Mendocino and Other Stories by Ann Packer

Author:Ann Packer
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
ISBN: 9780307488152
Publisher: Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group
Published: 1994-07-08T22:00:00+00:00

THOMAS PICKED OUR house because of the view, but there is something cruel in it to me: the sliding glass doors, the redwood deck, that sudden plunge of green; you could die falling out of our view. We live on a steep hill about an hour's drive south of San Francisco, and way below us, in the muted colors of a lovely old rug, is a sweep of neighborhoods and highways and trees that reaches all the way to the silver strand of the Bay. We have floor-to-ceiling windows on three sides, pristine white walls, and exposed beams, and there are rugs for warmth and a big, open fireplace. But it's a chilling house to live in. A man killed himself here.

IT'S SEVEN O'CLOCK and Thomas is up and gone. He's working very hard these first few months; he says he'll cut back a little once he gets his footing. This is something of a pun: his new job is to manage the finances of a company called ColoRun, which is about to introduce into the marketplace a revolutionary new running shoe.

I'm smoothing the bedspread over our bed when I hear Jenny calling for me. Her room is on the side of the house and looks onto a small clearing; most mornings I find her standing in her crib, looking out the window at one of the small delights of our life here: a rabbit trembling in the wet grass, a deer moving along the edge of the woods. Today, though, she's still lying down.

“Mommy,” she says, reaching for me. “Up.”

I lift her as if she's still a baby and that dependent on me; in fact, she just turned two.

“Eskimo kiss me,” she says, butting at me with her nose. When I lean toward her, though, she wriggles loose and starts to sing a little song she made up a few days ago: “Mommy, Mommy. Mommy and Tommy. Tommy, Tommy. Tommy and Mommy.” Although I've never told her to and I'm sure she doesn't yet understand that he isn't her father, she has always called Thomas Thomas. Now there's a little boy down the street named Tommy, and this coincidence has been a source of intrigue and delight to her.

“Thomas went to work,” I say. I go to her dresser and pull open a drawer. “What are you going to wear today, Jenny?” Without hesitation she comes over and reaches for her yellow overalls. It amazes me, how clearly she knows what she wants.

In the kitchen, I settle her into her high chair, then slice a banana onto her tray. “Breakfast,” I say.

I pour myself a cup of coffee and when I see that she's eating contentedly, I wander out of the kitchen and through the living room, to the doorway of Thomas's study. At some point every morning I seem to end up at this spot, staring at the magazines and papers on his desk, looking for last night's old-fashioned glass or tea mug and hoping to learn from these artifacts how he is doing, to discover just who it is I have married.

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