Our narrator in “Mrs. Kimby Is in Mourning” is a damaged soul looking for another damaged soul. What drew me into the story at first was the dark humor, the perfect details like the jelly stain on Mrs. Kimby’s sleeve. There is so much fiction about death, but little that starts with the sloppiness of mourning. As the story goes on, I feel for the narrator, who doesn’t know when is the right time to intrude upon grief, a situation he is only too familiar with. – Matt Salesses, Good Men Project Fiction Editor
♦◊♦
Mrs. Kimby is in mourning. Mrs. Kimby, I would like to say to her: I see the loss in your eyes, grief over the death of your dear husband . . . and there on your coat sleeve – what’s that? A jelly stain. Grief makes us eat too much, and too quickly, and when our minds are bent towards death we miss the little things, things like jelly stains on our coat sleeves. Take care of yourself, Mrs. Kimby. A woman like you—so young still, so pretty, so sad—needs to watch what she eats. There’s no sense in becoming a plump widow, especially when endings like this so often denote beginnings. Yes, I know it’s too early to speak of such things; I won’t speak of them. But your husband, having finished with this life, is surely beginning the next; and you, though grieving now over what has been lost, what is gone forever, must see, at least in some small way, that you are still a young woman, and so pretty. You don’t expect to be a widow forever, do you?
But it is early yet; I can’t say these things. Mrs. Kimby: I have sent you flowers. They are lost in the superfluity of them there at your home. Merely note: they are from me to you. For the living, not the dead. Stick them in some water. Enjoy.
♦◊♦
Mr. Kimby and I met on several occasions, and even played golf together once, when that was my weekend game. But I can’t say I knew him. He had the look of a benevolent old man, the kind of face that was hard to imagine ever being young, etched and furrowed, easy to smile. A banker, quite rich, married twice, the second time to a woman a good deal younger than he, my Mrs. Kimby.
I understand the first Mrs. Kimby lives somewhere in Florida now. The mother of his children (one boy, one girl, both grown) she did not even attend the funeral; her absence was noted. My Mrs. Kimby was so young when she married him, no more than a baby you might say, whereas he was quite old. It’s situations such as these that make one wonder how clear it was—to him, to her—as they stood there and looked into each other’s eyes, as they exchanged vows, as he placed the ring on her finger, that he would die so long before she would have an honest chance to; one wonders how clear it was (to him, to her) that she was marrying into an all but certain widowhood?
Not that she didn’t love him. I think she did. At the funeral she seemed hollowed-out, tired, her face a portrait of despair.
♦◊♦
I have long admired Mrs. Kimby. Her complexion, so pure, so soft and white; her deep green eyes, her fine, long nose. Her face is the shape of an inverted tear drop. Her hair (copper-colored, shoulder length) seems to shine, seems to glow from within. Perhaps it’s the shampoo she favors? I can’t say, but it’s very attractive, very fetching I think. I can’t speak for her breasts, as they’ve never made a public appearance, of course, and all of our almost accidental meetings have been quite public. And even though I’m able to say with some assurance that she has two fine breasts of moderate size, I would also say she’s displayed them with the appropriate restraint. So allow me to skip her breasts and move on to her wrists. How lovely they are! Such small, delicate wrists. She often wears a thin gold chain around one or both of them – a nice touch. Lastly, her collarbone is enormously magnificent to me; one talks about “good bones”‘ in a person: Mrs. Kimby, you certainly have good bones. They look as though they might be made of porcelain—and now I suppose I am becoming rather poetic, aren’t I? But when it comes to Mrs. Kimby I cannot help it.
I hope I have conveyed a sense of her physical beauty. I will admit (and why shouldn’t I?) that I am drawn to her on this level. She’s an attractive woman, and I’m a man of some good looks myself. I’ve been told I look like a television personality. I’ve been told I stand out in a crowd.
♦◊♦
So now the question is, How long does one wait before advancing? It’s possible to wait too long—or not long enough . . . She’s gone now, on a long trip to Europe, then the Eastern Shore, and on to Dayton, Ohio where her mother lives. She’s a traveler; this is something everybody knows. Who can say but in her travels she may meet another? Who can say that her widowed heart, recently frozen by death, will not be melted by some foreign Lothario, or that, in the suburbs of Dayton, she will not meet up with an Old Flame from high school, a past she might mistake for a future?
There is no instinct in human beings; we make the rules up as we go. I will have to trust that Mrs. Kimby’s grief outlasts her travels, and that she returns to our little town purged of death’s burden, memory scattered like ash across the Old World.
In her absence, however, I have become quite close to her dog, a 5-year-old Scottish Terrier named Carlton. Carlton ranges freely, off leash, through yards and streets; our little town is safe, even for the small black dog with the bright red collar. Usually Carlton finds a warm spot in Mrs. Kimby’s front yard and sleeps, waking for every passing promenader, giving them a piece of his mind. On my walks past her home he used to greet me with his terrible high-pitched yelps and bared teeth, but now my figure is so familiar to him he follows me halfway down the block, rolling on his back in the middle of the wide street to be rubbed on his belly, crying when I send him with a stern finger back home. We have become good friends, and how? Merely through a continuous association and a doggy biscuit now and then.
I won’t delude myself. A relationship with Mrs. Kimby will take much more time to come to fruition. She is not a dog. She will not roll over in the middle of the street to be rubbed on her belly. Mrs. Kimby is in mourning.
♦◊♦
Mrs. Kimby! How nice to see you’ve returned. No word yet on whether you succumbed to the dark charms of some Continental Casanova, and one supposes one would have heard by now were that the case, the nature of our little town being what it is. I say little: the town itself is quite large, with a population numbering in the tens of thousands. I actually mean the society in which one travels to be small, and those of us who know those of us who know those of us—this is the milieu to which I refer, 1-2 % of the entire tribe, connected by money and phone lines and parties and the accidental meeting at the good mall, shopping. Word travels. Mrs. Kimby has returned. She seems not quite so sad, the trip was good for her, et cetera—and nothing about a Carlos or a Jules or a Sam.
But there is some talk she may have put on a few pounds, and that now that she’s back she’s going to be serious about that diet. This is a step in the right direction, not that I mind a plump woman at all. To diet is to hope, to hope is to live, to live is to eventually re-marry. Can spring be far behind?
♦◊♦
My own marriage, many years ago, was—well— the truth is I was never married. I was once engaged, however; Mrs. Kimby no doubt has heard the story. The day before the wedding my fiancé changed her mind. That is making the long story short, of course. One hears about such things happening, but doesn’t really believe they do, but they do. Unable finally to make the necessary commitment, she said in her note. Not only could she not marry me, she could not face me ever again, and she left our town that very day (she swore) forever, living for years I heard on the slopes in Colorado—a ski bunny. She has since returned for clandestine visits, she has family here, but I have not seen her, nor do I care to. One imagines that after 15 years the memory of that terrible day would fade, and one would no longer be sad, or moved by the memory. And this is true: I am no longer sad. I am humiliated, however. And not so much in my own eyes, really, but in the eyes of others. In their eyes I am the man who was left at the alter—the great event of my public life. I am the man who has spent the last fifteen years of his life quietly, the odd bachelor, a fellow with the hand which is somewhat moist—or so it feels when shaken. Whatever else has happened to me is moss growing beneath this great dark shadow.
Like a common word, a man is defined by those around him, by those who speak his name.
♦◊♦
Here, as best I can recall, is what I said to Mrs. Kimby just this morning:
Mrs. Kimby? How are you? Well, yes. Here he is. I found little Carlton on my doorstep, crying. On my walks he’s followed me, each day a bit farther, and now I suppose we’ve become something like friends; today he followed me all the way home. When I went inside I assumed he would head back on his own, but later I found him on my doorstep. Nothing I could do could convince him to go home. It was then I remembered the leash hanging from my hallway closet door. The old leash . . .
Well, yes, Mrs. Kimby, I too once had a dog. A long, long time ago. And believe it or not—a Scotty. Yes. Could have been Carlton’s twin, old Toby . . .
Well, I knew you’d be worried, Mrs. Kimby, so I brought him right away. I did give him some water, actually, before coming, so no need to worry on that account.
And yes, I have to confess, perhaps one doggie biscuit!
O Mrs. Kimby. Thank you but . . . no, I can’t come in. As much I’d like to. I have an appointment over the mountain. May I take a rain check? Wonderful.
And Mrs. Kimby? May I say . . . you are looking well.
You are looking quite well, Mrs. Kimby.
The sun bathes the world in its yellow warmth as I walk home, feeling perhaps a bit not right, having just lied for the first time to Mrs. Kimby. Having lied twice, in fact. There was never any dog, nor is there an appointment over the mountain: I have this day free. But Mrs. Kimby, as she passes her day, will think of me, my poor dog (dog/death/husband/me), where was I going, what a nice man, I wished he could have stayed, perhaps he will come back again, the first neighbor to visit without a casserole or bean dish or meat tray or flowers—with, instead, my dog.
I am digging a little hole in her heart.
♦◊♦
My left eye has begun to twitch slightly, I don’t know why. It’s the smallest perceptible movement and yet one of the most distressing I’ve ever experienced. As if a tiny muscle has come alive, and is struggling to free itself from its spot on my face. Really quite disturbing. I don’t know. Sometimes I feel as if what I’m doing is wrong. And not just what I’m doing now, but everything I have ever done. That I am wrong, by nature. I think about it before sleep, lying awake, turning my pillow over and over, looking for the cool.
♦◊♦
I have seen Mrs. Kimby several times in the last two months—eight times in fact— and each time was a total coincidence. Twice it was coincidentally at the mall, where she stopped and spoke with me for a moment or two; three times we met (of all places) in the supermarket, our carts loaded down with fruits, vegetables, nuts and grains (she is dieting); and an additional three times we have met while she was out walking Carlton, and I was out walking myself. The streets of our little berg are fine for walks. The trees are old and tall, and in the spring and summer their leafy branches interlock from side to side above us, a natural canopy.
I hail her from the opposite side of the street. “Mrs. Kimby!”
Looking up, seeing me, she almost smiles. Then she seems not to know who I am. But Carlton is wagging his tail; he remembers me.
“Such a beautiful day,” I say, and rub little Carlton’s head.
“Oh, yes,” she says. “Very nice. Cool . . . ”
“But not too.”
“Yes,” she says. “Just right.”
And there doesn’t seem to be anything else to say at this time, and so I nod—would have tipped my hat if I had one—and both of us go our way.
Poor Mrs. Kimby walks her dog alone. She is a widow. A cloud of dust surrounds her. One must squint to see her, as though Mrs. Kimby herself were out of focus. She is not all there yet; she smiles as though she doesn’t know what a smile really is. And so, though our meetings have been pleasant and reassuring, Mrs. Kimby persists in her grief. With Carlton on leash ahead of her, she is pulled along the road as she would be pulled along the edge of a cliff. She’s a bit hysterical, I think. She walks her dog alone.
Our romance these days is largely a platonic affair. And yet it cannot go without noting: once on each of the eight occasions we have met, I have touched her. I have touched her hands, her shoulder, her arms, brushed up against her with my body as she passed—all in all, eight times have I touched her. Eight times.
♦◊♦
There have been other women, of course, before and after my undone marriage. Not too many, I suppose, but then who’s counting? Are numbers important? Say there were a hundred women (which there weren’t): what would that tell you about me? And if there was only one, one woman through the length of all these years, that would be another thing entirely. I mean of course to other people, for it’s what other people think which we think is important. We do things so as not to seem one way or another, regardless of how we may feel inside. We do not want to seem churlish even when we are. Everybody is the same. What is in our hearts matters not in the least; it only seems to. It only feels like it should.
But there have been other women. Of course. Of course there have.
♦◊♦
I dreamed of her last night. She was standing beside her husband’s grave, wearing a large hat, a long overcoat, and no shoes. Beneath the overcoat she was—naked. I couldn’t see beneath the overcoat, but even so, this was my dream, and I knew. Carlton was playing in a grove nearby, and I passed her on the little concrete path, lightly brushing her body as I did so. And she took my hand. “I think he’s comfortable,” she said. “This is a nice little place he has here, I think.” She thought of kissing me. She didn’t do it, but the thought passed across the glass of her eyes. Carlton pawed at my legs, whining. She continued to hold my hand.
♦◊♦
I regret having lied to Mrs. Kimby. Nothing good can come of it. For even in the best of all possible worlds—one in which I find myself close to Mrs. Kimby—I would be condemned to go on lying to her, day after day, forever. She might ask me to tell her about the little dog I never had, stories to amuse her, perhaps, on those long Sunday afternoons we spend in the gazebo, waiting for a breeze. I am not a man who goes about lying, hardly, but I was in a state of excitement at the time, and really felt I needed all the help I could get if ever I would pierce the dark armor of her widowhood. A dog, I thought, would do it.
How wrong I was. I wonder now what will happen next we meet. Will she ask me about that dog, whose name I can no longer remember? Will she ask me why I had to leave that day, when she so much wanted me to stay? Where was I going so important? Mrs. Kimby . . . I am contrite.
♦◊♦
The day that was to be my wedding I stayed home. I sat in a chair in front of the television, which was turned up quite loud in order to mask the noise that came from my phone, which was constantly ringing. For some reason I didn’t take it off the hook. I suppose I wanted to hear people trying to get in touch with me; certainly I didn’t want to talk with them, not then or—now that I think about it—ever. I had already taken the day off from work—the entire week, in fact, since we were going to the Bahamas on our honeymoon. But as there was no wedding there was no honeymoon, no Bahamas, no wife. There was me in a chair in front of the television, with the telephone ringing in the background not unlike a fire alarm. The television was a small black-and-white set with rabbit ears. The reception was terrible. There were game shows on that morning, and soap operas, and all the little black-and-white people were screaming at each other and walking around in a snowy haze. But I wasn’t really watching. Through a slit in the drapes sunlight poured in like melted butter, and when I breathed the dust motes swam and rattled. And that was how that part of my life ended, and how the rest of it began.
♦◊♦
Mrs. Kimby rests on her couch, a small glass of bourbon on the blue table beside her, staring straight ahead into what would be, if it were winter and cold, a fire. But it is not winter, it is not cold, and so the fireplace is as dark as a cave. It’s early evening. There may be sadder times of the day for her—first thing in the morning, last thing at night—but I’m not able to see her then, as I am now, and so would only hope there is no sadder time; this time is sad enough. Mr. Kimby would be home now, home from work. He would lay out his day before her, she hers. What was it like, Mrs. Kimby, those slow evenings with your husband, patch-working the day back together? How much do you miss those moments? Now she sits as if in waiting, as if he’s merely late. There is her bourbon in the crystal glass beside her, no coaster but a napkin at its base. The living room is thick and yellow with a still light. Carlton is curled into a black ball in the corner of the small couch at the back of the room, deep asleep, dreaming himself large and long-legged. He saw me here one night and yipped, and Mrs. Kimby turned on the porch light and scanned, but by then I was long gone, a street shadow. There is nothing I do more stirring than this. If I were to be caught it would only confirm what everybody already knows about me: I’m a sick and lonely man. But I might also be considered dangerous, and while I’ll admit to being sick with loneliness I am not dangerous. I watch Mrs. Kimby because I can’t not watch her. It’s dark out and her lights are on, no shades are drawn; from the road her early evening life is like a distant drive-in movie screen, the light falling on her shrubs and monkey grass, breaking into the night with this story of a woman alone. Come closer. I watched for a while from the street but could see so little. I want to know her; I want to see her. I mean no harm. But then, of course, all the crazy people say such things.
♦◊♦
I was perhaps not the man she thought I was. I refer to my fiancée now of many years ago. One thinks of the small things: the last time I saw her, the days leading up to the wedding. What was it? What actually happened? I ask myself, Was it something I said? After thirteen and one half months of courtship did it all hinge on a word? Perhaps I mispronounced a word? Or did she see my sock drawer? Did the sight of my taut and tidy balls of socks (I’ve never lost a single) repulse her? Blues, browns, grays, blacks. She would see that drawer for the rest of her life. Was the thought too much for her to bear? The last time I saw her I said something presumptuous about our honeymoon, something—in the light of how things turned out—possibly salacious: was it this? Was it this? It was all for the best. If it was my socks it was all for the best. She sent me her little note and, with it, an arrangement of flowers. She married sometime later. It was an idea difficult for me to grasp at the time, to accept—I mean, I’m sure she wore the same dress. The event was much the same as it would have been, sans myself.
But that is the past. The day is approaching when my courtship of Mrs. Kimby will truly begin. People will talk, this is certain; there is no avoiding that. Some will say It’s rather odd, isn’t it, and others will say Oh, I don’t know, it’s been so long and he is—and she is . . . But I’m ready for that. The furtive looks, the hurried glimpses.
My idea is to ask to her to join me for some event which begins quite early in the evening; a show at the museum would be perfect. I don’t know if there will be a show at the museum, but if there is and she would like to join me, this sort of thing would be ideal. We would be together and, of course, be seen together. I would take her home early, before dark, and the next day she would phone me, and ask if I remembered a certain painting—or some other equally valid question—and later in the phone call tell me what a good time she had. And I would tell her I had an equally good time. The next week we would go out to dinner. And it will go on like that, from one week to the next, year to year, and then we shall marry, and when we are old I shall say Mrs. Kimby? I am happy to be old. I am happy to be an old man sharing his life with you.
His life! She will cry, she will be so happy! And I will kiss her gentle tears.
But even now, Mrs. Kimby, now—I can’t think of a single reason why our hearts should not be as one. I do have a heart; people have forgotten that. I have seen your heart broken, but surely it’s on the mend by now. And I have so long admired you. Of all the women of my acquaintance, I have admired you most, Mrs. Kimby. As I stand in the dark outside your window, admiring, I watch you turn toward me, but this time I don’t move. Little Carlton begins to bark, and your deep green eyes widen, as if they’ve seen a ghost. Here I am, outside your window, waiting. No ghost, Mrs. Kimby, merely me: a man.
—
—photo PinkStock Photos/Flickr