THE MUMMY
“Have you ever felt like you need more sleep?”
“Only all of my life” she replied to the TV and the sound of her voice made her jump away from the open fridge. She knew the TV was on but still turned her head like Banjo does at sounds of neighborhood dogs. There was laughing in the yard, the kids playing frisbee with Brian while she was supposed to make lunch. Banjo looked up at her, torn between alert and his constant search for fleas.
She wondered if slamming the door hard enough would trap her exhaustion inside the appliance. Her secret would become lethargic from the cold and settle in the butter like a dozing fly. If she never opened the door again, the words might stay there forever. She could keep how tired she was of everything in her life from those who needed her - her husband, the children, her mother.
Her mother would call and tell her she had “issues”, a word she’d learned from daytime TV and now waved like an angry banner every time they talked on the phone. She would stand listening in front of the open refrigerator door, feeling the cold creep up her legs while staring at the rows of jars on the shelf. Her mother had become the William Hearst of Issues, a tycoon of her new domain and she felt like Patty, foiled in her attempt to escape her life. After her mother finished, she’d leave their conversation inside the fridge next to the Juice Boxes and go recover in their bedroom.
When she was a teenager, she went to an exhibit of traveling Egyptian artifacts with her class. She always liked Egyptian things, especially the clay jars holding make-up which she pictured lining a Tomb like the rows of perfume on her dresser. While her mother was at work, she’d stand in her bedroom and lift them one by one, a Royal Princess choosing which dark kohl would line her eyes. She turned up the radio when the song “Walk Like An Egyptian” came on and bent her arms like swan necks . The secret to walking like an Egyptian she decided was not bending your legs. She was technically a drawing of an Egyptian and her goal was to be two things at once, one that moved and one that didn’t. Like an eager magician’s assistant, she would dance alone and demonstrate the illusion.
At the museum, she lingered behind. Since she wasn’t really friends with anyone, noone seemed to mind and their voices were like distant coins hitting water at the bottom of a well. She slowly cruised along the cases, deliberately trailing her finger on the glass and leaving a pale smudge. Here was a pot of rouge. This was used for the eyes. This was a statue of a cat. When she reached the end, she’d point through the air like a guided missile until she’d land on the next one and continue her inventory. Milky green. Milky blue.
All the cases led to The Mummy which is what she wanted to see most of all. It was in a sarcophagus whose lid had been left ajar and she saw the ratty shoulders and head lying in the box. It looked dirty and she imagined bringing it home, her mother complaining about the mess. “You got Mummy all over the carpet.”
She walked behind the case, between the wall and the glass, the tight space like forts she built in her room when she was younger by throwing sheets over chairs and making a nest to protect herself. She bent close to the Mummy face, looking for a sign of who was inside the wrapping. “Who’s there?”, she thought, “How do you walk?”.
Through the glass she saw the other students disappear around a corner. Now she was standing alone next to the mute figure, like a bedside nurse with a coma patient. “I’m afraid, Mr. Tut, your family member has died. We aren’t able to bend the legs at all.” There would be a huge funeral crowded with mourners. A tomb would be built of chairs and sheets and she would lie inside, her perfume bottles lining the nearby shelf.
She sat on the museum floor behind the case and then laid down on the marble. It was cold like fish skin on the back of her legs and she straightened her limbs. She looked up to the ceiling and pictured the lid sliding shut, blocking the voices of the other girls gossiping down the museum hall. She folded her arms across her chest like a monarch and closed her eyes, adjusting her breathing like a radio to the stillness.
She didn’t know how long she’d been sleeping. She awoke and there was a guard standing over her, asking if she was all right. She quickly pulled down her top which had risen to reveal her soft stomach and apologized before fleeing. Her arms had fallen asleep and were useless, flinging themselves stiffly around her body as she tried to find the others.
She still dreamed of The Mummy, late at night after the kids were asleep. She’d lay on their bed in the dark, arranging herself like a corpse and crossing her arms over her breasts. Banjo would watch from the floor, a silent mourner. The sounds of the night wrapped themselves around her body like cotton strips, encasing her before she’d gratefully close her eyes.
She would love some Mummy Sleep right now while everyone was outside. She wanted to close the curtains before lining her eyes and placing herself on the bed. Banjo might howl and her family would run in to find her immortalized, a secret enclosed in ragged cloth. While they watched, she would close the lid to keep out the noise and keep them from disturbing her . She felt the sheets, cold like marble, against her neck and she was no longer forced to rule. She could sleep and dream and, if she desired, rise to open one of the jars lining her private place of rest.
They were coming inside now and hungry. She heard the refrigerator door slam and Brian handing out Juice Boxes. Soon they would want her to give them food, rouse her from her muffled box to provide for all who asked. Banjo was waiting to follow and when she finally stood, she put on her flip-flops and walked stiffly down the hall, the dog licking the ground after each step she took.
1:30:12 PM  sro home /
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Monday, January 20, 2003
