Vincent and Alice and Alice by Shane Jones

Author:Shane Jones
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Tyrant Books
Published: 2019-08-01T16:00:00+00:00

On the train ride back she falls asleep with her head on my lap. She drools. The guy still playing the violent video game is across the aisle from me, also in the aisle seat, and asks if – he points at Alice – is a video game. His chin is touching his chest but his eyes are fixated on me.

“It’s my wife,” I whisper. “It’s a person.”

“But.”

“My wife,” I say, leaning over slightly so he can hear me.

“But.”

“Shhhhhhhh she’s sleeping.”

“But.”

The man twitches and his legs that don’t reach the floor spasm. His head moves in a circle. “But,” he says, “But but but,” louder and louder until people are turning around, until his mother is glaring at me from the window seat, cradling his vibrating head in a soothing rocking motion. With my hands cupping her ears, Alice doesn’t move.

I decide to no longer be a people watcher.

The train rocks along toward A-ville as Alice sleeps. Two teenage girls keep going to the bathroom and each time they come out they have more make-up on. Some people have laptops open, there’s a woman sitting two rows up with some kind of wrap or shawl around her head, typing away. I’m not sure these people are interesting, but I can’t stop being a people watcher. A small man in a big suit is watching Pineapple Express but isn’t laughing. Most sleep on the train like Alice, heads wobbling against the seat or window. I think these people are fake sleeping. I won’t wake Alice until the train conductor tells me it is time to go. The sky is getting dark.

Driving home from the train station she asks what happened to the back window. I tell her I bought a dog named Rudy who was sick, who I left in the car, and someone broke the window because they thought he was too hot. Alice doesn’t take her eyes off me. I tell her Rudy is dead, if he wasn’t given medication. I describe his blood-tongue, greasy fur, and how he ran at the park, so thrilled. I tell her about the vet. She sits sideways in the passenger seat but doesn’t respond. She’s just looking at me, her blank expression never changes, she doesn’t find the vet funny at all. With her window down we drive in the rain and she doesn’t say a word about getting wet, an entire side of her body becoming soaked.

Alice has strict rituals around bedtime. Now that she’s back, I’m sure not to disrupt them.

What I would do – flossing my teeth while walking into every room, breathing too loud, eating cereal while standing in the living room, entering a room only to ask what she’s doing – are details she had mentioned to the therapist. But now I give her plenty of space, admiring her from a distance as she: makes tea, slices an apple on a cutting board, blows out the candle in the bathroom, grinds coffee for the morning, folds the sheets down on our bed with the headboard she has recently strung with white lights.

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