Maureen Seaton

Pluperfect

She found herself facing the question of whether to commit

suicide or to undertake something wildly eccentric.

—Charlotte Salomon, Life or Theatre?

1. Events in life happen.

I want to say I hid beneath school desks in the 50s and thought: Isn't this ridiculous? Nuns yelled at us to keep our heads down. Sirens whined. Somewhere in Nevada a test blast melted the hair off a young man's skull, there was nothing left of the pigs and rabbits in uniform, Rita Hayworth's face taped to the bomb like a foreskin. But air raids are peculiar events. They steal something from the Janes of suburban first‑grade fictions, tiny believers, pastel peacetime WACs. I kept my head down. No one laughed. Urine leaked out, warm truth.

1. Events in life do not happen, they simply are.

You can't always trust the memories of children. Their lives follow into your own, shadow and rebellion, pointed star in your belly drawing blood. Liquor's good: You can fly any­ where and twirl before the greatness of God, tremble and spit, a missile crashing into a bedroom window. She was a very sick girl in a bath of ice surrounded by magical interns. The tub teetered like a decision, icy water sloshed, docs sponged her up and down, in and out. In her dream (dream?) they've stolen something, but she can't remember what.

2. Time Flows

They named hurricanes after women: Alice, Bene, Cornelia. This made sense: may­hem on a Sunday morning, our mother white‑hot still on the Chevrolet's front seat in her feathered hat, her tangerine lips. (Our stinging cheeks, our shoes tied tight.) Or time flows because you can throw a stick in the river and watch it bump toward the sea, down and down, linear as Latin that takes you from logical begin­ning to predictable end, a whir through time, biting the bones, swallowing the fresh‑killed heart of God.

2. No physical experiment has ever detected the flow of time.

And yet the times she tries to die she can't. It's no joke when the kids come bounc­ing in on her like bombs, pee‑soggy and squealing for nourishment. If she lies still they go away, belly down the stairs to dry Cheerios—stick them to the ends of their fingers, pretend they're puppets, bite their heads off. Once, she climbs in the car and drives away, the kids quiet as a losing team in the back seat. Around they go. It's hilarious how the car brings them home. When they open the door to the house, it appears to be waiting.

3. The body is an isolated, self‑contained unit.

Fermi took side bets on the possibility that all of New Mexico would blow, atoms bump and pop to infinity, true Laurel and Hardy drama, sanctioned as my father's corporate moves, dragging his family behind him‑mama bear and the little bears in their little bear suits. My brother became a juvenile delinquent. I imploded like Alamogordo. How strange that Fermi stayed in New Mexico for the detonation. My own father was never home, the way the President sits in his oval office, hands folded and immaculate.

3. The body is in dynamic relationship with the universe and all other bodies.

She strains for the sound of her name beneath ice cubes—B flat, the key she saves for Sundays and days she calls herself sober. Relatives dig in‑salads with baby shrimp, fresh dillweed, cherry tomatoes. Her piece de resistance: a perfect London broil marinated in wine and thyme sprigs, grilled to black and bleeding. Nothing compares to that first buttery bite, everyone says so, it's what she's famous for. They keep her alive for her ability to feed them. Without her they would wander away, dazed with hunger, shimmering with grief.

4. Death is a final, absolute event.

It was because a friend's mother had written the most thorough of notes that Jane decided not to follow suit. They were sitting in the kitchen with the calico cats and the babies begging juice. The small pool in the backyard was shrouded in leaves. Shadows wandered down certain walls. Here is the note. Can you imagine? Blue­black ink of a suicide. Silent as a thumbprint. Perfect irretrievable light.

4. Since it refers to a body whose matter is not absolute, death is not final.

The first time I saw a dead person I passed out from flowers orbiting the room and giants on my mother's side screaming at each other in a mushroom cloud of smoke. Formaldehyde and carnations. It's said that the blessed take comfort in watching the damned writhe in hell; peering over banisters, angels delight in the agony of souls. Uncle Robby was a stranger to me. I was a little girl in a navy blue pinafore. He was a man so tall they built a special casket. But I knew his feet were curled up in there, elf's feet, that they hurt, like mine in patent leathers. You couldn't fool me. I knew he would wake up mad.