Breathing Lessons (1989 Pulitzer Prize) Read online

  Well.

  Fiona left and did not come back until morning; Maggie feared she was gone for good, endangering that poor sick baby, who needed much more nursing than Fiona could provide. She must have been planning to desert them all along, in fact. Why, just look at her soapbox! Wasn't it odd that for almost a year now she had borne off to the bathroom twice daily a tortoiseshell soapbox, a tube of Aim toothpaste (not the Morans' brand), and a toothbrush in a plastic cylinder? And that her toilet supplies were continually stored in a clear vinyl travel case on the bureau? She might as well be a guest. She had never meant to settle in permanently.

  "Go after her," Maggie told Jesse, but Jesse asked, "Why should I? She's the one who walked out." He was at work when Fiona returned the next day, wan and puffy-eyed. Strands of her uncombed hair mingled with the fake-fur trim of her windbreaker hood, and Leroy was wrapped clumsily in a garish daisy-square afghan that must have belonged to the sister.

  What Maggie's mother said was true: The generations were sliding downhill in this family. They were descending in every respect, not just in their professions and their educations but in the way they reared their children and the way they ran their households. ("How have you let things get so common?" Maggie heard again in her memory.) Mrs. Daley stood over the sleeping Leroy and pleated her lips in disapproval. "They would put an infant in a bureau drawer? They would let her stay in here with you and Ira? What can they be thinking of? It must be that Fiona person. Really, Maggie, that Fiona is so ... Why, she isn't even a Baltimore girl! Anyone who would pronounce Wicomico as Weeko-Meeko! And what is that racket I'm hearing?" Maggie tilted her head to listen. "It's Canned Heat," she decided.

  "Candide? I'm not asking the name of it; I mean why is it playing? When you children were small I played Beethoven and Brahms, I played all of Wagner's operas!" Yes, and Maggie could still recall her itch of boredom as Wagner's grandiose weight crashed through the house. And her frustration when, beginning some important story with "Me and Emma went to-" she had been cut short by her mother. (" 'Emma and I,' if you please.") She had sworn never to do that to her own children, preferring to hear what it was they had to say and let the grammar take care of itself. Not that it had done so, at least not in Jesse's case.

  Maybe her own downhill slide was deliberate. If so, she owed Jesse an apology. Maybe he was just carrying out her secret scheme for revolution, and would otherwise-who knows?-have gone on to be a lawyer like Mrs. Daley's father.

  Well, too late now.

  Leroy learned to crawl and she crawled right out of her bureau drawer, and the next day Ira came home with a crib. He assembled it, without comment, in his and Maggie's bedroom. Without comment, Fiona watched from the doorway. The skin beneath her eyes had a sallow, soiled look.

  On a Saturday in September, they celebrated Ira's father's birthday. Maggie had made it a tradition to spend his birthday at the Pimlico Race Track-all of them together, even though it meant closing the frame shop. They would take a huge picnic lunch and a ten-dollar bill for each person to bet with. In times past the whole family had squeezed into Ira's car, but of course that was no longer possible. This year they had Jesse and Fiona (who had been away on their honeymoon the year before), and Leroy too, and even Ira's sister Junie decided she might brave the trip. So Jesse borrowed the van that his band used to transport their instruments, SPIN THE CAT was lettered across its side, the S and the C striped like tigers' tails. They loaded the back with picnic hampers and baby supplies, and then they drove to the shop to pick up Ira's father and sisters. Junie wore her usual going-out costume, everything cut on the bias, and carried a parasol that wouldn't collapse, which caused some trouble when she climbed in. And Dorrie was hugging her Hutzler's coat box, which caused even more trouble. But everyone acted good-natured about it-even Ira's father, who always said he was way too old to make a fuss over birthdays.

  It was a beautiful day, the kind that starts out cool until sunlight gently warms your outer layers and then your inner layers. Daisy was trying to get them to sing "Camp-town Races," and Ira's father wore a grudging, self-conscious smile. This was how families ought to be, Maggie thought. And in the bus that carried them in from the parking lot-a bus they half filled, if you counted the picnic hampers balanced on empty seats and the diaper bag and folded stroller blocking the aisle-she felt sorry for their fellow passengers who sat alone or in pairs. Most of them had a workaday attitude. They wore sensible clothes and stern, purposeful expressions, and they were here to win. The Morans were here to celebrate.

  They spread out over one whole row of bleachers, parking Leroy alongside in her stroller. Then Mr. Moran, who prided himself on his knowledge of horseflesh, went off to the paddocks to size things up, and Ira went too, to keep him company. Jesse found a couple he knew-a man in motorcycle gear and a slip of a girl in fringed buckskin pants-and disappeared with them; he wasn't much of a gambler. The women settled down to select their horses by the ring of their names, which was a method that seemed to work about as well as any other. Maggie favored one called Infinite Mercy, but Junie disagreed. She said that didn't sound to her like a horse with enough fight to it.

  Because of the baby, who was teething or something and acted a little fretful, they staggered their trips to the betting window. Fiona went first with Ira's sisters, while Maggie stayed behind with Leroy and Daisy. Then the others came back and Maggie and Daisy went, Daisy bristling with good advice. "What you do," she said, "is put two dollars to show. That's safest." But Maggie said, "If I'd wanted safe I'd be sitting at home," and bet all ten dollars on Number Four to win. (In the past she'd argued for the family to pool every bit of their money and head straight for the fifty-dollar-minimum window, a dangerous and exciting spot she'd never so much as approached, but she knew by now not to bother trying.) Along the way they ran into Ira and his father, who were discussing statistics. The jockeys' weights, their previous records, the horses' fastest times and what kind of turf they did best on-there was plenty to consider, if you cared. Maggie bet her ten dollars and left, while Daisy joined the men, and the three of them stood deliberating.

  "This kid is wearing me out," Fiona said when Maggie got back. Leroy evidently didn't want to be carried and she kept straining toward the ground, which was littered with beer-can tabs and cigarette butts. Dorrie, who was supposed to be helping, had opened her coat box instead and was laying an orderly row of marshmallows from one end of the bleacher to the other. Maggie said, "Here, I'll take her, poor lamb," and she bore Leroy off to the railing to admire the horses, which were just assembling at the starting gate with skittery, mincing steps. "What do horses say?" Maggie asked. "Nicker-nicker-nicker!" she supplied. Ira and his father returned, still arguing. Their subject now was the sheet of racing tips that Mr. Moran had purchased from a man with no teeth. "Which ones did you vote for?" Maggie asked them.

  "You don't vote, Maggie," Ira told her. The horses took off, looking somehow quaint and toylike. They galloped past with a sound that reminded her of a flag ruffling in the wind. Then, just like that, the race was finished. "So soon!" Maggie lamented. She never could get over how quickly it all happened; there was hardly anything to watch. "Really baseball gives a better sense of time," she told the baby.

  The results lit up the electric billboard: Number Four was nowhere to be seen. That struck Maggie as a relief, in a way. She wouldn't need to make any more choices. In fact, the only person who came out ahead was Mr. Moran. He had won six dollars on Number Eight, a horse his tip sheet had recommended. "See there?" he asked Ira. Daisy hadn't bet at all; she was saving for a race she felt surer of.

  Maggie gave the baby to Daisy and started unpacking their lunch. "There's ham on rye, turkey on white, roast beef on whole wheat," she announced. "There's chicken salad, deviled eggs, potato salad, and cole slaw. Peaches, fresh strawberries, and melon balls. Don't forget to save room for the birthday cake." The people nearby were munching on junk food bought right there at the track. They stared curiously at the hamp
ers, each one of which Daisy lined with a starched checkered cloth tucked into little pleats around the edges. Maggie passed out napkins. " Where's Jesse?" she asked, searching the crowd.

  "I have no idea," Fiona said. Somehow, she had ended up with Leroy again. She jiggled her sharply against her shoulder, while Leroy screwed up her face and made fussing noises. Well, Maggie could have predicted as much. You don't use such a rapid rhythm with a baby; shouldn't Fiona have learned that by now? Wouldn't simple instinct have informed her? Maggie felt an edgy little poke of irritation in the small of her back. To be fair, it wasn't Fiona who annoyed her so much as the fussing-Leroy's jagged "eh, eh." If Maggie weren't loading paper plates she could have taken over herself, but as it was, all she could do was make suggestions. "Try putting her in the stroller, Fiona. Maybe she'll fall asleep." "She won't fall asleep; she'll just climb out again," Fiona said. "Oh, where is Jesse?" "Daisy, go look for your brother," Maggie commanded.

  "I can't; I'm eating." "Go anyway. For goodness' sake, I can't do everything." "Is it my fault he went off with his dumb friends somewhere?" Daisy asked. "I just got started on my sandwich." "Now listen, young lady . . . Ira?" But Ira and his father had left again for the betting windows. Maggie said, "Oh for-Dorrie, could you please go and hunt Jesse for me?'' "Well, but I am dealing out these here marshmal-lows," Dorrie said.

  The marshmallows traveled in a perfect, unbroken row the length of their bleacher, like a dotted line. As a result, none of them could sit down. People kept pausing at the far end, meaning to take a seat, but then they saw the marshmallows and moved on. Maggie sighed. Behind her back, a bugle call floated on the clear, still air, but Maggie, facing the bleachers, went on searching the crowd for Jesse. Then Junie nudged a few of Dome's marsh-mallows out of line and sat down very suddenly, clutching her parasol with both hands. "Maggie," she murmured, "I am feeling just so, I don't know, all at once. ..." "Take a deep breath," Maggie said briskly. This happened, from time to time. "Remind yourself you're here as someone else." "I believe I'm going to faint," Junie said, and without warning she swung her spike-heeled sandals up and lay down flat upon the bleacher. The parasol remained in both her hands, rising from her chest as if planted there. Dorrie rushed distractedly around her, trying to retrieve as many marshmallows as possible.

  "Daisy, is that your brother up there with those people?" Maggie asked.

  Daisy said, "Where?" but Fiona was quicker. She wheeled and said, "It most certainly is." Then she shrieked, "Jesse Moran! You get your ass on down here!" Her voice was that stringy, piercing kind. Everybody stared. Maggie said, "Oh, well, I wouldn't-" "Your hear me?" Fiona shrieked, and Leroy started crying in earnest.

  "There's no need to shout, Fiona," Maggie said.

  Fiona said, "What?" She glared at Maggie, ignoring the squalling baby. It was one of those moments when Maggie just wanted to back up and start over. (She had always felt paralyzed in the presence of an angry woman.) Meanwhile Jesse, who couldn't have missed hearing his name, began to thread his way toward them. Maggie said, "Oh, here he comes!" "You're telling me not to shout at my own husband?" Fiona asked.

  She was shouting even now. She had to, over the cries of the baby. Leroy's face was red, and spikes of damp hair were plastered to her forehead. She looked sort of homely, to be frank. Maggie felt an urge to walk off from this group, pretend they had nothing to do with her; but instead she made her voice go light and she said, "No, I only meant he wasn't that far from us, you see-" "You meant nothing of the sort," Fiona said, squeezing the baby too tightly. "You're trying to run us, just like always; trying to run our lives." "No, really, Fiona-" "What's up?" Jesse asked breezily, arriving among them.

  "Ma and Fiona are having a fight," Daisy said. She took a dainty nibble from her sandwich.

  "We are not!" Maggie cried. "I merely suggested-" "A fight?" Ira said. "What?" He and Mr. Moran were all at once standing in the aisle behind Jesse. "What's going on here?" he asked above Leroy's cries.

  Maggie told him, "Nothing's going on! For Lord's sake, all I said was-" "Can't you folks be left to your own devices for even a minute?" Ira asked. "And why is Junie lying down like that? How do these things happen so fasti" Unfair, unfair. To hear him talk, you would think they had such scenes every day. You would think that Ira himself was in line for the Nobel Peace Prize. "For your information," Maggie told him, "I was just standing here minding my own business-" "You have never once in all the time I've known you managed to mind your own business," Fiona said.

  "Now cool it, Fiona," Jesse said.

  "And you!" Fiona screeched, turning on him. "You think this baby is just mine? How come I always get stuck with her while you go off with your buddies, answer me that!" "Those weren't my buddies; they were only-" "He was drinking with them too," Daisy murmured, with her eyes on her sandwich.

  "Well, big deal," Jesse told her.

  "Drinking from this silver flat kind of bottle that belonged to that girl." "So what if I was, Miss Goody-Goody?" "Now listen," Ira said. "Let's just all sit down a minute and get ahold of ourselves. We're blocking people's view." He sat, setting an example. Then he looked behind him.

  "My marshmallows!" Dorrie squawked.

  "You can't leave your marshmallows here, Dorrie. No one has room to sit." "You messed up my marshmallows!" "I believe I'm going to be ill," Junie said, speaking upward into the spokes of her parasol.

  Leroy's crying had reached the stage where she had to fight for each breath.

  Ira stood up again, dusting off the seat of his pants. He said, "Now listen, folks-" "Will you stop calling us/o/fa?" Fiona demanded.

  Ira halted, looking startled.

  Maggie felt a tug on her sleeve and turned. It was Mr. Moran, who had at some point worked around behind her. He held up a ticket. "What?" she asked.

  "I won." "Won what?" "I won that last race! My horse came in first." "Oh, the race," she said. "Well, isn't that ..." But her attention veered toward Fiona, who was reeling off a list of wrongs that she seemed to have been saving up for Jesse all these months. "... knew from the start I'd be a fool to marry you; didn't I say so? But you were so gung-ho, you and your pacifiers and your Dr. Spock . . ." The people in the bleachers behind them were gazing pointedly in different directions, but they sent each other meaningful glances and small, secret smiles. The Morans had turned into spectacles. Maggie couldn't bear it. She said, "Please! Can't we just sit down?" "You and your famous cradle," Fiona told Jesse, "that you didn't build one stick of after you promised, you swore to me-" "I never swore to you! Where do you keep coming up with this cradle business from?" "You swore on the Bible," Fiona told him.

  "Well, good God Almighty! I mean, maybe it crossed my mind once to build one, but I'd have had to be crazy to go through with it, I can see it now: Dad standing there criticizing every little hammer blow, letting me know what a hopeless clod I am, and you'd be agreeing with him just like always, I bet, by the time I was finished. No way would I let myself in for that!" "Well, you bought the wood, didn't you?" "What wood?" "You bought those long wooden rods." "Rods? For a cradle? I never bought any rods." "You mother told me-" "How would I use rods to build a cradle?" "Spindles, she told me." They both looked at Maggie. Coincidentally, the baby paused just then for a deep, hiccuping breath. A bass voice rumbled over the loudspeaker, announcing that Misappropriation had been scratched.

  Ira cleared his throat and said, "Are you talking about doweling rods? Those were mine." "Ira, no," Maggie wailed, because there was still a chance they could smooth things over, if only he wouldn't insist on spelling out every boring little fact. "They were the spindles for your cradle," she told Jesse. "You already had the blueprints. Right?" "What blueprints? All I said was-" "If I remember correctly," Ira interrupted in his stuffy way, "those rods were purchased for the drying rack I built on the back porch. You've all seen that drying rack." "Drying rack," Fiona said. She continued looking at Maggie.

  "Oh, well," Maggie said, "this cradle business is so silly, isn't it? I
mean, it's like the dime-store necklace that relatives start quarreling over after the funeral. It's just a ... And besides, Leroy couldn't even use a cradle anymore! She's got that nice crib Ira bought." Leroy remained quiet, still hiccuping, gazing at Maggie intently.

  "I married you for that cradle," Fiona told Jesse.

  "Well, that's plain ridiculous!" Maggie said. "For a cradle! I never heard such a-" "Maggie, enough," Ira said.

  She stopped, with her mouth open.

  "If you married Jesse for a cradle," Ira told Fiona, "you were sadly mistaken." "Oh, Ira!" Maggie cried.

  "Shut up, Maggie. She had no business telling you that," Ira said to Fiona. "It's Maggie's weakness: She believes it's all right to alter people's lives. She thinks the people she loves are better than they really are, and so then she starts changing things around to suit her view of them." "That's not one bit true," Maggie said.

  "But the fact is," Ira told Fiona calmly, "Jesse is not capable of following through with anything, not even a simple cradle. He's got some lack; I know he's my son, but he's got some lack, and you might as well face up to it. He's not a persevering kind of person. He lost that job of his a month ago and he hangs out every day with his pals instead of looking for work.'' Maggie and Fiona, together, said, "What?" "They found out he wasn't a high school graduate," Ira told them. And then, as an afterthought: "He's seeing another girl too." Jesse said, "What are you talking about? That girl is just a friend." "I don't know her name," Ira said, "but she belongs to a rock group called Babies in Trouble." "We're just good friends, I tell you! That girl is Dave's girl!" Fiona seemed to be made of china. Her face was dead white and still; her pupils were black pinpoints.