Not her brownies!”
And when he begins chuckling
at his own little joke,
I’m struck by the lovely, quiet sound of it—
like water flowing over smooth stones.
I STEP OUTSIDE TO TAKE THE CALL
Samantha says
she’s walking though the quad
looking up at the bell tower,
and that it looks
exactly like a postcard
of how a college should look.
And just then,
the bells begin to ring—
great booming, echoing, peals of them.
She laughs and says,
“And it sounds exactly like
a college should sound!”
She says the leaves are falling.
She says the air is frosty.
She says, “Thank you, thank you, thank you!”
She tells me
she can’t believe
how lucky she is.
And I tell her
I can’t believe
how lucky I am.
AS SOON AS WE SAY GOOD-BYE
My phone rings again.
I check the number
and see that—shit!—it’s Roxie.
I let it go to voice mail.
But a second later,
it rings again.
And this time it’s Alice,
sounding oddly breathless.
“Oh, Holly,” she says,
“I’m so glad you picked up.”
And right away, I know
that something is very wrong.
“Alice,” I say. “What’s the matter?”
“It’s…it’s Michael. I’m sure he’s
going to be totally fine, but Noah and I
just drove him to the emergency room.”
An orderly brushes past me,
pushing someone lying on a table—
someone entirely covered with a sheet…
My knees begin to quake.
“Oh my God, Alice. What’s wrong with him?”
She tells me that they aren’t sure yet,
but that Michael called her a half hour ago
and said he was in a lot of pain.
He said that it came on fast.
That at first he thought maybe it was his appendix.
“But then,” Alice says, “he went to the bathroom
and…and…”
“And what?” I say.
“Well…” she says. “There was a teeny bit…
a teeny bit of blood in his pee.”
My heart skids to a stop.
“Is he there? Can I talk to him?”
“Not right now. They’re running some tests.
But he asked me to call you
and tell you he loves you.”
“Tell him I love him, too,” I say.
“Tell him I’ll catch the next plane out.”
And when Alice doesn’t say,
“Don’t be silly. You don’t need to fly home.”
a tsunami of terror engulfs me.
TURBULENCE
It isn’t until a couple of harrowing hours later,
when the flight
that I somehow managed to get a seat on
is zooming me home to California,
that I find myself
thinking about
how dangerously close
I came
to doing
what I almost did
when I was stuck in the elevator
with He Who Shall Not Be Named.
And my stomach lurches so violently
that I pull the airsickness bag
out of the seat pocket in front of me.
Just to play it safe.
ISN’T IT STRANGE?
When your husband’s
in the hospital
due to the mystery pains
knifing through his abdomen
and he sends you home to feed the cat
and pick up a few things for him
while you’re waiting
to hear the test results
and you happen to notice
his scruffy bedroom slippers,
the ones you’re always tripping over
because he forgets to put them in the closet,
those same aggravatingly old-mannish slippers of his,
whose presence there on any other day
would have irritated
the living daylights out of you,
isn’t it strange
to find yourself fighting a sudden urge
to reach down and scoop them up
into an embrace,
those tattered old mutts
standing guard so faithfully
next to the empty
unmade bed?
I SPLASH SOME COLD WATER ON MY FACE
And, braving the morass of Michael’s studio,
I somehow manage to locate the sketchbook
and the charcoal pencils he asked me to retrieve.
Then I head outside to pick some roses for him.
I’m snipping a bouquet of Double Delights,
when I glance next door
and see Duncan and Jane
rocking on their covered swing.
Madison and Pinkie
are curled up next to them,
both of them
deep in dreams.
Suddenly, Jane takes hold
of her husband’s hand
and places it on her full moon belly.
“Did you feel that?!” she says.
“Wow…” Duncan says.
“Our baby’s gonna be a drummer!”
“Just like her daddy,” Jane says.
And a proud-papa grin spreads across his face.
Then, very lightly,
he starts drumming on her stomach
and Jane joins in—
singing “God Only Knows.”
Geez.
I better get out of here
before I start
blubbering…
WHEN I RETURN TO THE HOSPITAL
Michael has dozed off.
That Percocet the nurse gave him
must have knocked him out.
Alice and Noah are snoring away, too.
I gaze at my cousin, drooling on Noah’s shoulder,
and my heart nearly cracks with tenderness.
Then I ease down onto the edge of Michael’s bed
and reach for his hand—so warm and solid,
so familiar and comforting.
I watch my husband sleep,
moved beyond words by each line on his face—
his “etchings,” he likes me to call them.
I lean down
and gently press my lips
to his.
TIME DOES NOT FLY WHEN YOU ARE WAITING FOR TEST RESULTS
The
hands
on
the
face
of
the
big
round
clock
on
the
puke
green
wall
move
so
slowly
that
between
each
tick
I
age
ten
years.
I’VE NEVER BEEN MUCH GOOD AT WAITING
But
this
is
ridiculous…
THANK GOD!
It turns out
it’s only kidney stones.
Nothing life threatening.
So Michael’s doctor sends us home.
But just as we exit the hospital,
we see Duncan racing in with a groaning Jane—
she’s dripping with sweat, her cheeks flushed,
her bangs plastered to her forehead.
“The bab
y’s coming!” Duncan shouts gleefully.
“Good luck!” Michael and I call out
as they dash past us
and disappear into the maternity ward.
A second later, we hear Jane let loose
with a gut-wrenching scream.
“You know something…” Michael muses,
clutching his midsection.
“I think I know just how she feels…”
FOR THE NEXT FEW DAYS
Michael has to pee into a sieve.
If he doesn’t pee those stones out
the doctor will have to go in and get them—
a procedure that involves,
among other things,
having a tube shoved into his penis.
So I cheer Michael on.
Telling him I know he can do it.
Telling him I’ve got a good feeling about this.
Then, after dozens of failed attempts,
with surprisingly little fanfare or pain,
he finally passes the stones.
And somehow this fills me with hope—
hope that our marriage,
with equally little fanfare or pain,
will manage
to pass its stones
as well.
MARRIAGE IS A FIRE
First it burns with desire,
with uncontrolled lust.
You touch each other
and you combust.
But if no one remembers
to stir the embers,
to feed them, poke them,
tend them, stoke them,
the blaze that once sizzled
will sputter and fizzle.
Which is why
I always say:
thank the Lord
for lingerie.
YOU KNOW WHAT I LOVE ABOUT MICHAEL?
I love that when we first met,
even though he was dating
a Marilyn Monroe look-alike at the time
(I’m not exaggerating—
she was actually getting paid
to impersonate Marilyn Monroe),
he
dumped her for
me.
I love his art, his eyes, his thighs,
and the tiny flecks of paint
that dot his cheeks like freckles.
I love that he has somehow managed
to convince himself that I’m
in better shape now than I’ve ever been.
I love that he always notices
and compliments me
when I lose weight.
But that he never complains,
or even seems to be aware of it,
when I gain it back.
I love that he’s funny,
always saying things like,
“I’ve succeeded far beneath my wildest dreams.”
Or, “The trouble with me is
that I can make a horse drink,
but I can’t lead it to water.”
And I love
that even when he’s miserable,
he never stops whistling.
ON A GOOD DAY
Being married makes me feel
like I’m still trapped in that mine shaft,
only my husband’s in there with me.
And there’s plenty of air
and candlelight
and champagne for us to sip
while we munch on cheddar
and green grapes
and pecans.
There’s plenty of Maugham
and Capote and Maupassant
for us to read aloud to each other,
plenty of Coltrane
and Hawkins and Webster
to saxophone us while we make love.
On a good day,
I’m still trapped in that shaft,
but I’m hoping that the rescue workers
will take
their sweet time
finding us.
MICHAEL AND I GO OVER TO MEET THE NEW BABY
The house has a hushed, awestruck vibe.
Even Pinkie is oddly quiet.
Jane and Duncan
have that new-parent glow.
Madison has that new-sibling
shell-shocked look.
She takes our hands
and leads us over to the bassinet.
“Dis is Cwementine,” she says. “She’s mine!”
“Clementine…” I say. “What a pretty name!”
“She is pretty,” Michael tells Madison.
“But not nearly as pretty as you.”
The little girl smiles shyly, and says,
“Wiww you push me on my swing?”
“Of course I will,” Michael replies,
and they head out into the backyard.
I look down at Clementine,
swaddled and snoozing,
bracing myself for the usual
tidal wave of yearning.
But it doesn’t come!
For the first time in ages,
I’m actually able to look at a baby
and not feel like weeping.
SAM’S TAKING A CLASS CALLED POSITIVE PSYCHOLOGY
She tells me that in 1979
a sociologist named Ellen Langer
did a study.
This study involved putting a group
of seventy-year-old men into a setting that
made it seem like it was twenty years earlier.
The only magazines, TV shows, games,
books, and music available to these men
were what were popular in 1959,
and they were told
to act and talk
as if it were 1959, too.
Sam tells me
that this study
had amazing results.
That after just one week
not only did these septuagenarians
look younger,
but their joints
became more flexible,
their posture improved,
and their fingers,
which usually get shorter with age,
actually lengthened.
Sam tells me
I should have
a more positive attitude.
And maybe she’s right—
maybe if I start picturing myself
with the body I had twenty years ago,
then that little ring of fat, jiggling around
my waistline like a belt made of sausages,
will mysteriously disappear.
Maybe if I don’t feel
ten pounds overweight
I won’t be ten pounds overweight.
And if I don’t think
I have any wrinkles
I won’t have any wrinkles.
Maybe if I
stop thinking of my hot flashes
as hot flashes
and start thinking of them
as short private vacations
in the tropics,
I’ll suddenly
find myself
with a nice deep tan.
I DON’T FEEL LIKE GOING TO THE PARTY
But something like intuition compels me
to slog through the infinite indignities
of getting ready to go out—
the hair dye, the blow-dry, the plucking,
the potions, the depressing descent
into the depths of my closet:
Am I thin enough to wear this?
Courageous enough to wear that?
Daft enough to don those?
I don’t feel
at all like going
to the party
but something like longing
propels me to barrel out into the night
with my husband anyhow.
And something like destiny gets us there
just in time to see our host place a match
to the logs he’s laid on the hearth;
just in time
to witness the conflagr
ation
that erupts.
And I’m so amazed I have to ask:
“How did you get the fire to catch like that
with just a single match?”
Our host smiles a that’s-easy smile,
then reaches into a sack and hands me something.
“Pinecones are the trick,” he says.
Pinecones…?!
I think back on all the hours I’ve wasted
balling up newspaper and shoving it under logs.
I recall all the fallen pinecones