“Oh my god, what am I doing,” Margaret was wearing striped leggings and a kitten T-shirt. She opened the door and hugged me. “Leah! Leah, Leah, Leah.”
Margaret was glad to see me. She always seemed like such an odd friend that at some point, surely, she would figure out that we had nothing in common, that she did not even like me.
“You’re shaking,” she said.
“I haven’t driven in a long time,” I said.
I sat down on the front step of Margaret’s house and breathed. The shaking slowly stopped. Margaret sat next to me. The sky in Palo Alto was a brilliant blue, luminescent clouds in the sky.
A woman in a minivan pulled out from the house next door. She slowed down to look at me. There was a little girl in a car seat in the back.
“Everything okay?” she asked Margaret.
Margaret nodded. “My friend Leah just drove in from San Francisco. It’s the first time she’s driven in years.”
I nodded.
“And the car is haunted,” I said. “Possessed, maybe. I am not sure.”
Margaret tilted her head to the side. The woman in the minivan did not hear me. She waved at Margaret and left.
“You are wearing a really nice dress,” Margaret said.
I was. I was wearing my funeral dress. I had looked at all the clothes in my carry-on bag that morning and I had not wanted to wear any of them. I did not know why. I thought I would wear the dress to Jonathan’s lecture, even though it was still hours away.
“You are getting it dirty,” Margaret said.
I shrugged. The steps seemed clean.
“I have been up all night,” Margaret said. “Someone from the department had these mushrooms that he picked doing fieldwork in South America and I guess I have been tripping all night. I didn’t believe anything would actually happen. Isn’t that crazy?”
It did not sound like Margaret.
“It was totally weird,” Margaret said. “And fun. I actually had a brilliant idea and I have been writing like crazy. My fingers hurt. Look at them.” She held out her fingers for me to see. “Are they red?”
“They look fine,” I said.
“They do,” Margaret said, holding her hands out and looking at her fingers. “They have been my best friends, these fingers, no sleep, just dancing over the keyboard. I wish I could give them something. A present.”
“Maybe a hand massage,” I said.
“Maybe,” Margaret said.
The woman in the minivan had been right to stop. We were both a little bit off, but it was nice to see Margaret like this, so un-Margaret-like.
“I have something to tell you,” Margaret said. She actually giggled.
“What?”
“I am in love.”
“With who?”
“Do you remember Yannick?”
I did. He was the unattainable graduate student in her department. The one who Margaret wanted, half French, half black, gorgeous, who was having an affair with a married woman. He was the program darling, a genius, the star of the department.
At that moment, Yannick emerged from Margaret’s house. He was also wearing a pink kitten T-shirt. Boxer shorts. He wore his hair in dreadlocks.
“Leah.” He called my name.
We had met before. I had spent a weekend in this house years ago, when I was in between apartments. I could not believe he was with Margaret or that they were wearing matching kitten T-shirts. The surprise of it all made me smile. Made me think that I never did know what could happen.
“I love those T-shirts,” I said. “Would you have some more?”
Margaret started cracking up.
“We do,” she said. Yannick also started laughing. I did not get the joke.
“It’s so nice to see you,” Yannick said. “You look so pretty. I like that dress.”
It was nice that he remembered me. I was suddenly glad that Jonathan Beene’s lecture had led me here, to these old friends. I looked at Margaret, worried she would be upset Yannick had praised my appearance. She seemed fine.
“Did you write me? Tell me you were coming?” Margaret asked.
I shook my head.
“But you’re going to Jonathan Beene’s thing?” she asked.
Margaret had taken one of my hands. Yannick the other. We walked into Margaret’s house. There was a Ping-Pong table covered with books in the dining room.
“Tessa moved out,” Margaret said. “Most of the furniture was hers.”
“Do you live here?” I asked Yannick.
It occurred to me that Margaret had not written me in a long time. I had not written her. I had gone quiet after I had gotten married. I was not sure why. My life had gotten less newsworthy. It felt as if everything hinged on that one file on my computer. If it was a novel, if it was a good novel, if that would work out for me.
It was a nice house that Margaret lived in. Big rooms, plush carpeting, an enormous kitchen, even if it was not furnished in the way you would expect an almost professor to live. By now, she must have been hired. There, on the Ping-Pong table, next to a tall stack of books, was a box full of kitten T-shirts.
“What size do you want?” Yannick asked.
“Extra large,” I said and then I reconsidered. “Large.”
Yannick handed me one and I slipped it on over my dress. The house was strangely air-conditioned and I realized I was cold.
“I am going to make coffee,” Margaret said.
It was the first thing she had said that had sounded normal since I had gotten there.
“Great,” I said.
I wanted to act cool, somehow, to not be surprised that Yannick and Margaret were living together. I did not understand the T-shirts. I was proud of myself for driving Judy’s car to Margaret’s house. I was so proud of myself but it seemed silly to talk about it. Margaret knew about Jonathan Beene’s lecture. Margaret also knew about me and Jonathan Beene. My leg had started shaking. My thoughts were racing.
“It’s okay,” Judy said. “Let them race.”
Margaret went to make the coffee. She had one of those little metal espresso-maker things you put on a stove. It was not what I wanted. But it was also coffee.
“I am so happy to see you,” Margaret said, rubbing her eyes.
She had taken mushrooms, I remembered. I had done a lot of things in my life, but I had never done that.
“I have Valium,” Yannick said to me. “If you need one.”
“Okay,” I said. Obviously, it was apparent that I might need one. “Yes. Please.”
This seemed like a good idea to me after the drive in Judy’s red car, though I felt slightly ashamed to be accepting one in front of Margaret. Yannick picked up a pill bottle from the Ping-Pong table.
“What do you think?” Yannick said. “The new improved me. Committed to an available woman, a woman who loves me. A smart woman. I am on medication. I am a veritable drugstore.”
“I approve,” I said.
Though I wasn’t entirely sure. It didn’t come out sounding right, Yannick’s words, the implication that he needed to be on medication to be with Margaret. I hope that was not what he meant. I was grateful for the pill.
“Yannick,” Margaret said. “Leah just got here. Too much information. Too much sharing.”
“There is a level of shame,” Yannick said, “regarding pharmaceuticals. It is not my area of interest but, as I am currently taking psychotropics, I am interested.”
“Did you take mushrooms last night, too?” I asked.
“I did,” Yannick said. “Would you like one? We might have some left. I could look.”
These were the smartest people in the department at one of the best universities in the country. Margaret had studied so hard as an undergraduate, never partied, never stayed out late, went to Quaker meeting.
“I’m good,” I said.
Margaret handed me a small cup of coffee. I thought about it for a second, wondering about the pill in my hand, and then I swallowed it with my coffee.
“Why do you have so many kitten T-shirts?” I asked.
“I bought a box of them last weekend at a garage sale,” Yannick said, as if that were the most obvious thing.
“I am so happy you are here,” Margaret said, again, squeezing my free hand, almost making me spill my coffee.
“You said that already,” Yannick said.
It was almost a relief to me to recognize the Yannick I had met years before; he had struck me as a pompous asshole. Now I was glad to see traces of the old him. He was the old Yannick and the new Yannick. Like Margaret. I didn’t use to believe that people could change.
“But I am.” Margaret grinned at me. “So glad. It has been much too long. I’ve missed you.”
“I missed you, too,” I said.
I wondered. Had I missed Margaret? I had known her for a long time but I never quite believed she really liked me. I thought her friendship was more like loyalty. What would a Haverfordian do? What did I know? I hadn’t missed Hans and we were married. I had been gone for three days. But already I was missing Diego, wondering why I had left his apartment without saying good-bye. Did I write a note? He was gone when I woke up. He worked fourteen-hour days. I had always known, in theory, that people did that. That was how they got stainless steel refrigerators.
“I am going to sleep,” Margaret said. “For like ten hours. And then we will catch up on everything. You can tell me about marriage and life in New York. We can go out for dinner and then we can go to Jonathan’s thing. Is that okay?”
“You’re going to sleep?”
It was not entirely okay with me, but this was a declaration on Margaret’s part. Her eyes were bloodshot, already closing. I was not sure what I was expected to do, how I would get through the day. I could drive back to San Francisco still and skip Jonathan Beene’s lecture. I did not have to follow the signs.
“Stella moved out, too,” Margaret said. “If you want, you can crash in her room. She left her bed. One day I plan to buy real grown-up furniture but I am so busy.”
Stella had been her other roommate. She was an English PhD candidate. Her favorite color was lilac and her hair was very straight. Why did I remember that?
“It’s the morning,” I said. “I don’t need to sleep.”
Margaret started to rub her eyes again. “I am sorry,” she said. “I wouldn’t have stayed up all night if I knew you were coming, but I have to sleep now.”
“Me, too,” Yannick said. “I am so sleepy.”
He took Margaret’s hand, rubbed it. He looked at her like he loved her. It looked nice. It looked like Margaret wanted him to come with her. It was almost hard to imagine, having that.
“You can eat anything you want. Read anything you want. There are bikes in the garage. I don’t know if there are helmets.”
“I am not going to ride a bike,” I said.
“You already drove that car,” Margaret said. “That so doesn’t look like you. That red car.”
“I know,” I said. “Do you think I could use your phone? The Internet?”
“Anything,” Margaret said. “Take a shower. Use my shampoo. I have Aveda shampoo.”
Margaret remembered how I loved Aveda shampoo. And I would. I would use her shampoo. Yannick gently banged into Margaret, pushing her away from me into the bedroom. I was a step behind them, following them to their door, unsure about being left alone.
“Sleep,” he said to Margaret. “Let’s sleep like the gods.”
The door shut gently in my face.
It’s what I had wanted, wasn’t it? To be alone.
I CHECKED MY EMAIL.
Another four new emails from Hans. An email from my mother. One from Scottie. Diego. An email from a literary agent whose name I recognized. I stared at the computer. It seemed obvious which email to read first, but I didn’t.
Diego wanted to know where I was. He had been calling to check on me. He was worried. “We will go out for dinner,” he wrote.
My mother was no longer worried about me now that she knew where I was. She sent her love. Her sympathy. She had met Judy, only once. We had all gone out for drinks when my mother came to visit. They had commiserated about me, what a frustrating person I could be. Mortifying, that was how I remembered it. “Be good to yourself,” my mother wrote. “I envy you. San Francisco.”
I had taken my mother to the sea lions when she visited. I had taken her to the bar where Daniel had worked and he had given her a shot of tequila. She drank it. I had had a life here, before graduate school, and then it had become my past, and suddenly I had all of these memories.
I opened one email from Hans. “Call me,” it read. “I love you.” I closed it. I did not read the others. I knew that he loved me. That wasn’t it. It wasn’t what I wanted to hear. I did not know what he could say. He had already apologized. I had already forgiven him. There were, I noticed, more documents attached.
I read Scottie’s email. It was understanding. He gave me time off and offered his condolences.
“Are you going to read it?” Judy asked me. “What are you waiting for?”
The email from the agent. That was what she meant. I knew. “When I am ready,” I said.
“I was ready ten minutes ago.”
“Give me a break,” I said. “Really.”
I read my email from the agent. I had not queried this agent. He had read a short story I had published in a literary journal. My only published short story. He wanted to know if I was working on something. He wanted to know if I had representation.
“Look at that,” Judy said.
I smiled, but then I frowned.
“It doesn’t mean a thing,” I said.
“It means they are coming to you.”
“Is that what it means?”
Judy didn’t answer. That was what she did when she was annoyed with me. My dead boss, my dead friend, constantly annoyed with me. She was wrong. It was not what it meant. Still, it was promising. This agent was young. He had sold some books. I looked him up on Google. He was wearing a suit. He looked like an agent. He was cute. Up until now, this trip, it hadn’t been an issue, the attractive quotient of other people. I was married. I did not really exist. At least that was how I felt.
It was quiet in the bedroom. I didn’t know why I was worried. It was too quiet. They had taken the mushrooms, the Valium, and I wanted to make sure they were okay. It was like I was a babysitter again, checking to make sure I hadn’t somehow killed the baby. I gently opened the door. Margaret and Yannick were spooned together, on top of the covers, in their matching kitten T-shirts.
It seemed obvious, suddenly, what I was supposed to do. I was supposed to open the file that contained my novel and start reading it. I was following the signs. There was a literary agent out there who wanted to read something I had written. I had written something. It made no sense to me, how insanely nervous I was about doing such an obvious thing. But I had taken Yannick’s pill. I did not have to be nervous because, really, I felt calm. I felt like I could float above my file and read it, like a ghost.
“You know I am not a ghost,” Judy said.
“Whatever,” I said. “You are not a ghost. I don’t know what you are.”
“Read,” she said.
I got stuck on my first sentence. Did it need a comma? It currently did not have one. I added it. I looked at the sentence. It was better. I kept reading. It had been long enough that I did not remember some of the sentences. I had written this, I thought to myself in wonder. I was pleased. I added a new sentence and three paragraphs later, I found the same sentence. I deleted the first one, kept the new one. They were the same.
I wondered if there was something good to eat in Margaret’s house. I found half a tray of brownies in the kitchen. Margaret has always liked making brownies. I cut off a small piece, ate it standing at the counter, cut off a much larger piece and settled back down with my computer on the couch. I wrote another sentence only to realize that it was there again, two lines down.
But she was wrong. I fixed sentences as I went because that was how I worked. Even if I was creating extra work for myself. At least I was working. It was how I had written this book, in small stretches of time. It had taken more than two years. Almost three. I knew I hadn’t imagined it, but it was somehow realer than I had thought. And I thought it was good. I did. I couldn’t see myself, sitting alone in the spacious living room of Margaret’s big rented house, but I knew that I was smiling. I stroked the kitten on my pink T-shirt.
“Meow,” Judy said.
MARGARET, YANNICK AND I WENT to the lecture together.
“This is the first time I have ever stepped foot in the Business School,” Yannick said. “Now I understand all the people I see on campus. This is where they go.”
Yannick was being openly started at, with his dreadlocks and his pink kitten T-shirt. Margaret had put on a black sweater and black jeans. Her hair tucked back behind her ears, she looked like a young professor. I was wearing my funeral dress. I was glad to have these friends with me.
“How did you know about it?” I asked Margaret.
“Jonathan Beene is probably the most famous Haverford alumnus right now,” Margaret said. “And I am on an email list of ’Fords in California.”
“Have you been in touch with him?”
Margaret shook her head. “We aren’t friends,” she said. “But we do have friends in common. He knows that I am at Stanford.”
“He does?”
Suddenly, I wasn’t sure why I was there. Because Judy had told me to follow the signs. Because she had died. Because Hans had choked me. It had only happened that one time and it was an aberration, but somehow, it also was not a complete surprise either, when I thought about it, though I did not want to think about it, and I had not forgotten, not yet, and it seemed like he was writing me too many emails, not allowing me to forget. But that did not explain why I was at Stanford for a lecture given by Jonathan Beene. Jonathan Beene was an asshole.
The Red Car Page 10