by Susan Isaacs
“Pam, there’s no reason why you have to eat tuna fish five nights a week.”
“There is a reason. I have very little money. It’s no shame. Someday I’ll have my doctorate. I’ll be working. And I won’t ever eat tuna again.” She paused. “That sounds like Gone With the Wind: ‘I’ll never be hungry again.’”
“Pamela, indulge me. Let me be selfish. I don’t like floors. I don’t like narrow, lumpy beds. I happen to hate tuna fish almost as much as I hate oregano. So please, let me find us a place.”
“Nicholas, I’m so confused.”
“There’s nothing to be confused about,” he said. He took her face between his hands and brought it close to his. She flushed. He couldn’t wait to make love to her again and again kissing her cheeks, her forehead. “I want to be happy with you. That’s all. Please let me.”
27
Cobleigh Coma?
NBC Quakes
—Variety headline
Sexual heat takes six months to dissipate. At least that’s what an article Jane read said. Lovers can endure only six months of the hell-heaven of lust, of seething with unceasing desire. A half year of obsession and swollen genitalia is all any two people are permitted. Then the ego saves itself from incineration; after those six months comes peace. The flesh cools and the lovers part. Or passion chills into mere proficient sex and the mindless pawing, screaming need for each other becomes companionship.
Jane read the article when her affair was eight months old and knew it was wrong. Her appetite for her lover was not merely insatiable; it grew after each encounter, so that there came a time when nothing in her life besides Judson Fullerton could satisfy her. Not only satisfy her but interest her.
On March 10, 1979, on her thirty-ninth birthday, she sat at her in-laws’ dining room table between her daughters and tried not to hear them. She, the celebrated housewife and mother, wished her children gone. Brilliant, intense Victoria—tall, large-boned, somber—at sixteen and a half a freshman at Brown. Adoring Elizabeth—big eyed, fluffy-haired, short, and voluptuous (an anglicized version of her grandmother Sally)—in her third year at prep school, a little more than fourteen and eager to try to enumerate the innumerable virtues of her sixteen-year-old boyfriend. The girls kept at her: Mom, did you read my Congreve paper? Mommy, were you surprised to see us? Mom, did you know Congreve had a daughter by the Duchess of Marlborough? Mommy, David’s Bernese mountain dog—her name is Snickerdoodle—she’s pregnant and not by a Bernese mountain dog. They think by a Labrador.
The role of mother was being thrust upon her. She did not wish to play it, it was tired and trite, but she forced herself to go through the motions. Smile, nod, speak of Congreve to Victoria, smile even more broadly and ruffle Elizabeth’s hair. There had been a time when she relished reading Victoria’s spelling test, when she knew the names of all Elizabeth’s friends’ dogs and cats.
Jane stared into the small, upright flames of the slow-burning creamy tapers in the silver candlesticks, barely even seeing Nicholas, who sat in dimness across the table. She only wanted to be alone and think of Judson.
They met two or three times a week. On Wednesday nights in his Manhattan studio and early evenings in his office in Connecticut. She commuted when Judson did, regardless of where Nicholas was. I’ll be in New York today, she’d lie. I have research to do for the Op-Ed piece for the Times. I guess I’ll sleep in the apartment. Nicholas was either in Manhattan or out on the eastern end of Long Island, working on the film he’d be shooting that summer, and was so embroiled he barely listened to her lies. Several Wednesday nights he’d left messages saying he was staying out on the Island overnight, so she’d spent the night at Judson’s, the two of them on that narrow sofa-bed, getting up sore the next morning from too little room and too much sex. We’re too old for this, she’d said, but they couldn’t seem to get enough. She’d been with Judson the previous evening in Connecticut.
“Mom, have you ever seen a production of The Way of the World?”
Jane started. “What? Oh. No, Vicky. Just Love for Love.”
The night before, Judson had set her, naked, on the cold glass top of his office desk and he’d lain on the floor beneath, directing her into different postures. Flat on your stomach. Come on. Now sit up with your legs over the edge. Every time she became self-conscious and tried to cover some part of herself from view, Judson would knock on the glass and say, Stop that.
“Nicholas,” James said. “A toast to Jane.”
She recalled how her face had flushed. She’d sat on the desk with her legs as far apart as she could get them. Jane closed her eyes. She wanted to remember exactly how Judson had gazed up, studying her, how he’d traced her labia on his side of the glass.
Nicholas’s chair shuffled against the rug. She opened her eyes and saw him rising. “To Jane,” Nicholas began. He paused for a moment, trying to think of something to say.
Later, she’d lain back flat on the glass. So cold on her back. Hard on her head. Judson had stood by the desk, wrapped her legs high around his waist, and entered her slowly.
“This isn’t the big one yet,” Nicholas said, “but thirty-nine does deserve attention.” It was his Academy Awards voice, strong and falsely pleased to be present on such a grand occasion.
Judson was so big, and he penetrated deep into her. She’d had nothing to grab on to. She’d clawed at the glass.
“From all of us, Jane—” Past the bright light of the candles, she saw Nicholas’s shirtfront. He was holding his wineglass directly in front of him. “All the best.”
Judson had stayed inside her for nearly a half hour, moving in and out. She’d watched the red root of his penis slide into her over and over.
There was silence at the table. Nicholas had finished and was sitting down.
She lifted her glass and tilted it slightly toward Nicholas. “Thank you,” she said. “All of you.” But Nicholas was no longer looking at her. He’d begun talking again with his sister Abby, the only Cobleigh offspring who had done what James had expected from his four sons: become a lawyer. Abby’s boyfriend, another lawyer, sat on the other side of Nicholas; he was so unnerved by Nicholas’s presence, the apartment, the maids, or perhaps by everything that three times his food had fallen from his fork to the rug on the way to his mouth. That had happened once to her in the beginning, but Jane didn’t care about him or his discomfort. She wished he, all of them, would just go away. She looked back into the candle flame, skimming through the previous night, trying to find her place.
Judson. During intercourse he’d rubbed her clitoris with his finger, so she had orgasm after orgasm, each set of contractions drawing him farther into her.
Kiss me goodbye, Judson, she’d said. He’d given her a perfunctory kiss, the sort a man gives to his wife as he leaves for the office. See you Wednesday at five thirty, he’d said.
He’d been rushed. They’d stayed even longer than usual. His wife had invited her parents for dinner.
Judson had been married for twenty-five years. All she knew about his wife was that her name was Virginia, she was called Ginny, and she was a strong swimmer. She swam two miles every day. What does she do? Jane had asked, and he answered, She swims. He’d also answered that she was forty-seven and she’d never been able to conceive. How come you never adopted? Jane asked. He’d shrugged. That was before Jane realized Judson had given her all the information she was going to get. He talked to her about business: They want you to address the Middle Atlantic Phobia Conference. Business and sex. He’d walked her to her car and said, Next time, no intercourse. We’ll just go down on each other the whole night. All right? He didn’t want to talk about anything else.
“David’s mother speaks Russian,” Elizabeth was saying.
“Really,” Jane breathed.
“Does she read it?” Victoria demanded, leaning across Jane.
“I don’t know,” Elizabeth said.
“Don’t you ask?” Victoria’s tone was brittle.
“I’ll ask if you want me to.”
“Oh, forget it, Liz. It’s not for me. It’s for you.”
“For me?” Elizabeth asked.
“You really don’t have an ounce of intellectual curiosity, do you?”
“Girls,” Jane said. “Please.”
Judson wouldn’t talk about Ginny. Was he happy with her, she’d asked, and he’d said, Jane, what’s the point of this? The point is, I want to know where I fit into your life. You know how much I care about you, he’d replied, giving her one of his voluptuous kisses. But neither of us is ready to make any changes yet, are we? God, you have a wonderful mouth.
But they never really talked. And they never did anything together besides have sex. Can’t we go out for a drink? she’d pleaded. Jane, you’re too public. People will recognize you. But they won’t know we’re—she’d begun. Jane, he sighed, stop that. Don’t you think it’s hard on me too? I should have followed my instincts, she’d told him. Gone to a Jewish psychiatrist. At least if I’d taken up with one, I’d get some conversation and a corned beef sandwich. If you feel I’m not giving you what you need, Jane…No, she said, I just wish we could go someplace besides your apartment and your office. He hadn’t responded.
He wasn’t that cautious with his wife. He would tell Jane he’d have to be home by seven, then stay with her in his office until eight thirty or nine, letting his answering machine respond to the ringing phone. She couldn’t tell whether Ginny knew or not. Once Ginny had called when she and Judson were in Manhattan and he’d said, Ginny, is this an emergency? He waited, tapping his fingers on the hard surface of the table. I told you, this is my time to be alone. Please don’t call me here. Does Ginny know? she’d asked him once. He told her he didn’t think that sort of discussion was appropriate. This is between you and me, Jane. Let’s leave her out of this. She doesn’t belong.
He was willing to speak about Nicholas, although it was always in a sexual context. Did he ever do this to you? Judson would ask. Did he ever go like this? Did he ever try this? Is he as big as I am? Judson, please, she’d said. Is he? No. No, he isn’t. What’s the longest he’s ever fucked you for? You never came with him? No. The world’s great sex god never made you come? Judson…Did he? No, I told you. He never made me come. Only you.
Judson said little about himself. He was born in Maine, near the Quebec border, and put himself through college and medical school. His father had owned a liquor store. Was he nice? Not particularly, Judson said. Why are you so closed-mouthed about your past? That’s just the way I am. Jane, maybe I’m wrong for you. Maybe you need someone who’s more forthcoming. No, no. I was just wondering, that’s all.
“James.” Winifred beamed at her husband across the table. “Isn’t Jane’s new bracelet dazzling?”
“Very nice,” James said.
Winifred turned to Jane. “Did Nicholas surprise you with it today?”
“Yes.” She smiled. Two days before, Nicholas had told her to go to Cartier and pick out something for her birthday. She hadn’t even been hurt. She’d selected a thin gold bangle thick with diamonds and sapphires, something he’d dismiss as too garish. “Doesn’t Nick have wonderful taste?” Jane asked, holding up her wrist. For a moment, Nicholas stopped talking to his sister and stared across the table at her. She picked up her wine and drank deeply, concentrating on the convoluted crystal stem of the goblet.
Judson. After the first night, they’d never even had a glass of wine together. Once she’d brought a bottle to his studio. He’d put it on ice, and then they’d forgotten it.
If you don’t want to talk about your father, she’d asked, can we talk about my father? She’d been thinking of Richard a great deal lately. Could a man sire a child, watch her grow up in his house, and not care about her? Not care a thing? Have a child and not call her or write to her in over seventeen years? Was it because of what she’d let him do to her?
The psychiatrists were wrong; some things should not be thought of. Maybe her father had loved her. Maybe he had loved her too much.
Then how could he have let Dorothy hammer her into the ground? Every sour thought prefaced with an endearment: Jane, dear…Her father must have known. He must have felt the hate. Of course he had. He and Dorothy were collaborators. Richard, this girl has been so bad. You must do something. Upstairs.
Judson, please listen. My father. He did all kinds of things. When I was in high school he used to get into my bed—
Jane—
Please. And before that, when I was younger, he’d take me up to his room and pull down my pants—
Jane, stop it. I’m not your psychiatrist any more.
Judson, I know, but I want to tell you—
I gave you the names of some good men who—
Judson, please, please. I have no one to talk to, to tell this to. I’ve never told anyone and I keep thinking about it and wondering—
Jane, you’re making it very difficult for me.
I just want to talk to you. Person to person. Not patient to psychiatrist. Don’t you understand? Who else can I talk to?
You know who you can talk to. Jane, stop it. You’re being highly manipulative. You know that. I’m the last person you should be talking to—
Judson!
—unless this is an attempt to drag your father into bed with us.
No! I swear it!
Okay, then let’s drop it. Come here. Let me hold you. Easy.
Don’t you care about me?
Of course I care. Slow breaths now. Not too deep. That’s right. Are you feeling better?
I’m sorry.
That’s all right. Come on now, calm down. Calm down. Go get a tissue. Did he force you to have intercourse with him?
No.
Did he make you perform fellatio?
No. Nothing like that. But he—
These things happen more frequently than you would imagine. Are you calmer now? Then let’s put the matter aside.
“Mommy?”
“What, Liz?”
“Are you having a mid-life crisis?”
“Elizabeth!” Winifred said. “Where did you hear such nonsense?”
“Mommy’s so quiet,” Elizabeth said. “Quiet and flaky. And it’s her birthday. It happens all the time. Thirty-five to forty. Ask any psychiatrist. David’s mother had one. She took too many diet pills and had to go to the hospital to get off them. Then she got better and had a face lift, but you can’t tell anyone about it.”
Jane looked down the table to her mother-in-law and smiled. “Who knows? Maybe I am having a small crisis,” she said. “I can probably get by with a nose job and mild catatonia.”
“Not you, Jane,” Winifred said, beaming back. “Your bad times are behind you. Aren’t they, Nicholas?”
Barbara Hayes, the producer of Talk, looked intimidating. She was nearly as tall as Jane but much larger-boned, although she had absolutely no fat. Her body and face were entirely angular, as if she’d been assembled from an assortment of geometric pieces; her cheekbones were so high and pronounced they could be columnar implants of silicone, her nose an acute triangle. She was black, and her dark skin had a red underglow. The four times Jane had seen her she’d worn man-tailored shirts with black ribbon ties, pin-striped suits, and a large, expensive man’s gold watch. Her hair was cropped close to her head. Her only feminine attributes were high-heeled shoes and a slit in her straight skirt, halfway up her thigh, although the bulging, spherical muscle of her calf diminished the slit’s effect; even Nicholas didn’t have a muscle like that.
But even though intimidating, she was engaging, Jane thought, one of those behind-the scenes people in television and films so incorrigibly charming and well-bred she made everyone believe the talk of the entertainment industry’s being crass was just vicious gossip. “Look at them look at us,” she said to Jane as they entered the restaurant. The businessmen were looking at them. “We are tall, but they’re staring as if we’re the first wave of the Invasion of the Amazons.” She’d smil
ed. She seemed to use her smile as she did her charm: when it was necessary. Jane felt relieved that Barbara thought it necessary to charm her.
Barbara was obviously well known in the midtown restaurant where they were having lunch. Finger signals brought waiters in tight bolero jackets scurrying to provide a second round of drinks, the menus. She smiled again at Jane. “I suppose you’re wondering why I asked you to lunch.”
Jane tried to think of a quick comeback. She couldn’t. “Yes,” she said.
“Every time you’ve been on the show you’ve been a hit. You’re a natural. You were born to be on television.”
“I always wondered why I was born.”
“Now you know. Is your fish all right? Good. Let me get to the point. Gary Clifford is going on vacation for two weeks. We’d like you to guest-host the show for one week.”
Jane stared at her. Barbara Hayes was making small sandwiches of smoked Scottish salmon, sprinkling onions and capers over the top, behaving as if they were having a perfectly normal conversation.
“Me for a week?” It was the only thing Jane could think to say.
“Yes. We’re having Jerry Gallagher from the Today show for the other week. You must have seen him. The one with the freckles.” Jane recalled the man. He looked like a ventriloquist’s dummy. “Very truthfully,” Barbara Hayes went on, “we’re testing the waters.” Jane nodded. “We don’t know if a woman would go in that time slot.” Jane couldn’t think of any adult-sounding questions to ask. But Barbara continued as if she was talking to a mature woman instead of a housewife with too much jewelry who could only think of escaping the conversation and going to the bathroom. Jane had rushed out of the apartment; she wished she’d made time to go. She shifted in her seat. Her bladder was so distended it rubbed against the top of her legs. “Four to six is an iffy time slot. We have housewives, working women just coming home, and men, although they’re only twenty-two percent. The thinking on the host has always been: male, friendly, slightly sexy, but an authority figure.”