The Fatted Calf: Don't Strain Yourself

You open your eyes and you can feel her pulling on you. It hurts in a weary, distant way, like it has been going on for a long time and you are just now feeling it. You can barely even lift your hand to stop her. You can’t even feel your crotch, which is dry and limp and she is pulling harder to make up for it. Her breath is hot and wet like something crawling on you and it brings up in your skin a sweaty, nauseous feeling. The couch under you is damp with your sweat. You look down and your head falls like a dead weight and you see her hand and in it your sad, boneless self, moving but not responding. You put your hand over hers to stop it and she keeps kissing your throat, your jaw, your neck, your lips. The edge of your mouth, even as you zip up your jeans. 

Still drunk, you think. Stumbling, blinding drunk, and you don’t even know who it is next to you. You put your hand on her shoulder and push her back gently as her neck stiffens against you and her lips pucker out, like a nursing baby. You turn to look at her face and all you see is her wrinkled, reddened lips hanging open in mid-kiss, the sad, sliding down of her eye makeup as if she’s been crying. Her breath is thick and sweet with rum and it’s so distracting that you can’t figure out who she is for a few seconds. 

Maybe Amber O’Quinn. The best singer in the youth choir. She was going to a performing arts college in Vermont. You remember, as she blinks her big, blue eyes at you, and asks you, ‘what’s wrong?’ that you had always thought she was cute, but just too good for you. Her hand is now resting beside what may have once been a fantastic erection but who knows how long ago that was? 

You can barely look at one thing for longer than three seconds before everything else starts spinning. You realize that you may have been sitting on this couch getting jerked off by Amber O’Quinn for hours. In a panic, you look around the room and adrenaline rushes in like water soaking into a sponge and you feel cooler all over, more awake. Thank God. No one is here. You and Amber are sitting on a couch with cushions that swallow you in certain spots even though the bed is right there.  

Amber sighs, then cuts her eyes away, then falls back onto the couch. She is drunk, and completely oblivious to your sudden and intense fright. Doesn’t she want to know what you did with the last four hours? Doesn’t she want to know who’s been watching?

You feel heavy from your neck down and the weight is so intense you can’t sit up and if you did, you know you would throw up. So you don’t. The room is dark and there are candles burning and you are thinking, shit, what is this? 

But you still have all of your clothes on. You are on a loveseat opposite the bed and when you look at it (empty, thank God), you remember when there were people sitting here, talking to you. Right after you did shots in the kitchen with Alex and Rodney and this girl he brought who hung on him like a fox fur.

Where's Rae?

You zip up and try to stand, slowly realize she is not here. She wouldn't be here. This thought gives you a cold feeling. You remember now what exists beyond the walls of this room, the college you are visiting that is nearly an hour away through nothing but creepy farmland. The room is small and the ceiling is low, the walls painted brick, slightly underground, the windows a strip of rectangular panes of frosted glass. The beds are positioned facing each other in opposite corners of the room, one half-made, one half covered with laundry and books. An open laptop glows in the otherwise dim room, the only light besides a desk lamp and the muted TV. You stare at the screen for a while and see a lot of naked women but you're pretty sure it's not a porno you're watching. Whatever it is, it seems to blend perfectly with the clanking sounds of Zeppelin playing from the laptop. You vaguely remember choosing this music.

 I said it's alright, you know it's alright, you know it's all in my heart...

 She murmurs something you don't hear. You hear the music and it's so good and the love seat is so acceptable (and you can't move anyway). You're pretty sure Amber is passed out for the long haul so you look down at your sad, limp penis and feel a rush of panic so you cram it into your underwear and zip up your jeans. You make it to your feet and you tell yourself it's fine, just keep your hand on something. A doorframe. The wall, to steady yourself.  You remember your brother telling you that there were still active Klan members out here, a community of them, out in the woods between your home and this college. This is what you are thinking about as you stumble to the bedroom door, as you turn the knob and nearly fall down opening it. You fall against the doorjamb, your hand clinging to the knob as your shoulder takes in the sharp edge like a bite. It stings but you talk your legs into working and you know that everyone in the common room outside the bedroom is probably looking at you, shaking their heads. The room outside is a loud rush like water that keeps crashing over you and it's just music, more music and conversation but it's so loud. You only think about this for a split second before you think about your cigarettes. Your coat. 

Then you think of something else and panic gets you, makes you suddenly fast, accurate, focused. You spin around to the couch and see your coat draped over the back of it and you pad your hands over it, groping for the shape of the small plastic case you put in your pocket earlier and nearly going limp with relief when you find it, solid and safe like you left it. Candace has leaned back on the couch and appears to have passed out. You look her over as you find your cigarettes. She's got on a deep red blouse that laces up the front like a corset. It's very low-cut and still, very strange to you. You have never seen this girl in such an outfit. For a moment you want to find a blanket and cover her up. For a moment you consider taking one of the bedspreads and covering her but it's too much trouble. You have to get outside, smoke a cigarette, find Rodney, and get the hell out of here. It's far too risky to stay. 

When you get to the front porch the cold hits you and makes you feel thin and weak and you slump against the wall, feebly sticking a cigarette in between your teeth. You are shivering and you drop your cigarette and immediately a rush of panic goes through you as you look at the crowded floor, the proximity of dirty sneakers that, any one of them, could crush your precious cigarette if you don't pick it up in time. You're not even sure if you can pick it up. Then you feel a hard, jarring slap on the shoulder and before you even look up, you know it's Rodney and then there he is, grinning at you, amused by your pathetic state. He is smoking American Spirits and he hands you one and says, "don't strain yourself."

"I need to get out of here."

"What? Did something go wrong with Amber?"

"She's passed out. Dude, what happened?"

"We were in there, like ten of us, and you two just started sucking each others' faces off like no one else was there. We ignored it for a while but, you know, we figured you guys wanted some privacy."

Rodney nudges you with an elbow in an encouraging way but it makes you feel sicker. He expects you to laugh, or even to crack a smile, and when you don't he straightens up and says, "okay. I'll go get the guys and we'll leave. Sit your ass down before you hurt yourself." 

There is nowhere to sit out here so you stay where you are, dead weight against the wall, smoking hard on the cigarette as if the smoke were a solid thing that could run through your bones and make them useful again. You don't dare close your eyes, and you keep your free hand inside your coat, feeling the plastic rectangle in your pocket, like if you take your hand away it might vanish without even having to be stolen. You have never had in your possession anything so valuable. 

Rodney is nearly as drunk as you are. You pray to the cold, the air, the plastic case in your pocket, that you get home alive. 

You have so much to live for.

The Fatted Calf: The Red Pastel

About five years ago I dated a girl from Alabama State. She was thin and blond and tan and sweet, just like all the others. Her name was Mary Kim Patterson. She always wore dresses and her lips were almost always shiny with lipgloss though I never saw her actually applying it. She liked that I was an artist. She liked talking about her friends and how much they liked me, how jealous they were of me. This was before the fire department, before the calendar and before the adult film agent approached me. This was before I thought I would ever take my clothes off for money, or even be asked. Mary Kim was from a town called Blacksburg but I could never remember what state she was from. She never seemed to have any interest in going there. I dated her for two weeks and our "dates" were never really more than scheduled preludes to sex. Mary Kim called it "making love." I always had to try hard not to laugh. It always happened at my place and she would deliberately leave things laying around as if by accident. It all ended the night of a sorority fundraising dinner when Mary Kim came to pick me up and she came in without knocking. She was wearing a little frilly white thing and her skin looked nearly orange by comparison. I looked at her once and added this new information to the list of things about her that were already starting to bother me. 

We had met at a bar and gone home together because my place was close. Eveyrthing that followed seemed superfluous to me by that night, by the time the first sexual encounter was over and we had both gotten what we wanted. I didn't even know what I was doing with her. She had come in and sat down on the couch with cautious stiffness, smoothing her hand over her skirt over and over again, while I fiddled around with my tie in the mirror. It would be my first black tie event ever. I was done with her by then, but I was still going.

Mary Kim did not get off the couch to help me with my tie even though I knew she could probably tie it better than I could. By then she wasn't sweet anymore. My apartment then was a nice efficiency that came furnished, with a serving window between the kitchen and the rest of the room, wall to wall carpeting. I had hated the whiteness of the place so I put down dark rugs over the carpet, hung bright tapestries and posters on the walls; Axis: Bold as Love, Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars with Bowie standing in a darkened alleyway. Mary Kim had looked at it and asked who the hell was Ziggy Stardust and I had decided right then not to play it for her for fear she would insult it and switch it to pop or country and I would have to go be sick somewhere. 

She sat on the couch, smoking a Marlboro Menthols and asked across the room, "what's wrong? Can't you tie a bowtie?"

So finally I turned around and asked her to do it and so she did, patronizing me like I was her son and she was proud of my show of effort. When she was done she kissed me and her shiny lips slid upon mine and left a trail of slime on my face. I wiped it away with more than a little revulsion. She tucked her purse under her arm and smoothed her skirt one more time. I saw it first; the red streak across her mid-thigh where she had just run her hand.

I said her name and her eyes followed mine and she screamed like a poisonous spider were crawling up her leg. She looked at me, and for a blink of time, her look seemed to be one of blame, before she looked down at her hands and saw the lump of red oil pastel on her right ring finger, picked up from the couch, the table (what else did she touch?).

I melted into concerned sympathy and reached out as if I might actually do something besides make it worse, and she swatted at me like a bug and left without a word, her footsteps percussive and angry. I followed her, though even as I was doing it, I wasn't really sincere in my efforts to get her to come back inside, and she opened the door to her convertible and didn't object when I got in. 

"We have to go back so I can change," she explained, then said "dammit" to herself over and over like it was the most effective cuss word she could think of, or muster the bravery to say out loud. In her deep southern accent, the word seemed to have three or four syllables.

Mary Kim changed into something small and royal blue and just as revealing, just as flattering and I complimented her on it enough to sound completely insincere (though I did mean it, actually) but she clearly didn't like this dress as much as the white one. All through the dinner she pulled on it like it was an uncomfortable sling holding an injured arm and she didn't really talk to me unless she had to. I knew it wasn't just because of the pastel. So I danced with some other girls who all said they knew me "by reputation of course" and I started to wonder what Mary Kim had told them, if it was even about my paintings or something else.

I had sold some top-shelf acid to a guy in town who owned a liquor store that all the college kids went to because he overlooked their fake ids. At first, the guy, whose name was bobby, asked me to paint a giant bar filled with famous dead people as a mural on the outside of the store. He even had a list written out of who he wanted in the mural. He asked me if I could do it in the style of Hopper. I said yeah, I could, and Bobby had shaken my hand and said, "make sure you put Marilyn in something skimpy."

The girls I danced with at the fundraising dinner were hypnotized by their proximity to me, openly and unashamedly worshipping him simply because my domain was public, because I had created something that everyone in town, at one point or another, had to walk by and see, even if they didn't really look. 

Yeah, that's me. The painting on the liquor store.

Mary Kim was no longer enjoying her friends and their coveting of her "artist boyfriend" and she even went so far as to say "don't touch me" when I found her on the dance floor after dancing with Haley, the only redhead in Mary Kim's circle of friends. We left early and she didn't care if people saw she was upset. In fact she played it up and the whole ride home I was so pissed off at her and her superiority, her pursed lips like a fucking little princess on the throne that I thought I might reach over and give her a good slap before getting out of the car. She acknowledged this, looked right at me and told me with her cold, dead eyes, that she knew and didn't give a shit what I thought about her. I unclenched my fist and got out of the car. As I walked away I heard her flicking a lighter over and over, a lighter with a flint that wouldn't catch. 

She had left a tube of lipgloss, a bra, a barrette. I started a small fire in the kitchen sink and dropped the items into it, one at a time. The lipgloss released a smell of magnolia and strawberries and my apartment reeked of it for a week.

The Fatted Calf: Regret is Useless

"So tell me why you're here."

"My parole requires it."

"Is that the only reason?"

"No. It's probably good for me to talk about things."

"Like your time in prison?"

"To name one."

"What else?"

"Well, there's the woman, Agnes. From the, you know, the whole thing with the guy, and she's bringing the kid around for me to, you know, get to know him. She even came to visit me once and asked me if I thought it was a good idea for her to bring the kid to visit it me next time. Talk about fucking a kid up for life, not to mention giving guys in the place the wrong impression."

"What impression is that?"

"To bring the child of a rapist into the prison where the failed rescuer is serving three to five for throwing said rapist in front of a moving vehicle? How about the impression that I'm playing daddy in this sick little family, that's the impression."

"Do you think Agnes expects that from you?"

"I don't know. I don't know. But...if I were her and I had gone through what she went through, I wouldn't keep the reminder of it around let alone go through the labor. Besides, I don't even know why she's so grateful to me. I didn't stop anything from happening. I didn't get there in time."

"Didn't you save her life?"

"How should I know? The guy had a knife but I don't know if he was planning on using it."

"Well Agnes seems to see you as a very successful rescuer, in fact, that's why she kept the child, right? Isn't that what she said? How do you feel about that?"

"Look, if she's happy, then that's great. But I can't honestly say that I feel comfortable with this child making any sort of bond with me. I don't feel comfortable having any kind of relationship with this woman. I mean, if you're going to crush a guy's legs, you might as well do it for a good reason. But every time I see her, every time I see that kid, I only regret not walking by that alley ten minutes earlier."

"Have you told Agnes your feelings?"

"Oh Jesus, she'd flip. I mean, she seems so grateful and content and like, over it, but I feel like one inch beneath the surface, I mean she was literally there to pick me up when I was released. But I feel like it's just an act. There's no way she's actually okay with it."

"Do you plan to let it continue?"

"Well, no, but I had to come to these sessions with you, and you're a woman, so I was hoping you could give me some advice, you know, some insight."

"What I'd really like to see you do is come to your own healthy response to the situation. And if I gave you advice of any kind, it would be as a therapist and not a woman."

"It's actually pretty funny that you are a woman, because if my problem didn't concern women, I wouldn't be asking for advice in the first place."

"And why is that?"

"I've gotten used to having to take care of things myself. I usually don't require help or advice. Except when it comes to women."

"That's a very common feeling."

"It's not a feeling. It's a certainty. I can't look back on any decision I've made since I was seventeen and say that I regret it. Whatever the circumstances were, a decision had to be made and I made it. And I might feel differently about it later, but that's just hindsight, which is useless, really."

"Do these decisions include throwing Rafael Correia in front of a car?"

"Absolutely. It would have been nice, of course, if the car hadn't been coming by at that exact moment. But it did, and I can't pretend that I had any control over that, because I didn't."

"Do you regret that you had to sacrifice three years of your life?"

"No. Not regret. I didn't choose to go to jail. But yes, I would have liked for that not to happen. Regret is useless. Looking back is useless. It would have been nice for the jury to have seen the truth."

"The truth?"

"That if a hundred other guys had walked by that alley, they might not have had the balls to do what needed to be done. But I did. And for that I should have been rewarded. Not punished."

"You served the minimum sentence. The judge was obviously sympathetic to your cause."

"He should have broken his gavel and refused to take part in such a circus of injustice. He should run around the goddamn courtroom with a banner chanting my name. That whole place should have been applauding me and laying fucking palms on the ground in front of me. But I don't rule them yet, so I can't expect the entire justice system to become enlightened in one day."

"So you believe Rafael deserved to lose his legs?"

"And more."

"So tell me (we'll get to the ruling thing later) why women pose such a conundrum."

"Aren't they supposed to?"

"I suppose so. Can you be more specific?"

"A woman may not be designed for the sole purpose of killing a man but she knows, from birth, a thousand ways to do it. It is sheer whimsy that keeps some of them from doing it. And most of the time they do it and don't even know they're doing it. So yeah, I can admit that I have no chance of ever being certain about anything concerning women."

"Well that's a start."

She asks me to tell her about a formative experience; something that forced me to face a painful or ugly truth about myself. She asks me if I have ever experienced anything so challenging.

At first, my answer is no. And I really do spend a few moments thinking about it. Then I say, oh, okay. And I tell her about my pet bird, Calypso, that I had when I was twelve. She was a cockatu. I loved her, but I didn't clean her cage, and because I was a thoughtless and careless little boy, the bird got sick and died.

I don't mention the broken fingers I received that night from my father after I was done with the task of burying Calypso in the backyard. I tell her because of that experience, I learned not to be so lazy and careless. So the therapist asks me if I have anything from my adult years. Anything that caused a lot of  growth.

Oh, plenty of things have caused me to grow. I didn't always used to be so awesome and powerful. And there are definitely things I have wanted to change about myself. Like, for a long time, I couldn't really grow a beard, and then, after this bike accident, it was like, poof, you know?

"What's the most painful thing you've ever had to learn about yourself?"

"Look," I tell her, "I've always known who I am. I've always known who Gabriel Hurt was and is. And every unpleasant thing I've ever had to experience has only reaffirmed that self-knowledge. I am very self-aware. Extremely. I have always been. It's really just a question of, do other people believe, and how can I get them to, you know?"

"Believe what?"

"That I am destined for great things. That I am a prince. But of the universe."

The Fatted Calf: The Sperm Bank

It all started, really, when Jared Bukowski asked me over one night (for prayer no less). He needed me to pray for him. For his sinful, persistent urges and his own noble, but futile attempts against them. He broke down, not me. I listened. I’m a good listener. All it took was a thought, a sentence started but taken back, when he said it was starting to get—

“painful?” I finished. 

“I don’t know what to do.” 

“Pray through it,” I told him, “I’m telling you. Prayer always works.”

“I’ve tried that,” he moaned, “don’t you think I’ve tried that? I mean, for ten months now…I can’t…I can’t do it anymore. I can’t not do it anymore. And believe me, other guys have given up sooner than I have, I swear.” 

“But Jared,” I say, “masturbation is a sin.” 

“I know! But is it really so bad that I have to suffer like this?” 

I told him I believed him, I sympathized. 

I swear, I’m not making this up.

“I mean, what kind of service to the lord can I do if there’s some…you know, permanent damage? How can I have kids of my own?” 

I swear, I’m not making this up. 

“Look, the question is…do you think that God would want you in this much pain? The Lord created our bodies as vessels for his message. If your body is sending you a message of pain, then do you really think that message is a divine one?” 

He was crying. Like, really crying, like he was scared his pecker was going to turn purple and fall off right there. And then, he was blinking, sniffling, thinking over this dilemma with a fresh perspective, as if I had actually suggested something that had not crossed his mind before. 

“No, unless this is a test…”

“You’ve been pure of heart and soul and mind for ten months! If there was a test, then don’t you think you have passed it? If this is anything, I think it’s a sign.” 

“Of?” 

“Of…” I stood up, like maybe I was going to leave, walk out with all of this still hanging in the air, “of…permission.” 

“What? Wait,” he jumped off his bed and I was surprised by his sudden agility, embarrassed by his weathered gray boxers, which was all he was wearing at the time, “permission to do what?” 

“To release the pressure! That’s all, not to pleasure yourself, but to rid yourself of the pain, that’s all.” 

“To rid myself of the pain…” he mulls this over, and I continued, thinking that I am possibly a genius. 

“Possibly even a calling? You probably have lots and lots of little Jared’s locked up inside that loin of yours.”

He moves his hand and covers his crotch, like a girl covering her bosom. Please. 

“If you just relieve yourself into a Kleenex, that’s wasteful. That’s sinful. You could use this chance to be of service to God, just like you said!” 

“Oh, Jesus,” he moans, and sits back down. 

“Listen,” I sat back down next to him, put my hand on his shoulder which sickens me because his skin is sort of clammy, soft, not at all the rigid, strapping muscle that a teenage boy was supposed to have. I resent the people who have made him this way, “go to the clinic, say hello to the nice lady, fill out the form, and get it over with. There’s no reason why anyone even needs to know. I’m pretty sure it’s completely confidential.” 

I told him I didn’t care who he thought about, or what, that I would be there for him no matter what, that this was the right decision. I told him to think about the family he was providing for someone who may have otherwise never had kids of their own. 

Jared pulled the covers over himself and asked to be left alone, like simply talking about it had made him ready to go. But we prayed one last time, mainly thanking God for clarity, for relief, for remembering the special sacredness (okay, I did make that part up myself) of our bodies, and what precious gifts we hold inside of us. He said he was thankful for me above all things, that no one else would have given him good advice; they would have told him to hold it until he had a heart attack. 

Really, I was just trying to get him to break down and buy some dirty magazines. The sperm bank thing was just a bonus. 

The bank was confidential, but Jared took them up on the option to be informed when someone purchased his sperm and had success with it. A young Lebanese couple from Ridgefield bought his little gifts and were pregnant. A letter of congratulations and thanks came in the mail. His dad opened it. 

Genius. 

The Fatted Calf: Let Me Tell You About My Inn

Let me tell you about the White Chapel Inn. It used to be the Hurt Family Inn. Before that it was Sprawling Oaks Bed and Breakfast. It is located on the site of what was once the third largest plantation in the entire South: Sprawling Oaks, which subsisted on juniper, rice and cotton. The house managed to survive the Civil War and Sherman's rages, and was sold, along with the forty acres, to a wealthy shipping tycoon from Baltimore in 1860 who saw a future in cotton. The house stayed in the tycoon's family until 1930 when it was lost, along with most of the family's wealth. The land was leased out in pieces to whatever local farmers could afford it and raise whatever crops, and it was during this time that the southern most part of the land was converted to an orchard for peaches and apples. The house stood, abandoned and depreciating in value until 1936 when my husband's grandfather, a moderately wealthy hardware store franchiser, bought the place and all the land and offered the local farmers a lower price than the one they'd been getting through their lease with the state. His initial plan was to make it museum (he'd started talks with local historical society and the Smithsonian to make it into a national landmark) but he was so impressed with the work he'd done and the work that could be done, that he wanted the place to remain functional. So he and his wife opened it as a bed and breakfast with only six rooms available, the rest choked with objects from around the house; some valuable, some not.

After a few years of success, Nathan's grandfather bought up chunks of disused farm land and began growing on some of them. The ones he didn't use either fell back into disuse or were leased out to other farmers or sold to land developers over the years. My father-in-law, Mathis was born in the house that had once been Sprawling Oaks, the youngest of three. His eldest brother, some nine years older than he, died at Market Garden and the next eldest son, Samuel, took over the place upon the death of their father. Mathis didn't continue to work the place under the supervision of his brother, and after college and Korea, returned only to move into a small farmhouse that had actually been passed to him. It had been a farm for strawberries, blueberries and cucumbers, and Mathis moved into the modest house and tended the crops, along with the Spanish dancer he had miraculously wooed away from the USO after the war. When Joe died, Mathis took over, and he has been working it since then. We've had presidents stay here as guests, movie stars and professional athletes, politicians and their wives, politicians and their mistresses. We are very discrete. 

I have discovered an immense well of peace that has no bottom, a source of joy that is constantly renewing itself. 

Let me tell you about my inn. 

We have a modest 40 acres, most of which is my father-in-law's territory, his gardens, and a small stable in which we keep 5 horses: Tawny, Saber, Butch, Peaches and Dr. Zhivago. The far western edge of our property leads, through a path starting just beyond the pasture, through a small wood and to a polo field, where, most days of the week, Rijken, our stable hand, can have free rein over the place for lessons when he's not riding the path with guests. This amenity is free to all paying guests.

If you cross over the polo field, you'll find that the path continues through a five-mile stretch of some of the most beautiful land you'll see around here. As you head straight West through it, the land becomes more cultivated and the last square two miles or so is the public park, which represents the beginning of downtown. The path circles around the outer edge of the park so guests can see the charm and character of our small town, and then meets itself at the edge of the woods and leads back to the inn. This aspect of our location and our link is a real winner with guests and it brings in a lot of them every year. With this guided walk by Rijken (whom the town lovingly has dubbed "Dutch" after my father-in-law) the guest feels that the whole town is welcoming them, that there is a real unity here, which there is. 

The house itself is a Greek Revival that was built in 1837 in the style of the Joseph Manigualt house. There is a charming parking circle in front and an iron gate that is always open during the day so as to appear welcoming. The front porch is Colonial style and deep, with seagrass furniture because it's more comfortable than wicker. In the summer we hang large misting fans and serve sweet tea and cucumber sandwiches. Through the grand cut-glass double doors is the main foyer, with various rooms branching off on each side, and a winding staircase wrapped around an antique chandelier put in about thirty years ago. 

Directly under the chandelier is the reception desk, a large federal-style affair behind which sits Karen, our clerk. The carpet in here is Egyptian Mamluk, dark navy and gold to emphasize the regency style of the room. The carpet also nicely compliments the dark reds and browns of the smoking parlor to the right, a room decorated in the Russian Empire style with polished leather furniture and Oriental rugs to soften the sound of a dozen conversations. 

Opposite the smoking parlor through three sets of double french doors, is the dining room, my favorite room. The high ceilings offset the crowded population of fifteen pedestal tables in the center of the room and booths along the walls, some large enough to accommodate parties of ten. Any larger party is usually serviced in the day parlor, which converts to a private dining or party area when the need arises. All of our dining room furniture is antique in the Queen Anne style and upholstered in Italian silk in rich creams, golds and reds to accent the dark mahogany of the walls which are decorated in the Thomas Hope style with carved wood medallions from Greece, Impressionist watercolors of exotic birds and beautifully dressed women by the French greats, antique armoires imported from Hong Kong containing a myriad of small antiques that have accumulated over the years: decorative plates from Spain, antique guns from Italy, figurines from Austria. The lights are usually dim at night and bright during the day when guests can attend a daily continental breakfast or tea served two hours before lunch. I'll have to tell you about our kitchen staff later. They're exceptional. 

Through the dining room is the kitchen, a large but tubular room that always reminds me of a very well-lit submarine. It was once all eggshell tile but I had it replaced with brushed steel not long ago. We have a meat locker with all fresh, local meat and a vegetable refrigerator with all fresh, local produce. Food is delivered three times a week by friends of ours who appreciate our business and are willing to go out of their way to stop by. During Thanksgiving season we have more turkeys than we know what to do with. But we do have all industrial strength appliances and at any time up to ten people could be preparing a meal or five in here, coexisting nicely. At the far end of the narrow kitchen is the staircase that leads to the basement. The only other entrance to the basement is through the pantry which leads directly out back of the house to Mathis' gardens where he grows prize-winning tomatoes and grapefruit. The basement isn't usually my place in the house; it's always scared me a little bit. Mathis' brother Joe, who ran this place until his death in 1980, had the whole house put on a scaffolding of some kind and had the basement put in back in the early 70's. Down there, in addition to the pantry, is a large laundry room with half a dozen industrial-sized washers and dryers, steamers and sewing machines. We even have copper vats at least a hundred years old for dyeing. There is also a maintenance closet and an employee locker room and bunk for anyone who needs a quick nap on their break. 

We have a small crew here, and we want to show our loyalty to them. 

The maintenance is usually performed by Mathis, my father-in-law, who owns the Inn but lately, due to his health, has receded from representing it to guests. Most guests who pass through meet Nathan and me, and few inquire about Mathis anymore. I think I'm going to have to hire someone else to fix up around here, since Mathis has taken to taking everything apart and stowing pieces of things around the house. He was working on his Carmen Gia a few months ago and put the carburetor in the linen closet upstairs, ruined a perfectly beautiful Brussels Lace tablecloth. 

We have ten bedrooms, two of them suites that were converted from two sleeping porches on opposite wings of the house. The suites are called the Red Room and the Blue Room for obvious reasons; one is decorated in a deep oxblood and the other a navy not unlike the Russian Empire smoking parlor downstairs. The rest of the rooms are pale yellows, greens, blues and pinks, five of them containing two double beds, three of them a single King sized canopy bed. We do not provide our guests with television sets but we do offer desks, chaise lounges and dressing tables all in a Louis XIV-inspired design. All of our bathtubs are antique clawfoot, all of our bathroom decorations rustic and usually made of brass and even the tiles are antique, imported from Barcelona. Room service is available until two a.m and that includes the entire menu but most guests don't order roast duck with foi gras at two in the morning. Housekeeping leaves fresh flowers from Mathis's garden every morning with the fresh coffee and breakfast pastries. 

Directly above the front porch is the second-floor balcony, also running the entire width of the house. It is also in the Colonial style, its columns thick, with a running balustrade and dentil molding. Wisteria grows from a hanging arbor over the balcony in the summer, covering the front walk with its dropped petals, releasing its cool fragrance when crushed underfoot. 

We used to live in the inn, along with the guests.We used to use the carriage house at back just for storage but then we had a second boy and we moved all of our things out, and converted our little apartment into the second suite. The carriage house is a small, two-story affair with a small winding staircase in the center of the kitchen that leads up to a lofted set of bedrooms and bathroom. There is a small corner living room that looks out at the Inn. Sometimes I just like to sit on the couch and watch the inn, searching for figures in the windows, the flickering of lights, any sign that there is life inside. It's so easy to forget with a house so old. 

Sometimes I see things that are not there. I can admit that now. Sometimes I cannot go into certain bedrooms because I feel like someone will be waiting there for me. And I can NEVER go to the basement. That was where all the bad feelings started. And sometimes they still come back. But not if I listen to Nathan. He's been taking real good care of me. 

Sometimes I still have the Awful Feelings. The kind that feel like a barbarous army bent on destruction, marching towards my little village. Sometimes I sit by the window and just stare and stare, at the iron gates enclosing our property, at the expanse of Mathis's garden, but I never can remember what it is I'm expecting to see. And that is very frustrating.

The Awful Feelings started before Gabriel left, I can admit that, they started like this vague sense that every decision I made would inevitably lead to disaster and my life would become nothing more than a pool of guilt for me to swim in for the rest of my days. I used to look at the men in my family, my sons, one timid and afraid, the other railing against every word of direction or authority, my elevated father-in-law retreating to his gardens because he has fought wars but none like this, my husband always yelling, always raging and then disappearing and then returning with a soft, apologetic voice and eager hand and I would always do what he wanted with my son's black eye in mind, his fat lip, or sometimes just his voice and it was awful but distracting from the even more awful reality of making love to someone I hated.

Eventually Nathan stopped trying, when he was in and out of treatment and he would return and we would all know it was just a matter of time and so we couldn't even make love anymore because I could look at him and see how dried up he was, like there was nothing warm or soft inside of him to give and there hadn't been much to begin with. I hadn't enjoyed being with Nathan for a long time, not since we were young and he had yet to show his despicable side, the sloppy, lumbering drunk that he was, breaking furniture and embarrassing himself, me, all of us. 

You can't come back from that, can you? Not when your image of that person is already unreasonably high.

There was a time when I would have said that Nathan had saved my life. I would lay in bed and chant it to myself, staring at the ceiling and hoping he would pass out on the couch downstairs and I would modify my fear, my repulsion by saying that he had saved my life. I might be dead if not for him. He had saved me. That's what I told the shrinks, all of them, in the beginning. He had saved me from an eternity of boredom, if nothing else. He saved me. He really had. 

That was a long time ago. 

But it's okay, because I've got the Inn. I've got it more than he ever had it, and it needs me, even if no one else does around here. I could climb around inside its walls like they were made of flesh and they were welcoming me. Most of the time I stay focused on the Inn. If I lose focus, the Awful Feelings start to come back. And then I hurt the Inn. I tear the walls down. I set things on fire. I take whole objects and shatter them to pieces. 

There is a lot of work to do today. There will be a lot of work tomorrow.