Chapter 8

Back home Jessie skipped the den and went straight upstairs to bed. Gary decided to leave her alone for a while, and didn’t get up there till it was close to five. She was fast asleep so he got some cream and lay down beside her. She was still clothed, a simple yellow sheath dress, white socks and tennis shoes. Since she was lying on her stomach he was able to unzip her dress. He did that and unhooked her bra. Pulling the dress free he started rubbing her down with the moisturizing cream. He realized she was awake, but didn’t open her eyes or try to move. He enjoyed massaging her; she was normally pink but had become well-tanned from her time at the pool, she was still soft though.

About halfway down her back she rolled over on her side. “Mm,” she murmured, “that feels so good.”

He leaned in and kissed her shoulders and whispered, “I’d like it if you took tomorrow off so we could do something, just the two of us.”

She sighed, “Ok, I guess so.”

It rained the next couple days so they didn’t get to do what he wanted. Jessie went in to work, and every night she came home even more frustrated. Of course, she talked to no one, and when she did it was with her usual harsh and biting tongue, followed by a quick retreat to the den where she could be heard crying. Gary didn’t feel like replacing another door so he left her alone. The blubbering didn’t seem to bother Dorothy or Melanie, but it did Katy. They tried to comfort her but she was still unhappy about it, it was her mother and she was the youngest.

The weather cleared Friday and Jessie was so pooped from work she offered no resistance. She called out sick, he packed a couple coolers, fishing rods, and other paraphernalia and off they went to the state park and the lake.

Somewhere during the week of rain and caustic comments Jessie’d gotten the impression that Gary had succumbed to her doctor’s blandishments, he’d decided to stay, and there was no need for them to ever have “that talk”. That was not the case; he was looking forward to the chance to get Jessie in a place where she couldn’t run away, and he believed the lake was it.

The lake they were going to was the same he’d taken Daisy. Out toward the center were two small islands; one was called Round Island, that was where he’d taken Daisy, the other was Rhoten Island. Rhoten Island was shaped like a C; the inner portion had a small sandy beach. Not much for a beach, years of rowdy high school and college kids had left their mark with old fire rings and shards of broken glass in the sand. The rangers called it “Kick out Cove” because if they wanted to catch kids swimming in the lake, that was the place.

Jessie and he weren’t going to swim; fishing, picnicking, and talking were Gary’s goals. He packed a nice lunch, cold cut sandwiches, home fried chicken, and a garden salad. He brought some beer; Rolling Rock of course, and a few cans of Pepsi.

He expected getting her to go would be hard, but she seemed eager for it. They took his Jeep. When they got there and started loading the pram she wanted to take her purse. He took it away as she got in, and locked it in the Jeep.

“Gary,” she complained, “my phone’s in my purse.”

That phone was the last thing he wanted. He didn’t tell her that though, “Look, if the girls need us I’ve got mine.”

She got belligerent, “What about my work?”

He laughed and lied, “We won’t be gone that long, and besides its Friday.” She coolly accepted his remark.

Once on the island he flapped a blanket out on the sand and dug a narrow hole for the umbrella. So, umbrella out, blanket down, and goodies on the side he set to work baiting their hooks.

She took her rod, an old spinner, and made her first cast, a good one. He did the same, nothing happened. They got a few nibbles and waited. Every now and then she or he would pull in their lines and rebait the hooks. There were little scampers out there, probably little perch or blue gills cleaning off their baits, but he didn’t care much.

After about an hour, around 10:00 a.m. she reeled in her line, sat back on the blanket and said, “I’m bored.”

He reeled his in, “Me too. Let’s talk.” He got his first suspicious glance.

She said, “About what?”

He asked, “You going to take that assignment out in the western end of the state?”

She looked down toward her lap, “Don’t know yet. It could be a great opportunity.”

This was it, time to chase her down. Her house was in an older established wealthier section of the city, an old suburb from the 1930’s, large single homes with nice yards, a mix of retirees and the upwardly mobile well to do yuppy types. Gary’s house had been well beyond the city, in the outermost suburbs, what they called exurbia. Her home was surrounded by Mercedes, B.M.W.s, Audis, and high end Toyotas and Hondas. The closest one got to a pick-up truck where she lived was an occasional Avalanche. On his end there were dozens of slowly dying farms, the first Walmart, a brand new MacDonald’s with its companion Pizza Hut. Every second or third house had its pick-up. Both communities were heavily “right wing” politically, but for different reasons. Jessie, like her mom and dad never voted for a Democrat, Gary, with a single mom, poor public schools, was a little left of middle. Actually politics never bothered them much; neither really gave that much of a shit. But the far west of the state was an entirely different kind of animal.

He sat back on an elbow and said, “I think you should take it.” He meant the job.

She looked over, then away. The last couple years she never took his advice. She asked, “Why do you say that?”

“For one,” he said, “it could be a new start. You’d be completely away from the office and the brown noses who want what you have.”

“You mean the partnership,” she said.

“Yeah,” he said, “that too, but I mean all the insider stuff, like who’s cheating who, who’s being true, and whose car is parked next store.”

She laughed sarcastically, “You’re so funny. That’s a reason to stay.”

“OK,” he said, “You move out west. You take the girls. I go with you, getting a job out west is easy if you have my credentials. You have our new baby. We buy an old house and fix it up. You start a brand new career.”

She really laughed then, “Your credentials? What you with that big M. Ed., you think you’ll set the world on fire? Come on Gary, people like you are a dime a dozen.”

He smiled sheepishly, it was a phony smile. She could change on the drop of a hat. “I don’t know. I do teach math, and there’s always a shortage there.”

She grimaced, “That’s it, the “math boy” talking. Come on; give me a real reason for taking the job in the west.”

“Math boy”, one of her lawyer friends used that around him when they didn’t think he was in ear shot. A lot of her disrespect grew out of what he did compared to the people around her. He’d always known that though. Her dad was cardiothoracic surgeon at one of the world’s leading hospitals. He’d lectured and taught at Johns Hopkins and Sloane Kettering. Jessie had grown up around doctors, not just any doctors, but the really high powered ones, the ones who didn’t think they were like God, they knew they were like God. Then there were her lawyer chums, the partners, the younger ones like her who’d been shading the “Holy Grail” all their lives. Some of those lawyers thought he was stupid; they’d make stupid factually incorrect remarks that he never tried to correct, and then laugh behind his back. Why would he try to correct them; they were all idiots, and any corrections he made of a partner would only injure Jessie’s chances.

He’d had a conversation or two with Jessie about some of that. Jessie was an idiot. An idiot isn’t a stupid person, no, an idiot is someone who is either ill-informed or miss-informed, but incapable of changing their behaviors or their beliefs when faced with their misinformation. It’s like Uma Thurman’s dialogue in that old movie “Pulp Fiction”, there are people who listen and those who wait to talk, an idiot will pretend to listen but they’re really only waiting to talk.

So Gary looked at her and said, “This could be our big chance. We could start over. It would be like you’re a new lawyer in a new town. You like horseback riding; the west end of the state is hands down horse country. You could trash the old high heels and get a pair of cowboy boots. Forget the $60.00 haircuts, you could wear a ponytail. We could put the girls in a good public school where they’d meet all kinds of different people. Damn, Jessie, there are a lot of really good public universities out there, the girls would be happy in a small university. The west is made to order for us.”

She bridled, “You’re an asshole Gary. Take the girls out of school and send them to some public school with God knows what kind of riff raff? Me in cowboy boots? Not a chance! And I know about those “great public Universities”, they’re all small, most of them don’t even have decent sororities, let alone good course selections. You really are an asshole! I’ve been out there Gary, its Hicksville!”

He grinned, “There’s a Hicksville on Long Island.”

“Get real Gary. Our kids go to a good private school so they can learn more and meet the right kind of people. I like where I live; it’s safe, and I like all our neighbors. And haircuts! What do you know about my haircuts? Sixty dollars! Jesus, sixty dollars doesn’t buy the shampoo!

Inside he was smiling, no laughing. There was so much he wanted to say, but held it in, “I’m just trying to show you what an opportunity it is.”

She started shaking. He thought, Uh oh, another panic attack. She was solidly on the edge when she started yelling, “I know what the partners want! They want to send me out to “East Jesus” because they know I’ll fail. Then when I fail they’ll offer to buy back my partnership and give it to some fuck face!”

“Who’s Fuck Face,” he asked?

Unwittingly she lashed out, “Jesus Christ stupid. You know! Jeff Snyder, the dick who...”

He finished her sentence, “Got your panties. I thought he got partner?”

She was shivering and it wasn’t cold, she got up, “I want to go home.” She started for the pram.

He ran ahead of her and pushed the pram out in the water, turned and said, “No we’re staying.”

She turned and started to run through the weeds toward a nearby copse of trees.

Gary yelled after her, “Go on and run. I’ll wait here. When you’re ready we can have that talk.” He watched as she disappeared in the trees. Damn, she’d done it again. He waited a few minutes before he went back to the woods. Looking all around, there wasn’t any sign of her so he walked back to the beach. That’s when he saw her. She was in the water swimming along the far shoreline toward the distant marina where they stored the pram.

He took off his sandals and swam to where the pram had drifted, got the prow rope and swam it back to the island where he reloaded everything, toweled off and motored back toward the marina. How afraid was she that she’d rather swim the distance alone and risk getting caught by a ranger instead of having to sit with him and talk.

He reached the marina and saw his Jeep, but there was no sign of Jessie. Worried he checked in the ranger’s office. There she was, seated on a metal chair and shivering, the place was air-conditioned. She got up, “Where the hell have you been?”

“I had to pack up first,”

She clasped her arms around her shoulders, “It’s cold in here and they won’t let me leave.” She pointed toward the woman ranger behind the counter, “Say something. Tell her who I am.”

Gary glanced over; the woman was looking at him. She looked to be about fifty, heavy, not very pretty, “Hi, I’m this lady’s husband. What seems to be the problem ma’am?”

Smiling, but casting a condescending look at Jessie she said, “Your wife was caught swimming in the lake. We have rules about that.”

Needing to get Jessie out of that cold office before she caught pneumonia he had do something. Getting the ranger’s name from her badge he said, “Sorry Madge. It was my fault. We were out on Rhoten Island fishing, and had a fight. She went for our pram, I pushed it off, and she took off and swam away. She was trying to get away from me, but I guess she forgot I’d locked our Jeep so she had no way of getting in.”

Madge nodded, “That was basically her story. You know we could call the police.”

He pleaded, “I wish you wouldn’t. Jessie, my wife, has been under a great deal of stress at work and at home, most of it’s my fault. Did she tell you she was pregnant?” He looked back at his wife; she was mortified.

“No,” said Madge. “I wish I knew that. You can take her home but I want you to promise she won’t come back and make of nuisance of herself again?”

Gary knew she wouldn’t bother with the state police, but he groveled a little more knowing it might aggravate Jessie. “Oh thank you so much. Yes, I’ll get her home, and I promise this will never happen again.”

Madge the ranger smiled warmly, “We have her on record. If it happens again there will be repercussion.” She looked down her nose at Jessie, “You understand don’t you?”

With cold hatred Jessie looked at her husband, then she turned to the ranger, “Yes.”

The ranger concluded her little plea arrangement, “I hope so,” she turned to Jessie’s husband smiling, “Have a nice day.”

He thanked her, stepped back, took Jessie’s arm, and guiding her out the door, they left the station.