The Jensens
Emily Ward
Smashwords Edition
Copyright 2010 Emily Ward
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Mrs. Gellar is now yelling. I watch from my position by the table of books. It’s the first time I’ve ever seen her without her hair curled. She waves her arms, and her face grows red. The others in the yard are trying to politely ignore the scene, but we are all listening.
“You have no respect for the dead!” Mrs. Gellar yells. “You have no respect for your wife, Jensen, and it sickens me!”
Mr. Jensen sits in his lawn chair, his lip curled up at his neighbor. “Oh, you old hag, my wife?” he asks, raising his voice. “Get outta here!”
Mrs. Gellar shakes her head and stomps away in her pink slippers. She shoots Mr. Jensen one last glare before returns to her house, but he’s already asking a curly-haired woman if she liked the collection of teapots.
Once the excitement is over, the people in the yard continue their search for bargains. I examine the jewelry, but my mind is elsewhere. All I can think about is the show on the Travel Channel I watched yesterday. I keep turning over in my head the chances I had to travel: a mission trip in senior year of high school, spring break during freshman year of college, a trip with the church choir. How had I let so many things get in my way? I’ve been here in Arizona for twenty-seven long years.
I turn to eye the books on the next table - To Kill A Mockingbird, old Nancy Drew editions, Danielle Steele novels. I pick up a book called 1,000 Places To See Before You Die. I’ve heard of it before, but never seen it on sale for only a dollar. The book is well-used, the binding broken. I flip through the pages, but my eyes catch markings.
I stop on page 251 - La Sagrada Familia in Barcelona, Catalonia, Spain. The title is highlighted, and there is a date written next to it: 08/86. I look through more pages - nearly all of the Spain destinations are also highlighted and dated, ranging from 04/84 - 06/06. I glance over at Mr. Jensen. He’s out of his lawn chair and showing a middle-aged couple how to work a typewriter. A cigarette is hanging from his mouth, and his nearly bald head is shiny with sweat.
I return to the book and find dozens more entries marked. The pages contained some handwritten notes. The maps are marked with red. I close the book and walk over to Mr. Jensen. He’s tucking money into his pocket and waving at a couple as they walk off with the typewriter.
“Mr. Jensen,” I say.
“Ah, Julia.” Mr. Jensen takes a handkerchief out of his khaki shorts and wipes his forehead. The sun is unforgiving today. “Good to see you. I haven’t been at the diner since before the funeral.”
“I know, we’ve missed you.”
Mr. Jensen waves his hand, taking a drag of his cigarette. “It’s my wife you miss.”
I smile. “I heard Mrs. Gellar shouting.”
“Dammit, the whole neighborhood did!” Mr. Jensen sits back down in his lawn chair. “Nosy old woman.”
I can’t help but laugh. Mrs. Gellar is at least ten years younger than him, but I just shake my head. I move the book from one hand to the other. “So, you’re okay with selling Elaine’s things?”
“Of course I am,” Mr. Jensen says gruffly. “I kept what I wanted.”
“I found this,” I say, my voice quiet. I hold the book out for him. “I thought you might want to keep it. . .”
Mr. Jensen takes the book with a blank look on his face. He looks through it quickly, then lets out a bark-like laugh. “You think this is something!” He stands up. “Wait here.”
After a few minutes, he comes out of the house with a box about a foot long and half as wide. It’s dark brown and painted with white flowers. He pushes some VHS tapes over, clearing a spot on a nearby table. He sets the box down and grins at me, somehow keeping the cigarette in his mouth.
Inside, I see a shoebox and various loose papers. Mr. Jensen out an old and dusty notebook and hands it to me. I gingerly open it, scanning over the yellowing paper and fading ink. The front page says, ‘My Travel Journal.’ The date is February 20th, 1995, but the next entry talks about her first trip out of the country in 1940. Elaine Jensen traveled to Hawaii, which, back then, was out of the country. Her writing resembles my grandmother’s: detailed and controlled cursive. The letters loop, and I can almost imagine her hand moving across the paper as she remembered her nursing days in World War II. I actually think of the movie Pearl Harbor, and imagine Mr. Jensen as a tall, dashing Ben Affleck.
Mr. Jensen sets the shoebox on the table, his eyes gleaming. His cigarette butt is now in the dry grass. Inside the shoebox are pictures - black and white, colored, polaroids, digital prints, and more. I put the notebook back inside of the box, the photographer inside of me fascinated. I begin looking through the pictures, and Mrs. Jensen’s face smiles up at me. I smile back at her.
I can’t believe it’s been three weeks since she passed. She and her husband were customers at the diner for nearly fifteen years. I remember them from working there for dad in high school. They seemed like an unassuming couple, but as I gaze at the pictures, I see there’s more to them than I thought.
Mrs. Jensen is young again, her body a different shape. Her hair is long and dark. She’s standing in front of a palm tree. Next, she’s in front of a pyramid. I find a photo in which she has a baby on her hip and a monk at her side.
Immersed in the photographs, I don’t even notice that Mr. Jensen has left until he comes back to stand at my side. I smile at him. “I can’t believe you’ve been so many places.”
“Why not?” Mr. Jensen asks, winking at me.
I laugh. “You’ve been coming into the diner for years now,” I say. “I don’t know what’s so fascinating about that place when you could be. . .anywhere. . .”
“We’re old, tired of traveling. . .we had gray hair before you were born.”
I smile and roll my eyes. After a pause, I look at Mr. Jensen. “When was the last time you left the country?”
Mr. Jensen shrugs and eases himself into his lawn chair. “Been a while.” He looks down the road, squinting his eyes. “What about you?”
“I’ve never been out of the country,” I tell him with a frown. “Maybe someday.”
“Today,” Mr. Jensen says firmly. “It’s all we got.”
I look back at the photographs, thinking back to the clear beaches of Indonesia on the television yesterday.
“I’m going tomorrow,” Mr. Jensen says. “Going to Canada. It’s not anything like we used to do, but I figure it’s about time to see mountains.”
“What, you getting tired of the desert?” I ask, grinning.
Mr. Jensen laughs. He waits for a moment before responding. “Now that I don’t have anyone to keep me company, I am. . .you gonna buy that book?”
I nod, smiling. “Maybe it’ll help me decide where to go.”
“See, you understand,” Mr. Jensen says. He waves his hand toward Mrs. Gellar’s house in disdain. “I’m not going to keep Elaine all to myself. All this stuff, it belonged to Elaine at one point, but now she’s dead. What am I going to do with it? Better to share her with everyone else.”
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About The Author:
Emily Ward is an author living in Salem, Oregon with her husband Chris and their two cats. She loves traveling, and has visited seven countries outside of the U.S. Along with writing, she loves to read and cook. She's been published in Literary House Review and Pond Ripples Magazine.
Blog: http://wordsofeward.blogspot.com
Website: http://emilyannward.com
Twitter: http://twitter.com/therealemilyw
Smashwords: http://www.smashwords.com/profile/view/emilyward