Sweet Bird, Empty Nest

"Shut up, you obnoxious little smash-faced thing," Loretta spat at the Pug dog in her living room. That dog never quits, she thought to herself as she walked out of the kitchen with a cup in her hand, Never. If it wasn't wicked to kick him, I'd do it all the time. But Obi didn't listen. He just kept barking that clipped little yip of his. Loretta knew she was the one person he wouldn't obey. She was sure that Mary must've taught him that.

Loretta ran her hand over the cool tiles of her spotless, powder blue kitchen counter as she strode away from the refrigerator. But she stopped short of the doorway into the living room when she noticed the delicious pink birds on the counter.

"Peeps" they're called, made especially for Easter time. The little chick-shaped marshmallows, coated with pink granulated sugar, were snug in their unopened carton. She grimaced as she walked by. How easy it would be to pick one right out of the slim yellow box, just one out of the neat row of five, and push it gently into her mouth. First there would be the feel of the sugar, rough on her tongue. Then a chew, a chomp on the delicate marshmallow innards. Little, scrumptious candy birds. Loretta was jarred out of her sugary reverie by more yapping.

"I said shut up, Obi!"

Peeps. Why did her mother-in-law bring them such things, when she knew Loretta was on a diet? Loretta decided a month ago that she wanted to look just as she had before the kids left-but so far, no one seemed to take her seriously. She had told Harvey's old bat of a mother time and again to lay off bringing sweets to the house. That woman always had the same response. "I don't see what you're fussing about. You have a lovely figure," she would say, "for a woman who's been a mother three times over." Then she'd add, "Besides, my Harvey's got a sweet tooth. Always has," as if to remind Loretta that she was there first, she will always be the first, that Harvey belonged to her long before he even knew what the difference between a man and a woman was.

She used to hate that about her mother-in-law. But now that her own two boys were grown and gone, Loretta had begun to understand Harvey's mother. Once you held them in your arms when they were first born and felt how much they needed you, once you knew that if you so much as stopped holding them, they'd die-after that, it's hard to accept that any other woman could fill those vital places for them.

It's different with girls. Loretta had never really wanted a girl to begin with, but she still got one. When she found out it wasn't a boy, Loretta was reminded of a movie she saw where someone was whining on and on about wanting something, and the heroine said, "People in hell want ice water, but that don't mean they get it." Loretta thought that was a very smart line.

So she got a girl, and on her last try, too. Mary had run off to the city a few months ago, with the type of guy that Loretta was positive would just smoke up whatever money they earned. She went wrong with Mary someplace down the line, though she wasn't exactly sure where. Eventually, Loretta simply gave up control and watched as Mary plunged into a dark place where no one (especially not her mother) could reach her. She did try to act like a mother for a while, that much should be said. But Mary being the youngest and Loretta getting older each day-well, she was just too tired. Let her go, she had said to herself. The devil's got her in his grasp and, besides, she's no good to anybody at all. That's how she convinced herself it was the best thing to do. That's how she came to let the girl, her last child, go. And she'd been on her own with Harvey ever since.

Well, almost alone. Obi had been Mary's dog since she was a little girl, a birthday present from her daddy. The dog was very well behaved as long as she was near to keep him in line. But the moment Mary walked out the door, he turned into the lapdog from hell. Even when she'd go out for short periods, to school or to a movie, he'd find some harm to do. He gave Loretta's cat all the trouble it could take, chasing it into corners just for fun. And once, he went into the bathroom and got ahold of the toilet tissue. He dragged that paper all over the whole house, dragged it until the roll ran out. When Loretta came home from the supermarket, she took one look at the living room and was sure the house had been broken into, vandalized. She panicked, summoned Harvey home from work using a neighbor's phone. Well, he figured it out right away and told Loretta that the next time she made him come home in the middle of the day, someone had better be hurt.

That was what Obi did when Mary left for a few hours. But since the night she left in December, it was like living with a tiny barking tornado. He used to sit at the front door for hours at a time with his little curled up tail tucked by his side, as he patiently kept the vigil for her. But eventually, it was like he got tired of waiting for her, like he got mad at her for going away. He started messing the carpet in front of Mary's old room. Two or three times a day, Loretta would be on her knees on the mustard shag in front of the bedroom door, scrubbing and grumbling, while Obi watched from the end of the corridor. He knew she wasn't coming back.

Obi wasn't the only one who got angry. Harvey blamed Loretta for the whole thing. He said it was she who drove Mary to behave that way, and drove her to run off in the end. Mary had been his favorite. Daddy's Girl. Although Loretta would never admit it to another living soul, she was glad not to have to share Harvey with anyone else now. At the time that she gave Mary the ultimatum to dump Rick or get out, the thought hadn't occurred to Loretta that Mary's leaving could cause problems between her and Harvey. She never imagined that he'd resent her for it.

A few weeks after that final blowout in December when Mary took off, Harvey had started bowling again. Joined a league and went three nights a week: Tuesday, Thursday, and Sunday. Loretta didn't mind so much on the weekdays, but on Sunday it made her awfully lonely. Without her Princess kitty to keep her company, it would be impossible. By ten o'clock, when he'd come home, she would be just about ready to burst. Like a little dog yapping, worse than Obi she'd be, bouncing up and down and trying to plant kisses on his face when anyone could see that all he wanted to do was put down the bag and have a seat. Then she'd rub her hands all over his chest and say, "Harv, Harv, I wish you'd stay home with me on Sunday nights," while he just sat there on his part of the sofa with his eyes closed. It made him look very thoughtful, and Loretta often wondered what it was that he was thinking of. But she never asked. Something about the way he squeezed his eyebrows together while he did it told her it was best to just leave him alone.

Loretta realized she'd been idly daydreaming before those stupid birds for ages. She looked at the clock with the frame of calico kittens. Quarter 'til eight. Almost time for her shows.

"Come on, Princess, come on pretty Princess!" Loretta beckoned to the fluffy, obese Persian cat that was sprawled across the kitchen table. The cat rolled its mass in the direction of Loretta's voice, but made no other visible attempt to move.

"Princess want a ride? Yes, okay." Loretta put her cup down and heaved the cat over her left shoulder, then leaned back to retrieve the drink of raspberry-flavored sparkling water she'd come into the kitchen for. She swallowed hard against the temptation of the sweets and went to the living room.

Obi was quietly curled on the left end cushion of the sofa.

"Obi, go! You know that's not your spot!" Loretta, hands full, prodded the dog with her knee until he moved over to the right. She eased the great cat into the spot where the pug had been, and Loretta herself took the spot in the middle. As she turned the set on, she thought she heard sounds outside. At the same time, Obi perked his head up and growled deeply. Well, relatively deeply. Loretta touched the mute button and listened closer to the outside world, but there was nothing.

"Quit it, Ugly, there's nothin' out there."

On the television, there were commercials that tried to sell her anti-wrinkle cream, gym memberships, and feminine products. Loretta stroked the cat's belly and took the first sip of her sparkling water, wincing at the tasteless bite of it. She missed the feel of real Cola running down her throat. She loved sweet things. Caramels, chocolate truffles, doughnuts-even fruitcake. She liked to dunk the hard slices into a cup of coffee. But her favorite was tiramisu, which she'd had once at the Italian restaurant Harvey drove them to on their fifth wedding anniversary. He gave her Princess, and he took her to dinner. At the time, her oldest boy, John, was about to start preschool. Luke was a toddler of three. Mary was growing inside of her.

Even in the womb, that girl was troublesome. She'd kick and turn, and make Loretta sick nearly every morning. Well, it wasn't Mary making her sick-it was the pregnancy. Loretta knew that. But it certainly was a troublesome pregnancy. That girl tried to come out every which way but the right one when she was born. It was the only cesarean any woman in Loretta's family ever had. From the start, she was trouble.

An ad on the television for frozen cheesecake caught her eye. Loretta's salivary glands ached. It seemed that ever since the last child left, she'd become almost powerless over this craving for sweets. She was always hungry, always empty. Loretta tried to focus on her motivation, her goal. But her "ideal weight," which was still more than 25 pounds away, made her feel more hopeless than motivated. She decided to weigh herself again before the show started. Maybe she'd be surprised.

"Momma will be right back, Princess. Pretty, pretty Princess!" Loretta rubbed her face against the belly of the ancient, indifferent cat.

In the bathroom, Loretta took her slippers and houseclothes off. She stepped onto the scale while holding on to the edge of the sink. Then she sighed, let go of the sink, and sighed again.

"It's no use," she said out loud.

She looked at the long mirror on the back of the door. She examined her brown hair, and yanked out some of the colorless strands that peppered it. She looked at her face. She peered at her wrinkles-crows feet round the eyes, laugh lines at the mouth. That was normal. But there was a much more serious breed of wrinkle starting over her throat. The skin sagged a little, and was starting to fold in generous portions. It was the kind of wrinkle she associated with her grandmother. Her mother had eventually grown one, too, but her grandma had one for as long as she could remember. A turkey wattle. She looked down at her ashy knees, then turned and looked at her buttocks with their dimples. She saw the blue veins beneath the translucently pale skin of her legs. She turned back around and reluctantly looked up at her breasts, the rosy pink nipples on them. There were stretch marks there, and on her hips. Tears welled up in her eyes. "Oh, I'm so ugly. How did I get so ugly?"

She'd been one of the prettiest girls at school. She would've been homecoming queen, if she hadn't been up against that cheerleading girl. It wasn't fair. That girl had diddled half the school, including all the football team. Of course they voted for her. Loretta's frosted pink lipstick and shined curls had been no match for Darlene's black-lined cat eyes and big hair. Something about remembering Darlene reminded her of Mary, too.

Loretta dressed again, pulling a terry robe over her flannel nightgown. Then she splashed some cold water on her face and tried to snap out of her little pity party. The theme music for her show began to play, urging Loretta to hurriedly finish dressing. She didn't want to miss even one minute.

At ten minutes to nine, Loretta poured the cat from her lap onto the sofa and rose for another cup of bitter sparkling water. Back to the kitchen, back past the Peeps to the fridge. As she poured herself a cup, Loretta tried not to look at the huge slice of carrot cake that Harv's mother had dropped by this afternoon. That woman had nerve. On her way to the living room again, she stopped before the Peeps. So irresistible, precious and sweet, soft and sweet. She snatched the box up in her hand. She could smell the sugar. Averting her gaze, she opened a cupboard and threw them in.

She rushed into the living room breathless and sank into the sofa again. It was much harder when Harvey wasn't home. But not too much longer to go-only an hour 'til he'd be back. Loretta picked at the pills of worn, balled up threads on her flannel nightgown, and thought it would be nice to get herself a new one. It was almost Mother's day. Maybe one of the kids would remember the tattered thing and think to get her another. A real nice one, with roses printed on it. That didn't seem likely, though. She'd have to start dropping hints to Harvey now, and maybe there would be one for Christmas.

It occurred to Loretta that this year would be their first Christmas alone in over twenty years. Both John and Luke had already decided that they would be staying at the University for the winter term. Loretta thought it seemed mighty early to be making such decisions, but the boys seemed set. The last time she called them in the dormitory, she asked Luke about it, about how they could be so sure they ought to stay. He seemed frustrated with her, started using the same tone of voice he used when she asked questions about his love life. He said, the cost of airfare was so high, and they'd get through school much quicker if they studied every term. Loretta thought with malice that it probably had more to do with some girl than with the price of a ticket. But the bottom line was that things would be quiet around the house this holiday season. Loretta frowned at the thought of how barren the tree would seem with so few presents beneath it. She remembered the way Mary's tangled golden mop of hair looked on Christmas mornings as she sat next to Harvey while he built her new bike, or Barbie house, or whatever thing she'd got that year.

Maybe she and Harv could buy several small gifts instead of one big one for each other this year, to help fill up the space. Loretta looked forward to the fruitcake that would be coming, even though it was months away.

Just as Loretta was visualizing the sopping wet bite that would enter her mouth and dribble coffee down her chin, Obi went crazy. He took a flying leap from the sofa and began clawing at the front door, barking frantically. Loretta hadn't reacted yet when there was a knock. She knew right away who it was.

Peering through the curtains, she saw the familiar mess of hair, yellow in the light. The girl looked up at her before Loretta could just slink away and ignore the knock. With a heavy sigh, she pushed Obi aside with her foot and opened the door. Raising her voice to be heard over the din, she spoke through the screen at her daughter.

"Hello, Mary. You're out late, aren't you?" Obi's muzzle hung with drool as he tried to push past Loretta's body to get at his estranged master.

"Hi, Momma. Obi! Obi Wan Kenobi! Hey, you handsome thing! It's not so late, only nine. Is it late for you? You busy?"

Loretta heard the applause of a studio audience from the television, wondered what she was missing that was good enough to clap about. "Well, I am watchin' my shows. Jesus, Obi, you're messin' my house coat up!" Loretta opened the screen door only wide enough for the dog to escape.

Mary scooped him up gingerly, smiling as she held the little dog. Obi was ecstatic. His stout legs stuck stiffly forward as he devoted all his thought and energy to covering Mary's face with dog kisses.

"Okay, okay Obi, relax!" She cradled him in her arms, trying to regain her composure. The porch light was unflattering for the girl's features. Her appearance was much different than the sophomore image Loretta kept in her mind. Mary had been aged well beyond her seventeen years. With the exception of her telling expression, the petite girl was the spitting image of Loretta at the same age. If only she took better care of herself, especially that nappy hair of hers, she could be such a pretty girl. Loretta thought with envy, What a waste of a young figure, hiding it the way she does in those ugly, boyish clothes. Mary's denim jacket was faded and needed washing. The pair of jeans she wore were frayed at the cuff, and had been defaced with colored pens. Loretta despised that habit. That girl could ruin a perfectly good pair of pants in no time at all. The denim that covered Mary's thighs was adorned with hearts, flowers, and the name of the loser who sat in his Nova at the curb.

"Watchin' your shows. That's nice. How are you? How's Daddy?" Mary looked around Loretta. "Is he home?" Mary stroked the short fur on Obie's neck.

"Mary, don't you remember what I said last week?"

Loretta thought of the previous Sunday, when Mary had come to the house in a similar state. The girl wanted to talk to her father. Loretta had told her that he was resting, that she would tell him, Mary came. Then maybe he'd call and invite her to stop by on some other Sunday evening-a Sunday that Loretta knew would never be, because Mary's father was five miles away in a bowling alley, and would never even find out that she'd been there.

Mary put her hand on top of her head and smiled. "Oh, that's right. I forgot." Forgot, hell, Loretta thought. She could hear the lilt in Mary's voice, and knew she was messed up on drugs.

"Here now," Loretta said, opening the screen door and extending an arm, "give me that dog before you get him all riled and he won't let me get to sleep later."

"Sorry, Obi." Mary held her pet up and kissed his ear, then passed him back to Loretta. When the dog was inside, the screen closed again.

Then the oldest turned cold, narrowing her eyes. "What do you want, Mary?"

"Nothing, Momma, just to drop by and say hi." She laughed. Her boyfriend honked the horn and yelled at her to hurry up. Mary turned and shouted, "Hold on a goddamn minute! You're embarrassing me!"

Obi was sitting between Loretta and the door. He was trembling. Loretta idly picked at a growing hole in the screen as Mary shifted her weight from one hip to another. The girl wet her lips and began.

"I just thought you mighta had a chance to talk with Daddy about me comin' over? I really need to talk to him, really bad Momma." Mary reached out her own finger to touch her mother's through the opening, but Loretta drew her hand away as if from an electric shock.

She said to Mary sharply, "Well, why don't you tell me what it is, and I'll give him the message."

The girl looked down, and replied in a hushed voice. "I'd like to speak to him myself. It's kinda personal."

She knew that her daughter was only after money, only coming home to cause trouble. Loretta had no intention of letting Mary disrupt the balance of her new life with Harv.

"Mary, we just don't have money to be throwin' away. You think we're sitting around here, putting our feet up on piles of gold bars?" Loretta waved her arm around in the air.

"No, Momma, I-"

"You the queen of Sheba, or something? Why the hell do you expect us to bow to your every command?" Loretta's fists were clenched, her face growing hot with the blood that rushed into it. She felt like a whistle on a teakettle. Mary seemed to shrink even further into her jacket.

"No, Momma, I just-"

"Yes, your majesty, anything you like, your majesty." Loretta bowed, painfully sarcastic. As she rose, she held the hem of her own gown between two fingers. "Do you know how long I been wearing this dress? Five years. Five."

"I know, Momma." The shine building at the corners of Mary's eyes showed how hard she was struggling to continue. "I just wanted to see if you'd spoke to Daddy. He never called us, and I just wanted to know. Did you talk to Daddy?"

"Yes," Loretta lied with a hiss. There was a pause, and Loretta could see on the girl's face that Mary knew it was a lie. But neither was willing to give.

Shoving her hands into the pockets of the jacket, Mary squeezed her eyes shut, like she was hoping very hard for a wish to come true.

"Momma, I'm pregnant."

Loretta set her jaw firmly. When she spoke, it was with thin lips drawn away from the clenched teeth, like an animal threatening to strike.

"I won't have nothin' to do with you or your bastard child. I said when you left here, that once you walked out the door there was no comin' back. And I meant it."

"Momma, please!" Mary lurched forward, clutching at the frame of the door.

"You made your bed, missy."

"Please!" the girl screamed, rattling the flimsy screen. Obi startled, began barking.

"Don't come by here no more. Your daddy won't want nothin' to do with you when he finds out, either." She began to shut the door, and Mary wailed. The mother mumbled to herself, "You were just one disappointment after another, child."

As Loretta turned the bolt, she could hear Mary cursing her.

"You bitch, you goddam bitch! You're jealous because you know he's always loved me best, more than he ever loved you! He should've left you when he had the chance!"

Obi began howling, long and loud, holding each note until he was out of breath. Loretta went back to her place on the sofa, turned up the volume on her television set, and fought back tears of-something-she couldn't tell what. Rage maybe, or humiliation, or regret.

"Obi, please!" Loretta shouted, as Mary beat ferociously on the front door, and then moved to the window. Even at maximum volume, the set couldn't block out Mary's voice.

"You listen to me, you can't just leave me to die out here! If I die, it's gonna be your fault, it's on your head, Momma!"

Loretta walked to the window and looked down at her daughter. She pulled the cord of the venetian blinds, which shut with a shuffle of tin. Then, she just stood there. Obi's grief-stricken howl quieted to a whine eventually and, after a long silence, Loretta thought Mary might have gone. But then she heard a soft sliding sound on the other side of the glass.

Loretta watched over a bent slat as Mary sobbed, gasping for air, and touched her fingers to the window.

"Why don't you love me, Momma? You never did. I know you didn't. But I tried so hard to make you. All I want to know is, why don't you love me?" The girl put her hands over her face and stepped back out of the thorny, barren rose bushes under the window. She unsteadily crossed the lawn to the car, and with a screech of tires they were gone.

The thought was trying to pry its way into Loretta's head. What have you done? What have you done? But she refused to let it in. "That girl chose her own path. We've done all we can for her, but she just don't want to learn."

She walked past the set, the audience, the commercials, still talking to herself. "It's not my fault. I raised her the best I knew how, with what I had." She entered the kitchen. "No reason she should have turned out any different than her brothers. Her brothers turned out just fine."

Bracing herself against the countertop, she let her head hang forward. "I don't know what she wants from me. I even gave my blood up just to bring her into this world." Loretta looked at the cabinet door, which stood ajar. She could see the tiny pink birds inside.

Well, just one. One couldn't hurt. She carefully peeled back the cellophane, and grasped the little bird on the end between her fingers. Pulling gently, she pried him apart from his brothers. The bird was soft in her grasp, she could feel the sugar exterior give. Into her mouth it went. Loretta closed her eyes as the sugar brushed over her tongue. She pressed the marshmallow treat against the roof of her mouth. Then she chewed, breaking the small head away from the body, and she chewed, and swallowed. Tears filled her eyes. Through the blur, she could see the remaining birds. She picked up the four, still attached to one another, and slid them into her mouth.

The soft mass filled her like a cloud from heaven. Like a delicious cloud, it rolled around her teeth and tongue and behind her lips-threatening to break free. She looked desperately around the room for something more to fill the emptiness. In the refrigerator she found the cake. Picking it up with her hands, she swallowed almost without chewing. She felt the creamy parts of it sticking to her teeth, the rest softening in her saliva. Grabbing Harvey's big bottle of Pepsi from the top shelf, she unscrewed and hurled the lid to the ground. She threw her head back and poured the cola into her mouth. Loretta felt like a baby drinking from a bottle, it was so good and sweet. Drops of it trickled out the corners of her mouth and fell onto the absorbent terry robe.

Obi watched from the doorway as she ransacked the cabinets, the drawers, the pantry. She shoved down half a bag of chocolate chips. She tore wrappers away from candy bars, plunged her hand into cereal boxes. Her palette was awash with the flavors and textures of butterscotch, licorice, crispy wafers, jelly beans-all at once. And when there was nothing left, Loretta took the jar of sugar from the counter. She lowered herself to the ground, and placed the container in her lap. Removing the lid, she could see the snowy mountain inside. She wet a finger in her mouth, dipped it in, and licked it. Repeated, licking more each time, until her entire palm emerged covered in white. She ran her tongue all over her hand, getting in between each finger, and felt the inside of her mouth becoming raw. She caught sight of herself in the reflection from the sliding glass doors. And then she cried. She really cried, she cried months worth of tears. Maybe even years.

Great, salty drops fell from her eyes and rolled over her chocolate smeared face. She hiccupped and sobbed, knowing that she had always been wrong, that Mary was right. Even when she was just a little girl, Loretta thought, I was mean even then. She was engulfed by cereal boxes, crumpled wrappers, glistening oceans of cellophane. Obi approached her.

"Come, Obi, come," she choked through her sobs to the dog. She leaned toward him, extending her hand to pet his head. As her fingers neared him, he backed away.

Loretta commanded, "Come, dammit!" But instead, Obi turned and trotted out of the room. She heard his little nails clicking against the linoleum when she closed her eyes.

She sat like that until she heard the closing theme for her last show. She sat until she heard tires on the driveway, and the door to the Chevy closing. Until Harvey came into the house and called, "I'm home!" She stirred then, opening her reddened eyes, but she did not rise.

Her husband entered the kitchen and she looked up at him. Harvey bent down, placing one hand against the cabinet behind his wife for support. Then, snatching the sugar jar away from her, he spat, "Holy hell, Loretta. No wonder you're getting so fat."