Kafkas uncle, p.13
Kafka's Uncle, page 13
She became drowsy, slept, and dreamed. She dreamed she was struggling up that snowy slope. She waved her Ph.D. to the shadowy figures. “Look, Mother! Look, Father! Look, my brothers! I’m getting my Ph.D. Look! Look! I’ll soon be like you and have letters behind my name!”
“Very good,” said the mother.
“Very good,” said the father.
“Wonderful,” said the brother on the left.
“Fantastic,” said the brother on the right.
She heard the voices of children calling down from above.
“Sing a song of sixpence,
A pocket full of rye;
Four and twenty blackbirds
Baked in a pie.
When the pie was open’d
The birds began to sing;
Was that not a dainty dish
To set before the King?”
Jennifer turned in the snow, the cold, the mist. There came to her a shining fog.
“Ignore that!” said the right brother.
“Has no meaning!” said the mother.
“Not logical!” said the father.
“Up here! Up here! The lofty heights of thought, achievement. That is all that matters!” said the brother on the left.
Jennifer was just about to scramble the slopes again when she heard the voices of the children again:
“Hey! diddle, diddle,
The cat and the fiddle,
The cow jumped over the moon.
The little dog laughed
To see such sport
And the dish ran away with the spoon.”
Jennifer turned and smiled and said:
“There was a crooked man and he went
A crooked mile.
He found a crooked sixpence against
A crooked stile.
He bought a crooked cat, which caught
A crooked mouse.
And they all lived together in
A little crooked house.”
From high above, the voices of her family:
“Immature!”
“Regression!”
“Stupid!”
“Childish!”
And Jennifer turned and said, “Childish! That’s right! Right you are. Fuck you!” She looked at her doctoral thesis. “And fuck this! I don’t need it!” and giving the finger to the heavens, “And I don’t need you!”
The mist changed shape and became a golden bird; suspended below it, a huge open basket filled with smiling children; and on the back of the bird, Dawn and Susan.
“Jump,” they cried.
“I can’t!” said Jennifer. “I want to but I can’t!”
“Yes, you can!” said Dawn. “Your imagination will carry you! Imagine that you can and you shall! Try!”
Jennifer closed her eyes, imagined that she was jumping, imagined that she was on the golden bird’s back—and when she opened her eyes, she was.
And everyone began singing:
“Lavender’s blue, dilly, dilly,
Lavender’s green,
When I am King, dilly, dilly.
You shall be Queen.”
And they sailed through the clouds; it became warmer.
“Call out your men, dilly, dilly,
Set them to work,
Some to the plow, dilly, dilly,
Some to the cart.”
The clouds thinned, vanished, and below them, the snow and ice were gone and the green of the Earth stretched forever and the golden bird beat its wings.
“Some to make hay, dilly, dilly,
Some to cut corn,
While you and I, dilly, dilly,
Keep ourselves warm.”
The bird soared upward, upward, through the blue sky, warmed by yellow sun.
Jennifer turned to Dawn, grinning, and to see Susan laughing, and the bird carried the basket of children as though it weighed but a feather and again everyone sang:
“Lavender’s blue, dilly, dilly,
Lavender’s green,
When I am King, dilly, dilly,
You shall be Queen.”
Jennifer awoke. “My God,” she whispered to herself. “My God!” She sat up. She watched the dark of evening fill her room, but that’s not what she saw; her mind was filled with the dream. Over and over it replayed in her mind. Finally, she got up, turned on the lights, and sat down with her notebook, but before she could begin, there was a knock.
Standing outside the door, Susan and Dan. Dan looked distraught. “Is Dawn here? Have you seen her?”
Jennifer shook her head. “No, she’s not here—I saw her last at four—she was going to go home to help with dinner and then a few minutes later—you, Dan, you and I talked—that’s the last time I saw her—”
Dan ran his fingers through his hair. “Oh, Christ! God damn it, where could she—”
Susan looked worried. “She was in the library today—she wanted to know—”
“What?” said Dan, “What did she want to know?”
“She wanted to know when the men were going into the swamp—”
“You know what she’s done?” said Dan. “You know what she’s done? She’s gone into the swamp to try to find Dusk’s Mirror! To warn it—oh, Christ! That’s just what she’s done!”
“Are you sure?” said Jennifer. “It’s ten o’clock—maybe she’s at a friend’s house—”
“No,” said Dan, “she knows she’s to be home at eight o’clock every night or have someone phone. Nope, nope, she’s in there, somewhere—and with those goddamn five goons in there—I’m going to get Walters, Shane, Timson and we’re going in there tonight—”
“No,” said Susan.
“What do you mean, ‘No’?” He looked utterly exasperated. “You think I’m going to let Dawn spend the night in that friggin’ swamp?”
“She’ll be all right,” said Susan.
“The only reason you can say that is that she’s not your daughter—oh, shit—I’m sorry, Susan—I’m upset. I’m sorry.”
Susan sighed. “That hurt.”
“I’m sorry—I—”
“She may not be my daughter, but she is—” she stopped. “I’m every bit as concerned about her as you are.”
“I know,” said Dan. “I know, I know!” But I want her to be safe, Susan; God, if anything happened to her—I mean just being in that swamp is bad enough but there are five men in there who by now are either drunk or spooked or both who are going to hear a twig snap and probably obliterate a cubic mile of forest! Maybe they went in with napalm! Maybe they’re going to burn the forest down!”
“But what good is it going to do if you’re the one who gets obliterated?”
“Susan!” said Dan, “What are you saying? Are you telling me that some—some—legend in there is going to save her—?”
“It did last time.”
“That’s—” Dan suddenly became silent. After a few minutes he said, “We’ll go out in the morning. I feel like I’m signing her death warrant—but maybe you’re right—I don’t know.” Without another word he turned and walked away.
Not more than a couple of minutes after he had left, Susan and Jennifer saw the faintest, faintest glow in the swamp.
“Susan,” said Jennifer.
“I know. I see it.”
They waited. The glow faded. And in a few minutes they heard a footfall.
“Susan! Jennifer!” Dawn came running to them.
“Dawn!” Susan embraced her. “What happened? Dan is worried sick! He was about ready to go in and find you.”
“It found me!”
“What?” said Jennifer.
“Dusk’s Mirror. I got lost on purpose. It was just as wonderful and gentle as it was before. I told it about the men—it knew already. It thanked me and we played—then it led me out to the forest edge—just now. Oh, Susan, it was beautiful!”
Dawn was obviously ecstatic. Jennifer had no doubt that she had indeed seen something and she became determined to see it, too.
They got Dawn home to a greatly relieved and happy, then angry Dan, who turned to a well—just—what—the—hell—do—you—do—in—a—situation—like—this—Dan who then listened patiently and who then, the next morning ran a newspaper headline which read: “DUSK’S MIRROR EXISTS!” The story not only talked about the night before but also mentioned Johnny’s “cure”.
Jennifer noticed a change through the town the next day. No matter where she went, everyone was talking about it; it was as though a minor Second Coming had occurred, or if it turned out that Santa Claus really did exist; (although, of course, everyone knew it but were afraid to say anything because—after all, what if it didn’t)?
When Jennifer finally ran into Dawn around noon, she was elated.
“Well,” said Jennifer, “aren’t you the star.”
“Oh,” she said, “oh, it’s so neat!”
“I’m sure the star wouldn’t mind being treated to an ice cream cone, would she?”
“Uh—uh,” said Dawn, grinning.
They went into Dusk’s Mirror Café and someone said, “Hey, there she is!”
People applauded and laughed. Someone yelled, “Long live Dusk’s Mirror!” and more applause. Dawn looked radiant, excited and enchanted.
As the day went on, it became Dusk’s Mirror Day; stores stayed open and, delighted and amazed, Jennifer watched the short main street of Dusk fill with people. Good Lord, she thought, where have they all come from? It was a celebration; Jennifer also noticed, with a profound sense of disbelief yet humility, that someone had set up a booth to collect clothes and materials in order to make Melissa and Johnny more comfortable.
That evening, while the little town of Dusk was ablaze in lights and celebration, Susan and Jennifer sat on a bench just outside the grocery.
Susan laughed. “You know, I wonder if the creature has any idea how much it’s appreciated.”
“Well,” said Jennifer, “It certainly must know something is going on. I wonder if Dawn knows why she’s the object of all this celebration?”
“A little prophet bringing glad tidings, a lightning rod, a messenger with a message from the gods, an ambassador. She’s all those things.”
After a silence between them, during which somehow the music, the voices of the people seemed suddenly to be loud, intense, Jennifer said, “And Susan, what is Dawn to you?”
Susan did not look at Jennifer; but there was a covert message she seemed to convey: you know, don’t you? I should have known you’d ask again, that you’d not forget. Had I only been more careful last night—but no, no, in spite of that, I should have known you’d ask. She stood, “All right. Let us go for a walk.”
They walked back to the motel in silence; the noises, the sounds of the celebration dimming as they walked. In back of Susan’s cottage, white, iron lawn chairs around a white iron round table. They sat.
Darkness around them. The darkness of the swamp closing in.
“I should say it’s none of your business,” began Susan, “and yet this desire to share with you—because I trust you? Because I’ve never told anyone? Because I know that you’ll understand and let this secret bloom and die between us?”
“If that’s what you wish, Susan,” said Jennifer.
Silence. In the darkness, fireflies blinked off and on like miniature stars coming into being and then vanishing. A great warm wind came, sighed and died.
Susan began slowly, in a low voice. “So like a cat you are, Jennifer, curious and watchful, yet when you pounce, it is with grace and softness that you touch. So you’ve touched the fact that there is something between Dawn and myself. Silence. “She is my granddaughter.”
Puzzled, Jennifer leaned forward. “Is that the secret? Dan knew of it.”
“And only of that. And all he knows of why I couldn’t take care of her was the case I made that she needs a family, a mother, a father, not a grandmother.”
“But wouldn’t Dawn have wanted to live with her grandmother?”
Silence. The fireflies—lightness/darkness.
“Dawn has no idea that I am her grandmother. Nor will she ever know.”
“But—but why?”
“Because—of my own shame. My mother married an army man; they fought bitterly and finally divorced—but not until after I was born. . . and beaten a few times. My mother did the best she could and always bore the guilt of what they did. She tried—I think—to honestly love me—but it was a love out of guilt—not real affection.”
“I left home—home being Cleveland, Ohio—when I was old enough to get the opportunity—seventeen—eighteen—ending up in New York and luckily getting a clerk job—a low paying drudge of a job—in a publishing house—and that’s when I began my love affair with books—never mind the idea of marriage, romance, men—all of it turned my stomach because all it brought to my heart was memories of fighting and beatings.” Susan sighed.
In the distance, sound of celebration; a band. And around them, the fireflies: flick/on, flick/off.
“It was December—early December—1941—I was having lunch at a café in New York and this soldier sits down beside me—I was I guess twenty, twenty—one—and somehow—some way—we fell in love—we saw each other for a few days—then the war broke out—Pearl Harbor—and he was gone. He wrote me—whenever he could—”
In the dark, Jennifer could see Susan rubbing her face—pain? Profound fatigue? She did not know.
“Cruel irony,” she whispered, “I can’t even remember my father—yet I end up with someone—in the military who was so like him—” A pause. “Thought I was so different than my mother—vowed to not make the mistakes—”
Jennifer listened, waited, said nothing.
“Jeff came back before the war was over—1943. We married—I—had—” long pause. “I had no idea how much he hated his parents, his mother—he was beaten as a child—”
“Oh, my God,” whispered Jennifer.
“Oh, how people find each other on which to wage the war for their parents. I still cannot believe. . . I still—uncanny—and I didn’t have—I didn’t know—until after our daughter Alice was born—she was an accident—I didn’t want her—not after I realized what was happening between us—Jeff and myself—I never hit Alice—oh, so often I came so close—such a burden she was and she knows—she knew—I came home one night—Jeff drunk, the child Alice—”
She stopped talking; her head lowered, pressing against upraised, clasped hands and Jennifer could not tell if she was crying.
“I took Alice,” she began, “went to Atlanta—far away from New York, and began to raise her like my mother had raised me. And Alice hated me. I did my best and told her, and told her, ‘avoid men in a uniform; don’t go near them. Don’t make the same mistake I made and my mother made’. At that time I thought it was just the men that I happened to pick; little did I realize how my hatred of men fed men’s hatred of women. I didn’t want to see that—maybe I couldn’t. The next thing I knew it was 1970, my daughter was twenty—five and married to a sergeant from Vietnam—and she was pregnant. And her last words to me were ‘Mother, stay away, don’t try to find me—just leave us alone’.”
Weeping. The sound of weeping in the most profound darkness. Jennifer moved her chair and sat close to Susan and gently placed her arm around her shoulders.
“For five years,” she whispered, “I stayed in Atlanta; I heard nothing—I stayed—went to school—became a librarian—and then in April, 1975—I don’t know how it happened—it could only have been a clerical error—I got a hospital bill—that was meant for my daughter. So, I came to Dusk—to see if I could help—to re—establish ties—to do something—I arrived—no one was at the house—but I heard crying. Dawn—my granddaughter—in a corner—” Susan stopped, unable to continue—then began again—“crying, a black eye, bruises—”
“Oh, Susan—”
“I’m the one who called Child Protective Services—I didn’t give my name—I didn’t dare—it was the next evening that my daughter and her husband tried to leave Dusk—” Susan sighed, found a handkerchief and wiped her eyes. “I was contacted a week later to see if I wanted custody—and I said no, that it’d be better to find someone in Dusk—which turned out to be Dan and Cora—and I moved down—and told them who I was—we all simply agreed it was better that way—that Dawn not know—but at least I could see my grandchild, talk with her, and love her in a way that I never loved my own daughter.” She sighed.
“I’m sorry,” said Jennifer, “that you went through that.”
“At least here, Dawn gets a lot of love from a lot of people. Maybe that will break the cycle of three generations—maybe she won’t grow up making the same mistakes—maybe with enough love, enough magic in her life—” she shook her head. “Only time will tell.” She wiped her eyes. “Only time will tell.”
Both stayed up a little longer, saying little, just sitting in the dark, with the fireflies, with the warm winds moving the night.
The next morning was quiet in Dusk; later that morning, stores began opening. Susan had gone to the library, and about noon, Jennifer stopped in to see Dan. “Hi,” she said, “I’m going to lunch. Care to join me?”
He smiled. “Don’t mind if I do. Oh, by the way,” he grinned now, “you want to hear a story right before it goes to the press?”
“Sure.”
“Our Fearless Five returned this morning; no report of Dusk’s Mirror, but they were all very well mosquito—bitten, Reverend Black had a sprained ankle, Bill Hansen came down with a vicious sore throat, Ralph Atwood spent the one night with vomiting and diarrhea, Ollie Ecklund came down with severe cramps and muscle spasms and Jake Matherson came down with violent migraine headaches.”
“Sounds like they had a bad time of it.”
“And there’s more. At night they were kept awake by hootings, thrashings and screeches. They never saw anything,” and he laughed. “But they sure felt something.” He shook his head. “Should have seen them. They were an incredible mess. I plan to send each one a copy of the paper so that they can read Dawn’s and Johnny’s stories. I’m sure they’ll enjoy them. Especially after their journey.”
