Diane Cook: Man V. Nature: Stories

West tried pulling rank. “It’s movie night.”

The large man said, “It’s Ace the Wrecker marathon night.”

Others called out the news, trivia, or crime shows they wanted to watch.

West contested. “But I signed up for this time. It’s movie night.”

Everyone turned to Jane for a final verdict. “Leave me out of this,” she snapped.

The large man catcalled, “You could use help around here. I can build an addition in exchange for a little—” He made a lewd gesture.

Jane dropped West’s hand and pushed through the crowd. The people pushed back. She stepped over heads and the hands that reached for her, groped at her ankle, her knee. They tried to reach higher. They pulled at her sweater, clutched at her belt. Arms looped around her waist. Her hair was yanked. She scratched her way out.

When she slipped into bed, she found four children hiding under the comforter, a rumple she thought was just bunched sheets. The children clung to her and called her Mommy. She could not free herself, so she lay limp while they mewled. West arrived and peeled the children from her and scooted them out the door.

When she and West made love that night, she saw shadowy figures hovering in the doorway. As she tried to sleep, she felt their breath on her through the sheets.

All night, the house stairs creaked; people thudded down hallways, in and out of rooms, slamming doors, laughing, yelling, fighting. Music blared, people fucked, moaned, glass broke. Jane shook. West held her and smoothed her hair.

“Hang in there, kiddo,” he said. “It’s only July.”

She turned from him and wept.

Jane woke alone. She smelled bacon and knew West had cooked for her. He was always doing small, thoughtful things.

He sat at her kitchen table, but so did forty others. They left no place for her. People perched along the counters, their heels banging against her cupboards. All the burners burned, the microwave buzzed, the oven was on broil. Something even cooked over a fire in her fireplace.

West looked up at Jane from the newspaper, ratty and worn as if it had already been read a hundred times that morning. Two plates of breakfast sat in front of him. He had waited, and seeing her then, picked up a strip of bacon and held it under his nose like a mustache, even though he had a full beard. Desire thrummed in her, and she said, “You’re so cute,” but it was drowned out by all the morning noise. He smiled, but she knew he hadn’t heard her.

Shouting began over by the toaster. More voices joined. Something about cinnamon toast. A scuffle erupted. People surged to escape the fight and both of Jane’s feet left the floor as she was pressed upward by the bodies around her. She screamed. The nearest people shrank from her and let her fall to her knees.

She had lost sight of West. She heard him call out, his voice filled with concern but far away. “Are you okay?”

Jane couldn’t speak. She punched her way through the crowd, wanting to harm, and once inside her bedroom, slid all the furniture in front of the door, even the wicker hamper which held only one sock. Someone had stolen all her dirty clothes

By midday, West was able to force himself into the bedroom. Jane sat stiffly in bed. He approached with caution, as if she was either delicate or dangerous. He tried to hold her.

“Don’t touch me,” she said coldly.

His eyes widened. “Why not?” He tried to hold her again.

“I don’t want people touching me.”

“But it’s me,” he said, his voice soft with confusion. “I’m different.”

He was different. That was the problem. “You need to go,” she said.

“But I can help. Let me help you.”

“Help? You can’t help me. I don’t even love you.”

“That’s not true,” he said, not believing it.

“Yes, it is,” she said, through tears now. “Get out.”

“You do too love me. I can see it.” He tried to sound certain, but he shook his head, stunned.

“You’re wrong. This whole world was wrong. I have nothing to give you. So leave.”

“Honey, you don’t really believe that. That’s not what you want.”

“You have no idea what I want.”

“So tell me.”

But she didn’t know what to say. She felt a strong desire to be alone, but she didn’t know how long that feeling would last. And she didn’t equate that desire with knowing what she really wanted. She said nothing.

West smoothed her cheeks, but he failed to find her behind hardened eyes, and so he reluctantly packed a bag, a bag he hadn’t arrived with, full of things that didn’t belong to him, and left.

News spread through the house, out to the yards, up the trees and underground. Conversations died in the living room. People quickly got out of Jane’s way when they saw her coming. For the first time in what felt like years, she went a full day without brushing shoulders with someone.

When the food ran out, she didn’t buy more. People scrounged in the garbage, hunted for scraps in the yard. The hunger set in. Motley caravans began to leave, clanging down the streets at all hours. People insisted Jane buy supplies to make them snacks and bagged lunches for the road, pay their bus fare, drive them to the airport. “You owe us,” they said, but she gave them nothing. They threw pennies at her, then collected what fell at her feet. They would need them.

“Mom, they’re leaving.”

“What did you do?”

“I kicked West out.”

“Oh honey, why?”

“I don’t know. They steal my stuff.”

“You have plenty of stuff.”

“It was too much. I couldn’t take it.”

“How am I not surprised? You have no follow-through. You never have.”

“Mom.”

“Jane. What’s one year? You were happy. They were happy.”

“I wasn’t happy.”

“Well, is this what you wanted?” her mother said. “Now who’s happy?”

Jane found a naked woman slumped in the shower. The woman was slack-jawed in the relentless spray, her pouty mouth like a cherubic water feature spouting water down her chin, her breasts. Jane pulled her onto the bathroom tile, where she lay splayed for days, barely breathing. Eventually the woman dragged herself down the stairs, trailing rust-colored urine. Jane listened to the drag all night.

The last people crawled away on their hands and knees, stricken by the sudden lack. Their eyes were yellowed, their skin blotchy. Behind the couch, Jane found two corpses, their gray, confused faces covered by a sheet. She recognized them. A new couple. A thing started here. They’d stayed too long, perhaps believing her fortunes would change.

She dragged these leaden bodies to one of the empty burrows and dropped them in. They hit like apples hit the floor.

The burrows in the yard sank with no families to keep them from caving. The tree-house nails rusted, and wind worried some boards from the branches. At night, Jane heard the creak of swinging pieces. Her house groaned above the shifting ground, and the floors settled into new, unnerving contours. The nighttime glowed green against her windows, and her room felt full of muck.

She was alone. She hadn’t meant to be this alone.

This is how her year ended: Occasionally someone would show up, most often some man down on his luck, having heard about a woman with prodigious good fortune to share. She would welcome him, buy him things, cook and serve his meals, take him in her bed or anywhere he wanted and he would find it all soothing. The man would be hopeful that his life was changing. But eventually he would realize no good could be found in such a desolate-feeling house. The man would stay a week more, eating her cooking, sleeping with her, because she made it easy to.

But then Jane would wake alone. She’d search, hoping to surprise the man in a dark closet, under a bed, all the places where she used to find people without even trying. But Jane would only ever find something missing. A box of her grandmother’s jewelry. Her checkbook. Stereo equipment.