"Coming back from the funeral, Gwen felt all-embracing relief. It was over and she could finally get away from all those who “meant well”. In the final months she had really wished Jack dead a thousand times. Hell, when he was alive and healthy she had wished him dead 10 times a day. But that was different. She knew he wasn’t going to actually die on a Tuesday afternoon because she had wished it. She knew he would still be coming through the door at dinner, stuck in his own world, raving about something that had happened that shouldn’t have, or something that should have happened but hadn’t.
"Before he got sick she used to wonder if
she loved him? She had once, but now
their marriage was an act of will – like all long marriages really. She got a kick out of reading those
ridiculous articles about couples in old-age homes who had been married for 60
years. “What is the secret of your great
marriage?” some feckless reporter would ask.
“Well, we never went to bed angry…we always talked things through…he
always bought me roses on my birthday…he was a good provider.” What garbage.
Any marriage that lasts 60 years – heck, even 10 – is purely an act of
will, or ignorance, or the lack of opportunity or the dominance of one partner
over the other. God, she used to think,
I have become cynical over the years. But when she looked at the marriages of
the women in her volunteer group, she came to the same conclusion. How could anyone have married that jerk? Even trying to imagine him at 25 was
impossible. He must have been a jerk
then. Jack had been gorgeous. That had
attracted her attention, but his brain and gallantry sealed the deal.
"The phone rang. 'Mum, are you OK?' Barbara, not her favourite child, calling
to be sure she could get out of town with a clear conscience. 'Gunther and I are just heading out to the
airport and I wanted to be sure you were OK before we left.' What does she think? I’m OK an hour after burying my husband of 43
years – her father? She had always been
a little thick. Could never make any
connections in her head. This was this
and that was that. My Dad has just died,
sad, and I am going to the airport. Gotta
call Mum. Did I remember my good
shoes? If I left them in the upstairs
closet I’ll be so pissed off. Gotta get
back because we’re giving a dinner tomorrow night for Gunther’s office. 'Mum, everything’ll be OK, you looked
great. Aren’t you glad I used that
caterer for the reception? Their
desserts were fabulous. They’re always
better than that caterer you usually use.
Weren’t the kids perfect! Annie
looked adorable in her little funeral dress, didn’t you think? The mourning outfits they have these days for
kids are just amazing!' "She felt like telling her to fuck off, but Barbara would never get it. She wouldn’t be able to get that connecting the caterer’s desserts with her father’s life and death were just the wrong connections. Barbara felt everything, or nothing, on the same level. Where had that come from? Probably not enough protein when I was pregnant with her, thought Gwen. She obviously didn’t get enough to make the extra brain cells required to have a brain that functioned above the basic stem level that regulated shopping and planning parties. My fault, it was summer and I ate a lot of salads. Or maybe she had been switched at birth?
"Barbara had always been a prig. Conventional, not traditional. Tradition was tossed out the window with gay abandon whenever she met a “new best friend”; convention protected her from reality. Even as she smoked (continually) and drank (occasionally) through three pregnancies, she could not connect the fetus with the nicotine and other addictions she forced on her offspring. When they start smoking at 11, thought Gwen, Barbara will be the first to be totally shocked! She bragged as she described every detail of each prenatal visit, about how the baby was perfect at every stage. 'And the doctor has refused to allow me to go on the patch while I’m pregnant because it would be just too hard on the baby.' Incredibly, smoking actually became “doctor’s orders”. Another missed connection. Gwen remembered pretending she didn’t know her own daughter when a fellow restaurant patron looked on slack-jawed at a very-pregnant Barbara smoking on the sidewalk. She looks like a hooker, thought Gwen, as she hurried to the car. As president of the local ‘Mothers’ Club’, Barbara enthusiastically neglected to reveal her furtive smokes behind the garage. One of her disgruntled brothers spilled those beans. Funny how you love your children, but step back in amazement when they grow up and reveal themselves. Especially when they choose a husband. That, of course, is the real kicker.
"Gwen intensely disliked her German son-in-law. Gunther was right out of a foreign movie. Smug, ignorant, one-dimensional, yet completely unaware that he suffered from any of these traits. After 11 years, he had still not asked the mother of his wife one, single question about herself – or anyone else in Gwen’s circle. Every time he opened his mouth he gave her another distressing clue about his character. His parents, of course, must be the root cause of all this. They were always overly-influenced by their own impressions of themselves. She tried to ignore all of it when they were forced to gather. For all they knew, Gwen could have beaten terminal cancer, swum the English Channel, performed daily open-heart surgery, or flown in space. Their world was entirely self-centred. Come to think of it, Gunther and Barbara were a perfect match. But they had produced grandchildren and so were conventionally elevated at weddings, birthdays, Christmas and funerals.
"Gwen assured Barbara everything was fine and hung up. She poured herself a scotch and sat in her perfect living room. Her thoughts drifted to the baby she had lost in a miscarriage a thousand years ago, just before Barbara. Would it have been a girl? Yes, she had decided many years ago. This was her favourite “daughter”, the one she conjured. With her two sons such disappointments, Gwen sank into a reverie about the daughter she might have borne. This daughter would have been strong, smart, athletic and independent – exactly as Gwen imagined herself. She didn’t often permit herself the luxury of wondering too long or too often about her lost child; pain prevented it. But Jack’s death offered a moment of indulgence to enjoy their imagined daughter. With two granddaughters, maybe one would fulfill her aspirations, the way Barbara had not.
"She and Jack had both been remarkable athletes as teenagers, but social convention had cut her sport career short, while his flourished. Gwen’s mother thought sports unbecoming in a girl, so Gwen was relegated to swimming and cheerleading. God, give me one granddaughter with a little athletic talent and I promise I will rise to the challenge. But she knew the obstacles she faced. That was why she humoured Barbara’s sense of maternal superiority, single-mindedly to get access to one of the baby girls. Her sons’ failures had made her long since abandon any attempts to influence the grandson. That she would leave to the Germans. Good luck to them, she thought as she drained her glass. Rigid self-discipline prevented her from re-filling it, much as she wanted to. She went to bed.
"Over the next few days, she disposed of
all of Jack’s clothes. She adopted her
mother’s unsentimental mien as she stuffed everything into garbage bags and
took it all to the Salvation Army. His
scent permeated the chore and she drank it in.
She had dumped all his toiletries a month earlier and scoured his
bathroom when she knew he would not be coming home. It was actually pleasant to have the ensuite
to herself and not have to use the guest bathroom. Early in their marriage, she had vowed never
to share a bathroom and she had kept to it.
Now her home was her own. She
could use any bathroom she wished.
Still, she missed his mess. Jack
had always been an impeccable dresser, but his personal space was constant
clutter. Gwen used to refer to his
favourite chair and ottoman as “the hamster cage”, filled and surrounded as it
always was with cups, mugs, coasters, pens, papers, letters, letter-openers, newspapers,
magazines, books, paperclips, shoes and other intimate objects. She even kept the space covered in an old
sheet so he wouldn’t literally transfer himself onto the upholstery.
"Just when her new life was settling down
it suddenly took off in a bizarre direction.
The phone rang about two months after Jack’s death. His son was on the line. Not one of their sons, his son. Slowly things he had said over the years
crept back into her consciousness. Now
and then he let slip a casual remark about a girl he might have made pregnant
when he was at graduate school in London.
That was the London of the swinging sixties – Carnaby street and the
like. The pill had just been invented
and free sex was everywhere – especially in London. So it was entirely possible that this man was
Jack’s son. She would know when she saw
him. There would have to be some
resemblance. "They met in a coffee shop a few days after the phone call. As she sat waiting for him to arrive, she realized she was more nervous than she had been in years. When she had told him on the phone that Jack had died, she could hear his voice break. Two months was all he had missed his father by and the regret he felt for not trying earlier got the better of him. Of course she would be a disappointment to him because she was not his father. But she had determined that she would share Jack with his eldest son as fully as she could. The minute he walked in, she knew who it was. He was more like Jack than either of her own sons. It was like seeing Jack. She was overcome with joy, but immediately felt selfish for her good fortune and his defeat. As she stood up to greet him, she blushed hard. His name was Nigel Cameron. He was 45 years old and very handsome. She didn’t know whether to embrace him or shake his hand. Was this stranger a relative? She decided he was and gave him a tentative hug. He returned it and they sat down.
"She immediately noticed his hands –
delicate and graceful like Jack’s. And
he had a cowlick right where Jack’s had been.
He ordered tea – another thing Jack always did. Tea, never coffee. She had come prepared with photos from their
life together. She had even thrown in
baby and childhood photos of Jack so he could try and relate. Where to start? She let him begin and out tumbled his life story
– his mother, her family, his school years, his love of sports. Everything was followed with a question about
whether Jack had done such and so, or whether he had liked this or that. It was like re-discovering her husband all
over again through the eyes of this man who was so strange, yet so
familiar. His English accent threw her
and was the only thing glaringly out of place.
"Suddenly her life popped into
perspective. While she had been living
with Jack and raising his only three children, this child was growing up in a
parallel universe on the other side of the world. But he was as much Jack’s as their own. The fact that she wasn’t his mother didn’t
make him any less Jack’s son. Suddenly,
she began to feel as if she were part of a harem, or part of a polygamous
marriage. Nigel’s mother loomed large at
the table in the coffee shop and she wanted to know more about her. But that would come later. This was his moment to meet his father
through her and Gwen was determined to live up to the expectation. Next it was time for Nigel to meet his
brothers and sister.
"Gwen hadn’t told her other children
about Nigel; she wanted to meet him first and she didn’t really have a valid
reason for allowing herself this somewhat impudent privilege. Afterall, she wasn’t his mother, but they
were his siblings regardless of what he turned out to be like. But Gwen often took advantage of her priority
in the family. She liked to assert her
matriarchic position. That was one of
her faults and she was pulling rank again.
But he was charming and now she could tell the rest of her family. She was planning a party in his honour. He couldn’t wait to meet his kin. Having been raised an only child, the thought
of meeting two brothers and a sister – plus two nieces and a nephew –
overwhelmed him and Gwen was proud she could at least present him with these
genetic realities. When she had phoned
all her children and told them, only Barbara had been disturbed. Her sons were thrilled about the prospect of
meeting another brother, but for Barbara this intruder skewed her sense of
order and perfection. How could her
father have been so wild in England!? To
think he had fathered a child! The prig
in her took over. Gwen didn’t care and
as the morning of the party dawned she was as excited as a little girl planning
her birthday. Everything had to be
perfect and it was.
"As Nigel’s taxi drove up, everyone
hurried to the window to get a glimpse of this brother. Only Barbara stayed in the kitchen, putting
the last-minute touches to the food Gwen had prepared so she could take credit
for the entire dinner. When he rang the
bell, the boys rushed to meet him. Gwen
was proud of how they handled the whole thing.
They shook hands warmly and immediately fell into an easy rapport. Nigel was visibly excited, but at the same
time quite shaken to be meeting his brothers in the house his father
inhabited. Seeing where Jack had
actually lived and breathed seemed to move him with a sense of longing for the
father he never knew. Later he told Gwen
it was all he could do not to burst into tears – especially when he went out to
the back garden and saw Jack’s roses. She
had not yet disposed of Jack’s gardening paraphernalia and his gloves and hat
were hanging on a hook in the shed when they went it. The way he handled them was eerie – almost
reverential and when he asked if he could have them she was glad she hadn’t yet
thrown them out.
"As the party went on, everyone relaxed
and by the time it was over it seemed to Gwen that Nigel had always been a part
of the family. Jack had somehow crept
back into everyone’s life through this long-lost son. The miracle of it all was that he had a wife
and three children back in England and so Jack lived on through them in an
ever-more expanding universe. So that's my story.
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