Em's Awful Good Fortune

by Marcie Maxfield

  “I’m going to Hong Kong,” I said. Just me. No kids, no husband.

  Why Hong Kong? They all wanted to know. Even for expats with loads of frequent-flier miles, Asia was exotic. That’s when the poet put his head in my lap and said he’d never been to Hong Kong. His hair was soft and feathery.

  “Do you want company?” he asked.

  It may have been the most romantic gesture anyone has ever made in the history of me.

  HONG KONG

  For the record, Hong Kong wasn’t my idea. I never wanted to go there. But nobody remembers that, not Gee or his mother; they remember only that I went. Or, rather, who I went with. Which is funny, when you think about it, because it was their idea in the first place; they shipped me off to Hong Kong and then when their plan backfired, boy, were they pissed.

  “Oh, but you must go!” That’s what Milly said when I told her that Andra was living in HK with the dot-com boyfriend. I was just making polite conversation. I didn’t feel like talking about Gee’s job, the kids, or the eighty-five different types of cheese they sold at the fromagerie on our market street, which was the sort of thing my mother-in-law liked to hear about when she called. Only I wasn’t in the mood to humor her. Instead, I offered this innocent piece of gossip: Andra had just moved to Hong Kong with her boyfriend.

  She swooped down on that like a hawk, insisting that I visit Andra, offering to watch the kiddies while I was away, like she’d be doing me a huge favor. Milly is the type of woman who always manages to make getting exactly what she wants seem like she’s doing you a big favor. Truth is, she was dying to come to Paris. She’s a total Francophile. The whole family is a bunch of snooty foodies, going on about the rôti chicken from Chez l’Ami Louis, that restaurant you have to book three months to the day in advance, insanely overrated, all the presidents go there … plus Gee’s family.

  “So, you’re going to Hong Kong,” Gee said, like it was a done deal, when he walked through the door that night.

  This was my mother-in-law’s version of the telephone game; I told Gee’s mom that Andra had moved to Hong Kong; she hung up on me and immediately called Gee at work to inform him that his wife wanted to visit her best friend in Hong Kong. Before you knew it, he was emailing me to ask when, not if, I wanted to go. Milly was already packing her bags. Now my not wanting to go to Hong Kong made me seem unappreciative.

  “What’s with your mom insisting I go to Hong Kong?” I asked Gee.

  “She’s not comfortable around you,” he said, “and you know how she can be. She just wants to come to Paris and spend time with the kids, and it would be easier if you weren’t here, that’s all.” Gee can make anything sound reasonable, even kicking his wife out of the apartment so that his mother could iron his shirts and poach eggs for their kids. And it was his apartment, after all, paid for by his job. I was just the glorified nanny. There were times when I felt like a first wife in the making, like his side of the family was just waiting for me to get fed up enough to walk out.

  Here’s the thing about my mother-in-law: Everyone loved her. Andra loved her, thought she was arty, always in the kitchen, making something divine, or snatching up conversation pieces at Goodwill for next to nothing, a fake fur vest or some totally au courant military jacket. She didn’t see the cunning side of Milly. No one did. And no one understood why Milly had a bee in her bonnet about me. Me neither. I mean, you can’t hate your daughter-in-law for not being a good cook; it’s a demerit but not a deal breaker. It had to be something deeper and more substantial, like she didn’t think I was good enough for her son. Or maybe Milly didn’t like how after Gee met me, it was all over for her. And after I moved to California, it was set in stone: Her precious son was never coming home to Mommy.

  “Em,” Gee said, “don’t make this into a big thing.”

  “But it is a big thing. Getting kicked out of the house by your mother-in-law is the definition of ‘big thing.’”

  “You’re exaggerating,” he said. “You’re not getting kicked out; you’re going on a trip, it’s a vacation, and it’s only a week. The two of you,” he muttered under his breath, but loud enough so I could hear, acting like he was in the middle of a catfight.

  I gave him the side-eye, a look that said, How long will it take for you to choose sides? How long before your allegiance shifts from your mother to your wife? The answer was that it should have happened already.

  “You’ll have fun,” he said. “Besides, we’ve got miles.”

  I was telling this story at Jerry’s blood-type dinner party—about how my mother-in-law wouldn’t visit us in Paris unless I vacated the premises, not just out of town but off the continent, on the other side of the world—milking it for all it was worth: the mother-in-law from hell and the bonus trip to China. That’s when the poet put his head in my lap and said, “I’ll come to Hong Kong with you.”

  We were sitting on the floor of Jerry’s apartment in Neuilly-sur-Seine with the marble foyer and stone fireplace, listening to Ménélik. I like French rap, maybe because I can’t understand the lyrics. It’s like watching protesters march in Place de la République, which happened pretty regularly, the view from inside the expat bubble, no skin in the game, no real comprehension of the rage that boiled just below the surface. Protest as a kind of performance art, a visual experience, colorful signs floating by the café window. Unlike my mother-in-law—her, I understood. I knew exactly what she meant when she said, “Oh, but you must go!”

  A few months later, we were having dinner at Chez Pierrot on Rue Étienne Marcel with Gee’s parents for their last night in Paris. It was my favorite restaurant, not fancy, not touristy. Gee told me the plan when he met me at Charles de Gaulle after my trip to Hong Kong, holding a bouquet of flowers. Like nothing had happened. Even though he read my emails and journals and maybe even found the mix tape I made Bleu and left in the tape player by accident.

  Cheaters always get caught—that’s what Andra says. A few years ago, before the dot-com boyfriend, she and I were lying on her ex-boyfriend’s bed. The plan was just to return her key to his place—open the door to his apartment and drop it in a bowl on the table. But then one thing led to another and we started snooping around. Andra found some photos of the ex with his new girlfriend (they were in Big Bear for the weekend); then I peeked in his closet and found some of the girlfriend’s clothes and decided to try them on. She had one of those dresses that buttoned down the front like a shirt.

  “She must be preppy.” Andra smirked. We raided his fridge for beer and collapsed on his bed, laughing. Me in his new girlfriend’s dress, Andra staring at a picture of him and the new girlfriend, getting righteously pissed.

  That’s when she said, “Cheaters always get caught.”

  Technically, he wasn’t cheating on Andra—he had moved on. But still, she felt cheated. And I wasn’t really cheating on Gee, either; “cheating” makes it sound like I was sneaking around, hiding the evidence. This wasn’t cheating; this was more like Fuck you and how does it feel?

  “I’m leaving you a painting in my will,” Gee’s mom announced at that now infamous Chez Pierrot dinner.

  “Oh,” I said, “which one?” Did I mention that the in-laws are collectors of sorts? Nothing worth much, but very art-school interesting.

  “The one you admired last time you visited, darling, with the big, ballsy woman in the red slip, sitting on a chair, legs spread, smoking a cigarette.”

  I didn’t even remember that painting, let alone ever saying that I liked it, but now it took on a whole new meaning. It was the Jezebel painting. I took a slug of wine; it was good, too, bloodred, robust. She’s got some nerve, I was thinking, but here’s what I said, what any good daughter-in-law would say in a situation like that: “Thank you very much, but I hope I don’t inherit that painting for a very long time.”

  “Liar,” she spat at me. Years of venom flew across haricots verts and foie gras. For a moment, time stopped. No one said anything. It was like the cat was finally out o
f the bag, sitting on the table for everyone to see. And it was mangy and ragged and stinky. Pus and crud. I opened my purse, pulled out a vial of Xanax right in front of the whole nasty lot of them, washed it down with a gulp of wine, and smiled. Didn’t even try to hide it. Didn’t excuse myself to go to the WC and discreetly take a chill pill like a lady.

  According to her ad in FUSAC, the English-language expat weekly, DeeDee was a life coach, diet guru, and marriage counselor, but I called her the Divorce Doctor, on account of the fact that the first time we met, she said 85 percent of couples who seek counseling are really there to negotiate a divorce.

  “Why are you here?” she asked us.

  “We’re in the 15 percent,” Gee responded immediately.

  I wasn’t so sure. If you need to negotiate how to split the chores, who cooks, who takes out the trash, who pays the bills, and how much money to spend or save, I get the whole marriage-counseling thing. But how was a marriage counselor going to help if you didn’t like the flat, nasal sound of your husband’s voice, or the way he walked with a forward tilt like he was always in a hurry and you were the one holding him back? I just wanted them all to leave me alone and let me hang out with the poet until I got bored. Was that asking too much?

  “You’re always trying to get me to give things up,” I said.

  “Like what?” Gee asked.

  “Like my friends, my sense of community, my job; like our house in Los Angeles on stilts with a view of the canyon. That house was everything, and now you want me to give up Bleu.”

  “Maybe you need some time on your own,” DeeDee suggested.

  DeeDee’s living room doubled as her office. It was very bougie: pastel colors and plump cushions. She had boxes of tissues everywhere—on the coffee table, on both sides of the couch, in the loo. It was like she wanted her clients to cry.

  “You could use a dartboard around here,” I told her.

  “Typically,” she said, “in situations like this, when one partner is having an affair, I request that he or she put that on hold while we work together on the marriage. Are you willing to do that?”

  “Um, not really.”

  “Em, I know you’re angry,” Gee said, “but we need to deal with this. Please, I’m begging you.”

  “Oh, so now you believe in therapy. When you came home from Japan, stinking of that woman you fucked over there, you wouldn’t have any part of it. I had to go solo to marriage counseling. Do you know how that feels, sitting there next to an empty chair, pointing at the air where your husband should be?”

  “It sounds like you have reason to be angry,” DeeDee said.

  “Not angry. It’s just funny how he’s all about therapy now, now that I’ve found someone else, someone to talk to, someone who has time to spend with me.”

  “That’s because your loser boyfriend doesn’t have a job,” Gee said.

  “Neither do I,” I pointed out. “Anyway, he’s a poet. And he works. Sure, he doesn’t make the big corporate bucks, but it’s not all about the money.”

  “Easy for you to say when you’re living off my income.”

  “What choice do I have? My passport is stamped non travaille pas.”

  “What do you both want?” DeeDee asked. “I tell my clients they have to figure out their personal bottom line. For some it’s sex; for others it’s money. Family. Love. Work. Intimacy. Security. What’s your bottom line?”

  “I want my wife back,” Gee said.

  “I want my life back,” I replied.

  I was staring at the wall, at this picture of nothing, just cool grays and soft pinks, lines, brushstrokes, colors swirling. It was meant to be generic and calming, but it pissed me off. Her art sucked. I sucked. I sucked as a tagalong wife. I was sucking it up and blowing it up all at the same time.

  “I agreed to one year in Paris, and it turned into four,” I said.

  Sacrifice. Compromise. I had no identity. I looked in the mirror and saw my mother. The poet saw me. Not a partner who would handle the logistics of an overseas post; not a tagalong spouse to take care of the kids and keep house. He saw me as a woman. And also, and especially, as a writer. It wasn’t even about the sex with Bleu; it was all about the cigarette after. The whole affair was like an extended postcoital smoke, meeting at cafés, talking for hours, dissecting everything: my marriage, his money problems, my writing. He loved my voice, the one on paper. It was like talking to someone wearing mirrored shades and seeing an enhanced version of yourself reflected back at you through their eyes.

  “I feel betrayed,” Gee said.

  “Let’s talk about Gee’s feelings of betrayal—”

  “The real betrayal,” I interrupted, “is the one year that turned into four.”

  “That’s a good place to start. Gee, can you hear what she’s saying?”

  “I want to. But I have a motherfucking full-time job, I have deadlines hanging over my head, we are FUBAR—fucked up beyond all repair, over budget, on a tight schedule—and just coming here once a week in the middle of a workday puts me further behind. If I don’t pull this project out of my ass, there will be no more expat package, no more fancy apartment in the Marais, her sitting in cafés all day.”

  “Can you see that he’s under pressure, Em?”

  “This was his choice, not mine. I would have preferred that we stay in LA, both of us working and raising the kids.”

  “I don’t get gigs in Los Angeles, Em. I go where the gigs are.”

  “I’d like to circle back to Bleu. Can you put that on hold while we work on your marriage?”

  “You’re both being so puritanical,” I said. “This is Paris. Doesn’t everyone take a lover?”

  “Em …”

  “Yes, Gee?”

  “I can’t deal with this right now.”

  “I know. But I can’t give this up, I can’t give up one more thing; it feels like huge chunks have been carved out of me and I’m just trying to fill the holes.”

  “Maybe you should move out,” DeeDee suggested. And I could see her point. I mean, I couldn’t very well kick Gee out, since his company was paying for our place.

  Bleu thought it was a good idea for me to rent a studio. Jerry hooked me up with her real estate agent, and the three of us went looking for an apartment. We found a flat above a bakery on Rue Charlot—rhymes with “low”; the t is silent. Looks like “Harlot,” but with a C. Every time I turned down my street, my mind said Rue Charlow; see “Harlot.” Like a footnote.

  I started to panic right there in the apartment with the real estate agent. Jerry and Bleu were checking out the kitchen and asking about rent. First and last.

  “How many months do you want, Em?”

  “Huh?” I hadn’t heard a word; it was all noise and no kids.

  Bleu came up behind me, put his arms around me, whispered in my ear, in that late-night jazz-musician voice, all rhythm and tone, “It’ll be all right; everything is okay.”

  “You’re in love, aren’t you,” Jerry said. It wasn’t a question; it was more like a statement, maybe even an accusation: You’re not just fooling around; you’re not like that, are you? You’re not that kind of woman.

  But what if I am? That’s what I was thinking, because I wasn’t sure. I might just have been bored out of my mind and trying to claim something for myself from the French experience, something other than learning how to buy jambon at the marché. It was all happening so fast, it felt like being on a people mover. The path was in motion, but my feet were not actually taking any steps. I couldn’t stop, jump off, or turn around. I wanted to close my eyes and make it all go away, all of them: Gee, Jerry, Bleu. I just really wanted to be alone. So maybe DeeDee was right about something.

  I called the apartment Camp Mom, hoping it would sound fun, hoping to fool the kids into thinking it was a mini-vacation—like that was a thing, all the cool moms were doing it when they got tired or crazy and couldn’t think straight or breathe anymore. But the kids didn’t buy that for a minute. Kids are no
t stupid.

  “You’re too old for camp,” Rio said.

  “Where’s the canoe?” Ruby asked.

  Camp Mom was shoebox-small, the bed hung like a cloud suspended from the ceiling over a futon couch. The kids loved that the first and only time they slept over. I joked that you could pee, wash your hair, and make coffee at the same time. Camp Mom was close enough to our apartment that I could walk home, make the kids breakfast in the morning, take them to school, pick them up after school, feed them dinner, help with their homework, put them to bed, and then wait. For Gee to come home from work—which was always late, intentionally late. After dinner in Montparnasse; after drinks at the dart bar; after Pari Roller, the Friday-night skate that started at ten o’clock and went until morning. Getting my own place turned out to be more about Gee’s gaining his freedom than about my having space. I was shackled to the kids.