The Lion is In

by Delia Ephron

  Such is the power of Marcel.

  She tells him random bits, that she and her dad played chess, that her dad taught her a train song, “When the Choo Choo Chugs to Cheshire.” She sings a line to Marcel, “‘Chugging off to Cheshire, glad that I’m aboard.’” She tells him Cheshire is in England, that her dad built miniature trains. “His were the most beautiful. Everyone at the conventions said so.”

  One day she lists every lie she told her dad. They’re endless and mundane, like, “I’m having pizza.” “I was in the library.” “I sound groggy because I was up all night studying.” “I need money for books.” Another day she rages, “If there is a God, why did he give Tracee deadbeat parents? Where was he when my mom split?”

  For the first time in her life she speaks aloud what has plagued her ever since her mother banged open her bedroom door that terrible scary night. “When she said, ‘I hate you,’ was she going off on my dad or did she mean me? Am I the reason she left?

  “I don’t know why you’re more attracted to Rita than me,” she tells Marcel one morning when he pads into his white cave and leaves her talking to empty space. She laughs. She doesn’t really mind when he spends their time together ignoring her or standing at the end of the cage nearest the kitchen because he knows Rita is there. That’s good for her too, not being the center of attention. Accepting that. She doesn’t feel jealous or neglected when, after Lana’s session, Marcel spies Rita, rears up on his hind legs, and presses into the bars for Rita to scratch his chest. Mostly he’s attentive and clearly, it seems to Lana, listening. No matter what he does, she feels his acceptance, the privilege of being in his company, his calming force.

  Lana hasn’t confessed everything to Marcel, not about her dad, but her heart is lighter. One day when their time together is over, she recites the Serenity Prayer: “Marcel, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change; courage to change the things I can; and wisdom to know the difference.”

  When she is finished, Marcel is more still than she has ever seen him, and he is brilliant at still.

  Tracee means to deal with the diamond necklace. But how? Lana has always solved her problems, but Lana doesn’t know about the necklace, and Tracee is scared to tell her in spite of Lana’s new, slightly mellower personality, which Tracee doesn’t trust. Something as simple as going to the police hasn’t occurred to her. She wants a way for it never to have happened in the first place. Disappear, poof, like magic.

  If Tim knew, he would leave her.

  She is convinced, because one night after making love, Tim tells her about his dad, who died in a freak military accident when he was in training. “His name was Kyle,” says Tim. “Kyle Shane Wilson.”

  “Cool name,” says Tracee.

  She plays with his hair. She loves the wavy curls and how tangled they are. She loves lying naked skin-to-skin, although Tim is insatiable and usually gets another hard-on minutes into cuddling. “Is that how you know Clayton? From your dad?” she asks.

  “He’s always been kind of an uncle, keeping an eye out. Before the army my dad worked in a furniture factory and perfected this way of making mattress springs using nylon cord tied in special knots. He was a true craftsman. He made the springs by hand. They last forever. I swear, the beds at my mom’s are firm to this day.” He rolls over and presses in between her legs.

  “I’d love to try them. We should sleep there some night. If it’s okay with your mom.”

  “I know what she’s going to say when she meets you,” says Tim, beginning to thrust. “‘I love her to pieces.’”

  For the first time in their lovemaking Tracee simply goes through the motions. Reality intrudes. How could his mom ever love a kleptomaniac to pieces, especially if she knew the whole of it, if she knew about the necklace? Why would she ever want her son, whom she surely loves to pieces, involved with a criminal? A fugitive from justice. Someone who is going to jail.

  No, Tracee cannot tell Tim.

  She could tell Rita. That’s exactly what she will do. Every day she decides that anew—I will tell Rita—but she doesn’t because she is so, so happy and doesn’t want to spoil it.

  Tim often works the bar now with Clayton. This means that when Tracee picks up an order, she can lean across the bar and kiss him. She’s having so much fun that she starts saying cheerful waitressy things like “Coming through” when she is carrying a tray loaded with drinks, or “You betcha” when someone asks for a refill. Lana complains to Marcel, “Tracee balanced a tray on her head last night.” The gripe sounds so obviously petty when she tells it to the big cat that she immediately forgets about it.

  One night after closing they all hang out, sitting around a table while Marcel sleeps. Tracee sips her favorite, ginger ale; Rita, orange pop; Lana, her usual Pepsi. Clayton and Tim share a pitcher of beer. Everyone has worked hard and nobody talks much or needs to.

  “I suppose you don’t want to go for a ride?” Clayton asks Rita.

  She shakes her head.

  “How about TV at my place? I bought a flat-screen.”

  “No, thank you,” says Rita. “But it’s kind of you to offer.”

  Clayton takes a final swallow and sets the glass on the table with a little more force than he intends. He has meant to act nonchalant in an effort to regain his edge, as if Rita’s hundredth rejection has rolled right off his back. “I’m hungry. You know what—I’m barbecuing. How about that? I’m setting up a barbie in the back. We’ll have us a little late-night snack.” He takes off.

  Tim kisses Tracee as if he is departing on a long voyage before he heads across the room to clean up the bar.

  The three women are left alone together.

  “I have to thank you,” says Rita. “That you picked me up was the most fortunate thing that ever happened to me. I never did believe in miracles, but I’d have to call that a miracle for sure. I’d left Harry before. I left him three times before. But he always found me. ‘You’re the wife of a minister, Rita. You’re the wife of an important man. We have to set an example with our marriage, and you have to come home.’”

  Rita closes her eyes. Tracee is sure she’s having a memory of Harry berating her, shaking his fist at her to do the right thing. Lana remembers how plain and colorless Rita was when they first met her, and that’s how pale Rita turns now. “I hope he never finds me, because I know I’ll have to go back. Harry tells you what to do and you do it.”

  “But you’re different now,” says Lana. “You’re brave. Fiery. You dance with a lion.”

  “You haven’t met Harry.”

  “Maybe he thinks you were kidnapped,” says Tracee.

  “He knows I’m fine.”

  Lana grips her arm. “Imagine not going back. Not ever. Because I bet Harry is the reason you don’t think you have an imagination. Remember how you said that? And look at you now with Marcel. Everyone has an imagination unless it’s stomped out of you.”

  “You can’t leave,” says Tracee. “What would we do without you?”

  “But we’re leaving,” says Lana.

  “Oh, right. I forgot. What made you leave?” she asks Rita.

  Rita shakes her head, marveling in retrospect. “It was like the cage door was open. He was late getting back from church because of a christening, and I was preparing Sunday lunch.”

  “Potato salad?”

  She smiles. “Just seasoning it. I’d made it the night before. I looked out the window and saw a plumber’s truck. Not the local man—I guess they needed someone on Sunday. I thought, ‘That’s my getaway car.’ It was like a fever came over me: ‘Now’s your chance, get out now.’ I put down the paprika, took my purse, left my ring on the mantel. I had to tug to get it off, and for a second I wondered if I would leave at all, because I didn’t want that ring going with me. Funny, why would that stop me? Well, I did get it off—caught the plumber as he was driving away, told him my car battery was dead, and asked if he’d mind dropping me at Keene’s Grocery. It’s right next to the highway. A
couple of hours later you found me.”

  “You found us,” says Lana. “Are you sure Harry wants you back? You left. You must have embarrassed him in front of the whole congregation.”

  “Harry’s big on forgiving, unfortunately. I mean, I only left him.” She considers that for a moment. “I admit that without so much as a note I walked out the door, but it’s not as if I broke a commandment. If I broke one of the ten, then maybe…”

  “Isn’t doing it with someone else one of the ten?” says Tracee.

  “You mean adultery?”

  “You could sleep with Clayton.”

  “I know this is hard for you both to understand, being so young and fresh and hopeful, but I don’t want another man in my life. Except Marcel.”

  39

  Clayton pushes all the back doors open.

  Rita loves it when the wall is gone and the outside and inside get mixed up together. Marcel can smell the trees and grass and whatever other marvelous odors the wind brings, which tonight include steak sizzling on the grill. Sure enough, he wakes and stretches. The moon is one of those middling three-quarter moons, indistinct in shape, and only the brightest stars shine, the rest obscured by a veil of clouds. The air is humid. Gusts of hot wind spring up now and then. They smack down the flames on the barbie. Seconds later the flames leap back to life when the wind dies with the suddenness of a hand making a fist. Behind Clayton and his barbecue there’s nothing, the world literally disappears. And yet far off, as if on the other side of a black and bottomless sea, spires of tall, pointy firs wall in the night.

  “How do you like your steak?” he calls to the three women as he throws several of Marcel’s meals onto the grill.

  “Bloody,” says Lana.

  “Medium for me. Same for Tim, right?” says Tracee as Tim goes to clean the restrooms.

  “I might be a vegetarian now,” calls Rita.

  Even from this distance she can see Clayton deflate. He gets an allergy attack, pulls out a kerchief, and blows his nose.

  Rita relents and goes to join him. “Make mine medium-rare. And please toss a raw one to Marcel.”

  “Coming up.”

  “We should keep Clayton company too,” says Tracee, but Lana holds her back.

  “We are leaving here, you know.”

  Tracee chews her lip.

  “My car’s repaired.”

  “It is?”

  “Pretty much.”

  Tracee pulls away and goes outside.

  Lana sits alone and fidgets, her face a snarl.

  Marcel pads to the corner of his cage nearest the great outdoors. He inhales the delicious aromas, preoccupied with supper. Not that it matters. Not that he could help Lana. She is off and running.

  “Are you okay?” Rita calls to her.

  She doesn’t answer.

  “I thought she was cured,” says Clayton as Lana begins pacing and banging into things, probably intentionally.

  Rita shakes her head.

  More furniture is banged.

  “I suppose no one changes all at once,” says Rita. “It wouldn’t be reasonable to expect that, even with a miracle worker like Marcel.”

  “I guess not,” says Clayton.

  Tracee moves into the field behind Clayton. She knows what’s coming. She’s seen it before. Lana’s about to blow the roof off. Still, Tracee recoils involuntarily and drops her plate when Lana kicks over a chair and charges out, screaming, “I’m here because of you. I screwed up my whole summer because of you.”

  “Sorry,” says Tracee.

  “I’m not fresh and hopeful,” Lana yells at Rita.

  “Yes, you are,” Rita replies placidly. “And Tracee too. She’s so happy with Tim.”

  “Tim’s her toy. She is stuck here. Stuck and bored.”

  “I love Tim,” says Tracee.

  “No, you don’t.”

  “Yes, I do.”

  She heads inside to safety, to find him, but Lana grabs her arm. “I didn’t wreck my summer for you to fall in love with Tim.”

  Tracee bursts out crying. Tears come so easily. She cries before she knows what she feels, a crybaby’s preventive strike so Lana will go easy on her. But then she screams, “No one made you get in the car and hand over your keys. No one made you come along.”

  “I came to take care of you. Because you can’t take care of yourself. Because you screw up other people’s lives. Because you’re a mess. You always have been.”

  Rita stands between them, unsure of what to do. She puts out her arm to Tracee, who falls into it, sobbing on her shoulder.

  Lana rages off into the field.

  “Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck,” she screams.

  She wants to howl. She hits herself first on the arm, and when that doesn’t satisfy, she slaps her chest until it hurts. Tracee is a bitch, a selfish bitch Lana has wasted her life trying to fix. Trying to make up for the fact that her parents were so self-absorbed they forgot to come home. She’s hapless, the little thief. Where would she be without Lana? How futile it is trying to make a dumb girl smart. “I’m smart. I’m the smart one,” Lana tells herself.

  She hates everyone.

  Maybe even Rita.

  For an hour she stays there, and for an hour they leave her alone. The air is lousy with mosquitoes, which she continually slaps and swears at. She desperately needs some OFF! or one of the antibug lanterns that make it so pleasant around the barbecue. She’d rather be bitten to death than borrow one.

  “Someone better get her,” Clayton says eventually, and so Rita approaches close enough for her soft voice to carry and says, “Lana, we’re leaving.”

  Rita and Tracee are already in Tim’s car when she shows up. She squeezes into the back. Tim holds the door as usual.

  On the drive home Lana is hostile, the atmosphere toxic. No one speaks.

  When they get out, Lana sprints ahead and enters the room before anyone else has reached the stairs.

  Rita finds that her research on lions helps her maintain her composure when she and Lana are alone together. If a wild animal is angry, Rita knows not to engage. A lion can be stubborn or moody, and if he resists it’s best to stay away until his mood changes. In her interactions with Marcel she’s never needed these bits of wisdom. With Lana it’s another matter.

  Rita is practicing dance moves, waving paper towels, rehearsing her role in the tricks with Marcel, when Lana comes out of the bathroom, still dripping from the shower and wrapped in a towel.

  “Look at this.” Lana pulls a charger out of her purse. “I bought it today.” She plugs it in, pleased in a furious way, and sets her cell phone in it.

  She sits on the bed and shakes her head so her wet hair slaps her face. “I’m getting my car back. Any day now.”

  Rita tosses the paper towels up in the air to see if that might be an effective dramatic close to the show, although probably nothing is more effective than her bowing to Marcel and Marcel bowing back.

  “In a few weeks,” says Lana, “we’re going to be able to pay back the cost of that wedding dress. Tracee stole it.”

  “I know,” says Rita. “Do you think I can stop wearing a bra? I hate it. It feels like a harness. I get welts. Do you think anyone would notice?”

  “Everyone would notice, but so what? You’re a star. How did you know the wedding dress was stolen?”

  “It’s got that plastic button attached, the kind that sets off alarms when you leave the store. What about the necklace?”

  “What necklace?”

  “Diamonds. I tried it on once. Spied it in Tracee’s purse and couldn’t help myself. My goodness, they sparkle. A row of little stones in the most unusual shape. I’d never seen anything like it—well, why would I? And gold between. I assumed, because of the dress, that the necklace was also—”

  Lana springs off the bed before Rita finishes the sentence. She tears outside in her towel and raps on Tim’s door. “Tracee. Tracee, open up.”

  She tries to see through the window but the blin
ds are closed. They’re probably having sex, she concludes, and is about to pound harder when she hears the sound of a motor, swings around, and looks down over the railing.

  Tim’s car is pulling out of the lot.

  “Tim, Tracee, stop. Tracee!” Lana rushes down the stairs but the car turns onto the street and vanishes.

  An hour or so later, on a lovely road shaded with oaks and lined with well-cared-for modest homes with wooden porches and blooming gardens, Tim’s car turns into a driveway.

  Tim hurries around to help Tracee out. He wraps her arm into his. They approach the front door together with formality. The house is dark. It’s nearly three thirty in the morning. Only the porch is lit.

  Tracee smiles nervously at Tim as he presses the bell.

  A light goes on upstairs, then downstairs. A woman opens the door and peers through the screen. “Good grief, Tim?”

  “Hi, Momma,” says Tim. “I’d like you to meet Tracee.”

  40

  May Wilson, a tall redhead in a silky pink bathrobe, pushes open the screen door and smiles widely. You’d think Tim had just done something remarkable, like climb Mount Everest, instead of showing up at three in the morning with a strange woman. His mom looks as if Christmas has knocked on her front door.

  “Tracee.” She claps a hand to her heart. “I am so happy to meet you. Please come in. Oh, Tim.” She throws her arms around her son, takes a break to appreciate his face, and hugs him again.

  “What’s going on?” a man hollers.

  Tracee looks up the stairs. On the landing there is, no other word for it, a hottie in nothing but boxer shorts.

  “Hi, Gil,” says Tim.

  “Tim brought Tracee home,” says May. “You two don’t move. I have to put on my face, be right back.” She hurries upstairs. Gil pats her ass as she scoots by.