Take a Load Off, Mona Jamborski Read online

  I finally just left it long, and long it is now. It looks sparser now, but maybe that's just my scalp being fat, and spreading out the follicles. Or, maybe it's because I am 47 and unhealthy. I haven't had a dream about having once again thick hair. But I have dreams that I am a waitress again, hustling people's drink orders to them, overwhelmed with customers, forgetting the menu, not sure of what restaurant I am in. I have dreams I am onstage again in a college play, having completely missed the opportunity to memorize my lines. Sometimes I am in front of a classroom of students again, with no idea what to teach them. Sometimes I am at the reception desk, with all the lines ringing, with no idea what to say when I answer them, or whom to transfer them to.

  All these are jobs I've had, and in none of them was I ever so ill-prepared. I did just fine in all of them: over-prepared, over-solicitous, for of course the fat waitress/actress/teacher/secretary must be extra nice to be liked as much as the thin ones.

  Once, when I was pregnant, before I miscarried, I had dreams about carrying baby birds so gently, so carefully, still in their shells, but dropping them and keening in grief over the mangled little bodies. I had dreams about opening up a bedroom closet and finding cages of forgotten gerbils and hamsters, in their final stages of dehydration and starvation, and I panicked over having neglected and killed them. I was caught between wanting to rush them food and water and cleaned cages, or, allowing them to die, since they'd suffered so much already. I woke up in indecision.

  So waking up fat, after a thin dream, really doesn't kill me. This is the ultimate it is what it is, today. I make my coffee, three cups of it, relishing every sip, drinking slowly, for a couple hours, while I watch the morning shows on television. Life is good in the mornings. I feel no urges, and I am in control. I am relaxed, my muscles haven't rebelled yet, I am not exhausted from simply drawing breath yet, and I am not fighting my battles with the kitchen yet. Just coffee, and tv, and a degree of comfort.

  There is someone at my door. Again.

  I am shocked. No one, in three years, has ever surprised me by knocking at my door until yesterday. And now again today? Sometimes I am surprised by the doorbell, down outside the main condo entrance, when someone needs to be buzzed in, but there is never a knock at my actual door that I am expecting. What is this?

  I can get up a little easier than I did yesterday, simply because it is morning, but the action still takes me a moment, and I am sweating by the time I am on my feet. "Coming," I say loudly, being careful to keep my voice neutral, not sing-song, because I do not want whoever is there to think I am overjoyed to sail towards my front door and greet a stranger.

  "Mrs. Jamborski, it's Food Mart. Uh, take your time," I hear, through the door. Not Javier. The kid from yesterday. Okay, well this is interesting. A third delivery? A problem? A psycho killer? The ultimate in teenage chubby chasers? I can't wait.

  I get to the door, take a moment to catch my breath, and I pat my hair down a little too – an old habit from younger days. I have not yet looked in the mirror today, also having not braved what must happen in the shower yet this week, so I am sure the long frizz is tangled and wild. My fingers find a major snarl by the side of my face, and I work through it until I win. The rest is probably fine. I do brush my hair, most days, as it's one of the few water-free ablutions I can perform with relative ease.

  I open my door, and there is my new friend, standing uneasily in the hallway with his clipboard, no grocery bags, keeping his eyes fixed on a spot somewhere to the left of me.

  I smile, since I know he won't see it. "Hi," I say.

  "Hi, uh, so I was wrong yesterday, it turns out there's a problem." He clears his throat and shifts his weight off his bad knee. He doesn't lisp, exactly, but there is a thickness to his sibilants, from the false teeth in front, I think. He speaks with such determination, simply wanting to end each sentence, with no expression at all, that his voice is as unique as his face is.

  I guess I am so used to analyzing people because I was often taken no notice of, so I was free to do all the watching. Plus, I am the daughter of two minor artists, so the art of observation might merely be genetic. I used to go through my yearbooks until I could name every little black and white square of a face by name, regardless of whether I was acquainted with the person or whether they were even in my grade – I just wanted to know who each person was, and know their names in my head when I passed them in the hall. I knew they'd never know me, or remember me, and this was proven decades later on Facebook. But at the time, I was the repository for all identifiable information, and I served as a bit of a party trick for my few friends, who would quiz me on who was who, sitting in the cafeteria, looking at who walked past or who was sitting alone or who was kicking around a hackeysack outside with his friends. I'd name them all, first and last names, but never cop to having studied yearbooks. Only a loser would do that.

  I'd call this kid Fake Teeth Guy if he were older, but I want to give him a pass because of his age. Something must have happened to him that wasn't pretty, somewhere along the way. He's fidgeting with the clipboard, drumming against it with his thumb, as I wait for him to continue.

  "Food Mart needs to charge you for the second delivery," he says, "even though it was their mistake. I'm new, so I didn't know, otherwise that might have been my ass too." He barks out a single syllable of what might be laughter, and then he speaks again as if he never paused. "I have to run your credit card here –" and he produces a cell phone with the thing plugged into the top that slides a credit card – "and if I don't then I can't bring the food back, so they will take it out of my wages."

  His eyes slide to mine, then hop away again. "Not that that's your problem, it's just information. I don't care. Just what they said."

  "That's okay," I said. "I certainly can't expect a free delivery simply because of a computer error. Is the total the same as the original delivery? Eighty-eight something, I think…?"

  "Yes. Eighty-eight seventy, and I can wait while you get your card."

  "Okay," I say, and the need to make a quick decision shoots a moment of alarm into my veins. Do I close the door in his face, so I can shuffle around my apartment in privacy, or, leave it open like a polite person would do, and let him see how difficult it is for me to move? I am frozen, not wanting to walk away from the door while it is open, but utterly unable to commit the rude act it would be to shut it.

  And, I am completely surprised. The kid takes a step forward, leans across the threshold to grab the door knob, and pulls it shut on himself.

  I stare at my blank door, amazed that somehow Food Mart is on the other side of it. I waggle my fingers at the door, disbelieving for a second he's not standing within my sight. But no, he's in the hallway, and he just saved a scrap of my pride.

  I don't even notice my walk to my desk, which is really saying something, considering every step is usually an effort. But I am at my desk (no chair, of course, I wouldn't fit) opening the top drawer where I keep my wallet and all my credit cards, and many stacks of ten dollar bills that I withdrew from the bank some years ago when I started relying more heavily on deliveries, seeing the writing on the wall that one day I'd be stuck.

  My credit cards are no longer inside my wallet, which is a laziness I only capitulated to last year. I devoutly returned any card to its slot prior to that, as if one day I'd grab my wallet and purse and go, then finally I let everything loose in the drawer. I select which card I will be using, a ten for a tip, and walk back to my front door, patting my hair again without knowing why. I am still amazed. I am unsure if I was shown a kindness or an act of pity or if there is a difference, but either way I'd like to look well-groomed for it.

  I open the door and no, there is not a prince charming who foresees and serves my every need, just a dour-looking kid of questionable ethnicity refusing to meet my eye, gripping a clipboard and a cell phone. I hold out my credit card and he takes it without a word, slides it, presents the screen for me to sign with my finger (I will never
get used to this thing – technology has officially left me behind), pockets it, and turns to go, accepting my tip after a second of hesitation.

  "Javier's done," he says, over his shoulder. "FYI."

  "Wait," I say, a word I have not said in years. I never want anyone to wait, not at my door. I want them to go go go. "What's your name then?"

  He stops and turns towards me, looks at the floor and nearly flinches as he speaks.

  "Moises," he says, and I erupt into laughter.

  No I don't! God, don't you know me at all? Of course I don't laugh at his name. It's a cool name, but I can see how all his classmates growing up didn't agree. I recognize like I recognize my own hand the expression on his face hardening against reaction, and the resigned commitment he showed before he spoke. It's like the male version of being named Mona.

  Well, no, because now I guess that he's Jewish, maybe Israeli, and the name fits an actual culture better than Mona fits anything. But Moises, and he said it with the accent on the second syllable, not Moses – I will be googling.

  "You can call me Mona," I say evenly, wondering if he'll intuit our similar private hells that uncommon names bring.

  And he does. He looks directly at me and smiles for a whole half-second.

  "I bet," he says. "Alright. See you next delivery. I, uh, promise not to knock again unless you're expecting me."

  I wave my hand, shooing away his words. "That's quite alright," I say. "I guess anyone downstairs holds the door for you when you're in uniform."

  His Food Mart tee-shirt isn't exactly a uniform, but whatever. Back when I actually traversed the lobby, I would of course open the door for delivery guys without making them wait to be buzzed in. A man in a uniform could get away with murder, I'm sure, and does, if the cop shows on television are to be believed. We innately trust the employed.

  He nods and disappears down the hall without another word.

  Chapter 7

  I guess you're wondering about my parents, now. It's not a secret. You can read about it in the newspaper, even. My mother, a part-time administrator at an art gallery and a constant volunteer at the museum, and my father, the art teacher, loved to dabble in their own watercolors as often as they enjoyed the art world at large. I have precisely three large, beautiful, gold-framed watercolor landscapes of theirs in this apartment – two are my mom's and one is my dad's. My mom's landscapes are both water views, but very different from each other. One depicts a grayer day at a still pond, and the other plays with light and a rushing river.

  My dad's is a cityscape, but also has water – a row of narrow urban homes that ends at a channel, it seems, and looks like a scene from Venice, maybe. I wouldn't know. I am untraveled, and so were they – both painted from their imaginations, using photographs only to nail down certain aspects of each composition: sometimes photos they took themselves on day trips, but sometimes from our old encyclopedias laying open next to the easel they shared.

  They really didn't paint much – they were both talented but neither was exceptional, and both would have admitted to the same. They loved art and enjoyed being part of the art world, but neither was going to break new ground or invent a new style or mix a new color. My dad's work had an interesting texture to it – sometimes he would let the watercolors drip without correcting their downward paths. He liked the natural medium of the paint to be apparent in his art. I asked him once about oils, when I was using oils in my own high school class, and he said when he had used oils, he didn't even use a brush, he preferred smearing the thick colors with a palette knife. My parents did not make fun of Bob Ross. They were not art snobs. Bob Ross's painting were beautiful.

  My dad was being honored, in his retirement, at some kind of Mid-Atlantic teachers' convention, because of how many graduating seniors he had helped secure art scholarships for. He and my mom excitedly packed for an overnight at a hotel with dress clothes for the gala, got in their car, and were both killed three hours later in an accident, an accident that did not leave a scratch on the day-drinking alcoholic who crashed into them at 120 miles per hour. Everyone was wearing seat belts, but the damage was all about angle of impact and air bags and who knows what else. I didn't read any of the police reports, and certainly none of the hospital or morgue reports. They were killed instantly, as far as I know, and as far as I want to know.

  Their condo had always been a second home to me, as they moved there right around the time I finished college. It wasn't my childhood home but it contained every last stick of my childhood furniture and retained the identical comforting smells. I could not imagine clearing the place out and selling it, so I didn't think long before I moved in. My only comfort in their absence was their home, their things, their scents. I crammed as much as my own furniture in as I could, since I wasn't going to give up all the acquisitions I'd amassed in my adult life, and I made the decisions later what to keep and what to axe. I have ended up with an interesting juxtaposition of my items next to theirs: a modern IKEA bookcase next to their traditional polished maple wood table; a beautiful mosaic boho lamp I once picked up at a craft show on top of their pea-green laminate file cabinet; their ancient gold velvety sofa that already knew how to accommodate my spreading ass and my savior of a coffee table.

  Et cetera.

  I pop open my laptop and google Moises, and discover that it's a cognate of Moses – duh – and an Ecclesiastic Greek name derived from the Hebrew name Moshe. So, Greek then? Well that fits a bit – the dark dark curling hair, anyway. The next hit I get tells me the name is Iberian, which another search later informs me means Portuguese or Spanish. Well, this kid is all over the map.

  I think about the pallor of his skin, the darkness of the blue of his eyes, the square facial bones with the round nose. He's a stumper, this Moises. At least I know his name is an iamb, thanks to Ponytail Man: iambic monometer, in fact, with the accent on the second syllable. I learned the same names for rhythm and meter in English class too, but, I wouldn't have remembered if it weren't for my old dactylic (PO-nee-tail) friend.

  I realize I am availing myself of one of my old tricks – remaining unnoticed while I parse to pieces someone who does not know I am watching.

  I find it funny, funny odd, how easy it was to be invisible when I was a younger woman, because no one pays attention to the chubby chick. Men don't catch my eye, women don't gravitate towards me, strangers don't stop me and ask me where I got those shoes – my invisibility allowed me to stare at everyone else, analyze their faces, commit certain angles to memory so I could sketch them later, watch snippets of their lives, and never be caught.

  But even younger, my weight made me stand out in a spotlight of hecklers, as I was called out in elementary school for not having the twig-like limbs of my friends, in a variety of colorful and painful epithets.

  Now here I am, so fat that I cannot help but attract attention, if anyone were to see me. Hiding behind my fat has officially backfired – now I am the one who would be stared at. I've lost my anonymity to memorize people behind a wall of invisibility – my wall itself draws fascinated notice. But I can analyze Moises, having had the rare chance to stare him down in the hallway when I was still behind my chain bolt, and I smile at the rush of the familiar pleasure I feel when I try to figure someone out who does not see me.

  So, for shits and giggles, I will figure this kid out. My skills are rusty. Maybe I should have moved to a first floor apartment, where I could have observed more foot traffic through my window. Nineteen years old, I will guess, and not in college judging from his daytime job, with a limp, unusual dentistry needs, and Jewish and Portuguese parents. So let's go with … he fell into a bad crowd in high school, probably rebelling from a traditional and strict childhood. A gang took a baseball bat to his teeth and kneecap, and now he is on the straight and narrow working a job to keep his position in a family that has expected more from him. He doesn't date, not yet, being uncomfortable in his own skin, but he probably pretended to be a casanova a couple years ago whe
n he was impressing his rivals. His mom, Catholic and Portuguese, speaks with a lovely accent but retains a constant sadness over her lost family, who froze her out when she married her Jewish husband, an Israeli national who moved to America when his parents fled during the second world war, not trusting their country to protect them from Europe.

  That works. My sketchbook is in the magazine rack (my parents') within easy reach of the couch (my parents'), and my charcoal pencils are in a hand-made wooden box with a mother-of-pearl flower inlay (mine) that I keep on the coffee table (mine). I flip on the television (mine – I wasn't feeling it for their old tube tv) for background noise, and I start to draw.

  You won't believe me when I tell you that being fat makes even drawing difficult, but it does. I use a muscle in my upper arm as much as I use the fine, careful muscles of my fingers, because otherwise, my hand will rest on the paper and smudge the charcoal. Every few minutes, the upper arm muscle starts to tremble and give out, and I am required to rest it, and watch the still face on my page wait patiently to take more shape.

  I manage to capture the square outline of his jaw and chin, and I rough in his nose to make sure I have the roundness committed to before I try to place the eyes. I let my charcoal pencil do what it wants when it comes to hair, and I am paying more attention to the tv at this point, because a Law & Order marathon has been on in the afternoons, and this is an episode that I haven't seen. I rest my arm for a while, my sketch unfinished, when suddenly a powerful sense of need overwhelms me.

  What is this, I think, taken by surprise, as I always am. It's been a fine morning, and a lovely day. I have a new little project, I've been happily distracted – what is this awful feeling that's blotting out my contentment, like a thick angry cloud over a springtime sun? God, oh god, it's time to eat, of course. How could I forget – it's time to eat.