“No monkey business, you!” BoBo, the stylist, surprised me by wagging her pointer finger at me.
“Don’t worry about me,” I assured her, stretching my neck out and peering down the treacherous ravine. “I’m terrified of heights.”
Eyeing a threatening scarf of clouds in the east, the photographer shouted instructions to BoBo and she took me back to the dressing area. They had to make sure they had this outfit photographed. I was jiggled into the yellow ski suit and propped up on three telephone books piled on the snow. I stood there trying to look like I knew what I was doing.
After a while, though, I could tell from the expression on the photographer’s face that this wasn’t working. He shot a roll without much enthusiasm. My heart sank. I knew I was wearing an important suit or they wouldn’t have gone through so much trouble to book little me. I remembered the look of pure relief on the face of the woman in the gray suit at Freundin when she’d found me, as if something more than a couple days’ booking depended on it. I had to do something interesting and I had to do it fast. The trouble was I had nothing to work with. The highest up I’d ever been was the top of the Empire State Building. All I had to go on was a yellow suit. Maybe I was inspired by Isolde’s saucy caper or maybe it was my natural competitive-sibling spirit kicking in, but I knew I had to take a chance to make things less stale.
I proceeded to ham it up. I built an imaginary trampoline and sprang from it. This was either going to get his attention and hold it, or he was going to get rid of me. And that would be the end of Germany. Where these girls had moved like statues on lazy Susans, I jumped up into the air, threw my arms akimbo, and gave what I thought was a crazy rendition of a trick skier flying down the mountain.
As luck would have it, the sun broke through. The photographer rose from his crouched position, unscrewed the stable camera, and resorted to his handheld Nikon. In this brilliant light even a 64 ASA film could catch movement without blurring. Wonder of wonders, he loved it. “Mach das nochmal!” he cried. “Do again. Same! Same thing!”
“Sehr gut!” the photographer actually congratulated me after he finished not one but three rolls. He was perspiring, I noticed, but I think he’d been having fun. He showed me the Polaroid. There I was suspended in blue sky, the yellow suit dazzling, my head thrown back, laughing. “Spitze!” I could tell it was high praise. Beaming, his assistant helped me down from my perch.
“Ja!” the stylist called out to me.
As I hobbled, trembling, on my skis past the other girls, they were all looking at me. Isolde came over, and if in the headiness of the moment I imagined she, too, was going to pat me on the back, I should have known better.
“Hey,” she actually poked me with her ski pole, “where are the rest of your legs?”
“They’re home,” I answered, disappointed, without looking. Then I added (lying for spite), “Holding down my fat bank account.”
Americans can take care of themselves. I should have known all along she’d come gunning for me. But I could handle her. I had my own beautiful and insulting older sister back home.
That only stopped her for a moment, though. “I see.” She narrowed her eyes, one provocative eyebrow up, showing off her English, catching the eyes of the others with collaborative derision. “And so you will build your career standing upon telephone directories …”
“That’s right,” I sallied, “and I’ve still got years and years to do it.”
That stopped her. I knew where to hit. I don’t normally like to go below the belt but when it’s needed I’m all set; I’m not part Irish for nothing. It sent her back to speaking German. I was pretty sure she didn’t translate that word for word. I went and changed into my next outfit.
Fast-moving clouds dashed across the sky. The light was beginning to fade and the tempo changed to quick. While the photographer and his assistants moved lights into the restaurant, one of the other models approached me—the one with the bright red hair. Her skin, I noticed, was sunburned under her makeup.
Suddenly I realized where I’d seen her before. This was the other half of the man of my dreams at the airport. She was much prettier than I, but, I reminded myself soothingly, only after a thorough application of makeup. She narrowed her eyes. I thought she was going to say something like, “Hey, I saw you at the airport,” but, “We don’t care for foreign girls here,” was what came out of her mouth.
“Excuse me?” I said. I couldn’t believe I’d heard her correctly. And people were listening.
“No, I don’t excuse you,” she went on in her heavy Teutonic accent. “You take work from the rest of us. You should go back to your own country and find work there. That would be better. Much better. That’s right. You heard me right. We don’t need you here.”
At first I thought she was joking. I was at a complete loss for words. She turned on her heels and stomped away. I stood there with my mouth open, watching her go.
Now Isolde, the magnificent dark one, walked across the canteen toward me. She placed herself next to me and the two of us watched the redhead leave. I suppose I was still visibly trembling. I didn’t know what this one would do. But Isolde lit two cigarettes and put one in my mouth. She didn’t smoke the regular ones. She carried a black package of pastel-colored, gold-filtered Vogue cigarettes. I’d never seen such things before. She gave me a peach-colored one and herself a purple, and ripped the filter off hers. She hadn’t liked me before but it seemed she liked the redhead even less and so I was, by demotion, promoted.
“She your welcoming committee?” I tried to sound casual.
“Ach. Don’t worry about her. That’s just Arianna Weiss. She won’t give you any trouble. She’s on her way out.” Isolde flicked a piece of tobacco from her lip. She did this all the time, like a hooligan in a film noir. “That was quite a show you put on,” she said.
“Oh,” I gave a wry shrug, “in New York all that jazzy stuff is nothing new. I used to stand on the sidelines—you know, poor, dejected me—and watch the working models do all sorts of contortions. This is the first catalog job I’ve ever had. I thought I’d try it out.”
She looked at me with interest. Self-effacement was something new. At this point, however, I was growing weary of who thought what of me. My ankles ached and my nose felt burned.
“Where are you staying?” she asked. “Which pension?”
“The Franz Joseph.”
“How much are you paying for your room?”
I told her. She snorted and the way she sucked in the fat smoke of her cigarette informed me it was too much.
“I am Isolde.”
“Claire Breslinsky.” I shook her outstretched hand. Its touch was capable and solid, more like a good strong peasant woman’s than my idea of a countess’s, but there was a warmth that drew you in.
“Where did you learn to speak English so well?” I asked.
“Boarding school. England.” She sniffed. She was even more dazzling up close. Isolde had brunette skin, like a good rare roast beef with the pink in the middle and brown around the edges. Her mouth was broad and generous and she had those dazzling-with-good-health and twinkling, mischievous, but shrewd brown eyes—the whites of which were almost blue.
“I’ll bet you gave them hell,” I said.
She threw back her head and, just as she was about to laugh, she stopped. At any moment with Isolde, you got the uneasy feeling she was about to run off. She pulled in her chin and frowned. Her eyes became dull. “It was dreadful,” she admitted. “They were sadists.”
“Oh,” I said, a little taken aback by her sudden black mood. To change the subject I said, “So I’m paying too much for my room, eh?”
“Why don’t you move in with me,” she suggested. “I’ve got a lovely little apartment in my house. I’ve got the au pair in there right now. She can move in with the children. She won’t mind. I sometimes rent to foreign girls like yourself.” She leaned toward me and said in a confidential tone, “You’ll make a fortune here.”
>
“You look more German than the Germans, with your sweet smile.” She looked me up and down, shrewdly evaluating my earning potential. “You’re curvy enough, but you’re too skinny. You’re lucky you have that big mouth. That’s what they all want now.”
Not sure I’d ever been described quite that way but liking the description for its blatant mercantilism, and impressed with the bold way Isolde ordered everyone around—including the photographer—and although it hadn’t occurred to me first, I suddenly asked myself why shouldn’t I stay awhile in Munich.
“Anyway,” she shook out her long mahogany hair, “I’m in the middle of a divorce. You’ll keep me company. My only prerequisite is that you speak English. It’s something I insist upon for the children.”
“I must tell you,” I warned her, wanting to be fair, to set things straight and give myself an out if I needed it, “I’m actually not sure how long I’ll stay.” I lowered my voice. “I’m really an artist. My dream is to make enough money to travel to the East. I’m not much of a model at all. Well. Obviously. You can see that.” I cleared my throat and adjusted my spine. “But nothing will interfere with those plans. That’s my dream and I’m determined to have it.”
She gave a little “sure, sure” snort. But then she said, “All the better. You can sketch the children. I’ll deduct it from your rent.”
“Well,” I drawled, still imagining I had some say in the matter, “I’ll think about it.”
A man came running toward us. “At last!” he cried and threw his arms around Isolde.
His clothes were beautifully made. I assumed this was her husband.
“Harry!” Isolde pushed him off her. He was heavyset but light on his feet. His mustache was wispy and unfortunate but he had these startled eyes—blue and light. He was flushed—he had lovely skin—and out of breath.
“Oh, Mr. Harry Honeycutt, this is Claire … what?” She turned to me. “What is your last name?”
“Breslinsky,” I said.
“What a ride!” he puffed. “But I’m here at last.” Harry wiped the snow from the rim of his elegant Donegal walking hat.
Isolde turned coldly from him. “Yes,” she said, “it was kind of you to come all this way. But I’ll have to stay with the group.”
He looked panic-stricken. “But I’ve come all the way from Munich just to take you home!”
“Dear Harry! You’re so good. But no one asked you to come. It wouldn’t be professional of me to just run off with you, would it?”
“But you said—” He looked bewildered. “You told me I should come. You told me where—” Isolde barricaded herself with a haughty I-don’t-know-what-you’re-talking-about look and he gave up. “Yes, of course,” he blustered. “Idiot me. Thinking of myself …” He swatted his knees with his hat. But you could see the disappointment in his eyes. I felt sorry for him. You could tell that was how she was. Everything was a trick.
“I’m sure no one would be upset if you went home with him,” I whispered.
“Tch. I wouldn’t go with him anyway. He’s been drinking.”
“Oh,” I said, and we went back to work.
Eventually we finished and packed up to go home. The photographer was herding the rest of the models onto the next gondola. There was only room for so many passengers. Harry waited for Isolde. Isolde pretended to hop in the car and just as the doors were closing, she jumped out beside me and said we would wait for the next. She stuck her tongue out at him. Poor Harry Honey-cutt glided away with a marooned expression. Laughing, she jumped into the next car and I followed. There was a sweep and a roar of metal and we were off. I joggled back and forth with the rest of the shivering passengers. I hardly felt the dangling height on the way down. I wasn’t afraid anymore. Although there were other models in the gondola, it was to Isolde everyone spoke. That was the effect she had on people. I noticed she’d forgotten to return the pale pink cashmere turtleneck she’d worn with her last outfit. Well, I reasoned, there’d been so much going on. Filled with admiration, I watched her.
She felt my look. “It’s too ghastly to spend the night alone. You’ll come home with me now.”
“Oh, no,” I said. “I couldn’t impose. And your friend Harry …”
“Nonsense. You’ll sleep in Daisy Dahlhaus’s apartment. She’s the au pair. She’s used to being bullied about.”
“Well …” I drawled, more interested to see where such a prima donna lived than tired of being alone. That’s how I am: curious of the rich. It comes from being raised in a big family without money. We weren’t poor. We just never had money.
“If you don’t love it, darling,” Isolde picked up a lock of my hair and rubbed it between her fingers as though she were examining a leather wallet she thought she might buy, “you can go back to your overpriced pension tomorrow.”
“All right,” I agreed. “Sounds fair. But I’d better let the pension know.”
“Liebling,” she scoffed, dropping my hair, “they could care less.”
It was a long drive back to Munich and dark when we got there. They let us off somewhere and I groggily followed Isolde into a stately Hof, then up a Biedermeier stairwell with worn wooden foot furrows and wrought iron railings. Just the thing. You huffed and you puffed but you knew you were in Europe.
“There are ninety-seven steps,” Isolde called over her shoulder as she briskly took the stairs, “or ninety-eight. They vary according to how much you’ve drunk.”
Drinking, too! I calculated excitedly, trudging along behind. Ah, to be a boarder in a German household at the top of the stairs! I’d read too many books about this sort of thing—romantic thrillers starring potentially courageous young women on their own in continental garrets—not to be impressed with my good luck.
As I climbed along behind, though, trying to keep pace, I had a premonitory glimpse that this would be the way of our relationship: Isolde confidently dashing on ahead and I struggling unsuccessfully to keep up. But I followed her willingly—delightedly, even—because I knew instinctively she held the key to what I yearned for. Privilege.
chapter three
At Isolde’s, the days passed quickly. The months dropped away like calendar pages, snowy scenes of villages I watched from the cozy insides of taxis, trains, and airplanes. It was work that kept me busy, gave me credibility and money. The studios were all the same. You can get used to the cold gray winter when you’re working every day. Time passes. You keep plugging away and then suddenly you’re walking home after work and you notice that flowers have sprung up everywhere. You raise your chin to the sun and there is still warmth. You can’t imagine where the time has gone.
One fine evening in April, I cut down the Hohenzollernstrasse and into the lush green of the Englischer Garten. This was where I would go when I was feeling moody. I’d often pause on one of the stone bridges and look out over the rapid green Isar. It was narrow but swift as traffic. You had to be careful never to drop anything into it or you’d never see it again.
I always felt safe behind the sturdy, moss-softened railing. I’d crouch down and put my chin on the velvety stuff and soothe my eyes with the rushing water, giving in to my feelings of homesickness for my parents, my sisters, the dog, my brother, Michael, who’d died. I couldn’t help being touched at the thought of Michael. My throat closed and I let myself cry. Michael had been a cop. At least he’d had that. At least he’d lived his lifelong dream. Very short was his life, though. And violent at the end, shot to death by a useless, weeping junkie.
Just the day before I’d telephoned. “Claire!” my father had cried out with delight. “You’re not in Asia, are you?”
“No, Dad, still in Germany.”
“Germany,” he’d repeated with distaste. He’d blown up plenty of swastikas in Germany. “When are you coming?”
“No, Dad.” I’d spoken with jocular volume to disguise my sorrow at not bearing the news he’d hoped to hear. “I won’t be coming home this month. I’ve got to stay. There’s so much
going on!”
“Oh,” he’d said, his disappointment final as a child’s.
“Dad,” I shouted into the post office phone, “you wouldn’t believe the flowers here! I’ve never seen such flowers!”
“Richmond Hill is filled with flowers, too,” he’d said with no guile, just loss.
“I’ll come home soon,” I promised, my throat suddenly tight.
“Make it sooner,” he’d said. Then, “I love you,” always gentle, always kind. “Here’s Mother.”
I could see it all, the Daily News unfolded on the kitchen table, the cups of endless tea, the dog alert to who was on the phone but really only caring how it would affect his walk. And then my mother, loving me, too, but unhappy at the thought of my being over here having fun. Fun! When I ought to be home taking sensible courses in college. I was spared a sermon because long distance intimidated her. We hung up quickly, before the operator intervened. I was glad now to be gone, glad to be spared the shelves of Mass cards my mother kept like literature to be read and reread, glad not to hear her stifled moans of grief in the night. Or my father’s military posture wane when he thought no one could see.
I pulled my hair back, hard, until it stung. I wiped away my tears and presently I felt better. I needed voices and happy faces, I told myself. I would stop off at the Riding School café. That would do it. I hurried.
I climbed the stone steps, skirting through the busy tables and chairs until I made it to the quieter corner of the stone balcony.
I fumbled around in my sack and came up with my charcoals and pad. I steadied myself, snapped a shot with my old camera as a backup for details, ordered a Kaffee with milk, and lost myself, finally, sketching the faces and figures around me.
“Claire!”
I glanced up, my teeth gripping a pencil pirate-knife style.
“Hi, Chartreuse. Sorry.” I pulled the pencil from my mouth and patted the chair beside me.
Pack Up the Moon Page 3