The Gilded Life of Matilda Duplaine

by Alex Brunkhorst

  “I mean after,” I said.

  “Oh, a bunch of us decided to get a drink.” Matilda focused on her beach bag as she said it, as if she was covering up a lie.

  It was a simple explanation, too simple for the place my mind was going.

  “Would you like to have a glass of wine?” Matilda asked, as she collected her straw bag. “I found a fantastic bottle.”

  I was about to ask how Matilda even knew what a “fantastic bottle” was but then refrained.

  “Didn’t you say you just went out for drinks?” I responded.

  “One—just one. Let me pour you a glass. You could use a little something to take the edge off. Did something happen today?”

  I hated her patronizing tone.

  “Work stress,” I lied. “I’m going to the store. We need food for dinner. Unless you’ve already eaten.”

  “We had some apps,” Matilda said. Apps. “But perhaps I could eat a little something else.”

  I was not a high-maintenance sort of guy. Had Matilda offered to come with me to the grocery store, her indiscretions would have been forgiven. Instead, Matilda tossed a vague wave in my direction before going inside. It wasn’t a gesture meant for a boyfriend who had waited all day for her to come home. It was the kind of wave a princess on a float would give to bystanders at a parade.

  I opened the car door, relieved at the opportunity to escape for a few minutes. Matilda must have driven barefoot because her sandals, along with quite a bit of sand, were on the floor of the driver’s side. More than anything—leaving me alone carless, the drink before driving, the lateness, that flippant wave—those sandals infuriated me. It was as if she was waiting for a member of her staff to pick them up, when the only other person there was me.

  * * *

  Manhattan, the summer after graduation.

  I had been naive then and believed that our lives would continue as they did in the golden halls of Harvard. But when Willa and I moved to Manhattan, things had gone off course, quickly and irreparably. It had been a particularly hot and humid summer, and I remember the stickiness as much as I recall the demise of our relationship. The first weekend after graduation it started: I was stuck with a tight deadline, hunched over a proverbial typewriter in a hot and muggy walk-up while Willa went to visit a childhood friend at her family’s house in the Hamptons. Willa helicoptered out to the shore on Friday; I took the jitney out Sunday morning. By Monday we were both back in the city, after a terrible argument about my lateness, which I tried to explain couldn’t be avoided.

  It only got worse from there.

  Our lives quickly veered in different directions: mine took the road of the young, working professional who was handcuffed by responsibilities, a tough boss, and the scary and strange realization that this—the world of work and deadlines—would be the next fifty years of my life. Willa, on the other hand, had slid into a comfortable vanity job in fashion with lackadaisical work hours. It was employment specifically tailored to accommodate the schedule of the socialite.

  We had moments where our roads intersected, but they were so few I remember them exactly: the time I took her to Central Park with a basketful of her favorite food; the dinner we had with friends at an Italian restaurant in Chelsea. There was also the time I ran into Willa on her way to a party downtown; the evening turned into beer and tortilla chips and a late-night impromptu visit to a seedy underground jazz club, arms wrapped around each other in a dark corner as we listened to the soulful blues. We went back to Willa’s place and spent the weekend with the shades drawn, in bed. Our happiness was artificial, though, for on Monday we were back to the real world, to an affair on the brink of the end.

  The next few days with Matilda were not as bleak as that painful summer in Manhattan, but there was something about it that felt scarily familiar.

  Matilda would return home whenever she pleased. I had bought her a cell phone, but she never picked up. She texted now, but for a girl who had such an extensive vocabulary, her texts were surprisingly short and her words abbreviated beyond recognition. The innocent, singsongy voice was rapidly changing into the voice of a teenager, peppered with adolescent vocabulary and cadences. She was petulant sometimes, and moody. I could tell what kind of evening it would be by the manner in which she drove home: if the car ambled in slowly and gently, it would be Matilda of old, and if the tires squealed on the gritty pavement, it would be Matilda of new.

  Every day Matilda would leave for the surf, for her friends I barely knew and activities we had never shared, and I was left alone. For the first three days I stayed at home, scouring the abandoned house for additional clues. There were none. I had begun to think that my premonition that Joel Goldman’s house held answers was, simply, wrong. When I considered things objectively, I realized that all I had was a key that opened nothing, a painting that still hung on a wall and a few drops of perfume at the bottom of a bottle. I also realized that my gut, a part of me I would have coined my strongest muscle, had weakened in recent years. In fact, I was beginning to think I could no longer trust it at all.

  By the fourth day, I decided it was best to leave the house, for the term cabin fever, it turned out, was created not only for cabins in winter, but sprawling Hawaiian vacation houses in fall, as well. Matilda had once again taken the car, so I hopped on the bike. The air was a welcome distraction, proof that there were things still moving, that the world was as it was supposed to be.

  I rode to downtown Honolulu, where Matilda and I had spent our days before she had started to spend so much time in the surf. While it was nice to be around activity and people again, every destination reminded me of Matilda. There was the jetty where we fished, the souvenir shop where Matilda had bought a puka necklace, the local café where she had first sipped coffee. I walked around aimlessly, finding myself glancing at my watch every few minutes. Whereas only days earlier Matilda and I had wanted to stretch our minutes longer, now I just wanted them to disappear.

  After several hours had passed, I started my bike ride home. In the middle of rolling hills, with nothing around it, I saw a slightly run-down bar with a lit shamrock in front. I realized, just at that moment, that I was homesick—not only for Los Angeles, but for life before Bel-Air and Matilda, life when it had been simple.

  On a whim, I decided to stop for a drink. I locked my bike and opened the door to the dark pub. Inside, I was greeted by three generations of fast-talking redheads, who I soon learned owned the bar. Their greeting was as warm and friendly as if I was a long-lost cousin off the boat from Dublin, and their sparkling blue Irish eyes gave off the impression that the day was dull before I showed up. I think they quickly took a liking to me because of our shared hair color and affinity for baseball and good drink, but whatever the reason, it felt good to have someone want to spend time with me again. Rightly or wrongly, I was beginning to feel Matilda was using the surf to avoid me.

  A football game aired on the televisions, and it felt nice to watch. I had been away from civilization for so long I had forgotten the real world was moving while I was staying still. The redheads served heavy dark ales to familiar patrons, laughing at a story they had probably told each other countless times before, glancing at the TVs once in a while and commenting on the score. It was ironic, I thought, that I was spending the afternoon in a windowless bar that smelled of yeast and my hometown while Matilda was out in the sun-filled sky. It was symbolic: it signified how quickly and seemingly irreparably my life was diverging from Matilda’s.

  Around five o’clock, I found myself looking at my watch, concerned Matilda would be home. The bartender insisted I have one last ale and volunteered to drive me home after, as darkness was ready to descend.

  We navigated the Hawaiian hills toward the house, making small talk about sports while the city prepared for night. Lights were flickering on, the vivid greens around us were turning black. When I spotted
the rusted gates of Joel’s house, I pointed out the entrance to the long driveway.

  “Here we are,” I said. “Take a right through these gates.”

  “Funny, I haven’t been here in a long time,” the man said, as he drove past the decrepit grass tennis court and the tall date palms. He stopped at the wide entry, looking at the house wistfully.

  “You’ve been here before?” I asked.

  “Just once or twice, when Joel was still coming to these parts.”

  I perked up. Clues had run dry and I had all but given up. “Did you know him?” I inquired eagerly.

  “Nah, not well. We had a few friends in common, so I was invited to the house a couple a times.” He smiled again—more like smirked, really. “Whatever happened to the girl?”

  “Which girl is that?”

  As a journalist I did my best not to lead the subject, but I assumed he was referring to Lily. He stopped the car in front of the house and looked at it nostalgically.

  “The dark-haired girl that lived here. I’m not a fan of brunettes—prefer light hair myself—but she was one of the prettiest girls I’ve ever seen.”

  My heart fluttered. Lily was blonde. I leaned closer to my subject, hoping he’d tell me more.

  “Who was she?” I asked.

  “One of his staff, if I recall. Don’t remember her name. She spent some time here, house-sitting I think. I only met her once, and it was after Joel stopped coming.” He paused. “Or, on second thought, it could be this old man’s memory playin’ tricks.”

  I thought back to earlier hours, at the bar. This man recited sports scores and recalled exact goals and touchdowns as if they had happened minutes, instead of decades, earlier. His memory was sharp as a med student’s. This was what we call in journalism a reliable source.

  “How long ago did Joel stop coming?” I asked. It had been a question I had only considered in a vague sense. This once-majestic property had been abandoned—but for how long, and why?

  “Joel hasn’t been here in twenty years—give or take. Such a shame, this pretty spot with no one to enjoy it. I’m glad you’re taking advantage of it. I always believe beauty shouldn’t be wasted on the rich. Now, you come back and visit us, you hear? Football this weekend.”

  “I will,” I said, thinking that questions were leading to more questions, not answers. “Thanks for the ride.”

  I got out of the car, pulled the bike from the hatchback and walked through the front door, calling Matilda’s name as I did. There was no answer. I immediately regretted leaving the bar so soon. I should have known I would come home to an empty house.

  But then my mind went to the conversation just moments earlier. A brunette, I thought. But Joel’s wife and Lily were blonde. There was a house sitter at the house, or a member of the staff. I wondered if somehow the key was related to her. Maybe it opened something that had belonged to her—a suitcase or a jewelry box—and she had left it behind by mistake.

  Mood buoyed with my newfound information, I walked to the staff bedroom in the front of the house. I had searched this bedroom before, and I sifted through its few contents again. There was nothing significant—in fact, it seemed hardly lived in. I peered out the dirt-covered window toward the driveway, thinking I heard the sound of a motor. I wondered if Matilda had come home.

  Instead, it was the man who had driven me home. He hadn’t left. He was still in the car, staring at the house—with regret or longing, I couldn’t tell which—until he saw me watching him and he drove away.

  Twenty-Four

  The next afternoon Matilda returned home from surfing earlier than usual, two shopping bags swinging from her right hand, car keys jingling in her left.

  Initially I thought that Matilda had finally come to the late realization that she had been ignoring me, and that she had come home early to spend the afternoon together. But I was wrong. She leaned in and brushed her lips on my cheek, almost as an afterthought, then focused her attention on her bags, rifling through the expensive tissue.

  “We’re going to dinner tonight with Lorelei and Isaac,” Matilda said, pulling a black jersey dress out of the wrapping by her fingertips, like a charmer teasing a snake out of its basket. She stared at it lustfully. I was wearing an army-green T-shirt and khaki shorts, and Matilda glared at the ensemble.

  “I’m going to get dressed. You may want to change into a nice shirt, Thomas. This dinner is really important to me.”

  Before Matilda disappeared, she bit off the price tag on her dress and tossed it, along with the credit card receipt, onto the dining room table. When she left, I picked up the receipt. The dress was a thousand dollars—money I didn’t have.

  I did as Matilda asked and changed into the only nice shirt I had brought with me on the trip, while she put the finishing touches of makeup on her face. Her eyeliner was heavy, reminiscent of the way Willa wore it at the art auction, but less artful. She had applied it with an unsteady hand, and it was something like the job of a fourteen-year-old who had dug into her mother’s makeup drawer with the babysitter.

  “How do I look?” Matilda asked, studying herself in the mirror over her vanity.

  Gone was the girl who had left pretzel bits on her lips without a care in the world.

  “It’s not your usual look,” I said.

  “What do you mean?” Matilda asked.

  “Your eyeliner’s usually more pencil than paint, isn’t it?”

  “Is it bad?” she asked, alarmed.

  “Not at all. It’s just different.” In fact, the makeup application was terrible, but we were running late and I didn’t want to start an argument. I already had the feeling this night was one I would soon want behind me.

  We walked to the car and Matilda relaxed for a moment, pressing her hair between her palms to straighten it. Our drive was quiet, as Matilda admired herself in the side-view mirror.

  “Thomas?” she said, more to the mirror than to me. “I haven’t told Lorelei much about, well, where we live. I get the sense she doesn’t have a lot of money and I don’t want her to think we do.”

  “I don’t have a lot of money. You may, but I don’t. You know that, don’t you?”

  “Oh, Thomas, now’s not the time to talk about such things.”

  “There’s never an opportune time to talk about money,” I said.

  There was a pause.

  “You know, Matilda, I can’t afford dresses like the one you’re wearing.” It was the first time I had used a tone of admonishment with her, and she reacted with surprise, as if I had no right.

  “It was just this once. It’s a special occasion.”

  “It’s not a special occasion,” I said. On cue, I saw our destination in the distance. It was a dingy little club with its name in neon lights. Matilda and I would both be grossly overdressed. “It’s drinks with some friends.”

  “Let’s not get this started on a poor foot, Thomas,” Matilda said, misusing the expression. “You’ve been in a horrendous mood all day.”

  I pulled into the lot. A few faux palm trees in pots flanked the entry, and the structure’s stucco was peeling. An open parking spot waited in front, the first good fortune of the whole day.

  “Wait,” Matilda ordered, before I could turn the car into the spot. “I usually park far away from the beach so Lorelei can’t see the car. If she sees the car—”

  “She’ll know about the money,” I completed her sentence. “Got it.”

  I drove down the street, toward a slice of gravel. “Here okay? Or would you prefer Kona?”

  “This is perfect. I just don’t want to screw anything up. I really like her.”

  Matilda was typically affectionate; she always wanted to hold hands or wrap her arms around my hips. But as we made our way into the supper club, she seemed distant and distracted. I reach
ed out for her hand, but it was already waving in the air toward a girl dressed in all black—boots, dress, eyeliner and nail polish.

  Emulation is a form of flattery, or so they say, and if that was the case, Lorelei should have been more than flattered. Matilda had clearly tried to look exactly like her.

  “Hi, M,” Lorelei said, embracing Matilda in a hug.

  “Hey, hi!” Matilda said. She seemed to hold on to Lorelei for an extended length of time, long after Lorelei had let her go.

  Lorelei turned to me. “Good to see you again, Thomas. We’ve missed you at class, but Matilda tells us you’ve been busy working on an important story for work.”

  Matilda didn’t know about my research, but in her mind it was a lie designed because she didn’t want me there. She had never even extended an invitation to me.

  “Yeah, I’ve been really busy,” I said, putting my hand out, determined to make the best of the evening ahead.

  “This place is really cool,” Matilda said, looking around the club with starry eyes, as if she was a teenage girl who had just run into a pop idol on the street. I wondered if she really thought this supper club with sticky floors, paper menus and sullen waitresses was “cool.”

  “Isaac and I come here all the time.” Lorelei squeezed the top of Matilda’s arm. “Rockin’ dress. Where did you get it?”

  “I don’t remember. It was forever ago.” Matilda dragged out the word forever and beamed with the compliment.

  I opened my mouth, ready to tell Lorelei that she picked it up at an expensive boutique that afternoon, that its thousand-dollar price tag lay at home in the trash. Instead, the rest of the group sat down at the table, and I excused myself to the bathroom.

  * * *

  The bathroom smelled of urine, cigarette smoke and gin, but it was still a respite from what was going on outside it. I walked into a stall, latching it behind me. I leaned my back against the cold metal door, grateful to be alone. I could feel the metal through the dress shirt Matilda had demanded I wear for the dinner.