Minimalist Fiction
Many Questions
Then Jake came home for dinner. The day had felt long, and he was tired. He sat at the kitchen table. His knees were stiff.
Erin stood at the stove. She stirred the pot of soup. He thought to get up and help her. He stayed seated.
Her mouth was a set line. She had been beautiful as a girl, and when he would visit her, her father would sit on the porch to whittle and listen to their chatter. After six childless years, Jake had given up hope to use his knife the same way.
She sighed, moved to the sink. Tomorrow would be a good night to go back to the bar, he thought. He hadn't been since Saturday. He still felt the mile walk home in his back. Falling asleep against the bar porch wouldn't happen again. Just two or three beers, a laugh with Rick Robson, then home.
Did she talk? He looked up. His wife at the sink, scrubbing at a black iron pan. Six years of Erin taking care of some other lady's children and house. Of Jake sowing and harvesting someone else's field.
Then he heard her: “I think I'm going to stay at my parents’ for a few days. Momma can't walk well enough to finish the wash any more, and Daddy sure as hell doesn't know how to help her.”
“Okay,” he said. His parents had died a few years ago. One after the other. Heart illness, they had said. Jake had agreed.
“Not sure how long I'll be there,” she continued. “Not like you'll notice the difference,” she muttered, soft.
He didn't respond, not sure what to say. They weren't cold to each other, but not hot, not lately. He knew how to make his own breakfast, dinner - lunch was served at the farm.
She crossed the kitchen to the door and opened it. She stood in the cold wind. The hair on his arms rose, making him want to jump out of his seat. He planted his feet to the floor.
“Do you hear me?” she asked. She said, “I don’t think you hear anything.”
He blinked. Looked at her with his eyes narrowed, blending the pattern on her apron into a gray blob.
He thought about the last time she wore red, how they whirled around the dance floor at Don’s place, and he was so proud to be seen with his pretty wife.
What happened? he wondered. She was in tears now, her mouth working.
She closed the door, head bowed. He stood, came to her. Once, his arms fit here, one over her shoulder, the other around her waist. He tried, but the mold was twisted - she moved away. He tried, “I’m here,” but she laughed. He tried a step forward, met only with a step back.
The red of her face was not as lovely as the red of her old dress.
“I’m going to my parents,” she said again. “I’m not sure when I’ll be back,” she says. He hears. He returns to the table. He spreads his hands against its grain.
He saw his father sitting at the table, just like this, hands worn. Mother cooking. Jake sitting by the door, bit of cloth or metal in hand. Did he not hear it then, either? How love escaped?
Didn’t they make it work, though? he thought, watching her back as she moved to pour their bowls of soup.
Potatoes and carrots. Thin chicken stock. She didn’t sit to eat. He swallowed a few spoonfuls. When she didn’t come back, he walked to the bedroom.
Her old bag was swollen, clothes in every pocket. Tears fell, but she was quiet.
“Don’t,” he started. “If you go, I’ll leave too. Won’t be anything here for me, and I’ll leave,” he said.
“Good.”
“You leave,” he tried again, “and there won’t be a home left for us.”
“I don’t mean for there to be.”
The end of the closet, and the last of the clothes. She slung the faded red dress across the whole mess. He caught her up in his arms then, somewhere between angry and glad, and kissed her.
**
The first time Jake had kissed Erin, she was a girl. He had caught her cheek in his palm in the dusk of her driveway. Her lips were cool. She gasped. They were married soon after.
**
She caught his cheek now, and he rubbed the sting away. The food was cold. The door was open again. This time, empty.