by Robyn Sisman
Jack slammed down his paper. “I didn’t need to. I forgot I had the damn stuff. Jesus, Freya, stop looking at me as if I’m a pervert.”
“I’m not!”
“You are!”
“I’m not.”
“You are.”
“Not.”
“Are.”
“Not.”
“For chrissakes, are you ever going to work?”
“Right now. Don’t be so touchy.”
“I’m not.”
“Are.”
“Not.”
“Are, are, are.”
Freya seemed to think this was an amusing game. Jack clamped his lips together, refusing to be caught again. Now Freya was leaving the kitchen. In a minute or two she would be gone.
But she wasn’t. First she brushed her teeth, then she disappeared to her room for what seemed hours, then she came out, went back in, came out, uttered a feminine little tut! of surprise as if she’d forgotten something, went back in, came out. Her footsteps clacked across the floor and she reappeared in the doorway, armed with her briefcase, standing as stiff and straight as if she had been frog-marched to this precise spot.
“I just want you to know how much I appreciate your having me here.” She spoke with the cheery spontaneity of a Greek messenger announcing a massacre in Sparta.
Jack grunted.
“Perhaps, as a gesture, I could make you dinner tonight?”
Ohhh, no. She wasn’t going to catch him that easily. “I’m going out.”
“Alternatively, I’ve noticed a number of broken electrical items in my room. If I could assist you by taking them to the repair shop—”
“No.” These women were as cunning as fiends. “I like them that way.”
“You like broken irons?”
“Definitely.”
“And broken alarm clocks?”
“Passionately.”
“And broken—?”
“I like everything except broken records. Stop nagging, Freya. If I wanted a wife, I’d be married by now.”
“A wife, singular? You’re slipping, Jack.”
“Don’t you have somewhere to go—like a public flogging?”
Hah! That got her. She tossed her hair, what there was of it, and turned on her heel. She was leaving! Click-clack, click-clack went her shoes—one of the five thousand pairs she had felt it necessary to stash in his study. He heard the front door open, the sound of traffic from the street, then . . . nothing. Time ticked by as he awaited the blessed slam of the door. It didn’t come. The pressure in his head became so great he feared his ears might fly off. What was she waiting for? Unable to stand the suspense, he lurched up from the table and strode out to see what was going on.
There she was on the threshold, head down, leg crooked to support a big, lumpy purse in which she was rummaging like a squirrel digging for winter nuts. Why did women buy bags that size if they could never find anything?
“Oh, Jack,” she said in a vague, maddening way, “do you have any quarters for the bus?”
“No. I do not have any fucking quarters for the fucking bus!”
She raised her head. There was an odd, shocked look on her face. He almost wondered if he had hurt her feelings. But then she shouldered her bag, stepped outside, and turned to present him with a phony smile.
“Good-bye, darling,” she cooed. “Have a wonderful day at the office. Aren’t you going to kiss me good-bye?”
Jack slammed the door in her face.
CHAPTER 9
When Freya returned from work that evening, she was relieved to find the apartment empty. After Jack’s deplorable bout of bad temper this morning, she had realized that Cat was right: men and women were simply not designed to live together in harmony. Besides, his absence gave her a chance to make some essential domestic improvements. She carried a large brown paper bag through to the kitchen and banged it down on the counter. From it she took a can of scouring powder, a bottle of toilet bleach, a scrubbing brush, cleaning cloths, rubber gloves. Mess was one thing; a shower cubicle where you could scratch your name in grime was another.
She hurried to change her clothes, not wishing to be caught by Jack in the middle of this demeaning job in case it gave him false notions about the roles of the sexes. The sight of her room was depressing. Small to begin with—a single bed at one end, Jack’s desk under the window at the other—it was now absurdly cramped. Stacks of shoe boxes took up most of the floor space, along with the suitcase she used as a chest of drawers. Her clothes hung high above the bed from a heating pipe. She might as well be nineteen again. Still, this was only a temporary arrangement. Tomorrow she’d get up early so she could buy the Village Voice hot off the press and check out the apartment rentals. With luck, she might find a cheap summer sublet.
Within a few minutes she had pulled on a T-shirt and ancient jogging pants and was standing in the shower in a snowstorm of scouring powder. She hefted the big scrubbing brush and set to work. It was surprisingly satisfying. Nothing could be duller than routine cleaning, but visible dirt was a challenge. After half an hour of steamy labor the light and dark gray tiles were revealed to be white and black, the toilet foamed with a sinister froth of chemical blue, and she could read the manufacturer’s name on the whisker-free basin. Since she was now so dirty and the bathroom so clean, it seemed a good idea to market-test her handiwork immediately by taking a shower. She had just finished rinsing shampoo out of her hair when the doorbell rang. It was almost certainly Jack, too lazy to face the effort of getting his own key out of his own pocket. Freya took no notice. She was not his butler, after all. Stepping out of the shower, she dried herself and slipped on her kimono, and was twisting a towel around her hair when the bell sounded again. Freya growled with exasperation. The idiot must have forgotten his key.
She slapped her way to the front door, leaving a trail of damp footprints. “Yes, suh, Massa Madison,” she croaked, in what she imagined to be a Southern accent. “I’s a-comin.”
But it wasn’t Jack. It was a young woman, whose expertly mascara’d eyes mirrored Freya’s own surprise.
Freya put up a hand to steady her towel turban. “Yes?” she inquired.
“Is—is Jack at home?”
“No.”
“Oh . . . He said to meet him here.”
“What for?”
“It’s Creative Writing night. We’re going together.”
“How sweet. You’d better come in.”
Freya stepped back and opened the door wide. She recognized the girl now. It was Little Miss ABC, Jack’s “student” from the other morning. With her cute, plump cheeks and flirty skirt, she looked about seventeen. As she jiggled past on high-heeled sandals, Freya was easily tall enough to see straight down her cleavage. That would explain Jack’s reference to her fine mind. Freya retied her kimono tightly around herself and followed the girl into the living room, watching her scan the apartment with a proprietary air, as if to check that Jack was indeed out. At length she turned back to Freya and gave her a pert, lip-gloss smile.
“I’m Candace,” she announced.
“The perfect name. I bet Jack calls you Candy, am I right?”
Candace flushed. “Sometimes.” Her little bunny nose twitched. “What’s that smell?
“Cleanliness. Marvelous, isn’t it? And before you ask, no, I am not the maid.”
“Who said you were?” Candace looked ruffled. “I saw you here Saturday. Jack said you were an old friend.”
“What a flatterer is he is!” Freya gave a brittle laugh.
“He didn’t tell me you were living here.”
“Men.” Freya rolled her eyes. “They’re so forgetful. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I must hobble back to my knitting. Help yourself to anything you want from the kitchen—Diet Coke, lemonade, milk and cookies . . .”
And with that, Freya escaped to her room, cheeks flushed, lips set in annoyance. She disliked being caught at a disadvantage. Why hadn’t Jack warned her? A glance in th
e mirror showed her unattractively naked face, her turban askew, the fraying silk at the neck of her kimono. A contrasting vision of Candace’s coiffed and perfumed perfection rose in her mind. Candace was short and small-boned, with ripe flesh that swelled and bounced in all the right places. Freya scowled at her reflection. She must look like an alley cat next to a fluffy Persian kitten.
She threw off the kimono and rapidly started to dress in her favorite jeans and a skinny black top. Why did Jack always go for these brainless bimbos? She could barely remember the last girlfriend of his she’d liked. Freya’s face was stern as she slicked her damp hair behind her ears and began to apply makeup. Didn’t he realize how inconsiderate this was—how difficult it was for the rest of them, Larry and Gus and the gang, to have to deal with someone whose earliest cultural references were Star Wars and Wham? More than one reunion of old friends had been spoiled by some Candy or Mandy or Bonnie or Connie canoodling with Jack, when the rest of them wanted to relax and reminisce. It was time he grew up.
When she returned she found Candace charmingly posed on the couch, head bent over Jack’s copy of Aristotle’s Poetics.
“Only me,” said Freya. At least the girl had the book the right way up. Freya fixed herself a bourbon on the rocks and perched on the arm of a squashy chair, swinging one long leg. Candace stared at her warily.
“You’re Frieda, aren’t you?” she said.
“Almost. Eight out of ten. Actually, it’s Freya.”
“Jack said you lived uptown with your boyfriend.”
“I did.” Freya’s smile hardened.
“So, what happened?”
Freya hesitated. She did not need to explain herself to this pinhead. “If you must know, he wanted to get married and I didn’t.”
“Really?”
“Yes, really. Is that so difficult to believe?”
“No. I admire you,” Candace paused, “for making such a brave decision.”
Freya frowned suspiciously. “What’s so brave about it?”
“Just . . . I mean, at your age . . .” Candace lowered her eyes and shrugged. Her entire upper body seemed to sway and re-form with the movement, like a water balloon. Freya wondered how it would feel to be as massively endowed as that; it must be like having two giant guinea pigs stuffed down your front. Candace probably couldn’t see her own feet when she was standing up.
Freya folded her arms across her own, less seismic, frontage. “Are you implying that’s the last proposal I’ll ever get?”
“I didn’t say that. My Aunt Rochelle didn’t get married until she was forty-two. She never had children, of course. And she’s divorced now.”
“What an inspiring story. Thank you, Candace.”
They sat in silence. Candace looked at her watch. “He’s late,” she said.
“Jack’s always late.”
“How long have you known him?”
“Ten years. And you?”
A holy expression came over Candace’s face. “You can’t measure a relationship in time. Not chronological time, anyway.”
“Oh, well, if it’s chronological time you’re talking about . . .”
“I mean, with Jack and I it’s a—a coop de food.”
“I beg your pardon?”
“Coop de food. It means, like, love at first sight. That’s French.”
“I see. How wise of you not to attempt the accent.”
Candace wasn’t listening. Her full lips parted in a secret smile, revealing sparkling, tombstone teeth. “When he walked into my first class I almost died,” she confided.
“Almost? That’s a relief.”
“Isn’t he just the handsomest man in the whole world? Those blue eyes . . .” Candace gave an ecstatic shiver. “Plus, I felt so in awe of his talent.”
Freya crunched an ice cube.
“At the beginning I wasn’t sure he even noticed me—as a woman, I mean. But then I sort of bumped into him after class, and I felt this incredible connection . . .”
“Oh, dear. Not painful, I hope?”
“. . . even though he’s above me in so many ways, so much smarter and deeper and . . .”
“Older?”
Candace looked stern. “Age is about the number of years you’ve been on the planet, not how human beings interact emotionwise.”
“How true.”
There was the sound of a key in the lock. Both women’s eyes swiveled to the living-room door. They waited in silence, listening to Jack maneuver his bike into the hall. Candace moistened her lips and shook back her hair in preparation for his entrance.
The door opened and Jack ambled in, sliding his wire-rimmed glasses into place with a forefinger. For a split second Freya saw him through Candace’s eyes—hunky, masculine, appealingly disheveled, the sort of man you kidded yourself you could “save.” Then she almost laughed out loud as Jack caught sight of them both and halted abruptly, as astounded as if he’d found Hitler and Stalin in his living room.
“Well, well, well!” He was suddenly as jovial as Santa Claus. “My two favorite women. Together! How—how wonderful!”
“I know. Isn’t it marvelous?” Freya mimicked his rapturous tone.
Jack shot her a dirty look and rubbed his hands with hectic bonhomie. “So!” he enthused. “I guess you two girls have met!”
“We two girls certainly have.”
Candace could resist him no longer. With a tremulous cry, she launched herself from the couch and almost ran to throw her arms around Jack’s waist. Freya watched deadpan as Candace gazed up at him adoringly, a darling little daisy turning its face to the sun. If she had called out “Daddy!” Freya wouldn’t have been in the least surprised.
Jack mussed Candace’s hair with a casual hand and disengaged himself. “Okay, everyone!” he cried, his jollity control still on maximum. “I’ll just, uh, get my papers, and we’ll go!”
“W—we?” faltered Candace, staring at Freya in panic.
“No, no.” She waved a hand. “You young people run along and enjoy yourselves. I want to stay home and give my dentures a good soak.”
The two of them quickly made their escape. Freya could hear them going down the path—the slow rumble of Jack’s voice, Candace’s happy, answering giggle. The sounds died away; then there was silence, and the long evening ahead.
Freya topped up her drink, slotted a tape into the stereo, and flopped onto the couch. On the floor beside it was the inevitable teetering pile of Jack’s magazines, mostly copies of the New York Review of Books. She hoisted a handful onto her stomach and shuffled through them idly, while Billie Holiday poured her tender melancholy into the room. “I don’t know why, but I’m feeling so sad . . .” Names leaped out at Freya from the magazine covers—Updike, Roth, Isaiah Berlin, Nijinsky, William James, Velasquez. How could a man who reveled in the intellectual fireworks of these articles spend his leisure time with the Candaces of this world?
Freya suspected it was sheer laziness. There was something about Jack that made women drop into his hand like ripe fruit from a tree; he didn’t have to bother to pick them. She remembered when she had first seen him, fresh off the plane from North Carolina. It was August: eyes prickling with heat and grime; the maggoty smell of sunbaked garbage. Those were the days when she was mixing with a bohemian crowd and living uncomfortably close to the breadline. Jack had strolled onto the drab set of their existence, with his beautiful leather luggage and that old beat-up typewriter he was so proud of, looking like Robert Redford in Barefoot in the Park. He’d been so young, so eager. So clean. So polite! One of the girls in the rooming house swore he smelled of fresh grass. He said he was going to be a writer.
It hadn’t taken long to scuff him up. They’d all teased him like crazy—for his beautiful shirts, his rich Daddy, the easy rise and fall of his accent, his expensive hardback edition of Proust’s Remembrance of Things Past (unread). Jack took it all in good humor. His family was rich but he wasn’t, he said; he’d had a big bust-up with his father and for the ti
me being, anyway, he was one of them. Freya took him under her wing. Jack was funny; he was generous with what he had; he wasn’t ashamed to be enthusiastic; and he was serious about his work. She liked him. And he liked her. But that was all. He was too young for her. And there was already a queue for him. It was tacitly agreed that they would be friends.
And they still were friends. Freya turned back to her magazines and flicked idly through the pages. She was glad she’d never gotten involved with Jack. He was good fun and good company, but his relationships with intelligent women—the few she could remember—never seemed to last long, probably because he couldn’t stand the competition. He used to talk about Fayette, the girl at the University of North Carolina who had been perfect in every way and had supposedly broken his heart, but Freya suspected that he used her as an excuse not to commit himself. It was easier to drift along with only a fraction of his brain engaged. Men liked intellectual challenges, and they liked attractive women: they just didn’t like the two in combination.