Olive Kitteridge - Elizabeth Strout [79]
“No ashtrays in this house,” says a woman on her way past Olive, and because of a little crush of people, the woman has to stand there in front of Olive for a moment; she takes a deep drag from her cigarette, squinting her eyes against the smoke. Some tiny ping of recognition, of knowledge, takes place in Olive, but she could not tell you who this woman is—she knows only that she doesn’t like the looks of her, with her long, stringy hair that contains a lot of unflattering gray. Olive thinks when your hair gets gray, it’s time to chop it off, or pin it up on top of your head, no point in thinking you’re still a schoolgirl. “I can’t find an ashtray in this house,” the woman says, tilting her face up quickly as she breathes out a stream of smoke.
“Well,” says Olive, “I guess that’s too bad.” And the woman moves away.
The couch comes into view again. Kerry Monroe is drinking a tumbler of brown stuff—the whiskey she was offering earlier, Olive suspects—and while Kerry’s lipstick remains bright, her cheekbones and jawline still impressively proportioned, it’s as though inside her black clothes her joints have become loosened. Her crossed leg swings, a foot bobs, some inner wobbliness is there. “Nice service, Marlene,” Kerry says, leaning forward to pick up a meatball with a toothpick. “Really nice service; you’ve done him proud.” And Olive nods, because she would like Marlene to be comforted by this.
But Marlene doesn’t see Kerry, she is smiling upward, taking hold of someone’s hand, and says, “The kids planned it all.” And the hand belongs to Marlene’s youngest girl, who in her blue velour jersey and navy-blue skirt squeezes between Marlene and Kerry, putting her head on Marlene’s shoulder, nestling her big-girl’s body close.
“Everyone’s saying how nice the service was,” Marlene says, smoothing the girl’s long bangs away from her eyes. “You did a real nice job.”
The girl nods, her head pressed against her mother’s arm.
“Great job,” says Kerry, tossing back the rest of the whiskey in her glass as though it were merely iced tea.
And Olive, watching all this, feels—what? Jealousy? No, you don’t feel jealous of a woman whose husband has been lost. But an unreachability, that’s how she’d put it. This plump, kind-natured woman sitting on the couch surrounded by children, her cousin, friends—she is unreachable to Olive. Olive is aware of the disappointment this brings. Because why, after all, did she come here today? Not just because Henry would have said to go to Ed Bonney’s funeral. No, she came here hoping that in the presence of someone else’s sorrow, a tiny crack of light would somehow come through her own dark encasement. But it remains separate from her, this old house filled with people, except one voice is beginning to rise above the others.
Kerry Monroe is drunk. In her black suit she stands by the couch and raises an arm. “Cop Kerry,” she says, loudly. “Yep. That should have been me.” Laughing, she sways. People say, “Watch it, Kerry,” “Careful there,” and Kerry ends up sitting on the arm of the couch, slips a black high heel off and flips up and down her black-stockinged foot. “Up against the wall, buster!”
It’s disgusting. Olive rises from her chair. Time to leave; goodbyes aren’t necessary. No one will miss her.
The tide is going out. Near the shore the water is flat, metal-colored, although out past Longway Rock, it’s starting to get choppy; there’s even a whitecap or two. Lobster buoys down in the cove bob slightly, and seagulls circle the wharf near the marina. The sky is still blue, but off to the northeast, the horizon is lined with a rising cloud bank, and the tops of the pine trees are bending, over there on Diamond Island.
Olive is not able to leave after all. Her car is blocked in the driveway by other cars, and she would have to ask around and make a fuss, and she doesn’t want to do that. So she has found herself a nice private spot, a wooden chair right below the deck, off to one corner, in which to sit and watch the clouds move in slowly over the bay.
Eddie Junior walks by on his way down to