Anne Sexton got home. She poured herself a glass of vodka. She put an arm into one sleeve, then the other, of her mother’s heavy, bristled fur coat, she slid them off her fingers, one by one, her rings, she went into the garage. She locked the door. She got into her car and started the engine, then closed her eyes and leaned back.
Ghosts…
Rico took Zorka to Anne’s grave at the Forest Hills Cemetery in Jamaica Plain.
My Friend, My Friend
The Fury of Abandonment
The Fury of Earth
The Fury of Sunrises
The Fury of Sunsets
Rico spent every Christmas with his family in Houston. That year he invited Zorka to come down with him, and so they got into his midnight-blue Toyota Corolla, and began their road trip southwest, down past Hartford, New Haven, Krispy Kreme, Wendy’s, the 95 to the 78, around New York, the 476, past Hershey, past Harrisburg, then on the border Zorka rolled down her window and yelled out “PEACE OUT NEW JERSEY” and Rico honked twice.
They continued down through Maryland, the long 81 down into Virginia, through the George Washington and Jefferson National Forests. Zorka took a small invisible hat off her head and said with a bow, “Khello Mr Presidents, how you do…” and Rico burst out laughing.
Past Roanoke, Blacksburg, Firestone Complete Auto Care, LaQuinta Inn, Kingsport, “What up, Tennessee,” Rico saluted, “the gays are comin,” at which Zorka began to sing the new song she made up as their talisman for driving through the South: “gay as fuck, wish us luck…”
Knoxville, down the 75, around the corner of the Chattahoochee National Forest, through the tip of Georgia, then onto the 59 into Alabama. Rico was tapping on the steering wheel. Then he reached over and turned the radio up and Zorka began to swivel in her seat, singing along to the lyrics with a thick pronunciation while rolling her window down.
Misssssssyyyyyyyy!” Zorka yelled out into the passing field. In the distance, a cow responded “mooo.”
They stopped for the night at a Super 8 motel, the coral exterior with the yellow sign holding the dilated orange-red 8 popping out of the wood. The woman with the name tag “Candice” gave both Rico and Zorka a long look, then slid the paperwork over and handed them the key.
“Enjoy your stay,” she said, uninterested in her own sentence.
They parked their car and went up the stairs, past the ice and snack machines, to the second-level rooms, 5B.
In the room the carpet was the colour of mashed potatoes and the two twin beds had a quilted comforter with square patterns in mauve and turquoise. On the wall was a watercolour painting of a bouquet of flowers and another of a large seashell.
They drank a couple of beers then turned on some music and Zorka danced around while Rico read. They talked about what Rico wanted to do after he graduated. He said he wanted to go to grad school. And to Paris.
“You wana go to Paris, Zorka?”
“Yeah, sure, Rico. Maybe French Girl can take us. Zhe parl an pu fransay, vou savey.”
“You got a good accent…”
“Shut up.”
“Ha, well no less discreet than your accent in English.”
“Yeah, this shit suck big time. Wish I just have no accent and speak like you.”
“No way, Zorka. It totally works for you.”
“Cause I know how to verk it…” Zorka dipped down, touched her toes and rolled back up.
They woke up in the middle of the night to yelling in 5A.
“I fucking knew it…!” a man hit his palm on the wall, right above Rico’s bedside lamp.
“You don’t know nothing,” the woman yelled back. “You too busy with your goddamn self to know something…” The woman began to over-enunciate her words. “You an embarrassment, William don’t want to see you, he tell me he don’t want to see his Daddy no more, you got him getting knocked round in school cause of you and he just a kid… comin home with a black eye, got his nose bleedin!”
“Oh I’m a embarrassment? Who the fuck you think pay all your bills?”
“Fuck you, that shit’s called child support and it’s for Willie to get his notebooks and shit for school you asshole, it’s for him to get his fuckin Hepatitis B shot!”
The man hit the wall again. The seashell watercolour swivelled on its hook.
“I ain’t ’fraid of you, Mitch.”
There was some pacing, then the room became quiet. The bed next door creaked shyly as each person got in it. Not long after, the couple was asleep.
Zorka got up, fixed the seashell painting and got back into bed.
In the morning, they checked out, got back on the road, past Birmingham, stopping at Denny’s for a late breakfast. Zorka got extra hash browns and covered them with a thick, swirling layer of ketchup. They continued on the 59, crossed into Mississippi, past Laurel, past Hattiesburg, right to the tip where they could see the water, then drove on the 12 into Louisiana, Baton Rouge, Big Head’s Bar-BQ, Goodwill, then the 10 to Lafayette, Beaumont, straight to that southern tip of Texas, into Houston.
“Home Sweet Home,” Rico said and parked the car in the driveway.
When Rico and Zorka came through the door, Rico’s mum was spraying vinegar on the countertop and wiping.
“Oh take off your shoes,” Rico pointed to the neat row of shoes by the door.
“Honeyboy!” Rico’s mum came running into the hallway with her arms wide, her right hand still holding the vinegar spray.
“Hi Mom,” Rico said and gave her a hug.
“This is Zorka.”
“Khello,” Zorka said awkwardly.
“Come here, honey.”
Rico’s mum pulled Zorka down to her level and gave her a squeeze.
“Are you hungry? I hope you’re hungry.”
Dinner reminded Zorka of those New Year parties she’d had in her building as a child, with the long table of plates of food, and her and Jana sitting under the table, whispering.
On this table: a ceramic pan of beef in a thick brown sauce with sliced green peppers, plates of cold cuts, ham, turkey, pastrami, a large aluminium pan filled with slices of pork belly, cubes of crispy fried pork, a square plate of sweetened cured pork, piles of glass noodles, dishes topped with halves of boiled eggs, shrimp, a macaroni chicken salad, bright indigo rolls, pastries in all colours, pink and yellow and green, rows of meatballs, and finger-sized fried rolls with bright orange dipping sauce, white rice with sliced chives, glistening barbecue skewers, white bread puffs splitting at the top…
She wondered if she lifted the tablecloth and crawled underneath – would Jana be waiting for her?
“You can call me Perla,” Rico’s mum said.
She went around the table, “…and that’s Tita Karen, that’s Tita Baby, that’s Weng-Weng, that’s Pinky, that’s Joseph, that’s Bongbong, that’s JJ, and this is my husband Bruce.”
Everyone waved as she said their name.
There were photos of Rico and JJ, his younger brother, in frames all over the walls, around which looped silver and gold tinsel and vines of Christmas lights. There were two stuffed Santa Clauses hanging from each corner, and a lit-up snowflake the size of a head in the window.
Perla said something to JJ in a different language and JJ picked up the cellophane-covered remote control and turned off the wide-screen TV and came back to the table.