The
Marriage
Maisonette
The new maisonette really is better than the last one. Julian assures Linda of this. The walls are cleaner. The bath tiles sparkle. There aren’t blue-tac stains on the bedroom doors like before, and the garden plants nicely potted and aren’t dead. The bathroom mirror offers a very accurate reflection of one’s entire figure. This is a good thing. You take a step out the front door, even the air is clearer.
“You know that’s impossible, Julian,” says Linda. “We’re only two post codes different.”
They are newlyweds, Linda and Julian. They lived with each other before, but Julian said that they had to move into a ‘marriage maisonette’ in order to make things official. Linda had always had some vague idea about what it would be like, moving into a marriage maisonette. It would be a new start to a new life. There would be an elopement, ideally.
They have been carrying boxes in all day. By five, they are nearly done. Linda carries the last of the small boxes across the threshold. The small boxes contain all Julian and Linda’s trinkets from the past – plastic paperweights advertising diet pills, a rainbow shoelace from Linda’s first rollerskates, hotel stationary, a lot of receipts. “Lethal artery-clogging tar”, Linda thinks vaguely, and then thinks, “I want to skull a cigarette like a beer and I want people to cheer as I do it, like I’m an all-American college freshman in a fraternity house in an American movie.” Julian calls cigarettes a psychological crutch for people of Linda’s disposition. Linda turns around and takes the last small box back across the threshold and onto the grass.
“You’re not marrying me,” she says to the box. She tries to pull off the tape that is on the top of the box. Inside the box are ticket stubs from films and plays that were enjoyed during memorable parts of Julian’s life. There are also soft toys from carnivals, and mix tape cassettes, and notebooks, and soccer jerseys and trophies from primary school.
“You’re not marrying me, July 2005 Indie Favourites mixtape. You’re not marrying me, plush bunny doll. You’re not marrying me, primary school sports trophy. Can you see that none of these things are marrying me, Julian?”
“The Catholics wouldn’t allow for it. It would destroy the sanctity of marriage,” says Julian. He laughs.
“Go away. I hate you to a large degree right now, Julian.”
Linda walks away from the box and from Julian, but not in a straight line.
“Calm down, honey,” says Julian. “I think we’re both very tired. Let’s just go inside and have a glass of water.”
Julian likes trinkets. He thinks that every time you throw something away, you lose a small part of what makes you an alive and breathing person. If you are careful, and collect things that you really like the look of, you can build a strong self-identity on trinkets alone. Then your trinkets can turn into heirlooms after you die and you can make other people feel happy and special by thinking about you.
There are too many boxes in the house. No other species needs so many boxes. Linda is drinking water copiously. She nudges Julian.
“Whole forests were knocked down to create the cardboard for these boxes. You know that? Trees lived in those birds. I mean, trees lived in those birds. I mean, trees lived in those birds. Argh, I mean –”
“I know what you mean,” says Julian.
“I don’t want to be followed,” says Linda. “My past is chasing my present is chasing my future.”
“Don’t say ‘chasing’. It makes your life sound like an antelope being prowled upon by a metaphysical lion.” He laughs a lot.
It is their first night in the new maisonette. Linda sleeps by holding on to Julian, as though there is the possibility that somebody will try to drag her someplace against her will and leave her there and she will not be able to get back. Then, suddenly, she lets go of Julian and doesn’t want to touch him ever again. She is still asleep when this happens.
The last box of trinkets is still out on the grass patch by the road.
Linda wakes up, thinking. She thinks about the process of redirecting mail from the old maisonette to the new one. It will be the same mail as before, just with a ‘Redirected’ sticker. Or maybe even no ‘Redirected’ sticker. The post office might not do that anymore. Of course, they will get no junk mail because the new letterbox has a ‘No Junk Mail’ sticker. This will be the only difference. The sticker has a cartoon man that is bracing and looks like he is in an aeroplane crash. She doesn’t want to redirect the mail.
“I don’t want to redirect the mail, Julian,” Linda says suddenly and resolutely. When these sorts of proposals slip out, Linda feels as though she is five years old. She feels as though she is asking her father for a pony or a panda bear. She knows that she is being obstinate, and that Julian will try to sooth her and talk down to her as though she is a foreigner, or a disabled person. She tries to go backwards and take back her words. “Cancel that thought,” she says. “Just pretend I didn’t say anything about redirecting the mail. I am actually sleep-talking.”
“Oh, come now. You know that is untenable. We need to redirect. Other – wise – how – will – we – receive – all – our – bills – and – corres – pondence?”
“You don’t need to break your syllables up, Julian. I am not three years old.”
“We came here together,” says Julian. He hugs Linda tightly. It is his form of explanation and apology. It makes Linda feel worse. She is not him. They did not come together. She came by herself. She doesn’t need Julian to operate. She doesn’t want to merge with him in the way that he wants her to merge with him.
“Okay,” says Julian, “I’m tired. Just tell me, what do you want to do? Do you want to go back? To move back to the old place?”
“No,” says Julia. “The old place had blue-tac stains on the walls. Don’t you remember that?”
“I was the one that told you that this morning.”
“Well, it doesn’t matter. I don’t want to go back there.”
“What do you want, then? Is this about the metaphysical lion, my precious antelope?” He keeps on saying this, thinking it is funny. It is not funny.
Linda wants to say, “You don’t understand, you idiot. I don’t want my new life to be a continuation of my old life. I want to have multiple lives. I want infinite lives. I want to have nothing and be nobody. Hold onto nothing. Have no mail and no trinkets and no boxes. Start again every single second. Lose you. Drop you. That would be my plan.”
Linda actually says nothing. She feigns sleep.
On the second day of living in the new maisonette, Linda drives away in Julian’s car without telling him where she is going.
She wants to annul the marriage. She wants to burn down the new maisonette. She wants to move somewhere with a completely foreign postcode, even if the air is smoggy and you have to wear a gas mask and the soil quality is so poor that no plants can grow, even potted plants. She wants just a tiny bit more than nothing. Just enough so that she can hold all her possessions in two hands, no boxes required.
Linda is twenty-one. She has two months left until she graduates from university with a degree in something-or-other. She is actually living a real life. She has ticked so many boxes. Julian could get her pregnant in her sleep and she could have that, too.
Linda turns on the radio and then turns it off, quickly, before anything tunes in. She drives to a national park. She stops the car at the gate and begins to walk. It is autumn and there is a lot of yellow and orange. In spring there are butterflies fluttering, but now there are yellow and orange leaves fluttering instead. There isn’t much difference except that leaves offer a lonelier presence.
Trees are where cardboard comes from, but trees are different from boxes. Trees don’t really hold anything. At least, they don’t hold onto anything. They drop limbs and leaves and fall down arbitrarily.
“I am a sweet little agnostic wanderer,” says Linda. “When you fall down, I will fall down along with you. I will not stand still, though. You will not become boxes under my watch.”
Linda wants to teach herself not to talk. She wants to forget her own name and the little knowledge that she has. She wants to take off her clothes and contact lenses and walk around the park in extremely wide and arbitrary circles. Walk around the park in extremely wide and arbitrary circles.
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