SHORT
I
Mary watches Nonna move the antenna on the green plastic television back and forth. “I can’t get this damn thing to work,” Nonna says. The picture on the screen disappears into zigzags.
“Watch your language, Ma.” Mommy points to Mary and frowns at Nonna. “Try adjusting the aluminum foil,” Mommy says when it becomes clear the zigzags aren’t going away.
Nonna fiddles with the foil on the antenna, and the picture morphs into a fuzzy black-and-white image. Mary sees a small man, shoulders hunched, walking toward a scary-looking helicopter.
Mary slides underneath the yellow Formica table. Winnie is there, thumping her tail. Mary buries her head into Winnie’s tangled fur, smelling her wet dog smell.
Mary is tired of watching the news and hearing about Washington every day. She hears Nonna and Mommy talking in hushed tones above her. “I just want to be able to watch my soaps again,” Mommy whispers.
“Oy! Me, too,” Nonna says. She pokes her head under the table, her large fleshy arms resting on her lap. “You come out and watch this, Mary. You can tell your grandchildren about it.”
Mary crawls out from underneath the table. The man waves again, clutching his wife’s arm before he gets onto the helicopter. The president is a bad man. Why would she tell her grandchildren about him? She tries to picture herself being old like Nonna, but she can’t.
II
“Light as a feather,” they each recite, one by one, eyes wide, as they try to lift Bethany, who keeps opening her eyes to see what is going on. She snickers as she remains exactly where she has been, firmly planted on the floor. “I told you it wouldn’t work.”
“We should play Truth or Dare,” Lisa says.
“No wait,” Connie says, as she looks over at Mary. Mary is afraid of Connie, because Connie is mean, and Connie knows Mary is timid. “You know, I heard my dad say that there are copperheads in the basement. Who wants to go?”
They line up with their flashlights, excited, a flock of baby ducks.
Mary doesn’t want to see a copperhead. She knows with absolute certainty that if there is a copperhead in the basement, she will be the one that it finds, bites, and kills. She follows the pack then peels off into Connie’s older sister Milly’s room. The walls have spooky posters on them, Stevie Nicks in black lace and wizards and warlocks with crystal balls that give Mary a little thrill. She picks up a mood ring, such a brilliant shade of turquoise, and puts it on her finger. The mood ring slowly turns black. She shudders, and takes it off, placing it gently where she found it, watching it slowly turn back to green.
III
They are on a tortuously long and pointless ride on the subway system. “Metro,” corrects Colleen, who thinks herself an expert because she grew up in Silver Spring and is the one among their friends who cooked up this fiasco. They end up in Landover where there isn’t a whole lot to see beyond a failing mall. They walk to the shopping center, their voices echoing in the emptiness, then turn around and trudge back in the snow to get back to the subway-Metro. Mary is irritated that she has been dragged out to nowhere when she could be warm under a blanket.
The Metro hums. Mary remembers the night before, dancing at Numbers at Dupont Circle. The music—Billy Idol, Prince, the Violent Femmes—vibrated through to her bones, every cell and neuron in her tingling electric, firing to wild life. She danced awash in a sea of neon greens, pinks, and sparkling blue rhinestones, and she felt something ignite, like a match lighting a gas stove burner, sparking a small but persistent flame that burned through her body. She rode the wave, feeling her lips curve up into a smile she couldn’t hold back.
The afternoon before, she and Bill and Pete and Sue went sledding. They slid down the hill outside the dorms on cafeteria trays, and she felt Pete’s body right up close against hers as they flew down the hill and landed at the bottom, staying longer than they needed to, arms and body parts entwined in a jumble. On the Metro, she closes her eyes, remembering.
They come back from their Metro-subway excursion, and they hear the news. Over and over, she watches, on her miniature television, seeing the rocket launch into the air, then hearing the excitement in the newscasters’ voices turn to horror as the Challenger burst into flames. She can’t breathe. She closes the door and goes to dinner.
IV
A thin silver line rests in the liminal space between water and sky. A trick of the sun, no doubt, in that blue that slips into green. She finds herself floating to someplace she does not know, a place without effort or disturbance, where all is ephemeral, cool, sacred.
She snaps her head up. The gentle sound of waves hitting shoreline should have lulled her to sleep, but Mary remembers Ben. Everyone has been talking about shark attacks this summer, and Ben has just learned to walk. She chastises herself for losing sight of him for an instant. She squints. The sun is so bright. Tears run down her cheeks from squinting, and she wipes away salt and sand from her face.
Ted, wearing the green Bud Light hat he always wears at the beach, catches up to Ben, and Mary relaxes. She watches Ted play with their son, who staggers in uneven patterns across the sand. Ted is having a hard time keeping up, but he’s had some practice. The green hat disappeared somewhere in a scant few minutes, and his hair is kinked with sweat. She imagines what it would be like to kiss him right now, digging her fingers into the solid, warm flesh of his back.
She settles back into the beach chair, covering her feet in the sand, feeling the warmth from the sun melt her insides, and closes her eyes. They have been arguing lately. They don’t know how to manage a toddler.
She told him once about that indescribable spark that lights her up and reminds her she’s alive, even sometimes when she should be bone-tired and should be sleeping but can’t. He didn’t understand it at all.
But. She remembers how he looked when Ben was born. His lips twitched into a grin that could only be described as giddy, once, twice, too many times to count, and he wrapped his arm around her as they looked in awe at this beautiful being, their son. She remembers that clearly. He may not think much about the indescribable Mysterious, but he feels it just the same, in his own way, she is sure of it.
She peeks one eye open. Ted is sitting by the shoreline, Ben between his knees. Ben bangs his hands in the puddles in the sand, making little splashes. Ted gazes out to the sea, calm. An invisible thread connects them across the beach, encircling and holding the three of them close. She shuts her eye.
V
Everything is gray. Smoke, dust, terrifying crashes as the building collapses into itself, swallowing everything inside of it like a giant beast. This can’t be real. She hears sirens on the street forty-three floors below her, and helicopters flying, hovering, overhead, so loud it seems they are in the building.
The smoke makes her want to choke, and she can’t see farther than a few feet.
The only person she can see or hear is Nick, the young mailroom clerk, a few feet away from her. They’ve spoken a couple of times. Nice kid. Working his way through college, thrilled to be working in New York City. She can hear him sobbing, and he wipes snot away from his face with the back of his hand. He’s little more than a child.
Mary wants to comfort him, but she is stuck. Some object—a bookshelf?— has fallen across her leg. There’s no getting out of here. If she could get up to try to find a way, she would, but she knows it’s pointless.
She thinks of her mother on Long Island, probably at this very minute walking back from taking Ben to school on what must still be a beautiful September morning. A picture flashes into her mind of her son’s cherubic, five-year-old face contorted with anguish when he hears the news. She can’t bear it. And Ted. She longs to call him, to hear his voice one more time, and to tell him she will be okay, that it would be okay for him to marry someone else, someday. But not yet. Not for a while.
Oh God, she thinks. Help me.
A plaintive folk melody from another time plays in her head. Was it something her mother sang to her, once? She can’t place it.
She wonders what will happen to her. Will her light dim to a thin line, imperceptible to the eye, or will it expand into something mysterious and bright beyond her comprehension? And how can she leave her family behind? She doesn’t know.
Oh, so short. So very, very short.
She looks over at Nick. He has stopped crying now. His youthful face is clear, resigned. He comes over and moves the bookshelf that has pinned her to the floor.
He holds out his hand and helps her up. It is a Hobson’s choice: either burn to death or leap to oblivion. She makes the calculation and decides.
They walk through debris to the gaping hole that an hour ago was a window. Neither of them says a word.
They look at each other, their faces mirroring the other’s fear. She squeezes his hand.
They jump.
