The Light that Life is Made Of

If she had not been distracted by a cobweb she suddenly saw hanging from the corner of the bedroom ceiling, she might not have spoken at all. She still would have wondered, but probably would never have asked Benett, "How do I look?"

"Fine, Honey, fine." He gently moved her from in front of the mirror so he could adjust his tie. "Really," he continued, making an effort to relax, "you won't even have to get out of the car. I don't know why you always make such a fuss." His mother had always told her how beautiful she was. But the creature she saw over her husband's shoulders in the mirror seemed limp and lifeless. Eyeliner might help.

There was no time for it. "I'll drive out if you want," he said. "I just need to get my bags." She thought she was sighing, and when he turned to give her a quick kiss on the cheek, she thought she flinched. "Well," he said, "I'll drive out, okay?"

     the sky is unfolding with magic dark ribbons       but what do i see in them what are they made of       the light in the trees       i'll call it green water       i'm breathing      i'm breathing

Sarah mechanically turned to get her purse, gazing after Benett, who was disappearing through the living room with a suit bag slung over his shoulder. Purse in hand, she glanced once more into the mirror as though to acknowledge the presence of a stranger. She knew she was forgetting something, because she was always forgetting something. But whatever it was, it wouldn't matter. And she went on to the car.

He had just closed the trunk. "Got everything you need? Got your keys, right?" Her keys were in her purse. She thought she smiled as she nodded. He grasped the door handle and the sound the door made, opening for him, was crystalline and sharp.

She didn't want to drive home. The sun would be in her eyes, with its thousands of splinters of light wriggling in front of her on the windshield like a map that couldn't decide what to be, that kept changing. She felt the familiar little jerk of motion as Benett began backing out of the garage. She found her hands smoothing down her hair, which reminded her somehow of seaweed, though it returned a glistening yellow echo to the sun as they backed down the driveway. She checked her door, since she didn't remember opening or closing it.

Benett was smiling at her. "You look fine," he said softly, as though only the touch of a ball of cotton should be needed to make her perfect and invisible. He really seemed to care. And that was almost too sad to think about. He was a good man.

Sarah wondered if she were repeating herself when she heard herself say, "I hope..." The trees of the neighborhood were flowing past her, and she let her eyes wander upstream. Not so far from home were things she couldn't be certain she had ever seen before.

"Why the long face, Sarah? Everything will be okay. The car's got plenty of gas for the week, my itinerary's on the fridge. Jason's coming over to do the yard on Wednesday, and if there's anything I forgot, just give me a call, and I'll take care of it." They stopped at a light, and he patted her knee. She reached over to rub his arm and ended up picking a light-colored loose thread from his sports coat. She looked out at the sky. They were still a mile from the freeway.

"I just meant..." She had the thought, but wasn't sure how to put it into words.

"I know, Honey, and I appreciate the thought. But you — well, we both know there's nothing new here. I don't like it any better than you do, and I know it hasn't been too easy the past several years. But you do great, you really do, and..."

      the sun is exploding &       what do you call it when distance is close       and closeness is distance       maybe the insects and birds know about it       with insects with birds       and the lines on the highway       daddy went on a trip

He would be in Seattle soon. The pretty key ring Robert had given her for Christmas dangled in front of her hand as she drove. She realized that the sun was not in her eyes. Maybe it had gotten cloudy.

Maybe she had had a life, somewhere, at some time, hidden behind this mass of lines all tangled with motion. The car had plenty of gas. Robert liked to watch Jason doing the yard. Sometimes Jason would pay him a dollar to blow the clippings off the driveway and sidewalks. Robert seemed to be having a life. Had she not had one, when she was his age?

      mommy when is daddy coming home       i don't know darlin' maybe soon       why don't you rest now       think of the moon       a bowl of milk and a silver spoon;       why doesn't daddy ever come home       what's wrong       am i a bad girl

Wiping away her tears, she was glad she hadn't had time to put on eyeliner. The sun had shattered long ago, and was now winking at her from a million places in the wide night of Tucson. She needed to use the bathroom, and she was hungry. She thought she was hungry.

She stopped at a truck stop to use the bathroom. Once inside, she fished in her purse till she found the needle and bit of thread she had never had occasion to use. She wondered if Robert would be crying, if Benett would have cut his trip short, if maybe he was already back home, and she sewed her wedding ring onto her panties. Everything was too clean.

She sat down in a booth, and it took forever for the waitress to come, she thought. All she wanted was a Coke. Outside, through the black shiny glass in which she could see a ghost of herself, there was a constant stream of traffic along the highway. The cars and trucks seemed to leave long strings of light trailing after them, light that was trying to catch up to them. It was still trying to catch up when the waitress brought her drink.

"I don't mean to be rude," said a man, "but if you're not a-waitin' on somebody, well..." Sarah imagined that she smiled at him. He shifted some of the weight of his pot-belly, and his grey moustache moved when he spoke again. "It's just, well, if you don't mind sharin' your booth, I could use the company. I don't bite." She thought she said, "I don't mind." Maybe she said, "I don't care."

"It's just, well, drivin' them rigs, you know, it gets kinda lonesome sometimes," he said, sitting down.

"I know what you mean," she said. "I mean, right now I do. Right now I think I feel like the most lonesome person in the world."

"Name's Paul."

"Really? That was my step dad's name."

      new mexico mountains are rumbles of noise       the night is a wheel       turning vibrating       the wind could be screaming       frighten the landscape       tips of the grasses       sway in the stars

I shouldn't have lied so much, she thought, when she woke up. She pretended she was still asleep. The radio was on. Paul was just driving, hardly even moving. I ought to go home, they're going to find me anyway. Maybe I want to go home. I guess everybody would hate me now.

When the truck driver let her off at the Ramada in El Paso, he said, "Well, I sure appreciate the company." He was quiet a second or two. "Shoot, Beverly. You seem 'bout as lost a girl as I ever met. But I reckon I ain't gonna talk you into toodlin' on over to Atlanta with me, am I?" Sarah lowered her head. She thought she wondered what Atlanta was like. Benett had been there five times in the last year. "Well, no," he said, "I guess not. I tell you what, though. When you find that boyfriend of yours, you tell him there's men knows better than to drop you off in the middle of nowheres, if it ain't to your likin'."

"Thanks," said Sarah. Paul was a good man.

Sarah had intended to call a taxi, and go to the bus station, and buy a ticket to Dallas. So she was surprised when her mother answered the phone.

"Baby, are you okay? Where are you? Everyone has been so worried..." And then Sarah thought that they were both crying, and all the little scratches on the glass walls of the telephone booth were blurry, and so sad.

"Oh Mom, don't let me do what Daddy did!" She could feel her wedding ring pressing against her thigh. She seemed to feel her fingers merging with the black mass of the phone receiver.

If she needed to rent a room, it would be easy, just an act, a process, an easy thing. The hardest part would be the light, the new and unforeseeable reflections, the foreign light that would hang and dangle in the curtains. Sleeping and waiting would be easy.

And if Benett, who was already back home, could learn to look differently at things... If Sarah's mother would come get her... If Robert would still love her... If she would never have to see that car again, that had made so many trips to the airport... If everyone could forgive her for things she didn't understand... Maybe, then, she would begin to be able to untangle it all, begin to find some way to weave, from the middle outward, some sort of fabric that would hold together, from the unfathomable, lonely lines of light that life is made of.