by Sheila Evans
“Mexican?”
“How about the Food Court? Then you can choose.”
“But it’s not very good.”
“Okay, Mexican, then.”
Traffic is light, we’re traveling at a good clip northeast on Highway 80 toward Sacramento. The oleander divider strip is still in bloom; I see people in shorts, tee shirts—it’s summer weather, which bodes ill for our water shortage: one small Halloween rain has been it so far this year. Bruce turns onto Florin Road, drives auto row with its new and used car lots. “There, the VW dealer.” He cranks the wheel over, pulls in, and parks in front of a new Jetta. Before we can climb down, several salesmen converge on us. Mack the Knife plays on the dealership speakers, as the alpha salesman sprints out to us, cutting off two other guys. He’s a flossy fellow, with white teeth and a heavy brow ridge, like you’d see on a prehistoric skull in the museum. Dark complexion; maybe Salvadorian, Puerto Rican.
“How are you folks today,” he sings out in aggressive good humor, and I begin to have second thoughts. How foolish to be here, wasting this guy’s time. I should have done research in The Kelley Blue Book and Consumer Report. I should have talked to other VW drivers, like Helen. I should have looked up road tests on the Internet. In other words, I should have been doing what Emmett would have done; what he probably did do before buying Maggie Quinn’s red Miata. I still need Emmett to take care of me, car-wise. I fear that Bruce isn’t going to be much help when the rubber hits the road.
Nevertheless, we follow this effusive salesman, who’s pressed his business card on us, around and through rows of banner-decorated Beetles precisely parked, their hoods up at the same angle—feeding time at Eidelbrok Volkswagen.
I hear the salesman, “That big rig too much for the little lady? Well, we can fix her right up, just the thing, anti-lock brakes, power-steering, dual air bags, heat and air, real leather seats.” He unwinds his sticky spiel and encases Bruce, his mistaken fly. I overhear, “… makeup mirror here on the visor, for the wife …”
“… for the wife.” Emmett’s been gone almost nine months. Wife has an exotic ring to it. I could be Bruce’s wife. We could be a pair. Why not?
Then a new thought attacks me: this is what Maggie Quinn did with Emmett. She’d followed him around rows of Miatas, a solicitous hand on his arm, beaming her green smile into his face, fantasizing, playacting the happy wife to the happy husband, the happy couple. The bottom drops out of my day, my play. I want to cry, I want to thrash around and shriek that it’s not fair. At the same time I smile up at Bruce, the smile I’ve practiced at home.
We go into the sales office where Miguel assaults us with a glossy clutch of brochures. He staples another business card to the one on top, then covers a sheet with figures—purchase price “fully loaded,” minus down payment, plus interest, blah, blah, blah. I’m not attending, partly because the showroom’s décor consists of mounted animal heads—bear, deer, elk—and their glassy staring eyes disconcert me; partly because I can’t afford the monthly payments, somewhere in the neighborhood of $600. What Bruce and I are playing at is charades.
We escape Miguel, Mr. Salazar, drive slowly through traffic, which is now thick, looking for Mexican food. There are a million ethnic cafés and fast-food outlets lining the road, and Bruce asks me which one I want. I point to Santiago’s—it must be Mexican, done up with sombreros and cacti. Inside, pseudo adobe walls are draped with dusty serapes; the dark tables (outside is full sun) are lit with candles in yellow glass holders. The waitress, a dyed redhead with blue eyeshadow, brings us salsa and chips, and splattered plastic-coated menus. Bruce silently studies his.
“Listen, I’m sorry,” I say.
“What for?”
“You wanted Chinese.”
“Hey, no problem. I was just thinking that if I were you, I’d shop around. He’s on the high side, but of course he’d expect you to deal.”
So he’s not sulking, which Emmett would have done. He’s not sitting there aggrieved with the plate of goo the waitress soon slides in front of him; he’s not hating me and my choices. He’s tucking into his beans, rice, whatever it is that’s covered with melted cheese, and he’s mulling over my projected purchase of a car. I take heart, and the world seems brighter. Besides, I have ordered a better combo, a neater arrangement of distinct foods. I can recognize my items.
How lucky I am to be here with a temperate man, because he’s not focused on me and my many failings, but apparently on his own bright prospect. Because he puts down his fork, which has a long string of cheese on it, and says, “Listen, how about dinner tonight? Could we get together after I do a few chores? There’s always hope, you know, for a second coming—” He says this with a slight flush, a self-deprecating laugh.
“Sure. Your place this time.”
“No, I can’t. Izzie’ll be home. But I’ve got a buddy, we can use his place. If that’s okay with you.”
I’m about to snap something about this being ridiculous, we’re adults, but I get a look at his expression and say. “Sure, why not?” So I cast my lot with Bruce, about whom I’m lukewarm. He’s a nice person, not a dreamboat, which I wouldn’t have liked anyway. I’ve decided that handsome men are a thing of the devil.
Later, alone at home, I deal with his laundry, although he’d said not to, that he’d do it. I transfer his white load from washer to dryer, then dump it on my bed to fold. I bemoan the state of his tee shirts, a ragged collection with holes in the armpits, frayed seams. His shorts—boxers with stretched-out elastic. He needs seeing to, but not by me.
The next load, his colored clothes. I match his socks, those protectors of his delicate feet, tuck them into each other, tight little bundles. I enjoy doing this, because Emmett hadn’t let me do it my way: he’d wanted this socks clipped; he always wanted something different from what I offered.
Other than a peek into his medicine cabinet, what could be more revealing than a man’s laundry? I’m touched that he’s tacitly permitted me to perform this intimate chore. I fold his things with a reverent hand, with none of the callous, threadbare familiarity I’d dealt with Emmett’s.
His shirts, pants. They come out of the dryer exuding a familiar fragrance that goes beyond the soap powder I used. It dawns on me.… Of course! Bruce deals with shipping materials, as had Emmett, and I can smell the cardboard, the paper, the indefinable something male. Almost in a swoon, I peel off my own clothes, I slip into Bruce’s, still warm, a long-sleeved polo shirt and khaki pants I’ve seen him wear to work. The shirt hangs on me; the pants are too long—he is four or five inches taller than I—and too big around the waist. I collapse on the bed, in love with the way I feel. It’s as if I am transferring some of his agreeable spirit into my increasingly hard-edged and brittle soul. After all, he pulled weeds, he spent time at the dealership; I didn’t allow him to go to the home & garden show, or eat Chinese. And he doesn’t hold any of it against me.
Bruce, a wash-‘n-wear kind of guy. Emmett had liked his pants touched up with the iron … where is my iron? On a high shelf in the utility room, where I left it after trying to discipline the linen dress I took to the redwoods (it went to the Humane Society with the rejects from the garage sale).
But Bruce won’t be fussy. No one has catered to him the way I catered to Emmett. A boil-in-a-bag, freeze-dried guy … his daughter doesn’t cook; he gets along as best he can. He wouldn’t expect blueberry pancakes with orange syrup.
Just the same, I’m aware of an insistent itch to please him, to astound him, to amaze him … to overwhelm him. Is this the kiss of death? I almost hope not.
His buddy’s place: a shabby trailer in a motor court off the frontage road. At first I am offended by its trappings. A Formica tabletop sticky with grime and drink rings; dingy indoor/outdoor carpeting; splintered cabinets with ill-fitting catches. The bathroom: aqua fixtures and a gouged starburst linoleum countertop, uncurling at the edges.
But in a perverse manner, this environment pleases me, takes me out
of myself, cancels judgmental tendencies I’m only newly aware of erecting. I’m not responsible for anything, it’s out of my hands. Out of my control. This place, and what occurs here, is something I can turn my back on; I can leave here intact—it’s as preposterous as a dream. Bruce evidently feels the same way, because he is willing, and he is able. He’s not seized-up, is how he puts it. Not that we discuss his condition.
Afterward, while Bruce does some sprucing up, I wait at the sticky table, pushing aside a lid from a mayonnaise jar someone used as an ashtray. “Your buddy smokes?” I call down to the dark cubicle that serves as a bedroom.
“Yeah, he took it up again after his divorce. I tell him to quit, but he’s at that point, he can’t do it yet.”
“Where is he tonight?”
“Out somewhere. He doesn’t hang around here much. He’s alone. Me, I’m lucky; I have Izzie.” Bruce reappears with a bundle of sheets—he’d evidently changed them for our use. (Later he admitted that his afternoon “chore” had been tidying up this place for me, which I found extremely touching.)
“I’d like to meet your Izzie.”
“You will. She’s coming to Vi’s Christmas party with me, you’ll have a chance to get acquainted.”
“Wonderful,” I breathe, but I’m aware of a falling off, a dampening of my spirit. Had I been hoping that he’d go to the party with me? Like a date for the prom? “Wonderful,” I repeat. “Can’t wait to meet her.”
“She’s just the best kind of person, I’m so proud of her. She’s got a good head on her shoulders, solid, sensible. Not like Jan at all.” He frowns.
It’s then that it occurs to me his talk is too full of Isabel. Don’t divorced men talk about their ex-wives? Maybe Bruce is beyond that. After all, it’s been four years. Four years of living with Isabel? Belatedly, an alarm sounds.
CHAPTER 13
So I ride with Helen to the Christmas party at Vi and Ed Corbet’s. They live on a gently twisting tree-bordered road halfway up a hill in Oakland. An ideal location: high enough to catch the view, but low enough to escape wildfires that ravage the chaparral every summer. An exclusive neighborhood, and from the main road, curious passers-by catch only glimpses of homes tucked within luxurious grounds. “Holy cow,” I breathe, awestruck.
“Yeah, Vi’s husband, Ed, has money. His grandfather invented and patented some turnbuckle contraption. They use it in this prefab housing industry.”
We turn down a driveway, and the house comes into view. I recognize this style of house, half-timbered, with mullioned windows, the kind that look elegant but don’t let in much light due to their design, and to the second-story overhang. A bitch to clean, the whole house a bitch—I should know: I had one like this on my route as a Molly Maid.
The graveled parking area is illuminated with tiny white lights, creating a fairyland effect—a bevy of Tinkerbells run amok. Helen slides her VW in next to a beige Honda; it belongs to one of the installers, Eugene, I think. Bruce’s rig, I find myself sneering at the enormous thing, hulks next to it, still ticking as it cools. Plenty of room in the back seat for Helen and me; again I wonder what Bruce is about … is he ashamed of us, of me?
A pair of ornamental shrubs, like bonsai plants, stands sentinel by the massive front door. It’s trimmed with a wreath of straw decorated with birds and fruit, twined around with a red ribbon. The effect is Christmas, restrained and festive, yet dignified. The effect is Money.
On my own street, Frieda decreed that this year we’d carry forth a candy cane motif. To keep on her good side, I strung a few red and white lights, hung candy canes on the podocarpus Emmett planted by the entry. Emmett could have cut up sheets of plywood into giant candy canes, painted them with red and white stripes, stuck them in the lawn. Frieda would have been pleased. But then again, Emmett hadn’t cottoned to Frieda’s controlling tendencies; he might have retaliated with Bethlehem stars.
Actually, Emmett wouldn’t have done that. He’d been repulsed by the Christmas brouhaha. If he’d lived through the attack, would he have gotten religion? He might have become churchy and pious. I’m glad he hadn’t had time to develop zealotry.
Helen pushes the buzzer and we hear an echo of chimes inside. Vi appears, bringing with her noise from the party, people talking, laughing. There is Christmas music, not the usual schlock, but something classical, the muted cooing of a flock of cellos, violins; unobtrusive, a contrapuntal statement of taste, class. Vi effervesces us into the hall, which smells of pine, cedar, and food. She expresses extreme delight at finding us here, as if we’ve accidentally met on an obscure street in Barcelona; as if we hadn’t been at work together just the day before, simmering with pre-Christmas surliness.
Vi takes our coats, exclaims over my hair, my silver dress that I did buy after all. She exclaims over Helen in a stretchy blue velour two-piece. She herself is done up in a swishy hostess gown, in a tawny beige. “Come in,” Vi sings, “come in. Make yourselves at home. Straight through you’ll find the buffet in the dining room, eat, drink—help yourselves. You won’t know everyone, but pretend that you do. I’ll put your things in the day-room off the parlor.”
I recognize the layout from my Molly Maid days. From this entry, which is low ceilinged with flat arches and dark paneling, I see the gleaming staircase with turned newels, trimmed with holiday swags. On a landing halfway to the second floor, you’ll find a set of windows with stained glass inserts. Under them a mahogany table with a crocheted runner, a stand for an airplane plant throwing out a cascade of starts. I’d once hauled a vacuum cleaner up steps like those.
To my right, an arch frames the doorway into the formal living room dominated by a grand piano crowned with a still life of hothouse roses. There’s a frozen-looking flocked Christmas tree trimmed with royal blue silk balls. To the left, the same archway treatment opens into the parlor/den/family room, which offers the everyday tree, a green one trimmed with plaid bows. Somewhere off this room will be a smaller room, the day-room, with a cot for naps; a place to stash the computer, its monitor showing a collage of family snaps, or a holiday-themed screensaver.
Standing between these two arches, on the cusp, so to speak, I know how this party will develop: women congregating in one room, men in the other, and in front of me the evening stretches out like a pair of queen-sized pantyhose. I feel a rush of fatigue, as if I’ve come here not as a guest, but as a Molly Maid whose job it is to clean, mop, and dust this monster.
I give myself a shake. Amy would not feel this way, were she here. Amy would pull it off, Amy would go in there and make friends with everyone, including the cat. Amy would kneel to rub the cat’s belly, showing off her shapely bum, and her red-painted nails. Amy would serpentine a silver dress like mine with its body-hugging curves around and through the crowd clustered at the punchbowl, which will be a handsome cut-glass affair, with matching cups. Amy would knock their socks off, score big-time as the center of attention. I will use Amy as my model, I will follow Amy’s lead and make this party my own. I plow ahead toward the dining room.
It’s dark paneled, as is the rest of the house, a handsome room with gleaming wide oak flooring upon which are spread oriental carpets. The dining room table, with a diameter of at least eight feet, is spread with finger foods—ham and cheese rollups, platters of shrimp and smoked salmon, vegetable wedges, melon slices (in December!), a silver tray of tiny cream puffs and tartlets, with serving tongs shaped like chicken feet.
In the center of the table, on a stiff lace cloth, an arrangement of poinsettias in luxurious bloom, in pots covered with gold foil, tied with red ribbons. Clusters of mistletoe hang in doorways; holiday greenery frames the swinging doors into the kitchen (I imagine a six-burner stainless steel stove, glass-fronted cabinets, slate countertops, a circle of copper cookware suspended over an expansive oak chopping block). More greenery around French doors that lead out to a deck where I see, leaning over it, a spiny monkey puzzle tree. Indirect lighting picks out details of its prehistoric character: savag
e foliage, neat rows of triangular shark’s teeth; bark studded with thorns. A friendlier note on the deck: built-in benches ring a fire pit. There’s even a fire, for guests who want to escape the indoor party.
The thing that takes my eye, though, is a glowing Tiffany chandelier over the table. A dome decorated with red and purple grapes against a background of trees as precisely frilled as broccoli flowerets.
I wish for Helen, or Bruce. Someone to whom I can say how much I like that chandelier. I tell the man next to me. “That thing is gorgeous I wonder if it’s real?”
“A real Tiffany? Sure is. You’re going to ask how I know? I’m your host, Ed Corbet.”
He’s a tall thin drink of water, with an untidy bird’s nest of sandy hair. His complexion is ruddy, freckled, dented—as if he’d had trouble with basal cell cancers. His nose is off kilter, as if broken a few times. He wears a Rudolf the Red-Nosed Reindeer tie, a trick tie that I recognize from Emmett’s collection. Battery-operated, the nose will light up with the press of a button. I say to him that I know how the tie works, on account of Emmett.
“Emmett! You’re Peg Malone … from the farm team.”
I admit yes, it’s true.
“I knew Emmett. He was a jokester. Never a dull moment.”
“I’ve been wanting to hear about that.”
“Emmett and I were in the same woodshop class at the junior college, that was how I knew him, personally. Then there were stories—”
“Stories?”
“In woodshop … move over here so we’re out the traffic … okay, in woodshop we had this dork, a real dud of a teacher, Mr. Feldman, and he and Emmett clashed something fierce. Feldman drove a Mini Cooper, a tiny car, so gutless it wouldn’t get out of its own way. Remember them? They’re making a replica now, really cute. Anyway, after a clash with Feldman, Emmett got some guys together … well, first I should say that the shop classes had just taken delivery of some heavy equipment in these wooden crates that were out back waiting to go to the dump. Emmett got six or seven strong guys together, picked up Feldman’s little car and set it on top of a wooden crate. When Feldman came out to the faculty parking lot, there was his car, two feet off the ground, he couldn’t drive home, had to call the janitorial crew to lift it down. Funny as a crutch, the way Emmett told it. He was a card.”