Joining The Chorus-Susan B. Townsend
Joining the Chorus
By Susan B. Townsend
I wake up crying again, my cheeks damp, one last low sob slipping out before I realize I’m awake. I gulp a deep breath as if I’ve just broken the surface of the lake after being underwater for a long time. No reason to check the clock–I know it’s a bit after two–and no need to look at what I’m wearing. I remember crawling into bed about nine last night, tired beyond caring that I was still wearing my clothes, a dress that, when I first put it on, fooled me into thinking the air was cool and I was pretty. A dress like the woman wearing it, faded and long past its best. Clinging to my body like a second skin after minutes in the summer heat.
When I was little and woke up crying and scared from a nightmare, Mama would be right there. As if she could feel the pounding of my heart and my body damp with sweat from clear across the hall in her own bed. As if we were connected somehow. She’d gather me up in her arms, stroke my forehead, and say, "Hush, Charlotte, it’s all right. It was just a dream." Magic words that soothed me to sleep.
Back then, bad dreams burned off like a morning fog, forgotten in the bright sun. Now they rest and wait–creatures born to hunt when darkness falls. One terrible night, my mind crazy with lack of sleep, I wondered if the dreams knew that when Mama died, the connection we had died, too, and her magic was laid to rest in that same cheap coffin under the sycamore tree up on the hill.
I hear the rumble of a familiar car engine in the distance and, for a second, I forget that my sleep is crowded with bad dreams, and my waking hours play out like some kind of nightmare, too. It’s Frank Henderson’s car. He comes by almost every night about this time. Maybe that’s what wakes me up–the thought of him passing by the house. A few times he’s brought my daddy home, limp with liquor, Frank shouldering him up the steps to our door like a soldier with his fallen friend making his way across a battlefield.
Frank never stumbles or brings the smell of the bar into the house like Daddy does, and I can’t help but wonder about the longing or need that drives him to the bar. We hardly speak the nights he comes to the door. But after he’s finished putting Daddy to bed and I offer my thanks, he smiles and stares me straight in the eye–a look that makes me think that Frank might possess his own sort of magic.
Frank and I finished high school together, ten years ago last June. The day after graduation, he went to work driving a truck for one of the big hog farms, while I got up the next morning and fixed breakfast for Daddy and tried to forget how much Mama wanted me to go on to university over in Petersburg. She saved every dime she could, even sold her mother’s pearl brooch meant for me to wear on my wedding dress someday. "Getting an education is a whole lot more important than getting married," she said and showed me the small brown book they gave her at the bank.
Of course, Daddy found a way to get the money and then to drink it away so fast you’d have thought cash could spoil. Grief became his excuse for everything–soaking up my money like a sponge with spilled whiskey, losing his job and spending his days getting over his nights. I grew to hate him for it until the day I realized that I was no better. I made him my excuse for enduring the mind numbing monotony on the line at the packing plant, for staying at home and alone so long that the thought of leaving here paralyzes me with panic. I was grateful when people stopped asking me when I was going to Petersburg or settling down and getting married. Every time I said, "Someone has to look after Daddy," I saw Mama with that brown book wearing her Christmas came early smile.
I hurry out onto the porch, the screen door closing with a slap that silences the peepers and crickets. Frank won’t stop tonight. I heard Daddy’s snores as I passed his room. The music from the radio he left on drifts out to me like the cool breeze I crave. An old song that sends me
back to a moment when Mama was still alive and wearing this same dress.
Frank’s car slows in front of the house, and when he stops and rolls down his window, I stand up on my bare toes and twirl around once, just like I saw Mama do a long time ago.
The song ends and I stand there, hot-faced and ashamed. Frank must be having himself a good laugh, but when I turn to face him, he’s smiling. Not the kind of smile you give a fool, but the kind you wear when something catches your fancy and makes you feel all lit up inside.
"Too hot to sleep?" he says.
I begin to walk towards his car, my bare feet making tiny brown clouds in the dust with each step. I keep my head down, not wanting him to see my puffy, cried-out eyes and my face looking lined and tired. I answer with a shrug.
"Weatherman says it’s supposed to cool down some next week," he says and then there’s only silence between us. The crickets and frogs start up as if inviting us to add our own song, but I can’t think of one blessed thing to say.
He puts one hand at the top of the steering wheel and turns it back and forth a few times. "Well," he says, "I just came by to tell you that I won’t be around much in the weeks coming up. You know, to check on your daddy and all. I don’t spend much time at the bar anymore, but I still stop in when I can around closing time to see if he’s okay. Thing is, though, I’m starting a new job this Monday."
It’s then I see the nervous excitement in those blue eyes of his, and I understand why he stopped tonight. He needs someone to tell. Someone besides the guys at the hog farm or the bar. I could be wrong, but I don’t think Frank has anyone. His parents are dead, and I know he lives alone. I heard a while back that he was seeing Sue Lawson, but never found out what came of it. With an unexpected flash of pleasure, I realize he’d be over at her place telling her if they had something going on.
"That’s good," I say. "I’m happy for you."
"You bet. Thanks," he says and slaps the steering wheel twice with the palm of his hand. "It’s a good job, but I’ll be putting in long hours. Be gone overnight twice a week, too."
"What’ll you be doing?"
"Driving a rig, just like I’ve always done, but I finally got on at
Dominion. I’ll be hauling concrete to D.C. for some bridge they’re building up there. 64, 000 pound loads."
I nod, my brain once again emptied of anything worthwhile to say. I want to make him glad he chose to share his news with me, but heaven help me, I don’t know how. "Sounds dangerous," I say, hoping that might be something he wants to hear.
I’m rewarded when a frown of feigned concern settles on his face for a moment. I can tell my words pleased him. "Oh, it’s dangerous all right.
Three trailers, hauling a heavy load like that. I’ll be in a convoy, though." He stops abruptly and stares at me. "You looked real pretty up on the porch a few minutes ago."
I look away and fight the urge to run back inside. Why did he have to spoil everything with a lie?
"Hey," he says. "I mean it. I’m sorry if I upset you."
"It’s all right," I whisper, not knowing or caring if he hears me. I fold my arms across my chest and pinch myself so as not to cry.
"Guess I should go." He starts the car and puts it in gear.
I step back and turn to walk away.
"Wait," he says and I hear the engine go dead.
"I came to tell you about my new job, but that’s not all." He pauses, and I force myself to turn around. "I came to ask you something." His eyes have gone dull with disappointment. I nod, encouraging him to continue. "I was wondering if I could come by on one of my days off.
Maybe we could go for a drive. Go into town for dinner or a movie. I don’t know. Something."
Somehow I know he’s practiced these words a hundred times, and somehow I know they’re not coming out the way he wants them to. Suddenly, I see Mama standing in the kitchen waving her little brown book and giving me her talk about choices. "Life is all about choices," she used to say.
"Never forget that you’ve always got a choice."
Tonight I choose to step out of my life and take a chance. "Yes," I say and watch the light in his eyes return. "I’d like that. I’d like that a lot."
Copyright C. 2008 Susan B. Townsend
March 5th, 2008 at 3:14 pm
Beautiful story. In so few words, Charlotte comes alive. I see her and Frank clearly.
March 5th, 2008 at 4:20 pm
Susan, So nice to find you here - we’re both in this issue (I’m in poetry).
This is fine writing. Strong and true! And, some wonderful lines. Both characters live and breathe and I have hopes for them.
Congratulations on the good work.
Alice
April 2nd, 2008 at 7:04 pm
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