Balancing Acts

by Lynne Sharon Schwartz

  ‘Except he’s dead,’ said Alison. ‘They told it at the beginning. He died a couple of years ago.’

  ‘You see,’ he said to Lettie. ‘The good die young.’

  ‘You’re safe, then.’ She stood up. ‘I’ll make some tea. Alison, why don’t you take your shoes off and lie down on the couch? What happened to those sneakers, by the way?’

  ‘Oh, I drew this abstract design on them with Magic Markers, and then I left them out in the rain overnight so the lines could sort of merge. But it didn’t come out very well. It came out a mess.’

  ‘Put them in the washer,’ said Lettie. ‘At least they’ll be clean.’ She went to the kitchen.

  Lying on the couch, hugging a pillow to her chest, Alison heard the mellow rhythms of Bronowski’s voice and, dimly, saw Lettie bring in the tea. Her eyelids drooped; she never got to drink any.

  And then Max was shaking her by the shoulder.

  ‘Alison, wake up.’ His voice was hoarse, as if he had slept too. ‘It’s after eleven. Your parents must be home by now. Call them and tell them to come pick you up.’

  She was wide awake instantly. ‘Oh, Max! Just let me stay here tonight and I’ll go in the morning. I’ll never bother you again, I promise.’

  ‘Out of the question. Come on, get up and call. They’re probably frantic already.’

  She sat up and cocked her head. ‘How are you going to make me?’

  ‘Don’t you fool around with me. I’m not going to make you. I’ll call myself.’ He went for the phone book on the window sill. ‘What’s your last name again?’

  She kept staring at him. It was like hanging on to the basketball and not letting anyone else have a chance, and feeling powerful inside.

  ‘Will you look at her?’ he said to Lettie, who was playing solitaire at the bridge table. ‘She’s like a lynx.’

  ‘Alison, sweetheart, tell Max your last name.’

  She sank into the pillows of the couch, stretching out her arms along its back. She filled nearly the whole couch now; nobody could sit on it without being in her power.

  ‘For Chrissake, Max, you’ve been teaching them all this time. Don’t you even know their names? What kind of a teacher is that?’

  ‘For my purposes I don’t need last names. I know them by what they do.’ He groaned. ‘There’s a list in an office somewhere but I never bothered to look.’

  ‘Very smart,’ said Lettie, and went to gaze out the dark window.

  ‘You’re the one who invited her to stay. Would you mind turning around and telling me what I’m supposed to do with her now?’

  The baffled look they exchanged was very like the one she had seen on Wanda and Josh, hours earlier. ‘Look, if you’ll just let me sleep here,’ she said, ‘I’ll call up and tell them I’m alive.’

  ‘How does a child get this way?’ Max queried of the ceiling.

  ‘I’m a freak of nature.’

  ‘Go on, go ahead and call. Say anything you please. Tell them I drugged you and tied you up in a closet.’

  ‘Could you both go in the kitchen, though, please? I want to talk to them alone. Okay?’

  ‘Maybe she could sleep with you, Lettie?’ she heard Max say as they left the room.

  ‘It’s you she wants, Max.’

  ‘I called to tell you I’m at a friend’s house,’ she said into the phone. But the words were barely out when Wanda began shrieking, and Josh took over. They were absolutely frantic, he said. They had called half a dozen kids from school and were about to call the police. Where the hell was she? he cried. What friend?

  ‘A friend, that’s all...I can’t tell you...No, I’m fine, I’m really not kidnapped. I just don’t—’ Something rustled behind her. She veered around. Max, sneaking up! He lunged, but as he gripped her wrist she managed to slam down the receiver.

  ‘That’s not fair, Max! You promised!’

  ‘I never promised anything! This is insane! I don’t need any more adventures in my life. You’ll be sorry, I’m warning you!’

  ‘You sound just like my mother when you say that!’ she yelled back. He could walk like an Indian. She would have to find out how that was done. Some other time.

  CHAPTER 7

  ‘YOU TWO WILL EXCUSE ME,’ said Lettie. ‘I’m going home to bed.’

  He didn’t like the tinge of amusement in her voice. ‘Are you actually abandoning me with her?’

  ‘Max, come over here.’ She led him by the arm into the kitchen. ‘Let her go to sleep,’ she whispered. ‘She’s exhausted and upset. Tomorrow’s Saturday anyway. In the morning we’ll reason with her and send her home. Believe me, everything will be all right.’

  ‘But what about her parents? They could probably lock me up for that.’

  She shrugged it off. ‘They’ve heard from her. Who knows, maybe that’s as much as they deserve.’

  ‘What you are,’ he accused, ‘is irresponsible and sentimental.’

  ‘She’s just one child who feels miserable, and you’re acting like your life is at stake. And also, Max, please don’t call me fancy names.’

  He grunted. ‘I was under the impression that my residence here was for repose, with no undue stress. I call this undue stress.’

  ‘We’ll repose in the grave,’ said Lettie, and left.

  Alison was curled up sullenly on the couch. Her face and hands were dirty. Her monotonously rhythmic sniffling was intolerable; he could never bear sniffling. He went to get a clean handkerchief. ‘Here. Blow your nose.’ Sinking into the armchair, he put his feet up and closed his eyes.

  The way she sat, wrapped tight in her suffering, was just like Tania, the ballerina, who used to give way to spells of self-indulgent heartache. After a blow-up with her current man she would come to cry on Susie’s shoulder. The two women talked in the tiny kitchen, Tania straddled backwards on the wooden chair, now and then flexing her ankles and pointing her toes absentmindedly. Susie would bring out a bottle of Scotch and a bowl of ice cubes, and they could sit for hours, drinking and murmuring. The bursts of weeping were followed by heavy silences: Tania wound a lock of long dark hair around her finger till she was ready to resume her account of grief, in a throaty voice. Since he hadn’t the patience to wallow in anyone’s misery, he went to bed, but through the thin partition he could still hear voices, phrases. Susie wouldn’t talk about him, he trusted, although with women drinking you could never tell. After a while Susie could have Tania laughing. The two of them would giggle, borderline drunk in that way women have, a fit of abandoned gaiety. If he called out to shut them up it made them giggle even more. So if he was in the mood and sure that the whining was finished, he would join them in the kitchen in his pajamas and robe, pour himself a drink, and encourage Tania, because with enough Scotch in her she could draw from a huge repertoire the most distinctive dirty jokes he had ever heard, and tell them in her thick Slavic accent. Only she never went home. They would all grow sleepy. Susie would put Tania in a soft chair and cover her with a blanket, then come to bed with Max to make love. The first few minutes, every move he made tickled her. ‘Oh, no, please, no!’ She laughed wildly, and squirmed away. Suddenly, he never knew precisely what did it, she would stop laughing and come into his arms and softly moan. Once after a drunken session with Tania she fell asleep, impervious to all his lures. Horror-struck, Max woke her instantly. ‘Oh, sorry,’ she muttered. ‘Were you in the middle of something?’ But it felt like making love to a corpse. When it was all over she unexpectedly came to life, demanding. ‘Oh, sorry,’ he echoed nastily. ‘Louse,’ she said. ‘Why did you even bother waking me, then?’ And she rolled far away from him. He followed her across the bed and fell asleep with a knee between her grudging but warm thighs. Even the bad was not so bad. Even if he could have her back for one bad night, he would die peacefully.

  When he opened his eyes Alison was in the same curled position, dull-eyed and defiant. She accepted the milk and the brownie he brought her in silence, avoiding his glance. While she ate he made up his bed
for her. She was nearly asleep—he had to half-carry her in and deposit her on it.

  ‘Don’t you want to get undressed?’

  She shook her head once and was out. He might as well, she was settled in for the night. He took off the sweaty white tube socks and dropped them to the floor. He slid off the jeans, bending her legs with care. There was almost nothing to her: tiny white underpants over a concave stomach. Her long thin legs stretched out, rough-skinned at the knees. Her shirt had an enormous red sun on it, and the words ‘Solar Power.’ She even had the beginnings of breasts. Fancy that. He had never noticed. He stopped for a moment, his hands poised, then left the shirt on her. As he tucked her in she gave a breathy sigh. Startling himself, Max bent over and kissed her lips lightly, briefly. They were soft and cool and smelled sweetly of chocolate. He lingered but half a second, then went to undress in the bathroom. He found an extra blanket, and after a last swig of Scotch from the bottle, put himself to sleep on the living room couch.

  It couldn’t have been for long. The phone roused him with a nightmarish jangle. His skin leaped. He jumped up to get it, seeing fireworks in the blackness. His heart was clattering like a drum. A gush of words cascaded into his ear.

  ‘Mr Fried, there’s a man on his way up to you. I couldn’t stop him, he was wild! He said he’s looking for that girl. Should I come up or—’

  ‘It’s okay, Vicky, don’t come up.’ He ran a hand over his tingling face. Alison in his bed! Already, fast heavy footsteps sounded in the hall outside. He turned on the lights and threw on his bathrobe before opening the door.

  ‘If you’ve touched my kid I’ll break every bone—’

  When his eyes registered Max in the bathrobe, the stranger quieted and lowered his fist. So quickly that it was almost an insult. Did he look altogether played out, a mere old joke of a man?

  ‘How do you do?’ He extended his hand. ‘Max Fried. You are no doubt the father of Alison, my unexpected overnight guest. Please come in. I’m sorry I can’t address you by name. Indeed that’s the source of—’

  But by that speech he had outdone himself. Undone. The wild-eyed man didn’t shake his hand. Shoving him aside, he pushed into the room.

  ‘Where the hell is she? What do you think you’re doing, keeping her here?’

  Max indicated the bedroom door. The man burst through it.

  ‘Alison,’ he cried, his voice breaking, ‘are you all right, baby?’

  Max got out two glasses and poured Scotch into both. He patted down his hair and secured the belt of his robe before appraising his face in the mirror above the cabinet. Benign enough? Grandfatherly, perhaps?

  He could hear him in the other room: ‘Are you all right, are you all right?’ he kept asking her. Carrying his glass, Max went to the bedroom door. Her father had uncovered her and was looking her up and down, touching her on the cheek, the shoulder, the knee. She sat up with her eyes wide and blank, simply a kid awakened in the middle of the night.

  ‘I came here by myself,’ she said, ‘after you left. We played cards. I wanted to stay so they let me.’

  Good girl. Max took another swallow. Her father turned and saw him standing in the doorway. ‘Put on your pants,’ he told Alison. Max went back to the couch, from which he could hear the man trying to calm his wife on the bedroom phone. ‘I don’t know yet, but don’t worry, I’ll find out,’ he was saying. ‘I wanted to let you know first. Take it easy, she’s all right.’

  So this was one half of the impossible parents. Well, there was a certain density, he had to agree. Yet the fellow seemed decent enough. He was approaching now, unbuttoning his suede jacket with shaking hands, while behind him, Alison crossed into the bathroom.

  ‘Sorry about pushing in here like that. I came under the wrong impression. But still, what’s the idea of keeping her so long without—’

  ‘Have some Scotch.’ He waved at the ready glass on the coffee table.

  ‘Thanks, I will. Look here, Mr Fried, it’s after one in the morning! Don’t you think you might at least have—’

  Max explained.

  ‘Shit!’ He pounded the back of a chair with his fist. ‘Markman’s the name. Josh Markman. I’m sorry for the trouble. She’s such a difficult kid. One hell of a kid to bring up, I’ll tell you. I guess I should thank you for—uh—having her.’

  ‘Hm.’ Max poured some more Scotch.

  Alison returned, dressed but still unwashed.

  ‘Do you realize what you did?’ her father asked her. ‘This was a terrible thing to do. To everyone concerned.’

  She looked up from tying her rainbow sneakers. ‘I don’t even want to go home. I’d rather stay here with Max and Lettie.’

  ‘Lettie?’

  ‘Never mind that,’ said Max. ‘Look here, my dear fellow, she’s all yours: remove her, and allow me to get some sleep.’

  ‘Oh, Max!’ She ran over and grabbed his arm. ‘Why do you talk like that! You know we’re friends, you told me. You know there’s a—a connection.’

  Max disengaged her. On her father’s face he glimpsed shock, followed by an array of confused suspicions, sliding over the handsome, bland features like a series of shadows. It reminded him of the stages of bewilderment John Todd and the other clowns used to practice in front of the mirror, refining the delicate shifts of muscle around eyes and mouth. The liquor churned in his gut.

  Markman gripped the edge of a chair clumsily, with one hand. His tone was uncertain. ‘I don’t like this business at all. The more I look at it, the more I don’t like it. She’s mentioned you at home—first it was a supermarket, then you turn up in school with magic, oranges, whatnot.’ He began to pace in circles, his hand aimlessly thrashing the air. ‘That’s how we located you. My wife remembered something she said tonight—about cutting classes and being interested in older people...Finally we called Ted Collins, from the school, and he thought of you. He gave us your address, but he said he couldn’t possibly believe you’d—’ Markman gulped down the last of his whiskey and made a wide sweep with the empty glass. His voice rose. ‘There’s something funny going on here! What are you up to—hypnotism, mind control? If I find out you’ve so much as touched her—’

  Mind control! Max had to act. He opened his apartment door, stepped into the hallway, and bellowed: ‘Lettie!’ Like Marlon Brando, he thought, yelling for Stella with drunken, demented passion. Invaluable woman, Lettie, fast on her feet: almost immediately she appeared, running towards him.

  ‘What is it? What happened, Max? Are you all right?’

  ‘Uh-huh.’ He grabbed her by the hand and pulled her into the living room, slamming the door behind them. In her royal-blue satin robe and her gray-blond hair mussed from sleep, she was splendid. Sexy, but a solid citizen. She would do perfectly. He spoke with forced calm, trying to send signals through her fingers. ‘Sorry to disturb you, darling, but there’s someone here I wanted you to meet.’

  ‘Max, for God’s sake—’

  ‘It’s all right!’ He put his arm around her and kissed her cheek. ‘Let me introduce Mr Markman, Alison’s father. Mr Markman, Lettie Blumenthal, my neighbor and—uh—paramour.’

  The cigarette between Markman’s teeth dropped into his palm. ‘How do you do.’ The lit match burned close to his fingers; he winced and shook it out.

  ‘Pleased to meet you.’ Lettie extracted herself from Max’s hold. ‘What’s that you called me?’

  ‘Later,’ he answered stiffly. He turned to Markman. ‘We elderly folks are trying to lead a quiet life here in our...twilight years, mine anyway, doing what we can to serve the community. Now, your daughter, a willful young person, if I may be so bold, has ventured past the line of acceptable behavior. So, if you will kindly...’ He linked an arm through Lettie’s.

  With exquisite timing, the telephone rang again. ‘Yes, Vicky, dear, everything is under control...You’ve had complaints? I’m very sorry—I guess I was a bit loud out there just now...They’ll be leaving shortly. And, Vicky, no more visitors tonight, pl
ease! These young people, what can we do? Good night now.’

  ‘Max!’ From Alison, a shriek of betrayal.

  ‘I’ll see you in school Monday, dear. Meanwhile, get some rest and practice your tumbling.’

  ‘Sorry again,’ Markman said wearily. ‘I guess I was way off base. Come on, Alison. Disturbing these kind people. Awful.’ He shook his head helplessly and steered her towards the door.

  ‘You haven’t seen the last of me,’ Alison muttered.

  Max inclined his head towards Markman. ‘I’m sure you’ll have the courtesy to call Mr Collins and restore my reputation.’

  ‘Oh, righto. Sure. Good night, ma’am.’

  Max closed the door on them and poured more Scotch.

  ‘Here, Lettie. You look like you need it.’

  ‘Thanks. Jesus, that yell you gave could wake the dead. My heart is still pounding.’ She sipped her drink. ‘You’re outrageous, you know? And the amount you’ve been drinking lately is bad for your heart, besides.’

  ‘I know, I know it all.’ He lay down on the couch with his eyes shut, balancing the glass on his chest.

  ‘So what’s that word you called me?’

  ‘You mean paramour? Girlfriend. My mistress. My woman.’

  ‘I’m no such thing.’ She was indignant. ‘You’ve never laid a hand on me.’

  ‘Alas.’

  ‘Alas? You mean you wish you had?’

  Max raised his eyebrows, and slowly opened his eyes. Lettie sat down on the small space of couch left next to him. The warmth sank into his thigh and seeped up and down his side.

  ‘So do it, then. It’ll do you good. If it doesn’t kill you.’

  ‘You’re serious?’ He removed the glass from his chest.

  Lettie leaned over to kiss him. She whispered, ‘Take a chance.’ She was still warm from bed, with the scent of sleep and whiskey on her. Something ancient moved inside and ached badly, a familiar ache whose return nearly brought tears to his eyes.