One Drop Might Drown You --Tony & Jan -- 9 October 2016
Henry slept softly in his kangaroo pouch of criss-crossed which fabric Jan wore around her shoulders and waist, holding him close to her body. At first he’d seemed confused about what to do with her breasts in the way of his nap, but had lacked the energy to figure out a way out of being squashed, and had fallen asleep regardless of the comparative discomforts of being carried by Mom rather than by Dad. Jan had used the kangaroo pouch before, but perhaps it had been too long, because he didn’t seem to remember what to do to fall asleep while she carried him. That, and she was aware of every uncomfortable fidget and every fuss he made, with Hank watching over her shoulder at every minute interaction she made with Henry. Of course he didn’t mean to snoop. He’d only wanted to enjoy his family on a walk in the park. Jan couldn’t begrudge him such a simple pleasure, but it had the effect of putting her like one of his bugs under his microscope. As much as he loved Henry, Jan worried she might always be scrutinized for her interactions with their son, as long as her husband was present. She wasn’t a natural, like he was, and he seemed upset with her for it.
“He’s getting heavier,” she commented to Hank, and yawned. From boredom, from the cold air and hot sun, from the tedium that was always being on her best behavior in the new house with new rules they had put together. Now that Henry was asleep, Jan wanted either a nap or a coffee to keep her on her going. In the middle of the public park, neither was readily available, and she had only the wariness to do the trick.
“He’s getting big. And he’s been babbling more. He wants to be able to talk, but he doesn’t have the motor skills,” Hank explained, and Jan nodded along. She didn’t have the energy or the inclination to say she’d read all the same books he had. It might start a fight. That was the last thing the two of them needed was to accidentally break their new facade, but such a mock up was like the scales on a butterfly’s wings; with only one touch, they might be brushed away for good. Jan didn’t dare, after all she’d done, be the one to start that. Hank put his arm around her--Jan had to wonder if he were oblivious to her feelings, or if he was just keen on ignoring any discomfort between them as if it had never been there and had never happened--but she stiffened as if a stranger had touched her, as if she needed to be guarded against him, as if his touch had burdened her in some way, or could hurt her again.
“Let’s sit,” she said, and turned from him, and let his arm fall back to his side. Her bruise had healed. The swelling had gone down. For a while, Jan hadn’t been able even to conceal their fight and their problems with makeup, no matter how she’d tried, and Hank had treated her like a glass figurine. From the guilt or the shame, Jan didn’t care; the distance was nice, and was a solace in the pain she felt when she put on ungodly amounts of concealer and eyeliner to cover the worst of it. Now that the last of the marring was gone, she wanted it back. Hank had been overly familiar and overly physical in the last few days. Apparently, a bruise was the statute of limitations on wanting some physical space from someone who had hurt her and wanted to make things better again.
They were supposed to be going back to normal, all things considered. Jan had agreed to do this; to play along with the efforts to make things work for Henry’s sake and for the sake of their image. That last priority had been Jan’s own, added only in her own mind so she could say she was doing this for herself, for her own reasons.
For her part, she had been good. Jan was home by six every night since the wedding. Every morning she spent some time with their son before going to the office. In the evenings they would go on dates for dinner or to a music performance, with no risk, no flame, no ardor or desire. Other nights, they might stay home in a tedious and excitement-free pattern of dinner, Netflix, and bed that put Jan to sleep just after Henry. It was a form of normal, she supposed, but not her normal. It had never been normal for her and Hank to sit in solemn silence, enslaved to the clock, wed like penitential prisoners with a life long lock.
There was never a risk that one of them wouldn’t make it to their date, having spent the day crime fighting and weary to the bone, but with a fantastic story to tell about their adventure. Neither was so busy they couldn’t keep their calendar straight, or so excited to see one another they were ashamed to miss a date. That was normal. The flustered, heart broken moments of miscommunication and embarrassment, but with the kind of longing--terrible longing--that could only be sated by the others’ company was normal for them, or had been, once upon a time. That was what Jan missed. Not this boring existence built around equal parts making do, melancholy, and morose patterns. Served neat, always neat, with nothing to water it down.
Jan sat back on the bench, pressing her hands down behind her to steady her leisure. Hank wasn’t far behind her, and sat down by her side. “It’s nice out today.” Jan looked about at the park, but didn’t respond. This was it, then? The park spread around them, a few pathways for walking. Henry had been keen not too long ago on eating dirt and tasting leaves. Both Jan and Hank had been eager to get him out of that mess and scoop him up, even at his protests. Someone not much younger than Jan passed them on a skateboard. It was quaint, but it was a whole lot of quaint nothing, which Jan wished could be shared, and maybe even enjoyed, with anyone else, at any other time. Now they were back to talking about the weather. What was next? One another’s health?
“You know, usually when two people have a conversation, they actually reply to one another.”
Jan grit her teeth at that, so hard they squeaked under the pressure. This alarmed her, and she took the conscious effort to separate her jaws. “Oh, yeah,” she replied, trying to keep her tone from biting and becoming confrontational. She could feel the tensions beneath them, shifting and pulling, keeping them two or three big fights from divorce, a break, another physical fight, or a custody war over their son, but she had always thought that she might speak and do as she liked, at least.
“Henry seems happy to be with you today.”
Jan looked down at him. He was alright. Today he was better behaved than he usually was. It could be that, like the rest of them, he liked the weather today. “Better than usual.”
“He’s growing up so fast.”
“Mhmm.” Jan began to lose track of the conversation as Hank made comments about the weather, the garden, the class he was teaching, his students, and the ants. Jan began to wonder just how painful a lobotomy was, and if, in fact, it would keep her from hearing and understanding, or would just relieve her of the duty to respond to such boring and asinine conversation as what Hank was offering her. She would certainly appreciate the former, as she would feel less frequently like her ears could bleed and she would be in less pain than she was at the moment. All things considered, the second was a passable substitute, if only she didn’t have to make these mono-or duel-syllabic responses to Hank’s horribly boring conversation. She wanted some fun, not these PG rated dates they would go on.
“It’s time to go home,” she finally announced, as Hank started to comment on the ants crawling out of a crack in the sidewalk as if it were some fascinating topic of conversation. Back in the day, he’d made them interesting. They were informants, spies, allies. Now they were just a creature he studied. Now that he’d stopped fighting crime, there was a whole lot less to him. Jan stood up and looked over at him, finding herself in genuine wonder of what on earth she had seen in him all those years they’d been together. He was a looker, but that was increasingly mitigated by his dull topics of conversation and his lack of interest in anything Jan enjoyed. She signed to herself, and began to walk back down the path towards their home.
“Time? I didn’t realize you had a schedule to keep on Sunday,” Hank said, a little too sternly for Jan’s liking. With her back turned, Jan risked raising her eyebrows and distorting her face into an expression of ferocious rage to rival most of Disney’s worst and most cunning villains.
She relaxed her face and mustered a smile before replying. “With Sue.” Although truth be told, Jan had’t actually made plans with her friend, or spoken to her more than a quick text when she’d come home safely from Asgard, and another from Susan when she arrived back. Then three weeks of radio silence. She and Carol probably thought Jan had fallen off the face of the Earth. “Come on, even you have to admit that we haven’t done much in the last few weeks. It’s all work, home, sleep for the both of us. I need to see some friends. Retail therapy. It’s real, Hank, and it’ll cure my cabin fever.”
Hank didn’t quite manage to conceal what he thought of Jan’s choice of outing. He tried to say something affirming, but it was his turn to reply “right,” as if there could be nothing less right about her wanting or needing some space from her home and her family.
Half an hour later, the three returned home, and by the grace of God Henry was still asleep. Jan brought him up to his crib, where Tabby had taken up napping in the baby’s absence. She nudged him out of the way, much to the old cat’s chagrin, and placed Henry inside next to him in the warm spot Tabby had pre-heated. As soon as he was horizontal on the mattress, Henry woke and began to fuss. Jan rolled her eyes and looked to Tabby. “Watch him, will you?” Almost immediately, as if he understood enough English to know what to do, Tabby placed a paw over Henry to get back into the patch of sun he’d been enjoying. This cuddle quieted Henry. He really was getting bigger, Jan saw. He used to be smaller than Tabby; now he was just a little longer and a little plumper.
Jan left the nursery, but she didn’t go downstairs just yet. Hank was still there in the living room, or maybe he was in his lab. She hoped he was in there, out of the way, and she wouldn’t have to say anything to him when she went down later. She hoped, too, that she’d gone through enough posing and smiling and nice words that day to convince herself and everyone else that she’d earned the afternoon to herself.
Jan was going into the city. She knew that much and only that much about her plans for the afternoon. The suburbs were getting ready to drown her if she stayed out here much longer, with the perfect yards and the nothing, absolutely nothing to do. A year ago, she had chosen this house for the homey feel and the nice neighborhood and the distance from the crime and noise and hullabaloo of the City. Now she couldn’t stand that it had trapped her with such a dull family and away from all the excitement and movement she had known for years. How, she wondered, had she thought she could return to New Jersey the same girl as she’d been when she’d left? Back in 2007 she’d barely spent time here; she was always at school. There had been no past, Jan had learned only through the realization of the false equivalence, in which she had been happy in the New Jersey suburbia.
In her own bedroom, Jan decided to leave through the window, rather than risk having to make more small talk with Hank, lest he try to make the Orange County recycling program of some interest to her. She changed into her iconic yellow and black suit, and opened the window to let in the chilled fall air. For several minutes, Jan was perfectly happy just to fly away from her troubles, North, and towards salvation. It had been weeks since she had been able to do as much as this, and it was exhilarating to fly as fast as the neighborhood traffic, almost as fast as the highway traffic--if she had really felt like it, she could have saved time by holding on and hitching a ride, but it was too beautiful a day to feel any more hobbled and reliant than she had already been made to feel so many times over.
The bright sun hit Jan’s skin and made her feel hot under her black suit and with the tremendous effort of flying. Perhaps, after all this way she might notice a difference in her waistline, which was still held together with the help of a postpartum belt months after she should have stopped wearing it. She knew it wasn’t the issue anymore. Lean muscle clung to Jan’s frame, as strong and cut as ever. But now, there was a layer of weight that she couldn’t shed, that pushed at her clothes and sagged strangely under her skin. If only she had known, Jan would never have gone off the pill.
It was almost too soon that Jan crossed the river, passing above the Holland Tunnel, but when she was in the city, on the island of Manhattan, Janet stopped for a moment and alighted on a tree branch. It swayed considerably in the light breeze of the coastal air, and threw Jan off balance as to which way was up and which way was sideways. Where to, she wondered, now that she was in the city. Over to see Susan, as she had told Hank she would? Or should she get on with some retail therapy alone? Maybe she could start by going into a Starbucks and offering to buy a drink for everyone in the room. Then a new dress to wear to her next formal, in which she might be spared the humiliation of spillage.
Jan wondered if this was how the Charlie Sheens of the world were made. If one day people just cracked under so much pressure and that they started going on television and saying they had tiger blood. In Jan’s mind’s eye, she sat in a studio being interviewed. “What’s the difference between an ant and my husband? I’ll tell you; my husband is interested in ants, but he’s so boring the ants can’t find a reason to be interested back. Look, you want to know how I bounced back after the baby? Eat anything you want, but be sure to take your crystal meth--that’ll jack your metabolism right up. And surgery. Let me tell you about the surgeries I’ve had. I recommend one for every new mother.’ She would laugh while she took off her shoes and none-so-subtly pulled a flask out of her purse.
Nonsense, utter nonsense. Jan wondered how many would believe her. Probably millions. The public loved nothing more than a good breakdown by some celebrity or another they had loved, most particularly if there was money in it for them. Maybe, Jan thought, fading from her fantasy interview, she should stick to Starbucks. Better yet, she could simply stop stalling and go see Susan. Jan hadn’t been to visit her friend since she’d embarrassed herself at the wedding, and as much as she wanted to see her, there was almost certainly going to be an adjoining lecture about her behavior. One she deserved, most certainly, but one she didn’t need or want to hear right at that very moment, all the same. She didn’t need to some righteous speech about how to be a better wife and a better mother. She just needed some support.
Jan let herself fall from the tree and blow a few feet before catching the wind and flying up above the pedestrian sidewalk, in and around leaves on yellow trees and under the canopies of small business’ windows. Jan couldn’t have named the street, but it was a familiar block of SoHo where she was sure she had enjoyed shopping before. The fantasy of a hilariously terrible interview faded from Jan’s mind, to be replaced by the very real idea of stopping to drop some cash in a shop that had hilariously terrible shoes shaped like octopus in the window--truly, there was nothing to the shoe to make it look like it could be walked on or walked in, save for the mannequin foot wedged between the tentacles--when she instead caught sight of a more welcome sight than even Sue reflected in the window.
‘STARK70,’ read the license plate of a black Beamer. Jan turned from the shop and saw the car just a few feet away, stopped at a light. He was the last person Jan needed to see right now, but the only one from whom she could be assured there would be no lecture. He had misbehaved as badly as she had, and in that, there could be no scolding or superiority. Jan kicked off the glass of the mirror and flew over to the car. He didn’t seem to notice her, and as the light changed, the open window pulled away, making it so Jan had to fight against the considerable wind drag before she finally pulled herself through the opening and tumbling through into the passenger’s seat.
Gasping for air, Jan righted herself and resized, only to wipe away the sweat that had accumulated from more or less the equivalent of a sizable run. Physical exertion was easier with her molecules compacted as they’d been, but duration was key. “Wow, talk about prettier on the inside,” she gasped, her hand loosely grasping at the seat belt before pulling it across her and into the receptor. “Wouldn’t have known it was you, except for the plate. Tell me, are you really up to seventy, or did you go for the birth year plate? What do you do when people take your name plate? Or did you already buy them out in case you end up with 100 cars down the line?” She propped her head up on the window ledge, and relished the feeling of wind through her damp hair. “There should really be a law against putting your name on any car with less street cred than a Mercedes.” She looked at her manicure on her left hand. It was shaking badly, but nor from anything she was feeling, but from the sheer exhaustion of flying so far and so fast. “I’m thinking about getting a Tesla--those are gorgeous. So.” She straightened up and slapped her legs in punctuation. For the first time since she’d gotten into the car, Jan turned to look at her friend. “How fast does she go?”
