Muriel Gray - Furnace

‘For you. It’s dumb but it’s for luck.’

She looked up and met his eyes, a smile beginning to ghost in them again.

‘You been screwing someone?’

‘I wish.’

She opened the box, rustled the piece of tissue paper and revealed the dull metal brooch. Her name was etched clearly but unevenly on it, with the E too far from the L and the final T and H crammed so tightly together they were practically one letter, but Elizabeth took the cheap gift from the box as if it were a Fabergé egg.

‘This is beautiful.’

‘It’s just junk. I thought you’d like it.’

‘You thought I’d like junk? That’s what I call romantic.’

She was smiling full on again. For Josh, the brooch had already proved hundreds of times its worth.

‘You like it?’

‘I love it.’

‘Well wear it and things’ll look better tomorrow.’

Her face clouded again and she toyed with the brooch, making a scraping sound on the table as she shifted it around.

‘Maybe.’

Josh held the bridge of his nose between a finger and thumb.

‘What’s the deal here? I’ve been gone longer and you’ve said less.’

‘I had things to talk to you about, that’s all.’

‘Well talk to me now.’

‘It’s too late.’

Josh sighed and bent his head. ‘Shit, Elizabeth. You’re acting like a teenager whose prom date hasn’t shown. I’m kinda tired here.’

She looked at him coldly, stood up, still clutching the brooch in her hand, and walked to the sink to stare out the window.

Josh watched her face as she turned back to him, and saw some kind of battle being fought behind those brown eyes. One of the emotions eventually won and she spoke softly, as if ashamed of its victory.

‘I’m pregnant.’

Josh blinked. He was aware that his heart had picked up its pace, but if that meant more blood was suddenly required and being provided, its rapid distribution seemed to be having little effect on him. It was as though his system had stalled like a smoky engine, leaving him temporarily unable to speak or move. He searched for the kick-start, and when he found it and spoke merely for the sake of speaking, realized that he should have waited.

‘Is it mine?’

Elizabeth’s face, already harder than he had ever seen it, darkened into the suburbs of fury.

‘I’ll give you one chance to take that back.’

He swallowed. ‘Shit, I’m sorry … I mean … Fuck.’

She regarded him with a mixture of contempt and grief. The same eyes that only minutes ago had looked up at him like a lover were now scouring him with acid accusation.

Josh tried again. As he got up to move towards her she made him jump with a sudden violent movement, lifting her arms and waving them in front of her as if to protect herself. He backed off, hands held out in an imploring gesture, and his voice, when it came, was higher than he would have liked.

‘I didn’t mean that. I don’t know why I said it. I’m glad. God, Elizabeth, I’m so glad.’

With those words something happened to Josh Spiller. A happiness that was beyond any he had ever experienced flooded into him and he realized that ‘glad’ was a weak and sickly word to describe the power of his sudden ecstasy.

Elizabeth watched the face of the father of her child as it exploded into rapture, watched his tense muscles melt into a slack, serpentine tangle of joy. Her lip trembled like a child’s as she braced herself. Then she spoke quickly to interrupt the acceleration of his emotion: ‘I’m not keeping it, Josh.’

His imploring arms fell.

‘What?’

‘I don’t have a choice.’

Josh looked at her for a very long time, then turned back to the table and sat down heavily on his chair. He leaned forward and cradled his head in his hands, his hot forehead pointing straight down to the table top.

‘Now hold up. This is going too fast. Talk to me.’

Elizabeth looked down at a hand which had become a fist, and when she opened it to reveal the brooch she had been clutching she could see two clear indentations that the scissors had made in her flesh. She closed her hand.

‘You weren’t here to talk to. I decided on my own. It’s impossible, Josh.’

He looked up from the cradle of his hands.

‘Why? For Christ’s sake we’re doing okay. Aren’t we?’

She swallowed back a sob, barely able to speak.

‘Nope.’

‘What do you mean?’

Elizabeth moved stiffly and rejoined him at the table. She stared into the yellow pine as though the words she was speaking were printed on it.

‘Commitment, Josh. That’s what a baby needs. It’s what I need too and I’ve never had it from you in any shape.’

He opened his mouth to protest but she silenced him with a sorrowful look.

‘I’m not complaining. This is an accident in a relationship that’s doing just fine. But it’s a relationship that can’t handle children.’

She was sounding rehearsed, but seven days to perfect a speech hadn’t been enough to stop it sounding phoney.

‘Welcome to daytime TV, folks.’

The bitterness in Josh’s voice was as alien to him as it sounded to Elizabeth. Any plan she might have had evaporated, and she looked at him like a frightened child.

‘Look at us, Josh. We live together but we’re not married. I see you for two, maybe three days out of every ten. I’ve just started a new business that needs all my time and energy. There’s nothing in this dumb life of ours that’s stable enough to make a good job of growing another human being.’

‘We love each other.’

‘Then why aren’t we married? Why aren’t you at home?’

‘Why aren’t you? Is sewing fucking Batman suits better than staying home and looking after our baby?’

She looked at him coldly. ‘Jesus Christ. You can take the man out of the truck but you can’t take the trucker out of the man. What next, Josh? The chorus of a Red Sovine song?’

He lowered his eyes.

‘I didn’t know you wanted to get married.’

‘You never asked.’

‘What if I asked now?’ His voice had an edge of desperation.

‘It would mean nothing. You wouldn’t be asking for the right reasons.’

There was a pause. A heavy silence that made Josh’s response startling.

‘FUCK!’

He slammed his fist down on the table so hard that Elizabeth leapt in her chair and caught her breath with the fright. Josh was breathing heavily, staring down at his hands, and she spoke softly when her heart had stopped pounding.

‘Next week. Wednesday at three o’clock. It’ll be over.’

He looked up slowly and her grief was almost uncontainable when she saw the film of tears that coated his eyes.

‘Then why even tell me? Does it feel good to give me a few moments of joy and then steal them back again? Huh? Make you feel big? Feel in charge? That what you call love?’

Elizabeth started to cry. Her chest heaved and she bent her head to her chest. Josh watched, wanting instinctively to comfort her but cancelling the order from his brain before it reached his arms.

She sobbed for a few minutes in silence, wiped her arm across her eyes and nose and then faced him again.

‘I told you because I was scared and lost. I always tell you everything.’

He looked at her tragic, puffy face and tried to feel the love for her he knew was there. But the imminent death of his baby, that terrifying appointment, the time already ticking away towards its execution as the baby’s cells split and multiplied inside her, was blocking it like a wall. He spoke quietly and with a malice he never knew he possessed.

‘You didn’t tell me you were a selfish bitch.’

Elizabeth stared at him for a moment, stunned.

‘Damn you to hell.’ She opened her hand and with all the force a close sitting position could afford, threw the brooch at Josh’s face and ran from the house.