Almost Paradise

by Susan Isaacs

  He interested her, though. His looks were clean, classic American. He was smooth, most likely the product of a prep school, but his voice was deep and pleasant, with an intriguing catch in his throat—not the nasal sound many of them made, as if their adenoids were bigger than their brains. Everything about him seemed right; even his oxford shirts looked better pressed than anyone else’s. But he didn’t seem arrogant. He sat straight in his chair, avoiding the contemptuous classroom slouch—legs stretched out, head thrown back as if the discussion were too boring to be borne. Although he never volunteered an answer, when called upon he was prepared, and his responses were well considered if not brilliant. She did not have a crush on him because she was too practical to pine for the unattainable. But three or four times that semester she glanced at the back of his head and shoulders and, just for an instant, wondered what it would be like.

  They noticed each other once the following semester. They picked up their laundry at the same time and were about to leave the store when it began to rain, the cold, comfortless rain that takes the joy from the early weeks of Rhode Island’s spring. They reached the door at the same time. Jane’s laundry bag was cradled in her arms, Nicholas’s slung over his shoulder. They glanced at each other. It was a moment that might have led to coffee if either had said, “Isn’t this weather awful?” but instead he pulled back so she could pass by first, and they both rushed through the rain, Jane to her dormitory at Pembroke, the women’s college of Brown University, Nicholas to his room in the Alpha Delta Phi house.

  One night the following year when they were juniors they worked at the same table in the library. They noticed each other at different moments and kept their heads down so they would not have to waste time deciding whether to acknowledge the other and then whether to simply nod or to say hello.

  Several times they just missed each other. In their sophomore year, Jane went to a party at the A.D. Phi house with a senior she was dating and danced within inches of Nicholas, who was dipping a Connecticut College freshman, a girl he’d seen on and off since they’d met the year before at a comingout party, but they didn’t notice each other. They didn’t see each other the last week of their junior year either, when they actually sat beside each other in the theater watching the cartoons that were run late afternoons the week of final examinations. And the first week of their senior year, they both ate chicken chow mein at Toy Sun’s restaurant at the same time, but Jane was gossiping with her colleagues from Sock and Buskin, Brown and Pembroke’s oddly named drama group, and Nicholas was holding hands with Diana Howard, the girl he was pinned to, so they never knew the other was near.

  It might not have mattered. Probably each of them had been that close that often to a large percentage of students of the opposite sex. Jane and Nicholas were merely following the law of averages, which says that X, a certain Pembroke girl, will be in the same room with Y, a certain Brown boy, 28.92 times during their four years in Providence. Of course, it might have been Fate trying to set something up, but, if so, Fate took a while to get it going.

  Nicholas saw Jane once when she did not see him. In November of his junior year he was watching a Sock and Buskin production of The Nights of Jason Weekes, a play set in Mississippi with conventionally decadent characters. Along with the alcoholic father, satyric brother, sapphist sister, and schizophrenic mother there was a sharecropper’s daughter, a slut named Delia. Delia wore an appropriately sluttish costume, a tight slit skirt and a revealing blouse loosely laced up the bodice, and behaved like the archetypical lust-driven slattern, so it wasn’t until the curtain call that Nicholas realized the whorish girl with the black hair spilling over her bare shoulders was the tight Pembroke grind who’d sat behind him sophomore year.

  Jane was rehearsing Gertrude in the Sock and Buskin production of Hamlet, and since she’d drunk poison moments earlier and was slumped back, dead, in a chair, she did not see Nicholas walk out onto the balcony above the rear of the stage, lean over, and look down the seven feet to the floor. What she heard was the director, Professor Ritter, call out from the first row, “Do you think you can do it?”

  “Just jump?” The voice came from above and behind her. She opened her eyes and twisted her head in time to see the flash of a figure hurtle itself off the balcony and land with a horrible thud in a half crouch two feet behind her. For an instant the figure stood as he had landed, head lowered, hands resting just above his knees, and Jane rushed to him, thinking he’d injured his spine and was paralyzed in that hunched-over position. But just as she reached him he straightened up, so they met almost nose to nose. “Hi,” he said.

  He was so close his breath felt warm on her mouth, an impending kiss. Recognizing him as the cool, handsome boy who’d been in her Social and Intellectual History class, Jane flushed and drew back. “Are you all right?” she asked.

  “Sure,” he said, and stood straight and bounced on the balls of his feet. His eyes were an extraordinary blue tinged with green, and when he offered her a polite smile and turned his eyes to Professor Ritter, she felt as if she’d lost something precious. “Was that what you wanted?” he called to the director.

  Professor Ritter was a giant blob of a man with the low forehead and buck teeth of a village idiot, so his dainty gestures and high-pitched voice seemed false, as if he were constantly giving a corny impersonation of effeminacy. He held his hands together prayer-fashion and rested his chins on top of his fingers. “Perfection. Absolute perfection. Except for one small thing. You forgot to shout, ‘Where is this sight?’ before you jumped. You’re Fortinbras! You’ve only just come upon this dreadful—what have you—carnage in the Danish court and so, in essence, you gasp, What’s happening? and leap down, flinging yourself directly into the center of a world gone mad and, in effect, by your sheer physicalness, provide a hub, a new center of sanity, of wholeness.” The director’s nose was squashed into his face, and his right nostril was much larger than his left.

  “Professor Ritter, really, I’m no actor. I just came here because one of my fraternity brothers hauled me in and said you needed someone to jump and I thought it would be fun—”

  “I need that life-embracing leap into the abyss. Don’t you see that? The man of action, the man of muscle, you—Fortinbras.” Professor Ritter rose. His slacks stretched so tight across his massive thighs the blue flannel seemed the outer layer of his skin. “Don’t you see…? Tell me your name once again.”

  “Nicholas Cobleigh.”

  “Listen to me, Nicholas. Hamlet, who lived the life of the mind, lies dead, and you—you leap in, stripped to the waist, brandishing a sword. You are the embodiment of the life force itself”—the director’s voice climbed to a squeak—“fighting to reassert itself in the midst of this terrible negation.”

  “I’d really like to help,” Nicholas said, “but I’m not good at memorizing.” He put his hands in the back pockets of his khakis; his palms must be sweating. Jane thought the jump had frightened him—none of the company regulars had been willing to try it—but then she realized he was unnerved by being onstage. His eyes darted from Professor Ritter up to the lights, then flickered down to her and then to Hamlet and Laertes, still lying on their backs. “Sorry.” His voice, which she suddenly remembered from class, had had a tantalizing trace of hoarseness. Now it sounded raspy, and it didn’t carry. It seemed only she had heard his apology.

  “You’ll be grand. Alive, muscular, powerful. Take off your shirt. I want to see if you’ll seem credible bare-chested.”

  Nicholas backed away a few steps. One hand moved flat over the top buttons of his yellow cotton shirt. “Isn’t it a little cold in Denmark to go around without a shirt? Anyway, I really don’t think I’m your man. I wouldn’t be able to remember a word, and I’d just clam up. I appreciate—”

  “Jane!” the director barked. “Raise your hand! Do you see that girl? She’ll help you with your lines. You’ll be splendid. The quintessential warrior king. Now take off your shirt.”

  �
�How can I feel horror?” Nicholas asked. “I know you’re not dead.”

  “Of course I’m not dead,” Jane said. “Not that Ritter wouldn’t love it. He’s a fiend for authenticity. He wanted us to throw up onstage after we drink the poison, but we finally talked him out of that. I mean, how can I say ‘The drink, the drink, I am poison’d’ if I have a mouthful of oatmeal? He’s still trying to get us to make disgusting retching noises, but that’s neither here nor there. We’ll probably end up compromising by holding our throats and gagging a few times. That’s show business. Anyway, what was your question?”

  She was not what Nicholas had expected. At the director’s insistence, he’d made an appointment to meet her the following morning, on the Faunce House porch, and although she didn’t seem the black stockings–white lipstick–beatnik type, her tallness and powerful features—the long nose, large mouth, and square jaw—made him think she’d have an overbearing personality. He imagined her booming voice. Most likely she’d be hyperintellectual and condescending. Or she’d be pretentious, calling him “my dear” or waving a cigarette in a holder beneath his nose. He’d regretted arranging to meet her at so public a place, because she probably had a brash laugh and would make sweeping, theatrical gestures that would attract attention.

  Instead, she was reassuring and friendly, telling him his cooperation had saved Professor Ritter from his monthly psychotic episode and how everyone appreciated what a good sport he was. She had a wide smile that showed most of her teeth, and its openness went well with her midwestern accent.

  Her friendliness was tempered with awkwardness or shyness. They walked from Faunce House to the campus and sat under an oak whose leaves had just begun their autumn fade from green to brown, and she avoided looking at him, gazing instead through the branches or over at a touch football game under way across campus. She fiddled with the pages of her worn paperback Hamlet. She crossed and uncrossed her legs, which were far too long for the Bermuda shorts she was wearing, and played with her long braid, bringing it over her shoulder and brushing it against her cheek. Between bursts of chatter, her fingers floated up to cover her mouth.

  “My question was, how do I act shocked that all of you are lying around dead when you’re not dead?”

  “Think dead.”

  “Come on.”

  “I mean it. You look down from the balcony…. Don’t you get scared looking down from that height?”

  “It’s really not that high.”

  “Anything over three inches is high. Anyway, you look down and what do you see?”

  “I don’t know. A bunch of students pretending to be dead.”

  “No! You see the king and queen—that’s me, so it’s really profoundly tragic—and Laertes and Hamlet all lying dead. Think about it. Denmark’s political, moral, intellectual, and social leaders are wiped out. The cream of the cream is gone, and now you have to take over the throne.”

  “Good,” Nicholas said.

  “No, it’s not good. That’s the wrong attitude. You’re supposed to be noble, and it’s very déclassé to gloat when the entire royal family of Denmark bites the dust.”

  “Aren’t I supposed to be ambivalent?”

  “Are you kidding?” When she smiled she tilted her head to the side, like a child trying to get another angle on absurd behavior. It was a gesture at odds with her mature appearance. She was big, as tall as Nicholas, and had probably looked like an adult when she was twelve. No youthful bloom could penetrate the darkness of her sallow skin. Even though her sweater was loose, he could see she had heavy, womanly breasts, and then he remembered the play he’d seen her in, where she was half hanging out of her blouse. He stared at her, searching for the wanton character she had played, but all he could see was a big, plain-looking Pembroke girl in a dark green sweater. Although she was studying the ribbing on her knee socks, she must have sensed his staring because her smile flickered. “Do you think Fortinbras feels ambivalent?” she asked.

  “I guess not. The girl I’m pinned to is an English major, and in English literature everybody’s ambivalent. At least according to Diana.”

  “Is she at Pembroke?”

  “No. Wheaton.”

  “Oh.” Jane recuffed the sleeves of her sweater. “Well, anyway, on with the show. Do you see this root here?” She patted a large gnarl on the twisted root beside her. Nicholas nodded. “All right. Pretend it’s Hamlet and he’s dead.”

  “I can’t do that.”

  “Yes, you can. Come on. No one’s going to notice.”

  “They’ll notice if they see me talking to a tree.”

  “Don’t be so self-conscious. Just tuck yourself away in a corner and become Fortinbras. Come on. You’ve read Hamlet. What’s Fortinbras like?”

  “He’s not a major character.”

  “You can play Hamlet next time. Meantime you’re Fortinbras. What’s he like? Come on. Three adjectives.”

  “I feel…all right. Strong, brave, and—I don’t know. Uncomplicated.”

  “What do you mean, uncomplicated?”

  “Do you do this all the time?”

  “Sure.”

  “Isn’t it like playing games?”

  “Sort of.” A triangle of sunlight beamed down between the leaves and shone on Jane’s cheek, brightening her skin to bronze. “It’s a game in that it’s not real. And it’s playing the way children do, when they pretend to be lions or pussycats or fairy princesses. Whatever. But it’s playing for a purpose. It satisfies our need—well, my need, anyway—to be someone else. But it’s more, because I’m not just a child playing games alone. I’m being someone else before other people and they accept me not as Jane Heissenhuber—and Lord knows with my name that’s a blessing—but as another person, a person who inhabits another universe: the play. And the play isn’t just a dream, or a game, something that has no substance. It’s real. It adds something to the audience’s life that wasn’t there before. And I’m an intrinsic part of that process.” She pulled her head back and her face was again shaded, but she smiled. “You don’t get it, do you?”

  “Not really. I mean, I can understand a little why someone else might like to do it, but it’s not for me.” He paused, then added, “Sorry.”

  “That’s okay. How about this? How about doing it just because it’s fun? You know, jumping from balconies and waving a sword and having everyone in the company in your debt forever because you stood between Professor Ritter and existential darkness or whatever he thinks is after him. All right?”

  Her smile was so genuinely nice. He couldn’t think of a way to say no that would save her smile. “All right.”

  “Good. Now talk to the tree. Come on. You’re Fortinbras. Brave and strong and uncomplicated. Shoulders back. Head up. Look down at Hamlet. He’s dead. No more Hamlet. Stare at him. That’s it. Feel the loss and then begin with ‘This quarry.’”

  Nicholas licked his lips. He stared at the bulging root of the oak. “‘This quarry cries on havoc.’ I feel really dumb.”

  “Come on. You’re doing fine.”

  “Where was I? Oh, ‘cries on havoc.’” The root did not change into a Danish prince, but Nicholas became absorbed in the swirls and black speckles on the bark, its thick, jagged texture. The voice that spoke the lines did not feel completely his. “O proud death!/ What feast is toward in thine eternal cell, / That thou so many princes at a shot / So bloodily hast struck?’” He lifted his eyes to Jane. He felt embarrassed.

  “You’re a natural,” she said.

  Jane’s roommate and closest friend, Amelia Thring, was the only other Pembroke student as tall as she. But while Jane appeared strong and substantial, Amelia was so elegantly thin Jane felt she belonged to a different species, the product of the mating of man and swan. (Her father was a Bar Harbor, Maine, policeman; her mother a cashier in a lobster pound.) Amelia, supine on her bed, lit her cigarette with the distinction of a priestess burning incense to her god and dropped the match into the ashtray resting on her stomach as if i
t were part of the ceremony. “I won’t even bother to say I’ve never seen you like this before,” she said to Jane. Then she added, “I’ve never seen you like this before. You’re a wreck.”

  “I know.” Jane sat cross-legged on her bed, resting her head against the wall. “I’ve never felt like this before. It’s like being dead with none of the advantages.”

  “Jane, stop it.”

  “This is the stupidest thing that ever happened to me.”

  “Oh, dear. You’re crying!” Jane wiped her eyes with the back of her hand. Amelia flowed upward from her bed. The cigarette and ashtray seemed to disappear and instead she held a tissue. “Here.” She put it into Jane’s hand and sat beside her on the bed, drawing up her knees so her chin rested on them.

  “It would be one thing if it were just some crush, Amelia. You know, if I just saw him on campus and mooned over him. Or if I had dated him and he broke it off because he wasn’t interested. At least those things have an end. Eventually you stop mooning. Eventually you realize you’ve had all of him you’re going to get and that’s that, and you go on with your life.”

  “Jane, let’s be rational.”

  “Please don’t play psych major now.”

  “Listen to me. There is an end to this. The end is you stop crying and realize he’s pinned. By June he’ll probably be engaged and the following June he’ll be married. He introduced you to her, for heaven’s sake.”

  “If she was beautiful I could have stood it, but she’s just okay. I swear, Amelia, I’d imagined this beauty and there she was, this ordinary nice-looking girl.”

  “Let me get another tissue.”

  “She didn’t let go of his hand the whole time. Just held it in this calm way. I mean, she wasn’t being possessive. Why should she? She didn’t consider me a threat. ‘Diana, this is Jane.’ ‘Jane! I’m so glad to meet you. Nick’s told me you’ve been just marvelous, helping him with his part. I can’t wait to watch him tonight. Oh, and you too. He told me what a fine actress you are.’ And all the time holding his hand.”