Nikki’s Mom, also known as Jean, Jean Marlowe. She was Jean Monroe when David knew her in high school. She was about three years older than him, though she graduated with David’s class. It was well known to David and his friends that she was out of school for all of 1963 and the first semester of 1964. This is part of the explanation for her being behind at school. At the time, David heard a rumor that she was failing classes. But his friend Lorraine told him that wasn’t the case. Before too long the gossip was all about one thing—Jean was pregnant, and her family pulled her out of school. There was a great deal of secrecy surrounding her situation. All David knew at the time was that she had a daughter, and her mother and sister were helping her with the baby. He had no idea about the identity of the father until much later. There were any number of guys at school who were suspected at one time or another. He even heard a rumor that the father was Mr. Fawks, Jean’s algebra teacher. This suspicion was brought to the attention of the School Authority Board. After looking into it, they decided there was no truth to the rumor, and they instructed all teachers to make no references to Jean’s situation. Mrs. Lowery instructed them to send any student heard gossiping about it to her office immediately. The school had an official policy prohibiting harassment and slander. These offenses were not on the disciplinary notices. They were handled directly by the school’s counselor, and depending upon the nature of what was said, usually carried a mandatory three-day suspension. Oh, it was also known that Jean’s father, Ray Monroe, a stockbroker with a small regional brokerage firm downtown, had left his family. This left Jean, her sister Patricia and her mother Millie Monroe on their own. Much later, David heard that Ray Monroe was suspected of having stolen funds from the accounts of elderly clients. That’s what he heard, but he couldn’t be sure it was true. Anyway, Jean returned to school in enough time to graduate with David’s class. Then it turned out that she was pregnant again, this time with Karen, and she married a man named Thomas soon after graduation. She was an attractive girl, and was always nice to David. It was at his urging that his friends agreed not to ask her any questions about why she had been out of school, or to discuss it at all for that matter.
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“Jean, wake up; come on, wake up, damn it!”
Thomas Marlowe bent down over Jean, who was lying in the bed. He slapped her face a couple of times.
He had come home from a business trip and found Jean in a bathrobe she had been wearing for the last three days. She was lying in bed with an empty bottle of Tuinal next to her. This was the medication her doctor gave her after she told him about the anxiety attacks she was having. Jean became depressed, and this became increasingly worse as time went on. With her husband away much of the time, she would sit on the couch and stare at the TV for days, not changing her clothes. Nikki would avoid her as much as possible, since she would explode in anger when she was around. She took to coming and going through the window of her bedroom. It was kept unlocked at all times. But that night she heard her father yelling at Jean. She went to the bedroom door and peered in.
“Is she alright, Dad?” she asked nervously.
He looked up at her. “Go! Do you want to make it worse?”
He grabbed the phone and called for an ambulance.
It wasn’t long before the ambulance arrived. Although it was late, the neighbors emerged from their houses wanting to know what was happening. Inside, Thomas handed the empty pill bottle to the paramedic.
“I think she may have taken her nighttime dose twice.”
The paramedic gave him a strange look. Another paramedic walked up to him and looked at the bottle.
“Call it in…stomach pump.”
Thomas climbed into the back of the ambulance as Nikki stood in the doorway.
“What should I do, Dad?” she called out.
The doors of the ambulance shut with a loud bang. With lights and sirens blaring, the ambulance sped off. Nikki looked around at the neighbors, who all turned away and went back into their houses. She sat down on the front step.
“I hate Nikki’s Mom,” she muttered.
Jean Marlowe
Jean is the daughter of Raymond and Millicent Lynn Monroe, and sister of Patricia Flowers. Jean's father skipped town when the head of the investment firm at which he worked, Easton Financial Advisors, found out that he was stealing from clients. Millie's sister is Beatrice Masterson, a friend of Ellen and David's Aunt Kara. Millie was known to be mentally unstable throughout her life, and for decades had visited doctors, none of which was a psychiatrist, of course, and had been prescribed a bewildering array of medications. Jean discovers the stockpile of drugs in Millie's bathroom and she helps herself to them. This goes unnoticed by Millie, who would start taking the pills she was given, only to suddenly stop. Although Patricia is normal enough, Jean begins displaying the type of instability clearly discernible in her mother. She was taken out of school in 1958, the school being told that Jean was "sick." As she gets older, Jean finds it hard to deal with her mother's behavior and she lives briefly with Patricia. Jean meets a man at a party named Thomas Marlowe and is soon pregnant. Her condition creates serious problems with Jean's sister and mother. She names her daughter Nikki. Another daughter, Karen Marlowe, is born when Jean becomes pregnant again...Thomas being the suspected father. Jean finally marries Thomas, and Jean's mental condition declines substantially as time goes on. Eventually, Jean shows considerable hostility toward Nikki, but dotes on Karen, who is quite sickly, whereas Nikki is strong and healthy. Following an attempted suicide when she took an overdoes of Tuinal, Jean is hospitalized. She is released when she shows signs of improvement, but upon returning home, continues to deteriorate. The situation between Jean and Nikki becomes so bad that Nikki begins coming and going through the window in her bedroom. Although the band, in its early days, plays in Nikki's garage, Jean finally chases them out. One evening, Kerry brings Nikki along to David's house. And like Kerry, Nikki soon moves in. David finds it strange that the girls refer to Jean as Nikki's Mom, even when talking directly with her. It is a nick-name that Nikki has given her. Jean, although older than David, is someone he spent time with during high school. David's relationship with Jean remains vague and undefined. The last time he sees her is the day that she stops by his house with an important announcement to make. She asks if Nikki can continue staying with him and then tells him that she is leaving and will not return. Years earlier and by chance, David met Jean's cousin, a girl named Kayla Swann, who will become a key figure in David's path to Epiphany.
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“It’s on the doorstep,” Jean said, pointing toward the front door.
“What is?” David asked.
“Nikki’s shit.”
David, cup of coffee in hand, went to the door and gazed into two boxes of, well, Nikki’s shit.
“You didn’t have to just throw everything in there like that!”
“She’s lucky that she’s gettin’ it at all.”
David looked at her and sighed. “What about the house?”
“Couldn’t make the payments; bank’s taking it Monday. Look, I gotta go. I know you’ll look out for her.”
Then she paused and looked at David. “Do you remember when…?” She suddenly stopped.
David smiled at her. “I remember a lot of things. There’s a lot of good things to remember.”
Jean looked away. “Yeah, I guess so. Sorry to hear about Lani.”
David looked at her with a puzzled look on his face. He was surprised that she knew about it. “Yeah, well, I guess things do get complicated.”
Jean nodded and turned to leave.
“Hey Jean! Wait a minute. Do you have anything you want me to tell Nikki?”
She turned around and thought for a moment. “No…yes; tell her…tell her I wish things had been different.” Then she turned around and left, and David and Nikki never saw her, or heard from her, again.