Gray

By Dawn Moore Roy

GRAY is a viscerally lush, sometimes playful, and unflinching exploration of loss, divorce, midlife sexuality, and the search for fulfillment, even in the face of death.

Vera Mine has a big problem. An ordinary middle-aged white American woman, Vera is a realist, yet fragile: unable to sugarcoat and always figh

• Language: English
• Publisher: Middlesex Press
• Release date: Jul 27, 2021
• ISBN: 9781737516613

Dawn Moore Roy

Dawn Roy has been a home engineer for most of her life, managing a ménage of various biped and quadruped creatures. Her writing began decades ago with daily (almost) entries into her very personal journals. Along the way she became afflicted by the psychiatric disorder of aspiring to be a writer and after staring at stacks and stacks of annual diaries, her illness developed, leading her to complete a master's degree in creative writing from the University of Edinburgh, where a special professor cured her by saying, "Just write a damn book." So she did, and now feels ready to share it. Roy lives in Cape Elizabeth, Maine, with her husband and their German Shepherd, Otto.

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"Roy is a very talented writer, often wickedly so. [Gray is] an impressive tale, wonderfully plotted and detailed, about a woman starting over. The ending delivers a delightful twist, an upsetting of expectations worthy of a mordant O. Henry."

—Kirkus Reviews (starred review)

Roy’s approach emphasizes observation with original, artfully expounded detail, perceptions and thoughts captured in remarkably clean and composed prose. Lovers of self-investing literary fiction will find much to contemplate.

—Publishers Weekly

The story hinges on Vera, her perspectives, her thoughts—ugliness, pettiness, beauty, intelligence—her journey as a person who ultimately is like the rest of us; trying to figure out what life can be and how to make that vision a reality. Roy’s prose is lyrical and beautiful—some passages are heartbreaking in their truth and honesty. Poetic without being oversaturated with excessive lyricism, the writing is introspective and explorative, while the subtlety and beauty of language transform this book into something more; a study in humanity and the ebbs and flows of human emotions and doubt, and the trappings of memory.

—BookLife Prize Review

GRAY

DAWN MOORE ROY

Boston, Massachusetts

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

Copyright © 2021 by Dawn Moore Roy

Hardcover ISBN 978-1-7375166-0-6

eBook ISBN 978-1-7375166-1-3

Library of Congress Control Number: 2021913969

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or used in any manner without written permission of the copyright owner, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

Book production by The Pub Pros, Inc., www.thepubpros.com

Cover and interior design by Zoe Norvell

Printed and bound in the United States of America.

For Michael

Acknowledgments

I cannot begin to express my thanks to the publishers at the Pub Pros. Through the entire process, my experience with co-founders Celia Blue Johnson and Maria Gagliano has been nothing short of, as Celia would say, lovely. My copyeditor, Beth Blachman, taught me a few new punctuation rules that I will never break again! And a thank you to Zoe Norvell who designed the book cover, jacket, and interior, then wrapped it all up together for us with a most beautiful original design. My photographer, Stacey Maddox, was especially patient with me and actually managed to take some great natural photographs. Niki Papadopoulos for her verification of the Greek colloquialisms. And a very special shout-out to my professors and classmates at the University of Edinburgh, who provided me with the kind of formative feedback that a writer could only dream about. And, of course, a special thanks to my loving family and close friends who have encouraged me to write a story that is playful, but that also weaves in things that matter.

I would be remiss not to include the great author Virginia Woolf, who first made me want to pick up a pen and write.

What a man knows, he must do.

—A. H. Maslow, Motivation and Personality

Chapter 1

Threshold

We don’t have complete emotions about the present, only about the past.

—Virginia Woolf, A Writer’s Diary

No one knew how long it would take. Least of all Vera. It was the cusp of a late summer and the beginning of a colorful New England fall. Her car windows were wide open and without that pesky glare from headlights following her, Vera decided to take her time. She crept along the drift and curl of narrow roads, lined with the mighty branches of century-old trees, and beneath this canopy of floating red and orange leaves, she longed for the trees’ age-old wisdom and stability. Right. That isn’t going to happen, she told herself. Just speed it up. The coolness of a dark breeze hit her in the face hard, and somehow readied her for the coming prickling jolt, the wave of her own salty sweat, and Vera had that familiar rush of a new season coming, a big change about to happen.

She strained to hear the chorus of trilling crickets, and, with surprise, heard the soft talk of an owl. The orchestration, the fluidity of the roads soothed her, delivered her, and she was suddenly standing in the doorway of hospital room 350.

Jesus. Look at him.

Vera had considered a sometimes-effective practice in Buddhism—imagining a situation before it happens. She would have been familiar with, prepared for the pitiable sight of her dying father. Nonetheless, this approach wouldn’t have worked anyway, because the vision of her father’s death—anyone’s death, really—bordered on hopeful fantasy: the departing tucked in bed with stiff white sheets; people circled around the bed dreamily holding hands; the air laced with the sugary breath of merciful angels. Plus, Vera had never been a totally committed Buddhist anyway.

Vera sniffed, and her nostrils caught the sting of disinfectant roaming throughout the air, the tiny particles stumbling over one another to find a way out. Warren sat propped up—the image of an overgrown baby in a highchair flashed by. God, she hated her thoughts sometimes.

His now crumpled frame was held in place (more like tied up) with white cotton straps attached to a lime-green leatherette lounger (easy to wipe down with antiseptic, a nurse might say). Hitting at the chest, a large, curved plastic tray helped to keep him upright. Jesus Christ. Warren. Once a man with presence, her father seemed a complete stranger. A foggy drifter cast away: roped and bobbing on the unpredictability of a colorless sea—tethered between a life and a death.

Pausing, she looked up to the white ceiling. Lost herself in the swirl of infinitesimal blue specks. It was an oddity about her (funny, really), and Max—poor, dear, dead Max—would sometimes comment about it when they were married. I don’t know of anyone else who looks up so much, he’d say adoringly to her when they were alone. He was good at that, being so sweet, so attentive when no one else was around. What are you looking for up there, my love? he’d say, and cock his head, touch her with his soft, flirty eyes. Velvet eyes. Max had velvet eyes.

Vera treated every room in every building like an open sky. Chin up, she’d talk, work, make love even, with one eye on the ceiling above. Keep your chin up, love. Those had been Max’s last words to her. Before he died in the arms of the bimbo girlfriend.

Stubborn thoughts clogged her head, and she forced a look down. Whispered, Dad. But the room’s ceiling called her back, tempted her with its sheltering sky and bawl of screeching seagulls. And so, again, she looked up.

Recalled the stirring memory of an eagle she once saw. And Vera considered birds in general. Either the prolonged gaze up to the sky, followed with impassioned tales of boldness and strength: of mainsails and massive wings, gliding through a vast blue, with the air brackish and briny, so very clean and fresh. Or—a fleeting glance—the mere blink to the side of the road: the sad spotting of a feathered gray carcass, washed up and dirty, so clearly dead. An imagined whiff—to be sped by quickly and purposefully forgotten. There were few tales of a bird’s final journey to death, few recounted sightings of the sick and staggering, from that time between the plume of great glory to the hard fall of a roadside stench.

Drawn in by the sounds of Warren gurgling on phlegm and slow to block her reflex, she looked toward him. Then probed. Yes, it was there. Somehow, this once-grand eagle of a man held on to a small piece of what was.

With care, she examined the ceiling.

Once, on a day sail, she had spotted the sweeping ascent of an albatross while Max was below deck mixing cocktails. Would have been unusual to see such a sizable bird in that part of the Atlantic but she was sure of it. At the time, couldn’t remember if it were a sign of good luck or bad.

Well, if you don’t shoot it with a crossbow and hang it around your neck as a burden, I’m kinda sure it’s all good, Max had said, and handed her a ridiculously strong, straight-up margarita.

Otherwise, of course, it would be regrettable for you for the rest of your life. He downed his drink.

She remembered how he had coolly leaned back against the boat’s gunnel, as though so proud of this literary association, and fixed his eyes on her—fingering the palm-tree stem of his plastic glass. So … it’s doom from a figure of speech plucked out of a poem about old mariners … or the sight of a beautiful bird in flight.

Another?

Well, I’m having one, Max had said, gripping the glossy rungs of the mahogany ladder as he climbed down. He had paused.

There’s always a choice, Vera, he had said. Your choice. And disappeared down into the galley.

Of course, at this point in the relationship, Vera had already stopped listening to any words of wisdom from Max.

Go with the beautiful bird, he had yelled from below deck.

Her father gurgled. Without thinking, she blinked and couldn’t help but focus on the tiny white bubbles gathering on his lower lip. A few had started the descent. Should she wipe his chin? Should. Should. Holy God.

Instead, she stood frozen. Encased within the solid door frame. Overhead, the bulky molding gave her a sense of protection, the wooden sentries on both sides steadied her legs, and she was surprised to find an effortless comfort from the inanimate. Jesus. And where the hell was Sally.

Eyes squinting, she stared through the room’s fluorescent glare to the oversized rectangular window across from her. Searched for anything out there to fix her gaze on. Anything. Nighttime now, too dark to see beyond the glass. The huge window was foggy on the inside and dewy enough to draw on, though. And she had an urge, suddenly, to float across the room, winged like a fairy, pink like a princess, and drag her tiny little finger across the clammy windowpane, carving out a long list of cursive words for her dying father to see and read aloud to her in his strong, soothing voice. Words. How to untangle the swirling new emotions from familiar words.

The best words, the only words she could visualize to scrawl on the steamy hospital window, frightened her. Terrified her. Yet they came to her so easily, so naturally, so very perfectly.

He’ll be a stiff, rotting corpse soon. A grand feast of ghastly cold flesh served up buffet style for an army of hungry maggots—that is, if he isn’t cremated soon enough, burned to a crisp. And me? My silly self, my fragile shell of skin will live on. Without him.

Words once benign, so harmless in the past, now crystalized before her in a jagged new form. The edges were sharp, and they cut into her. The words were too personal. Horrifically real, and now personal.

As she stood silent, eyes locked on the window, thoughts about Professor Brody came to mind. He had talked a lot about the word personal. Vera had recently finished up a six-month-long sociology seminar with the famous Sam Brody titled Self and Society.

Too tall, too thin (running addiction, no doubt), too bald, too excitable and jumpy for her taste, Brody occasionally delivered a shiny penny here and there to his small group (she’d give him that). On occasion, he’d leap to a stand—as if ready to bolt from the room, perhaps considering a short sprint around the block—and, after a lengthy private deliberation, would impart some lasting wisdom or profound question to his little circle of six students (handpicked and all very agreeable and adoring of Professor Brody).

Just take the damn step, Vera said to herself. Walk through the doorway. Walk into the room. But her legs wouldn’t move, they felt detached from her body. As if a separate entity.

Professor Brody’s pocketful of wisdoms had turned into a game of silently guessing which philosopher he happened to be quoting next—or misquoting. It didn’t matter, though, if his personal highs (jogging about in the latest running apparel, or, in seminar, pseudo-reposed in pressed khakis and boat shoes) resulted in self-delusions of champion marathoner or accomplished philosopher; he appeared to be in excellent shape, and the philosophers’ thoughts he stole—they were some of the best.

He’s a friendly fool sort of guy … how could anybody not like a guy like that? Max would have said about him.

Her dad’s head jerked forward. The top of his hospital gown caught a sudden stream of thin drool.

Professor Brody rarely gave any author credit at the end of an adage or quote. And only once, through all the seminars did she, during a brief moment of boredom, reflect on the obscenity of the class tuition cost. But, hey. Such a nice guy. To his credit, he did have a few insightful thoughts, though, and one of them had stuck with her.

"Nosce, people, Brody had boomed. Temet nosce … know thyself … and the only way for you to do this—is to first understand others! We have a newfound worth for the skill … the gift … of seeing how one fits in with other people. We have advanced from solitary hunter-gatherer in a cave … to survival of the fittest in a vast beehive of communication."

At the time, she had glowed within. It was instinctive, entirely characteristic, for her to focus more on others. But then, she never cared much for thinking about herself. Didn’t like the banal reality of who she was.

Ms. Vera Mine of Newton, Massachusetts—born, bred, and still there. At fifty-five years old, she considered herself smack in the middle of middle age (after all, it was the early part of the twenty-first century, and she could potentially live to one hundred). Her past included East Coast private schooling (secondary and college), adjunct work as a psychology instructor at one of the lousy local colleges (never evolving into anything permanent), and a divorce two years ago from Max (after twenty some years of marriage).

Warren’s eyes were closed, and his chest rose and fell with rapid breaths. Right. He’s sleeping now. Having a nice dream. Right.

Like so many, she had been a dreamer—had high aspirations to be somebody: go down in the history books as somehow significant, carry out some remarkable feat for the betterment of all mankind. And she was, just now, beginning to acknowledge this would most likely not happen for her. Or mankind.

She was born to Warren Mine, a decorated American pilot in World War II (medals in the top right drawer of his desk), and an Englishwoman raised in an orphanage, but Vera was never quite sure about the orphanage story. The English part sounded real enough. After her mother divorced Warren and moved out, she left behind pieces of glossy fine bone china, random teacups to stare at, and white doilies to fiddle with. This seemed pretty English.

Her mother was a survivor, not only of the supposed orphanage but of the German Blitz on England, in 1940. Warren verified this. At eight years old, her mother was one of the sole surviving students from the basement of a London elementary school, taken out by the first German aerial bombing. Her mother walked away from the pile of smoldering bricks unscathed, and Warren had bombed the hell out of Berlin two years later. Twenty years after that, Warren met the young beauty over tea while staying in England with distant relatives. They married in 1960 (she eight years younger than he), moved to the States and four months later delivered baby Vera. They divorced when Vera was three, her sister Sally, two.

Warren hacked at the mucus pooling in his throat; the white foam crept down his chin, and she stared at the slow, irregular descent for what seemed an hour. Should she … where’s a facecloth? The ceiling light momentarily caught her eyes. Still, her legs would not move.

Her mummy (signature on a card to Vera when she was four) flew back to Europe, speedily remarried, and divorced again. And Vera was always ashamed of this: her mother was a divorcée twice over. Growing up in the middle-class America of the sixties—in a whirl of thrill, with new hopes and dreams; Dr. King, flower power, miniskirts, afros, and bra-burning;