The Obligatory Year

By Mike Henderson

Tom Flynn, former film critic and presently a lecturer teaching mass-media writing at a university in Portland, Oregon, loses his wife and then suspects she had been pregnant. Troubling is the fact that they hadn't had sex for two months. Flynn suddenly is consigned to the "The Obligatory Year" of dealing with grief and immediately is descended upon by three very different women.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Mike Henderson
• Release date: Aug 8, 2010

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THE OBLIGATORY YEAR

By

Mike Henderson

Smashwords Edition

Published by Mike Henderson @ Smashwords

© 2010 by Mike Henderson

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ISBN #######

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Smashwords Edition, License Notes

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Manuscript formatting and cover design by Deb Dahrling

PART ONE

CHAPTER ONE

Crash

The strawberry-colored, heart-shaped stationery that was stuck to the double-wide Sub-zero was signed by the faint remains of a lipstick smooch from that morning. My wife had been out the door before 6. It was typically sweet of her, I thought, to leave me sleeping soundly in cloudy, clammy Portland while she traveled to California to attend a semi-annual two-day retreat in Carmel-by-the-Sea for buyers and other execs representing Monde, the peerless department-store chain of North America.

I stood close to the refrigerator and re-read the semi-legible labor of my wife’s crabbed hand:

"Seventy-seven and gentle breeze south of Monterrey today, sucka. Stay warm (Oregon style: wine). Pity me (retreats are very hard work, especially at beach resorts). Wait up for me manana (arrival maybe 10ish).

"S + T = TRU LUV (barf)

(Call me, Tommy. Wait! Better call me Shelley. gtg).

Shelley relished leaving me with her playfully deliberate misspellings because she knew how the linguistic corruption some call ad-spell makes me seethe. I read the palm-size missive for maybe the eighth time. Maybe it was the eightieth. It was very odd that I hadn’t heard from her. Even when she was out of town we at least traded voicemail, texts and e-mail every few hours, maybe less out of affection or devotion than for the ongoing amusement of a relationship that seemed based mainly on making each other laugh.

It was 5:15 in the afternoon and I tried her yet again with a text: You floating off to Valhalla or just too cool to get back to me?

Then I punched her number with the same result I’d gotten the several times I’d tried that day: Hi, it’s Shelley, was the sunny recorded response. Leave me a message and I’ll get right back.

My laptop, plopped at the far end of the speckled-granite kitchen island, was offering me an audible e-mail prompt. My electronic Netflix friends were reminding me of what was coming in the mail the next day: the brilliant noir Mildred Pierce plus a contemporary Oscar nominee from Clint Eastwood.

At about 5:30 I phoned my buddy Miles Glover and left him voice mail: Listen, pal, I’m gonna have to bag the drink at six: domestic obligation. Will check in later this week.

I dribbled another inch of shiraz into my goblet and hit the remote for MSNBC, immediately turning it off when the phone rang.

God, I thought, frickin’ finally.

But it wasn’t my cell phone. And it wasn’t Shelley. We kept a seldom-used cordless landline on a wall in the walk-in pantry off the kitchen. It was a phone that rang seemingly just once a week, invariably to carry a pitch for an investment strategy or, annoyingly, a bogus ploy to have us buy tickets to a charity basketball game between city and county police. That’s what I half thought it was when the woman’s voice said:

Mr. Flynn?

Yes, I snapped, what is it?

Thomas Flynn? You’re the husband of Shelley Montaigne?

Yes, I said, wandering to the kitchen island and easing onto a stool. Who is this?

This is Officer Chang, Mr. Flynn. I’m with Multnomah County police. My partner and I are within a few blocks of your building. We’d like to come up.

Two minutes later Janet Chang, slight, no doubt likeable under other circumstances, but now with a drawn complexion, and a portly Norm-something, perhaps twice her age, were standing in my kitchen, both in street clothes. Chang handed me her business card. Then she let me have it with everything I needed to know and nothing I wanted to hear.

We were asked to come see you by the local authorities in Santa Cruz, California, she explained. We keep reciprocal arrangements with other jurisdictions as a courtesy.

What? I don’t understand… I ventured. Is something –

There’s no easy way to say this, Chang said, pausing. She extended her left hand and firmly grasped my own before adding: I’m afraid that Ms. Montaigne was in a traffic accident this morning, near Santa Cruz. It was fatal, Mr. Flynn. We didn’t get word until just a while ago. The process of finding next-of-kins can be a little . . . tedious out of state. I’m so, so sorry.

I reeled backward, my legs buckling beneath me, as numb as the brain that was trying to process all of this. Dead? My eyes welled up and blinded me. I tried to speak but I couldn’t. I sank down into a stuffed chair near the kitchen and, for a blessed moment, my mind was a complete blank.

Then, I was seized by an intense grief unlike any I’d ever experienced, even when my close friend’s dad had been killed in a hit-and-run accident.

Shelley actually was dead. Or why were these two distinctly uncomfortable police representatives in my living room giving me the worst news I’d ever received?

I don’t show much emotion, and never among strangers. To my embarrassment, tears began leaking from my eyes, although I tried to stop them, aware of the ludicrousness of male pride even at a moment like this.

Oh, my God, I heard myself say, and I began quaking. Excuse me, I said and rushed to the bathroom just in time.

My stomach rumbled and I retched. Grabbing a fistful of tissues, I wiped at my face, seeing a fleeting mirror image of a bloated visage that moments earlier had been my angular, normal-looking face. When I returned, Officer Chang slowly pulled an envelope from her large shoulder bag and placed it on the counter.

Mr. Flynn, this envelope has some basic information for you about the incident, including phone numbers you can call, ways to get help with loved ones to make arrangements.

Even if I’d been of a mind to process the information, the conclusion was the same: The lone loved one worth contacting obviously was gone.

We can stay for as long as you like and answer any questions you have, she said, gently. We just didn’t want you to have to find out about this over the phone.

I stared at her for what must have been an uncomfortable half minute. Thank you. That’s very kind, I replied dully. I’m sure it’s all covered in the envelope. Please, it’s okay; I think I need to be alone to….I can’t think straight right now. I don’t even know what to ask, sorry. I’ll have to wait ‘til later to look in the envelope.

A typical handshake was utterly wrong for the occasion. Instead Chang took my left hand with her right and gave me a firm squeeze as her partner moved behind her toward the door. He accidentally rubbed against Shelley’s heart-shaped note on the refrigerator, and it came unstuck and fluttered to the floor.

Oh, gosh, sorry, he said awkwardly, dropping to a knee to retrieve what he may have imagined was a valentine left over from the previous month. I took it from his fat hand and slipped the missive into a drawer beside the kitchen island.

A moment later they were gone.

What had been a languid day was about to be transformed into an evening of ceaseless activity, though I had no sense of passing time. Suddenly my cell phone went off and simultaneously, I heard the buzzer at my entryway, indicating somebody else now wanted in at the security door to my building.

I ignored the call. It was Miles Glover getting back to me. Instead, I went to the intercom.

Tommy, it’s Kate from the store, the voice stated with a hurried urgency.

I groaned. In my experience, Kate had been given to histrionics no matter what the occasion. That she was Shelley’s favorite among her co-workers had seemed odd to me because I had always thought their dispositions were diametrically opposite.

Tommy, she continued and the dread was evident, can we come up? Please let us in.

I buzzed Kate up and left the door to the hallway half open. A few minutes later, I heard the elevator doors, but not to deliver Kate. What I heard instead was the familiar sound of a shuffling yellow lab service dog tethered to the left hand of my next-door neighbor, Edward, perhaps the most competent legally blind court stenographer in the world. I pulled the door toward me and, as he passed, Edward must have felt a draft.

Thomas? That you?

Hello, Edward, I said, endeavoring to put enough bounce in the phrase to keep him moving down the hall to his door. He and I had taken to amusing one another with the formality of our given names, even though others often called us Tom, Ed, Eddie, Tommy. Shelley had preferred the latter, though most everybody else called me Tom or, inaccurately, Professor Flynn.

How’re you doing? Edward casually asked as he got to his door and inserted the key. Shelley get to the Bay Area okay?

Edward, I’m pretty tied up right now, I said, realizing I’d need to try to compartmentalize my emotions and hold off Edward until later. I’d try to deal with Edward later. I’m on the phone. Let’s talk a little in a while.

Within seconds the elevator emptied with Kate and two others, both men. As they approached, I knew from Kate’s face, puffy with grief, that she was reading mine.

Tommy, the police called us, she said as I vaguely guided them toward the palatial living room Shelley and I had dubbed The Good Room. They needed your phone number, so we made them tell us why.

Once seated – they were on one sofa; I sat opposite them – the shorter, older of the two gentlemen commenced. Mister Flynn, can I call you Tom?

I nodded.

I’m Jerry Weathers, he said, tilting his balding head nervously, tugging just a little at the unbuttoned collar above his necktie. I don’t think I’ve met you. I’m vice president, director of H.R.

Human resources, the other man said, adding that I’m Manuel Mendez. I know we’ve met. I’m Shelley’s –

We met at a holiday party, I blurted.

Mendez, dark hair, tanned, terrifically groomed and dressed, was a rung or two above Shelley on the company pantheon and was her nominal boss.

Weathers again: More of us would have been here but . . . this is all so . . . I mean, we didn’t want a crowd here with you. The police –

Police, I repeated. I know. From Santa Cruz.

We asked them if we could see you first, Weathers said. As I say, others wanted to come over with us. The police needed your home phone number. They called us from Shelley’s business card.

Then Weathers paused for a moment, furrowed his brow and, practically in a whisper, almost as an apology, said: So . . . Shelley.

Yes, I said, swallowing. An auto accident.

Kate, her face swelling as she wiped her eyes, had kicked away her slip-ons and buried her feet under her rump. She was lumpy-looking under a clingy knit outfit, brown like her hair. She whimpered now as Weathers continued.

We only just heard about it a half hour ago, he said, seemingly thankful that the worst part of his obligation had past. I have no idea why it took them so long. Shelley either died instantly or later at a hospital in Santa Cruz; we don’t know yet. We still don’t have all the details, but we’ll be getting them soon.

After a long pause, I spoke again. It came out as a kind of mumble, a blubber, an utterance, a slur sent to no one in particular. She died instantly, I blankly repeated, scarcely even capable of understanding my own words.

Then, amid the silence, the merciful physiology of shock intervened for a moment, transporting me back to my normal world, where I taught writing courses to college students. In my flat-lining mind amid the silence of the room, I seized upon the phrase died instantly, a construction that I’d discouraged my students from using. For a writing exercise pertaining to creating a news story from a police report, I would observe that most of my minions repeated the cop’s assertion that the deceased had died instantly. Then I would ask someone in class to try to describe to me how anybody could know for certain when and if a victim actually died instantly.

What was an instant? Was it a snap of the fingers? A nanosecond? Was it the time it takes for a telephone prompt to let a middle-age man know he’s a widower? Did the deceased come back to life and report that he – she, I was beginning to realize, if not accept – died instantly?

I stood up and wandered toward the bank of windows that revealed the disinterest of street life. Four floors below me, business professionals and others walked briskly in each direction, purposefully returning from workdays and ready to embrace the sweet, mundane ways of whatever their typical rituals would be at home at 6 on a Monday night in early spring.

Suddenly, I was overcome by a rare emotion, for me: rage.

What the fuck? I yelled, wondering for an instant whether Edward could hear me from his balcony, whirling to look at Shelley’s three co-workers. How does this happen? Shelley catches an early flight to San Fran –

San Jose, Jerry Weathers interrupted.

To California, for Christ sakes, I continued, yelling accusingly now, and then I find out she’s dead? I’ve got this note from her in my kitchen. I can almost smell her on it. I’ve been re-reading it all day. She wrote it this morning. She’s dead? What the fuck is that?

But I suddenly thought better of the situation and abruptly shut up. Perhaps it was a reaction to the pathetic expressions on each of their faces. Weathers’ eyes behind his glasses suddenly seemed sunken another inch into his head. His irregularly pocked complexion was reddening. Manuel Mendez seemed certain any second to lose it in teary grief, clinging to a handkerchief he’d taken from his breast pocket, possibly the first and last time he’d ever use the sartorial accessory as something functional. No one spoke for a minute. Then Kate, improbably, found the strength to continue.

We all adore – adored – Shelley, Kate said, and we want to be sure you understand that we’re here, the whole company, everybody at Monde, is here to help you any way we can. So if it’s all right, maybe Jerry can say a few things.

I excused myself and went to the nearest bathroom, the opulent one Shelley used, rather than the more austere latrine I usually preferred. On the way back I grabbed the box of tissues Shelley kept on her nightstand. Then I took a circular turn through the kitchen so I could collect three bottles of water for my nominal guests.

Kate, who had appeared for a time to be morphing into a fountain of tears, seemed relieved when I set the tissues in front of her and each eagerly uncapped a water bottle and sipped. I sat and directed my vacant gaze Jerry’s way as he began.

The company had a policy, he explained, for these rare circumstances when executives experience an untimely accident or passing (and there’s a euphemism the absurdity of which Shelley could have appreciated, I thought; was there such a thing as a timely accident or passing? Was it merely untimely for this vital high-achiever, growing gorgeous in a gangly way as she approached midlife, never to reach forty?). Policy included assigning to the main survivors of the deceased a human-resources representative to help the survivor with every question and need he might be experiencing in the aftermath of the tragedy.

He asked me if I had any questions. I said I didn’t think I could come up with any just yet but I was sure they’d occur to me.

Then, we sat in silence for what seemed to be two minutes. Kate took several cleansing breaths. Mendez got out a linen handkerchief and dabbed below his nose. Weathers sighed after a time and was the first to stand, followed by the other two, Kate squeezing what now was a wad of tissues that under other circumstances would have dabbed my wife’s eyes as she watched something sad on TV.

I figured I’d better rise lest the visitors feel obliged to stay longer than any of us really wanted.

Kate embraced me, quaking with yet more remorse. Oh, Tommy, she said, and that was all she could muster.

Jerry pulled from his jacket pocket an envelope thick with what might have been a half-dozen folded papers.

Stapled to the first page, he said, are several of the business cards for Kristin, Kristin Hefley. She’s my assistant, a wonderful person who knows – who knew – Shelley and who will be available now and however long you need her. You can e-mail her immediately. You can call her. She prefers her private cell. Tom, if you wanted to, she said you could call her in the middle of the night anytime you need to. She can help contact survivors. She can get you any information you might find too . . .

He paused as though it wasn’t really a practiced pitch of his, but the continuity of the rest of his speech led me to believe he’d memorized it. That was fine, I thought. I mean, what a thankless job he had.

That I might find too painful, I stated without any rancor in my tone.

Yes, he said.

I’ll hear again from the cops, I suppose? I asked for lack of anything better to say.

Kristin can help with that, too, Weathers said.

She’s very good, Mendez added, managing a slight smile.

In a minute, after yet another Kate embrace and some two-handed clasps from the men, they were gone. I waited to hear the elevator arrive to assure myself that I was alone. God, was I ever.

I must have absent-mindedly left the door open as I shuffled back to the kitchen to find my half glass of wine and pour it full again. I recalled a fleeting snippet from a ‘fifties-era film in which the protagonist is lectured about not turning to the bottle after a catastrophe. Screenwriters are so perceptive, I thought, pleased that I could bring forth a cleansing measure of sarcasm, some perverse redemption for me amid the grim circumstances. Shelley would’ve appreciated it. Shelley: Oh, shit, this didn’t really happen, I thought, knowing that of course it had.

Chastened by the movie memory, I nonetheless sipped the shiraz until I heard a knock on the open front door. It was Edward with Izaak. The latter no doubt was being taken down to the interior courtyard of the building, where hard-working Ize could frolic safely for a few minutes, perhaps with other dogs from the building. He could make his excretions with impunity, the building custodian agreeable about picking up after the dogs in trade for regular tips from the pet owners.

Shut it for you? asked Edward, his thick black crew-cut damp, perhaps from a post-work shower.

That’s okay, my friend, I said, straining to show as little emotion as possible but knowing how perceptive Edward could be about verbal inflections.

Something wrong, Thomas? You sound really –

I think Ize is impatient, I interrupted. After you get him settled, c’mon over for a minute, if you don’t mind. We need to talk.

On the kitchen island, next to my soon-to-be-drained shiraz bottle, my cell phone was emitting its inexplicably cheerful ring tone. It rang six times, then stopped. I didn’t pick it up because the only person I wanted to talk with couldn’t possibly be calling.

CHAPTER TWO

Test

When we bought the condo for much more than we felt we could afford, the somewhat pompous real-estate agent had insisted on calling the main space the great room. Later, as Shelley and I considered committing to the condo, she hugged me, sighed and said: I’m down with it, Tommy, but with one little proviso: I love that room so much, the deck, the view. But we can’t call it ‘the great room,’ we just can’t. A great room is something you see at, say, Versailles. This one has to just be ‘The Good Room,’ agreed?

To both of us, it was much better than good; in fact, the whole place was better than either of us had imagined we’d ever have. The entryway opened to the proverbial state-of-art gourmet kitchen (Sub-zero, e.g.), beyond which was an expanse of space seemingly large enough to accommodate a half-court basketball game. The ceilings, in fact, were high enough to leave room for basketball hoops; Shelley feigned mistaking my facetiousness when I suggested that maybe we ought to hang up at least one backboard and hoop at the far end, over the massive gas-flame fireplace.

In back of the expanse was a hallway leading to two entryways, one to the master suite, which included the de rigueur luxury bath with dramatic skylight, as the brochure-author preferred; there also was a walk-in closet larger than my bedroom from my youth and a small balcony with fire escape leading to the alley four floors down. The other door led to the someday office, as we called the second bedroom. The space was a simple twelve-by-twelve, flanked by a three-quarter bath. It was partly set up to be an office but I preferred marking student compositions and using my laptop at the kitchen island that took advantage of the view.

About 30 minutes later I heard the familiar three-buzz signal at the door. It was something Edward had long-since established as his way of letting us know it was he at the door. When I had asked why the trio of brief buzzes he had shrugged and simply answered: I’m kind of audible-oriented, you might’ve guessed.

I’d used the half hour to send an exploratory e-mail to Kristin Hefley. It was simple and direct:

Jerry said you can help me. Boy, do I need it. If it’s possible, I’d like to know all the details pertaining to her death. Like, all of them. Then we’d go from there. Thanks again. TF

I included the Santa Cruz phone number and the name Officer Chang. To my surprise Hefley answered almost immediately.

I’m so glad you contacted me, and of course I’ll get that info a.s.a.p. Meanwhile, the most important time consideration is finding out what her wishes and yours would be.

Wishes? I thought. Her wishes were to skydive once, but only if she could be a hundred-percent sure the chute would open. She wished that Bush and Cheney would be impeached. My wish? Mine was that this was merely that staple of melodrama – the bad dream.

But there was Edward at the door. As I’d gotten to know him better during our three years as neighbors, I’d gradually been emboldened to ask what could only be construed as personal questions. He usually seemed eminently willing to broach personal matters. He had volunteered that his eyesight had been fine until about age five, but had gradually deteriorated. Now in his late forties, he said he could occasionally make out vague shapes but that was all.

So I’ve gotta ask, then, I felt it all right to say when we’d known one another for a proper stretch. Why would a legally blind guy buy property with this amazing view? The resale?

To my relief, he laughed heartily, characteristically running a hand across the top of his crew cut, which he seemed to prefer because the upkeep was easy for a blind man.

For one thing, he answered, it’s just eight blocks to the courthouse, so that works. The main reason is the noise, that and the smell of the street. I like to leave the slider open or sit outside on the balcony and just kind of sniff and listen, like Izaak. Even from up here I swear I can pick up snippets of conversation when the traffic noise dies down. For you and Shelley, it’s all about the view. For me, it’s all about everything but the view.

I noted that he now had a cane with him, having left Izaak next door.

I put the TV on for him, Edward said. He’d told me that on other occasions, the first time adding: Ize does the watching; I do the listening.

Now he followed me into the Good Room, quiet, sensing something.

Come sit over here, I said with a low, croaking voice. I’m afraid what I have to tell you is serious . . . well, much worse.

Edward situated himself precisely where Kate had sat. Don’t tell me, he smiled, his eyebrows arching above the dark glasses he liked to wear (bad enough to be blind, he had said to me once without having people stare at you to see if your eyes look scary.) Don’t tell me, Thomas. I can smell it. Your girlfriend was just here. Is this the wrong time to ask if this means I finally get to run off with Shelley?

It had been a fairly harmless ongoing gag: Edward had first dibs on my wife should anything happen to me.

Suddenly I realized that I didn’t know what to say. Then, just as quickly, I was aware that I wouldn’t have been able to say it anyway, overwhelmed now with the understanding that I finally was having to tell someone. My eyes were full of fluid as I reached over and grabbed first one then another tissue. Edward, of course, heard and identified the sound. He quickly