Anthropology of an American Girl: A Novel - By Hilary Thayer Hamann Page 0,258

the chairs were set—in curves rather than lines, no lines for Jack—I came in from the yard and found his mother sitting in the living room, dressed at last. She was wearing a taupe pant suit and on her lap lay a closed book, an album of some kind. Though she said nothing, there were two cups on the table and a plate of those triangular sandwiches without crusts. I figured I was supposed to join her.

She transferred the book to my lap as though passing a clipboard in a doctor’s office, without fanfare or emotion. It was a photo collection of Jack’s life that she had assembled from family events—weddings, graduation parties, birthdays. She intended to display it at the memorial. I didn’t have to look hard or long to see that Jack was miserable in every shot, despite the fact that he had successfully bastardized all his dress-up clothes. There were Boy Scout badges Superglued onto his wide-lapeled Brooks Brothers suit and flames painted onto his one silk tie, and Wacky Pack stickers varnished onto his good shoes. I could not see the shoes in the photos, but I knew they were there. The shoes were legendary. Denny had borrowed them for the senior banquet even though they were two sizes too small, and when we’d danced, he’d moved like magic, not missing a single step.

I was overwhelmed. I hadn’t seen pictures of him in so long. I wanted desperately to restore him. I couldn’t understand why it was not possible to do so. Me just thinking, his voice, his voice. His face, his eyes, his voice. I realized that I had not neared the bottom of my pain, that my sorrow was stronger than I could ever be, coupled as it was with the sickening knowledge that I’d wasted years with Mark that could have been spent instead with Jack—helping him, if that would have been possible. I held the book close to my face, squinting.

“Is something wrong?” Jack’s mother asked in her deflated sort of monotone, not looking up from the book.

“I forgot my glasses,” I said, lying.

“Glasses,” she said dismissively. “You’re awfully young for glasses.”

I stayed that way with her for the better part of an hour, going through photo by photo, squinting and sinking further into despair, because I couldn’t exactly leave her alone with the wretchedness of memories on the day of the funeral. After the funeral it was going to have to be every man for himself. And, besides, Rita the housekeeper had made a fresh pot of coffee, and though I’d often walked past the Fleming couch, I’d never sat on it. It was actually quite comfortable. Mrs. Fleming didn’t seem worried in the least about me holding a cup of coffee and eating sandwiches while flipping through the overstuffed album and blowing my nose, despite the very real potential for spills, which led me to wonder whether Jack had not made more of her cleanliness neurosis than she deserved. I kept looking up, half-expecting Jack to walk in, to join us. I thought it was something we could have gotten through well together—not the funeral, but coffee with his mother. I was sorry we’d never tried.

I heard myself say, “Do you mind if I open the drapes?”

She struggled with the suggestion as though having some cognitive lapse, as though a word or term I’d used were foreign to her. She moved her mouth, but nothing came out.

I stood and drew back the curtains on each window. “It’s pretty today,” I said. Rays of sunshine charged in at varying angles like they’d been waiting. “Isn’t it pretty?” Pretty as a word might not have been an appropriate choice for a funeral day; however, I used it with authority. The day was mine, I’d decided, and even if it wasn’t, I intended to take it. In old film noir movies, the detective takes on someone else’s problem, and in the process of solving it, solves his own. He works backward through the crime while moving forward in his mind to crack his own riddle. In such narratives the crime is a metaphor, and the riddle is a metaphor, and quite possibly, beginning at the end is also a metaphor, a prescriptive for successful living. The way it goes is this—The story starts when I enter it.

Mrs. Fleming flinched as though stunned by the flare of oncoming headlights. Then she settled back, looking wide-eyed and stony.

“Are you okay?” I asked, not sure if