He was an intense man, dark, lean-faced, quick-moving — with ready intelligence. He was impatient with inefficiency, and when he had a problem, he would work doggedly at it until he had it licked. She was, she knew, a good foil for that dark intensity. She was cairn and blonde and placid, with a sense of fun and a quick eye for the ridiculous. Their marriage was seven years old and she knew from observation of other couples that it was better than most.
Had it not been for Stevie, the pattern of their life would have been clear. Hal would have remained with Jason and Rawls. In time he would have become a senior consultant and perhaps later a junior partner. After Stevie had been born, they had moved from the tiny uptown apartment to a small house in Pleasantville. In time, there would have been a bigger house with wider lawns.
But it had all changed in the office of Doctor Gaylin a little over two years before. They had rushed Stevie there. It had been the worst asthma attack he had ever had. Jean had been in panic as she listened to the boy fighting for breath. The doctor had eased the struggle, with medication. They left Stevie with the nurse and went into Doctor Gaylin’s private office.
Jean remembered how pale and upset Hal had been. “Isn’t there anything you can do about this sort of thing, Doctor?” he had demanded.
“I want to talk to both of you. I don’t think we’re going to be able to do much with medication. He may eventually grow out of it. Or it may get worse. I’d like to recommend a different climate, a warmer place. Florida. Arizona. Southern California. These winters up here are more than he can take. But I know how difficult it is to pull up stakes. I was wondering if you have any relatives you can send him to.”
They had talked it over later. Doctor Gaylin had made it clear that the next few years were crucial.
Hal said, that night, “I don t see why we even have to talk it over very much. We’ve got to do it. There’s no one we can send him to even if we felt we could. We’ve got to go. Good Lord, Jean, this job I have is just that. A job. It isn’t a dedication. I’m thirty-one. Stevie’s health isn’t the sort of thing you can take a chance on: a job is.”
They had planned as carefully as they could. Hal had taken a quick exploratory trip, had seen the opportunities on the Florida west coast and had decided on Clearwater. They had received less for the Pleasantville house than they had hoped. The firm had been sorry to lose him, but Mr. Rawls had been very understanding when Hal told him about Stevie.
Once they had sold themselves on the idea of change they began the new life with optimism and excitement. Hal had been a specialist in accounting procedures, and so, in downtown Clearwater, he had opened a small office. Harold Dorn, Consultant. Jean had found the house, for a little more than they had expected to pay. A nice home in the Bellaire section where there were other small children.
It had all started out so perfectly. Hal was confident and full of tireless energy. He acquired some small accounts. Neighborhood stores, a gas station, a small boat company, a few bars. He told Jean it wouldn’t take too long to get over the hump. His reputation would spread. He was selling a service they could use. Sometimes fie was able to get to the beach with them, but not often. He spent the days soliciting new accounts, and the evenings working on the accounts he had acquired.
And then he told her that it was foolish to maintain an office and a secretary. It was delaying the break-even point. Better to rent desk space in an office. The phone would be answered. It would cut expenses. He’d found he could make a deal on the office lease. It was then that she had first detected something uncertain, perhaps even a bit frightened, behind his smile. And she began to worry.
Later he gave up the rented desk and used his home phone as his business phone. He told her they nearly had it made. Another month or two and income would be ahead of their living expenses and his business expenses. She had long since inaugurated stricter economy measures, studying the papers for bargains in food, repairing children’s clothing she would previously have discarded.
She watched Hal more carefully and was shocked at the change in him. He was leaner, and the lines bracketing his mouth had deepened, and his eyes seemed to be set more deeply in his head. The grin of confidence became a grimace. She knew their meager reserve was dwindling.
“I’ve lined up a job,” he told her. “It will start Monday. Not much of a job. Warehouse work. I’m sort of a stores clerk. The pay isn’t much, but it will help. And I can work on the accounts at night.”
But she learned it was more — or less — than a clerk’s job. He came home dulled by weariness. His hands became calloused. That was the worst part, watching him tear himself apart, watching him fight and use every reserve — often falling asleep at his desk at night as he worked on his clients’ accounts. He became thinner, more silent, and he was irritable with the children. She tried to find a job, but could find nothing that would leave her any surplus after paying a sitter.
Two weeks before, they had come to the end of the line. The children were in bed. Hal came out into the living room.
“Finished with the books?” she asked.
He sat on the couch, hands clenched between his knees, looking at the floor. “With our books,” he said in a dead voice. “We’re finished, baby. We’re licked. We can’t make it. We’ve got to go back while we can still afford to go back or I don’t know what’s going to become of us. We’ve got to get our money out of this house and go back. And hope the two years here have fixed Stevie up for good. I... I’m so damn sorry, Jean, I...”
And he had looked up at her for a long lost moment and then had looked down again and begun to cry. She knew they were tears of exhaustion, of defeat.
Today was the day of departure, when defeat would be certified by the act of leaving. She could see the loaded station wagon in the carport, the same car they had driven down. It was packed to the roof. The luggage carrier on top was full, the tarp roped tightly. There was a small nest for Stevie and Jan just behind the front seat. And room for the crib and the bedding and the final suitcase.
With all my worldly goods...
She wondered why she had thought of that phrase. There was no ceremony to this parting. Not like the parties and silly parting gifts when they had left Pleasantville — people saying. “Going to live in Florida? Wish I had it so good!”
When you’re licked, you sneak out. The Dorns? Oh, they couldn’t make it. Had to go back north. Too bad. Nice folks. But you know how it is. Too many people down, here trying to scratch out a living. If you got a retirement income, or a big wad of dough for a tourist trap, you can make it.
So you don’t say good-by. You write letters later, from the north. Full of ersatz confidence. See you again one of these years. The way Hal said we’d try again later. But you can see in his eyes the knowledge that we won’t. Because it has taken something out of him. Some essential spirit. He’ll never have that sure confidence again. And others will sense that lack of certainty, and so the bright and golden future is forever lost. It could not change her love. But she felt sick when she thought of what it was doing to him and to his pride in himself.
She woke Hal and then went in and got the kids up and dressed. Stevie woke in a sour mood. He did not want to leave. He could not understand why they had to leave. He liked it here. Jan sang her placid little morning song and ignored the querulousness of her brother.