by Rona Jaffe
“Have pity,” Felicity said. “I’m trying.” Her eyes filled with tears.
“I’m going to talk to those people, I know them from my trip to Italy,” Kathryn said, and disappeared, surfacing at a corner table where everyone was laughing.
“I need to go home,” Felicity said.
Gara felt abandoned by Kathryn and depressed by Felicity. Felicity’s mood was too catching. “Stay for a while,” Gara said. “Don’t just leave me.”
“All right,” she said, distantly, already vanishing into herself and the sad place where she kept reliving parts of her life. “At least when I was married to Russell I wasn’t alone,” she said.
“You claimed you were.”
“You’re right.” Felicity flashed her a hint of a smile. “Just keep reminding me, please, how unhappy I was.”
“You were miserable. You were bulimic. You kept saying you hated him.”
“Thank you.”
Gara was relieved when the waiters announced dinner was to be served. They went downstairs to the main rooms, which were bright and colorful and festive and glittering, with cozy tables and a gourmet dinner with wines. Gara remembered the times she and her parents had gone out somewhere to celebrate when she was a child, and how she had sat there with the grownups, vaguely bored, vaguely lonely, and thinking: When I grow up I’ll have my own life and it will be different. Well, she was grown up now, and this was her own life, and somehow it wasn’t that different at all. Even Kathryn, who was normally chatty, had fallen silent, defeated for a moment by the palpable gloom.
There was a band afterward in the downstairs bar, and the flashing lights were almost black. Kathryn was her old self again, and was dancing with a man. “Dance!” she cried to them. “Dance!”
“I’m leaving,” Felicity said, and did.
Gara stood there for a few moments, watching the dancers, feeling invisible. There were balloons and pointed hats, and streamers, and people were counting the minutes to midnight.
I’m alive, she thought to herself. I’m alive and I’m not sick and there’s tomorrow. There was no one for her to speak to so she spoke to God, as she sometimes did these past few years because it made her feel so much better. Thank you, God, she said silently, for giving me my five years, and for loving me, and for helping me to help myself. I told you I would renegotiate, and now I’m doing it. I want more. Many, many more.
She did not ask that she might meet a man in the New Year because it seemed impossible, and also because love and sex seemed to bring with them so much grief. She only asked to continue to be well and to appreciate her days. She asked to be able to help her patients and send them on to happier and more productive lives. She asked for Felicity to recover soon.
At midnight the revelers gave a cheer. And at two minutes after twelve she felt free. It was over, and she was not obliged to go through the Happy New Year bullshit for another whole year.
“I’m going,” she said to Kathryn. “Happy New Year.” She took a cab home alone, surprised and grateful to find one.
Kathryn called her the next morning. “I left right after you did,” Kathryn said. “I wasn’t having much fun.”
“I thought you were.”
“No. I was bored.”
“We’ll have better times this year,” Gara said.
“Of course we will.”
Chapter Forty-one
KATHRYN WAS MOVING ON. It was time, the New Year was calling, and she had places to see, people to meet, things to do. She had known, when she had been bored during that New Year’s Eve dinner, that it was time. Life was short, and she had many years to make up for in the years she had left, however many they might be, until she was too old to care. She could not imagine ever being too old to care.
Despite the constant heavy blizzards that made New York unappealing, she sublet her beautiful Fifth Avenue penthouse apartment for an outrageously large sum of money to a couple who wanted to stay there for a year, and planned her itinerary. First she would go to California to see her mother. Her mother was in her eighties now. Her mother’s husband, Arlo, had died, leaving her the beauty salon and enough money to live comfortably, and by now of course the salon was sold, so she had more. She was living in a little apartment in Marina Del Rey, with a terrace that overlooked the Marina with all the sailboats and yachts, and enjoying her retirement.
Kathryn had talked to her mother on the phone, planning her visit. She wanted to take Sheila on a nice trip, and offered to take her wherever she wanted to go. It had occurred to Kathryn, after Gara had tried to make her remember things that night at Yellowbird, that her mother had saved her life. Now that so many years had gone by she and her mother got along very well, although they didn’t see each other very often.
“Arlo and I used to go to Hawaii,” Sheila said. “I’d like to go back.”
“Done deal.”
She would also visit her children, Kathryn thought, scattered as they were around the country, but she wouldn’t stay long. A few days always did it with grown children, no matter how much you loved them and how much fun you had. Then, for the months of February and March, she had the rented house in Palm Beach, where some of the women she played tennis with were going to be, and after that she would go to Canyon Ranch. Spring would be the time for Paris. In early summer she was planning a safari in Africa, which she had never done. In August, back to a house in a different part of Italy, or maybe the south of France, with a different recently divorced woman friend, Pamela, since Susan, the one she’d spent last summer with, had remarried.
After that, who knew? She would see where the breezes blew her. Whenever she missed New York she could always come back for a while and stay at a hotel. But there were so many places she hadn’t been to yet, so many things she hadn’t done, that Kathryn doubted she would miss it for a long time, although of course she would always keep her apartment. The apartment was one of her trophies. It was also a good source of income.
She called Gara to say goodbye. Gara seemed sad at the thought of her deserting them again. “Let’s have a going-away dinner,” Kathryn said.
“At Yellowbird.”
“Oh, no, do we have to?”
“Please? Felicity will want to come, and I guess we should have Eve. It will be like old times.”
“I have never been attracted to old times,” Kathryn said, laughing, “but we did have fun together, and we will again.”
When they met for dinner and sat at their usual table there was a small wrapped present at her place. “What’s this?” Kathryn asked.
“From me,” Felicity said. “It’s nothing, really, just the thought that counts.”
Kathryn was touched. She opened the package and there was a Janis Joplin CD with all her most famous songs, the songs they had heard so often at Yellowbird. Freedom’s just another word for nothing left to lose, the card said, in Felicity’s precise handwriting. I love you, Kathryn, and I will miss your great spirit. Felicity.
“Oh,” Kathryn said, “thank you.” She was beaming, but there was a lump in her throat. What a sweet woman Felicity was. “I want to find out you’re happy when I come back,” Kathryn said sternly.
“I’ll try.”
“I’ll give her some of my power,” Eve said. “Then she can move the world. Or one prick.” She laughed. “Get it? Move one prick?”
“We get it,” Gara said dryly.
“Gara doesn’t believe in mysticism,” Eve said. “She is wrong. Sex is mysticism. The yin and the yang of the two opposing spirits, always conflicted, always needing one another.”
“Whatever works,” Kathryn said.
They ordered their usual broiled chicken, and Eve her chicken-fried steak, and they had a bottle of very expensive wine, which Kathryn insisted on paying for even though she was sticking to her vodka and wouldn’t have any of it. “I hate that you’re leaving,” Gara
said, “and I’m going to miss you. Who’s going to buy us Montrachet?”
“Visit me. I’ll be in so many wonderful places.”
“What a life you have.”
“You wouldn’t want it,” Kathryn said. “You live for your work.”
“Well, I do love my work, that’s true.”
“Maybe I’ll get bored and want to work again some day,” Kathryn said. “You never know.”
Billie came over, wearing red satin jeans and a tiny black sweater, with a red silk scarf around her neck, hiding her scar. Kathryn thought that even if she went to aerobics class every morning of her life she would never look that good in tight pants. Billie was a knockout.
“So Gara says you’re leaving New York,” Billie said. “I can’t imagine wanting to live anywhere else.”
“I’ll be traveling, not settling down,” Kathryn said. “And just for a year.”
Or maybe forever, she thought. She didn’t say it. It occurred to her then, apropos of nothing in particular, that New York was such a strange city that if you came back and didn’t call anybody you could be here for years and they would never know it. Or you could walk down the street and run into six people you knew, from all different areas of your life. She had been in this town for eleven years, and she knew how mysterious it was. She had made more friends than any of the other women she knew, even Gara, who had been born here.
“Well, that’s nice,” Billie said. “I guess.”
No, not more friends than Billie. Billie knew the whole world. But Billie’s friends were mostly men, and Kathryn’s friends were mostly women. Being horny and actively hunting made all the difference. Kathryn knew that in the unlikely event she met a suitable man and fell in love she might change her mind, but right now she didn’t care if she never had sex again. She didn’t even care if she never fell in love again.
Alastair Uland, she thought. Wow, that was a name from the past. He was the only one of her husbands she had ever loved, and she certainly had no idea why. He and their life together was so far away now it was less than a memory, more like a dream, or a story that had happened to someone else. Everything, Kathryn thought, that had happened to her had happened to a person she no longer was, who she would never be again. Every cell in her body had been replaced many times, and so had most of the people. Pare down, move on, live for the moment. The moment was all you had. That was her philosophy now, and it was what she intended to live by. It unquestionably made life simpler.
Chapter Forty-two
SCI-FI WAS IN THE PIPELINE for fall ‘96 on TV. Alien invaders, alien abductions, scary things coming down from the sky. Strange life-forms in business suits working alongside human beings. Scientists who believed, and those who scoffed, constantly being tested by bizarre events. Eve was called to Hollywood to read for a pilot.
The one-hour prime-time show was to be called They Are Here, and it was rather lighthearted and fey as those shows went, although there was plenty of action too. Her character was named Cornelia, and she was a space alien who was also a scientist (weren’t they all?) and it wasn’t a lead or even one of the large supporting parts, but Cornelia was going to appear in every segment even when she had no lines. Eve knew it was her chance. Although she had put down television as being beneath her, when push came to shove she was ready to take a small recurring role because she knew that when the producers and the public got to see her work she would get a bigger part and then, finally, she would be a star. She was absolutely convinced of it. Apparently everyone had forgotten about her troubles on Brilliant Days, or perhaps people who did nighttime didn’t keep up with soaps. At any rate, when she arrived for her audition everyone was cordial, and a few days later her agent told her she had won the part.
It was odd to be back in Hollywood again, and it would be odder still if the pilot was bought and she had to stay. The soft, warm air brought back memories, even though the traffic was worse, the sky was discolored with smog, and she was a good deal older and wiser. She would rent a little house, Eve decided, in Studio City near where the show was to be shot, with a palm tree in the backyard, or maybe even an orange tree, and possibly even a pool. This time she wouldn’t have to support Nicole. She would be able to spend all her time and money on herself. Orange Fiestaware, she thought. And I’ve always wanted to put a ceramic flamingo in my yard.
Eve was euphoric. She couldn’t stop bragging to Gara and Felicity and Billie in Yellowbird. She was sorry Kathryn had left town and wouldn’t be able to know the news, but when Kathryn turned on her TV she would see. “I don’t want to lose my apartment because it’s cheap,” Eve told them, “so I’ll sublet it. If you know anyone who wants to sublet, let me know.”
“If the pilot gets bought and the show is a hit, you could be in California for five years,” Felicity said hopefully.
“True. I could give up my apartment then. I could go from one series to another and buy a mansion in Bel Air.”
“I certainly hope this works out for you,” Felicity said. “My fingers are crossed.”
“Mine too,” Gara said.
In the spring, when Eve went out to shoot the pilot, Nicole insisted she stay with her, since she had broken up with Brian and was in between boyfriends and said she would enjoy the company. Nicole was quite a faithful little thing, Eve thought; she’d had those two long-term relationships and even though she met attractive men all the time at work she was careful who she dated. Nicole had a two-bedroom garden apartment in Beverly Hills now, in a white building that looked like a large private house, on a tree-lined street. She was driving a BMW convertible, like all the rich high school kids, but she had paid for hers herself and she only looked like a kid. It always amazed Eve how young Nicole looked, even though she was twenty-nine. It gave her a very wide range of roles.
Eve didn’t have to worry about memorizing her part because she had only two lines: “Here’s the laser, sir,” and “No, he’s not here.” Waiting to be made up she flipped through Vogue and wondered if she should color her hair with more red in it so it would photograph better.
She was in the swivel chair under the hot lights. What were they—they were putting latex on her head! What was that thing? It looked and felt like a too-tight shower cap, and it had brown spots on it like Homer Simpson’s boss’s head, and they were gluing lumpy plastic on her face! “What are you doing?” Eve shrieked.
“Don’t wiggle,” the makeup woman said sternly. Her name was Trellis, and she had made herself up to look like a member of a rock group, and was wearing black nail polish, which Eve had given up a year ago as being too common.
“They won’t be able to see my face,” Eve protested. She was horrified. How would anyone know who she was? All she could think of was that humiliating day long ago when she had played Yahoo the Clown for a bunch of little birthday brats in Beverly Hills. “I’m allergic to this shit!” she shrieked.
“Nobody is allergic to it. Hold still.”
At least she could move her mouth, at least she could talk. The mask was surprisingly mobile. If you looked closely and you knew her you could tell it was Eve Bader, otherwise nothing looked familiar except the eyes. At least they had left her eyes. The eyes that were the mirror to the soul.
“Nobody told me I would be doing this part in full drag,” Eve snarled.
Trellis laughed. “What did you think? You’re a space alien.”
“So are the people on Third Rock from the Sun.”
“But they’re in disguise as humans, remember?”
Eve crossed her arms and set her lips. There had never been any description of the space aliens in the script she had read, and she had really not given their appearance much thought.
“You might want to cut your hair short,” Trellis said. “This cap really messes it up, and it’s very hot, too. Unfortunately they haven’t found a way for it to breathe.”
“I will never cut my
hair,” Eve said.
“Suit yourself.”
On the set Eve drank bottled water through a straw and cursed her agent. Even though she had only those two lines, she was in some other scenes in the background and they wouldn’t let her leave. She had been appalled at the way she looked in the mirror and when she looked around at the other space aliens toiling away in their laboratory, she felt like one of the Munchkins in The Wizard of Oz. Who was going to discover her now?
The director, Nelson Gruen, was a tall, thin young man who looked as if he should be dating Nicole. “Good work,” he said, patting Eve on the shoulder as he went by.
Good work? Suddenly Eve felt her depression lifting. He had noticed her, he had singled her out. People would know who she was. Maybe not that she was Eve, but that she was Cornelia, and then they would read TV Guide, which would surely write about the show, and there would be a group picture, at the very least, and she would be identified. Her part would be bigger by then. Maybe she would have a love interest. She glanced at the other space aliens and then at the humans and thought that she could easily be matched up with either species. After all, she had the power. This show was going to do it for her, at last. She was sure of that.
“They made me wear a mask,” she told Nicole that night at dinner. Nicole had taken her to Spago to celebrate. “My skin still hurts. I have very delicate skin, you know.”
“People will love you,” Nicole said. “Just behave yourself.”
“What does that mean?” Eve asked, insulted.
“Do your job, be nice, don’t ask them to change anything. Do what I do. You’ll be working forever.”
“And since when did you become the mother and I the child?” Eve said.
Nicole actually thought for a moment. “I don’t know exactly,” she said. “But I like it better this way.”
“I have something to say about that, you know,” Eve said.