four MARGARET part 2
I stripped the bed and stuffed the sheets in the wash with my laundry. I was totally fanclub for Melanie but this appliance was the place where my appreciation for her cosmic good works turned hard and sharp, pierced the limit of healthy envy and let rancid jealousy leak in. There’s a certain deficit of dignity that results from not having your own washing machine and I get extremely defensive about it. I won’t lie, it really fucking stings and it’s one of the first civil seams to split when I find myself coming undone due to a lack of modern amenities.
I took clean sheets from the hall closet. Shooed Bagheera from the mattress and made the bed, stowed it away for the final time.
Melanie left a spare set of Cheeto’s keys on the kitchen counter beside a plate of cookies and a Post-it note:
breathe
set yourself free
and a smiley face.
She’d gotten up ugly-early and gone to class. Melanie was wrapping up her master’s in accounting. Had trained in Krav Maga, served in the Peace Corps. This was a woman living life with her head up and her arms wide open. Reaching with both hands to grab anything she wanted. Tending to herself through wisely crafted connections and shrewd investments of time that made the rhythms of her days rich and full.
One week ago Melanie was hardly on my radar, barely a familiar face at work. Now I was living under her roof and using her only vehicle to manage the logistical fallout of my failed relationship while she rode the bus to school, and to top it all off the bitch was leaving motivational notes for me and baking ketogenic n’oatmeal cookies.
I popped my suitcase open. Folded my clothing into sloppy squares and wondered out loud:
Who the fuck goes around with a heart like this anymore?
Melanie and I worked nights together for almost a year, proofing bank transactions in the same pool without saying much more to each other than Cute shoes, Have a good weekend, that kind of thing.
The night I left Vincent was also Claire’s last shift before retirement. Someone sent a card with a collection envelope around the office and Melanie brought it across the aisle to my cubicle.
I found room to write We’ll miss you! in one corner. Dug my bike-riding sneakers out of my bag to get at my pocketbook and chipped in $3.50 for Claire’s card, cake and flowers.
Melanie opened a book of receipts, tucked a carbon behind a fresh form and noted my contribution. The job wasn’t Bletchley Park but we were paid to track debits and credits down to the penny and that doesn’t happen without a paper trail.
So we’re hauling Claire out for karaoke and shots?
I meant this as a joke. Claire was so fucking old she probably bought beer for Jesus.
Melanie patted her pigtail braids, ducked her head near my ear and whispered:
The managers and suckups and most of the observant Somali girls are taking Claire to Lyons for pie and coffee. The rest of us are going for drinks at Darrell’s to celebrate.
She rapped her knuckles over my bicycle helmet.
If you need a ride I’m driving.
Melanie stood up straight, tore away my copy of the receipt and click-clacked back to her cubicle. We were the only women in the proof pool who worked nights in heels.
I adored her low-key vintage style, admired the way she moved through the office like a polar icebreaker, completely unafraid to own space while getting where she was going. The girl didn’t hug the wall or chant sorry over and over when passing someone in the narrow hallway to the restroom. She just smiled and kept on stepping.
Melanie’s lean but powerful body described the shape of a capable creature. A woman I could picture punching rivets and building a World War Two bomber or looking over a bare shoulder, posing to be painted on the nose of one.
I returned to my endless batch work with zero effective focus. Made an error and repeated it. Repeated it again and realized I was holding my breath. Exhaled and acknowledged a prickly feeling of real delight at being categorized as a subversive insider, invited to convene in secret at The Amber Room at Darrell’s Restaurant.
Melanie and I played eight-ball and came out of the closet to each other about our OCD while racking. Spent more money on the jukebox than on drinks. Sang along loudly with every track and split two baskets of crinkle-cut fries. Teamed up against Maryam and Sandra, talked trash when they ran the table and squealed in triumph when they scratched on the eight. Yeah, I squealed. So what?
Sometimes all you need is one good friend.
I’d left my Cinderella sneakers behind at work. Melanie waited on the curb outside my building while I dashed upstairs to change into suitable bicycle-carrying shoes and fetch a book of keto recipes for her to borrow.
I returned with the cookbook and a backpack, stooped under a sagging duffel full of clothes. I wanted to explain what had happened in the casual tone of someone who’s only missed a bus. Did my best to sound like anyone but a woman who just ended a fifteen-year relationship without leaving a note, without saying goodbye.
I was shaking, certainly in shock. Still standing in my heels.
My voice sounded like a recording from a tin box stitched deep inside a doll when I asked Melanie to drop me off at the Holiday Lodge.
Yeah, you’re not staying there, she said. Yelp that shit, I did the research when my family came to town for the eclipse.
Melanie, I can’t-
No. No way, not some grody motel. You’re coming with me.
Her elbows rose defensively, hands gripping the wheel between tight fists as if we were about to wrestle for control of Cheeto.
I held the cookbook on my lap and looked out the window. Carole King’s “It’s Too Late” came on the radio but we didn’t sing along with that one.
My mind hummed and ticked, unable to index any instinct or experience that could serve as a reference to explain where I had landed, guide the way I should behave. The way I ought to feel now and next.
I was angered by the good fortune of every mundane element around me. Each normally invisible detail now seemed somehow significant, even perfect and I hated those things for being uncomplicated yet wholly successful in their place and purpose. For belonging without trying. The streetlights, the traffic signs, the stripes on the pavement were born into natural states of order and utility.
I heard a voice inside me tell Melanie how I was twelve, thirteen and all I wanted was to be Carole King. Let my curly hair grow wild and live barefoot in a house with hardwood floors and a cozy spot by the window for me and my cat like the cover of “Tapestry”.
©2017 J.R. Schaefers — all rights reserved.