Superior Women

by Alice Adams

  Even, most of the time she still thinks of herself and Potter as “happily married”; they almost never fight, never yell at each other, and they look wonderful together, still—she is sure of that. And they are very popular, invited out everywhere, all the time. It is just that she cannot bear for him to touch her. “My dear, would you consent—” Jesus: no—no—no—

  Is she in fact frigid? Is that what has happened to her, along with almost reaching forty? And, would it be worse to be frigid in an absolute sense, or only frigid with your husband? Logical Lavinia cannot quite work that one out, not yet.

  In the old days with Henry Stuyvesant, though, she came every time, or almost, and so quickly; they both would be trying to slow themselves down, postponing, in those long sultry nights in the river house, near Fredericksburg, in smells of rain and honeysuckle, wet grass and earth-wafting river smells. Or anywhere, hotel rooms in New York, making love with Henry she would come again and again—although now she does not even like Henry, and they never see each other. Everyone says he is a Communist, and he has no money.

  Nevertheless, ten years or so ago she was wildly in love with him; she cannot pretend otherwise to herself. Which should have given her some clue as to his character, Lavinia recognizes, with an inward smile of pure irony. It is clear by now that she only falls in love with shits. Harvey the crippled crook, and then terrible Gordon Shaughnessey (thank God he died), and then Henry. Whereas, with Potter Cobb, her nice husband, with whom she was never, never “wildly in love” at any moment, she is sexually bored, she is frigid.

  Is it simply that Potter is so exceptionally nice, is not a shit—or would she at this point, at this age be frigid with anyone?

  Oh, if only some friend were around to talk all this over with, Lavinia sighs to herself—in her yellow silk bedroom, just redone. What fun we could have if old Kitty were around, instead of dead, her liver ruined, at thirty-eight. “Well, in that case you’d just better find yourself some other rotten guy,” is what Kitty would say, probably—with her yelping, coughing laugh.

  Or even Peg. Although of course with Peg the tone would have to be serious; she could only hint at the nature of her problem, using words like “exciting” instead of “sexy,” and of course “respond” for “come.” In the old days, good old Peg would have reminded Lavinia of the essential goodness of good old Potter, her lovely little daughter, and her several lovely large houses. But now, with Peg, who knows? On his last visit to New York Cameron Sinclair (who is terribly nice, both Lavinia and Potter have decided: does this make Peg frigid with him?)—anyway, Cameron told Lavinia and Potter that Peg spends absolutely all her time with some friend she met in Georgia, a Mexican girl, from Los Angeles, “even if she’s really rather pretty.” Cameron said. At this point Lavinia cannot imagine any conversation with Peg, who never writes, much less a womanly talk about sex. (But did Peg ever, uh, go to bed with a black person, down there in Georgia? This thought is so shocking, so wild, that Lavinia actually cringes, and then giggles, silently, furtively.)

  Megan then enters Lavinia’s mind, possibly by association; there were always those rumors about Megan and that colored trombone player. Another rumor, however, makes Lavinia thrust Megan from her consciousness, as fast as possible. This rumor began with Potter, though, a notoriously inaccurate, unobservant person. However: Potter said that he saw Megan and Henry Stuyvesant walking along lower Fifth Avenue together, holding hands. Potter was in a cab, coming up from Wall Street—and Potter was so often wrong. Very likely for some reason or other he had been thinking of Henry, and then he imagined that he saw him. This happens all the time, Lavinia knows: when you think of a person you believe that you see him; she herself used to see Henry everywhere, when they were in love. Very likely it was Megan with someone else, some other tall thin man whom Potter saw. Though surely Megan is a little old for holding hands? (Lavinia snickers at the thought.) Or very likely it wasn’t Megan at all. Was neither of them. Not Megan. Not Henry. (Lavinia has trouble putting both their names into the same sentence, even.)

  But there is something just slightly odd in Potter’s attitude toward Henry, Lavinia has noticed. It was Potter, in fact, who explained to Lavinia about Henry’s not being rich, after all.

  “You only thought he was rich because of his shoes,” was what Potter said, and the worst of that remark was its at least partial truth; Lavinia had once loved Henry’s shoes as much as anything about him. She loved and admired such good, old highly polished shoes. People with no money do not preserve their things in that way, she thought; she was remembering the almost new cars that poor people turned into rattletraps, so quickly, driving around the country roads of her childhood, in Maryland and Virginia, in the thirties. “Henry is the original poor relation,” Potter had continued. Henry didn’t even have a trust fund, said Potter.

  When Henry and Lavinia were in love, the subject of money never came up, of course. She simply assumed, from everything about Henry, beginning with his wonderful name, that he was everything he seemed to be, i.e., very rich: his schools and accent, clothes, his friends, or most of them. It still amazes Lavinia that she could have been wrong, in that way.

  It is almost as though Potter somehow knew about Lavinia and Henry, but of course that is impossible.

  Since Henry, there has been no one, no lover in Lavinia’s life. Although several men have tried with very obvious invitations to lunch, or to tea, for heaven’s sake. And since she is almost always, well, frigid with Potter, Lavinia is worried about her skin, and the circles under her eyes. Sex is the only thing that really works for your skin, she has always known that. You can spend a fortune on creams and oil, massage, but without good sex, well, forget it.

  However, except for the sexual part, Lavinia does not really want to have another affair. For one thing they’re very dangerous; almost always someone finds out, no matter how discreet you are. Someone sees you somewhere where it’s odd that you should be. For example, Price Christopher, who is still a friend of theirs, sort of, is almost always having an affair with someone or other, usually someone who is also one of their friends, and one way or another Lavinia and Potter always know. Price may be a little less discreet than most people are (there was the girl he always took to the Russian Tea Room, of all dumb places), but still, things get out.

  But: her skin, although perfect, to Lavinia’s practiced scrutiny looks dead. Deeply disturbing. Frowning into her mirror—probably making lines!—for a moment Lavinia even entertains a fantasy in which she telephones Henry and suggests that they spend, maybe, an afternoon a week together? She could rent a tiny apartment somewhere, and maybe—

  But then she remembers, entirely and vividly, their final day together, in Chapel Hill.

  Hot. That is the main thing that Lavinia remembers about that very old, very pretty, and absolutely terrible small town. So hot! Hot at the incredibly tacky Raleigh-Durham airport—to which, on an impulse, just phoning Henry that morning (“Darling, I’m coming down to see you in an hour! Isn’t that fabulous! I couldn’t wait,” which was not her best impulse, as things turned out), she flew down from Washington, an hour away.

  Instead of taking her right out to his cabin and making love to her, making love all day, as they sometimes did, just doing it for hours (which is all that Lavinia had thought about, not seeing him for almost three weeks), instead of anything like that, Henry insisted that she must see the campus, the university, for God’s sake. He showed her the Old Well, and the Playmakers Theater; in that awful heat, in her heels, they walked through the Arboretum, all those damn exotic plants, with name tags, and wisteria blossoms fallen all over those gravel paths, swollen, like awful bugs. And those skinny young girl students in their next to no clothes, with their long straight hair and good tans.

  At last Henry took her to the stadium, of all absolutely crazy choices for an intimate conversation, which perhaps he had never even intended to have; very likely not. They walked past a really ugly red brick tower, the bell tower
, on more graveled paths, between clipped hedges, down more paths and through some scrubby pinewoods to a huge open stadium. No one there of course, but still, a stadium.

  The benches were green, old flaking paint that would stick to Lavinia’s pale linen skirt, but at that point she hardly cared; her feet hurt so much, from all that goddamn gravel.

  “You must admit, this place really has it all over Soldiers’ Field,” said Henry, in a satisfied way, and they sat down on one of the topmost, highest benches.

  That possibly innocent observation had an instant and cruel effect on Lavinia: it took her back vividly and violently to Soldiers’ Field, at Harvard. Oh! twenty years ago, or more. She had to close her eyes against the vision: a dazzling New England fall day, a Saturday, the game. The sky a cold, electric blue, and the stadium packed, milling crowds, the Crimson band. And Lavinia: she could see herself in her wonderful dark red coat, lined in gray kid (Daddy had worried so much about the cold weather in Cambridge that he had been very generous); she could see her own lovely pink skin in the marvelous air, could feel the perfection of her skin—and she was with Gordon, Gordon Shaughnessey, so handsome, in his ROTC uniform. Oh, she had loved him so much, so innocently, so happily—as they watched the game, and thought about being together later on, after all the parties, a little drunk and kissing, hours of kisses. Oh, Gordon, how could you let me go like that! Lavinia inwardly cried out, even then, even twenty years later. Tears came to her eyes. “I think North Carolina is a terribly tacky state,” she burst out, passionately, to Henry.

  In a preoccupied way (and it occurred to Lavinia that he had been somewhat less than absolutely with her, ever since she got off the plane) Henry observed, rather academically, “That’s how people from Maryland often seem to feel, I’ve noticed. Or Virginia. Even South Carolinians generally feel superior to Tarheels, as they call us. It’s curious.” He even laughed.

  “Us?” Lavinia did not ask.

  Well, are we going to sit in this stadium all day? Lavinia would have liked to ask that also, but did not. She only muttered, “Well, I think all those people are right, it is quite tacky. Red clay all over.”

  “You should never go to Georgia, you wouldn’t like that either,” Henry unhelpfully told her, just then.

  “I most certainly hadn’t planned to.”

  And then, putting his arm around her in a way that was much more friendly than sexy, Henry announced, “Beautiful Lavinia, the worst possible luck about this afternoon. Just after you called someone phoned me about a meeting. It begins at four—” He glanced at his watch, a brand-new and very cheap one, Lavinia noticed (which could or should have been a clue). “That’s a couple of hours from now but it’s over in Hillsborough. And the worst of it is, I just can’t promise when it’ll be done with.”

  Lavinia forced a laugh. “Well, in that case, Henry darling, I guess you’ll just have to cancel the meeting.” She reached her mouth up to kiss his cheek, like a little girl.

  “Actually, my darling, I can’t do that. It’s, uh, important.”

  With more courage than she knew she had, and much more tenacity, Lavinia kept at it. For one thing, she could hardly believe what he was doing. “Well, that’s perfectly simple, then,” she told him. “We’ll drive to Hillsborough together, and you can park me in a bar, or something. You appear at your meeting, and if you promise to leave early, as soon as you can, I’ll be good and not pick up anyone.” And she laughed, naughtily.

  “Lavinia, there are no bars in Hillsborough. The state’s dry. And I can’t take you out there.”

  Realizing at last that he was serious, Lavinia allowed herself a small strike. “One of your Communist cell meetings, I suppose.”

  As though she were a perfect stranger, in a cold way Henry explained, “Actually I broke with the party some time ago. But I have certain loyalties, certain obligations. I suppose I should have explained some of this to you before. But it had so little to do with ‘us.’ ” (Was his “us” ironic? Its effect was chilling, to Lavinia.) “One of the things we were doing,” serious Henry explained, “in our cell, as you put it, was establishing a credit union for black people, in Carrboro. That’s where most of them live, around here—”

  “Fascinating,” Lavinia murmured, just not saying: But what about me? She got to her feet. “Well, I really seem to have picked the worst possible day.” Her words were a triumph of lightness, she felt, a victory over her suddenly leaden heart. “I do hope you have time to drive me back to the airport? I don’t suppose there’s a taxi.”

  “Just,” said Henry, looking again at his cheap new watch. And saying again, “I am sorry.”

  And that was all. Hardly need for him to say, I don’t love you anymore, you have ceased to be important to me. They drove those silent dozen or so miles to the airport with those dismissive words playing through Lavinia’s brain, however; past all the hated, eroded red clay, past turgid brown creeks thickly overgrown with honeysuckle vines. Small rickety unpainted houses with bare yards, chickens, skinny black children. The tackiest state, so hot, so terrible.

  At the airport, with one of his darkest, most beautiful looks, Henry kissed her quickly; he kissed her before she could stop him, actually, and he said, “I’ll write to you, I’m extremely sorry about today, Lavinia. You were beautiful to come, it’s just—”

  “Oh, darling, please, please don’t write, I know how busy you are,” and Lavinia smiled, and hurried into the plane, not looking back. And even on the plane she did not cry; she hurried back to Potter and Amy, who had not expected her for a couple of days—“I need a tiny vacation to myself,” she had told them, and the maids, so daringly. Even then she did not cry.

  However, Lavinia now reminds herself, there is less than no point in thinking of Henry; he might as well be as dead as Gordon Shaughnessey. As forgotten as crippled Harvey Rodman. And there is really no point in worrying about her skin, which everyone else admires. Even the new girl at Arden’s, generally such a little bitch, who was giving Lavinia a facial the other day, remarked on her fantastic skin, and she did not say, For your age. (And she got the large tip that she deserved for once.)

  If Lavinia wanted worries over skin, though, there is Amy. Amy, as though on purpose, as though visiting some judgment on her mother, has terrible acne, the poor child, but still, it is hard to bear. Pimples. Pustules that no tetracycline or anything seems to affect. Thousands of dollars to dermatologists, in New York and Washington, down to Johns Hopkins, even to Boston—Mass. General; they made a special trip up there to a man who was supposed to do miracles with adolescent skin. But no, that beautiful little girl, that fairy princess has become a living rebuke to Lavinia, her mother (although she is no longer sure what she is being punished for, having convinced herself that the child is surely Potter’s, as Henry said all along). And not only pimples: Amy, at only thirteen, has gigantic breasts, as big as Megan’s were before she got so thin, but Amy is thin, so thin that those breasts look grotesque; and the doctor said, all the doctors all said that plastic surgery would be a mistake, at that age; you have to wait. (But wait for what, for those bosoms to get even bigger than they are?)

  Thank God, at the moment Amy is away at camp, in Vermont. Invisible. Just nice perfunctory misspelled schoolgirl letters.

  Down in Fredericksburg, where now they often go together, Lavinia and Potter have frequent weekend guests, house parties; actually that has become the true function of the river house, a place for entertaining.

  However, on a particular hot Saturday night in August 1966, they are alone. They will have dinner alone, together, and spend the evening alone. Which is one of the reasons that Lavinia dallies as long as she can at her dressing table; she is wondering what on earth they will talk about.

  Although Potter is several years older than Lavinia, and she is a few months past forty, Potter continues to have his hair cut as though he were twenty-one, a crew cut. Short gray hair. Lavinia hates it.

  Not that she would want actually long hair, B
eatle hair, hippie hair (oh, Jesus, the very idea is ludicrous) but something other than a 1942 crew cut. Something attractive, dignified. And he dresses that way too, as he always has, in old Brooks clothes. Worn-out button-downs and gray flannels. Old navy blazers and regimental ties.

  But even though it is Potter, her husband, whose very hair and clothes she does not approve of, with whom she is to have dinner, Lavinia makes an effort at being beautiful herself, and all through dinner she talks, and listens, and laughs.

  • • •

  After dinner, since no one else is there, they go out on the terrace for coffee, in the heavy, humid darkness, the still air full of river smells, and honeysuckle.

  Potter, who has taken off his blazer and hung it neatly over the arm of a wicker chair, now stands and stretches. He is near the bench where Lavinia is sitting, her long legs in silk trousers, and looking at him, Lavinia thinks, At least he’s stayed thin; I could not be married to someone fat.

  Raising white shirt-sleeved arms above his head, and then down, in a discouraged gesture that Lavinia recognizes, Potter says, “Well, it looks like they’re really going to run Nixon in ’68.”

  “Richard Nixon? But that’s crazy, he’s all washed up. That awful speech about not having him to kick around anymore. And he’s so—so awful. So ugly.”

  “As you would say, my dear, he’s thoroughly tacky, in fact he’s tacky as hell. I absolutely agree. But there’s some very big money that says he’ll run.”

  “Oh, I don’t believe it.” However, Lavinia reflects that at least they are having a conversation. So often they are as silent as some terrible cartoon couple, some terrible low-class marriage, with the TV on and no one even speaking.

  Potter laughs. “I would like not to believe it myself, my dear. But I truly think the Vietnam war has wrecked the Democrats, so almost anyone we run will win. And, I repeat, the really big money boys really like Nixon.”