insides just fell away, leaving only the sky and ocean blue shells with the crusts of green and yellow land. I was scattered like the dirt of the world; there was suddenly no possibility of Jerry to fill me.
I wandered into the living room and sat on the couch. I wondered if I should go to the funeral, if I could say goodbye. I hadn’t seen Jerry face to face in over fifty years; no one at his funeral would know me.
Fifty years. Yet every day, Jerry walked with me to my mailbox, he drove with me across town to the hardware store or the dress shop. He told me what to buy, what tool to use, what looked good. When I sat down to eat my supper, he sat across from me and made me laugh with tales from his workday. And at night, I always slept on the left side of the bed, leaving the right side for him.
On my mantel was the old clock Jerry and I found when we were sixteen. We were wandering through the graveyard, figuring on finding a hidden shady spot to fool around, when we found this clock on someone’s grave.
“That’s really weird,” I said and I squatted down to give it a closer look. The clock wasn’t working; one of its hands hung loose while the other seemed soldered on the number four.
Jerry knelt next to me. “Pretty though,” he said, even though it wasn’t. “Like you.” Then he lifted the thing up. It was so heavy, it made him grunt. “I’m going to give it to you, to show you that I’m yours for all time.”
He carried it to the far back corner of the graveyard, then set it under a tree. It was there and then that I let him do all the things he ever wanted to do. He was mine for all time and I was so grateful and in love that there didn’t seem to be any reason to say no anymore. After-ward, we lay in the grass, his entire body pressed against my bare back, his arm around my middle and his hand between my breasts and over my heart. And I reached out and held the loose hand on the clock. I wanted to thank it. The time it brought me sealed the deal with Jerry. He was mine for all time. He thought I was beautiful.
We brought the clock to my home, taking turns carrying it and sometimes each holding an end and carrying it together. Then Jerry kept my mama busy talking in the kitchen while I stumbled with it up the stairs and hid it on the floor of my closet, under a jumble of clean clothes I always forgot to hang up.
My mama found it, of course. I told her we got it at the junkyard and she told me to get rid of it. I said no, because Jerry said it was pretty like me. She shook her head, but she let me keep it then. She understood about me and Jerry. She always said a girl like me was lucky to get a guy like him. The day he left for college, she cried. I didn’t. I knew he’d be back, even if she said he wouldn’t. The clock sealed the deal; he was mine for all time.
That clock sat on my bedroom dresser the four years Jerry was away and I stayed home and worked at the Super Mart. And it came with me when I moved into my own place above the store. I kept the clock, even though I hadn’t heard from Jerry much in most of those four years. I kept it because I had to prepare a place for him and me and the clock held our time together. I brought it with me to the few other places I lived and it’s been on this mantel since I bought the house when I turned thirty-five. I was tired of waiting on Jerry to buy us a house so I decided just to make the decision for him. Only widow women and divorcees and old maids owned homes, I thought, but I told myself I wasn’t one of those, I was just waiting on Jerry, and I went out and bought one anyway.
I knew what happened to him. I saw his graduation announcement in the paper and I attended the ceremony, way in the back row. He got a job a state away and eventually, I followed him there and got a job too, head cashier in the grocery store. I hoped I would bump into him, that he would come through my line and I would smile and he’d remember to come home. I about
I wandered into the living room and sat on the couch. I wondered if I should go to the funeral, if I could say goodbye. I hadn’t seen Jerry face to face in over fifty years; no one at his funeral would know me.
Fifty years. Yet every day, Jerry walked with me to my mailbox, he drove with me across town to the hardware store or the dress shop. He told me what to buy, what tool to use, what looked good. When I sat down to eat my supper, he sat across from me and made me laugh with tales from his workday. And at night, I always slept on the left side of the bed, leaving the right side for him.
On my mantel was the old clock Jerry and I found when we were sixteen. We were wandering through the graveyard, figuring on finding a hidden shady spot to fool around, when we found this clock on someone’s grave.
“That’s really weird,” I said and I squatted down to give it a closer look. The clock wasn’t working; one of its hands hung loose while the other seemed soldered on the number four.
Jerry knelt next to me. “Pretty though,” he said, even though it wasn’t. “Like you.” Then he lifted the thing up. It was so heavy, it made him grunt. “I’m going to give it to you, to show you that I’m yours for all time.”
He carried it to the far back corner of the graveyard, then set it under a tree. It was there and then that I let him do all the things he ever wanted to do. He was mine for all time and I was so grateful and in love that there didn’t seem to be any reason to say no anymore. After-ward, we lay in the grass, his entire body pressed against my bare back, his arm around my middle and his hand between my breasts and over my heart. And I reached out and held the loose hand on the clock. I wanted to thank it. The time it brought me sealed the deal with Jerry. He was mine for all time. He thought I was beautiful.
We brought the clock to my home, taking turns carrying it and sometimes each holding an end and carrying it together. Then Jerry kept my mama busy talking in the kitchen while I stumbled with it up the stairs and hid it on the floor of my closet, under a jumble of clean clothes I always forgot to hang up.
My mama found it, of course. I told her we got it at the junkyard and she told me to get rid of it. I said no, because Jerry said it was pretty like me. She shook her head, but she let me keep it then. She understood about me and Jerry. She always said a girl like me was lucky to get a guy like him. The day he left for college, she cried. I didn’t. I knew he’d be back, even if she said he wouldn’t. The clock sealed the deal; he was mine for all time.
That clock sat on my bedroom dresser the four years Jerry was away and I stayed home and worked at the Super Mart. And it came with me when I moved into my own place above the store. I kept the clock, even though I hadn’t heard from Jerry much in most of those four years. I kept it because I had to prepare a place for him and me and the clock held our time together. I brought it with me to the few other places I lived and it’s been on this mantel since I bought the house when I turned thirty-five. I was tired of waiting on Jerry to buy us a house so I decided just to make the decision for him. Only widow women and divorcees and old maids owned homes, I thought, but I told myself I wasn’t one of those, I was just waiting on Jerry, and I went out and bought one anyway.
I knew what happened to him. I saw his graduation announcement in the paper and I attended the ceremony, way in the back row. He got a job a state away and eventually, I followed him there and got a job too, head cashier in the grocery store. I hoped I would bump into him, that he would come through my line and I would smile and he’d remember to come home. I about
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