Henry, Himself by Stewart O'Nan

Author:Stewart O'Nan
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Penguin Publishing Group
Published: 2019-04-08T16:00:00+00:00

Sleeping Arrangements

Emily and Lisa had never gotten along. The reasons were legion, the foremost, according to Emily, being that Lisa was spoiled. From the beginning the two of them had fought bitterly, and now, twenty years later, had reached an uneasy peace. They barely spoke, leaving Henry and Kenny to act as go-betweens, every visit a diplomatic mission.

Jeff Emily liked. A former offensive lineman raised Methodist by his ex-missionary grandmother in the hinterlands of Michigan (the tip of the mitten, as he said, holding up a massive hand), he was even-tempered and polite. He worked as an administrator in a retirement community, and if Emily wished he were more ambitious, she would always be grateful to him for helping Margaret.

“It’s a shame,” Emily said in bed. “We’re losing the wrong one.”

“You’d never know it to look at them.”

“Oh, I can.”

They had to whisper because of Arlene, plus Margaret was still up, ensconced on the screen porch, waiting for Kenny and Lisa to pull in, maybe right now getting high. Henry could hear Jeff running water directly overhead, and imagined how strange it must be for him. He and Margaret would have to sleep together. There was only the one bed.

For years, calling on an inner censor he’d adopted when she was a teenager, Henry had actively suppressed any vision of them making love. Now he couldn’t summon one to save them.

Who knew what happened in a marriage, what bargains and compromises people struck? He and Emily were opposites in many respects, yet well matched, both of them practical at heart. Jeff had wanted to rescue Margaret, an impulse Henry distrusted. He thought he should be grateful they’d stayed together this long, though that only made it harder for everyone involved. He wanted, above all, to suspend judgment. There was fault on both sides, he was sure, and then felt disloyal to her. Jeff was the one who was leaving.

“Are you reading or are you sleeping?” Emily asked. “Because I’m done.”

“I’m thinking.”

“That’s dangerous.”

“It is.”

“There’s nothing you can do about it tonight.”

“I don’t think there’s anything we can do at all.”

“Probably not, so turn the light out.”

He did.

She rolled his way and gave him a good-night kiss. “Stop fretting, you’ll never get to sleep. I’ll talk to her tomorrow and find out what’s going on.”

She was right. In minutes she was snoring, releasing a subtle whistle with each breath. As so often with Margaret, he felt helpless. He needed to know what he should hope for.

At three, when he padded to the bathroom, Kenny and Lisa’s SUV was sitting in the drive, and in the morning, as he was putting water on for coffee, Sam and Justin were already outside playing croquet, the balls tracing paths in the dew. The day was bright, the shadow of the chestnut swallowing part of the garage. Henry left his cup on the screen porch to give Sam a bear hug, lifting him off his feet.

“All right,” he said, choosing a mallet, “who’s ready to lose?”

“You are,” they said.

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