Toothpick House

by Lee Lynch

  “Yes, to all three,” Victoria said, still looking into Annie’s eyes.

  “When I was a kid,” Annie went on, “I used to walk down to the football field and across it to the train tracks. I’d walk along them, full of the big feeling of the field I’d crossed and imagine I could just keep walking forward along the tracks and they’d never, never end.” She sighed. “In the summer the grass on the field was so damn green and the tracks stretched into the bluest sky I ever saw. Everything was new and possible. I haven’t felt like that in a long time.” The blush which had left her face now returned as if she had just realized she was saying these things to a perfect stranger.

  Victoria’s smile felt strained, frozen. She wanted to respond to Annie, but couldn’t think of anything to say. She shook her head again, trying to look sympathetic, wanting to tell Annie to go on. Even her name is delicious, she thought, her faded smile returning to her, Annie, Anne, so regal one way, so common the way Annie used it. And herself as Vicky. She never allowed that, but she couldn’t imagine Annie calling her anything else. She wanted to lay her lips on Annie’s fine hair. “I used to lie on the grass and try to feel how big the sky was,” she said finally, remembering Central Park.

  Annie nodded, understanding. She moved to lay her hand again on Victoria’s before she realized that it might be too much, too forward of her. She lifted her cap and brushed her hair back from her forehead with her sleeve, studying Victoria’s face to fix in her mind what she looked like. Eleanor was right, the face was only partially formed, but Annie yearned to touch the planes and curves of it as they grew, to somehow help mold them. She knew they could not sit and stare at each other any longer, unless she said what was on her mind. Was it too soon? She did not even know if the woman was gay. Annie made an abrupt movement to bring her mug to her lips. Then she swung it out in a toast. “To the sky.”

  Victoria lifted her mug too. “To the tracks.”

  “Like it?” Annie asked.

  Victoria made a face. “Kind of bitter. What kind is it?”

  “Oh, Bud, Miller, Schlitz. Who knows? They all taste the same.”

  “I’ve tasted Heineken before, but I remember it being much creamier.”

  “Maybe you had the dark beer.”

  “Could be,” Victoria agreed. She was thinking of her childhood and of the wonderful feeling she got each time she made a friend and they began to know each other. It was similar to this, but without this sensuality. And each time her parents would uproot her, change her school, or ship her to the relatives on Long Island. After a while she had learned to stop friendships before they mattered. It was just too painful to lose that feeling every time it happened. She had not felt it in years. How could she tell that to Annie, though. Victoria felt the words locked inside her. Against everything she felt, Victoria heard herself say, “I have to join my friends after this, you know. It was rather rude of me to chase them away.” Fool! she called herself. Why was she saying this? Annie’s smile had fallen.

  “I’m sorry to have butted in. I’ve got to get back to work anyway. All I wanted to talk to you about was, well, I acted kind of mad in the cab that day and I didn’t mean to put you off. I didn’t know you were you, if you know what I mean.”

  Victoria remembered Annie’s pale, sleeping face as she had seen it in the cab. And who do you think I am, Anne, she wondered as she tried to think of a response. Out loud she said, “I think I do,” but she had closed up inside, had felt herself snap shut like a trap, an empty trap, tripped by its innocent prey. She was uncomfortable about having been in a gay bar and the meaning of her presence there to Annie. And her own feelings had begun to frighten her.

  Annie felt Victoria’s distance. She had started moving; buttoning and unbuttoning her jacket, neatening the table, looking at Victoria and then away. “Do you think,” she stuttered, knowing that she was going about it all wrong, scaring Victoria even worse, “do you think you might like to meet me for dinner sometime?” Victoria was silent. “Maybe Wednesday night?” Annie tried to keep the plea out of her voice and sound reassuring. “We could meet at Yale. Go to The Pub.”

  Victoria was lightheaded with anxiety, but even more afraid of the yawning despair that grew inside her as she began to make an excuse and say no. “All right,” she said, “Yes, I’d like that.”

  “Seven okay? Here and we’ll walk over?” Annie asked. When she saw Victoria’s nod, her attempt at a smile, that was enough for her. She rushed away, almost upsetting the same chair Claudia had tipped over, escaping like a scared rabbit out the door. Behind her she had left the remains of her own image. She was just Annie Heaphy scurrying away, leaving her fate in the hands of that beautiful woman. She would never be able to see herself as a cool butch again. Her cab, when she reached it, looked huge, too big for her to handle. She slid into the driver’s seat and slumped for awhile to recover a fragment of her composure. Behind her also she had left a relieved and apprehensive Victoria. A Victoria who held the promised dinner to herself like a lifebuoy.

  Chapter Five

  They paused at The Pub’s entrance, adjusting their eyes to its darkness as they waited to be shown to a booth. A young man in sharply creased black pants, a white shirt and black tie walked toward them with quick, tiny steps. “Hiya, Sonny,” Annie grinned.

  “Annie, sweetheart, aren’t you on the wrong side?” Sonny asked, raising his eyebrows to see her in the restaurant and not the gay bar that was its complement.

  “Not tonight, Sonny,” Annie answered, glancing, embarrassed, toward Victoria.

  “Oh, I see. Come with me ladies,” he winked at Annie, turning to lead them to the last booth. He set wine lists and menus before them as they slid in. “Enjoy your evening—and your dinner.” Victoria faced the back glass wall of the restaurant and noticed the blueness of the winter twilight fading as it would from her imagined skylight. She ran her hands along her thighs, feeling the softness that had come into her new jeans as she washed them. Annie’s face was glowing in the dim light of their table when she turned back to her.

  “Sonny’s a Yalie, too,” Annie said. “But he wants to be a dancer. His father’s some bigshot out west and won’t hear of it, so Sonny’s working, trying to flunk out and save money to go to New York. Poor guy. His father could probably buy him a ballet company. But he’s got guts. Hey,” she smiled mischievously, “want a yard of ale?” She knew that she was rambling out of nervousness, but went on, pointing to a printed card propped under the yellow lamp that barely lit their table.

  Victoria looked at Annie as if to decide whether she was joking and laughed. “May I suggest instead that we see if they have any wines we’d like?” and immediately became frightened Annie would feel rejected by her decision.

  “Sure,” Annie smiled timidly. She set her cap toward the back of her head and admitted, “I don’t know much about wine. Outside of the old standbys.”

  “Well, I’ll tell you what I know and you tell me what the old standbys are.”

  “That’s easy: Almaden, Mateus, the popular ones. I used to like Catawba Pink. But that,” Annie added emphatically, “was because of Thomas Wolfe.”

  “Thomas Wolfe?”

  “Haven’t you read him?” Annie asked, looking surprised and even concerned.

  “I read half of one of his books. Last summer. I bought the paperback that was out. But he’s so—undisciplined.”

  Annie saw the look of distaste on Victoria’s face. “That’s one thing I like about him. I read him in high school and he was like a key to life. He was so full of passion and oh—he made everything sound so beautiful and sad just when I was discovering how beautiful and sad everything is. You know? I mean, I’d go to the Boston Gardens and watch the swanboats go around the pond or ride on one myself when I had the money and everything was lush and bursting, even the boats’ colors, people’s clothing, and we’d get to that part of the ride where the old oriental lantern is—have you been there? And I’d get such a pang of sadness. Like, it’
s all been going on so long, over and over, here and in China and a billion adolescents feeling like I felt and a trillion leaves blooming over and over and it was so full, so much, that it hurt.” Annie paused, the plea for understanding leaving her face as self-consciousness took over. “Anyway, he wrote about a place called Catawba so the wine always held a lot of promise for me.”

  Victoria had been watching Annie intently. “I think I understand,” she said slowly, rubbing her finger across one cheekbone, in a way Annie wished she could. “Or I want to understand and that’s why I’m drawn to you. I sensed your fullness, your love of life, when we first met. I want to feel like that.” Her eyes, to Annie’s surprise, held tears. She was asking Annie to teach her something, just as Annie hoped Vicky would share what she was with her. “Let’s see,” Victoria continued, composing herself quickly (like she’s scared of me, Annie thought), “let’s see what the Pub has to offer.” Annie picked up her list and seemed to devote all her attention to it. Worried that she wasn’t the way Victoria saw her, she shrugged her shoulders to shake off her intensity and match Victoria’s new mood. She lifted her cap and ran her fingers through her hair, then pushed the list toward Victoria. “You pick.”

  “All right. Here’s your Mateus. But do you feel adventurous?” Victoria asked in a tone that sought adventure.

  “Sure,” Annie responded immediately, meeting Victoria’s eyes, ceasing to fidget.

  “They have a few German wines. I had a friend once . . . Ah, Zellar Schwarze Katz. Let’s try theirs.”

  “Zellar which cats?”

  “Schwarze. It’s a Moselle. A white wine. Very dry. Do you think you’d like it?”

  “I love Almaden White Mountain.”

  “Then you may like this,” Victoria smiled gently, almost protectively, at Annie.

  “Are you ready to order dinner?” a smiling, red-haired waitress asked, suddenly appearing in their small circle of light. She broke into a hum after her question.

  “Oh, dinner,” Annie smiled, pulling her cap over her eyes. “Forgot all about dinner,” she scolded Victoria, shaking her head and wagging her finger playfully.

  Victoria laughed. “Why don’t you bring us a bottle of Zeller Schwarze Katz and we’ll give you our order then.”

  The waitress hummed in response, smiling broadly, bobbing her head and writing on her pad as she hummed her way to the bar.

  “I always eat the same thing here,” Annie said. “Is it okay to have steak and kidney pie with white wine?” she whispered, leaning close enough to Victoria to smell a faint perfume.

  “I don’t really know. Kidneys?” Victoria asked, making a face.

  “Yeah. They’re good. My father used to make my mother cook them although she hated them. Listen, you probably love caviar and junk like that.”

  “Why do you assume that?”

  “Oh, it’s a cabbie joke. They call Yalies the Caviar Kids. Anyway, I think that stuff is gross. Fish eggs!”

  “All right,” Victoria laughed. “I like fish eggs. You win. If you let me taste the kidney.”

  “Okay. And I’ll take my chances on the etiquette.”

  “To tell you the truth, Anne,” Victoria took her turn to whisper and leaned closer to Annie, “I don’t really care. I’m not that impressed with the this-enhances-that theory of wine drinking.”

  “You’re not?”

  “No. And to prove it, I’ll have a steak. Oh, my parents would be shocked. But then, they would order French wine.”

  “But you like German better?”

  “Tonight I do.” Victoria answered, glancing quickly at Annie’s lips and feeling herself redden.

  “You started to say something about a friend and German wine before?”

  “Etta. You remind me of her—in spirit.” Victoria paused, feeling the flush covering her neck and face. “Her family is German. She introduced me to the wines. Or, I should say, made me appreciate them.” She looked up when she heard the waitress humming above them. “Ah. Here’s our wine.”

  The waitress, still humming, tipped the open bottle at Annie and poured a half inch into her glass. Annie turned red and stared at it. She pulled off her cap, shrugged and tasted the wine. Then, not looking up, she nodded toward the waitress. Victoria watched Annie’s head come up when the waitress hummed away, sounding like a bee buzzing on to another flower. “I’m sorry,” Annie said. “I know I look like a guy. She’s new here. I hope it didn’t embarrass you.”

  “Oh, is that why she gave it to you to taste?” Victoria asked.

  “That, I guess, plus the goddamned stupid idea that a woman can’t tell if the wine is any good herself and has to be allowed to drink it by a goddamned idiot man.”

  Victoria was shocked by Annie’s sudden bitterness. “You don’t speak in theories, do you?” Annie looked puzzled. “The women who call themselves feminists at school,” Victoria explained, “talk feminist theory till I’m ready to scream. But what you just said and the way you said it, makes feminism more real to me than hours of their talk.”

  “My only theory,” Annie answered, putting her hat back on savagely, “is if you ain’t born one, you ain’t one.”

  “Then let me exercise my birthright and pour the wine. Maybe that will balance out your tasting it.”

  “Perfect. But I ought to learn how to handle that. You know, without getting everybody uptight.”

  Victoria twirled the bottle expertly as she poured. “Graciously? It wouldn’t hurt. Let’s see. How about, ‘Thank you, we’ll finish pouring?’”

  “Hey, how come I can’t think of things like that?” Annie asked, seeking Victoria’s eyes behind their glasses.

  Victoria smiled. “Probably because you speak from your heart against oppression and I speak from my head to gloss things over. I’m good at that sort of thing.”

  Annie stopped watching the wine and frowned toward Victoria, as if concerned about her. “Well,” she said, raising her glass, “I won’t drink to you putting yourself down, but I will drink to something else that’s a fact, not theory.” She paused while Victoria lifted her glass and raised her eyebrows expectantly. “That every woman has it in her heart to say.” Victoria nodded slowly, hating herself for noting the contradiction in Annie’s reasoning, and touched her glass to Annie’s while Annie’s eyes touched hers. They drank. “I feel much less bitter now. Thank you for understanding,” Annie said, shivering as she thought that this dinner which seemed to progress so painfully slowly would remain one of the clearest and most detailed of her memories all her life.

  “No, thank you,” Victoria paused. “Thank you for your insights.”

  “It’s good,” Annie indicated the wine. “Etta has good taste.”

  “Or had. I haven’t seen her for years. Since I came to Yale.” Victoria’s eyes wandered back to the now black window.

  “Hiya, Annie!” a rough voice growled affectionately as a fist shot out in front of Victoria’s line of vision and punched Annie’s upper arm.

  “Hi, Turkey. What are you doing out so early?”

  “Trying to get a head start on you. But you beat me again,” the heavy woman laughed loudly while Annie drained her glass as if to fortify herself.

  “Turkey, this is Vicky,” Annie said slowly, seeming to relish the name. “Vicky, this is Marieanne, but everyone calls her Turkey ‘cause it’s easier. And true!”

  “Hey!” Turkey objected, continuing her banter with Annie while Victoria watched. She recognized Turkey from the bar. Turkey did not stop smiling for a moment and laughed at the end of every sentence. “Join us later if you can,” she laughed to Annie, including Victoria with her eyes.

  “If you’re still on your feet,” Annie laughed back.

  Victoria waved and called, “Nice to meet you,” at the retreating figure that did, with that crest of hair and the heavy-hipped, short-stepped walk, look turkey-like. Annie was watching her face when she looked back.

  “She’s a lot of fun. Do anything for you,” Annie explained as
if she were self-conscious about Turkey. “Don’t worry. I won’t force my crew on you.”

  “Oh, but I’d like to spend some time with —” she hesitated at the name “—Turkey. After we know each other better.” They were both silent for a moment under the promise that seemed to have been made with Victoria’s words.

  Then Annie whispered, “Here comes the Hummer.” Victoria pulled her hair back from her ears and made a show of the humming sound becoming too loud to bear as the waitress came toward them. When Annie unobtrusively pretended to cut off the sound as a conductor would, Victoria burst into laughter. Annie joined her.

  “Ready to order now?” the Hummer asked cheerfully, rolling on the balls of her feet to the jukebox in the bar.

  Annie looked at Victoria. “Yes, yes,” Victoria answered and, wiping tears from her eyes, gave their orders. “That wasn’t fair,” she scolded Annie when the Hummer left.

  “But so true,” Annie defended herself, leaning around the booth to hear her hum out of sight. “So tell me about your German friend who bathed in wine,” she asked, more comfortable now that they had shared something and laughed together.

  “No, no,” Victoria protested laughingly, suddenly realizing the barriers she and Annie had broken down. “God, her family was much too staid to allow that! Although, like me, she was brought up on wine. For Etta, though, it was because her family was newly arrived from Europe while mine has been here so long we’re in the second generation of returning to European customs.”

  “A Mayflower person?”

  “Not quite. Probably a runaway deported English thief. But an early one who learned how to steal legally over here. He probably never drank anything but stout in his life.”