By Ellen Graham (1256 words)
Row row row your boat
Gently down the stream
Merrily merrily merrily merrily
Life is but a dream.
Margaux cannot believe that song is in her head. Her mother used to sing it just before she would black out. Only coming from her it sounded more like “lice is but a scream”.
She and Jasper would hide away and repeat lice is but a scream until they fell over laughing.
Jasper.
Margaux is trying to calm the anger she inherited from her mother. Breathe in for five, hold for five, release for five.
She has just come from Jasper’s room, wondering why he wasn’t making himself available to the workshop attendees. When she opened the door she found him in bed, dangling an empty bottle of Scotch. Two plastic glasses on the floor. Next to a partially clad Bunny. Partially clad Bunny. Try unseeing that.
Life is but a dream. And if caring for your drunken brother with a wannabe in his bed who won’t do the only job he is capable of isn’t living the dream then what is?
“Get up!” she had whisper-yelled. “People are paying for your presence!”
“Hey sis, oh well yeah. We took the last bottle of Scotch from the pantry. We need to replace it. And we need one for tonight. Please? Please? Pretty please?”
He held out his trembling hand. Bunny snoring in her stupor, her pink bra around her neck.
“If I’m supposed to lead a prompt—no, respond to the pig prompts—is that right? I have to have a drink.”
“Get in the shower! And get Bunny OUT of here.”
What grown person goes by the name of Bunny?
Margaux walked away to calm herself in her room. Jasper wasn’t wrong about the musty smell. It’s as if every person who ever stayed in this room is still in it.
You are not your mother’s anger. You are not your mother’s anger. You are not your mother.
She always thought of her mother as Volcanic Louise, spewing her anger like lava, telling her and Jasper they were no good, they would never amount to anything, why did she have kids?
Margaux twirls her hair. As a kid this would always get a hand slap from Louise, so as an adult she does it all the time. A way to self-soothe.
She and Jasper would invent ways for Louise to die. Silly kid ideas.
Step on a crack, break her back! Dress up like the ghost of Grandpa and scare her to death! Put green pepper in her food so she’ll die from allergies! Cut the brakes in her car! Electrocute her! Put poison in her booze! Push her in front of a train, splat!
They would laugh until they cried, holding each other as tightly as they could.
All of these made it into the Matricide Murder series, even the last two books which Margaux wrote for Jasper. She loved writing the details of a body getting hit by a train. The sounds. The sights. The satisfaction. That one she wrote in great detail, as if from memory. She can’t believe they are out of murder ideas. And she can’t tell anyone she wrote the last two. He is the face of the series. When did it get so bad with him?
She looks at all the bookmarks and business cards on her bed. Calling cards from attendees who don’t want to be forgotten. Who think the Jasper magic will rub off on them. People who seem confident and happy with their work. But after three drinks dissolve into bleary puddles putting their faces too close. Confiding that they always wanted to be somebody, but they never were. These poor writers. Thinking Jasper could help them.
Her phone buzzes. I Got You Babe. Jasper. She feels her anger returning.
Visualize a place you love. Breathe. Five in. Hold for five. Exhale for five.
She used to love I Got You Babe—oh that oboe! Now it reminds her of Groundhog Day and she wonders if she is trapped in the same horrible day over and over and over again.
Margaux thinks again of childhood and how she and Jasper waited for someone, anyone to rescue them. Not their father shut away in his study with his own Scotch. They were never on a military base long enough to get to know other families. And if other families did venture over they never came back. Louise saw to that.
“Buck up Buttercup” she would say to him. “Nobody is going to help us. So let’s do another plan to kill her.”
After that they started to imagine characters and plots. Usually ordinary people who a reader would never suspect. They had fun imagining what they wore and what they ate and who they loved and where they lived and what car they drove and what kind of house were they in and if they were rich or poor and who were their friends? Did they have dogs or cats or gerbils or goldfish? They spent hour after hour imagining. Margaux joked she always wanted to end one of the mysteries with a last page turn and, ta da! IT WAS ALL A DREAM! Like that stupid Bob Newhart show. Jasper wasn’t buying it. He would laugh and call her a loser. But every time she suggested it he came up with a better plan. And a better book idea.
The sun is out. Finally. She can hear a blue jay screaming and a crow answering back. It might be a decent day. Water diamonds the branches. She cracks the window, never getting tired of the smells after a rain. The freshness. The renewal. Thinking anything might be possible. After all this time in the Pacific Northwest it still thrills her. And nourishes her.
She studies the sky the way a pilot studies his instruments. What can it tell her? Even with a little sun it’s the color of slate. Are those? Yes, three turkey vultures are circling and catching the air drafts.
Margaux stands and looks at herself in the mirror. When did she get so round? My God, she thinks, I look like a German baker. And has she always had those dark circles? What on earth happened to her hair? Think. Think. Jasper is out of Scotch and you are out of patience. A mile walk to the liquor store down the road might help both situations.
Time to Buck up Buttercup. She runs a comb through her hair and changes her clothes. An ironed shirt, a green puffy vest, fleece lined pants, her Columbia rain jacket and, optimistically, her sunglasses. Making some room coffee she pours some into a thermos and packs a bag of peanuts. And puts on her Clinique power pop lipstick in mauve. Fake it till you make it.
She still feels a little fuzzy headed and confused. What the hell happened to the body? She knows she didn’t imagine that. And what DID that pig have in his mouth as he ran down the hall? A bone or an arm? And what was Mavis going on about Sicard Ficino not being Sicard Ficino? So many unanswered questions. She looks down and across the road. I need to get out she thinks. Why is that couple dancing? Who are they? And is that Lucy?
She’ll get her brother his Scotch and on the way get to the bottom of this. If it’s the last thing she does.
