Oola

by Brittany Newell

  The way I see it now, there was never an option: I had to lose her in the end. This was the only way to keep her vivid, clear. After she left, I was always on my toes, for fear that she should fade away. When once nine-to-five, I became a 24/7 romantic. This is what becomes of the brokenhearted: nightwatch. Only my longing was strong enough, deep enough, to contain all of her, every hair as it whipped in the autumning breeze. Personally speaking, I’d rather be pined for, pinned up to the bathroom wall and pickled in recurring dreams. The heart is such a lovely jar. Better the well-preserved fetus than the Velveteen Rabbit, who was hugged until his fur rubbed off.

  I am reminded here of something a man on a plane told me. I was headed home for Christmas break my sophomore year of college. We were waiting for takeoff, making polite conversation. He was a nondescript businessman, raised in Manhattan, headed for O’Hare. He was smartly dressed in a gray wool suit and pin-striped tie, though the seatbelt accentuated his paunch. “Connection?” I asked.

  He shook his head. “Home.”

  I asked why a lifelong New Yorker would move to the Midwest. “In search of service with a smile?”

  He shook his head gravely. “I went to Chicago because I so loved the sea.” He adjusted his briefcase. “Capisce?”

  For some reason, this made us giggle. “Capisce.”

  Then we both got drunk on Bloody Marys and he fell asleep with his chin on my shoulder. He told me his name and gave me his address, in case I ever found myself stranded in Chicago and in need of a bed—my wife’s a great cook!—but of course both of these details have been forgotten. All I remember, somehow, is his daughter’s dog’s name: a rescue pit bull she called Catfish.

  * * *

  THINGS MIGHT HAVE GONE ON in this fashion for God knows how long had I not found the diary.

  It was no bigger than a pocketbook and covered in shaggy faux fur. The fateful name, Le Roy, was printed no fewer than two hundred times in her spindly half-cursive. The day I discovered it was the day my self-induced spinsterdom ended. But that’s life, isn’t it? You spend your days in the garden, your nose in a book, bothering no one, eating and watching and thinking the same thing every night (if only I hadn’t … her hair in the lamplight…), until bam! Psychic clusterfuck—everything happens at once.

  The first call to action, I guess, was a postcard.

  It was sent by my dentist, an ex-tennis prodigy named Jiffy whose age (late twenties) and forearms (veiny) never failed to surprise me. After abandoning tennis and discovering teeth (something to do with a malfunctioning ball machine), he’d set up shop fifteen minutes from his alma mater in a sunny split-level in Berkeley. It was my mother who’d recommended him when Oola and I moved out west. He was the nephew of one of her bridge partners; we’d allegedly played tennis together as kids. “College changed him,” she told me, moderately tipsy. “I think he smoked weed.” I was impressed by her terminology. The two or three times we’d seen him, I got a kick out of picturing her in this foreign environment, wearing her funkiest sweater set (apricot, alpaca), politely declining homemade baba ghanoush (her new diet, presumably: I don’t eat anything over two syllables, thank you), coyly asking after Jiffy’s backhand. Shortly after the water began to taste salty, we’d found our gums frequently tingling, particularly when it was overcast. The stray tooth in O’s parsnips was one step too far; we drove up to Berkeley and had Jiffy check to make sure it hadn’t been ours. “All in order,” he chirped. “Except for the cavities. Good heavens, you two—double digits!” We laughed out loud when he asked if we flossed. “That’s not optional?” O cackled. He wrote us in for emergency cleanings the very next day.

  The postcard featured a picture of a jack-o’-lantern with a caption that read Halloween Is Over—Don’t Let Cavities Haunt You! The jack-o’-lantern’s grin was missing several teeth. On the back it reminded me that I was due for a checkup and whom I should call. At the bottom, Jiffy had added a personal note: Long time no see, Leif. I’m not scary, I promise! He seemed determined to push this Halloween joke to its limit. Nonetheless, I giggled like a granny. Jiff had a niche: His clientele consisted mainly of long-skirted retirees, former hippie babes who brought in zucchini spelt muffins (sugar-free, they said, winking) and had a curiously high tolerance for Novocain. The lemongrass-scented waiting room often resembled a love-in, folding chairs rearranged to facilitate the inevitable massage train. The gals discussed moon cycles with Oola and patted my hands.

  Am I interrupting something? Jiffy would bellow, flinging open the door to his operating room with a WASP-approved grin.

  Loosen up, kid! a chorus of voices would belt. There’s the golden child! If I was ten years younger … You’d need a chiropractor when I was through with you.

  Reading the postcard at breakfast one morning, it struck me that the metallic taste in my mouth might be due to a cavity—something rotting where I couldn’t reach it. It also struck me that I hadn’t been to San Francisco, much less Berkeley, for months. Since Oola left, the farthest north I’d traveled was the Costco in Monterey. I had a sudden longing for Market Street, the bustle of ferry-goers, cable cars crawling with tourists who’d forgotten their coats, the keen sea smell of the bay mixing with ground coffee and crab, the pearly furrows of fog that truncated tall buildings and spilled over the hills of Marin like a split pillow’s stuffing. I finished my breakfast and dialed Jiff’s office.

  “You’re lucky,” the girl on the phone told me perkily. “Dr. Jiffy has an opening this Friday at noon. After that, he’s booked solid till Valentine’s Day.” She giggled. “And you know what happens then.”

  “I do.” I was seized by a bout of flirtatiousness. “Does your boyfriend buy you candy hearts?”

  “I don’t eat candy,” she said a bit curtly. “And Gladys always buys me soap. Shall I pencil you in?”

  By 11:00 a.m., the date was set. I’d drive up the coast and leave my truck in the garage at Millbrae; from there, I’d take BART through San Francisco and under the bay into Oakland and Berkeley. I’d leave Big Sur early in the morning, when the narrow highway was populated solely by construction workers on their way to the jobsite—some multi-acre dude ranch no doubt—plus a few runaways in dinged cars and suntanned punk kids on bikes, sleeping bags on their backs, key chains rattling, racially misinformed dreadlocks dampened by dew. The sun would rise with me, pinking the sands of the beaches where they had just camped. The cows in their vast, tamped-down fields would turn from dull brown to dull orange, their jaws never still for an instant. I wouldn’t have to spend the night. I’d leave Berkeley by 3:00 p.m., pretending to be a professor. I’d get dinner in Gilroy, garlic capital of the world; the smell of its fields always made me so hungry, the air suggesting supper in that perfect suburban way, as if I were a high schooler, coming home from track practice, knowing that hot food and warm looks awaited, smelling the chicken, the pasta, before I turned down the drive. The cows would still be chewing, turning back from orange to brown again. The highway would be a little clogged with commuters and vacationers, their white stream of headlights mimicking the unseen line of surf that nonetheless heaved and crashed somewhere below. I’d be back at the cabin, nursing my tooth, by 9:00 p.m. at the latest. How glorious it would feel to put on my slippers, to take off my face. I might even reward myself, after a long day’s drive, with a nice cold Chardonnay.

  Since O left, I’d stopped drinking, which I know may be hard to believe of a writer living alone. Big Sur in particular had its host of deep thinkers and heavy drinkers, as the gas-station attendant was fond of informing me, and I had to admit that it would have been easy, to stand on the edge of the continent, looking out at more ocean than one could possibly fathom, and choose to match this obliterating force, of water and sky, with one’s own rather less awesome destruction. Still, with Oola gone, I had no desire to join their rank ranks, to artificially extend and sustain the morning fog that hung one foot off the ground at dawn. Despite my clanging rooms, hotel-clean, and occasional conversations
with the face in the mirror, I was no Jack Nicholson (at least, not yet). I only let loose when whacking weeds. I was a beast in the garden; the ants knew my wrath. I lurched between beds, shovel raised, hunting ivy. At all other times I was monkish, drank tea. My project, if you’ll remember, was one of preservation, a work of nearly nonfiction, and I needed to think clearly, especially now that Oola was gone.

  I was committed: It didn’t matter that I hadn’t started writing the actual manuscript, or that, by the end of November, I’d accrued only outlines, five in total, for five vastly different plots, each centering around the all-important and ever-developing character sketch of a young girl named Oolah. Truth be told, I looked down on the artists who came to Big Sur to get blitzed, to compare the hills to hips (go figure) and confuse passing out in the grass with becoming one with the land. Jeffers, Kerouac, the glorious fart that was Miller: They all claimed allegiance to this patch of earth and took it as a lover, yet as far as I could tell, I was the only one who went the distance, who sought true fusion with my muse. After much deliberation, one night in December, I laid the porch down with old magazines and bleached my hair. There was only one way to know, after all, if blondes really did have more fun. My trip to the dentist would be one more test of commitment. It was a day out, which I desperately needed, but also a kind of debut, and for this reason, I took an hour and a half to get ready when, like Christmas Day, the fateful Friday rolled around.

  I looked sharp, there’s no denying it. I was careful not to overdo it, as the cooped up and underappreciated so often do. I wore a yellow T-shirt with the sleeves cut off and black high-waisted pants, both formerly Oola’s and immaculately laundered. She’d never had much in the way of a butt, so the pants fit me perfectly, just a bit slack in the thighs. The shirt was emblazoned with big black felt letters: LEAVE MICHAEL ALONE. I paired it with a black wool cardigan and my cow-print clogs. I combed my hair and wore it down, with black cat-eyes, a bit of bronzer, and violet lipstick (Lavender Menace). For a purse I used a mesh grocery bag, like the old women in Paris do, into which I threw my cigarettes, lipstick, and two writing pads. It was chilly when I stepped outside; I pressed my thermos of coffee to the small of my throat and hurried to the truck. I noted the crow’s latest offering: an oyster fork, small and silver, poking out of the grass. I was impressed by his taste. I made a mental note to retrieve it as soon as I got home. I’d add it to the collection of gifts, which was quickly spreading over the mantel and reminded me, with an unpleasant shiver, of an heiress’s personal effects.

  I jammed the keys into the ignition, cranked up both heater and radio, and with one last glance in the rearview, set off down the road.

  * * *

  DR. JIFFY’S OFFICE WAS TINY and clean, located over an apothecary on a quiet and almost suspiciously well-lit residential street overlooking UC Berkeley’s campus. His neighbors were pleasantly aging professors of nice things like botany or the science of dreams, plus a few undergraduates and a rumored tiger mom who had followed her son from Andover to Cal. Inside his office, a single stick of incense burned, while Cat Stevens trilled in the background.

  Dr. Jiffy himself was suntanned, compact, and bursting with energy, rather like the Brazil nuts he ate on the hour. He had the permanently ruddy face of so many New England men, suggesting, all at once, good health, cold winters, and a family history with alcohol. Transplanted to the sunny state, where surfing was a winter sport and flaxseed scarily abundant, this former prep-school pretty boy was high on life, the muscles of his stout, firm calves patterning his chinos. He wore a thin woven bracelet on one thick wrist, a token from a trip to Bolinas and a mighty concession, I knew, to his liberal surroundings. He strode toward me, quadriceps flexing so hard as to seem shimmery.

  “The infamous Leif!” he crowed, clapping me on the back. “Can it be?” If he was thrown off by my makeup, he hid it with applaudable finesse. “Long time no see. What’s new with you?” His gaze lingered for a second too long on my bra strap, which, in the tussle of hugs and how-are-you’s from the waiting-room ladies (who took my outfit in stride), had slipped off my shoulder. “How’s the writing? Still plugging away at the Great American Novel?”

  I smiled demurely. “Something like that.” I righted the bra strap. “It’s coming along.”

  “Terrific. And tell me—how’s Oola? I have to say, I’m surprised that she didn’t come with. Let me guess”—he leaned in—“she hasn’t been flossing.”

  I nodded and he let out a pane-shaking guffaw. “Naughty girl.” He took me by the elbow and laid me in his chair. “You tell her we miss her, out here in the real world, and not to be ashamed. There’s plenty of people like her, I assure you. She can’t hide forever!”

  I pondered this. His tone, as he bustled above me, scooting about on his rolling stool, rinsing his hands, lining up instruments, moved and assured me. “I will,” I said. I tried to smile up at him, but at that moment he turned on his overhead lamp. In a flare of hot white, the tanned, pleasant face was reduced to pixels, and a floating pair of heavy hands emerged, too mannish to be an angel’s.

  “For now, relax.” I heard the snap of his latex gloves, and his voice drifted toward me as if from a dream. “Open wide.” He wheeled closer. “I promise to be gentle.”

  I opened my mouth and closed my eyes, giving myself up to him.

  Why hasn’t more been written about this experience, the erotic frightfest of a teeth-cleaning? After months in the cabin, I wasn’t ready for this type of contact, intermittently tender and brusque. Within minutes I was gagging, squirming. “You’re in good hands,” he intoned. As if to demonstrate, he took firm hold of my chin and turned my head from side to side. “Open,” he commanded, and I did. “Wider,” he called, and I dutifully complied. “Tongue down,” he instructed, and I felt chastened. “There,” he cooed, and it felt like we’d made it. Adjusting the overhead, he admired me by different light. He stroked my wrist as I moaned. I let him watch me drool, and what’s more, I had to ask his permission to spit. “There”—he pointed—“in the sink. Very good. My, my, some blood! I’ll have to go slower.”

  I, in turn, became acquainted with his stubble, the animal grade of it spreading under the chin and over his throat, like a low-res tidal wave. “This will only hurt a little bit,” he soothed, holding the seven-inch needle up to the light. “You’ll feel a tiny prick, that’s all. Trust me on this one, OK?” And I could only gurgle my consent.

  Is it too obvious to have sex dreams about one’s dentist? I wondered this as he fingered my gums, peeled back my lips with his latex-coated thumbs, and exhaled so close to my face that my eyelashes fluttered. Would that be as boring as dreaming about your professor? “Shhh,” he said with every prod. “Don’t worry, bud. You’re doing fine. A-plus work.” And I believed him, beaming like a grade-grubber. I regretted that I had never taken the chance to examine Oola’s teeth in such detail—what slits and pits might I have found, what new wetness in which depths? I assuaged my regret by focusing back on his stubble: I could actually see where the brown hairs began to look blue. I was touched that he’d recently chewed gum: peppermint.

  At the end of an hour both exhausting and exhilarating, he gingerly removed my smock. “Whoopsie,” he said, and leaned back in, dabbing my spit-slick cheeks with the balled-up smock. I was wrong; he was an angel. “Fank yoo,” I garbled, and he grinned, blotting my gummy upper lip. “No sweat,” he whispered. He kept blotting. “You’ll have to forgive me. I think I messed up your lipstick.”

  “Iz OK,” I swooned. Thank God I was already reclining.

  Like a prince, he extended a hand and helped me up to my feet. He led me back to the waiting room, where he laid a hand on my shoulder. “Till next time,” he said, warm eyes crinkling. “Don’t keep me waiting.”

  “I won’t,” I promised, steadying myself on the edge of the check-in desk.

  He winked. “I believe you.” He consulted his clipboard and turned toward the room. “Ethel?” he bellowed. While
the lucky gal gathered her scarves and extracted herself from her chair, he turned back to me. “Tell that Oola I say ciao.” And he disappeared with Ethel on his arm.

  I made eye contact with the remaining old lady. We smiled and sighed in tandem, saying without saying aloud, What a guy! She laid a bread-soft hand on my wrist and blinked up at me from behind her orange-tinted glasses.

  “Would you like a persimmon?” she said. She produced one from nowhere. “You look like you need one.”

  I took it from her like a jewel. “There’s nothing I’d like more.”

  It was cool and smooth and strikingly colored. I rolled it between my palms as I walked out the door, down the stairs, along the ingeniously dappled street. I touched it to my cheek as I climbed the steps to the BART station and held it between my shoulder and chin while I paid for a ticket. I tossed it up and down like a tennis ball while I waited for my train to come. Only once comfortably seated on the long bench seat that faced the windows did I contemplate eating it.

  We were whizzing along, the train less than half full at this awkward afternoon hour and the train car thick with autumn light. We were on the elevated tracks, in the treetops of the city. Chimneys and fifth-story windows whipped past, more than a few hung with rainbow flags or Giants black and orange. By staring straight ahead of me, I could watch it all sing by: the soccer fields down below, the abbreviated billboards, and far away the blinding bay, like a wineglass shattered on a blue tablecloth at some fantastic dinner party.