Mitchell Jackson - The Residue Years

I’m parked near the hydrant outside Andrew’s place, the house he bought with his wife. He’s got his front porch primed and his handrails sanded and his siding power-washed. You can see his wife — his sun, moon, stars — inside with a TV dancing grays across her face. She peeks up at me at the sound of the doorbell, then strolls into another room. She lolls out with Andrew behind her. He’s the one that answers. He jitters the handle to open the storm door. Grace, he says. To what do we owe this surprise?

Afternoon, I say

He steps aside to let me in. I say hello to his wife and she plays like she doesn’t hear it. Humph, I say, and follow Andrew into the kitchen. Out in the world this man is meticulous — shirts with creases in the sleeves, slacks with all the wrinkles knocked out, wing tips polished. But today he’s dressed in a T-shirt and un-pressed khakis with his belt unfastened.

Drink? he says.

No, thank you, I say.

He pours himself a vodka straight, no ice. He asks me what I’ve been up to. Says he hasn’t seen me in days.

Days, weeks, months, I say

So let me guess, you’re back in church, he says.

How would you know? I say.

It’s about the only time I see you, he says.

It’s the only time I can come, I say. The only time I can stand that woman, what you’ve done.

Which church? he says.

First Zion, I say.

That Baptist? he says.

Andrew’s a Catholic, attends St. Andrew’s hour-long Sunday masses, Wednesday night choir practices, takes minutes at meetings of the local archdiocese.

He’s right too. This isn’t the first. First Zion, First Baptist. St. Mark’s. Maranatha, Parkside Missionary, New Hope. I join and go a Sunday, go Sundays, steady until a weekend binge keeps me away for a week, for weeks at a time, for too many Sundays to brave the faces, to face the pastor, the first lady, a deacon; I join and attend until a choir member or an organist or an usher sees me wild and stumbling outside myself. The times that’s happened it’s been much easier to find a new place to pray.

How long, how long? When will you let it go? he says.

Lose a mother, and lose a father, get replaced, and all is well, I say. It’s just that easy, is it?

Grace, he says. Give me chance.

Chance? You have no clue, do you? You could never know how it feels to be left behind and cast back?

The wife sweeps in and stands over the stove. She asks Andrew when I’m leaving, if I might stay through dinner, says she didn’t fix enough for company. Andrew grabs prescription bottles off a carousel and shakes out pills and downs them with his vodka.

Is that safe? I say.

These old things? he says. He re-racks his meds. We’re Thomases. We’re built to last. The wife clears her throat and makes noise in a cabinet over the stove. She tramps out.

What do you call that? I say.

Oh, what can we do? he says. What can we do?

The time for doing been passed, I say.

He says my name again and throws up a hand. This man is an expert too, has lied to himself about what he’s done to me. Their old Chihuahua barks in a back room. The refrigerator groans. It wouldn’t kill you to call me Dad, he says. That is, after all, who I am.

That is, after all, who who is? I say.

Is this why you came? he says. I know this can’t be why you came.

Correct, I say.

Then why? he says.

To invite you to church, I say. Come with me one Sunday, I say. Just one.

I’m not so sure about that, he says.

Why not? I say.

He gets up and pours himself another drink and pours me a glass of water and carries them both over. What is it you want from me? he says

You don’t get it, do you? It’s not what I want from you. It’s what I want for you.

He’s glum under the light, this man who’s been a man for all but me. I shove away from the table and stomp into the living room, stopping to gawk at the shrine of Pat and my adopted sister, a girl who was more of the girl he and his wife wanted than me — the first true hurt. I turn a family portrait of them facedown and whisk into the living room, where the wife is sitting on the couch smoking. I stop a few feet from her. She crosses and uncrosses her legs and blows outs smoke. God bless you, I say. May God have mercy on your soul. She looks over my shoulder and I look over my shoulder at Andrew, her husband, who’s standing in the kitchen’s entrance.

He has the face of martyr, this man, he who hasn’t been crucified enough for his sins.

Under a sky the color of dried tears I push past a politician’s campaign sign. The sign is plunged into the front yard, into dry grass, cause it ain’t been a drip of rain (which you should know by now is a small-scale miracle) in the P for days on end. I knock and stand back, peeking through a split in the curtain of the front door’s oval window, hoping for a few smart words, maybe a sentence, weighing one last time if bothering these people that don’t know me from the next nigger is worth what it might cost in expectations.

Life has what?

Breaking out now is still one of them. Abandoning this shit altogether, before the door swings open and my options (what options?) taper to none. Got that coward’s-retreat weight on my heels when a woman answers, standing barefoot and blowing on a black mug with her long gray hair parted and her eyes creased with lines. She greets me with a smile that’s straight and blanched.

Hello? she says. Her voice means peace.

Hello, I say, and pause.

Blame these sprint-twitch shivers. There’s still time to turn tail, to claim I’m a Jehovah’s Witness, a salesman hocking magazine subscriptions, a distant neighbor hounding after a lost puppy — still time to claim any one of these excuses and she’d probably close the door and spare me the risk of making a fool of myself.

But what do I do? Apologize for the bother and ask if I can speak to her about the house.

Our place? she says. She cups her mug and moves to where I can see her better. She gives me the once-over. I give her a twice-over on the sly. She’s got green eyes, a regal neck. Do you mind? she says. She eases the door shut, leaves me on the porch, and through the glass I see her evanesce.

I swing around to face Sixth, see the wind blow the peak off a pile of old leaves in the yard, shiver a naked tree branch. This is a last chance, and because it is, I plant a foot so as not to be foiled by my wayward courage.

The woman opens the door and there’s a man standing behind her. He steps out in front and introduces himself and offers me a palm knobby with calluses.

What can I do for you? he says.

Sorry to bother you, sir. This may seem strange. Well, it is a bit strange. Okay, let me back up. I used to live in this house. My family and I. This is weird, I know, sir, miss, but I was wondering if I could have a look inside, I say. If it would be too much of a bother to maybe have a look around at our old place.

And your names is?

Sorry, sorry. My names is Shawn, sir. Shawn Thomas.

Shawn, a look, you say? You mean a tour? he says. He turns to his wife and she looks at me. He steps aside and points me to the living room couch. His wife asks if I’d like a drink and shuffles into what was the kitchen and probably still is. There’s glassy magazines fanned across a nicked wood table, framed pictures hung on the walls — a black-and-white wedding photo, a flick of what looks like the husband holding a fish long as a shark. He lowers himself into an easy chair and leans forward and clasps his hands. One of his thumbnails is obsidian.