Элизабет Страут - Olive, Again

Jack opened a hand. “Maybe not. But I think it would be nice for you to invite them.”

“They don’t need to be invited, they can just come.” Olive put both hands on the armchair’s armrests, then put them back in her lap.

Jack leaned forward, his elbows on his knees. “Olive, sometimes people like to be invited. I, for example, would have loved to be invited to your house on many occasions, but you’ve not invited me except for that one time when I asked you to take me over. And so I have felt rebuffed. Do you see that?”

Olive exhaled loudly. “You could have called.”

“Olive, I just told you I did call. I called you a couple of times, and because you turned off your friggin’ answering machine, you didn’t know I called.” He sat back and wagged a finger at her. “Only pointing out here that people can’t read your mind. And I sent you an email as well.”

“Ay-yuh,” Olive said. “Well, I don’t call a bunch of question marks an email.”

“I like you, Olive.” Jack gave her half a smile, then shook his head slightly. “I’m not sure why, really. But I do.”

“Ay-yuh,” said Olive again, and her face felt warm again, but they talked then. They talked of their children, and after a while Jack told her about his day a few days ago, how he was stopped by the police for speeding.

“They were unbelievably rude to me, Olive. You would have thought I was wanted for murder, the way both of them spoke to me.” Jack opened his hand in dismay after he said this to her.

“Probably thought you were an out-of-stater.”

“I have Maine plates.”

Olive shrugged. “Still, you’re an old man running around in your zippy little sports car. They know an out-of-stater when they see one.” Olive raised her eyebrows. “I’m perfectly serious, Jack. They could smell you a mile away.” She glanced down at the huge watch of Henry’s she was wearing. “It’s late,” she said, and she stood up.

“Olive, would you stay here tonight?” Jack shifted in his chair. “No, no, just listen to me. Right now I am wearing a half-diaper because of prostate surgery I had right before Betsy was diagnosed.”

“What?” asked Olive.

“I’m just trying to reassure you. I’m not going to assault you. You do know what Depends are, right?”

“Depends?” asked Olive. “What do you mean—? Oh.” She realized she had seen them on television ads.

“I’m telling you that I’m wearing half a Depends, a thing for people who pee their pants. Men who pee after this surgery. They say it will get better, but it hasn’t yet. Olive, I’m only telling you this because—”

She waved her hand for him to stop. “Godfrey, Jack,” she said. “I’d say you’ve been through quite a lot.” But she was aware of feeling relief.

Jack said, “Why don’t you stay in the guest room, and I will stay in the guest room across the hall? I just want you here when I wake up, Olive.”

“Just when you wake up? Well, I’ll come back. I get up early.” When he didn’t answer, she added, “I don’t have my nightgown or my toothbrush. And I don’t think I’d sleep a wink.”

Jack nodded. “I get that. About the toothbrush—we have a few new unused toothbrushes, don’t ask me why. But Betsy always had extra on hand, and I can give you a T-shirt, if you care to wear it.”

They were silent, and Olive understood. He wanted her there for the whole night. What was she going to do? Go home to the rat’s nest she now lived in? Yes, she was. At the doorway, she turned. “Jack,” she said. “Listen to me.”

“I’m listening.” He had remained in his chair.

She stood there, staring at the ridiculous lampshade with its ruffled business going on. “I just don’t want to have to bump into you talking to that Bertha Babcock in the grocery store—”

“Bertha Babcock, that’s her name. God, I couldn’t remember her name.” He sat back and clapped his hands once. “She talks about the weather, Olive. The weather. Look, Olive, I’m just saying, I would like you to stay here tonight. I promise: You get your own room, and so do I.”

She came close. She did. But then she said, “I will see you in the morning, if you like.” It wasn’t until she had pulled open the door that Jack rose and went to the door as well.

He waved his hand. “Goodbye, then.”

“Good night, Jack.” She waved her hand over her head.

Outside, the evening air assaulted her with the smells of the field and she heard the peepers as she walked to her car. Reaching for the handle of her car door, she thought: Olive, you fool. She pictured herself at home, sleeping on the big window seat in “the bump-out room,” she thought how she would listen to the little transistor radio against her ear all night, as she had since Henry died.

She turned and walked back to Jack’s door. She rang the bell, and Jack answered the door almost immediately. “All right,” she said.

—

She used the new toothbrush that his poor dead wife had somehow bought (Olive didn’t have an extra toothbrush in her house), then she closed the door of the guest room with the double bed, and pulled on a huge T-shirt he had given her. The T-shirt smelled of fresh laundry and something else—vaguely cinnamon? It did not smell like Henry. She thought: This is the stupidest thing I have ever done. And then she thought: It’s no stupider than that stupid baby shower I went to. She folded her clothes and put them on the chair by the bed. She was not unhappy. Then she opened the door a crack. She could just see that he had settled himself into the single bed in the guest room across the hall. “Jack?” she called to him.

“Yes, Olive?” he called back.

“This is the stupidest thing I’ve ever done.” She didn’t know why she had said that.

“The stupidest thing you ever did was go to that baby shower,” he called back, and Olive felt stunned for a moment. “Except for the baby you delivered,” he called out.

She left the door partly open and got into bed and turned over on her side, away from the door. “Good night, Jack.” She practically yelled the words.

“Good night, Olive.”

That night!

It was as though waves swung her up and then down, tossing her high—high—and then the darkness came from below and she felt terror and struggled. Because she saw that her life—her life, what a silly foolish notion, her life—that her life was different, might possibly be very different or might not be different at all, and both ideas were unspeakably awful to her, except for when the waves took her high and she felt such gladness, but it did not last long, and she was down again, deep under the waves, and it was like that—back and forth, up and down, she was exhausted and could not sleep.

It was not until dawn broke that she drifted off.

“Good morning,” Jack said. He stood, his hair messy, in the doorway of her room. He wore a bathrobe that was navy blue and stopped halfway down his calves. He was unfamiliar; she felt put off.

Olive flapped a hand from the bed. “Go away,” she said. “I’m sleeping.”

He roared with laughter. And what a sound it was; Olive felt a physical sensation, a thrill. At the very same time she felt terror, as though a match had been lit on her and she had been soaked in oil. The terror, the thrill of his laughter—it was nightmarish, but also as though a huge can she had been stuffed into had just opened.

“I mean it,” Olive said. She turned over in the bed. “Right now. Go away, Jack,” she said. She squeezed her eyes shut. Please, she thought. But she did not know what she meant by that. Please, she thought again. Please.