“I’ve just been thinking.”
“I’m sure you have.”
“Maybe we should take it slow,” he said.
She thought about that. In the old days she wouldn’t have dared say it, but now she told him: “You just want to fuck, in other words.”
“We don’t have to put it like that.”
“Except that’s how you’d put it to someone else, right? What you told Pete when you went fishing today.”
“Nothing’s changed with you, has it?”
She wiped between her legs with the sheet and pushed it away, her stomach got tight but then she didn’t feel anything, she was just looking out the window. The day was nearly over. She could have been lying next to anyone. There was still time to get the tomatoes in the ground. She felt herself choke up.
“You leaving?” she said.
“I wasn’t planning on it.”
“Maybe you better.”
“This is still my house.”
“I’ve made every payment on my own since you left, and a couple hundred dollars here and there doesn’t make a dent.”
“Come on.” He rolled toward her and she felt the frame give under his weight. They had never been able to afford a proper bed. Then there was the trailer with its fake wood paneling. She had never wanted to live here— she’d let herself be talked into it.
“I talked to a lawyer from the shelter.”
He looked at her, half- grinning.
“She said the house is legally mine until you pay your share.”
“That’s a bunch of bullshit,” he told her.
He was right—she hadn’t talked to any lawyer. But she was surprised how angry her own lie made her feel. She believed those words. They might not have been the truth but they should have been.
“Go talk to someone,” she said. “See for yourself.”
“You’re a fucking nightmare, Grace.”
“Get out. Bud Harris said it’s a felony, you still owing so much on child support.”
“Our kid isn’t a child anymore.”
“It doesn’t change what you owe. The court still ordered it.”
“You would bring a cop into it, wouldn’t you?”
“I would. I will.”
“Well, that figures.”
She was quiet.
“Petey’s wife said your cop boyfriend takes enough pills to kill a steer—Xanax, Zoloft, the whole routine. Biggest prescription in Fayette County.”
“Maybe CVS ought to know their employee is going around talking about people’s business.”
“Most people think that Barney Fife motherfucker is queer.”
She thought, he’s got a bigger pecker than you do, but she kept her mouth shut. She suppressed a giggle.
“What,” he said.
“Go on and take everything you brought last night.” She watched him dress and walk out, he was shaking his head the whole time. When his truck pulled out she thought she might cry but she didn’t. She forced herself to get out of bed, knowing that if she didn’t she might end up stuck there, wallowing. She wondered who she could call to find out for sure but it didn’t matter, she knew, knew he’d run out of money, maybe gotten dumped by one of his girlfriends so he’d looked her up. It was what the girls at work had told her was happening, they’d been watching it go on forever, but she hadn’t wanted to believe them. That was when she started crying. Not too much, though. She picked up the bottle of whiskey he’d left, undid the cap but it seemed distasteful that his mouth had touched it. Into the trashcan.
The sun was getting lower. She hoped Billy would come home soon but what if he didn’t? She should get a dog, maybe. It wasn’t too late to go to the shelter, they could always use extra help. She could call Harris.
It hit her suddenly how cruel Virgil was, he was an empty shell, he’d gotten by his whole life on his looks, but that would change for him as it was changing for her, and what would be left—-just the mean streak. The parts of Billy she worried about, the quick temper, it all came right from Virgil. She wondered how she’d never seen it before, but then she knew she’d always seen it, she’d chosen to ignore it. She was making another decision now, or it felt like it had been made for her, it felt impossible at that moment that she’d ever loved him. You’re probably just in shock, she thought, but then no, it was like a switch had been turned off.
The tomatoes were there in the window, she carried them out and got a shovel from the shed, out behind Billy’s half- done projects, a parts car he’d bought to keep his other car running, riding lawn mowers, the four- wheeler. Worrying about him again, coming home last night with the cut on his neck. But things like that had happened many times before, never that bad but still, he was a magnet for trouble. She should have taken him out of this place a long time ago.
Kicking the shovel hard into the dirt, she planted all six tomatoes and the peppers as well, setting the trellises and stepping on them to set them firmly. It was nice standing in the breeze, her hands dirty, looking at the plants and the freshly turned soil, looking out over the rolling hills, it was a good view. Forty- one was not so old. It was almost too young to be president. She would call Harris. He was a good man, she’d always known that.
Of course she could just keep going like this, being alone, but there was no point to it. You felt strong for about a week and then you were just alone. And Bud Harris, he was a good man, uncomfortable but what did it matter, the ones that had the easiest time talking also had the easiest time screwing around behind your back. That was a lesson you didn’t learn until it was too late. But it was not too late. Harris, he was respected, there was a reason she’d nearly left Virgil for him, two different times she had thought seriously about it, and Virgil, Virgil was not respected by anyone and there was a reason for that as well. I will sleep with Buddy tonight, she thought, it will clean me out, it was a giddy notion. Virgil had done worse, he’d come to her smelling directly of other women. She wondered if he’d given her any diseases. She had been checked, though most of the time she’d made him use condoms, that was the one smart thing she’d done in her life.
She walked around the inside of the trailer. When they bought it Virgil swore it was temporary, that they would build a house soon enough. She wondered why she’d listened. It was an old trailer, at least it was a doublewide but it leaked air everywhere, fake paneling from the 1970s, she’d splurged to replace the carpets but with the boy in and out of the field so often they were quickly ruined again. Virgil had wanted to put plastic covers on the couch but she hadn’t permitted it. She sat on the couch and could feel herself drifting away, thinking about things, but there was no point in it, she needed to get a handle on life instead of spending her time daydreaming. At least the garden was done. That was an accomplishment, it would pay off the rest of the year.
She nearly called Harris’s cell phone but then she thought about how he would feel if he found out that Virgil had just been over. It wasn’t fair to him. Not to mention Harris probably had other girls himself. Not to mention she had burned him twice, now. She would have to ask him gently. She would have to allow him his dignity. He wouldn’t just come at her beck and call. She could wait, collect herself, have some dignity of her own. She went to the mirror, pulled her hair back in a tight ponytail. That was the way she should wear it, tight and away from her face. She would get a haircut, no one wore their hair long anymore, it was stringy. She still had her cheekbones, she’d always had good bone structure. Half of it was the way you carried yourself, she had been depressed, there wasn’t any question about that. She would take baby steps. With a little mascara things would be fine, she’d run out months ago, she would get more tomorrow. She fixed herself a small dinner and watched the sun go down from the porch, there was no moon and the stars came out very bright. She went back inside and watched an old scratchy yoga tape the director of the shelter had given her, she liked all the stretching, it felt as if the poisons were coming out. After that she fell easily into sleep.
