Happiness Lies at Home

Short fiction

Happiness Lies at Home

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Oes 12-18-2007, 10:24 PM
Let me preface this by saying that I have never written much of anything in the way of fiction before. This is the start of something new for me and I imagine I have plenty to learn. So please, give me some advice.


Jason Davis
jason@screenink.com
Lincoln, NE


Greg’s plane had landed according to schedule: 7pm central time in Omaha, Nebraska on that Thursday, August 27th, 1984. Greg’s mother had just passed and an old family friend by the name of Miklos, Miklos Zaycek, was meeting him at the airport to drive him back to his mother’s home. She still lived in Walton, in the home he grew up in, the home he left behind some four years ago, the only home he knew. Miklos owned a quaint little bike shop in Walton. He wasn’t the brightest of men but he knew his way around a bicycle pretty well and thus decided to make a living out of it. He and Greg’s mother, who’s real name was Bozena but she had long since come to prefer a simple Edna, both had come to the states from Czechoslovakia at around the same time. They were not only escaping the Communist overtake of their homeland; but also chasing their dreams. They ended up becoming lovers for a brief period until and eventually life long friends. Greg never knew his biological father and so to him, Miklos was a much-needed replacement at times. When Greg was young, he had always imagined his father being a big, strong and courageous firefighter or perhaps an overly passionate police detective, solving murders and saving lives.

“All in a days work.” His father would have told him as he tucked him into bed.

His mother would never deny him these possibilities because she simply didn’t want him to know the truth. His real father was, in fact, a well-kept secret. One that she damned near took to the grave. Edna had difficulties with intimacy all her life, something she passed along to her only child, which is why she died alone.

Edna had always been a bright, strong and independent woman, a loving mother. She had worked several dead end jobs in the capital city while attempting to further her education and also raise her son before she finally completed her M.A. at the University of Nebraska Kearney and landed a position tutoring, then teaching at the University’s Slavic Studies Department. When Greg finished college she had sensed her son’s true aspirations of becoming a successful architect and designer. She had pushed for him to follow those dreams.

My health problems are being blown way out of proportion by these American doctors,” she had told him, I’m not going anywhere soon,” she would always say.

Now she was gone, dead at age 63. Greg’s mother had been battling cancer off and on for just over 3 years and instead of giving up his career pursuits after graduating from the University of Nebraska Lincoln, Greg had put Miklos in charge of hiring a caretaker for Edna, someone who would take to her needs. He knew no matter how his mother tried to convince him, she wasn’t going to last too much longer. Putting his mother’s care in the hands of someone else allowed Greg the ability to chase his only promising job lead, working for Burkholder & Associates in Manhattan, New York as an in house architectural draftsman, without the thought of leaving his mother alone eating at his conscience. Miklos found a young Czech girl by the name of Jana, the daughter of his friend back home, for the job.


After only two years of precisely measured lines and consistent rotation of finely sharpened pencils on floor plans Greg had solidified a position on their team of designers selected to move on to train for more creative endeavors with the firm. There was computer software still fresh on the market, and the firm wanted to get a jump on the potential change in technology.

Greg had been allowed one week of paid personal leave to go home and take care of his family’s estate and, in his boss’s words, bury his mother. To some, this sort of talk would strike a chord; but for Greg it was no more an issue than throwing away his mother’s semi-annual catch up letters. Greg loved his mother, that was not to be doubted, but there was some definite resentment of the fact that she never spoke of his father. Edna was, after all, the only one around to blame for his absence. Besides, Greg had already dealt with the idea that she would be dying years ago when he had left for New York; it was just easier for him that way. And when it came to emotionally heavy decisions, he liked taking the easy route.

“Greg, over here!” Miklos let out a heavy holler through the gaping smile stretched across his face.

“Miklos, come here old man. It’s been too long!” They embraced as if forcing through each other. Miklos never had any kids of his own. Some two years after Miklos and Edna settled in Nebraska, she up and moved away to Kearney, Nebraska leaving no forwarding address for him. She had just vanished from the town of Walton in the most mysterious of manners. It wasn’t until some four years later that Edna had returned, with child and no spouse. Miklos had by then met an American girl by the name of Karla who, as it turned out, wasn’t able to bear children. This hit him pretty hard. Miklos had taken a real liking to Greg the first time he watched him peddle his cherry red Schwinn Typhoon off down the rural road from his bike shop. Greg had saved up money from delivering the Lincoln papers every Sunday morning in order to buy it. A smart investment, Miklos had told him. A kid has to start somewhere and that bike allowed him to deliver papers a heck of a lot faster.

“You came alone, I see.” Miklos poked.

“Yeah, I’ve got no time for women. I haven’t the slightest need for one to tell you the truth. Doin’ just fine on my own.” Greg had noticed his ill humor was not so well received.

“You just wait boy, there’ll come a time.”

“Not so sure about that one Miklos, but I’ll take your word for it.”

“Anyhow, I meant to tell you over the phone, I’m real sorry about your mother, Greg, she was a special woman.”

“I know, I know. How about we get back to the house and I can fix us up something to eat.”

“Hell, we can have Jana take care of that Greg, she’s a pretty good cook. Your mother made Jana learn all of her old Czech recipes and, well, you know Jana’s Czech herself so she wasn’t one for complaining. Those two got pretty damn close these last couple of years.” Miklos’s eyes swelled up and Greg attempted to sway the mood a bit.

“Well we can call her over then, I suppose I should thank her for all the work she’s done. You know I haven’t met the woman, is she around my age or--?”

“She’s probably a little younger than you Greg. She’s been livin’ at your mother’s house you know.” His eyes widened and his head bobbed in a matter of fact sort of delivery.

“Is that so?”

“Oh yeah, your mother insisted on it. I’m telling you Greg; those two had gotten to the point where they wouldn’t even speak English anymore, just Czech. Boy they had a heck of a lot of fun together, I tell you what,” Miklos explained.

“I bet they did.” Greg’s voice had a slight tinge of jealousy. He was an only child, and sometimes those types tend to get fairly protective of their parents.

Greg hopped in Miklos’s rusted old brown ’68 Chevy pickup and they talked all the way back to Walton. They spoke loudly in order to allow each other to hear over the noise of the wind pushing through the cracked and flaky seals on the passenger side window. Miklos talked of the bike shop, the old Typhoon and how he had passed it on to another boy in town. He was a paperboy just like Greg, he told him. Greg tried his best to explain the concept of modern computers and the programs he was learning in Manhattan. Greg had a lot of questions about Jana and Miklos did his best to fill him in on the details. How she wasn’t much of an English speaker. How she kept to herself and fell in love with the countryside and his mother’s estate. How she and Edna went and tied themselves off at the hip. How she was the daughter of an old friend back home and he had her fly to the States just for the position because her father wrote him talking of how much she adored the American lifestyle. Something Miklos found to be quite funny being that she was here now and had, until these recent and unfortunate events, chosen to keep herself cooped up with an old Czech woman as if she had never left the homeland.

When they pulled up to the entryway of his mother’s estate, Greg immediately traveled back in time to his paper route, to mowing the yard on Saturdays and to painting the old shed every other year just so Edna could use it as her descriptive marker for newcomers to the house. Greg would have to paint it a putrid blue green color. A color that had no place on the wobbly old shack of a shed, resting all lopsided some forty feet from the house. He never asked questions though; questioning his mother was a moot point. His mother always knew best, always. Everything had its place and everything had its reason. The firewood stacks behind the garage, the lawnmower goes in the shed, after it’s washed clean of course. Plastic bags were placed over the tomato plants before the first winter freeze and the bushes are pruned before they could get a jump on things from spring’s rain. The windows were sealed up towards the end of fall too and they had to be blow dried to tighten up the plastic otherwise Edna couldn’t see through them. It was all coming back to him; it all took place at the end of the long, winding gravel road leading him back home.

“You know your mother bought this house from a farmer?” Miklos asked.

“Yeah, I know. She never did any real farming though did she, more like tended to an oversized garden I’d say,” Greg chuckled, “I remember how she used to make me take the extra tomatoes and cucumbers on my route and give them out to all the neighbors and people in town.”

“Oh yeah, Karla and I never had a shortage of vegetables at the house, not while your ma was still tending to that garden of hers.” Miklos’ face was cherried as he shook his head. His mouth wanted to spread wide but he fought it back in an attempt to disguise his admiration for Edna.

“Here we are, home sweet home.” Miklos spouted and jumped out of the truck.

Jana had been in the yard hanging some of Edna’s clothes out to dry. It was as if Edna was just inside the screen door, reading her morning paper in her favorite old armchair. Sipping her coffee and patiently waiting for them to arrive, waiting for her boy to come home. Greg stayed in the truck. He thought, and he stared. Stared at the white strips of rail along the porch, counting the layers of paint in his head that he must have put on the old porch over the years. Examining each window on the house to make sure she wasn’t just waiting inside, hoping that it was all just an elaborate hoax to get him back home to visit. He just waited there, watching. Edna didn’t surface; she wasn’t home.

“Get inside boy, it’s time for supper! You can finish the chores after we eat, don’t want the soup to get cold,” Edna commanded.

“Alright ma, I’ll wash up.”

Greg remembered watching her oversee him from the porch with a vacant stare as he came running towards the house for dinner. He lost her for a moment there and could sense that she was keeping something from him. Perhaps it was the cancer, he thought, or perhaps it had something to do with his father.

“Let him be Jana” Miklos’s distant voice broke Greg’s spell. “Let’s go on inside and fix him up some bedding,” Miklos told Jana under his breath, grabbing her shoulder and pulling her in as they walked towards the house together.

“I already did that Miklos. I already did that in his room.” When Jana spoke she had the softest tone, like an angel. Miklos and Jana went into the house leaving Greg some time to himself.


The next thing Greg remembered was waking up to Jana’s gentle gaze, her soft face upside down, lying on the truck seat next to his, her cheek pushed upwards forcing her one eye to close up a bit. Her lean body twisted and bent in an awkward manner, sort of emulating or perhaps, he thought, mocking his own uncomfortable position.

“Why you still in the car?” she asked.

“It’s a truck, technically. I just wasn’t ready to go inside yet, I guess.”

“You can come in now, Gregory, I will take you.” Her voice brushed onto his nose and rolled across his cheek and then slipped into his ear. His eyes closed up slowly as he absorbed her tone.

“My mom calls me Gregory.” Greg explains delicately, briefly forgetting why he is home.

“Your mom will always call you that, you know. She will always be around too, you know.” For some reason Jana always seemed to repeat the last few words of her sentences, something that normally could be considered awkward or annoying but Greg found it to be completely endearing and irresistible.

Jana went around the pickup and let open the door with a slow creek. She coaxed Greg out and grabbed his arm, slinging it over her shoulder and grasping his hip as if having to walk him to the house herself. Her attention towards him and her lack of awareness for personal space was utterly confusing to him but Greg didn’t resist her. His hand squeezed her shoulder tightly as he crept to his feet and her hand responded, squeezing his opposite hip. They remained embraced as they walked towards the house. Just before reaching the front stoop, he looked down to her and stopped walking. She turned to him and her eyes sank deep into his, almost beaming straight through him. He lost himself in the glazed green haze of her eyes. He realized his vulnerability but still wanted to kiss her, to hold her, this complete stranger. She held such beauty in her delicate cheekbones and soft eyes, her long light brown hair so soft and gentle, breaking across her nose and mouth in the breeze. He closed his eyes and broke their gaze, realizing how ridiculous and awkward it might have been if he had acted on her vulnerable innocence. Glancing over her shoulder, he noticed some of his old track t-shirts from high school hanging out to dry on the line.

“Are those my—those are my track shirts?” He said, perplexed.

“Yes. I wear them now. Bozena told me to wear them now you are gone.” Jana stumbled on her words and became slightly defensive, like a child she backed up a step and lost herself briefly.

“Bozena? Miklos used to call her that when I was young,” Greg smiled, “It’s alright, you can wear them Jana, I don’t mind at all.”

“Y-e-a-n-a,” She sounded out, her tongue slapping her lower palette as she released the “n”, “My real name is Yeana.”

“Right, is Jana your American name then?”

“Yes, it is my American name.”

“Get on in here you two, let’s eat something before it gets late!” Miklos shouted from inside the screen door.

“Come Gregory, we have an important day tomorrow, you need sleep well and I make you a big breakfast tomorrow, OK?”

“That sounds good. Thank you, Jana, for everything.”

“No, Gregory, thank you. I am very much glad you are home.”


Edna was put in the ground wearing her favorite lavender and cream flowered dress along with her mother’s lavender pearls. Most of the town showed for the service and they placed tomatoes, vegetables, and carrots next to her tombstone. It was, after all, about the only thing they knew of her besides her teachings at the University. There was no family but of all the guests Greg noticed that Miklos was having the hardest time. Greg approached him stone faced and eager to raise his spirits.

“Hey old man, it’s all right. She’s in a better place now.” Greg’s attempt surfaced as weak and relatively void of emotion. Miklos collected himself, pulled a handkerchief from his pocket and wiped his tears.

“I know boy, I know.” Miklos’s words were brief and non confrontational. He simply seemed to be avoiding something. “I’m gonna head back to the house and help Jana pack her things so you can have some time in the house alone.”

“What? No. I—where is she going to go?” His tone tinged of desperation.

“Greg? Do I sense a tone of desperation in your voice?” Miklos teased. “You falling for my old friends daughter?”

“I—I don’t know what I’m doing Miklos. I just—I think she’s special. The way she cared for my mother and cares for the house. I don’t want her to leave.” Greg’s voice petered off as he awkwardly forced out his last words.

“Listen, Greg. Why don’t you phone your boss, take some time off? You need it. Spend some time here, with Karla and I, with Jana, at home.”

“That’s probably not a bad idea Red but falling too far behind in my current line of training could cost me my job.”

“A job’s a job Greg, Job’s are everywhere. Hell, you think I intended on fixing bicycles my whole damned life? Tell you what, you do what you feel is right in your heart. You know I ain’t got too many years left myself and I wouldn’t mind seeing a certain somebody take over my shop for me.” Miklos’s face blushed a bit as he looked to the ground and kicked at the grass.

“I appreciate that Miklos. I really do.”

“Oh, before I forget, your mother wanted me to give you somethin’. You can read it now; you can read it back in Manhattan. Hell, you can just throw it out if it pleases you but it’s something your mother thought you should probably have. Whatever it is, it must have been special to her.” Miklos pulled out a sealed manila envelope and pushed it onto Greg’s chest as he patted his shoulder.

“I’ll see you back at the house.”

Greg stuck around the cemetery until everyone had left; he found a bench near his mother’s grounds and opened up the envelope. Its contents were minimal but packed a solid blow. He read the letter first, immediately noticing his mother’s handwriting. She wrote briefly of how proud she was of him. She mentioned Jana and how fond she had grown of Greg even though they had never met. The boy who was, after all, the only boy she knew in the states. How Jana would openly and honestly confess to Edna how attracted to Greg she was and how silly she had felt about it. How she felt she already knew him because Edna had talked about him so often. Then she mentioned Miklos, how close she was to him so long ago. How they needed each other at first but then she pushed him away and left. Then returned years later demanding to be just friends and never to discuss their relationship as to avoid hurting his wife Karla. The letter closed with a single demand, to view the rest of the contents and do with them what he will.

Inside the manila envelope Greg pulled out an old black and white photograph of a young couple holding hands at a farmers market. The girl carried a demanding beauty and the boy looked so happy to be with her. On the back it read “Boz and Mik, June of ‘59", then in fresh ink it read “your father”. He collapsed on the grass by his mother’s tombstone and just lay there, staring at the sky, numb.

Greg took Miklos’s truck back to the house. He pulled in off the rural road and kept it in first gear all along the gravel path to the house, he remembered crashing the Typhoon coming home from delivering papers one Sunday and how skinned up his elbows and knees had gotten. How upset his mother was at him and how confused the whole situation made him, realizing now that she simply couldn’t put her love for him aside, not even for a simple accident. How she was upset because she couldn’t handle seeing him hurt. Greg tried to fight back his tears as his abdomen clenched, again, then again and finally his emotion exploded in a gush of tears. Twenty some years of repression belted out a fierce cry and the sound didn’t come from his stomach or from his lungs; it screamed from his chest, from his heart. As he wiped his eyes and tingling moisture from his chin he parked the truck in front of his home. He glanced at the clothing on the line, drifting in the slight fall breeze, at the dwindled stack of firewood next to the garage, over at the blue-green shed and at tomatoes and cucumber plants, then up at the house. He scanned the windows and dried his eyes again, searching for tightly stretched plastic, potential streaks that may not have been blown clear. For cracks in the paint, which may need a fresh new coat before winter. Then she surfaced, Jana, standing in the living room window, patiently waiting for his return. His heart sunk deep in his chest; he exhaled completely and closed his eyes, then collapsed onto the truck seat. Waiting, for her.