Just an Ordinary Day: The Uncollected Stories of Shirley Jackson by Shirley Jackson Read Free Book Online Page A

the center. Stand out more.” He was still standing helplessly in front of the easel, watching her when she walked across to stand in front of the picture he called “Mood.” It was a painting of a girl sitting by a window; she was a very pretty girl with long dark hair down her back; she was wearing a white dress and she was staring at the moon. “It looks swell here,” Katie said. “Just fine.” She began to laugh, not turning around. “Were you late for dinner yesterday?” she asked.
    “Not very.”
    “Was she sore?”
    “Katie,” he said desperately, “for God’s sake, stop walking around and come talk to me.” His voice trailed off weakly. “I don’t know what to do,” he said.
    “Poor old Peter,” Katie said. She came over and took his arm, leading him to the bench. “Poor old Peter,” she said again. “She gives you a hell of a time.”
    He put his head in his hands, saying shakily, “Sometimes I think I can’t stand it much longer. What am I going to do?”
    “Don’t get all upset,” Katie said. Impatient again, she got up and reached into the pocket of her shorts for a cigarette. Lighting it, she walked over to the easel and said to the picture, “Don’t pay any attention to her.”
    “I think if she doesn’t leave me alone—” he said.
    Katie moved closer to the picture, frowning. “Why is this part blue?” she asked. “You told us in class…”
    He lifted his head. “I wanted to see how it would look there. It’s a sort of departure to give a greater effect.” He sighed. “I suppose it looks awful.”
    “It’ll do,” Katie said. She moved restlessly away from the picture and along the nearest wall, seeing without interest the familiar pictures one after another, still lifes of vases and books and violins and china cats, portraits of his children, an occasional abstract in vicious reds and yellows, a landscape with a rusty barn, a picture of a beautiful girl with dark hair knee-deep in a moonlit pool, another of a beautiful girl with dark hair gathering roses by moonlight. “I passed her on campus this morning and she wouldn’t speak to me,” Katie said.
    He was frowning, staring at an imaginary picture. “It needs something there,” he said. “Blue seemed like the thing.”
    “I wanted to walk right up to her and slap her face,” Katie said. “What a worn-out old hag.”
    “Don’t talk like that,” he said.
    “Excuse me,” Katie said formally. “I forgot she was your wife. What a well-preserved old hag.” She laughed, and he smiled reluctantly. “Cheer up,” she went on, “don’t let her make you miserable.” Her tour of the room brought her back to the easel, and she said, “It’s a swell picture, honestly.”
    “I made it as good as I could for you,” he said. “I only wish I weren’t a third-rate artist.” He waited for a minute. “If I could make it better, I would,” he said.
    Katie dropped her cigarette on the floor and put her shoe on it. “I don’t want to make her mad, though,” she said. “She could get me thrown out of college if she got mad enough.”
    “She’s waiting for you to graduate.” He stood up wearily and went over to the easel, looking at the picture while he felt out for the brushes and palette beside it. “She says that after a few weeks I’ll never see you again.”
    “She better not make any kind of a fuss,” Katie said.
    He began to paint cautiously. “I’ve let her go on thinking that I won’t see you again.”
    “I certainly wish you could come out to the beach,” Katie said.
    “I don’t know.” He pursed up his lips doubtfully. “She may go away somewhere with the children.”
    Katie said quickly, “But of course there’s my family and all my friends. Maybe I could meet you in New York or someplace.”
    “New York would be easy,” he said, turning around to her. “I told you I could manage New York.”
    “I’ll see how things come out,” Katie said. Going to the window near the door,