by Alix Strauss
Look at Carol’s mother. Watch her dote on your pregnant friend, one hand resting on her shoulder, the other rubbing small circles over her large belly. Wish someone were resting a nurturing hand around your bloated middle. Consider getting pregnant so people will touch you.
Another month goes by. December finds you at the Four Seasons’ party room, filled with friends, co-workers from the museum, and family. At least fifty people are raising a glass of low-cal champagne and listening to you toast your once-best friend. Yesterday she reached her hundred-pound mark. This is monumental. “To my wonderfully terrific, gorgeous friend and her equally wonderful fiancé.” The words flow easily out of your mouth at Olive’s weight-loss-engagement-party-turned-you-don’t-know-what.
You look at your friend glowing in the praise, wearing clothing purchased in regular stores. Search for familiar gestures: a smirk, the tilt of her head, the way she caresses a glass when she talks. Find none. Now when you develop photos they’re of a stranger. When you look through the lens of your camera, you have trouble locating her, trouble understanding where she’s gone.
Ray has barely said hello to you, and though you tried to strike up a conversation with him, he seemed uninterested in talking. He drank from his beer, rubbed at his goatee, and looked off to the side. Eventually he said he was going out for a smoke.
Find Olive’s parents talking with their friends, and when her mother’s eye catches yours, she smiles, nods her head, and raises a glass in your direction. Then she mouths the words “thank you.” Wish your parents were here. Look around the room hoping to spot them, or Ed. You want that magic moment where he shows up, dressed in a suit, red roses in his hands, and begs for forgiveness. You even find yourself looking for Morgan, thinking perhaps she cares enough to show. That she’ll want to make sure this event runs smoothly, too. So what if she’s a little younger than you. Maybe it’s time to make new friends. Unite with someone over something other than a college connection. She’s clearly reached out to you. So you scan the room again. When you spot no one, feel utterly alone.
Go into the bathroom. It’s tranquil in here. Sleek and slick with its marble floors, long row of sinks, basket of fluffy hand towels, bowl of wrapped mints. Look at yourself in the mirror. Three months of dieting and you look the same. You might possibly look worse. Though you’re wearing your best suit, you still appear pudgy. Your makeup seems to have disappeared, somehow slipped off your face. At closer glance you appear tired, pale, and ghostly.
“Olive looks wonderful, don’t you think?” someone says to you, Laura or Betty or Sally. You can’t remember her name even though you were just introduced. Nod and agree. Watch her reapply lipstick, fix her hair, and leave.
Wait for the bathroom to empty out.
When you are the only person left, go into a stall, preferably one with a sink in it, the one used for wheelchair-bound people. Remove your jacket, make sure your shirt is tucked into your pants, tightly. That your hair is pulled back, is secured by a rubber band. Lift the seat up, inspect the rim. So clean. This is why you like hotels. The anonymity of it all, the traceless marks people don’t leave because someone is always cleaning up after you.
Take a deep breath, lean forward, and stick your index finger down your throat. Gag. The third try produces a gross amount of vomit that floods out of your mouth. Do not stop until you see a brownish yellow. The omelet you ate for lunch. The first bite of food that entered your mouth. Flush and take deep breaths. Listen to see if anyone has entered. It is silent, calm, and you are lucky. Thank God for this favor as you spit the last bit of puke into the fresh bowl of water. Sit on the floor until the shaking stops. Until the throbbing in your head eases. Wish you had water. Next time you’ll remember to bring a glass in with you, or some iced tea. Iced tea would be so nice right now. Talk yourself into believing you can get used to this. It isn’t so hard. You have other friends who have done it. You’ve watched them, held their hair back.
Cheer yourself up by thinking how successful your gallery will be. You could be the next Mary Boone. Fuck Ed. Fuck the family you don’t have, or the one who gave you up, even the one you would have started with Ed if he weren’t such a moronic, scared piece of shit. Fuck them all. You are a wonderful person. You are strong and stable and resourceful. You may not have a mother, but you have a gallery. You have your photographs if not your best friend. You may not have a husband, but you have something better. When everyone has left you, at least you’ll be thin.
Chapter 12
Sheila
Room 1608
They met randomly, by accident really, as New Yorkers often do.
Sheila noticed him first standing on line at the Starbucks on Ninety-sixth and Madison Avenue, his face crunched up, impatient from the wait, frustrated by the slow ser vice. He noticed her, too. She could tell. She caught him glancing at her while they stood with the others, all of whom ordered frappuccinos and other overly sweet drinks that took forever to make.
During those first few weeks she’d turn her head toward the crowd behind her, appear as if she were searching for something outside, and see him staring at her. She’d blush, he’d nod slightly. Once she could swear he was sniffing her. Another time she caught him looking at her hands and wondered if he’d made a mental note that they were clean, finely manicured, and wedding band–free, just a simple ruby ring on her pinky. Often they displayed signs of recognition to each other; a raised eyebrow, a flick of the chin, a small half wave.
She liked hearing him order, his voice smooth and confident, like a voiceover actor. Liked the way he’d dig into the breast pocket of his trench coat and pull out a thin brown lizard billfold.
If he was sitting in the back of the coffeehouse, which he usually did, she’d pretend she was interested in the wall of useless items on sale: aluminum thermoses for the car, mugs that were microwavable, coffee machines, boxes of candy. She’d spot his hands and head partly hidden behind his New York Times, and if a seat were available at his table, she would ask if she could sit there. He always seemed happy to oblige.
He was clean-cut, freshly shaven, and smelled of something woodsy. His dark hair was thick and wavy and he had a boyish charm for a man who appeared to be in his forties. And there was something smart and worldly about him. She could see it in his hazel eyes, which seemed to take everything in at once. Even the small scar that ran over his left brow added a level of sophistication and edginess to him.
Eventually they started a dialogue.
“I’m Marty,” he offered first, his hand extended.
“Sheila,” she replied.
On these occasions when they sat together, they exchanged passing comments about the weather, about current events, about their jobs. He was a therapist. “I specialize in compulsive behavior,” he told her. “Gambling, smoking, OCD…”
“How do you know the difference between a vice and a compulsion?”
He smiled, exposing two dimples. “Well, that’s a rather complicated question. Is the vice ruining your life?”
“No, I just like tea. Though I have over thirty-eight different kinds at home.”
“That sounds like more of a collection than a compulsion.” He took off his wire-rimmed reading glasses and set them on the table. “I don’t think anyone ever died from too much tea.”
“And it doesn’t seem to be affecting my life choices.”
“Good to know.” He raised his coffee cup for emphasis, then took a large gulp. She watched his Adam’s apple click up and down as he swallowed. “I’m all about coffee. In fact, I think it’s both my vice and my compulsion. But that doesn’t mean we can’t be friends.”
“Absolutely.”
They clinked cups. Then she watched him rub the tip of his finger over the rim of his mug. “You didn’t tell me what you do.”
“I’m a teacher, fourth grade. I’m at Nightingale-Bamford, just a few blocks away.” She took a sip of her Earl Grey. Was it possible for grown women to get schoolgirl crushes?
“So that means both of us are free during the month of August?”
They laughed at this, their voices melding together, his deep and rich with texture, hers light and bubbly, something she hadn’t heard released from her throat in years.
And that’s how it started. Perhaps that’s how all affairs begin, she didn’t know, she’d never had one before.
Soon their accidental encounters became planned. They progressed from Starbucks in the morning to lunch—Mondays and Thursdays at Sarabeth’s, one block from her school and two from his Park Avenue office.
He had made the first move, innocently brushing his knee against her thigh. And they had touched hands when both reached for the small metal container of milk. She had giggled, he had smiled while their eyes held a long, intense stare.
Weeks later they sipped wine in her living room. Then they’d move shyly into her bedroom, his thumb caressing the outside of her hand as they walked through her narrow hallway.
When they ate Chinese takeout in bed, she’d watch in great dismay as his wedding ring would catch her bedroom light, the glare reflecting off of the simple gold band. She had tried shifting the colorful faux Tiffany lamp from one side of her dresser to the other, but it was useless. It was almost as if an eye was watching from above.
“Do you think this means we’re bad people?” she asked him. “Do you think we’ll be punished later on in life?”
“I think I’m more to blame than you are,” he said. “We’re both adults, and I’m making a choice.” He sighed, she moved closer to him. “And you? Well, you’ve just fallen for a guy who happens to be married. Unhappily, unexcitedly, married.”
She’s dreamed of Marty leaving his wife and marrying her. They were so good together. Their bodies meshing the way first-time lovers did, raw and organic. They would hold hands and listen to each other breathe, and walk naked around her apartment unashamed. Sometimes she’d put on a CD and make him dance with her, closely, so that their bodies, still warm and slightly sweaty, could stick together, like conjoined twins.
But she wasn’t in it for the sex. She’d told this to him on that first day in her apartment when everything was new and unshared. She loved him more than she’d loved any man. More than her college boyfriend, Leo, who she had been close to marrying. Even more than her father. She loved the way he lit his cigarettes, the way his lips fit over hers, the way his clothes hung on him, but mostly it was how he listened to her, as if she were the most important person in the world. And she wondered if this was why people adored their therapists.
She’d always been the good girl. No one-night stands, no drugs, no need for an AIDS test. She was respectful, did well at college, led a quiet, uncomplicated life. But with Marty, there was something exciting yet soothing about him. Often they’d hold each other, their bodies feeling the coolness of the sheets while they listened to the lull of the traffic outside. During these moments, her mind would wander as she conjured up countless images of what their life could be like. She envisioned vacations and long holiday weekends spent at their cottage home in Maine or Cape Cod. Saw their children—he didn’t have any with his wife, Faye—having his eyes and soft full lips with her laugh and kind disposition. During the month of August, since neither would be working, they would travel abroad, leaving the children with his parents.
Sheila never had playful, carefree summers or family vacations. Her father, an overseas radio communications operator, was never home. Every year or two she and her mother followed him to whichever air force base he was assigned to: Texas, Nevada, Ohio, North Carolina, and Arizona. Husbands and fathers were always being called away from their families. Worried wives would talk with other worried wives who lived on the base, their voices becoming hushed when Sheila walked by. And there was the ever-present feeling that at any given moment a knock would come at the door. That they’d open it to reveal a somber man wearing an officer’s uniform who’d tell them that her father was dead.
A man of great presence, her dad was broad and tall. Dashingly handsome and charming. When he was home, they’d read together, play cards, do crossword puzzles found in the backs of newspapers, take long walks around the base camp, and he would tell her about his job, how he hated to be away, about the adventure he was having. With him home, she felt complete. She and her mother and her father. A threesome. A perfect unit.
Marty made her feel complete, too. Even though he was twelve years older, she could see her future forming in front of her. She had tried the support groups the government offered for children who grew up in a military world. But the men she met were hardened by what they’d seen and ruined by the wars they fought in. There were very few male teachers at her all-girl school and most of her friends, neighbors, and co-workers were married, living a different life than the one she was trying to get through. At thirty-five there was still plenty of time for her to get pregnant. To start a family. And though she loved taking care of other people’s children, was honestly good at what she did, that’s what they were. At the end of the day, she handed them back to their parents, and she went home to nothing. The cost of guilt she felt being with a married man was overridden each time by the safety and love she experienced when she was next to him.
Sheila wanted to write Faye a letter of apology each time she slept with Marty. I’m so sorry. Or Please forgive my poor behavior, but he makes be feel whole. There were no cards at the Hallmark store that echoed her sorry-I-slept-with-your-spouse sentiments that she was aware of. She ached to tell Faye about the two of them as much as she ached for Marty to leave Faye. Sometimes she would dial him at home from the pay phone on the corner, the words already in her throat busting to come out, and hope Faye would answer. But she was never home. She only heard Faye’s earnest, wistful voice on the answering machine telling her that she and Marty were not available, and if she would leave her name and number, they would gladly call her back.
She tried to picture what Marty and Faye did at home. Saw them in their predictable lives, he paying bills, maybe smoking a pipe, talking about his patients. She might be on the phone, gabbing with her friends, or showing him her recent purchases: pair of shoes bought on sale, a tie for him, maybe a vase or new towels. At night they might watch a foreign film, the lights turned down, bowl of microwave popcorn and plate of freshly cut fruit situated between them. She would gladly take that life, a life not unlike the one her parents had. And as humdrum as Marty claimed his life to be, she would give anything to exist with him in it. She needed him more than Faye did, couldn’t he see that?
This is the question she still asks herself, even though it’s seven months later and they have moved their lovemaking to Fifty-seventh Street, to a hotel room on the sixteenth floor. The Four Seasons was Marty’s suggestion. And though Sheila liked being in her own bed, Marty mentioned how her apartment was too similar to the one he lived in, and how lovely it would be to have sex in a bed that belonged to no one in particular. To make love on a floor where hundreds of people had stepped. To take a bath in an enormous tub where no one claimed ownership.
“Everything in a hotel is common property,” he said last month, as he reached for his glasses and kissed her above the bridge of her nose. “Here, you and I are equals. Nothing in this room is yours, nothing is mine. We’re just two people sharing universal things.”
She hated the room for the very reason he insisted on liking it. Nothing was hers. The familiar objects that brought her comfort, that she spent a lifetime amassing were gone. And though the Four Seasons was a lovely hotel, it wasn’t her home. She had moved around enough as a child. The constant packing, the minimalist living, the simple fact that one moved into a furnished home and stayed there for only a year or two made her feel terribly unstable, as though she were living with roommates she never met. Nice as the Four Seasons was, the sheets weren’t as soft as hers, the pillows too puffy, the comforter too crisp and white. She longed for her teas, for the smell of
the freshly baked chocolate chip cookies she’d make for her students. For the simple, yet specific objects that defined who she was: her collection of ceramic teapots, her shelves of children’s books, an old cuckoo clock given to her by her mother that was broken—the little bird only shot out at two and five o’clock.
She’d also heard reports on TV and read them in magazines regarding how hotels weren’t as clean as they insisted. Where sheets weren’t changed and soaps not replaced and carpeting went unvacuumed, especially in hard-to-reach places like under the bed or by the curtains. The sheets felt dirty. She felt dirty.
Every time Marty would get ready to leave she thought of her father. The way he’d reach for his watch or his wallet made her see quick flashes of her dad in his uniform. She’d see him reach for his military hat, see him take the receiver from her mother’s hand and nod solemnly to whoever was on the other line. Her mother’s face would drop and fill with a defeated sadness.
Over the past several months, Sheila has brought up the possibility of Marty leaving Faye, a woman he says he married by mistake, and now can’t leave.
He was tracing his fingers over her stomach and chest, explaining the floor plan of his office, the setup of furniture and where his patients sat or laid down depending upon the work they were doing. His finger was at her right nipple, which at that moment doubled as the light stand in his office.