Volatile temperaments were not the only thing to tarnish the shine of marital bliss. Neither of us liked attending to the mundane details of life, but I soon discovered that my laissez faire attitude did not extend to finance. We established a joint checking account a few months before the wedding, so we could both contribute to the cost of setting up house. David moved into our future apartment at the beginning of the summer, while I went home to pack my life into a few boxes and prepare for our wedding. He kept the books while I was gone.
After we got home from the hapless honeymoon, we planned a shopping expedition to furnish the apartment. David had slept on a mattress thrown on the floor, eaten off of cardboard boxes, and sat in a torn lawn chair. His only purchases were a television – to feed his addiction, and an apartment-sized washer. He also was given an antiquated dryer that wouldn't fit in the utility area and so claimed a corner of the living room.
Since we were poor students, our shopping itinerary included the Salvation Army, Goodwill, and the Campus Barter Shoppe. I dug the checkbook out of the stack of papers in the corner and turned to the ledger. It was blank.
"David," I said. "Where do you keep the books?"
He tapped his head. "Up here."
"I'm sure you have an idea up there of how much money we have, but where do you write down the checks?"
"I don't." I stared at him with my mouth open as he explained his accounting system. "I keep a running tally of how much I spend, and once a month or so, I call the bank and find out my balance."
I licked my dry lips and then croaked out, "What if you have an outstanding check or two when you call the bank?"
"I told you, I keep the figures in my head, so I usually know about how much I have. I'm rarely more than a few dollars off when I call the bank."
I tried to speak, but no sound came out. I cleared the frog from my throat and tried again. In a reedy voice, I informed my new husband that I would be taking over the books. I was not willing to risk a bounced check because the calculator in David's head malfunctioned. Later I suspected that he deliberately devised this haphazard bookkeeping scheme to get out of the chores of bill payment and checkbook balancing.
This, though, was not our only financial challenge. It soon became clear that our fiscal philosophies were in opposition. He must have been a reincarnated suicide victim of the great depression – that's how tight he was. He was always vetoing purchases as extravagant. There was no need to buy new underwear if the ones we had were stained and dingy. Who was going to see them anyway? In fact, he wore several holey pair until I 'lost' them. I told him Yeti, the nickname I gave the monstrous dryer, must have eaten them.
I wanted to keep an accurate account of our finances so I would know how much money we had to spend. I wasn't adverse to a budget, but I felt justified in splurging on a special occasion, say an anniversary.
On our first anniversary, David took me to a fancy restaurant. Before that, when we ate out, we frequented Bella's Grill or Bud's Barbeque, student haunts that had fairly tasty food at reasonable prices. The prices were kept low because neither joint wasted money on décor or wait staff. You ordered at the counter and took care of your own culinary and condiment needs. Tables that looked like salvaged picnic discards huddled under bare bulbs with low wattage. It was best to concentrate on your companion or your plate, because a stray glance might light on an exploring mouse feasting on yesterday's fry rejects or a trail of ants hauling away dropped bread crusts.
For our anniversary celebration, David made a reservation at an upscale bistro recommended by a professor. When we opened the calligraphy engraved menus, David's gulp was audible. As he peered at the menu in the dim lightening, I'm sure I heard him mutter that the purpose for the candlelight was so that patrons could not read the outlandish prices beside the entrees. He anxiously scanned the page, looking for a single digit dollar amount. In 1971 you could still get a decent meal for under $10 a person. David was accustomed to the $5 range.
He suggested we split a meal so as not to deplete our meager funds. I reminded him that this was an anniversary celebration and refused to take part in his shameful scheme. Finally, he ordered the cheapest thing on the menu, shish kabob. Sympathizing with his abject misery, I also ordered one of the cheaper entrees.
He was so upset at the price he was going to have to pay that he didn't enjoy one bite of our meal. I'm sure that he spent the whole time imagining the things he could have bought with the money he was eating. I believe it took him several tries to get each morsel past the obstruction in his throat. When the $26 bill finally came, he visibly paled as he parted with the cash.
I couldn't help but tease him about the fact that his frugal nature sapped the romance from the meal. He informed me that the rest of the evening would make up for it. He took me to see Love Story. When we got home, our table was covered with a lace tablecloth. A candle centerpiece provided amorous lighting. A single rose lay across my plate. He seated me formally before bringing out the top tier of our wedding cake.
I had forgotten the frozen treasure and the tradition of eating it on your first anniversary. I clapped my hands and cried, "Bravo."
With a flourish, David brandished a knife and then pressed the blade against the cake. Only the icing gave way.
"That's strange," he muttered. "I told Andy to take this out as soon as we left so it would thaw. I guess we'll just have to eat frozen cake."
He pressed harder on the knife. The cake dented and then careened toward where I sat. I jumped back, and the pastry slid off the table and landed upside down on the floor. David and I stared in amazement at an icing-covered cylinder of frozen cardboard. We both collapsed in spasms of laughter.
If our honeymoon was from Hades, then our anniversary celebration was from Vaudeville.
Over the years, our financial divide narrowed. David learned fiscal generosity, and I discovered thrift. At heart he remained a penny pincher and I a spendthrift, but we forsook our natural tendencies when appropriately challenged by the other.
#
Faith couldn't help but smile at Mama's description of Daddy's frugal nature. She remembered being taken to the movies by her parents as a small child. They always made a stop at the dollar store on the way, to fill their pockets with candy.
"They charge an arm and a leg for candy at the theater," Daddy said when Mama protested. "It's un-American to give them a monopoly at the concession. Besides, I know you'll make me pay the outrageous price for a box of popcorn and a drink; they're a little harder to smuggle in."
"And you'll buy the smallest of each and make us split it three ways," Mama responded with a, "Humph."
Faith thought the smuggling of candy an adventure. She and Daddy giggled as they looked for places to hide their stash so as not to alert the concession police. Her brothers, though, warned her that one day she might be a wee bit embarrassed by Daddy's food frugalities.
They told her of one excursion to the Mall. They were going to window shop, so Mama would know what they wanted for Christmas, and then eat at the food court before going to the movies. Everyone indulged Daddy his trip to the dollar store to select theater contraband. What embarrassed them was that he brought Mama's brownies to the mall and pulled out the Tupperware container where any passing kid could see that he was too cheap to buy desert. When the brownies appeared, my humiliated brothers suddenly had to make an emergency trip to the bathroom. By the time they returned, Mama had judiciously hidden the incriminating evidence of Daddy's tightwad ways.
Faith, though, could appreciate Daddy's thrift. She and Aaron were the cross gender fiscal equivalents of her parents. Aaron was generous to a fault, and she was a cautious spender. When they went shopping for wedding rings, this became clear.
"Look, Faith, aren't they magnificent." Aaron pointed to a pair of diamond-studded bands.
"But look at the price tag," she whispered.
"We'll only get married once. We might as well do it right. These bands are unique and will clearly set us apart as a couple."
"Is starting out in debt so we can have distinctive rings doing it right?" she said. "What good are spectacular rings if you're still paying for them on your tenth anniversary?"
They left the jewelry store that evening without rings. Eventually, they decided to forgo traditional gold bands and purchase jade bands adorned with tiny gold nuggets. Her Aunt Joni, who lived in Alaska, suggested the compromise after Faith unloaded via email. Jade was relatively inexpensive, even with the gold nuggets. The combination was rare as a wedding band and would identify them as partners in a way plain gold would not. Faith got inexpensive; Aaron got unique, and both were happy.
Putting down the journal, Faith took out the ring box with the wedding bands Aunt Joni had sent from Alaska. Looking down at the jade bands, she felt a hard knot form in her belly. She thought she had come to terms with the fact that she wouldn't be Aaron's first. But she hadn't known that he had fathered a child with another woman. Somehow that changed things. And then the abortion on top of that. Could she come to terms with all of that?
She had given Kyra almost a week to answer. Going over to the computer, Faith clicked on the link she had marked to Kyra's MySpace site. Maybe if she could talk to Kyra, she could deal with what Aaron had told her. A message came up telling her that Kyra's space was restricted to invited friends and family.
"What?" Faith said aloud. "Did she do this because of my message?"
She sent a message inviting Kyra to accept her as a friend.
The response came back immediately, "Invitation refused."
Kyra had frozen her out; there was no doubt in Faith's mind. For some reason, the question about Chandler High School had frightened her. Going to the on-line white pages, Faith typed in Kyra Hancock in Monroe, LA. She found no listing. Faith stood up, slamming both hands on the desk.
"Blast it all!" she said. "She must only have a cell phone."
Faith wondered how else she could find her. She knew Kyra was a student at the University of Louisiana at Monroe, but calling the school wouldn't help. Privacy acts guaranteed that they wouldn't give out the kind of information she needed, especially over the phone. They probably wouldn't even give it to her if she went in person.
"I bet I could find her if I went up there, though," Faith said aloud. "I know what she looks like. If the campus is laid out anything like LSU, she's got to take classes in a nursing building."
Picking up the phone, she dialed the paper. Soon she had her boss on the line.
"You know that week off you offered me after the funeral. Well, I'm still having trouble sleeping, and I was wondering if it was still an option," Faith said.
"You know that we'll give you some time if you need it, Faith, but you need to give me a couple of days to find someone to fill in." He took a breath. "You do realize that the offer was time off without pay. We can't afford to pay you while someone else is doing your job."
"I know, Sam," Faith said. "I just appreciate you being so understanding. How about I finish out this week and take next week off? Is three days long enough to line someone up?" She twisted her hair around her finger as she talked. "I'll be back the following Monday."
Faith punched her fist into the air after her boss agreed with the plan. "Yes!"
Going back to the computer, she searched for available accommodations in the Monroe area.
With plans underway, she tried to distract herself from the problem of finding Kyra. She resumed her daily routine: pick up statistics, type them up, email them in, cry a lot, and read the journal.
#