day at school, laughing about how good the games were, how lavish the food had been, boasting about it loudly, in front of those who had not been asked. Aggie, with her own taste for sweets, had made a luxurious cake: dark chocolate layers separated by date filling and slathered with chocolate icing. Inside were little prizes, charms and coins — a special, extra touch. Ice cream was also to be served.

Eight candles were burning when Aggie carried the cake in from the kitchen. “Make a wish,” her father said.

(What did she wish for then? Probably something silly, like good marks. What she would wish for now would be colossal. She might wish to be loved. But now she's too old to believe in wishes. Now she prays, and the only love to be prayed for is God's.)

Aggie, at her end of the table, began to cut the cake, topping each slice with ice cream, and passing it around. The girls' high spirits bubbled over into hysteria. Hot and over-excited, they began giggling, snorting and poking at each other; June, too. This was the best part. No one would forget this pure shared joy.

Disasters always seem to happen in slow motion. There was June, bent over laughing as a plate arrived in her hands at the same moment the girl beside her nudged her. The plate slipped, the cake swept into the air, separating from the ice cream, and went plunging into her lap while the ice cream slapped across her chest.

She watched it all happening, amazed.

Chocolate stains slithered down her body, and there was a little plopping sound as the ice cream hit the floor. Suddenly no one was laughing. There were little gasps and sucked-in breaths. June stared at the disaster of pink taffeta, so carefully and unwillingly stitched over so many hours. She could not believe this. In a moment it would go away, she was sure; it was something like a nightmare, but she'd wake up.

“Jesus Christ!” she heard. It was very loud and made her look up. Aggie was standing at the far end of the table, her hands planted on it in fists. “How could you be so clumsy? You've ruined your goddamned dress!”

Had she never shouted before? Of course, but not like this, not in front of people, and not swearing. June could feel her father standing, moving in behind her, putting his hands on her shoulders, looking over her head at her mother. June stared too.

Does Aggie think something like that could be forgotten? That was no mere expression of anger. It was rage and fury, and something that looked like hatred. And it wasn't for a single incident, either. It was for everything. It was not something June interpreted, but something she knew, right into her bones.

“It's all right, bunny,” her father was saying quietly, bending over her. His voice was a little shaky, a bit high; he must have seen, too. “Here, I'll just wipe off the worst of it.” He looked up. “Everybody carry on, eat up before your ice cream melts. It's nothing serious.” He knelt beside her, sponging at her dress, while the others, very quietly now, began to eat again. His kindness undid her. “Come on, bunny, don't cry, it's just a dress, it's not important. It could happen to anybody, it's all right.”

It was nice of him to pretend she was crying for the dress.

“Oh, for God's sake, quit bawling.” Through tears, Aggie was just a huge, dark, powerful form standing at the far end of the table.

“Stop it,” he said quietly. To Aggie, not to her. But what exactly was he telling her to stop? Hurting June? Hating them? June thinks now that he meant it absolutely. He wanted her mother to stop being, to vanish.

Quickly and uncomfortably her friends finished eating and left, sliding as unobtrusively as possible out the door.

What a mess June was: drenched in chocolate and tears, her party ringlets limp and dangling, even her white stockings wrinkled around her ankles. All that awful brown smeared across her dress. Her mother began to clear the table silently, stacking the dishes, picking crumbs from the floor, her mouth set in that bitter way she had perfected. Her father was saying over and over, helplessly, “It's all right, don't cry. It's all right.”

“It's damn well not all right,” Aggie snapped finally. “Take her upstairs and wash her. There's water in the basin in my room, and a clean cloth. Get that dress off and get her into a nightgown. And throw out the dress, it can't be cleaned. Jesus.”

“There's no need to swear.”

“Go to blazes.”

He smiled at June a little shakily, and took her hand. His hand was so dry! Hers was wet. When she thinks of it, it seems his hands were always papery-dry, like an old man's.

They were both uneasy in Aggie's room; it was so clearly hers, more or less forbidden to them both in normal times.

He'd never undressed June before, and was clumsy and ill at ease about it. The heap of pink taffeta lay spoiled on the floor. “I know it's early,” he said, “but maybe you should stay up here in your room, and I'll come and tell you a story.” He told her the one about Goldilocks and the three bears. Had he forgotten she was growing up? Did he think her safer as a baby? Did he like her better as a baby?

Too old for the story, she heard it in an older way. The danger of what Goldilocks had done struck her: how dangerous it was to be where you didn't belong, how risky to fall asleep when it would be wise to stay awake. How foolish, taking safety for granted.

What she could not make out was what she'd done that was so bad. Certainly she'd been clumsy, but that didn't warrant a look like that. It must have been something from long before a ruined dress. What did her mother blame her for?

Later, she heard them shouting, which was rare, and she cried again because it was her fault somehow, and downstairs, her father was suffering for some flaw in her that her mother could not bear.