My Old Man

by Amy Sohn

  “Did you ever see a movie called Bob & Carol & Ted & Alice?”

  “Why do you have to be so pessimistic?”

  “I’m not. Look on the bright side. Divorce isn’t the worst possible scenario.”

  “You think they’re going to get divorced?”

  “A woman who knows her husband is cheating but doesn’t know is one thing. But one who knows in no uncertain terms is dangerous. As soon as she tells her friends the friends project their own reservations about staying with their lying, cheating, or unresponsive sonuvabitches. They say things like, ‘You gotta leave him or you’ll never be able to look at yourself in the mirror again.’ By that point even if the wife has second thoughts she’s gotta leave him, if only so she maintains the respect of her friends.”

  “So why didn’t Hillary leave Bill?”

  “Alphabitches play by different rules.”

  “Is there anything I can do to bring him back?”

  “I can’t be of any more assistance. He made his own bed.”

  I knew I might be pushing my luck but I couldn’t help wondering whether he was just pissed about his lack of orgasm. “Why are you so grumpy?” I said. “Is this about last night?”

  “What about it?”

  “Are you mad you didn’t—you know?”

  “That would be infantile,” he said. “I got work to do. I’m jumping off.”

  He hung up.

  ON my way over to what I found myself reluctantly thinking of as my mom’s, I tried to convince myself it was all going to work out. She’d be mad at first, but once she got over the initial rage and incomprehension she’d realize at the very least she should let him explain. After the week it took him to realize what a psychotic bitch Liz was he’d go back to my mom and devote the rest of his life to pleasing her in bed. Their first night together again, he’d show her the new cunnilingus technique he’d learned from the queen of quim. Aghast, impressed, and astounded, she’d have no choice but to take him back. He’d call up Good Vibrations, order all the toys he’d used with Liz, and have them sent to my mom, insuring an old age filled with hot sex, G-spot orgasms, and perennial perineal satisfaction. Grateful to Liz for having invigorated her middle-aged life, my mom would arrange a Cuckold Conversation to thank Liz for having given her a crash course in sexual technology.

  My dad would smell a commercial idea and the three of them would start running sex-toy workshops for couples, where he and Liz would do live demonstrations on each other while my mom lectured on technique. They’d call it Cobble Hill Electric Company and they’d go on a world tour, teaching middle-aged men and women all about dual vibes, female ejaculation, and the pleasures of plug-ins. They’d build up a buyership of thousands, their seminars skyrocketing to Anthony Robbins–like attendance levels, as they restored vitality to the sex lives of menopausal women and menophobic men from Syracuse to Shanghai.

  When I got home Nina was hugging my mom, who was rocking in tears on the couch. I hugged her but she didn’t hug back. “So this girl was a friend of yours?” Nina said, as I sat down next to my mother.

  I nodded. “But not anymore.”

  “How long have you known?” my mother said.

  “I don’t know. A month and a half.”

  Her face reddened in rage. “You knew for a month and a half? How could you not have told me?”

  “I didn’t want to hurt you! I didn’t know what was going to happen and I thought it was up to him to decide.”

  “Apparently he was going to keep her in the dark as long as he could,” Nina said. “Typical American male.”

  My mom blew her nose angrily into a Kleenex. “Don’t you have any sense of family obligation?”

  “It wasn’t my business! It was between you and him!”

  “You knew your father was going around behind my back and you didn’t think this was information I deserved to know?”

  “I thought about it a long time,” I said, “but it’s against Jewish law.”

  “Since when have you cared about Jewish law? You wouldn’t even come to Rosh Hashanah services!”

  “That doesn’t mean I stopped thinking about it. You’re not supposed to speak evil of others, even if it’s true. You’re not supposed to do anything that would cause pain. ‘A tongue is like an arrow. Once an arrow is shot, it can never be called back, even if the archer has a change of mind.’ I knew if I told you, things might happen that I didn’t want to happen. I was trying to protect you!”

  “That’s not the real reason!” she hurled. “You were protecting him. You never support me in anything.”

  “This isn’t fair,” I said. “If I had told you, you’d have been furious at me and you’re furious at me anyway. Nothing I do is right with you.”

  “It would have been right of you to tell me right away!”

  “Don’t be so hard on her,” Nina said, rubbing my mother’s back. “How was she supposed to know this girl would turn out to be a conniving little whore?”

  “She should have had better instincts! You surround yourself with dangerous people and this is what happens!”

  “I can’t believe this,” I said. “I couldn’t help it that Liz walked into that restaurant that night.”

  “No, but afterwards you probably encouraged him. What, he came over to visit you and you invited her up?”

  “Of course not! You’re out of your mind. Why would I do that?”

  “I don’t know,” my mother said, and covered her face with her hands. “I don’t know what to think anymore.” She collapsed into a fit of tears and Nina went to get more Kleenex from the bathroom. I looked around the room at the two bookshelves on either side of the fireplace, the framed photos of me getting picked up from summer camp, the three of us cross-country skiing in Vermont, me in a Laura Ashley dress standing in front of a bulletin board that said BAT MITZVAH RACHEL BLOCK, me graduating Wesleyan and smiling in my cap and gown, flanked by my parents. We looked happy and intact. And now everything had gotten ugly so fast.

  “Maybe he’ll come to his senses,” I said. “Maybe he’ll find a way to make it all up to you.”

  “It’s too late for that!” she said. “When I told him to get out I swear I saw glee in his eyes, like he knew this would happen eventually and was glad it finally did.” Nina came out of the bathroom and passed her another tissue.

  She blew her nose, collected herself, and took a deep breath. “I knew something wasn’t right with him,” she said. “He was never home. I kept thinking he was fixing computers, like he told me. I can’t believe I was such an idiot!”

  “Don’t blame yourself for thinking he was a halfway-decent person,” Nina said. “You thought he was a mensch because he never gave you any reason to think otherwise.”

  “I just can’t believe he was so stupid! To be cavorting with this girl out in plain sight where anyone could see him! He must have wanted to be caught.” She wiped her eyes, suddenly looking very old. I leaned over and hugged her tightly but she pulled back and glared at me, her eyes cold and devoid of love.

  “You know what, Rachel?” she said calmly. “I appreciate you coming over but I don’t think I want you here right now.”

  Nina got a strange, uncomfortable face and then coughed into her hand. “I don’t understand,” I said.

  “I need to think things through,” she said. “It’s all too jumbled right now. I’m feeling really angry at you and I think the best thing is for you to leave.”

  “But Mom,” I said. “You have to believe me when I say it wasn’t my fault. I swear to God I tried to stop it!”

  “Rach,” Nina said, standing up and leading me to the door. “She’ll be all right. I’m here. But I think you should listen to her. I’ve had three other friends go through this so I know how to handle her. She’ll come around.”

  I looked over my shoulder at my mom. Her eyes displayed a steely rage and I was afraid something had changed in her, that she’d lost whatever residual love she had for me, even though I knew I ha
dn’t done anything wrong. I didn’t like seeing her there next to Nina, I wanted him back, I wanted him to fix things, I wanted it never to have happened.

  I hated Carol for blabbing, however entitled she was. My mind went through a series of negative Dayenus. If only she hadn’t seen them, it would have been enough. If she had seen them but hadn’t told, it would have been enough. If she had seen them and told but my mom had been able to forgive, it would have been enough. But she’d set things into motion and now everything was falling apart, more quickly than I could have imagined.

  When I got outside I peeked in the window. Nina and my mom were sitting side by side, their faces downcast and hard, like this was the beginning of the end.

  OVER the next week I was totally spacey at work. I kept mixing ingredients, putting gin in my vodka tonics, and mixing up the Harp and Brooklyn Lager. My tip total for the week came out to three hundred dollars, my lowest since I’d started working at Roxy. Jasper tried to comfort me by telling me how hard it was when his parents separated, but as an overweight celibate who spent all his free nights in a bar he didn’t seem to be a raging example of good coping skills.

  I left three different messages for my mom but she didn’t call back and I figured the best thing I could do was give her space. When I called Nina she said I shouldn’t worry, my mom would come around, and all the women in the book group were taking turns coming over to make sure she was all right.

  Now that he lived above me, my father began treating my apartment like Kramer treated Jerry’s. He’d knock at all hours of the day, wanting to chat, talk about job interviews, and go for bike rides. When I tried to explain that just because he was living upstairs it didn’t mean I had to spend all my time with him, he’d pout and pad out, sulking, like I had a completely warped sense of parental obligation even though he was the one who had turned our family on its head.

  Powell, meanwhile, stopped inviting me to his apartment altogether, and I was too demoralized by his walking out on me to try to invite him to mine. But instead of disappearing completely as any decent guy would have done, he would call me at all hours of the day to read me scenes of The Brother-in-Law, and invite me to breakfast every morning at D’Amico. And because it still flattered me that he wanted to be with me, even though he stopped touching me and commenting on my body, I took what I could get. We’d sit at a table in the back and I’d laugh appreciatively as he riffed on all the New York Times headlines, hoping that one day he’d have a change of heart and invite me over to his apartment.

  One morning he strode into D’Amico with a wide smile. I was sitting at a table listening to two old Italian guys, both in fedoras, argue about which one of them did more for the country during the war. One was saying he was in the service and the other said his friend wouldn’t have had any ammo if it wasn’t “for the balls of tin foil we sent over.”

  Powell ordered his cappuccino and sat down across from me. The two old guys looked up, trying to figure out how we were connected.

  “What is it?” I said.

  “I got a call from someone at Jennifer Lopez’s office saying she wants to meet with me. I’m having lunch with her on Thursday. Supposedly she’s seen all my movies and says she’s been dying to be in one of my films.”

  I found Jennifer Lopez to be the lowest level of talent on the block, a living testament to the unexplainable appeal of mediocrity. “Oh my God,” I said distastefully.

  “Yeah,” he said. “I’m kind of nervous myself.”

  “Why?”

  “Because I want it to go well.”

  “Hank!” I said. “Why on earth would you want to make a movie with Jennifer Lopez?”

  His face contorted into a furious mess. “That individual knows how to act! Did you see the tour de force of Selena? What about Out of Sight?”

  “Everyone’s good under Soderbergh,” I said. “You can’t judge her by that. A decent director can get good work out of anybody.”

  His eyebrows flared and he flashed his teeth. “So you don’t think I’m a decent director?”

  “Of course I do,” I said, realizing this was not going in the right direction. “I just—didn’t think Jennifer Lopez would meet your idea of a decent actress.”

  “You know what you are?” he said, leaning back in his chair. “A racist.”

  “I’m not a racist!”

  “You don’t respect her because she’s attractive, talented, successful, and Puerto Rican. She threatens you. You should try opening your mind.”

  What was wrong with me? I had to learn to be more normal, more quiet. I had to learn not to say every thought that came to my mind. But wasn’t that the point of being in a relationship, however dysfunctional it was? Was I testing him to bring him down off his high horse, or was I just being myself?

  “I’m sorry,” I said as daintily as I could. “But I have a right to an opinion.”

  “Rights are like tights,” he said. “They make my balls itch.”

  “Look, if you want to work with her to make money that’s one thing but don’t pretend like you respect her. I mean I know you have a lot of money problems. I know these last few years haven’t been easy for you.”

  I didn’t think it was possible for him to get any angrier than he already was but he exploded and pushed his face up against mine. “You don’t know when to shut up, do you?”

  “I just—she can barely put lines together. To be honest, I thought Rosanna Arquette was a dubious choice for Knock for Greenberg but J.Lo? In a Hank Powell movie? Don’t you have any respect for your own oeuvre?”

  “Jennifer Lopez is the most dynamic female screen presence to come along since Judy Holliday,” he said, “and if you can’t see that I don’t know why I even bother talking to you.”

  All I was doing was stating my opinion but Powell didn’t seem interested in a two-way conversation. It was beginning to seem that if I committed to being around him I’d have to commit to being a stroker, and after a while all the stroking got tiresome. It was like the only leverage I had with him was my willingness to be polite and when it came down to it, that wasn’t leverage to be proud of. I couldn’t decide which I wanted more—to have him or to have him be nice.

  “Can’t we disagree?” I said.

  “Not when it comes to incontrovertible facts, such as the talent of Ms. Lo.” I had to chill out or he’d leave. I knew better than to defame a star that could pay Powell’s alimony for two years straight. I had to learn to shut my mouth and be better company. The key was not to kiss his ass but to say just little enough not to piss him off.

  “I’m sorry,” I said. “I mean this could be great for you. If she was in one of your movies it could do good things for your career. Catapult you to high-level fame.”

  “What level of fame do you think I have now?”

  “Mid.”

  “You think my fame is midlevel?” he hurled.

  “All the best talents were marginal until they died! Look at van Gogh!”

  “You’re the queen of the sabotage,” he said, looking at me as though he could no longer remember a single thing he liked about me.

  “Hank,” I said, suddenly terrified. “It came out wrong. I really didn’t mean to say you were only marginally famous.”

  He was still glaring at me, like a pouting child. “Look, you’re probably right. I probably don’t like J.Lo just because she’s so attractive. I guess I have a lot of competitive issues with women. That’s probably why I spend all my time with men.”

  “You definitely leave issues.”

  This had ceased to be any fun at all but I was so afraid he was going to dump me that all I could think was to try to calm him down. “Why don’t you read me some obituaries?” I said. “That always makes you happy.” His face softened just slightly and he picked up the paper.

  FOR THE FIRST three hours of my shift the next night my clientele was almost entirely single men. Jasper had gone out on what he thought was a really good date with a girl who never returned
his phone calls; Octavio, a gray-haired architect, was trying to decide if he should dump his girlfriend; and these four drunk guys who worked at VH1 and played tennis together once a week were saying there were no good women left in the city.

  “Do you know anyone who would go out with me?” Jasper said. “Do you have someone to set me up with?”

  “I’m not sure,” I said. How was I supposed to tell him that even if I did have a single friend, I wasn’t sure how I would bill him? It would be easy enough to say he was big, but how would I explain that I knew him because he spent every night sitting opposite the spigots?

  As I set his Harp down in front of him a cute girl with low pigtails and a YMCA summer camp shirt sat down at the other end. She had the kind of pubescent breasts guys like, and I felt certain her nipples were the puffy kind. I angled my head toward her. “You want me to make her sit over here?”

  He glanced up and took her in. “She’s not my type.”

  “What do you mean she’s not your type? She’s smokin’!”

  “They have to be at least five-seven, big and strong, built like Midwestern girls, and blonde. I prefer them to weigh between one-forty and one-sixty and they have to wear a double D or bigger. And they have to have really high arches.”

  “You’re incorrigible,” I said.

  “Come on, Rach, you’re just down on men these days because of your dad.”

  “Why don’t you shut up?” I said.

  “What happened with your dad?” one of the VH1 guys shouted.

  I asked the girl what she wanted. “Um, an apple martini?” she up-talked.

  “I can do one,” I said, “but you’ll regret it.” Our apple juice was disgusting and the apples we kept in stock weren’t even the right kind.

  “OK,” she said. “How bout a Cosmo, then?”

  Women never tired of Cosmopolitans. I didn’t get it. It was a stereotype that I was quickly discovering to be apt: women didn’t like the taste of alcohol so they had to turn it into candy.