by Lisa Lutz
“Are you playing dumb?”
“No,” I said, not whispering at all.
“Do you like me?”
“Yes.”
“Then what do you say about us going on a normal date?”
“Sure,” I said. But then I had to ask the obvious question. “What is a normal date?”
For Daniel, a normal date was pretty much defined by a home-cooked meal followed or preceded by another activity such as a movie, happy hour, or tennis. But I came to the conclusion that playing tennis should only be a normal date activity for people who actually enjoy tennis. I was still undecided in that regard and grateful for the respite. We would play one last time, but I’ll get to that later.
Normal Date #1
Three days after Daniel asked me out at the tennis club, we met for drinks at a wine bar in Hayes Valley. A hovering sommelier with a few too many “suggestions” prompted us to leave. Then Daniel had a suggestion of his own: I come back to his place for a “home-cooked meal.” Eventually those words—home-cooked meal—would carry an air of doom with them, but on that very first night, Daniel and his home-cooked meal seemed almost perfect.
Dr. Castillo resides on the first level of a three-story apartment building. Two bedrooms, one bath, clean—but not obsessively so—and tastefully decorated without even a hint of a professional’s touch. It was far too modest a space for a man whose name is followed by the letters DDS.
Daniel defrosted a plate of enchiladas from his freezer collection. I questioned whether defrosting really qualified as a home-cooked meal, but Daniel explained that he had indeed made the dish (from his mother’s recipe) and therefore it counts. I didn’t argue once the food was served. I’ll give Daniel this: He sure knows how to make a good enchilada. Unfortunately, that was the only thing he could make.
Normal Date #2 (five days later)
After a walk in Golden Gate Park, Daniel invited me over for another home-cooked meal. This time he tried a chicken cacciatore recipe that he found in a Gourmet magazine sitting in the reception area of his office. The dish might have been edible, but when Daniel failed to locate a spice, he would substitute it with one that was similar in color or name, but not necessarily flavor. So instead of oregano, he used thyme. Instead of black pepper, he used cayenne.
The charming thing about Daniel was he didn’t seem to notice that the failure of the meal was his own failure. He simply thought that the recipe wasn’t properly tested. With each bite came a comment along the lines of, “Interesting combination of flavors.” Then a few bites later, “I probably won’t be making this again,” and lastly, “But I do enjoy experimenting.”
Still, I have fond memories of Normal Date #2. After Daniel cleared the table, he pulled a six-pack of beer out of the refrigerator.
“Let’s go up to the roof and look at the stars.”
There were no stars that night, but I didn’t say a word, since rooftop drinking is one of my favorite activities.
We sat on plastic lounge chairs under the dark, foggy sky, mostly in silence, but there was nothing awkward about it. Just two people quietly enjoying each other’s company. I was fairly certain he’d brought me to the rooftop to make his first move, but three hours later, when it got too cold to sit there any longer, I realized I was wrong.
Normal Date #3 (three days later)
Once again, Daniel insisted on making me a home-cooked meal. Nothing could prepare my stomach for the sweet-and-sour stuffed cabbage that was presented to me. Daniel, of course, blamed the recipe: “Don’t they test these things out?” he said. “I’m definitely not making that again.”
“I kind of liked it,” I replied.
That entire statement was a complete untruth. But I figured since I was lying about my entire biography, the least I could do was lie about his cooking.
While Daniel washed dishes, I roamed his living room, scanning his bookshelves. It was then that I made the discovery that would change everything—at least it would change our range of activities. I pulled one of the DVD box sets off the shelf and walked into the kitchen.
“Daniel, I noticed you have—”
“Speak up. I can’t hear you over the water.”
I moved next to him and showed him the DVD. “I noticed you have the entire Get Smart collection on DVD. I didn’t even think this was available.”
“It’s a bootleg copy,” he replied.
“Was it a gift?” I asked.
“Yes,” he said. “A gift to myself. I love Get Smart.”
“No, I love it,” I said enthusiastically. “My best friend [censored]6 and I used to [censored]7 watch this show all the time.”
Daniel turned off the water and dried his hands. “What do you say to a marathon?”
Ten episodes and an inestimable number of shoe phone calls later, Daniel yawned and I realized that I had to be up at seven the next morning to be at school by eight.8 It was time to go.
Daniel turned off the DVD and said, “When I was a child, I thought for sure I would grow up and work for CONTROL.9”
“Me, too,” I replied, although what I really thought was that I’d work for KAOS.10
Normal Date #3 ended much on the same note as Normal Dates #1 and #2. Daniel walked me to my car, followed by a handshake (on #1) and a brief hug (on #2). It was the pat on the head (on #3) that ultimately shattered my patience. After three tennis dates and three normal dates, I still had not gotten my first kiss.
I sat in my car as Daniel disappeared into the foyer of his building. I started the engine, prepared to leave, prepared to accept yet another night of dentist rejection. But then I changed my mind. I had waited long enough.
The window of Daniel’s living room is only six feet aboveground and readily accessible if you use the drainpipe that runs horizontally along the front of the building. When I saw the lights go on in Daniel’s apartment and his shadow moving about, I got out of my car and knocked on his window.
People don’t respond to window knocking as they do to doorbells or door knocking, but they do respond eventually. Daniel opened the window just as I was losing my grip on the dusty sill.
“Hello, Isabel. Is my buzzer broken?”
“No,” I said, not understanding the question.
“What are you doing out here?”
“I wanted to talk to you.”
“Okay. Would you like to come in?”
“Sure,” I said, pushing the window up another notch with the palm of my hand.
“Why don’t you go around to the front and I’ll buzz you in?” Daniel said.
I’m not sure when doors became the single mode of entry and exit in our domesticated world, but something about that hard and inflexible rule struck me as unscientific. Daniel wanted me to jump off the drainpipe, walk ten yards to the front door, wait for a buzzer, and pass a security gate and two doors to reach the same destination that a pull-up and leg throw could accomplish.
“I’ll just use the window, if you don’t mind,” I said.
Daniel stepped back as I threw my left leg over the window and straddled the sill. I swung my other leg inside and dusted off my hands.
“You might want to clean that,” I said.
Daniel remained unresponsive to my suggestion.
“Is everything all right, Isabel?”
“No.”
“Care to elaborate?”
“What am I? A golden retriever?”
“Of course not,” Daniel replied, confused.
“Three games of tennis, one happy hour, a stroll in the park, twelve beers, one glass of wine, and three home-cooked meals. What does it take?”
Daniel leaned back on the arm of his couch.
“What does it take?” he repeated.
“Four handshakes, a businessman’s hug, and a pat on the head?”
“Isabel, I need you to spell it out for me,” Daniel replied.
And so I did. I reached for his tie and pulled him close. After seven weeks, twenty-five tennis lessons, two weeks of short-term surve
illance, three tennis dates and three normal dates, and ten episodes of my favorite television show of all time, I finally got my first kiss.
“You get it now?” I said as I pulled away.
“I get it,” Daniel replied as he put his arm around my waist and kissed me back.
Hiding Daniel from my parents and hiding my parents from Daniel required a more aggressive regimen than my previous exercises in stealth could prepare me for. The easiest part was keeping Daniel from my home. I explained that any unannounced visit could result in the accidental meeting of the parental unit. I explained to him that if he met the unit at this point in our relationship, he would undoubtedly break up with me. Daniel wrestled with the concept that people who sacrificed their lives to become educators could be the kind of lunatics their daughter portrayed, but he accepted it as truth.
My parents would have found nothing unusual in my behavior had it not been for the sudden sartorial changes. I don’t dress like a schoolteacher and for Daniel to believe a lie, which I believed was so observably untrue, I figured the only way to sell it was to dress the part.
THE SKIRT WARS
Initially I’d rush home after work, shower, change into a tailored dress or a tweed skirt and a somewhat ironed shirt, and try to slip out of the house unnoticed. But nothing goes unnoticed in that house. If it rained, I could hide my attire with a long overcoat. On the rare occasions when I was expected to meet with a client, the outfits were essentially interchangeable. But mostly I did my best to remain unnoticed. Defenestration became my coming-and-going method of choice, but it’s hard to say what is more suspicious: a sudden, drastic change in wardrobe or not using doors.
However, the greatest challenge would occur in the middle of the day, when Daniel would want to meet for a “surprise” lunch. A patient canceled. He’s suddenly free. I’m astounded by the number of people who don’t think twice about canceling a dentist’s appointment. I railed against every cancelation, wanting to call each and every patient and shout, “Do you know what this is doing to me?!” or “Don’t you care about dental hygiene?!” Instead, I learned to change in the car. I would park down the street from the school du jour—Mission High School, Presidio Middle School, Jefferson Elementary School, etc.—change my clothes, and wait for Daniel on the street. Occasionally I’d wave to a complete stranger who had that weary haze of an educator and say, “See you next week, Suzie” or “Take care of that cold, Jim.” Daniel never noticed the awkward stare I’d receive as a response. He bought it all, and why shouldn’t he have? This particular truth was much stranger than any fiction.
It became such a routine—car changes adjacent to public schools—that I began viewing these sessions as amateur sporting events rather than a by-product of deceit. My best time was three minutes and twenty-five seconds for a full wardrobe change. My worst time was eight minutes and fifty seconds, when I caught the zipper of my wool skirt on the tail of my linen shirt. A week after Daniel and I began our Normal Dates, Petra commented that my dress seemed over the top, as if I were performing the part of a schoolteacher in a play. But I found that I needed the clothes to remind me of the act. In my case, the clothes didn’t make the woman, they made the lie. And while I should have found my own behavior disturbing, I did not. Not until one day when I caught a glimpse of myself in the rearview mirror. The arm of my sweater had twisted into a secure knot and I writhed in the backseat of my car, besieged by my own clothing.
It was time to put an end to Daniel’s surprise lunch dates. To satisfy Daniel’s desire for spontaneity and mine for restaurant food, I started dropping by Daniel’s office whenever I was in the vicinity and appropriately dressed. Since substitute teachers have a notoriously flexible schedule, Daniel was none the wiser.
The first time I was introduced to Mrs. Sanchez, Daniel’s sixty-year-old hygienist, office manager, and all-around saint, she looked me up and down and smiled politely. Then she mumbled something to Daniel in Spanish.
On my second “spontaneous” visit, approximately six weeks after Daniel and I started dating, Mrs. Sanchez told me to take a seat, that Daniel was with a patient and should be finished in fifteen minutes or so. Then I made the mistake of engaging in small talk.
“Daniel tells me you’re a substitute teacher,” Mrs. Sanchez said.
“He did? I don’t know where he got that idea from.”
Silence.
“Sorry, that was a joke,” I said, although it wasn’t much of one and it’s always a bad sign when you don’t even get polite laughter. “Yes, I’m a teacher. A substitute teacher. Aren’t kids great?”
“Yes,” she replied. “I have three grandchildren of my own.”
“That’s wonderful,” I said. “I hope you have some regular children, too.”
Silence.
“I meant that you would need to have your own kids first and then the grandchildren follow.”
“I have three children,” she replied with a polite but unsettling smile.
“Congratulations,” I said because I was losing steam.
“So Isabel, where do you teach usually?”
“Oh, everywhere.”
“Don’t you have some schools where you’re a regular.”
“Not really. I like to mix it up. Keep things interesting.”
“Well, where did you teach last week, for instance?”
Last week had been one of Daniel’s surprise lunch visits, and I’d changed my clothes outside of Presidio Middle School. It’s important to maintain consistency in lies—I learned that at a very early age.
“I was at Presidio Middle School last Tuesday and Wednesday, if my memory serves me.”
“My grandson Juan goes to Presidio. Then you must know Leslie Granville, the vice principal.”
“Oh, I don’t know her1 very well.”
Silence.
“Him, you mean. Leslie is a man, last I checked.”
“Right,” I said, feeling the blood drain from my face. “Him. Yes, of course. I have that thing where you swap pronouns. There’s a word for it. An actual condition. Anyway. Yes, Leslie is a man.”
An act of God—the telephone ringing—saved me from any further embarrassment, but after that day, Mrs. Sanchez always looked at me like I was a person with a secret. Can’t blame her. I was.
By the time Daniel and I had been dating for six weeks, there were too many acts of deceit occupying my everyday life. It was time to come out of the closet, so to speak. I could hide my real self from Daniel, but I would no longer make heroic efforts to hide my fake self from my family. I was aware that my priorities were faulty, but I did see this evolution as an improvement. The next day, I wore a tweed skirt and sweater set and walked right out the front door. Then I did it the following day and the day after that, albeit different outfits.
On the fourth day, my father intercepted my path out the front door. Since it was only 7:00 A.M. and my father routinely crawls out of bed no earlier than 9:00, I was already on guard.
“Good morning, Isabel.”
“Dad, what are you doing up so early?”
“I thought I’d watch the sun rise.”
“How’d it go?”
“I missed it by a half hour. Who knew it was so early?”
“Are you deliberately blocking my path out the door?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“What’s new?”
“Nothing much.”
“Your clothes say otherwise.”
“I wasn’t aware that my clothes were on speaking terms with you.”
“Oh, they are.”
“What are my clothes saying?”
“They’re telling me that you’re up to something.”
“Harsh words from fabric, wouldn’t you say?”
“The dresses, Izzy, they’re suspicious,” my father said, slowly raising his voice.
“Dad, I have to be across town in ten minutes,” I replied as I slipped past him and opened the door. “I’m going to instruct my
clothes not to speak to you anymore. I hope you understand.”
THE INTERVIEW
CHAPTER 4
I notice that Stone has jotted down my habit of window entry and exit in his notebook. His scribble is borderline illegible and difficult to read upside down. Usually I’m pretty good at that sort of thing, subtle upside-down reading, but I stare just a little too long.
“Isabel, would you stop trying to read my notes?”
“I wasn’t.”
“Yes, you were.”
“No, I was not.”
Stone puts down his pen and stares at me sternly. “How old are you?”
“You know how old I am. It’s in your notes.”
“Answer the question.”
“Twenty-eight.”
“Last I heard, twenty-eight was an adult. You can legally drive, drink, vote, marry, sue people, go to prison—”
“What is your point, Inspector?”
“I’d like you to act your age.”
“What is that supposed to mean?”
“It means it’s time to grow up, Isabel.”
His reprimand strikes me harder than it should. I want to believe that his remarks are a product of endless hours of parental brainwashing, but I know that’s not the case. Stone’s made his assessment of me all on his own.
I look down at some etchings on the wooden table that I made during my childhood-through-adolescent interrogations. I try to forget about why I am here. I try to avoid thinking about all the words that must have transpired against me in this very room. I try to forget that he has already interviewed every other member of my family. Well, almost every member. I try to think about anything else, but Stone brings me back to reality.
THE WAR ON RECREATIONAL SURVEILLANCE
CHAPTER 2
I returned home that night prepared for a second wave of wardrobe-related interrogations, but another conflict was brewing that distracted everyone from my comparatively benign outfits. I found Rae standing alone in the hallway, staring myopically at her bedroom door.