An Imperfect Librarian - Elizabeth Murphy [55]
CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR
through the looking glass
AFTER MEGABYTES OF MESSAGE BLOCKED for this recipient, followed by my declined invitation to share fatherhood with Brutus, Elsa announces that she misses her husband, me, Carl Brunet, recent recipient of the outstanding-cuckolded-husband-of-all-time award. The same Carl Brunet who’ll soon have a hint of a lean to one side from poking his hand in his pocket to rub the two smooth beach rocks between his fingers.
I squander a fortune on an overpriced ticket, dump what clean clothes I own into a backpack then board the plane for a weekend in Norway. I forget to ask for an aisle seat to avoid the aerial view of the ponds and meadows that remind me so much of Cliffhead. When I arrive in Heathrow, I visit a bookstore while I wait for my connection to Oslo. I end up in the history section even though I never read history books. I walk past the duty-free shop with its promotion on cognac. I’m tempted to ask if they know how well it mixes with partridgeberries. I fall asleep on the plane until the bumpy landing in Oslo jolts me awake. The passengers push to debark. I stay behind, half-asleep, half-wondering how I ended up on the other half of the world.
In the terminal, I waste time walking to the baggage claim. Elsa’s at the end of the corridor. It’s not easy to ignore someone so tall, so blond and so pressed up against the glass wall. She waves. I look the other way. I didn’t check in any baggage but I stand around the carousel anyway. One by one, the bags disappear until I’m facing an empty carousel.
“Did you get your luggage?” a man in a uniform asks.
As soon as I exit the baggage area, she flaps her arms around me. “It’s good to see you,” she says. “You’re still wearing that same shirt and pants. Have you been losing weight?”
“I’ve shed a bit. Life’s hard in Newfoundland. I have to fight to stay alive.”
She glares at me. “Is this a joke you’re doing?”
I almost forgot that Elsa hasn’t mastered the nuances of English. “Yes. I’m making a joke.”
“You weren’t a joker before. You always...” She talks about how I used to be, how she used to be and how we’re going to be. We ride the elevator to the parking lot. Elsa updates me on the last two years. “...then there was this one time when Sophie wanted me to...” I’m distracted by our reflections in the mirrored sides of the elevator – infinite layers of Carl and Elsa reflecting off each other. She curls her fingers into mine as the elevator descends. I pull away to adjust the bag on my shoulder. The door opens. I follow her through a maze of parked cars.
“Why don’t I stay with you at your hotel?” she says. “I’m your wife. I hope you have not forgot this already.”
I shake my head. “Forgot is not the word.”
She chats about who we’ll visit, invitations to suppers, how happy she is to see me, how we’re going to enjoy the old times together. I interrupt the old times to ask her about new times. “Do you know if I’ll have email access in my hotel room?”
She laughs. “You don’t need email while you’re here. You’ll be too busy. Tonight, we’ll have something to eat, talk about old times, I’ll help you unpack, give you a massage.”
She unlocks her car and I take my seat in the front. “I’m not hungry and I don’t need to unpack but I do need to send an email.”
“Once you smell the food, you’ll rediscover your appetite – same for your wife.”
“I don’t want to be married to you anymore, Elsa. I decided on the way over here that I want a divorce.”
“What are you talking about all of a sudden? You can’t decide something so important on an airplane flight!”
I gaze out through the side window. “Sorry. I had time to think about what I want. It’s not you. It’s not a life in Norway.”
Her sniffles harmonize with the swishing sound of the wipers. “Are you planning to stay forever in Newfieland?” she says.
“I promise to stop calling her Brutus if you’ll stop calling Newfoundland, Newfieland.”
Elsa drives the car and the argument for the full distance