A Day In the Death of Walter Zawislak Page 16

  22

  June 16 1991

  Walter drifted toward wakefulness, growing aware that his wife’s cold hands had eased into his boxer shorts. He sighed, enjoying Rosie’s amorous intentions.

  “You awake?” she whispered in his ear, her body pressed up close to his back.

  “I am now.” He breathed deep of the lilac breeze that floated in through the screen. Rosie had insisted on planting that damn bush by their bedroom window. It was nice at times like this, but it attracted every insect known to man at the end of May and beginning of June.

  He rolled over to face her, keeping his eyes shut so that the first thing he saw would be her. It was ridiculous; he knew it, was nearly embarrassed by it as if someone might know he was behaving like some teenager.

  But that was what love did to Walter.

  He had been gone for a week on business, and missing his wife was like having a rock in his shoe. He couldn’t do anything without thinking about her.

  And being back home over the weekends, these days made him feel almost tipsy. Mellow and convivial.

  He opened his eyes and there she was. A red crease across her forehead from the pillowcase and that warm, warm look on her face that always went straight to his groin.

  The morning light came in through the window and hit her brown eyes in such a way that they looked like fine brandy.

  They were as potent as all the cheap brandy he had guzzled over the years.

  She smiled and leaned in close. “Good morning,” she whispered deliberately blowing her foul morning breath over his face.

  He did not understand this little joke. This little routine of theirs that for whatever reason she found so funny, but he played along because her hand was doing fantastic things in his shorts.

  “You been eating shit in your sleep again?” He said his line and she laughed.

  “You’re hilarious,” she said and began pressing kisses to his neck, across his scar that he knew long ago she stopped seeing. His scar, she had told him once, was like his eyes or his broken nose, it was just part of what made up the looks of the man she loved.

  He touched her back through the blue silk of her slip and kissed her shoulder where the blond lace had slid down her arm.

  “I’m the luckiest man alive,” he told his wife.

  “No foolin’,” she told him.

  * * *

  Rosie glared at him in the mirror as she clipped on her right earring.

  “You promised,” she said and started to button her bright blue shirt and tuck it into her matching skirt. “Last week, you promised. And so did Jennifer.”

  Walter stretched and kicked at the sheet that covered his legs. They were nice sheets, like the ones in the fancier hotels he stayed in on business trips. He had asked Rosie to buy the expensive sheets and she’d complained at first about the money, but now they couldn’t sleep on anything else. Their bed was a Taj Mahal for a good night’s rest. And frankly, right now, he wouldn’t mind a little more time in bed. An extra hour of sleep.

  “But Rosie, the lawn, and the car needs an oil change and—”

  “I don’t care.” She turned, her hands on her hips. “You promised you would go to church this week. Seriously Walter, I am not asking you to join the priesthood. I ask for one Sunday a month.”

  “I know, but the—”

  “If you say the lawn I swear to god I will go out there and pull the whole thing up.”

  He smiled, but when the heat ratcheted up in her eyes he quickly squelched it. Apparently Rosie was serious about this. “Okay. We will go to church.”

  “Good.” Rosie leaned over him and pecked his lips. “I knew you would see it my way.”

  That was the magic of their relationship—she could always get him to see things her way.

  She swiveled back to the mirror and gave herself one last look. And apparently wasn’t happy. “What do you think?” she asked, smoothing her hands down her hips. “I look pretty wide, don’t I?”

  He didn’t know how to answer these questions. He always told her the truth, that she was perfect, gorgeous, but it never seemed to do much for the way she saw herself. He didn’t understand it.

  “Baby.” He threw the sheets off his legs and stood. “I told you, you’re perfect.” He stroked her long brown hair and kissed her forehead. “Beautiful.”

  He walked past her to the bathroom, wishing he could just put on his shorts and go mow his lawn rather than fight with their daughter, watch his wife fight with their daughter, and sit through one of Father Kennedy’s sermons.

  There were a million things he’d rather do.

  * * *

  Walter locked the door behind him and followed Rosie and Jennifer toward the garage. His daughter was all in black and he had wanted to tell her to change, that she looked like she was going to a funeral rather than to church, but Rosie stopped him.

  She gave him her old pick-your-battles argument and Walter listened, but the whole time he was thinking what Jennifer really needed was a good swat across the butt. If she was going to behave like a two-year-old then she should be...

  He cut off his thoughts, feeling the hard beat of blood in his neck that signified an increase in blood pressure.

  Doctor said he needed to relax more.

  “You coming?” Rosie asked over her shoulder and Walter nodded.

  The sun was shining, the hum of a lawnmower and the smell of fresh-cut grass wafted over the fence from the Pillens’ house next door.

  He bounced his keys in his hand, enjoying the sun on his head and the lax bonelessness from having made love.

  Maybe he could convince them both to go get root beer floats after church. It seemed like that kind of day.

  “When are we going to get an automatic garage door?” Jennifer asked. She and Rosie stepped out of the way as he heaved the old door up.

  “When you win the lottery.”

  Jennifer rolled her eyes.

  In the cluttered gloomy darkness of the garage sat the old beige Parisienne.

  “When are we going to sell this old car?” Rosie asked. He stroked his wife’s hair, which she had left loose after he asked her to, and languished in the soft vanilla scent of her lotion.

  “Never,” he answered, kissing her ear. “I want to be buried in this car.”

  He loved this car, this terrible relic from the gas guzzling seventies. The Millennium Couch as Jennifer called it, and it was like driving a recliner down the road.

  “Can we put a limit on the PDA? We’re going to church.” Jennifer scowled like she was the authority on appropriate church-going behavior. She slammed the door shut behind her before lying down flat in the back seat.

  “Yeah,” he said to his wife before squeezing her hips. “Enough with the PDA.”

  She swatted his hands away and they both wedged their way past the junk and clutter he never seemed to find time to throw away.

  “You have got to do something with all this crap.” Rosie ducked past the wood from the oak he had pulled down last year. He was going to build a chest for her as soon as he found the time.

  “After church, I promise.”

  “Walter?” He looked up to meet his wife’s eyes across the top of the car. “I really appreciate this. Church and everything.”

  He smiled and slid into the plush seat of his car.

  The engine started with a jump and roar, and he hit all four of the automatic window switches making the glass descend halfway into the door with a hum and whir.

  Rosie, seeming to understand his mood, turned on the radio and switched it from AM to FM and found their favorite oldies station.

  She tapped her fingers along to the Supremes and he put the car into Reverse.

  “Let’s take the long way,” Rosie suggested.

  “Come on...” Jennifer whined.

  “Sounds good,” Walter agreed and backed up out of the dark garage into the bright morning.

  * * *

  Church was church. He wouldn’t have mi
nded going if it weren’t for all the religion. He nodded at friends. Shared a few jokes with some of the guys from the VFW who got dragged here with their wives. He liked this part, the chitchat and sitting in a room full of people he knew. Didn’t care much for the singing.

  Jennifer fell asleep and he had to jostle her with his elbow. He stood. He held his half of the hymnal. He tried very hard to focus on what Father Kennedy was saying, tried to repent for the years of neglect toward his soul. But he couldn’t concentrate on any of it.

  The light was shining through the stained glass windows behind the altar. He had no clue what was being depicted in those windows, but it was blood and gore from the looks of things, and he was not inclined think about anything unpleasant, anything war-ish.

  It was beautiful, this sunshine. As beautiful as the goodness of people in his community. He didn’t understand why they needed to come here to know that. Why did everyone need to believe in something other than themselves and their families? Rosie always said that church made her feel less alone, that she was loved despite all her earthly flaws, and he always said that she made him feel less alone and more worthy of love.

  Some cloud outside must have shifted away from the sun because the light turned up a notch and in the windows the ruby red of the blood, the blue of cloaks, the emerald of trees, and the bright white of beards were illuminated and the colors fell in blocks across the carpet and onto the uplifted faces of the folks in the pews. There were red spots in the white hair of the Maries in front of him, green splashes across Mike Rogers’ face, and Sarah Pillen’s mouth and neck were checkered blue and yellow.

  Walter was suddenly taken with the notion that those people were being anointed. Marked for a later higher purpose, their goodness noted and sanctified. He turned and looked at Rosie, her brown hair lit with red and his daughter blinking and trying to dodge the yellow beam that was falling across her eyes.

  He looked down at his lap, expecting nothing. His hands, resting on his knees, were bathed in bright purple light.

  Walter turned his hands over and cupped the light in his palms.

  * * *

  “I’m gonna practice.” Jennifer shrugged off her jacket and threw it at the coat rack by the door. It landed in a lump on the floor, but his daughter was already on her way to her room. They got her a piano a few years ago. A cheap used thing she made sound like it cost a million bucks.

  Walter tossed the keys onto the little telephone table Rosie bought a few weeks ago, and Rosie picked up Jennifer’s jacket and hung it up properly.

  “I am going to mow my lawn.”

  Rosie smiled and patted his shoulder. “Of course, it’s been neglected for a week, you better make sure it’s all right. You know the Meyers hired a service. We could—”

  “No way.”

  “I’m just saying.”

  He shot her a look, and she shrugged and let it drop. Walter could hardly believe she’d bring it up. Theirs was the nicest lawn on the block, maybe in all of Beaverton. He mulched and seeded and fertilized it all himself. His neighbors had those services come in with their chemicals, and his yard still looked nicer.

  “Gonna change.” He was turning to walk through the kitchen to the stairway that led up to their bedroom when it struck him that perhaps he could convince his wife to forget his high cholesterol and make her famous egg salad sandwiches for lunch.

  He turned and saw Rosie weave a little where she stood and clutch at the coat tree.

  “Rose...?” He took a quick step back to her, to catch her, but she waved him off.

  “Just got dizzy for a minute.” She laughed. “I need some lunch. How about egg salad after you are done with the lawn?”

  “You read my mind.”

  “Coming up.” She smiled and Walter turned away, his mind on fertilizer.

  * * *

  Walter stood in the gloom of the garage and considered his years of junk. The stacks of Consumer Reports moldering in the corner, those could go. He’d keep the oak. He was going to make that chest. The old lawn mower, which he liked a lot better than his new one, needed some engine repairs but it was time for him to stop kidding himself. He was never going to get to it.

  He wheeled it out to the curb for the garbage guys to take along with the magazines, Jennifer’s first bike, and the canoe with the hole. They weren’t, as Rosie put it, the camping kind of people, no matter how much he wanted to be.

  His father’s old fedora sat on the corner of his workbench. He blew off the thick layer of dust and again, for the millionth time, decided, against his better sense, to keep it.

  He wheeled out the new mower that Jennifer and Rosie got him for Christmas, checked the gas and the blades. He pushed it over to the corner of the lawn, pulled the cord, and the hum of the motor blocked out the world. Walter swatted at fly from the lilac bush and decided he’d shake things up a little today.

  Today he would mow diagonally.

  * * *

  Jennifer ate her sandwich in a hurry and then excused herself to go back to practicing. But he and Rosie lingered, picking at chopped egg yolk and listening to their daughter who, despite her sullen attitude, was growing into a virtuoso. The only thing she seemed to love was that piano.

  “At least she loves something,” Rosie said. “I’m so glad something makes her happy.”

  “She’s been pretty good today.”

  Rosie covered his hand with hers and they listened to Jennifer play warm-up scales that were more complicated and more lovely than anything Walter had ever produced in his life.

  “The auditions for the summer program at Columbia are next weekend.”

  “Chicago? Again? Rosie, we’ve been over this. I thought we decided no.”

  “You decided no—stupidly, I might add. This is a huge chance for Jennifer...”

  “And a huge expense for us.”

  “Maybe she’ll qualify for a scholarship. We won’t know until she tries.”

  “She’ll just get her hopes up, Rosie. What if she doesn’t get in? What if she doesn’t get a scholarship and we have to tell her no?”

  Rosie’s breathing was coming fast as she leaned in toward him, and he could not understand why she wanted this so much. Didn’t she understand what this could mean for the family? It meant Jennifer might leave and he could not understand how Rosie could be for that.

  “You are so scared. Really, Walter. You are the most scared person I know, but I won’t let you put your crap on our daughter...”

  “I’m not putting my crap on—”

  “Yes, you are. You are scared she’s going to leave us...”

  Sometimes when Rosie nailed him like that, when she proved once again how he had no secrets from her, how she knew him down to his very last thought, he got dizzy from his awe. Dizzy from all that love.

  “She’s our daughter, Walter. She’s not going to leave us.”

  “Okay, okay, you win. She can audition.”

  Rosie stood and clapped. “Oh she’s going to love this.” She ran into the other room and Jennifer’s scales stopped, and there was a squeal and some clapping and Walter smiled, hoping that it was the right thing to do, that he hadn’t made the biggest mistake of their lives.

  The last egg salad sandwich whispered his name.

  Rosie came back into the kitchen and stood by his chair to kiss the top of his head. “You made her day.”

  He nodded and tried to hide the sandwich he shouldn’t be eating.

  “I’m going to go change,” Rosie said. “Maybe take a nap.” She walked past him toward the stairs and shot one of those warm looks over her shoulder.

  Walter put down the sandwich, wiped his mouth, and followed.

  * * *

  Walter knocked on his daughter’s door and hoped for the best.

  “What?” she said through the door.

  “Open up, Jen.”

  He heard the complaining squeak of her mattress and reminded himself that she needed a new one. The door was flung open and his
daughter, in all her awkward maturity, glared at him. “What, Dad?”

  “You want to go with me to get a video? For after dinner?”

  “Right now?”

  “Sure.”

  “I’m busy.”

  Walter looked behind her and saw nothing but the mess of clothes and music books. “Doing what? Cleaning your room?”

  “No.”

  “So let’s go get a video.” He tried to keep a smile. He tried to not demand that she go with him, that she change her crappy attitude, that she act happy.

  “Dad, I am studying for my auditions next week.”

  Walter waited for the thank-you. He waited for the acknowledgment that he’d had some sort of effect on her life. But the silence spun out and he, like he always did, got impatient and pissed off with his daughter.

  “Fine.” He shrugged, feeling like a fool for even trying. He turned and headed back to the kitchen.

  “Dad?” Jennifer called out.

  “What?”

  “If you get Ghostbusters,” she said. “I’ll ask Mom to make some popcorn.”

  “Carmel corn?”

  “Sure.”

  He nodded, smiling though she couldn’t see it. She spoke a totally foreign language, but he knew a thanks when he heard one.

  The sun set and Rosie sent him outside with a plate of chicken to grill for dinner. He stood out on the small back patio with a can of Coke and watched the world darken. Dogs barked and the smells of the earth changed and he could see fireflies in the purple shadows, blinking and hovering near his freshly cut grass.

  The streetlights came on and Jennifer began playing “Yesterday,” her newest obsession. It was the twelfth time she’d played it that day, and considering that the eleventh time he’d heard it he wanted to smash the piano, he was surprised that the song seemed right for the moment.

  This magic moment of twilight.

  “Hey, look.” Rosie came out onto the patio and pointed up to the sky.