Practical Jean Read Online Free Page A

substituted. Years before, back in the ancient past of their marriage, Jean had been aware of a snag in the thread of her relationship with Milt, and she’d discovered that he and Louise had had the briefest, barest fling. It was hardly an affair at all, more like a friendship with glimpses of partial nudity, as a movie rating might have put it. But when she went to confront Louise, Jean had found herself far more charmed by the woman than threatened by whatever designs she might have had on Milt. She had an odd, abstracted air and a scattered sort of sincerity, so it took Jean no time at all to forgive Louise, and before long they were good friends.
    Jean went up the steps with the card in her hand and was about to plunk it through the mail slot when the door jerked open and Louise burst into view. It was mid-morning on a weekday so that was a surprise, and Jean sort of jumped back. Louise did almost the same jumpy thing when she saw Jean.
    â€œOh, Jean!” she said. “I saw the car through the window and I thought . . .” She glanced from Jean to the car and bobbed her head down as if to see inside, looked back at Jean, and smiled. “It’s great to see you!”
    Louise was wearing a white blouse and shapeless tan skirt, which seemed like the sort of outfit she would wear to work. Her long, tarnish-colored hair was combed as usual, high off her head. It was a style quite unconnected to modern fashion. It seemed stuck in a vague Other Time, which fit Louise because her mind often seemed drawn to some misty Other Place. All things considered, knowing Louise as she did, Jean thought it possible that her friend had just forgotten to go to school that day.
    â€œLouise, you look so nice,” said Jean. “Is that a teaching outfit?”
    Louise giggled in the rolling, girlish way she had. “It’s a P.D. day, Jean.”
    That was a relief, and Jean handed Louise the card. The two women chatted for a while, with Louise showing true concern for Jean’s feelings regarding her mother’s recent death, and Jean not knowing what to say because Louise expected her to be sad and sad was a draggy, wishful emotion—that’s how Jean felt whenever she thought of Cheryl—and the way she felt about her mother’s death wasn’t like that at all. But apart from that, talking to Louise really was refreshing, and Jean decided that Milt’s idea of having all her friends over was a good one. She invited Louise then and there to come for a little party on Wednesday night.
    Framed by the doorway behind her, Louise looked happy and lost at the same time.
    â€œThat’s . . .”
    â€œNot tomorrow,” said Jean, “but the next night.”
    â€œOkay, sure!”
    The trees and hydro poles cast charcoal cutouts of themselves onto the lawns and sidewalks as Jean made a few more thank-you stops. There was a quick one to the tiny house owned by her good friend Natalie Skilbeck, who was working, so Jean wrote a note on the back of the card about coming over Wednesday. It’ll be fun! And there was another to the minister who’d performed the funeral service for Marjorie. Jean couldn’t quite remember the service because in her mind the entire funeral was such a dark, inaccessible blur, but she thought a thank-you only polite. We very much appreciate your effort on behalf of our mother. The minister came to the door in a rumpled plaid shirt and jeans, looking much less formal than Jean expected of a member of the clergy. He was an older man with large, flat glasses, like little windshields on his face, and when he saw Jean he immediately started talking about grief and how important it was. He went on and on about it. Jean listened as politely as she could for a while, and finally started backing away toward the car. By the time she was at the curb the minister was almost shouting at her to be sad. It was all a bit much.
    She also delivered a card to Tina