Louder Than Love

by Topper, Jessica

  Rob and Marissa are great cooks. And not the measuring cup, recipe book–type cooks. They are the kind who taste a dish and can decide it needs a dash of oregano or a splash of vermouth. And when they get their sauce cooking, it’s a family affair. No matter Brina is only four; she’s peeling garlic. Joey is all of six, but he is working the blender. The sauce begins to simmer at around ten a.m., and it bubbles on a low flame through dance lessons, baseball games, work picnics, cold and flu season, birthday parties; getting an occasional stir by whoever happens to whiz through the kitchen at any given time. The invitation to their friends and family is open-ended: Come and eat if you’re hungry, come and chew the fat if you are not. Some Saturdays, there are upwards of twenty people sopping up the gravy.

  Tonight there were only five of us; Joey had been invited to mini-golf and pizza with a friend from school. Brina and Abbey relished the rare opportunity for girl power and ran outside after dinner to the backyard clubhouse with plans of outfitting it into a “Girls Only” paradise. Teddy bears in dresses, tiny porcelain tea cups, and about two dozen strings of colorful plastic beads left over from Marissa’s last Mardi Gras party went out with them. Lickety and Split, the family’s two Jack Russells, happily followed the girls back and forth.

  Marissa and I lingered at the table, dipping the last of the farmer’s market bread I had brought into the sauce left over on our plates and washing it down with chocolate milk. It sounds disgusting, I know, but the unique blend of cocoa-sweetened cold dairy and zesty sauce-covered meatballs somehow works. Marissa and I had been doing it since we were kids during Sunday dinner at her mom’s house, so we would accept no substitute. Rob was doing the dishes, occasionally lending his two cents to our conversation.

  “So any word from Shrimpy McLobster?”

  “Very funny. No, but whatever, it doesn’t matter.” I picked the olives out of the bread on my plate and popped them into my mouth. Seven days of silence from my answering machine was a bit disheartening, but it certainly wasn’t a world record.

  “He said he would call, though, right?”

  “I believe the words were ‘ring you up.’ Yeah. But he didn’t say when.”

  “Well, no law says you have to sit around and wait.” Marissa brushed crumbs off the tablecloth into her hand. “You have his digits. You contacted him to begin with, remember?” I gave a noncommittal shrug. “Well, if he doesn’t call you, he’s an idiot. Or should I say, if he doesn’t ring you up, he’s a wanker.” She sipped her chocolate milk as daintily as if she were the Queen of England at afternoon tea, and continued in her piss-poor attempt at a British accent, “You are one smashing lass . . .”

  “Smashing!” echoed Rob from the kitchen.

  “Oh, stop, you two. I don’t need a pep rally.” I got up and began to collect the last of the dirty dishes. Marissa, sensing she was losing me, resorted back to her tough Yonkers tongue as she followed me into the kitchen.

  “Seriously, Tree, I don’t think you realize you are quite a hot commodity. You’re witty and intelligent, financially stable, fiercely independent, you’ve got a ton of interests, hair like Julia Roberts wishes she still had, a great figure—”

  “Rockin’ bod, Tree,” Rob agreed, squeezing his sudsy sponge for emphasis.

  “Really. You are the only person I know who could gain twenty pounds, then whittle it all off your middle and redistribute it into your butt and your boobs. Kiss my lily-white ass! This guy should be begging at your doorstep for a chance to take you out.”

  “Pleading!” Rob chimed in. I watched as he arranged and rearranged dirty dishes in the dishwasher as quickly as a tosser in a street corner shell game, the wheels in his math-geek head spinning as he aimed for maximum load capacity.

  “Well, he’s not, and neither is anyone else, so perhaps that should tell you something.” I scooted alongside Rob to ditch my glass of chocolate milk in the sink and reached for the Pinot Grigio on the counter. I prided myself on my iron stomach, which never rebelled over beverage combinations like milk and wine. It was definitely time for wine, if they were going to continue to rah-rah me to death.

  “Like . . . ?” Marissa prompted, handing me a wine glass.

  I watched out the window as the girls ran in and out of the clubhouse, bringing more things in to feather their nest like busy little birds. “Like maybe I’m damaged goods? Or I’ve got some extra baggage?”

  “If he thinks that, then he really is crazy,” Marissa said, her anger flaring. “And he doesn’t need a fancy-pants city shrink to tell him that.”

  “Easy, killer. I’m not ready to string him up just yet. Or write him off.”

  I watched as Marissa handed her husband the last saucy pot, kissed his cheek, and smiled. There were couples that went through the motions on autopilot, and then there was Marissa and Rob. I don’t know if it was the Italian thing or what, but he was like the meatball to her chocolate milk; they complemented each other perfectly.

  Marissa poured herself some wine and leaned against the counter. She swished the contents of her glass and studied it. “He couldn’t keep his eyes off you, you know.”

  “Really?”

  “Yeah, the whole time he was playing, he kept sneaking little glances, making sure you were still in the room. He needs to shit or get off the pot. I wonder if there’s a British translation for that.”

  Patience and Fortitude

  “Is Daddy in the stars?” Abbey came trotting into the bathroom just as my wet foot touched the bathmat.

  “What do you mean, honey?” I pulled the shower curtain closed and squeezed some of the moisture out of my hair.

  “When I slept at Brina and Joey’s, we watched The Lion King, and they said in the movie that all the great kings are in the stars.”

  “Well . . . that is a nice way to think of him, I suppose. Like he’s watching over you.” We weren’t religious; there had been no talk of heaven in our household. There were times when I fervently wished I had been brought up believing in some doctrine of afterlife, if only to pass that unquestioned comfort on to her.

  She sat down on the closed toilet lid and sighed. “I wish I could hear his voice.”

  “He sounded a lot like Unkie Luke,” I offered. Our wedding video was collecting dust somewhere, but I had never mentioned it to Abbey. I wasn’t ready to see it myself just yet. Someday . . .

  Abbey fondled all of my jars of creams, sniffing their contents. She opened and closed every pressed powder and eye shadow compact like a pearl diver searching for that one lucky oyster. Then she sampled my dental floss. “Mmm, minty. Can I watch PBS? There’s a Maxwell MacGillikitty marathon on all day today.”

  “Abbey.” It was barely eight o’clock and I was already exasperated. Knowing the whole day stretched out in front of us without a plan made me panic. Sundays often crept up on me and smeared me in the face with the reminder that, for most people, Sundays meant cherished family time after a long week of work. For Abbey and me, Sunday was just another day in a long string of days with each other for company. And as much as we enjoyed each other, along with lots of activities in and out of the house, there were times when we needed a break, an escape. I knew Maxwell was a bit of an escape for her, but couldn’t in good conscience let her sit in front of the tube on such a beautiful day. Not to mention, every time I heard the opening notes to the Maxwell MacGillikitty theme, I thought of Adrian and his noncommittal ‘Can I ring you up sometime?’ It made me want to wring his neck. Well, not quite. But it stung and saddened me that he hadn’t, despite what I had said to Marissa the evening before. “One episode,” I said firmly. “Then we are going to the zoo.”

  For many kids born and raised in Manhattan, Central Park becomes their backyard paradise, their playground. Despite the fact I dragged Abbey out to the suburbs before age one, I didn’t want her to miss out on the opportunity to learn every inch of that wonderland. It was her legacy. Pete an
d I had happily squandered many a summer day in Sheep Meadow, Frisbeeing with friends, reading the New York Times under the stately oak trees, eating Naked Bagels from Liz’s shop, and dreaming away the hours. We never did skate on Wollman Rink, although we had always meant to. But we took many walks past it during the crunchy cold winters, bundled and leaning into each other as our conversations frosted over in front of our faces.

  From the time Abbey was born, we would bring her there. As she people-watched from the BabyBjörn carrier on my chest, you could tell she was absorbing it all. We would take turns pushing her stroller through fallen leaves and whipping around pigeons, and when she would finally surrender to a nap, hand in hand we blissfully glided along the paths we knew so well. Chatting quietly about what we would show her there when she was two, five, ten. The statues of Alice in Wonderland and Mother Goose. The zoo. Cleopatra’s Needle. Bethesda Fountain. Strawberry Fields. The carousel.

  Abbey’s favorite place in the city was now the park, thanks to our regular visits. And her favorite thing to see in the park was the zoo. Although the Bronx Zoo was a borough closer, we preferred the more intimate surrounds of the Central Park Zoo. We could walk the whole thing and still have energy for other things, like playing at Heckscher Playground, climbing Cat Rock, and pretending we lived in the Dairy.

  Traffic was nonexistent that morning, and the parking gods were on our side. To our shock, the gates at the brick-and-wrought-iron zoo entrance were still closed. “Gee, Abb, we’re early,” I explained, pulling out my cell phone to glance at the time. “They’ll be open soon. Why don’t we sit on a bench and have a snack?”

  The path that led to the zoo was deserted, save for some Asian tourists posing cutely for their companions’ cameras. East Drive had the occasional cyclist zooming past, but all was relatively calm in the park at this hour. I breathed deeply and gazed at the canopy of emerald green over my head. I felt like a stalker, knowing we were so close to Adrian’s place. It was a silly thought. He wasn’t aware that I knew where he lived. And Abbey and I were only two of the thousands of people who came to enjoy the park every day. No crime in that.

  “I can’t wait to see the sea lions!” Abbey crowed. She bounced her tiny butt, clad in denim shortalls, up and down on the bench.

  I handed her a bag of peanut butter crackers and began searching through my pocketbook for a juice box. “Do you remember their names?”

  “Of course! There’s Scooter . . . April is the cutest one . . . Clarisse . . . Adrian!”

  “What?” I had just turned, juice box in hand, to see Abbey take off like a shot, running toward East Drive. I took off after her, yelling her name as bikes whizzed by at a dizzying pace.

  How she recognized him, I’ll never know. First off, he was wearing one of those ridiculous aerodynamic bike helmets that made him look like an alien life-form. Add mirrored shades to that, and those obscenely tight spandex bike shorts. Plus he was off his bike, kneeling and pumping air into his tire with a small handheld pump. He was totally wired for sound and shut off from the world, iPod clipped to his arm. Precisely as I was about to snatch her by the scruff of her neck, he glanced up, smiled big, and I recognized him. It was one of those moments that made Manhattan truly feel like a small place, just a hunk of bedrock twelve miles long and two miles wide.

  He stood to his full height. Luckily, the Chelsea football jersey he was wearing covered most of his spandex-clad nether regions. He pulled the earbuds off, and I could hear tinny guitars and drums screeching a million miles an hour. “Hello, ladies.”

  “See, Mom, I told you it was him.” In actuality, she had just yelled his name and gone running without looking both ways, but I figured there would be time to scold her later. “We’re going to the zoo. Like in your song, but we didn’t take a crosstown bus. We drove. Wanna come?” Abbey offered.

  “Thank you, Abbey, but . . .” He turned his head theatrically from side to side, pretending to make sure no one was eavesdropping, and said in a stage whisper, “If I go back there, I’m afraid they won’t let me back out.” Then he crossed his eyes and scratched under his arm like a gorilla, much to Abbey’s delight.

  He turned to me. “They should really lock me in the loony bin for not calling you. I’ve no excuse, other than being a fool.”

  “So redeem yourself,” I challenged, trying hard not to study the rambling topography of his spandex. Arms. Arms are safe. His biceps strained against the tight blue and yellow cuffs of his football shirt. I forgot how cute he was. I liked the way his hair curled out from under his helmet and down around his collarbone.

  “We have to go, good-bye, Adrian Graves! Mommy! Come on!” The gates were opening and Abbey was making a beeline back toward the zoo.

  “I will . . . tonight!” he called after me. “Watch out for those reactionary zebras, Abbey!”

  ***

  We arrived home to the longest message in the history of our answering machine. Adrian left his cell number, his home phone number, his e-mail address, and his IM screen name. “Since you are a librarian and love information, now you have every possible way to contact me. So whatever works best.” I fulfilled my starving daughter’s request for ravioli with a perpetual grin and grabbed my laptop. The only person I regularly instant messaged was Kev; it wasn’t a medium I particularly loved, but with a cranky, hungry, wiped-out child in the room was less stressful than a phone call. I signed on and there he was.

  K: Boo.

  A: Ah, redemption!

  K: Just a keystroke away.

  A: So when can I see you again? Pick a place, anywhere. I will meet you there.

  K: Are you sure? I think I am hazardous to your health.

  A: On the contrary. What are you doing tonight?

  K: It’s a school night, not a good idea. How about Friday night?

  A: Okay, now you ARE really trying to kill me, woman.

  K: Can you find Patience?

  A: No, I’m worse than a kid, I’m into immediate gratification.

  K: Well, find Patience and meet me there on Wednesday at 10:30.

  A: Meet where?

  K: I just told you, silly.

  A: Patience . . . is that some new rave club?

  K: Ha. No.

  A: You’re making me work for this, aren’t you?

  K: Yep. J

  A: Well . . . can I ask you the rating on this date?

  K: Isn’t that a tad premature? I don’t know, I’m hoping 8.5 out of 10, maybe? LOL

  A: No, I meant, will it have a G rating, PG rating, etc.?

  K: Oh, you mean will Abbey be there? No, she has to be at school by 9. So the date can contain some mildly crude language, adult references . . . partial nudity, if you are lucky.

  A: LOL Who needs redemption now?

  K:

  A: So 10:30 . . . AM?

  K: Is that too early for you?

  A: Yes. But I will be there.

  “Favor to ask.”

  The crunch of Marissa’s potato chip crackled through the phone line. “Shoot.”

  “Can you grab Abbey at school one day this week, in case I’m late?”

  “Late because of . . . ?”

  “A playdate with the kiddy musician.” I grinned at the notion.

  “Oh my God!”

  “Well, can you?”

  “Of course. But tell me, tell me! What took him so long to contact you?”

  “Don’t know. I guess he was working up his nerve?”

  “So do you think he’s rich?” Marissa had been intrigued since learning of his Central Park West address. “He could pass for the wealthy eccentric type, don’t you think? Rich and crazy. Better than poor and crazy.”

  “I wish I never told you that stuff.”

  “Just kidding, Tree. So . . . give him a chance, I guess.”


  “I am,” I replied. “I’m meeting him in the city on Wednesday.” I had been reluctant to tell her that part of the story, as it meant our yearlong Wednesday coffee-klatch streak was broken.

  “Where?”

  “At the NYPL.”

  “Oh, that is sexy.” Marissa snorted in my ear. “A date at the library.”

  “No, I just told him . . . well, I kind of implied I would meet him in front of the library.” I shared my off-the-cuff riddle of finding Patience and what it meant.

  “Girl.” She sounded alarmed. “You should call him and tell him. Not everyone is literary. If he doesn’t show, you won’t know if he intentionally blew you off or if he didn’t get the reference.”

  “I have faith in him that he will find it; he seemed up for the challenge. Where is your sense of adventure?”

  “He’d better show—I’ll break his little guitar-strumming fingers if he doesn’t!” she threatened. I could picture her flexing her elbow and baring her fist, rings glittering like a knuckle-duster, to send her point home.

  “Mariss, who isn’t giving him a chance now? Let’s give him some credit.”

  “I just want you to be happy.”

  “No, you want me to be safe,” I pointed out.

  “What does that mean?”

  “You’d rather see me give someone like Grant a chance, let the jerk prove to me that deep down he has a heart of gold, and then we can neatly merge our little broken families and I can live happily ever after and be the comfy wife of the local antiques dealer, like my mama before me. Honestly, the known terrifies me more than the unknown at this point.”