by Dani Shapiro
“I’ve always known I was going to love your work.”
She pushes back from the table and folds her arms.
“So how many pieces can I have for summer?”
It’s the middle of the afternoon by the time they get back uptown. Clara has been so immersed in Jonathan’s news that she actually hasn’t thought about her daughter for a couple of hours. Twelve pieces to start. Great placement in the front counter. Jonathan’s name included in group ads. Clara and Jonathan stopped for a beer. Sat in an outdoor café on West Broadway, just across the street from the old Kubovy Weiss Gallery, which was now a new gallery full of Leroy Neiman prints and old movie posters. See? I can be here. I can do this, she thought to herself. It’s all different.
Now they are back at Ruth’s apartment. A sparkly pair of sneakers—the only pair of shoes Sammy brought on this trip—by the front door. So they’re not in the park. Maybe Sam got tired and Peony brought her home.
“Hello?” Clara calls. Feeling suddenly cold. “Hello?”
“In here!” A voice calls from the living room. Peony’s voice.
Sam and Peony are sitting side by side on the sofa facing the fireplace, a large book open between them.
“What are you guys—”
The very sight of Peony sitting so close to her daughter—Peony’s dark hair pulled messily into a clip, her small pretty face, skinny jeans, and thick-soled boots—makes Clara uneasy. It’s as if the girl has slowly morphed into a modern-day Ruth. She blinks sleepily up at Clara.
“Mom, look at this!” Sam tilts the book so that it catches the light.
It hadn’t occurred to Clara. It really hadn’t—and the shock of it causes her to take a step back, nearly tripping. She can see the spread of two photographs, even from this vantage point—Clara with the Pumpkins; Clara, Hanging—how is it possible? The book isn’t supposed to be published for months.
“The bound page proofs,” Peony says proudly, as if she had bound them herself. “They just arrived from Steiffel this morning.”
“Is that so.”
“Yeah—and they look so amazing. Do you want to see?”
“Um—no.”
Does Peony somehow not hear the edge in Clara’s voice, or is she merely ignoring it? It’s impossible to tell.
“Ruth hasn’t looked at them yet; she’s been sleeping. I’m just so happy that Steiffel got these to us while she’s still—”
Peony stops, finally seeming to take in the fact that Clara hasn’t moved a muscle.
“I mean—” She falters. “I called them last week to see if they could rush—”
“How thoughtful of you.” Blood is pounding between Clara’s ears. “I’m sure my mother will appreciate the gesture.”
“What’s wrong, Mom?” Sammy asks.
The contrast between the two girls—the false guile of the older one and the genuine guile of the younger—is so stark that Clara has to restrain herself from striding across the room and grabbing Peony by her black Rolling Stones T-shirt. Who the fuck do you think you are?
“This should have been my choice,” Clara says. Staring at Peony. Her voice cold. “Whether or not I wanted to show my daughter—and when. You had absolutely no right to—”
She feels Jonathan’s hand on her back, warm through her shirt. Steadying her. Not in front of Sammy. What’s done is done.
Clara stops. She flashes one more withering glance at Peony—she wants the girl to melt down into her thick rubber-soled boots and disappear. Is she actually malicious? Or just young and stupid?
“I’d better check on Ruth,” Clara says. But she’s not going to leave Sam sitting on the sofa next to Peony, not for another second. She forces her voice to soften. “Sammy, why don’t you come with me?”
Peony closes the book. Clara can see the front cover of the page proofs. The wavy hair, the braided rug, the close-up of her face. The black paper sash running across the image, obscuring her nakedness. The black paper sash—CLARA—like a mourner’s armband.
Ruth’s head is turned away from the door. Her chest rises and falls beneath the covers, accompanied by the high-pitched wheezing that has become part of her every breath. It’s impossible to tell, from the doorway, whether she’s awake or asleep.
Sammy precedes Clara around the hospital bed—she’s unafraid, matter-of-fact in the face of this wasting away—and softly whispers, “Grandma?”
A thin stream of drool runs from the side of Ruth’s mouth down to the pillow, where it has created a damp spot.
“Grandma?”
Something is happening behind Ruth’s eyes. A consciousness. A flutter.
“Sweetie, maybe we should just let Grandma rest,” Clara says.
This is the best it can be, for now: Ruth, seemingly not in pain, unconscious.
“No.” A very small voice, muffled by the pillow.
The eyes struggle to open and make it halfway. Clara swears Ruth’s dark brown eyes have become lighter these past few weeks—they appear to be a yellowish green—as if she is being scrubbed away, bit by bit.
Ruth’s gaze rests on Sammy. She blinks a few times, as if trying to clear her vision—as if perhaps she’s imagining the girl leaning over the iron rail of her bed.
“Is that you, sweetheart?”
“Yes, it’s me,” Sammy says in a whisper.
“I’m so happy to see you, darling.”
“Me too.”
“How long has it been?”
Ruth reaches a shaky hand up to stroke Sammy’s bare arm. They’re in their own little zone. Protected, impenetrable.
“I’ve missed you so.”
Sammy looks across the bedroom at Clara, her face clouded by confusion. She just saw her grandmother this morning. What does Ruth mean?
“I saw your book, Grandma,” Sammy says. “It’s really beautiful.”
Clara swallows hard, past the lump in her throat. Sammy thinks the photographs are beautiful.
“What book?” Ruth asks. Her voice weak.
“Your—”
“Come closer, my darling girl.”
Sammy moves her face even closer to Ruth’s. The afternoon light catches the peach fuzz on her smooth cheeks. Her eyes are a clear amber brown.
“I want to tell you something,” Ruth says.
“What?” Sammy’s hands are wrapped around the rail. She’s all ears, hanging on to Ruth’s every word.
“I want to say—” Ruth stares at Sam intensely. Too intensely. She struggles to lift her head from the pillow.
Give them room, Clara thinks to herself as she watches her mother and her daughter. Fighting the urge to pull Sammy from Ruth’s bed, to drag her out of this room and away from whatever comes next.
“I know that I hurt you,” Ruth goes on.
“What do you—what do you mean?” Sam stammers.
“I mean, I’m an artist. You understand me, Clara.”
Jesus Christ. She thinks—
Clara takes a step toward Sam. But then she stops. She can’t help it. She wants to hear more.
“Sometimes—” Ruth is starting to lose her voice. “Sometimes I think—” Every word is costing her something. A tear leaks out of the corner of her rheumy eye and trickles down the side of her face.
“It’s me, Grandma,” Sam bursts out. “It’s me. Sam.”
Sammy is a little scared now. Ruth doesn’t seem to hear her.
“Forgive me,” Ruth says.
Sammy doesn’t know what to do. She searches Clara’s face for an answer, but Clara—Clara is crying too hard.
“Grandma, I—It’s not—”
Ruth reaches a hand out once more and holds Sammy’s forearm.
“Please. Just say you will.”
Sam is silent. Her face is bathed in the golden light streaming in from the west-facing windows. Who is she—to Ruth? Is she Clara in the Shroud? Clara in the Fountain? Clara, Hanging? Does she look like the artist’s model? Or the artist’s daughter?
Clara looks at her mother
. Ruth’s eyes are glued to Sammy’s face. Waiting—waiting for something that doesn’t come. After a few moments, Ruth’s lids drift slowly down. Her breath deepens. Her chest rattles as she falls back into the netherworld between sleep and death.
THE SEVENTH GRADE at Brearley. The seventh grade anywhere, really—but more so at certain New York City private schools: Brearley, Spence, Chapin, Fieldston, Riverdale, Dalton. These schools have always had their own special version of early adolescence. Girls whose mothers take them to Eres on Madison for their first bras. Girls who pay a visit to their mother’s dermatologist at the sight of their first pimple—as if that teenage rite of passage, acne, can be fixed like everything else if only you know where to go. Girls who seem to sparkle through their most awkward of ages, with clear skin and straight teeth, shiny hair, and lovely little bras beneath their school uniforms—whatever turmoil, if any, well hidden beneath their preternaturally polished exteriors.
Not so Clara. She is beautiful, yes—no one can deny that—but she has a face that shows her feelings. A face that registers every embarrassment, every slight. Every single moment she wishes the floor would open up beneath her and allow her to just…disappear. There are daughters of movie stars at Brearley, daughters of politicians, even daughters of white-collar criminals whose names have been splashed across tabloid front pages—but none of these girls incites quite the swell of whispers and murmurs that surround Clara like a rustling breeze wherever she goes.
It’s the piece in Vogue that tips the balance. Vogue, the one magazine that every Brearley mother reads without fail. Had the photographic essay on the work of Ruth Dunne appeared in Bazaar or The Atlantic Monthly or even Newsweek, at least some people would have missed it. Or had the essay been done years before, when Clara was still a little girl, perhaps her friends would not have noticed. But twelve-year-olds are not known for their kindness toward each other. They are not about to look the other way.
So when the first dog-eared copy of the September Vogue—featuring a blond model in faded jeans and a Christian Lacroix jacket on its cover—makes its way into the halls of Brearley, it doesn’t take long for the chain of whispers to extend all the way back to Clara. She hasn’t heard about the essay—Ruth neglected to mention it—but Clara does know that, whatever the gossip, it somehow has to do with her.
Elizabeth Ridgeway is the first to say it straight to her. Elizabeth, whose nickname is Buffy and whose father owns a football team—Clara has never paid attention to which one. Buffy’s lank brown hair falls halfway across her face. She peers at Clara curiously with one unobscured eye.
“So how does it feel?” she asks.
Clara hugs her books to her chest.
“How does what feel?”
“You know,” Buffy says, braces glinting.
“No, I don’t.” Clara feels herself beginning to flush. She tries to think cool thoughts. Ice cubes. Air-conditioning. A freezing lake. Even though she doesn’t yet know what she’s supposed to feel—or what it’s about—she doesn’t want Buffy to see her squirm.
Buffy bends down, rummages through her knapsack, and pulls the copy of the magazine out from between her French and algebra textbooks. She thumbs through it, frowning. Clara sees a blur of color—perfume ads, fashion spreads, glistening lips, kohl-rimmed eyes—until Buffy stops on a page that is black-and-white. She thrusts it at Clara.
“Here,” she says. “This.”
The double-page spread that opens the essay has three photos and very little text. The first image is a recent one: after Clara in the Shroud, Ruth became interested in covering parts of Clara but leaving other parts exposed. In this one—Clara has never seen it before, though of course she remembers posing for it—she is lying in bed, a rumpled sheet pulled in what appears to be a haphazard way across her body, her chest—the very beginning of her prepubescent breasts—exposed. Her eyes closed, grimacing. Her arms trapped beneath the sheet.
“It looks like you’re…” Buffy trails off.
“What?” Clara asks. Honestly, she has no idea.
“You know.”
“Will you stop saying that?”
The heat is rising up Clara’s neck to her cheeks. She feels herself blushing. Now there’s nothing she can do about it.
Buffy leans forward. Her breath tickles Clara’s ear.
“Masturbating,” she says.
Clara’s hand flies to her mouth. She’s heard about that—she’s never done it, not yet anyway—but now, when she looks at the enormous photograph of herself on page 246 of the September Vogue, that’s all she can see. Her hands beneath the sheets. That look on her face. What was it Ruth had said that day? Try to look like something is hurting you, Clara. That’s right. Close your eyes. Beautiful. Just like that.
Buffy shakes her head, as if she is truly sorry.
“I thought you knew,” she said.
She tries to pry the magazine from Clara’s hands.
“No,” Clara says. She grips it tighter.
“Come on. It’s mine—give it back to me.”
“No!”
“I stole it from my mother. You have to give it back!”
Other girls are starting to look at them. Clara stands her ground. Sweat is pouring down her back, but she doesn’t let go.
Finally, Buffy releases the magazine. She lifts her chin slightly. Even though she’s shorter than Clara, she appears to be looking down at her.
“Fine,” she says, with a small, closed smile. “That’s fine. There are millions and millions of others.”
CLARA SINKS to the living-room floor, her back against the soft velvet of the sofa. Her favorite spot. How could she have forgotten? The threadbare oriental, worn in the same patches. The bit of missing fringe. She was three years old here. She was four, seven, twelve, sixteen. The space between the sofa and coffee table. Near the fireplace. A haven. A warren. A place to burrow and be safe.
She closes her eyes against the swirling images. God almighty, Ruth! Clara hears her father’s voice. Look outside of yourself for once! The ghosts of Nate and Ruth of decades past, standing just on the other side of the coffee table. Ruth, her hair sprung from its braid, eyes wild. Her bathrobe hanging halfway open, a breast exposed. Nathan in his navy blue suit—getting ready to leave for the office—afraid to go. Afraid of what might happen. Promise me. His voice cracking. Promise me you’ll leave her alone.
“Here, Mom.” Sam sits down next to her. “Here. You should—”
Clara sees what Sammy is carrying. The fucking book again.
“No, Sam. I don’t want to.”
Jonathan sits down on her other side. She is sandwiched between her husband and her daughter.
“Take a look,” Jonathan says. “There’s something you should see.”
She starts thumbing through the page proofs from the end back toward the beginning. Angry, resentful. Why should she be looking at this? There are no surprises. What could possibly be a surprise? She was there for all the photographs. She had posed for them under bright metered lights. From Naked at Fourteen all the way to Clara with the Lizard. The narrative of her entire childhood as created by Ruth Dunne. She closes the book. So what? She’ll do the best she can to pretend it just doesn’t exist.
“You missed something,” Sam says.
Her small fingers pry open a page toward the very beginning. The dedication. To Clara and Robin, in the center of the page, and then simply the words, Without whom.
Without whom? Without whom what? Clara’s heart is pounding, skipping beats.
“Excuse me?” Peony appears, as she always seems to do, at the worst possible moment. How does she walk so quietly in those heavy boots?
Clara looks up at her, startled.
“What?”
“I’m worried about Ruth’s breathing,” Peony says. “I think we should call Rochelle.”
Clara checks her watch. “She’s due any minute.”
Jonathan gets up without a word and quickly walks down the hall toward Ruth’
s bedroom.
“She’s gasping. She’s having trouble taking in air.” Peony looks stricken. Clara almost feels sorry for her. Almost. Someday, when Peony is a famous photographer herself, she will be interviewed about her time in the household of Ruth Dunne. She will speak with authority, mincing no words. Her daughters just couldn’t see Ruth for who she really was. Her genius was lost on them.
Clara pulls Sammy close to her. The child is shaking. She shouldn’t be here for this, she shouldn’t be—
“She’s having trouble.” Jonathan comes back into the living room. “It’s true.”
Clara begins to shake herself.
Jonathan sits down next to her, pushing the page proofs aside. He puts his arms around her. She looks up at him—his eyes clear as they have always been.
“Come into the bedroom,” Jonathan says.
SHE IS FOURTEEN when she figures out a way to break free of her mother. It begins on a rainy afternoon, after school. A group of girls is walking down Lexington Avenue—their destination a soft-serve ice-cream shop—when one of them suggests that they hop on the subway downtown instead. They aren’t allowed to do this, of course, which only makes the idea that much more appealing.
“Where are we going?” one of them asks. They are so cosseted uptown. Their neighborhood haunts consist of a soda fountain, a deli, and the park benches along the edges of Central Park, where the more rebellious among them smoke cigarettes and sometimes pot.
“I know,” Clara says casually, as they wait for the train under the fluorescent lights of the subway station. Where did the idea come from? It seemed to spring to her mind, fully formed. “I heard about a place where we can get tattoos.”
It was true that she had seen a small tattoo on one of Ruth’s interns—a tiny bird flying above her ankle—and it was also true that Clara had asked the girl who had done it. A guy on Eighth Street, the girl had told her, and then described the building: a brownstone tucked between some taller buildings, a buzzer with no name, a five-story walk-up. Clara took in these facts and tucked them away for months and months in the back of her mind.