“Thank you.” Trudy picks up another photo of the four of us. “I know this sounds monstrous to utter out loud, but he was already dead. I was, too.”
She shakes her head and continues. “We both got so complacent. Well, that’s not even the right word. We both simply became invisible to one another. We stopped caring about what we looked like, what the other ate, what the other did... we lived in the same house, but we were no longer husband and wife.” She touches the framed photo. “I don’t even think we were friends.” Trudy looks up at me. “Instead of us going for a walk together in the morning, Ralph would make a huge breakfast of bacon and eggs. Instead of working in the yard, he would sleep in his recliner. Instead of us making a healthy dinner together, he would run through the drive-through at McDonald’s and bring me back a Big Mac and fries.” She looks down at herself. “And suddenly, twenty years are gone, and you look like this.”
She puts the photo down. “And then he’s gone, and for the first time in decades, I sleep through the night. When I wake up, I’m not even mourning his loss but simply grateful for a do-over.”
I stare at her, stunned by her honesty. I cannot find anywords, so I say, “Well, speaking of do-over, your ’do does look great.” I gesture to her hair.
She laughs. “Nice segue. Ron took me to see... was it Casper?”
I laugh. “Gaspar,” I say. “His prices will scare you like a ghost, but he does know how to pull off a glow-up.” I wait until she looks at me. “So do you, I think.”
“Thank you.” She picks up a framed cast photo of me with the Golden Girls. “I think you do, too.” Trudy points at Coco. “I did a little online sleuthing while I was in here hiding...” Trudy hesitates. “Actually, to be totally transparent, I was just in here hiding from the world. It seems I’m very good at that. I didn’t mean to snoop.”
I walk over to the modern walnut bookcases that flank the flat-screen TV in the living room.
“Oh, Coco is public knowledge,” I say. “It’s just that the public doesn’t know he existed.” I touch the face of a character I’m still running from. But he was really just me all along. “Please, take a seat,” I continue, nodding at the low-slung mid-century sofa.
Trudy places the photo back down and sits.
“Speaking of Coco, that’s why I came inside,” I say. “I was just about to watch an episode ofThe Golden Girls. I have to preview one for our upcoming show.”
“If you can believe it, I’ve never watched an episode ofThe Golden Girls,” she says. “In fact, I’ve never watched a sitcom in my life.”
“Well, we have something in common,” I say. “Besides an occasional disdain for Teddy. I never watched a sitcom either until we started doing our show.”
“My father didn’t allow us to watch such nonsense, said it would rot our brains,” Trudy says. “We couldn’t listen to secular music. We couldn’t even shut our bedroom doors. They had to remain open at all times. Teddy and I would sneak downstairs, though, on Saturday mornings when my parents were hungover and watch cartoons.”
My heart pings, and I imagine little, fierce, funny Teddy fighting to survive. I watch Trudy hug a pillow. My eyes meet Coco’s on the bookshelf.
How the hell do any of us survive?
We fight, or die.
I scroll the TV.
“If you can believe it,” I finally say, “I don’t think I’ve ever seen this episode before.”
The episode is titled “Mary Has a Little Lamb,” and it is about a teenage girl named Mary, who is pregnant and seeks the women’s help after failing to get support from her father. Dorothy steps in to offer advice and guidance.
“Is Dorothy always the one who stands up for someone in need?” Trudy asks toward the end of the episode. These are the first words she has spoken since it started. I look over and see she is still holding the Jonathan Adler pillow, clutching it, rocking it like a newborn.
“She is the truth teller,” I confirm. “Just like Teddy.”
“Our mom’s name was Dorothy,” Trudy muses. “Did you know that? Teddy was named after her. He was with her when she died. They were watchingThe Golden Girlstogether.”
“He told me about that after we met in therapy,” I say.
Trudy turns to me. I pause the show.
“Therapy,” she sighs. “So that’s something people actually do.”
I don’t mean to laugh, but I do.
“Not to offend you,” she says quickly, “but that is not a staple of Midwestern life that I grew up with, like milk and eggs. Men didn’t address their emotions. They drank. And if they drank too much, they didn’t get sober, or else they were told they couldn’t hold their liquor. Women cried in the bathroom when their husbands were asleep, bathtub faucet running to hide their pain. And children mirror their parents: We become just like them because it’s easier to please than become...” she stops and meets my gaze “...ourselves.”
“It took me a very long time and a lot of therapy to realize that running away from my pain wasn’t solving anything,” I tell her. “I was simply running. To nowhere. I was just masking it all with isolation, anger and bad decisions.”
“Masks,” Trudy whispers. She looks at me intently. “Are you okay now?”
