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Dido put down
her coffee cup and stared at the computer screen with
more interest and wonder than it deserved. It was winter
time and she felt cold and insecure. She distracted herself for a moment with a
trinket – a small cat keychain her daughter had bought for her at the Christmas
Fair back in ’92. She wondered if somewhere out there, in the foggy night, if
her daughter ever thought of her and her
suburban Philadelphia life or remember all the times she
drove her to soccer practice and spelling bees and all those other American
perfect pleasantries.
She scrolled through her aol account.
Bills, bills, the bold herald of an email. Nothing from Michael just yet.
She placed the
coffee cup on the coaster and adjusted it accordingly. Everything in its place.
Waste not, want not. All the axioms of a truly American woman – albeit one
alone with her thoughts and an AOL Instant Messenger account.
Dido looked at
the numbers on the microwave. They blinked 7:00. This
was the time she usually spet washing dishes after cooking a
fresh salmon and mustard meal , listening to her carefree kids on the couch, watching
cartoons. Her husband napped on the sofa, a blanket covering his eyes from the
light as she scrubbed away at the pots and pans, adjusting the heart chain
around her neck.
The pile of
envelopes on the table caught her blue eye. She put her
chin in her palm. A bill from Dr. Mulligan. A notice from
the Philadelphia Electric Company and the Department of Health. It was just all
too much to address at once.
She wondered
if he would get online tonight. If he would type to her that everything was going to be alright and that she wasn’t
alone. Sometimes he used adjectives she didn’t understand so she
bookmarked Dictionary.com as a reference.
There was
something odd about waiting for him every night at the same time. When they chatted it was like all was forgotten. Her
world of Kohl’s and working part time book keeping at Carpet World.
None of it mattered. She felt like one of those princesses in the
stories her
goddaughter at Harvard used to write about.
Princess. That
wasn’t something she could have ever related to. She wore denim and cotton every day. She owned nothing with
lace.
She remembered
the day he asked her for a topless photo. She had been
caught up and distracted at work. The day was full of clouds
and Carly
Simon kept coming on the radio
and her morning coffee wasn’t doing
what it was supposed to. They had been chatting online all
morning and
she just got lost in the moment.
She felt like
she was 16 again – like she did in the days of jean cut offs, aluminum beer
cans and brown rusted Pintos by the lake. The days when she had long hair to
her waist and used to kiss boys in the thickets of upstate Pennsylvania
forests. Those summers felt like they would never end - fireflies, Led Zeppelin on the radio and
shirtless boys with mustaches.
But now Dido was in the bathroom, hiking up her shirt to
reveal a
pastel waist, fraught with Caesarian scars and marks from
eating chocolates and drinking wine late nights alone in bed. This was the body
she was coming to know and for some reason, this inviting stranger took an
interest in it. More than her husband ever had.
She was
wearing a red lace bra – brand new from JcPenney’s. She had
smiled to herself when she bought it.
Dido used her Nokia and snapped a quick picture of
herself in the mirror and rushed back to the beige office where she worked. She
immediately asked him he received the picture. When he replied “NO” her heart
sank deep into her stomach. She looked at her phone.
Had she accidentally sent it to her
husband? Had it become lost in the Cyber Universe? Did her BOSS see it?!
The seconds felt like an eternity.
Anticipation was becoming the
underlying feeling of her life.
] “GOT IT!
WOW!!!!!!!!!!!!!@!!!!!!”
He typed back.
Textual tension.
Her heart
readjusted itself. She pulled out a Marlboro from her 1988 brown cigarette
case. She lit up right in the office, knowing full well it was forbidden. But
nowadays the forbidden was all she was about.
As the weeks
went by, she kept taking pictures for him, each time in
some not-so-secluded location. At work, in the Target
restroom. She thought she had mastered the side angle of herself that showcased
her best features. She now went to Boscov’s once a week for a new pair of underwear. Her red cell phone
rang. It was her daughter phoning it in from a quick jaunt to Italy. Dido ignored
the call and kept on shopping.
Her life was
changing – finally. After all these years, the suburban nightmare was ending and someone was finally loving her for who she
was. She WAS beautiful, dammit, and thinner than anyone else in the neighborhood.
Why wouldn’t a hygienist married with his own family want her?!
One November
afternoon, she realized they had gone an entire day without chatting. It was 4 o’clock and she lingered in the
office waiting for him. She attempted to distract herself but it was impossible.
What am I doing with myself?! she
demanded and cried gobs of mascara
down her cheeks.
It was hard to
drive home that day – with the tears in her eyes blurring the way. She went
home and turned on Oprah, mindlessly devouring a bag of Hertz potato chips. She
had started LIVING for these chats. It
wasn’t about Jillian and Nathaniel anymore or Lionel or Sylvia
or Alan. It was for these stolen sentences on the screen on her Dell that made
her want to wake up in the morning.
It crossed her
mind to toss the computer across the room. That $500 machine only brought her
misery.
But she left
her Instant Messenger open – hoping she might hear the twinkling spritely noise
that heralded his return to their little world. Sure enough…
It was
February now.
The waiting
room at Dr. West’s office smelled like apple juice. That’s what Yankee Candle
had intended. Dido looked to her left to
a stack of Entertainment Weekly. She nervously adjusted herself in the seat-
straightening her posture and tucking a weft of Clairol colored hair behind her
shoulder. In her head she had practiced answers to questions she thought the
doctor might ask.
Had she
ever smoked marijuana?
No.
Ever
contemplated suicide?
No.
What is your favorite color?
Red.
Dr. West
entered the room with squared white teeth as Dido was muttering something to herself. Dido immediately noticed the doctor’s bronzed knees
peaking out from underneath her dirndl skirt. The white teeth shook her hand.
“So nice to
meet you! Come upstairs.” This doctor cooed like a pigeon.
“So tell
me,” looking her in the blue eye as she crossed her denim legs, “What brings
you here?”
A question Dido
had not anticipated. She had thought the
session would begin with something like a Rorschach test.
Dido scanned the room and noted how much she loved
the cat print quilt draped over the spare chair.
Dr. West
smiled.
“I am not sure if I am having
what may or may not be considered an affair.”
The doctor
did not stir.
“Tell me
about that.”
It felt
strange to say that sentence out loud. All of the months she had quietly kept
this to herself – not mentioning it to her neighbor Denise or coworker Angie,
her pals and confidants. As she annunciated each word, her internet tragedy
became more than just html and binary code. It felt as though she somehow was
being drowned in a digital bath. She wasn’t sure how but it did. In her mind,
she envisioned her husband, his bloated bell over her in the lavender scented
bubbles of chat pop ups and memes wrapping his palms around her throat and
plunging her face beneath the water made up of 0’s and 1’s.
Marilyn
asked her a lot of questions and Dido coolly supplied her with many answers in
return. But the whole time she was fixated on thoughts of that technological
bath tub and maybe, just maybe, visions of her family’s finch lying belly up in
sawdust at the bottom of his cage.
“I’m going
to Prague, Mom, and may never ever come back,” the telephone receiver said.
“But I may come home for a few days to see you because I don’t know if and when
I’ll afford to do that again.”
“Ok,” Dido said flatly, staring at the mirror. “You
should do that.
“Thanks,
Moooooom,” Jillian purred and hung up.
“Mom,” Nathaniel
shouted from the foyer through all
American orthodontia. “I’m going to Alex’s house. See you Monday!”
“Ok,” Dido replied feebly. “You should do that…” Voice
trailed off into the air.
The phone
rang again. It was Lionel on the line telling her her was going to be late at the
shop again.
“Ok. You
should do that.”
By the time
Dido put the receiver back in its
cradle, smoke was bellowing from the kitchen.
Today she
had chipped her best Revlon nail polish and burnt the meatloaf.
Dido was wearing grey sweatpants and maroon Keds
the evening the cops took her away. As the cameras flashed in her face, she
noticed she had forgotten to water the azaleas and that the mulch was
distributed evenly. How embarrassing.
Her outdoor cat, Mimsy, cradled a dead sparrow in its paws and looked up at her
with dishsaucers.
“You
monster!” Denise next door screamed in her bathroom. Mimsy, at the sound of her
shrieking, dashed off, leaving the sparrow behind.
The soles
of the Keds sneakers were stained with dark dried blood and they pressed into
the soft earth beneath them.
In the
crowd, she caught the gaze of her dentist – the second time she had seen him
face to face since their romance had commenced. His arms were folded and he
shook his head.
Last week
they had met at the studio Dido ’s father in law had maintained. They kissed
and caressed on the concrete floor of the garage as a dust covered stereo
played Journey.
Dido ’s
eyes were shut as she thought of summer and jean cut off shorts and brown
Chevrolets and feathered hair.
When she opened
her eyes, she saw the round figure of her disapproving husband looming above
the kissing couple – about to spew profanity of the most depraved kind.
She had
decided to do it when the divorce papers arrived promptly on her desk. Dido took
her keys and cell phone and an abnormally large box cutter the owner of Carpet
World had left behind.
At home her
children lie selfishly asleep in the haze of a Wednesday afternoon. Jillian had
swallowed a Melatonin pill in preparation for the jet lag before her and Nathaniel
had smoked his father’s marijuana to himself on the terrace.
No one had
bothered to take out the trash or clean the unwashed dishes or put the wet
towels in the dryer. Lionel, too, lie peacefully asleep upstairs taking a break
from doing absolutely nothing.
Dido wasn’t
sure of what she was being asked by the reporter as she said, “No comment.”
All she
could think about was getting a new gmail account and picking a new favorite
color.
Note: This is a really, really rough draft. I know there are at least 2 parts that are repeated and I am just trying to decide where in the story I would like to keep them. Just thought I'd share with everyone this work in progress.
While I appreciate constructive criticism, if you are one of those individuals who has nothing to say but that my writing is "cliche," I don't really care to have your input since I'm pretty sure you don't attempt anything anyway.
“It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood, who strives valiantly; who errs and comes short again and again; because there is not effort without error and shortcomings; but who does actually strive to do the deed; who knows the great enthusiasm, the great devotion, who spends himself in a worthy cause, who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement and who at the worst, if he fails, at least he fails while daring greatly. So that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who know neither victory nor defeat.”
PEACE!
