a river runs
The angled bend of Janey’s right thumb was reminiscent of a petal spilling off the stem of a declamatory flower. She sat high in the window, back lit by a blue summer. Her diaphragm quivered from the exhalation of breathe. Circular pillows were strewn on the floor, creating a mock perimeter around the antiquated coffee table. A plush lounger was dissembled and was pulled in at the head of the table.
A mug sat next to it, stuffed with Audrey’s half-smoked cigarillos. Bern had collected all the plastic plates and discarded them in a paper grocery bag. She stood at the sink, entranced by the water streaming out of the faucet head. She was startled by the sound of the AC’s hefty bellow as it roared awake. Her focus returned to the dishes, her childhood cat, Audrey. Bern wished she could scrub away the heavy energy that remained in the room as easily as she scrubbed off the scum left on the ceramic bowls.
Prior to the group’s departure to the shoreline, Audrey laid out on the plush lounger, her posture extracted out of ancient hieroglyphics. Those who rested on the floor before the Egyptian relic, sat in gaudy awe as Audrey told a story of finding God in a dollar store; who came bellowing to her from the heavens above. Janey had been sipping on the same glass of pop for nearly twenty-five minutes. The carbonation had long since fizzled out and the ice melted down, tinging the once lime-colored libation to that of dull urine.
Bern examined the condensation, beads of liquid had run down Janey’s glass and pooled between her thumb and forefinger. She watched the faces contort in tune with the narrative shifts of Audrey’s stories: a trip to Turkey to receive a body affirming surgery, backpacking across Greece with a mute Kenyan. The group sat transfixed and slightly indisposed as she flaunted experiences she knew no one else had ever come close to realizing.
Bern went outside and pulled out a manila folder she had tucked in between the pages of a magazine. Janey made her swear to leave work at home. They called it work for there was no better name for it. To put it simply, it was, in fact, Bern’s obsession. She wanted to try for Janey, but knew she’d make an empty promise. The thought of the unopened folder sitting at home, with its photographs and and details more juicy than anything that could appear in culture magazine she picked up at the convenience store when they were en route. Bern figured she deserved the luxury of only looking.
The shoreline had a chill to it in the late afternoon that Bern relished. She liked feeling the cool air brush against the damp parts of her armpits and neck. She tucked the envelope back into the centerfold of the magazine and tossed the roach she’d been dragging on into the sandy dunes below. Hair on the back of her neck raised and she shivered. Sensing that she was being perceived, she stood a moment longer with her back turned. Then quickly wheeled around, expecting it to be Janey. She was preparing a response in case she’d seen her. But it was Audrey who’d been watching her. She narrowed her dark eyes into Bern. Her feline body caressed the corner of the house and she blew a cloud of Turkish smoke into Bern’s face.
While Bern’s apartment was meager, it was also unique. She lived on the third floor of a renovated church that was turned into housing. Her windows were stained glass and circular. The wardrobe in her bedroom was originally the reverends and was abandoned once the building was purchased for renovation. It didn’t have a full kitchen— the unit is categorized as a studio— but she didn’t cook, so the kitchenette sufficed. A small, white card with a message written in pink highlighter was pressed onto her front door. Inside the card was a printed photograph of a family portrait. All the faces were blotted out except one. The note was dotted with hearts and signed with a pair of X’s and O’s. Bern sat on the floor with a bowl of noodles and thumbed through a binder of photographs.
When Bern was in high school, she imagined herself catching a plane over to the Amazonas or Laos or Cambodia after graduation. She pictured herself joining an organization that built sustainable homes in underdeveloped countries. She’d be tasked with building water wells and preparing food for the locals. Bern grasped for a reason why it didn’t happen. It just didn’t. She left home two months before graduation. She moved by the arch of her thumb from the Gulf Coast’s Panhandle to Dallas and got a gig as a cabbie.
She’d only driven a car once when she was fourteen. She was at Chicha’s with her mom’s boyfriend, Denny. Chicha’s was a regular outing for the two of them when her mom worked the night shift. They had cheap wings, metal music, and a petite bartender with squat legs and a large bust who would slap men, hard when their fingers became overzealous. That particular evening, Denny got so blisteringly drunk that he wet himself and passed out in a corner booth.
‟Men bite,” the Bartender leaned over the counter with a knowing smile, ‟That your fella?”
‟Nah, that’s Denny,” Bern twirled a bone cleaned of all meat and fat on the counter.
‟You wan’ another?” the Bartender squinted at her through the veil of cigarette smoke that lauded the bar.
Bern shook the empty can and nodded, smiling at the young woman over the bar.
She didn’t feel drunk that night. She’d only had a few tall ones. However, it wasn’t until she lugged Denny to the passenger seat of the Mazda Rotary and sat behind the wheel that the beer flit to her head and she felt her vision dip out.
Driving the cab didn’t last long. Bern had a map of the city glued to the dash next to her. Her finger ran over the creases of printed streets on the flimsy paper. On her break she ignored her lunch and tested her knowledge. She squeezed her eyes shut and projected a mental image of the map. Her efforts to quiz herself were futile. It should’ve been easy. Ave’s run East/West, St’s North/South, but she couldn’t nail the damn thing down. On shift, she turned each corner anxiously, hoping, praying that there wouldn’t be a pedestrian hoping to become a passenger. She didn’t know where the spots and hubs were. When someone would flag her down, jump in the back seat and shout something like, ‟Take me to the Rickshaw,” Bern would squint at them through the rearview and utter, ‟What’s that?”
After Dallas, Bern found a ride with a medicine man she met at a hot dog emporium. The line for slaw dogs and malted beverages stretched out far beyond the shade of the arcade and into the dusty parking lot. Cars swerved into the lot, their speed severe, causing patrons to tumble and dive, narrowly avoiding impact with the vehicles— steaming from heat. Mothers gripped the small paws of their children and sprinted from the lot to the shade of the arcade to avoid the sun’s eye and the moving vehicles alike.
Bern worked at Swirly Dan’s— an ice cream shop that lived across the hoppin’ dog shop. She worked the stall alone. The owner (not named Dan but Abbas) was a short, hairy man from Iran. A caterpillar of an eyebrow stretched across his wide forehead in a perpetual upturn, a second smile to the one his lips bent into. The owner worked on occasion; taking orders from a group of young girls or an attractive woman. He’d birth a wide smile that ate at his cheeks. Most of the time, however, he sat on a stool next to Bern and read imported newspapers.
At Swirly Dan’s, Bern sold twisted cones of ice cream that began to melt before she could even hand it over the counter. They offered 12 different flavors that Abbas would tote in his red pickup at the beginning of each week. They came in large tubs with the same calligraphy printed on the side as his newspapers; bold, large lettering that danced yet appeared rigid and brawny.
Abbas wouldn’t give Bern a break, but when he’d step away he would be gone for hours. During his absence, she’d stick a makeshift sign she made with a large felt pen on the counter. It noted she’d be right back but instead would go sit out front with a pop and a cigarette. She’d witnessed the medicine man selling his wares outside the emporium before. He pulled a rickshaw behind him, targeting the hungry patrons of the hot dog emporium to purchase miracle tonics and herbal remedies instead. They were contained in small glass bottles, their tops crudely covered with, it seemed, whatever he could find: leaves, pieces of parchment, cloth, towels. Anything that wasn’t too cruddy.
His little tonics clinked and rocked as he took his rickshaw up and down the line, calling out to the unresponsive crowd. Bern never once saw him make a sale. One day, she grew curious and as he came close to her table, she waved him over. Before Bern even got the chance to ask a question, he jumped in and asked her if she was looking for a job. Without waiting for a response, he began telling her about his sister in Jennings.
She was a model in magazines, he told her. She’d been pictured in every girly magazine there was to read. He told her that she’s driven to Los Angeles and Seattle to have her pictures taken. Now, she’s opened her own business and needs help. He’d been making tonics and herbal remedies out of the cart in hope of opening up his own store one day. He told her there’d be big comfy chairs for people to sit in as they digest his miracle juice, similar to the cafes he witnessed over in the French Colonies of Northern Africa. But the sister’s business was successful and if he wanted to see any of that success, he needed to find her help besides himself.
‟Drivin’ up on the morrow if youse wan’. Moght be interestin’,” he grinned.
The medicine man’s name was Jeb. He’d been born as Jeremy but changed it to Jeb for spiritual reasons. He spent most of the drive to Jennings incapacitated, which meant Bern did most of the driving. He had a duffel bag filled with smaller bags of Marijuana. From these smaller bags, he pulled the flower, rolled it, and smoked it. Nearly as soon as one was finished he’d begin rolling up another. Many times he proffered her to take a puff. Bern refused.
Bern stayed in Jennings for two days, before riding her thumb to Santa Fe. She left in the middle of the night, abandoning Jeb and his sister’s start-up. They told her to be included, she first needed to invest one thousand dollars of her own money— which would be returned with interest almost immediately with how successful the business would be. Bern had never seen one-thousand to her own name, and it would be impossible for her to front that much.
In Santa Fe she worked as the help. She cleaned luxury ranch homes baked into the side of the foothills. The architecture was robust and sandy, mimicking Pueblos in Northern Spain. She was the only worker who spoke English and in turn became the vehicle of direction from the Matriarchs of the homes. If the Matriarch was home, they’d all keep their heads down and work silently. The woman of the Pueblo would glide through her home, arms crossed, eyes beaded like a prison warden. The ones like this would scrutinize mid-shift, after-shift, and after, after shift— It wasn’t unusual for the women to leave a nasty voice mail that waited for them at the company’s headquarters. The voice mail, addressed to the manager (to which the Matriarchs are unaware of is Luce who participated in the cleanings) would first be long and swirly. Unlike the way the women spoke to the help while in their homes.
Their greetings were elongated and effusive, reminiscent of the tone Bern’s mother adopted when conversing with Sandy—a friend she secretly despised but maintained a relationship with for the sake of weekend and holiday pool party invitations. Quickly, the tone would drop and become venomous. All the women who called exhibited this behavior, as if they participated in a collective which congregated solely for the orchestration of this strategy. This would occur time after time and yet, by the end of the week the women would always schedule them to come back.
In the homes in which they worked without supervision, the workers would chatter. She’d watch the way their mouths and tongues moved at the rapid speed in which they spoke. They tried to engage with her, using gestures and pointing to include her. Bern only shook her head and smiled, too embarrassed to reciprocate. While the women would chat and clean, light caught off the silver and gold plates embedded in their gums— their mouths formed like crystal geodes. Bern especially enjoyed hearing their voices. Their sentences silky-smooth like caramel rolling off their tongues. She was attuned to their fluidity; it was sexy and utterly indecipherable.
While they spoke, Bern wandered into the various bedrooms and offices. She obsessed over the personal spaces of those homes she temporarily inhabited. It felt intimate to her. She’d take an extra long time dusting picture frames just so she could closely examine each persons face and imagine their lives in her head. She used their habits and belongings to infer on who they were. She theorized on their patterns, their ways of thinking. After a few times at one house, Bern assumed she could have a person figured out.
After tidying their belongings, organizing their clothes, scrubbing the baseboards and mopping the floor, she’d sift through dresser drawers with a ruler. Careful not to toss the belongings, but just push them to one side and the other, like a doctor examining the throat of a patient. She dug her hands under the mattress’ of freshly made beds, hoping to grab at something. She searched for troves of secrets, stashed away from spouses.
It enticed her knowing that when she found a secret, it was a special knowledge only she and the person knew. Most often she’d find a trove of alcohol siphoned into a blank water bottle, or some grass tucked away in a ziploc. Even the discovery of pornographic magazines with a few pages glued together, tucked under a layer of business folders in the office became moot. These items were normal, certainly the unearthing of these items would be scary for those hiding it away, but they were not unusual.
The real high didn’t hit unless she discovered a discreet box under layers of folded coats. Inside which contained photos of a man who wasn’t in the family portraits. Letters of seduction and provocation exchanged with a woman from a different address and dated only mere months ago. Or images of bondage printed on professional letterheads and crumpled in between indexes of tax documents. These discoveries were her triumphs.
A burning grew inside Bern each time she revealed a hidden truth. Her desire to get closer grew stronger. Similar to when one starts falling in love. The mind finds any way it can to revert back to that person. Eventually, they occupy more space than thoughts of daily life. Eating, bathing, working, cleaning, they all become secondary. It was Bern’s obsession with these hidden truths that led her to start taking tokens. A polaroid from a hidden box. A clipping from a kink mag. A page of a transcribed phone call pulled from an envelope. She brought them home and like the others, hide them away despite living alone. In a tin box, similar to the ones nuclear mothers would pack their child's lunch in, Bern held onto the secrets of others.
She dusted a group of vases displayed on a mantle in the parlor room. She dusted these vases every other week for four months. Bern never suspected anything conspicuous about them, many who occupied the Pueblos had ornaments, pottery and trinkets on display. The vase at the far end was smooth, with streaks of yellow and powdery swirls of blue. It’s neck streamed upwards into a long flute and opened at the mouth like a blooming flower. She had finished dusting it and cradled it in her hands.
She ran her fingers along the thin streaks of blue that seemed to corrupt the piece from the bottom up. Bern was about to place it back on the shelf, when as if acting on pure instinct, she thrusted her hand into the vase. Truly expecting nothing but it’s hollowness, she was ready to set the vase down and laugh at herself when her fingertips grazed the crisp edges of an envelope. Her wrist was too wide and was stuck in the neck. Her fingers flicked the paper around the inside of the vase, pushing it from one side to another. A vacuum kicked on in the adjacent room. Its tremendous roar vibrated the home. Finally, she was able to clasp it between the tips of two fingers and extract it.
A stony Egyptian lived in the apartment across from her. Toasted breads, minced meats and North African spices wafted out from under his door and proliferated the hallway. Bern’s low effort meals shallow in comparison. Even with a full stomach, she salivated over his cooking. Bern wanted to make friends with him. With hopes they could one day cook together, eat together. But he is rarely seen. When he exits his apartment, he runs out of the building. The same with entering, even if others occupy the halls, he runs past without the slightest acknowledgment of them.
She took no notice of his cooking when she returned home with the document folded in her waistband. Shortly after retrieving the envelope from the vase, Luce entered the room. She scolded Bern. While the words said were beyond her, she knew what she meant. Bern had been dilly dallying, there was still work to do. She only intended to pull a part of the contents within the envelope, but was startled by Luce’s entrance and pocketed the whole thing.
The cafe didn’t provide music. Individuals sat silently over steaming cups of brewed coffee and folded newspaper pages. An elderly couple sat apart from each other, their noses pushed deep into the pages of sticky library books, and communicated with soft murmurs and grunts. Clinking dishes and the hum from the power washer drifted out from the back of the kitchen. Marcellina Green had her nose pressed into a pocket mirror. She examined her reflection curiously, tilting the mirror to expose an apparatus of spider veins clustered at her temple.
Marcellina rubbed at the temple with disdain; her skin indented at the point of her nail, and she traced the blue tendrils that led away from the web to her soft, unblemished skin. She applied a thin line of raspberry lipstick across her upper lip and snapped the mirror shut. Her hand shook as she re-lit a half-smoked cigarette. She took a long draw and turned her head, blowing the cloud of smoke behind her left shoulder. A waiter with a moppy haircut noticed this and came to their table. He told her his boss would yell at him if he didn’t tell them to go outside.
‟I can smoke at any other damned cafe in this city,” She insisted.
‟Well, not this one,” the waiter trailed off.
Marcellina huffed and gathered her belongings. They moved to low, lounge chairs positioned in the far corner of the outdoor patio. The joints of the table were weathered and rusted and it creaked when they put any weight on it. Marcellina had the habit of stamping the end of the cigarette rather than gently tapping it against the tray to ash it. Over lunch, she consumed nothing but tobacco fumes and an herbal tea which she pushed away after taking two sips. She spoke with an airiness, her breath escaping faster than words produced. Her eyes were big and watery. Bern spoke to her carefully.
‟Did you get my note, love?” Marcellina asked, ‟I was rather pent up d’you know?”
Bern nodded. Her mouth was full. She’d ordered a veggie burger without cheese. The waiter warned her it’d be dry. She took it anyway. They didn’t offer any additional condiments aside from mustard so the meal was exceptionally dry indeed.
‟Your building is quite drab, don’ you think?” She twisted a cigarette between her fingers. A small mound of tobacco leaves gathered on the table.
‟You said you liked it,” Bern swallowed some water. The food crawled down her esophagus without hurry.
‟I’d only seen it at night. Anything holy looks good under the moon.”
‟I like it.”
‟Rather. I can’t imagine it anything but stuffy there?”
Bern shrugged. ‟What are you doing later?”
Marcellina lifted an eyebrow. ‟Hubby and some of the pals are having a ball at the club. I think I’d rather not, but… oh Bern could you come as well? It would be just grand to have another lady to commiserate with.”
‟Well—”
‟Oh, please please please Bernie. Don’ make me suffer those mugs by my lonesome.” She interrupted.
‟I’ll think on it.”
‟Oh, Bernadice, you just have to!” Marcellina whimpered.
Marcellina was an excitable woman. Without doing much, Bern elicited many reactions during gatherings. Bern remained steadfast during tantrums, and breakdowns, but also moments of bliss and calm. She felt enraptured by Marcellina’s fragility. She moved against her better judgment and went to soothe the woman. Bern placed her hand on top of Marcellina’s and squeezed.
‟My husband’s goin-a kill me,” Marcellina whispered.
She woke up with a start. Her head was thrumming. The voices from her dream echoed in her mind. Her window was dewy from the mist. It was dark still. She rolled over, hoping to fall back to sleep, and was startled again by the figure slumbering next to her. A moment of sheer panic washed over Bern and she sat up. Who is this person? Her eyes adjusted and realized it was Marcellina. She had forgotten that the woman had spent the night. She reached back into her mind, trying to remember what happened the night prior. Did they go out?
No. No, they didn’t go out. Marcellina showed up unannounced. Bern was watching a picture on her RCA TV set. The amount of static dipped in and out depending on the weather and with last night’s rain it made the picture difficult to distinguish. She didn’t have enough money for a color, so she brought the screen in close to her bed and squinted at the grainy black and white picture. At some point during the showing Marcellina must’ve rang. That’s what must’ve happened. She dozed off again and woke up to Marcellina lifting her stockings.
‟I’m off,” She said when she saw Bern watching her. ‟Do wash your sheets, they smell quite foul.”
Bern sat up and wrapped her arms around the woman.
‟You want breakfast,” Bern asked.
‟Here?” She looked around at the apartment.
‟No, of course not.”
‟Then where do you suppose?”
‟We could go out?”
‟And whose to pay? Me?”
Marcellina moved away. Her shoes were leather riding boots. The color was pristine. There were no scuffs or marks of any kind.
‟You’re drying up my funds rather fast,” She continued.
‟I don’t have any money.”
‟Of course you don’t, dear.”
Marcellina blew her a kiss and left.
A group stood in front of the Santa Fe Country Club. Four school children played. Their motions were familiar, yet their faces were strained. They held plastic toys at their waist. One child was in motion, their face blurred and unfocused. A man stood with a parked car. He grinned and was looking away, at something off in the distance. His hand was placed on a gun holster that sat at his hip. A woman laid naked. A streak of semen ran across her torso. A belt throttled so tightly around her neck that the veins grew large and discolored. Her eyes were blank and appeared distended from her skull. Three pairs of shoes stood around the asphyxiated woman. A mutilated arm. At the wrist, the small whites of bone poked through the skin. The hand hung awkwardly.
These photographs spilled out onto the floor along with a ring. It had to be a wedding band, for the ring was golden and had an immaculate diamond placed on top. Bern picked each photo up and studied it. They were crisp. Folded only slightly from the bend they committed to inside the vase. She leaned into her butane stove, flicking on the pilot and torched the end of a cigarette. Bern was perplexed. Each photo was a visual feast. Captured in magnificent black and white photography, yet considering the contents, she felt uneasy. Unlike the other hidden truths she discovered which gave a small insight to those people’s interior lives, this discovery felt off. Malicious.
For all Bern knew, these photos don’t show any actual crimes committed. It could be a kink and she was only interpreting it differently. But those woman’s eyes really disturbed her. The way they looked lifeless. And as for the arm, it’s not clear whose it is. It could’ve been photographed just after an accident.
Bern tried to piece it in her mind. Why were these photos lumped together. Normally when a person hides a stash, it’s a clear trend. Pornography, drugs, etc. There isn’t a crossover. But here, some of these photos appear to be regular photos. So why would they be placed together in this envelope?
The Santa Fe Country Club was built up like an institute. The facilities proffered to club members were expansive. Tennis, swimming, pilates, golf, horseback, weight-training. Most of the savings Bern had maintained during her time working with the cleaners had went to her membership fee. A few thousand to drink a mimosa by the pool and gab with the other socialites. She stuck out sorely the first time she attended. Unlike these other women, whose outfits are trim, designer, and most importantly clean. Bern’s clothes were baggy, boyish. She wore work pants, a dirty tank, boots. All she had were work clothes.
She went in with the photograph from the envelope. She kept it folded in her pocket, with her hand placed on it. Afraid that if she lifted her hand for a moment the photo would vanish. She studied the faces in the picture. Memorizing each crooked nose and blank smile, hoping she could then recognize them in person. Bern walked through the gymnasium and stopped to watch a group play badminton. Their shorts were religiously white. The men’s arms were tanned but not burned. They moved cautiously, purposefully. No one took a misstep.
Bern sat at the bar and ordered a beer. The bartender gave her a curious look. She did this three more times. Explored the club. Observing. Never participating in any of the functions. Either she remained unnoticed or people were indifferent to her watching. She was never approached nor acknowledged. She was a invisible. On her fourth visit, she was sitting at the bar, her beer nearly empty. She was about to get up to leave when a woman appeared next to her.
‟Cosmo,” the woman called. The bartender’s eyes moved down, and stumbled to make the drink. His hands were a little shaky and he never looked up once. Bern hadn’t seen him react this way to any of the other club members. Normally, he wore a facade of confidence, would flirt with the older women. He had this cocky glint in his eye, but not with this woman.
‟You’re awfully spunky” the woman turned to her.
Bern went to make a snarky remark but thought better of it and shrugged. She didn’t recognize any of the people in the photograph, but she did recognize this woman. Her name was Marcellina Green and she was the woman whose house she pulled the photo from. They’d never met. Marcellina was never home to oversee the cleaners, but Bern was certain it was her. Like other homes, Bern studied her and her husbands portraits, family photos and private collection for the five months she’d been cleaning their home. Even though Marcellina had no chance of recognizing her, Bern still turned away nervously. There was always that what if.
‟Oh, did I startle you darling?” Marcellina laughed and placed her hand on Bern’s shoulder, ‟I suppose I am a bit of a fright.”
Bern never showed to the club. Marcellina told her to arrive at seven. She was overwrought with anxiety and spent the evening pacing across her living room. She wasn’t even sure what she hoped to achieve. She started for the door twice, keys in hand, before backing away. She tried to pass the time reading but her mind kept turning to the pictures. She examined the group photo under lamp light, examining each person’s face. One of the faces looked like Marcellina, but she couldn’t be sure. The photo was taken 20 yards from where the group posed. From the shadows that extended below their feet, it appeared that the picture was taken at mid-day, maybe slightly later. The sun had been directly overhead and didn’t give much depth or clarity to their features, but it did make their faces appear haunted.
Bern turned her apartment over searching for a magnifying glass to no avail. She was determined to I.D. Marcellina. Hoping to find some connection between one of the photos and the home in which she found it. She must’ve fallen asleep, because she awoke to a start to her phone ringing. She turned over, reaching for the phone, and knocked over a glass of water.
‟M’yello,” She whispered into the receiver when she finally got hold of it.
‟You didn’t come.”
Bern sat up, ‟Marcellina?”
‟Why didn’t you show?”
‟I fell asleep.”
‟That’s not an excuse Bernie.”
Bern didn’t know what to say.
‟I had to show. On my own.”
‟I wanted to, but I got nervous so I didn’t.”
‟I thought you fell asleep.”
‟Sure I did.”
‟Help me clarify.”
‟How?”
‟You got nervous and fell asleep?”
‟Yes.”
‟I still don’t understand.”
‟Neither do I,” Bern laughed.
‟I find your excuse pitiful. Maybe you shouldn’t come to the Club for a while.”
‟How longs a while?”
‟Long enough.”
Marcellina hung up. Bern turned the clock over. It was one in the morning. She fell asleep with all the lights on and was still in her day clothes. The water crept along her floor and stretched into a long, thin stream. She knew she should clean the spill and change out of her clothes, but she turned over and went back to sleep.
Three months passed without a word from Marcellina. Neither party tried contacting the other. Bern called out the previous two days her house was scheduled to be cleaned. Luce told her if she called out sick again, her hours would be cut. It was strange, being in her house again. All was how it was and should be, but with Marcellina’s absence in her life, everything felt off. Bern walked through the house, pretending to clean, and examined the pictures of her and her husband instead.
He was a tall drink of a man. His hair was tight and curled at the top. He wore tinted spectacles and had them on in all the displayed photographs. They held onto each other, but with resistance. Like a child being forced to grasp an Aunt they don’t have any relationship with. Bern could see the strained looks in their faces. She knew they hated each other. She didn’t see if before, but it was so clear now. Their disdain pictured, photographed and to remain witness on their walls.
She spent the first shift wandering, barely cleaning. The women mumbled and glared at her lack of work. Bern felt like a ghost in their house. She felt like her purpose was lost. She felt so stupid. She went home and went straight to bed without showering. Her hair was frizzy and clumped from sweat. A small pile of dirty bowls and silverware sat in her sink and needed cleaning. Flies rubbed their hands together greedily and buzzed about her apartment. Her fingernails had grim built up underneath— she didn’t care.
She moved through her life as she did prior to meeting Marcellina. There was indeed a levity from canceling her membership at the country club, but she still felt as if there was something remiss. She took herself to the movies, she walked through parks. She tried to distract herself, but the mystery of the photos she pulled from their house, and of Marcellina, consumed her. It was all she could think of.
The next time she went to Marcellina’s home, she told herself she wouldn’t let it affect her the way it had before. She had begun to scrub the rugs as she was told to do, but the draw of the unknown in the house tugged at her. She ended up in their bedroom. It started slowly, at first. She pulled open a dresser drawer and shifted through their belongings. When she found nothing and moved to the next one, she became more aggressive in her searching. And aggressive more in the next. Soon thereafter, the bedroom drawers were ravaged. Flinging briefs and nightgowns. She flipped over their pillows and tossed about shoes in the closet. She yanked their rug, causing a tear to form where the bed sat on it. She knew something was amiss. But it was beyond her.
Bern was digging under the mattress when Luce came looking for her. Her hand was brushing against a firm object under the bed when the woman yelled at her to come. Bern pushed her hand deeper, ignoring the woman’s fury. Luce streamed across the room and yanked Bern around. Her fingers were just grasping around the hidden object when she slapped Bern hard across the face and knocked her down to the floor.
‟Fire,” Luce said.
The bar was dark, back-lit by a warm, orange lit above the bartender. Someone put Zeppelin III on again. It’s got to be a joke, the number of times someone can listen to the same song over and over. Bern figured someone was playing a bit, because in no good faith can someone want to listen to the same song five times within an hour. It was so dim that the people who moved through the bar were shrouded in shadow; ghastly figures who’ve come here to die. She stood up and humped forward, bumping into a large shadowy figure.
‟Bless’um,” Bern muttered.
It was cool outside despite the day being blisteringly hot. Nearby is the Rio Chama river which cuts through downtown Santa Fe. She could hear the rush of water. It’s commanding force living just out of sight. Bern closed her eyes and listened to the river. It was telling her something, but was indecipherable to her ears. She made a mental note, telling herself to write down how to understand the river so she wouldn’t forget.
Her moment of thought was interrupted by the sound of tires churning through mud and devilish headlights cast upon her. Bern tried stepping aside, but unknowingly stepped in the direction the truck was turning. The driver rolled his window down.
‟Hey, move on lady.”
Bern raised her hand in apology and stumbled forward. She put up her thumb.
‟I’m tryin’ park dammit!”
Bern nodded and left the parking lot.
Bern was out of breath when she reached the summit of the foothill. Sweat ran down her forehead and pooled under her arms. The breeze was more intense at the top. It swept through in gusts that fluttered her hair around. Either her drunken state faded or she sweat it out for she felt considerably sober. She wished she still had some of that drunken courage for now an anxiety overcame her. The Pueblo stood before her, illuminated with rich lights which appeared like small bursts of contained sunlight.
Bern peaked through the garage windows, needing to lift off her heels to see in. There was one car parked in the garage. A grey tarp draped over it. At the side of the house, Bern kicked rock and dirt from her boots before removing them completely. She approached the rear of the house in her socks. She stepped on the tile spaces, carefully placing her toes down before her heel like one does when they’re testing the water of a pool.
The back of the house was dark. No lights appear to be on in the house. The grass in the backyard has been ripped up, leaving it to be upturned roots and dirt clumps. A large mound of fresh grass lay stacked in the far corner, waiting to be placed. Adjacent to it was a mound of mulch. At the top of the mound an animal scurried away at the sight of Bern.
The back door was locked. The windows were locked. The blinds were drawn. Her hand shook as she removed the keyring from her pocket. Each key was marked with an address on small, red tape. Bern combed past the keys until she reached the one with this address. The lock unlatched and she crept in slowly. She embodied the feline, taking to the darkness and slinking along the walls. She reached her toe out, touched the ground and then lurched forward to avoid contact with light streaming in from the outside.
Her feet pattered against the stairs as she quickly climbed to the second floor. She hid in a hallway bathroom, listening for any noise— any disturbance that wasn’t her. She lifted her ear and waited. She wanted to be sure before entering the bedroom. But all she could hear was the soft lift and heave of her breathe and the wind as it rippled against the roof. Her heart sank when she approached the bedroom door. It was shut. What if someone was inside? Asleep? She hadn’t considered that. She figured if someone was home they wouldn’t be in bed at this time. Why hadn’t she considered that?
Bern didn’t think turning back was an option. The brass knob was cold. It made a loud clicking noise when she turned it. She opened the door just wide enough for her to slide in and stood in the corner of the room.
‟You’re back too soon,” Marcellina whispered and turned over in bed.
The room was dark. The blinds were drawn tight. Bern stood petrified in her corner. Unable to move, Marcellina turned towards the door. Her figure took shape in the darkness. Bern couldn’t see it but heard her tumble out of sight. Bern heard a drawer open and the click of a revolver hammer moving to place. Bern closed her eyes, afraid to move. Marcellina rolled into view. It was so dark, but Bern was positive she could see the fury lit in the woman’s eyes.
‟It’s me it’s me it’s me it’s me!” Bern shouted and raised her hands.
Marcellina pauses and lowers the weapon a moment before raising it again.
‟Turn on the light!” She yelled.
‟Where is it?” Bern asks desperately.
‟Over there,” Marcellina gestures with the barrel.
Bern fluttered with the switch a moment before flicking it on.
‟That bastard,” Marcellina said.
The cigarette shook in between her lips. The welt was large. It was purple on the outside and turned into a gradient, transitioning to a sickly green as it moved to the center. It grew into the right side of her lips, making them swollen and puffy. It was obviously painful for her to hold the cigarette in her mouth. The gun never left her hand, despite Bern doing her best to convince Marcellina she wasn’t there to kill her. They sat in stunned silence with cups of coffee between them.
They moved to the couch. Bern stroked the woman’s hair and prodded gently at the mark left on her face. She wouldn’t tell Bern how it happened. At first claimed that she fell, but Bern saw that Marcellina instantly recognized how implausible that was. She eventually fell asleep in Bern’s arms on the couch. Bern was never explicitly told to leave, so when she was certain Marcellina was asleep, she crept back upstairs to the bedroom.
Regardless of whether Marcellina was there or not, was okay or not, didn’t matter. Whatever was under the bed felt like it was an answer to a mystery Bern wasn’t even sure existed. She was certain of it. The bedroom was left disheveled from the intrusion. The blankets were thrown on the floor. A few bullets must’ve fallen from wherever Marcellina pulled the gun. Their hard, compact casings rolled under her feet. Bern upturned the mattress, letting it fall off the frame.
Aside from the stashing of a nudie magazine, it was empty. The firm object Bern had barely grasped before Luce slapped her was gone now. She streaked through the closet. Tearing open shoe boxes and pulling aside bundles of clothes. Her key had been there, but she was just short of finding it. She came up empty and crashed down on the couch next to Marcellina. The woman opened her eyes slightly at Bern’s arrival.
‟Say, was your husband ever married before you?”
‟Why no, no I’m his first wife. Why?” She yawned.
‟I tore apart your room,” Bern said.
‟Why?”
‟I don’t know anymore.”
‟Hmm well… The cleaners are coming in the morning anyhow.”
Bern and Marcellina didn’t see each other for another month. Bern would come home from the warehouse and sometimes find notes stuck to her front door like she used to. But they never prompted an invitation, it was simply a ‟quick hello’’. They shared a few phone calls, but they never lasted more than five or so minutes, with Marcellina always needing to leave abruptly. When Bern prodded, the woman’s answer was vague.
‟I can’t talk much these days,” She whispered into the receiver.
Bern worked in a lumbar warehouse. She was responsible for overseeing the bundling and shipping of lumber to outside facilities. She was the only woman, but fit in nicely. At first the men didn’t give her a piece of mind, but she liked to think they warmed to her. The pay was decent, and she was able to get off work early enough in the afternoon to go see a picture in the evening.
She tried to put Marcellina out of her head, and the photos found within her house. But some nights when she can’t sleep she wanders to her closet. A poster covered the side wall. All sides are tacked down except one, where Bern lifts on the tab, exposing a small, dugout crevice. There the envelope lies with her metal tin of collected belongings. Sometimes, she’ll stick her hand in to make sure they’re all there. Knowing it’s there gives her comfort. Other times, she’ll pull out the envelope and examine the contents within.
Bern was invited by a few of her coworkers to go out. They were to see a movie and all go to dinner afterwards. Most of them had wives or girlfriends they brought along. Bern went alone. The movie was lousy. The previews for it were quite frightening and everyone was excited to see what it was all about, but it ended up not being nearly as scary as it was made out to be. Over dinner, everyone gabbed about the film. It spooked one of the wives for she kept saying, ‟Well I don’t know what you lot are talkin’ bout. I thought it was quite frightening.”
After dinner, a few of the couples retired to their homes, but two of them proposed to try out a new bar that opened downtown.
‟Want to come?” They asked Bern.
Bern felt strange coming along without a partner, but figured all she’d do is go home and drink anyways. The bar was sleek, with modern designs and trim architecture. It was built into the side of an old bank building, with the upper floors remodeled for apartment homes. When they entered they immediately noticed they were outliers, for the average age of the people at the bar were younger than them. A lot of them looked barely eighteen. Tommy ordered shots for all them. He passed the liquor around and said ‟Salude.”
When the third round was coming to the table, Bern saw a familiar tuft of hair sweep by. A man and woman held arm in arm were hustling towards the exit.
‟I’ll be right back,” Bern shouted over the noise.
Bern followed the couple outside. They rushed past a group of boys who were bent over studying a collapsed rat on the sidewalk. Bern brushed past them, knocking into one boy.
‟Hey, watch it,” he called.
‟Sorry,” Bern called back.
The couple hurried around the corner.
‟Hey!” Bern shouted after them.
Marcellina glanced back at her. Their eyes connected for a moment before the man tugged her forward.
‟Hey! Wait!” Bern called.
The man looked back at Bern and whispered something into Marcellina’s ear. Marcellina nodded and they stopped.
They said nothing when Bern approached.
‟Hey,” Bern smiled.
Marcellina looked away.
Bern turned to the man, ‟Hey I’m Bernie.” She stuck out her hand for him to shake.
He gripped it and shook briefly.
‟Is this your husband?” Bern turned back to Marcellina.
‟Just a friend,” he smiled.
‟What’s your name, friend?”
‟Cox,” he squinted.
‟What did you think of the place?” Bern jutted her thumb back towards the bar, ‟We’re getting too old?”
Marcellina and her friend stared back blankly.
‟Well,” Bern thumbed her jeans pocket, ‟I saw ya and wanted to say hey.”
‟What are you doing tonight?” Marcellina blurted.
‟I dunno,” Bern chuckled and tried to remain relaxed, ‟It’s pretty late. Out with friends now but probably go home soon. Why?”
Bern eyed her and the man named Cox. His cold eyes never left Bern’s face. He looked familiar but she couldn’t place him.
‟You good?” Bern asked.
Marcellina look up at Cox before reverting back to her normal self, ‟We’re supposed to meet up with some pals. Say, I’d love to have a girlfriend tag along.” She turned away cooly and then focused back on Bern.
Cox seemed to fidget when she said this. Bern wasn’t positive, but his motion seemed like he bumped into Marcellina.
‟Sure, I can come,” Bern said eying the man, ‟Tell me where.”
‟My house actually. Rather drab don’t you say?”
‟We should get going Marcy,” The man began to pull away.
‟Be there in an hour,” her eyes narrowed in on Bern’s.
‟Okay, I will.”
Cox pulled Marcellina away.
‟See you soon,” Bern called after them.
Bern knocked twice on the large wooden door to the Santa Fe Pueblo. It was five minutes past midnight. She could hear chatter and noise through the door. Someone thumped down the stairs. Bern jammed her finger into the door bell; it’s tone rang through the home, hushing the interior. A man with a mustache that swallowed his mouth opened the door. His eyes were bloodshot. He seemed to have been expecting someone else because he had greeted her like they knew each other, but when he realized it was Bern on the other side of the door his face grew serious.
‟There’s a lady here,” He called out.
Bern heard an object clatter to the floor and roll into the wall.
‟—chaps sit down. No sit down dammit” She appeared at the door with a smile plastered on her face, yet her eyes were dire. Someone called from the living room, but Bern couldn’t make it out.
‟—just a friend.” Marcellina said and pulled her in. The mustached man stayed in place and Bern needed to push against him to move inside.
Marcellina gripped her arm around Bern’s and announced, ‟Fellas! This is Bernie!”
The coffee table was set up with clusters of beer bottles and paper cups stacked up into a pyramid shape. Shoes were strewn about on the floor near the entrance. Some lay sideways and others turned upside-down like they’d been kicked off in a hurry. Bern would’ve tripped over a hulking pair of black rider boots had Marcellina not wound her arm around her own so tight. An avalanche of cards sat abandoned on the dinner table. A man slid the back patio door open and poked his head inside. He watched Bern enter the house. He surveyed the room with an upturned eyebrow and withdrew from view.
‟Bernie,” Marcellina continued introductions, ‟These are the fellas. That’s Romy and over there, that’s Rick, and there’s Lin.” She pointed to each man as she said their names.
‟Oh dammit and Cox is around her somewhere. Oh, but you were introduced earlier, yes? Yes. ” She said cheerily.
None of the men reacted to their introductions; they only gazed back, their eyes glossed over or looked down at their beers.
‟And the big scary behind us is Lindsey,” She continued. ‟But, he’s only a big baby, aren’t you?” She asked in a baby voice.
Lindsey glared at Bern and turned away into the study. Bern watched him enter the study and quickly glanced a young woman sitting upright in an armchair. Her face was doughy and splotches ran across her jawline. Her eyes swiveled to meet Bern’s. Bern was about to ask who she was when Lindsey swung the door shut.
Marcellina led Bern up the staircase.
‟Hey! What about the game?” Someone called from below.
Marcellina leaned over the railing, ‟You mugs play on your own, Bern and I have things.”
She danced around the bedroom silently. Her foot swiped at the floor in her mock dance. Her arch curved into a saber and led to an exquisite point. Her eyes were closed yet Bern could read the focus which seemed to strain her. It made her look older, oddly. Her face crumpled and revealed wrinkles. Her cheeks were puffed and clumpy. She twirled into a magnificent finale, bowing before an unseen audience before collapsing onto the white duvet. It lifted into the air and crumpled down unevenly. Makeup exploded across her vanity. Various shades of nail-polish were left opened and discarded. Dirty makeup cloths made a small pile at the edge of the surface. The mirror to the vanity contained a row of delicate kiss marks; endured on the reflective glass by the color of plum and burgundy, peach and bronze. Each smudge was so gentle that Bern felt the heat of jealousy rise in her cheeks.
‟Where’s your husband?” Bern asked prodding at a pimple.
‟Oh,” Marcellina paused, ‟He isn’t invited.”
‟How do you mean?”
‟How I mean is, he isn’t, wasn’t, invited.”
‟I see.”
She sat down next to her friend. Her hands laid still in her lap, yet they vibrated with inhibition. The woman rolled to her side. Her eyes too were bloodshot. Her hair was hardened and clumped together from too much product. She smelled of alcohol and overripe fruit. She held Bern’s gaze for a long time before Bern grew uncomfortable and looked around the room.
‟Who was the girl downstairs?”
‟Who?” Her face scrunched up with confusion.
‟The girl. The one downstairs.”
‟Was she with the fellas?”
‟She was in the study.”
‟Oh, her,” Marcellina said and rolled her eyes, ‟just one of their pets, d’you know? They like to keep a glammed up doll around. Apparently, I’m much too fraught for them.”
Marcellina was wearing a dress far too sheer for company. It fell at her shoulders and presented her abdomen with grace. She and Bern never really had much to say to each other. They normally found themselves at an unspoken understanding. Bern tried to remember what Marcellina was first like. She was utterly bewitched by her; her eyes were compact and brown, with flecks of golden light caught within. She was unlike any woman Bern had ever been friends with, and yet the more time she spent with Marcellina, the more difficult she became to understand.
‟You’ve always been fraught?”
‟No, no. Of course not. You know me darling. Only those saps downstairs think so. You have a muff with a husband, no problem,” Marcellina said. ‟But a muff with a brain, oh George are you tough.”
Marcellina twirled her hair with a stiff finger.
‟Are you okay?” Bern asked.
‟Peachy,” Marcellina said through pursed lips.
The catalog was a large bank that ran alongside the Rio Chama River. She’d never been to it before, but was aware of its existence due to it being a popular spot for bashes amongst teens and young adults. When Bern first moved to Santa Fe, she spent her hours after work wandering the used bookstore. She liked the smell of the store. It was a labyrinth of books, towering tall over the pathway. Each tome brimmed with yellowed pages and the faint, musty scent of history. It was difficult to distinguish the organization method of the place; some sections were by author’s name, others by genre. A large section at the back of the store was designated to the cultivation and propagation of the three-leaf sumac. While flipping through the pages of a novel she’d read during primary school and forgotten about, a young man approached her.
‟You seem like a righteous lady,” he leaned in close, ‟be here tonight.” He pushed a wrinkled flyer into her hand. The printing press they used for the flyer smudged the ink. The words were dark and hard to read. A crudely drawn smiley face swam in the corner. Bern couldn’t make out everything it said but made out the words, At the Catalog, 8 till late.
A young girl went missing last spring. She’d been missing for a week before her parents reported her disappearance to the police. It had been two weeks after that when they discovered the body. She was last seen at a party held at the Catalog. Authorities had the local paper print a blown-up copy of the flyer for that nights party. It was for a spring jubilee; printed with a dancing clown at the center of the page surrounded by a perimeter of floral print.
They requested any persons with information to the throwing of the party or who was in attendance should go to the police immediately. Before any new evidence came through, a volunteer with the search committee found her washed up on the side of the Rio Chama six miles down from the Catalog. Her body was camouflaged by the Earth. She had sunk into the mud leaving only her appendages protruding. Ants and other pests had hollowed out her eyes. A Vulture swooped in and plucked out her tongue. Her parents held each other and cried in front of Television Cameras.
‟Our dughter would never— never go tuh party. We raised huh better.”
Bern was at a dinner hosted by Tommy and his wife. She asked if either of them had gone to the Catalog before.
‟I’ve never been,” His wife laughed in hysterics, ‟I’m too old.”
Two weeks after seeing Marcellina, Bern received a note. It must’ve not been stuck on well because when she came home from work, she found it lying at the foot of her door. This one was unusual however, for it wasn’t done up with her normal hearts and pink sign-age. This one was in a white envelope, it’s message brief and without signature. It was an invitation to another party. At the Catalog.
Marcellina must have figured Bern had never been out there because she also included a map of how to arrive. Part of the city was sketched out with a drawing of where the river and the trail meet. She either got bored or ran out of time because it was left unfinished and the rest of the directions were written out. The last being:
Be there 10
The city was drenched in amber light from the passing street lights. The buildings were shrouded in mist, conveying the feeling that she was suspended in a dream. Bern passed men dressed in luminescent green handling power saws. They too appeared stuck in a dream with their movements exaggerated and slow as they disassembled a felled tree.
The note said to walk along the country trail and turn off when she got to the mile marker that had crude drawings etched into the side of it. However, along the trail Bern spotted three different half-mile markers with exaggerated penis’ scratched into them. Bern waited and listened for the the roar of the water, it’s gurgling created a liquid sound-scape and turned off at the one that seemed closest to the river. The hush-haw of water sucked into air pockets and pooled out over jagged rocks. It gave the feeling that the wood’s lungs were filled with fluid.
She wandered the path, wondering if it was the right one. The county trail disappeared behind her and she was aligned with the running river. Parts of the bank were dredged, the clearing had large branches strewn about. Tufts of weeds, pulled out in bunches, were tossed in a pile at the clearing’s edge. There was no clear path. She wandered the dark and cursed herself for not considering a flashlight. She tripped over a downed tree branch and frogs scuttled to pools of water to avoid her stumbling feet. The muddy path squished below her, and ate at her soles. She couldn’t find a dry patch anywhere. Every step seemed to sink her deeper and deeper, pulling her to be level with the Rio Chama.
An unseen bird sang songs of moonlight stupor. Unlike the songs of merry when birds greet another day of sunshine, this one was melancholic, lonely. Bern pushed through scraggly branches to a large clearing. Empty beer bottles and cigarette packs lay scattered across the empty ground. At the far end of the clearing was a trashcan. It’s skeleton crisp and warped to a gooey-tar substance due to frequent immolation. A tire swing hung at the river’s edge off a craggy branch. It’s rope was twisted and contorted, resembling the auto-cannibalism of the uroboros.
Bern was certain this was the catalog. It had a lingering energy. As if the space itself was alive and dancing still. The trashcan had dull red embers that radiated at the bottom of the receptacle warmed her ankles when she got close. Her foot pressed something firm and round into the spongy earth. Bern leaned over in the dark and searched for it. She pulled the buried piece of metal loose and knocked the dirt from it’s cavity. Bullet casings, three of them, accumulated on the ground near her foot. Bern wasn’t sure how long she’d wandered through the woods, but she missed them. The party was long gone.