Ann Margaret Lim

Let's have the room: an average room for an average mid-life, average-income couple. First, we'll have the bed, nothing outstanding, but big enough. Big enough for the wife, her husband and his belly; his belly and her pregnancies. Big enough, too, to sometimes host two small people along with wife, husband, and husband's belly. Then let's have the woman's favourite thing in the room, the imitation Victorian plush red Vicksburg chair, with its Beachwood crest and arms intricately carved in rose and leaf design, mahogany finished. And let's also have the plasma TV, the husband's pride, now on, on ESPN, at three in the morning. The woman - Roxy Brown - sits up in the bed, reaches for the remote and switches off the TV. But she doesn't go back to sleep; the Vicksburg chair now becomes the recipient of her fretful stare.

Roxy's been married to Malcolm Brown, the snoring man beside her, for 20 years. When they met, he was an ambitious teenager who couldn't bother with college, but joined the police force, confident that his intelligence and athleticism would fast-track his career. (He was right; in no time, it seemed, he was sergeant). But Malcolm thought he'd been superintendent for too long now.

If this were two weeks back, Roxy would've been in a deep sleep, dreaming about Julie, their daughter, the first one who'd gone overseas, in her freshman year at college; or of some chivalrous and buffed younger man. But tonight, when perhaps only owls spot her round-eyed stare, Roxy's up, thinking of how to tell her husband that she almost cheated on him, years ago - not long after their second one, the boy, was born.

That Saturday, on themasseur's slab, she'd disrobed completely for the man kneading her shoulders, back, thighs, libido.

'I'm sorry, Miss, but I don't do that. I'm a professional masseur; please put it back on.'

She didn't hear anything after 'I don't do that'. Thoughts clouded her brain as wasps, and they stung. I'll never be desired by anyone again. He doesn't even see me. I'm just a mother, an udder, a fat cow. He does it with other women and thinks I don't know. And now? Now I'm only good for missionary and babies.

Roxy followed her younger self as she sprang from the slab and bolted flat-footed to the changing room with the towel clutched around her, too beaten to cry.

If this were two weeks back, she wouldn't have been so harassed by this memory. Fact is, her usual response to this reappearing piece of her past was: 'Ah hell, you win some, you lose some.'

Like many people, Roxy's church attendance was sporadic: Easter, Christmas, christenings, weddings, funerals, and the one or two 'special invitations'. And, before last week, she had considered Christians fanatics. But last week, something happened.

'There's a woman here today dissatisfied with her life. I am here to tell her, Jeeesus is her satisfaction! Jeeesus will be your husband! Are you ready to be truly married, to be loved as you should be loved, to be washed in His blood?'

Roxy knew the preacher was speaking to her. 'Come to the rose of Sharon! Give your life to Him. Say with me, Lord, I have sinned ...'

And now, just before dawn, guilty in bed, with her confession on her tongue, Roxy nudges her husband. 'Malcolm, wake up. I have to tell you something.'

'What time now?' Her husband's glaring, red eyes seemed to say.

'Is four o'clock, but ah have to tell you ... I was naked in front of him,' she quivered.

'Him who?' Malcolm still glared.

Her voice squeaked and cracked. 'After I had Damian, I went to Jencare. I was feeling so bad ... you didn't touch me ...'

Malcolm didn't need to hear the rest, and though Roxy tried hard to continue, there was just too much sobbing.

'Nothing happened,' she told him. 'Go to sleep, we'll talk about it later.'

Next evening, Malcolm didn't come home. Roxy was used to that. She had stopped complaining about it since her masseur incident. She also stopped the Jencare visits, using home beautifiers instead, but only hardly. She had stopped buying trendy clothes. She had stopped asking Malcolm if he loved her.

Her husband didn't come home that evening because it was his one-year anniversary with Tanya.

He'd met Tanya on the job; she had been a telephone informant. Tired of Shuffle, her abusive baby-father, and desperate for money, Tanya called Malcolm and pleaded for protection; after all, Shuffle was a murderer. When Malcolm met Tanya and saw her fleshy legs and strong buttocks protruding from her tiny jeans shorts, he was excited.

'Baby, doan worry yuself, nobaddy nah kill you,' he said, eyeing her like breakfast.

They slept together that night in a motel room off the Molynes. They did things Malcolm had never done with Roxy - nor with Joan, Kristine, Carmen, Joy and Pauline, etc., either. They were all younger versions of his wife, not raw like Tanya. He could do anything with Tanya. 'I doan mean this as any disrespect, but I use rubbers if is not ma wife,' Malcolm had told Tanya on their first night.

Tanya was getting used to having Malcolm. Plus, she and the kids had stopped starving and she had more bragging rights in the lane. Her nails were now always done, her hair was always new. She didn't care if Malcolm didn't like the fake hair; it wasn't about him, it was about her. 'Why you doan lef' Mrs. Boring? You can get rid of har easy. You no police? Me can get rid of har fi you.' Tanya woke Malcolm with these words.

He didn't do the first thing that came to his mind. Instead, Malcolm got out of bed, put on his clothes and left, his hands trembling with anger as he drove home. That gal. Thinks she's better than my wife. No one's better than my wife.

'God answers prayers,' Roxy testified to her bible study group.' I prayed for my family. Damian, my son, who's living in sin with his girlfriend, phoned last week, said he's getting married. And my husband, he's acting as he did when we first met.'

'Praise Jesus, sister, you getting more sex. We Christians love it, you know. Is we supposed to have it more than anybody else,' Sister Daisy joked.

It was a Tuesday morning; Roxy woke early to see her husband off. Although he badly wanted to be assistant commissioner, Malcolm's position earned him enough foreign trips for him not to be too disgruntled, though he was impatient. He was going away for two weeks. But something happened at the airport. Policemen he didn't recognise were walking toward him with Paul, whom he knew. He'd seen Paul in Tanya's lane, hailed him, but had never had a conversation with him.

'Is him dat, Officers! Him pay me $40,000 to kill him wife. But I'se not a murderer,' shouted the string bean, his face slashed on one side from ear to mouth, pointing his gold-ringed, dirt-caked finger in Malcolm's direction.

Roxy said she wouldn't press charges. But that didn't matter. The police had already been called, and conspiracy to murder was a serious charge. It was Roxy's worst experience. Her life was inked in the papers, whispered in the pews, parodied on radio; her work was only humiliation.

Tanya testified that she was Malcolm's lover, and that she knew he'd talked to Paul, but didn't know about their agreement. 'Ah doan waan Malcolm go prison, your honour. Him say him would do anything to be with me, but ah didn't tink him would kill him wife,' she wailed.

Paul gave an elaborate account of their meeting. Residents in the lane even testified that they'd overheard the men in discussion.

Julie was flown down to speak about her father; Damian testified, too, and so did Roxy, whose testimony was published in The Gleaner. Everyone had The Gleaner that day. By that afternoon, her life was on the airwaves.

'Missa P, I tell you, I was dem helper one time an' de man no good! Him have ooman wid har so till. But some time a' di ooman fault, you know, Missa P., dem doan do nottin' in de house, bout dem a career woman. Man fi do certain tings, an' ooman fi do certain tings, you know, Missa P.'

That night, Dear Pastor lauded Roxy for her strong character and encouraged her church to support her. 'That is a righteous woman. Jesus said forgive seven times seven, turn the other cheek. Ah not saying women must be stupid, but we know that is women show the way to righteousness. Faghet Eve an' de apple, faget Jezebel, look at Abraham's wife Sarah. Look at Ruth, look at Rahab!'

Members of the police force also gave character references. But it was more of their investigative collaboration with the defence attorney that freed Malcolm, and locked up Tanya, Paul, and Michael 'Businessman' Burns.

After Malcolm left Tanya, she picked up with Businessman, the deportee area Don. Businessman believed Tanya when she told him that Malcolm had locked up Shuffle because he wanted her, and that he'd forced her into their relationship. Tanya didn't know that Businessman would have done something so elaborate. She thought he would just have killed Malcolm - not frame him. Now the truth was out: she had squealed on Shuffle, and thought Businessman would kill Malcolm for her.

So Businessman told the truth, figuring he wouldn't be locked up for long, since it wasn't conspiracy to murder, or murder. And, with his links, he would get out long before the sentenced time. On the other hand, if he wanted, Tanya could die in the lock-up. Anything could happen to Tanya in the lockup if he wanted it to.

Three months after the hearing, when the Browns were thinking of going into exile - although it would mean virtual poverty, after their expensive court ordeal - Roxy got a phone call.

'Malcolm, wake up.'

Now, at least 40 pounds slimmer, Malcolm did nothing much, but sleep. He barely watched ESPN, and he went nowhere. Hisred eyes didn't even glare when Roxy woke him.

'Malcolm, we can go away, and we don't have to be beggars. Macmillan called, they say they want to publish my story; but it's really ours, Malcolm. I would write ... we would write. It won't be a scandal, we'll write it,' Roxy said to him.

'I've done wrong, Roxy. You don't have to stay,' was Malcolm's only answer.

'With the money, we could get counselling. I need my husband, Malcolm,' Roxy told him.

Now I swear to you that, each dusk for the last six months, the Vicksburg chair keeps vigil as the Browns write their life, rediscovering each other.

- Ann Margaret Lim