While standing in the garage going through the donation and storage piles, I notice Penny Bradshaw approaching the driveway with too much caution to make the visit appear spontaneous. I can hardly blame her; she just wants to know what’s going on, like everyone else in the neighborhood.

“Wow, Beth,” she says, holding an offering in her hands, “quite a bit of spring cleaning! I brought some chocolate chip cookies.” She pauses, her legs twitching slightly. “I figured you wouldn’t be cooking much this week, with the move and all.” The twitching stops and she improves her posture. She’s offering me confections to trade for a confession. Nothing more, nothing less. I’m relieved, really. At least she isn’t handing me a piece of monogrammed stationary with small script listing three phone numbers, an email address and a Pilates instructor’s name with a promise to keep in touch. She’s spared both of us that indignity.

“Actually Penny,” I say, breaking the silence, “the kids and I are here for another month.”

“Oh,” she says, looking past my shoulder at the piles and boxes filling the garage. “I thought you were leaving this weekend.”

“Well, Mason is moving out tomorrow.”

“Oh… right.” She shifts again and holds the plate of cookies out for me. “Hmm… I made sure there aren’t any nuts in the cookies for Ben.”

“Ben isn’t allergic to nuts, that’s Bennett next door.”

“Oh, right.”

I take the cookies from her and place them in the laundry room inside the house, hoping she’ll be gone when I return. Instead of leaving, she’s standing over the items from my grandparents’ house, eying them in such a way I feel exposed, like she’s caught me out of the shower before I’ve grabbed a towel. Her gaze stops at an oil painting of the Last Supper, poorly rendered and framed in plastic made to appear like silver.

“You’ve got some great stuff here Beth. Have you thought about selling it on eBay?” 

“Not really. It’s just easier to give it away and be done with it.”

“I know, but you could make some money. That… that, might come in handy now.” This time she looks into my eyes without a hint of her previous unease.   My business is not her business. I know this, but I also know that despite her bravado, she’s terrified. They all were. Each well-meaning neighbor, offering advice and good wishes, came to me pretending to care about my future while really playing detective, looking for the clues that will prevent my circumstances from becoming hers.

Penny makes a poor sleuth. Like the other women of my neighborhood, she’s better suited for grazing at the mall in a terry cloth tracksuit carrying a soy latte with a delicacy normally reserved for fine crystal. If I thought anyone would listen to the truth, I’d talk to these women about trying to save their marriages with the same tenacity they employ to save their skin from sun damage. But sadly, they’re all like Penny, only wondering if I’m getting  alimony along with child support payments.

The phone rings from inside the house. “I’d better get that,” I say. “ If you’d like anything, just take it, I really don’t need it.” I go inside before she can reply. As soon as the door closes I can hear her opening boxes and rummaging through them. After thirty minutes pass, I check and she is gone, along with some items from various piles around the garage.

*    *    *    *    *

I decided to make everyone’s favorite dinner tonight-- my soon to be ex-mother-in-law’s fried chicken. While I freely admit to emotional blackmail with the kids, I’m less sure of my intentions toward Mason. Part of me wants to demonstrate how wonderful I am. He’ll never get to have his mother’s fried chicken again after tonight--she stopped making it years ago, after her hip surgery.  He knows how much work the chicken is. His sister never got the hang of getting the oil the right temperature like I did. I’m a little shocked by my keen manipulation. This is what my marriage has done to me. Or maybe, this is what the end of my marriage has done to me.

He could be touched by the effort I made. He used to. He’d stand behind me at the stove, his arms wrapped around my waist, his head buried in the nape of my neck, and whisper, “ I love the smell of chicken grease in the afternoon.” We’d laugh at the accuracy his voice could reach, resembling Robert Duvall in Apocalypse Now. We did have good times, though they are difficult to recall these days. As I dredge the chicken through its second pass in the buttermilk, I decide he will be touched by the effort I’m making.

And how could I not make an effort? I wanted to try and fix things, for real that last time. He seemed to just stop, sputtering out of gas and leaving our marriage abandoned on the side of the road. I ignored this and made do once again, my silence breeding his contempt until no charges were left in our emotional engines. Mason and I never mastered those dramatic shouting matches swiftly followed by great make-up sex. Perhaps those might have helped. Instead we’d wait for things to pass. The fight over which relatives to see over the holidays would fold itself over into Ben’s soccer season.  After an argument about decorating the house, we’d wait for one of Alexa’s dance recitals to bring us seated next to each other again. That was our problem, the waiting. We lost interest in waiting for each other.

As I stand over the stove, waiting for the oil to heat, I almost convince myself this fried chicken dinner will soothe the sting of failure, like an ice cube over a bee sting. I even made the frosted brownies the kids love for dessert. Confections to camouflage their father’s departure.

*     *      *      *      *      *      *

When Mason and I began sorting the household items, neither of us wanted to keep much. We sloughed off material items like dead skin. He surprised me by piling boxes of sports and college memorabilia in the corner of the garage designated for donation. For my part, I had no trouble letting go of the macramé Christmas banner his Aunt Shelia had made us for our first wedding anniversary. I kept a few of my high school and college boxes, thinking I could use a laugh or two, recalling my naiveté, which is now replaced with just enough intelligence to recognize how stupid I was in my marriage.

In my own excavating I came across two boxes from my grandparents’ house. Mom divided their things between the three of us kids. Somehow I ended up with the tacky stuff, like their Last Supper painting that had held the prominent spot in their small dining room. The low chandelier’s light would reflect off the silver frame surrounding Jesus and the disciples. I always thought it must be valuable with its shiny frame. I was wrong. For the last week, the Last Supper leaned against the garage wall, in between the pile for donations and the pile for the storage unit. After making the decision to divorce, I’ve stumbled on other decisions, giving them a weight and consideration I never felt obliged to give my marriage.

I have put more thought into tonight’s dinner.

*          *           *          *       *

The kids return from school and begin their homework as if today were any other day. I’m grateful for this. Ben’s excitement for dinner is difficult for him to contain with the tempting fried aroma swirling through the kitchen. I saved small pieces from the frying pan for him to nibble. Alexa, who is studying nutrition in her sixth grade class, is disgusted with her younger brother.

“I can’t believe you’re eating those,” she lectures him, and myself as well, I think. “ Fried chicken drippings are pure fat. That’s bad for your heart you know.”

“Shut up,” Ben answers.

“Mom! He told me to shut up!” She challenges me to do something.

“Alexa, just leave him be, it’s a busy day.”  I hope this cue serves as reminder enough for her to move on.

“Right, let him get away with it. If I  said that, you’d be furious.”

“Please, Alexa, not today, let it go. Ben, be polite, or don’t say anything, okay?”

He smiles. “Sure Mom.”

“When will Dad be home?” Alexa asks me, her face reddening and her eyes bright with determination. She needs this challenge, this argument over something silly.

“The usual time,” I answer, trying to sound like I do on a usual day in a usual house where a usual husband comes home night after night. We made the decision to divorce three months ago. Admittedly, it was more of an acknowledgement than an active decision. Things had been over for quite a while. Still, on the eve of our new existence, my own unease inhibits my ability to soothe the hurts of my children. I made the fried chicken. It took all afternoon. I need them to eat their dinner and enjoy the brownies. As usual.

When we told the kids about the divorce, they did not seemed surprised, though Alexa cried. Once assured they’d still attend the same school, but just live in  different houses, they calmed down a bit. I thought that was the worst night, but today the finality is hitting me. When I ordered curtains for the kitchen in the new house last week, it didn’t feel like my marriage was over. Was the chintz so spectacular I’d forgotten?

Mason is home early today. The dog nearly knocks me over to reach the back door in order to greet him. She always does that. He comes through the door and stops to pet her, letting her kiss his hand as he rubs her ears. He never asked to keep her himself. Do I see regret in his gestures?

Alexa jumps from her seat and rushes toward him. “Daddy!” she squeals, “Ben told me to shut up and mom didn’t punish him.”

“Really?” Mason laughs. “Well Mom knows what she’s doing.” He steers Alexa back to the table and pats Ben on the head, “Hey little man,” he says, tousling Ben’s hair.

“Hey, Dad,” Ben says, showing no signs of distress from his sister’s attempt to get him in trouble. “Will you watch me play Guitar Hero? I know a new song.”

“Sure, right after your homework is done.” He disappears upstairs.

*      *      *      *     *      *

My special dinner is a big success. The kids eat everything on their plates and ask for seconds.  Conversation centers on school news and Alexa’s complaining about some of the members in her Girl Scout troop. Ben makes funny faces while she tries to explain how annoying Jenny Murdock is, prompting laughter from around the table. Mason offers a compliment on the chicken. I notice he does not look directly at me while speaking. He must be worried about the kids too.

When we start dessert, Mason asks how my own packing is going. “You’ve made quite a bit of progress in the garage Beth.”

“It doesn’t feel like it; I’d forgotten how much junk we had.”

“Yeah, I had quite a bit of my own in the donation pile. I even saw that Last Supper thing from your grandparents’ house the other day. I didn’t think you’d kept it.” His eyes focus on the plate of brownies as he speaks.

“What thing?” Alexa asks.

“Nothing,” I say.

“You mean that ugly silver painting?” Ben asks.

“You think it’s ugly?” Mason asks him.

“Well yeah- duh.” Ben replies. Mason chuckles to himself.

“What silver painting?” Alexa demands again.

“The ugly one,” Ben answers, looking at Mason, who laughs, and then back to me, waiting for a response.

“Do you really think it’s ugly?” I ask him.

“Anyone can see that.”

“Anyone?” I say.

“Anyone expect Mom,” Mason interjects. He and Ben laugh.

“WHAT SILVER PAINTING?”

“The silver one with Jesus, dummy,” Ben tells her.

“Oh, that one.” Alexa shrugs her shoulders and returns her attention to her brownie.

Before more arguing erupts, Mason queries, “Do you guys want to play on the Wii?”  They leave the table in unison. Mason puts his hands behind his head and leans back in his chair.  “Works every time,” he proclaims.

“You’re awfully pleased with yourself,” I say, feeling caught between wanting to feel embarrassed and wanting to laugh.

“I just think it’s funny.”

“What?”

“I thought you got rid of that ugly think years ago,” he answers, facing me at last. His face is relaxed, with no tension visible. He is not trying to upset me, I feel certain.

“Mason, my mother said I’d go to hell if I threw away a painting of the Last Supper.” I almost giggle, because the notion is even more absurd when said aloud.

“I just can’t believe you never noticed it was junk.”

“I was a kid! It was hanging on a wall! I didn’t go around touching things on the wall,” I protest, my cheeks feeling the flush of embarrassment.

“I could see the thing was plastic the first time I saw it,” he declares.

“You always did have an eye for art.”

Mason smiles and clears his throat. “It’s still a funny story.” He begins to help clear the dishes. “Where is that thing? I didn’t see it when I came in tonight.”

“Well actually, the story gets even funnier.”

“How’s that?”

I tell him about Penny Bradshaw, her cookies and her eBay advice.

“You’re kidding me,” Mason says, shaking his head.

 “I would not make up a lie about the Last Supper.”

We laugh together. We won’t laugh in this house together again, that part of our lives is gone, discarded into piles of things to forget and piles of things worth remembering. But this new direction, the ending of our marriage, has begun with a laugh. I won’t discard that.

About the Author: Dawn Maria

Dawn Maria's work has appeared in Raising AZ Kids magazine and on skirt!.com where she is a featured blogger. She has completed a novel that she is currently submitting to agents and publishers. Dawn lives in Scottsdale, AZ with her husband, teen sons and two constantly shedding family dogs. Catch up with her at www.dawnmaria.com.