She did not fancy herself poor, nor old, nor crazy, but they could think what they wanted. She was fine, although a little shaken. His death was not a surprise—she had expected it. How could she not have?
CHAPTER TWO
October 12th, 1970
Indianapolis, Indiana
Never judge a book by its cover,
people liked to say, yet Alice knew it happened all the time, this judging by appearances, first impressions. The cover was the first thing one saw, sight generally the first sense to provide information. One could not help making an initial judgment based on the physical, especially if the other person’s aura wasn’t particularly strong. Like the first time she noticed Betty in her first year of college. She thought Betty a gluttonous, greedy girl for a long time because, well, Betty had to be at least two hundred pounds and about five feet four inches tall. But as Alice got to know her through a shared class, then observation, Alice realized that Betty did not actually eat everything in sight—she tried to be very careful with her diet, ate with great caution. Alice eventually learned Betty had diabetes.
When Alice noticed George for the first time, she thought he was good-looking. His looks plus the cockiness exuding from him led her to believe that he was nothing but full of himself. All show and no go.
This impression deepened once she realized who composed his circle of friends: a bunch of assholes as far as she—and most of the school—was concerned. She had heard stories about them, the things they did to people, the things they said. And if “birds of a feather flock together” had any truth to it, she knew it would be wise for her to stay away from George and his circle altogether.
But she also realized it wasn’t fair to judge them only by what she’d heard, even though she had no other information to go on and the stories about them were pretty consistent. Still, she figured it wasn’t fair to George for her to not even read his first page when he wanted to give her the opportunity. And so she did—and his first page turned out to be consistent with all her impressions thus far.
He swaggered up to her that first day, looking her straight in the eye, almost as if daring her to look away. She had to, briefly, but looked back at him, determined not to show any signs of weakness, although she wasn’t sure what she was fighting just yet.
“Alice, is it?” he asked as he came right up to her, invading her personal space by a fraction. She could smell mint gum on his breath. He must have just popped it in.
“Yeah, I’m Alice. Who wants to know?”
She thought she was doing a pretty good job of coming across as self-assured.
He put out his hand.
She was amused by this gesture, the way he stuck his hand out like a person new to the social game, but she slipped her small hand into his larger one anyway. He covered her hand with his other hand, making a hand sandwich. There was nothing beginner-like in that grip.
His palms were warm.
“I’m George,” he said, a twinkle in his eye, as if he could see through her weak armor. She wondered if it was all in her head. “You’ll want to remember that,” he continued.
His confidence was infuriating.
She looked at his shoes then let her eyes travel up to his face, and, turning up the attitude a notch, said, “Why should I care to?”
His teeth were so white, so straight.
He was quite a handsome fellow; she had no problem admitting this to herself. But she had to keep reminding herself that he was a jerk.
“Well, it’s the name that’ll be beside yours on your marriage certificate,” he said, grinning at her. His eyes still twinkled, wrinkling a tiny bit at the corners.
She was shocked by his audacity but also felt an enormous desire to laugh entwined with a tremor of delight. Here was a man who knew what he wanted and had no problem putting himself out there to get it. An admirable trait indeed.
And his smile was so beguiling. His eyes, a captivating shade of blue.
She heard herself say, “Well, there are so many Georges around, I would hardly be surprised.”
She was pretty sure she’d suppressed any hint of a smile or delight on her face; absolutely positive that she was wearing a sober expression, lightly sprinkled with disdain.
But his smile only grew. She then realized he still held her hand in his. She quickly pulled it away.
“Look,
George
, I’m not sure how many girls you try that line on, but it’s not going to work with me.”
She turned to go but couldn’t remember where she was supposed to be heading.
“So what’ll work with you? A movie? This Friday at seven?”
Alice’s mind started to race, trying to find an excuse. He moved so fast…
“Well I…I think I have a…”
“How ‘bout we meet near the Quad? Around six-thirty?”
“I have to study,” she said at last, disappointed by her weak excuse.
He scoffed.
“No one studies on Friday nights. So I’ll see you on Friday then. Try not to be too late! I know how you women are.”
He winked at her then sauntered away.
Alice just stared after him in disbelief, feeling she had no choice but to show up at the appointed day and time. It was obvious he would not rest until she went out with him—no use putting it off.
Soon it became apparent that he did not rest at all. It seemed to Alice that she spent every minute outside of class dodging him, for he was intent on dating her, making them go steady, spending as much time with her as possible.
She liked the attention, but his intensity and insistence were a bit unnerving.
It was so very hard to get away from him those first few weeks: he always managed to corner her, always had a proposition for her. Then one day, as she was about to slide quickly behind a tall, broad senior so that George would not see her and try to chat with her before she slipped into class, she realized she did not want to get away. After all the movies, lunches, and dinners, the ducking and dodging, the nights chatting about the movies, lunches, dinners, ducking and dodging, she realized she had gotten used to him, and he was not as much of a jerk as she first thought. She saw that he operated on the rule that if you pretended to be confident, believed in yourself and in your own competence, then others would too. As far as she could tell, it had been working for him. She soon decided that all his cockiness and confidence was manufactured to cover up insecurities, his feelings of inadequacy. She was just learning about the subject in her psychology class, about everyone having defenses—in various forms and for various reasons. What she knew of him thus far was not enough to elucidate what he was insecure about just yet, why he might feel inadequate. Why he was so obstinate, felt such a strong desire to win. But she did start to see that he liked having people around him. Whether it was just to ward off loneliness or just that he needed more people to witness his struggles, watch him triumph over them, then give him a pat on the back for his accomplishments, he befriended all sorts of folk.
While Alice was initially concerned about the boys he hung out with, she soon saw that they were at least loyal to him, and respectful toward her—in her presence, at least. But Alice had trouble feeling comfortable with his friendships with girls. She tried to make it clear to him that she was not at ease with those relationships but he only laughed it off, telling her not to worry. Alice didn’t think she’d have such a problem had he been more casual with them, had they seemed more acquaintances than friends. She had a hard time feeling special when she found out that the notes and messages he left for her that she’d thought were so sweet and considerate, notes that had helped her fall in love with him—were not exclusive to her; he sent notes to one or two of his female friends as well. Of course, his notes to them were of the “have a nice day,” “good luck on your exam” variety instead of the “can’t wait to see you later, sweet-cakes” and “I love you” notes he sent to her, but she still felt encroached upon nonetheless.
And then there was his friend Abigail. As far as Alice knew, he and Abigail were both from out-of-state, Illinois specifically. They had even gone to the same high school, but they did not know each other at the time; he knew of her only because she had entered a state teen beauty pageant once and everyone in the school knew of her then. She had even placed second runner-up. George and Abigail became friends not long before he started courting Alice, in his senior year and Alice’s junior year, but to Alice, Abigail acted as if they had been friends much longer. Alice was never sure what to make of Abigail exactly, but for the most part, Abigail seemed to view George as a platonic friend only, another ear to her incessant tongue. Since Alice started hanging out with George’s friends more, she was there when Abigail would talk about the most recent note she had found from George or their phone conversation from the night before. Abigail was now part of George’s circle, so it was not strange that she revealed much about herself in front of them since they were now her friends too. Alice sometimes felt like the only one who was somewhat of an outsider. But she reminded herself in those times that she wasn’t an outsider; she had gained automatic entrance to the circle since she was George’s girl. Everyone knew it. Even before it was official.
For the most part, Abigail was benign—even though she had the annoying tendency to try to get into the same classes as George, since they were both business majors, and she was constantly trying to prove—Alice was not sure to who exactly—that her relationship with George was intensely close and interminable. That they were the best of friends. But for the most part, Alice could ignore her—she reeked of desperation, after all. Something must have been missing in her home—parental love and attention or something of the sort. Alice was sure her psychology books would say something like that.
But it wasn’t just Abigail that Alice had to learn to ignore. George went out of his way to converse with girls, to go beyond the “hi/bye/have fun in class” casual talk, and it was obvious to Alice the girls appreciated it. But Alice did not. Although she could see that they were no actual threats to her because they were not his type, or they had boyfriends, or they were friends he’d had before meeting her or some other reason, she didn’t like it. She didn’t like the way some of them looked at him, the way he flirted back.
She knew that she might not have been bothered by any of it had it not been for the fact that he discouraged her friendships with males, whether they had been there before him or not. He would look at them strangely, and if they were of the weaker variety, they would shy away from her, and their conversation with her would be reduced to “hello” and “goodbye” if she was lucky. If they were a stronger type, George would ask her explicitly to tone down on her interactions with them, claiming he suspected ill intentions on their parts. And if George was really desperate, he’d have one of his friends have a talk with the guy.
Alice felt her friend pool get smaller and smaller until there were only girls left. But she thought George’s jealousy cute, endearing—even as it enraged her. Obviously he loved her, and was afraid of losing her. So much so that he did everything in his power to make sure she remained with him. She tried to tell him he had nothing to worry about, but he was like a sullen child at times. Other times he looked at her with scared, vulnerable eyes. She wondered: did his mother leave him? His father? She still did not know why he was so insecure. She even severed relationships with male friends herself to show him how serious she was about him, to help him feel more secure. To prove she loved only him. She did not need them anyway, just him.
George provided her with steady companionship, eventually becoming her best friend and confidant. They not only started doing just about everything together, but he also bought her flowers and a card for every important occasion: her birthday, Christmas, Valentine’s. Sometimes, for no special occasion at all. In those cards, he would scrawl the sweetest words proclaiming great love and appreciation of their friendship and romantic relationship. She had no idea such a poet existed within him. He was adorable in his secret sentimentality.
CHAPTER THREE
Tuesday, June 27th 2006
Bloomington, Illinois
Alice turned down all the photos including George as she walked through the house. She needed to distance herself in order to operate properly; she could not let herself think about what had happened. A funeral needed to be planned. Children needed to be called. Things needed to be taken care of.
As she wondered where to begin she found herself walking up the stairs toward the master bedroom.
She went to their closet and stood there, staring at it for a few moments.
He had left it open as usual.
Then she started pulling down all of his shirts, his belts, and shoes, and tossing them into a heap on the floor. Once she had cleared out his clothing and footwear, she took out the three boxes he had packed in the closet, shoving them aside, near the bed, to go through later. Right now, she needed to get rid of all the things he had worn, everything that held his scent—including the bedsheets and his pillow.
When she had satisfactorily cleaned out the closet, she moved on to his dresser. Out came all of his nightwear, underwear, and sportswear.
Once his drawers were emptied, she cleared off the top of it, tossing his brush, deodorant, Ben-gay, and cologne, musky smell and all, on top of the hill of George-wear.
She went to his nightstand and removed his Bible, adding that to the pile.
She was aware that his nightstand drawers were full of paper—things that needed to be filed properly, documents she needed to go through, and now that she finally had access to the key, she planned to go through them later as well. Important financial information was probably contained within, along with other items of import he had put himself in charge of.
She went to their bathroom and removed all of his belongings from there too—toothbrushes, aftershave, medication—adding them to the pile. By the time she had finished putting all of George’s things together, she realized she would need to wait until Drew arrived to take the items downstairs after she had packed them up. She made her way to the attic to gather boxes and containers for that purpose, and was reminded that there were things to go through there as well. She wanted all of him gone, no reminders.
While in the attic, she examined the articles there, but as far as George’s possessions went, there were only books, old decorations, and other old knick-knacks, nothing particularly interesting. All the good stuff had been packed away in plain sight in their room.
When she returned from the attic, she started packing the pile of articles away, sorting them according to their final destinations. She left the containers neatly on top of each other next to the dresser, the heaviest—with shoes, belts for example—on the bottom, clothes on top.
Then she stretched out, arms akimbo, bending her head back so that the ceiling was visible. She shook out her arms. She was moving at a good pace.
She decided to go through the boxes she had found in the closet next. The first one she dragged out had nothing but books in it—texts on business, financing, economics. Still she took each one of them out and shook them, but no loose paper of interest fell from them. She tucked all the books back in, then dragged that box near the other ones ready to be disposed of via garage sale, garbage, or Salvation Army. Now the local library could get a piece of the action.
For the next container, she had to get a pair of scissors to cut an opening in the top through all the tape. She found old cards, letters and notes.
Excitement ran through her.
She started looking through the stationery. Most of the letters were from her, some from their children and grandchildren, some from his parents, a few from his sister, and some from random friends throughout George’s life—a few of which she was interested in perusing at that moment. She began reading one of the letters from Abigail, dated six years prior:
Hi, George,
Thanks for your letter! Yes, it’s been such a long time—too long of course! My children have been well, thanks for asking. Bob’s in grad school and Mary’s now a doctor. And of course Bill knows how lucky he is—I remind him every day! Glad to hear your family’s doing well. It was really nice to hear from you! We should catch up sometime!
Alice remembered the day Abigail had stopped by to “catch up” six years earlier. She looked a lot different—her once-long brunette hair had been cut short and dyed red. But she was still petite, thin. And she was not as annoying as she had been in college or the last time Alice had seen her, which was about twenty-five years ago. It was not hard to find a letter she had written to George around that time:
Hey, Georgie!
Yes, Mary is such a sweetheart—I’m so glad I had her, even though it’s pretty tough raising her by myself. I just bought her a bike and she absolutely loves it! I think she will be quite an athlete when she gets older. Maybe I’ll put her in gymnastics class. Anyway, I met this great guy and he’s okay with everything. He absolutely adores Mary. We might even be married within the next year or so. You can come if you’d like! I’ll definitely send an invitation. Tell Alice I said hi! I might visit you guys sometime!
Abigail was true to her word, taking it upon herself to visit a week before her wedding, on a weekend. She’d brought along an overnight bag and ended up staying for two days. When George asked about Mary, she said she’d left her daughter with her own mother for the time being.
It appeared Abigail had forgotten Alice and George had children as well, for she’d looked surprised when Drew came down the stairs to see what the commotion was about, followed by Elaine.
Alice remembered being very surprised when Abigail showed up, for she’d been given no notice and Alice had known nothing of the exchanges between George and Abigail then. But Alice did her best to be as hospitable as she could. However, she was awash with resentment when she was cleaning up after dinner that first day while Abigail sat watching television with George. The kids would have been there in their usual spots too, but tonight they’d gone upstairs, not too fond of the stranger, Alice guessed. Alice worked faster than ever before to get the dishes away and sort out the kitchen. When she was heading to the family room, she noticed Abigail had taken it upon herself to sit next to George on the two-seater couch. As Alice prepared to send her off elsewhere, she heard her daughter call out to her. She quickly ran upstairs and took care of her—although she spoke a little more sharply to Elaine than she would have liked, but she was irritated—then started heading downstairs again. But Drew then started calling to her, having heard her come up. She went to his room, soothed him, read him the shortest story she could find, kissed him on the head and told him she would stop by later, since it was the weekend and they did not have to be in bed as early as usual. Then she went back downstairs. By that time, Abigail had made way for her and moved to a separate chair.
Alice could not be happier when Abigail left the following evening. Although she did not cross any major boundaries, Abigail’s approach to George, as if they’d been best friends from birth and would remain so forever, was severely irritating. As much as Alice tried not to care, she couldn’t help it; Abigail acted as if she and George were soul-mates, like the husband-wife relationship could not compare. While George did not act the same way, he did not discourage her either, and that also upset Alice. He was probably amused by Abigail, maybe even flattered that she valued him so much and sought out his friendship so…well,
desperately
was the only word Alice could think of. Alice was surprised Abigail had not asked George to be a groomsman or to walk her down the aisle, the way she carried on.
Alice made sure they were unable to attend Abigail’s wedding the week after. It was difficult at first, since George tried his best to make them go, but Alice had one major thing on her side: the same day Abigail was getting married was Alice’s thirtieth birthday, and she had plans to celebrate it with her family—all of them. For George to not even show up at the wedding…Alice hoped it hit Abigail in the right place. Of course, if she was a reasonable girl at all, Abigail would realize that Alice’s birthday party took precedence, even if George did not fully realize it and had still tried unsuccessfully to convince Alice they should all fly down for the wedding, postponing her party.
Alice flipped through the rest of the letters, searching for other names that would interest her, putting them aside.
Before she knew it, the night had come and gotten comfortable. She glanced at the clock on her nightstand: ten thirty-eight p.m. She would definitely have to begin funeral arrangements and go through the family finances tomorrow. She felt a bit uneasy about it, since George had always been in charge of their assets, but maybe with Drew’s help she could figure it all out.
She decided to call Drew and Elaine in the morning; it was not only past her bedtime, but past a decent hour to call someone’s house.