Marjorie Stretched to Her Limits

When Marjorie woke, on her own accord, she vaguely remembered dreaming about rubber bands.
No, she thought in a hazy state of lumbering, not about rubber bands. I was a rubber band. I was rubber. I was stretched around my house. Trying to…trying to what?
“Mom!!! Get your ass out of bed! You’ll be late for work and more importantly, I’ll have to take the bus. Which we’ve discussed, is detrimental to out mother-daughter relationship.”
Trying to keep my house together.
Emily continued, “Gus hasn’t been fed today and the hinge popped off the kitchen cabinet again this morning while I was getting some pop-tarts…and nooooooooooooooooo I wasn’t hanging off the door either.”
Emily had this habit, when scouring the kitchen for snacks and dinner spoilers, of hoisting herself up onto the countertops, opening the cabinet doors and letting half of her body suspend over the kitchen linoleum. All of her weight would rest upon a single top-hinge.
Marjorie was fixing a lame version of three-cheese lasagna the first time Emily broke the cabinet. (Before David up and died.) They rushed to the hospital and dinner was ruined. By the time they had returned from the emergency room the lasagna, having been left out, was cold, half-cooked, and half eaten by Gus, their mongrel cat. Marjorie made turkey breast sandwiches instead. Emily stared at her sandwich, with mayo, like it was unexplored territory. They sat in silence for at least ten minutes, Marjorie with her head bowed and Emily looking at her bread.
“It’s a sandwich Emmy.”
“I know that moth-er,” she scoffed, “Cut me some slack. I’m on drugs.”
“Can you wear hats at school?”
“What do you think?”
“Just don’t lie and tell everyone you got those stitches from a barfight.”
“I think they look cool.” Emily began tearing the crusts off of her sandwich and throwing them on the floor.
“You would. Since when do you do that?”
“Do what?”
“Not eat your crusts.”
“Since I split my head open on the floor.”
Marjorie finally looked up at Emily, smiling. “You are so willful sometimes.”
“Mom,” Emily brought her legs up to her chair and her elbows up to the table, “Since my head is half-shaved now anyway, can I just buzz it all off?” In truth only a quarter of her hair had been shaved. A small patch above her left temple had been sheared for the stitches.
“Elbows off, and no. What would your father think?”
“He’s never here.” Emily rolled her sandwich up into a ball and tried to bounce it off of her plate. “I don’t think he would care anyway.” The bread ball thudded against her plate and lobbed itself to the yellow and green “spring sale” linoleum covering the kitchen floor.
“Well, I don’t know about that. Besides, this half-shaved look suits you.”
“But I want to be bald.”
“Wait till your father gets home and then ask him.”
“He wouldn’t notice if I did it anyway.”
Marjorie supposed that things weren’t much different now that David was gone than they were before. She still slept on the left side of her bed and the right side was still empty. She signed every slip of paper allowing Emily to do anything related with school. She was constantly waiting. Before (Before what?) Marjorie was waiting for the front door to open, or the garage door to close, locks turning- any sign of Dave returning home. Now she was waiting for a ghost. Something to make those noises again. David was slipping from her memory so much, that she couldn’t remember if it was his presence that comforted her or just the noise of his return.
No DAMMIT! He was comforting. He was a good husband. He slacked. We all do he-
“-okay Mom? Mom? Moth-er, did you hear me?”
Marjorie stared at the crack in her ceiling. She didn’t want to leave the comfort of her bed. Glancing over at her clock she noticed the time: 6:28. In two minutes her alarm would sound on its own. But Marjorie needed these two minutes. They were necessary.
Is it just my imagination or is the crack bigger this morning? Longer? I’m crazy?
Marjorie’s door swung open and Emily bounded in. She was wearing a long pair of boy’s shorts. “Skater” shorts, Emily had called them and then explained the intricate difference between board shorts, skater shorts, and surfing shorts.
“Why must my daughter look like a boy?”
Emily snorted. “Why would you say things like that to me? Wake up?” Emily was up on the bed straddling her mother.
“I didn’t say that to you. I thought it.”
“No, you totally said it to me. You’re so rude.”
“Did I?” Keep it together Marjorie. Keep it together.
“Anyway,” Emily steamrolled, “Get up! Get up! Get up! Drive me to school.” Emily rolled off of her mother to the other side of the bed.
The right side. David’s side. The empty side.
“Emily, look at the ceiling.”
“Why?”
“Just look at it,” Marjorie hissed. “Does that crack look longer to you. Bigger. Does it look dangerous?”
“What crack?” Emily’s head rested on Marjorie’s shoulder.
“That crack, Emmy, right there. Starting in the corner.” Marjorie pointed and made an invisible line with her finger.
“Mom,” Emily was snapping her wrist with her own rubber bands, which Emily had for her own reasons. “I don’t see a crack. There is no crack.”
“There isn’t?”
“No,” Emily kissed the side of her mother’s head. “Now come on, school now, crazy later.”
***
It was a precarious situation, certainly. But Marjorie couldn’t find David’s ladder. Or the step ladder for the kitchen. All in all, the structure seemed solid, stable. She started with the ottoman from the downstairs living room. On top of the ottoman she had placed a large piece of particle board from Emily’s room. Something Emily would eventually turn into “art” or a skate ramp. Or maybe both. On top of the particle board she put a chair from the hallway. It was an old plastic-deco piece that David had loved and Marjorie thought to be useless. I guess it has some use now. It was the first time that Marjorie had ever used the blue and white plastic retro chair. If she had had her choice she would have used one of the leather chairs from downstairs, but they were too heavy to carry and the cushions, she thought, would not provide proper balance. At the top of this precipice, was a bathroom trash can. Little, pale yellow, and turned upside down. The base of the waste can was just wide enough for Marjorie to plant both of her size six feet.
On her tiptoes, Marjorie could stretch her five foot nine frame just high enough to touch her bedroom ceiling.
If I can feel the crack. If I can notice a difference in texture. Then it is real.
She traced her finger along the stucco. Starting in the corner, where she felt the crack had started, she drove her fingers along the US country highway that had formed above her. Marjorie could feel the powdery plaster flaking off from inside the crack and watched it coat her hand lightly. From her current position, her hand would only stretch so far. The crack continued veining outward, beyond her grasp.
I can feel it! Goddammit, I can feel it. It is real and I am together.
Marjorie wanted to spit at the crack, to defile it. She wanted to cause her ceiling pain. A little fleck of stucco and paint floated off the ravine above and slowly blended in with the atmosphere. Through the crack she could see the attic’s baseboards. She stuck her index finger inside the wound and slowly dragged it across as if opening an envelope.
The crack widened, more plaster and debris fell and Marjorie wondered if this was how god created canyons.
Two fingers.
Three fingers.
Her entire hand slipped up inside the space between the decaying ceiling and the wooden attic floor. The plaster felt cool on her palm and the wood itchy on her knuckles. She pushed a little farther and little veins began feathering out like little creeks.
I am not crazy. My daughter is crazy. Or fucking with me. I swear to god if she is fucking with me, I will kill her. Goddammit David. I told you, all of that rain would damage this ceiling. The entire time we lived here we didn’t reshingle once. You never fixed the house. You never fixed the car. You never fixed Emily. You never-
“Uh!” With a grunt and a quick jerk of her hand a rather large chunk of her ceiling came crashing down to the floor.
“There!” Marjorie screamed. “There! There is the crack!” Furiously, she began tearing at the plaster. Chipping fingernails along the way. Sweat beaded and she stretched to her tiptoes to slash at more ceiling, throwing the center of herself, her scaling contraption and her entire house off-kilter. With a final indignant swipe, Marjorie toppled.