by Maria Semple
7–9 AM: Wake up, make breakfast.
9 AM: LadyGo arrives. Say good-bye to David.
9:20 AM: Go down to garden. Dig cell phone out of hole. DON’T TURN ON PHONE TO CHECK TO SEE IF TEDDY HAS CALLED. HE HASN’T. Give phone to Dot.
9:30 AM: Leave for LA Mission.
10 AM–6 PM: LA Mission: Feed homeless. Disperse Teddy’s presents to homeless.
7 PM: Pick up David at office. Take one car to Paul McCartney at Hollywood Bowl.
8–11 PM: Paul McCartney concert.
11 PM: Get David’s car back at office. Drive home.
12 AM: Sex with David. Sleep.
So far, Violet hadn’t deviated from the plan. It was 9:30 and she’d made it out of the house and into the car ahead of schedule, sans cell phone. The phone had been her most formidable adversary in her attempt to banish Teddy from her thoughts.
A week into her travail, Violet had announced to David that she wanted to change her phone number. “Why?” he asked, glancing up from his breakfast. Violet blanked. She couldn’t remember what she had just said. That’s how bad it had gotten. She’d often start a sentence and, midway through, realize she had no idea what she had just set out to say. That’s where Teddy lived, in the interstices. Between sentences, between words, between thoughts. “Never mind,” she told her husband. “I don’t care one way or another,” David said with uncharacteristic alacrity, which only served to rattle Violet further. He continued, “I’m just asking because if there’s a problem with Sprint, I’ll have Kara get on it.” “No, I was just thinking about it.” Violet knew it wasn’t an answer. But now she was trapped into keeping her phone number, a cruel reminder that Teddy had forsaken her. All she could do was change her ringer, so it wouldn’t turn her into a Pavlov dog and unleash a stampede of hope every time it rang. Last night, she had woken up at four in the morning and gone to the kitchen, where her cell phone was charging, and checked for messages. She called voice mail over and over in a sickening loop, in case Teddy had called while she was dialing. Then she’d heard a voice. “No!” it said, “No! No! No!” It was Dot, from the baby monitor. She was scolding her dolls, something she was into these days. Violet then realized it was daylight. She’d been standing there for two hours! Disgusted with herself, she walked to the garden, dug a hole, and buried her phone.
She turned south onto Beverly Glen and passed a cluster of real estate signs. She remembered: it was Tuesday. The morning rush clogged the canyon road, but Violet eschewed the quicker Benedict Canyon because that’s where she was driving when Teddy had called her after their idyll at the putting green. It was in front of the shoddy alcazar, with the flesh-colored VW bus abandoned halfway up the curb, that Teddy had made it known he’d jerked off to her the day they met. It was while she was driving by the once-proud family of deep green palms, now stiff and cappuccino colored since the cold shock a month ago, that Teddy had asked her to say, I certainly like doggy style. It was as she was passing the Craftsman with the sycamore trees, strange ones that grew more horizontal than vertical, that Teddy had said he would write plenty of poems for her. Because of Teddy, Benedict Canyon was now ruined. So were Wilshire, Beverly Drive, RIE class, the 405. And Sondheim. The know-nothing had even managed to ruin Sondheim!
A few weeks back, Violet had made an appointment with a shrink she’d seen on and off. But his earliest availability was two weeks away. “I can come in early one morning if it’s an emergency,” the therapist had offered. “No!” Violet answered. She hung up and decided to cut through the yackety-yak and get on some fucking meds. She called her agent — who had frequently spoken of the rainbow of pills he popped — to get the name of his psychopharmacologist. Violet was tickled to be put right through, even though she hadn’t worked in several years. “Oh God, don’t tell me it’s you, too?” the agent had said on speaker. “I’ve got a thousand former show runners who will work for nothing just to keep their houses. Don’t tell me I have to find work for the wife of a billionaire.” His laughter and that of others filled his office. Violet said she was calling to secure an item for the RIE auction, and quickly hung up. Two weeks later, she drove to the therapist’s office but never got out of her car. What would she tell him anyway? He’d never understand Teddy. There was no way to convey his laugh, what a great kisser he turned out to be, so playful, so obliging . . .
Violet snapped the rubber band on her wrist and said, “Gilbert Osmond Gilbert Osmond Gilbert Osmond.”
This morning, she had written GO on a rubber band and put it around her wrist. Any time she thought about Teddy, she was to snap it and repeat her mantra: Gilbert Osmond Gilbert Osmond Gilbert Osmond. Were their affair to proceed, that’s what Teddy would have been, Gilbert Osmond to her Isabel Archer. Invoking The Portrait of a Lady, one of Violet’s favorite novels, gave her strength and clarity. Everyone but Violet would see that Teddy was utterly beneath her and only interested in her money. At least Gilbert Osmond was a suave aesthete. Teddy didn’t know who the Medicis were!
Crawling to the intersection where the Four Oaks restaurant used to be, Violet saw an open-house sign. Taped to it was a handwritten piece of paper: LAND !!! She checked her watch. She had time, and it was always fun to look. . . .
She followed the signs up a mile of increasingly narrow streets, through the land that curb appeal forgot, and arrived at a dirt cul-de-sac. Among a forest of blue-and-white GWEN GOLD flags was a white Lexus SUV with the driver’s door open. Inside was a woman in her sixties who wore a dowdy Ann Taylor suit. She seemed utterly surprised to see Violet.
“Pull up behind me,” Gwen shouted. “Make sure you turn your wheel to the right.” Gwen pantomimed turning the wheel. A former actress, Violet thought. Violet introduced herself as a neighbor in an attempt to quell any hope of a sale on the part of the eye-lifted realtor.
“It has fabulous estate potential,” Gwen said. “Ten acres, which is unheard of in 90210.” Two huge gates, held together by a rusty chain, lay in the dirt at the bottom of the hill. “As you can see,” Gwen said, “the driveway needs some work.”
“What was once here?” asked Violet. “Was there a house?”
“Over the hill. It’s the old George Harrison estate. He lived here in the seventies. The next owner tore the house down and never rebuilt.”
George Harrison. The name sent a bolt through Violet.
Five years ago, in a book of Linda McCartney photographs, Violet had seen a photo of George Harrison sitting in a Los Angeles house that overlooked a lake. She and David couldn’t figure out where in LA it was. Violet had even asked Barbara Bach about it at a dinner party; she said the house was in Beverly Hills. Violet knew there wasn’t a lake in Beverly Hills, but felt it would be insolent to challenge the wife of a Beatle.
“The house — or what’s left of it — is it up there?” asked Violet.
“You can hike up if you’d like.” Gwen handed Violet a spec sheet. “I wore the wrong shoes. I have a meeting with a mediator at noon. I thought it was next week, but my ex’s lawyer informs us this morning that it’s today.”
Violet headed up the rocky path. At the first switchback, she stopped to catch her breath. Below were tightly packed hippie shacks. It was quite charming, this incognito hamlet. She continued her ascent. The driveway, if widened and stabilized, could be stunning blanketed with acacia groundcover and Aleppo pines. She reached the top of the rise. Stone Canyon Reservoir shimmered below. She made her way down the cushiony gopher hole–riddled hillside to the foundation of the former house. There wasn’t a building in sight. The reservoir was so close, it bounced sunlight onto her face. The water lapped against the shore. It felt like Lake Tahoe. David loved Lake Tahoe. She could build a Lake Tahoe retreat in the middle of the city.
Violet owed it to David. When she had arrived home with LadyGo and Dot after her humiliating trip to Teddy’s, Violet explained her sudden disappearance with a convoluted story involving a birthday party at Chuck E. Cheese, a freeway closure, and a note she thought s
he’d left on the counter. She had expected a merciless interrogation, which she was only semi-prepared for. Instead, David gave her a big hug, then took Dot and did her night-night all by himself.
Could it really be? Had David become more loving and patient than ever since the night of her betrayal? Or was it a cruel illusion, another facet to her madness? She didn’t know anymore. A week ago she’d left her credit card at a restaurant on purpose just to provoke some of David’s good old-fashioned rage. But he had patted her on the head and driven back to get it himself. Had there never been any basis for escaping into Teddy’s arms? If there was a God, Violet was convinced it was a cruel one, for turning her husband nice on her.
Building a house. It was a huge project, but she needed a huge distraction. The other house was cursed. Violet’s unemployment, miserable pregnancy, empty bank account: these could all be traced back to the Neutra house. She had to get away from the front door she had opened to Teddy. The living room ceiling she had stared at, trying to coax Father Time into making the sex last forever. The bed of roses where Teddy had taken her, his brown body with its huge cock, ramming into her from behind, her pussy throbbed now just thinking about it, God, if she could only feel it again, just one more time, she’d tried to replicate it, lying in bed while David slept, touching herself with one hand, pulling her hair with the other, but she couldn’t, she needed Teddy, oh, to be on her knees, sucking that cock, that’s all she needed, to feel her mouth around that glorious —
Violet snapped her rubber band. Gilbert Osmond Gilbert Osmond Gilbert Osmond. She forced a breath through her pounding chest.
The spec sheet said there were ten acres of land. For $1.9 million, it was a steal. David, a huge Beatles fan, would heartily endorse buying a part of Beatles history. And how fortuitous that tonight was the Paul McCartney concert? Violet needed to get to David’s office ASAP. She clambered up the hill, her feet sinking into the rodent-softened soil a good six inches with each step.
IF the past five weeks were any indication of what the rest of her life would be like, Sally hoped to live a long, long time. Between planning the wedding, Jeremy’s growing fame, and her pregnancy, things were getting better and better, faster and faster. Life was a thrill ride, and Sally’s hands were up in the air.
“Will all debtors please stand up?” It took Sally a second to realize this meant her. The two hundred others who had appeared for their 341 bankruptcy hearing in this ballroom-turned-courtroom stood up. Sally sprang to her feet.
“Do you solemnly swear,” said the bailiff, “to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, so help you God?”
“Yes,” answered the cacophony.
A small Japanese woman had taken “the bench.” The bailiff said, “Bankruptcy court under the Honorable Aiko Yashima on this first day of May, is now in session.”
“You may all be seated,” said the tiny judge.
The notice had said to plan on being here all day. Sally had come prepared with wedding-related paperwork. Even her bankruptcy hearing, which she had imagined as a bunch of towering figures with distorted faces hissing indignities at her, turned out to be altogether civil. Most of her fellow “debtors” were white, middle-aged, and looked pleasantly bored. Sally untied the ribbon on her wedding organizer and spread out her flowchart, bridal magazines, and RSVPs on the empty chairs beside her.
Who knew that planning a wedding could be this deeply satisfying? David had told her to spare no expense, so Sally had hired the wedding planner to the stars. Under Pam’s guidance, Sally had discovered she possessed a unique talent for picking the rarest lily, the most sought-after calligrapher, the tip-top-of-the-line tent. Any time Pam presented Sally with makeup artists or photographers from which to choose, she would pick the most expensive. “Why do I bother?” Pam would ask, shaking her head. It became one of their many hilarious inside jokes.
Sally dove into the RSVPs that had arrived yesterday. The first one she opened — wouldn’t you know — was an acceptance from Kurt. Sally’s heart sank. How would she ever explain his presence to her friends? Sally had attempted to work Kurt into conversation. “I thought it would be fun to wear white cowboy boots with my wedding dress,” she had said to the gang at their girls night out at the Laugh Factory. Maryam barked, “Don’t tell me you’re even considering talking to that creep Kurt again.” Sally blushed. “Of course not!” When she returned home, she called Kurt to disinvite him, but got the machine. The outgoing message was normal enough, “Hi, it’s Kurt. I’ll catch you later.” Then a woman giggled in the background. With laughter in his voice, Kurt seemed to turn to her and say, “Wha —?” Beep. Sally was so flustered that she hung up. The best option at this point was to act indignant that Kurt was there and blame his presence on Violet.
“That’s me, Your Honor.” A man in the row behind Sally stood up using the back of her envelope chair, which caused them to spill all over the worn carpet. Sally shot him a dirty look and gathered her RSVPs.
“Is this a complete list of your assets?” asked the judge. “A 2006 Formula Sun Sport boat, a 2005 Porsche Cayman S, adjoining properties at 2860 and 2862 North Beverly Drive in Beverly Hills.”
“That’s right, Your Honor,” answered the man.
Sally looked around for someone to exchange an eye roll with. But most were too absorbed with text-messaging to even be listening.
“The court will appoint a trustee to sell your nonexempt assets. Once you complete the required course in personal-finance management, you will receive a notice informing you that your debts are hereby discharged.”
And that was it! The guy with the speedboat, Porsche, and not one but two houses in Beverly Hills made his way down the row of chairs and out the door!
Dum-dum da-dum-dum-dum-dum. The wedding march trilled from Sally’s cell phone. It was her new BFF, Pam. NO CELL PHONES signs hung everywhere. Sally crouched down and whispered, “Hi, Pam.”
“What’s this message about you inviting the entire Lakers franchise to the wedding?”
Jeremy’s star was rapidly rising, and with it, the number of guests. Jeremy would never think of inviting his new business associates, but as his better half, Sally considered it her duty. What had started out as a once-a-week spot on Match-Ups had turned into a nightly appearance on SportsCenter. Jeremy had just been assigned to broadcast from the floor of the NBA semifinals. So on their first day as man and wife, they’d be crisscrossing the country, first-class.
“Don’t kill me.” Sally giggled to Pam. “But we just found out that Jeremy is doing some print ads for the Gap!”
“Get out!” squealed Pam.
“I know. They’re doing a new campaign called ‘You Will Be Famous,’ starring people who just got famous. Jeremy’s going to be on billboards!”
“Girlfriend, you have landed yourself such a hottie.”
“I know. But it means I have to invite the Gap people and his commercial agents.”
“Oh God. How many?”
“Ten,” Sally said in an itty-bitty voice.
“Can I renegotiate my deal so I’m paid by the guest?”
“Shut up!”
“You’d better not stop by any Starbucks between now and then,” Pam said, “because you’ll invite all of them to this thing, too.” Sally loved Pam. She was so salty.
“Sally Parry,” the bailiff called. “Sally Parry!”
“Gotta run,” Sally whispered, then sprang up. “I’m right here!”
“I see you have no assets,” said the judge without looking up. “Your debts total forty-nine thousand dollars to eight credit card companies. Is that accurate?”
“Yes.” Sally straightened herself. Compared to that last guy, she felt a flush of pride over her fiscal responsibility.
“You want to reaffirm the debt on your 2006 Toyota RAV4. Is that car insured?”
“Yes, Your Honor.”
“Have you cut up all your credit cards?”
“Yes.”
“The
court has received certification that you completed the personal-finance-management course,” said the judge with an impressed pout, “ahead of schedule. Your debts are hereby discharged. You will receive a written notice within thirty days.”
“Randall Kline,” said the bailiff. Just like that, it was over. Sally collected her wedding stuff and skipped out. What did she care if Kurt came to the wedding?
VIOLET stood outside David’s glass-fronted office. His newish assistant, Kara, sat at her desk. “So, what’s it like out there?” she asked Violet. “Did it ever start raining?”
“What — oh, no,” Violet answered.
“I’m from Arizona, and every morning I think it’s going to rain, but it never does.”
“Yeah. . . .” Violet would normally make small talk with an assistant, especially one this mousy and sweet, but she had the rare opportunity to observe David at work. He was on his headset, elbows on his knees, looking out the floor-to-ceiling window behind his desk. No checking e-mail or leafing through Billboard while on the phone. Completely tuned in. A rare quality in this day of multitasking, it had impressed Violet seventeen years ago.
She’d never forgotten that conversation outside the Murray Hill Cinema. “You’re Violet Grace?” David had said, as if in disbelief. “Yes.” Violet scrambled to her feet, peeled off her Walkman, and tucked the newspaper under her arm. “You already bought the tickets?” he asked, with a bluntness that belied his sad eyes. The incorrigibly self-possessed Violet found herself stammering, “I — I thought it might sell out. I got here early. I hope that’s okay.” He looked deep into her face and said, “I’m surprised.” “Good surprised or bad surprised?” Violet was born with an instinct for people. Sure, she had the education and worldliness that was out of reach of an accountant-turned-rock-manager from Denver. But she somehow knew that David was a better person than she. “Good surprised.” The glint in his eye said he was wild with approval. She craved more. She’d been chasing it ever since.