What could I do? “Fine,” I said.
There was an almost audible exhalation in the room. Grandma and Janice exchanged quick smiles, and Simon laughed the fake little giggle of a five-year-old, trying to fit in though he didn't understand the ripple of electricity crackling in the air around us.
“What time do you get off work tonight?” Janice asked, bolder now that I had said yes.
For a second I entertained the idea of lying to her, of saying that I had an extra-long shift today and would not be home until late. But this was all rather inevitable. If not tonight, another night. Grandma and Janice would scheme and plan, maybe even pulling Simon into their operation if I proved to be recalcitrant. I didn't need him pitted against me too.
“I'm off at five,” I answered.
Janice's lips curled slightly. There was a time; five o'clock was concrete, a moment on the short linear procession of our lives that was singled out for us. Her plans were being realized. “Okay. Can you be ready to leave at six?”
“Whatever,” I said, pulling my arm from Grandma's gentle grip. “I've got to go or I'm going to be late.”
The room buzzed with energy behind me, and I knew Grandma and Janice were silently celebrating. I rolled my eyes and had swung the door open a little too forcefully when suddenly Janice's voice drifted from the kitchen.
“Wear something pretty, Julia. It's a really nice restaurant.” I didn't bother to look at her, but her voice fell soft on my ears. Soft and pleased.
Maybe even hopeful.
O
N THE WAY HOME
from work I heard a song on the radio that pierced me as if unseen arrows filtered through the speakers instead of innocent sound waves. It made me feel open somehow, exposed, as if the songwriter knew my heart and had captured it, caged it, and conferred it upon any ear open enough to hear. It was disconcerting. It left me cold, because I hadn't even known myself that I felt this way until the words washed over me in the still air of the car.
April back in New York. The thirty-first floor. It seems somehow everything's changed. â¦
It was probably supposed to be sad. The vocalist probably sang of sorrowful things and deep longing, but the thirty-first floor sounded like home to me.
I never wanted to leave. It never crossed my mind to get behind the wheel and look east. Or west. Or any direction at all. New York, San Francisco, Houston, Toronto ⦠it never occurred to me that I could exist anywhere other than where I had always existed. Here. With Grandma, of course, but I hadn't thought of all the things that I was here with
out
.
It was warm, and the cloudless sky reflected light between its never-ending blueness and the roll and tilt of the earth below. I could drive on. I could find an unexplored highway and just go. Go and go until I felt like stopping. Until I found myself somewhere I had never been, never even dreamed of when I was young and had other hopes to fill my life with promise. Though only days ago the road seemed unfurled to more and more of nothing but the same, with the brilliance of the sunlight on my car I could imagine distant cities over the edge of the horizon.
But the way home was automatic; I drove the roads without thinking of where I was going. When the gravel of the farm driveway crunched beneath my tires, I startled with the reality of where my roots ran deep. Leaving here would be a digging, burrowing, nearly impossible thing. I would almost have to cut and run, take whatever semblance of self I could rip out of the ground and pray that new roots would grow before everything within me withered and died. But trees don't take well to the shock of being uprooted, and neither did I. Or at least that's what I figured.
Not now
, I told myself, thinking that maybe someday I could whisper, “Not
quite
yet.”
It wasn't nearly as thrilling as the pull of the open road, but I was relieved that Janice's car was not parked beside the unattached garage, and Grandma and Simon were already gone. The house was empty, and I looked forward to spreading myself across my bed, stretching out my back, and pointing my toes to the far corners of my mattress for a few moments before I had to curl into my designated sleeping position. I longed to sleep on my back, my stomach, in any position but on my left side. I thought of blood flowing to feed and strengthen my son and the inconvenience seemed lesser, but my muscles still stiffened in protest when I folded them into the same position every night.
The house was warm and stagnant, a little musty after the freshness of a late spring afternoon, and I stifled a yawn. Planning to throw open a few windows before my quick presupper nap, I stepped into the kitchen and was stopped in my tracks. I forgot about the windows, the heat. Any sleepiness was extinguished and surprise turned my feet to lead.
Hanging from one of the cupboard doors was a dress. It was black with a narrow V-neck that was outlined in a tasteful pewter-colored ribbon. The narrow bands of silvery charcoal crisscrossed the bodice of the dress, resting off to one side in a neat knot that ended in a stylishly uneven wave of extra fabric. It had a snug empire waist, and by the way the skirt draped from the cupboard and over the counter, I imagined the full folds would probably fall just below knee length. It was gorgeous. And I knew instinctively that it was intended for me.
I glanced around, half expecting someone to emerge from the shadows of the hallway, but the only sound in the house was the soft pat from the leaky faucet over the kitchen sink. It dripped in syncopation to my pounding heart. Shaking myself a little, I kicked off my shoes and went to examine the dress. The fabric was cool and sleek in my fingers, finer and softer than anything I had ever worn beforeâincluding the hand-me-down prom dress that I had forced myself into my junior year of high school. Though I couldn't blame Grandma for trying, that dress had been as uncomfortable as the prom itselfâa lopsided event that left me with no desire to attend my senior year.
Up close, the black dress was even more breathtaking than it had been from a distance. It wasn't a formal dress by any means, just exquisitely tailored, well made, and classy. I could also see that there was a necklace slung around the hanger, a pretty platinum chain with a single black pearl dangling from the very end. And on the floor was a pair of shoes: strappy black sandals with small, slim heels. Tucked between the shoes was a card.
I picked it up hesitantly, wondering who would do this, fearing the answer, and somehow also afraid that I was mistakenâthat all this extravagance was not meant for me. But the envelope read
Julia
. I tore it open with unsteady hands. There were only four short lines:
I know this does not make up for everything
I missed.
But I do hope you like it.
Please wear it tonight.
âJanice
Something indefinable and nebulous gnawed at me. I had never been the recipient of such an expensive gift. The dress alone was luxurious in a way that convinced me it had not come from JCPenney. And it made me giddy, almost dizzy, to catch the necklace in my palm and realize that the pearl, with its rainbow iridescence and slightly misshapen sphere, was unquestionably real. Janice must have been saving an enormous chunk of every paycheck for such opulence.
But though I was strangely enchanted, deep in my chest something thudded angrily at what could only be considered a bribe. Janice was trying to buy me, win my affection as if I were a naive child to be wooed. A mindless imp easily swayed by something lovely. The only thing missing from her kitchen display was a box of chocolates, maybe a single red rose. I tried to talk myself into going upstairs and lying down as if I hadn't seen her backhanded offering. But maybe I was being melodramatic. Maybe her intentions were pure. The card was open in my hands, and I didn't know how to explain that I could not, would not, take her gift. I wanted to accept it almost as much as I wanted to reject it.
Leaning against the counter beside the dress, I unclasped the necklace from the hanger.
Just for a moment
, I told myself.
Just to see what it feels like
. I hooked the chain around my neck with clammy fingers. The pearl rested precisely below the hollow of my collarbone, and I could feel the slight weight of it roll against the warmth of my skin.
Wiggling my toes, I studied the shoes. My feet were still slender, not at all swollen, and I stepped into the heels without pausing to think. I promised myself I was only sampling the goods, proving that they wouldn't work anyway, but the sandals were a perfect fit. I knew the dress would be too. Grandma must have helped Janice raid my closet and research my shoes and clothes, averaging everything out until they were left with the right sizes. It was obvious that the two of them had given their secret much thought.
I sighed and took the dress from the cupboard handle, pressing the billowing fabric against the length of my body. What should I do? Leave everything untouched? Walk away and refuse not only the gift but also Janice's none-too-subtle offer of reconciliation? Or could I accept what had been given, even if it was not freely given? Could I take this one small peace offering without somehow communicating to Janice that I had a price? that all could be forgiven and forgotten for nothing more than the cost of a pretty dress with all the trimmings?
Standing in the kitchen, I felt my mind freeze, my body solidify against the chipped countertop as I came to an impasse and did not know where to turn. I blinked in the half-light of the kitchen, sliding the dress through my fingers and trying not to think, until I saw Janice's car coming up the long driveway.
Feeling like I had been caught in the act of doing something forbidden, I cast around looking for an escape and an explanation. I fumbled with the necklace, trying to get it off as I twisted my foot out of one of the shoes and hung the black dress back where it had been. When I heard the slam of her car door, I jumped and started toward the stairs, necklace forgotten and lone shoe abandoned. I still wore the heeled sandal on my right foot, and I hobbled, almost tripping, and then changed my mind in an instant and reached suddenly for the dress, the other shoe.
I scrambled out of the kitchen and hopped into the stairwell, pulling the door closed behind me but not hard enough to latch it. I waited on the second step, knowing that Janice would be in the house any second and unwilling to betray my position by starting up the creaky stairs. She always went straight to the bathroom when she got home from work. She ran the water, so I assumed she washed her hands and face, but mostly I figured she wanted to be alone for a few minutes. As soon as my movements were hidden beneath the muffled gush and purr of water in the pipes, I could escape to my room and decide what to do.
The front door protested loudly as Janice opened it, and I heard her footsteps on the dull tile of the mudroom floor. Then there was nothing more for a long moment, and I imagined her standing on the threshold of the kitchen, surveying the empty spot where the dress had hung like a trophy. Had she intended for it to be a baited thing? In my mind's eye, I watched a slow smile blossom across her face and I was torn as if my soul was perforated into two incomplete halves.
Something in me rose at the thought of a gate swinging wide in the walls I had so carefully built. And another something tugged me down, chaining me to doubts and fears and disbelief that anything could be any different from what it had always been. I felt ashamed and vulnerable at the same time.
I should have kept driving
, I thought in the darkness of the stairwell. I pressed my eyes shut.
I should have gone off to find my thirty-first floor.
The swish and flow of water in the faraway bathroom spurred me up the stairs, and I stumbled into my room, still uneven on one lone shoe.
Cinderella
, I thought, tossing the dress on my bed and rubbing my head with trembling hands. Only there was no Prince Charming. Just a wicked ex-mother.
I got ready unenthusiastically, freshening my makeup by rote and pulling my hair into a loose French knot with little concern for the wisps of curls that struck out on their own. Going through the motions was soothing somehow, normal, even though I felt drawn forward, pulled into this evening against my will and utterly helpless to do anything about it. At some point I knew I would wear the dress; I resigned myself to it. I wasn't sure what such an action would suggest to Janice, but I decided that I didn't care. Whatever the night held, I might as well look good enduring it.
When I emerged from the staircase at exactly six o'clock, Janice was waiting for me at the kitchen table. She stood as I entered, pushing back and up expectantly, fluidly, as if she had waited a very long time for this moment and had practiced how she would rise to the occasion.
“Julia.” Janice blinked quickly, and for a split second I thought that she had teared up, but then she smiled broadly and exclaimed, “You could have just walked out of my high school graduation photo!”
I didn't know how to begin to respond.
Janice read my indecision, and the smile wavered and slid off her carefully made-up face. “I should have said, âYou look so beautiful.' I guess that sounds pretty self-serving now, doesn't it? Though you do.” She stopped, started again. “You look very beautiful.”
Silence grew between us, a small hill of misunderstanding that would soon be an impassable mountain. Janice laughed a little self-consciously, trying to beat back the growing peak. “Hasn't anyone ever told you that you look like me?”
“No,” I said, my voice a shard of ice chipped from the block I held close inside.
“A younger me,” Janice clarified. She smoothed the coat of her pastel pink suit and sighed. “We're not off to a very good start, are we? Let's try again. Can we start over?”
I just shrugged, swallowing the many things I wanted to say and maintaining my icy calm.
But Janice would not be so easily deterred. She covered her eyes with her hands and took a steadying breath. Then she quickly uncovered her face, like a child unveiling some marvelous surprise, and smiled. “Julia!” she cooed, her voice different this time around. “You look gorgeous! That dress is a perfect fit on you. How are the shoes?”