“Liv, you know I’m a good guy,” Jack said. “I’m not just going to turn you out on your ear.”
“Thanks,” I said, laughing. “God knows my ear’s already been through enough. You’re welcome to take my place on MacDougal Street,” I offered.
Iperused my divorce agreement standing at the counter in Ray’s Pizzeria. Jack gave me the apartment and some of the furniture and, much to the chagrin of my attorney, who came recommended by Marti Landesman, I agreed to no support.
I also retained sole custody of the video I had rented but never returned, The Long, Long Trailer. I kept meaning to watch it.
My father had helped his models get at least a hundred divorces, and I knew he would be hurt that I hadn’t asked his advice. But I wanted to do it alone. He had turned the wedding into his party, and I didn’t want my divorce to become his party too.
I asked the pizza man to lend me a pen so I could sign. I wanted to do it quickly, alone and without ceremony.
“You need a witness for that,” the pizza man said. “And a notary public.”
I looked at the last page. “You’re right.”
“I’m a notary,” he said. He opened a drawer behind the counter and pulled out two big stamps and an inkpad.
Romeo Manuel Ernesto Montego signed as my notary and Jesus Jorge De La Cruz, the boy smoking cigarettes outside the door, signed as my witness. I put the divorce decree back in its manila envelope and left. It was a good deal. My wedding band had slid off like a whore’s panties, while my husband’s had to be cut off his finger by a surly locksmith.
39.
ALL ORIG DETAILS
The day Jack came to pack up his clothes and eggs and things, I left the apartment so I wouldn’t have to see him.
When I came home, a woman was entering the lobby at the same time I was. She had a conservative blond haircut and was wearing a light raincoat, carrying a Ghurka briefcase and half-reading a newspaper. She had on low-heeled navy shoes.
“Hello,” she said to the doorman, and kept walking past him, rumpling her newspaper.
“Can I help you?” the doorman asked, rising from his wooden stool. His hair was pulled back into a ponytail under his doorman’s cap. He picked up the receiver of the intercom system and got his finger ready to buzz someone.
The woman stopped. “I live here. You know you do this every time,” she said. Her voice was filled with the hurt and frustration of a little girl whose parents were always away. The girl whose bedroom was so far away from her parents’ master bedroom suite that even if they were home they couldn’t hear her crying desperately once when there was a cockroach in her glass of milk. I recognized her tone of voice. It was mine, throughout my childhood.
“I’ve lived here for nine months,” I heard her saying desperately, as I stood waiting for the elevator.
I couldn’t stand to witness her embarrassment. I suddenly realized there were terribly unfortunate people in this world. Sick people and lonely people and people so invisible their own doormen didn’t recognize them. Your husband might as well call you by a different name in bed.
It was one thing if your own parents or husband couldn’t bear to see you. They had a lot invested, after all. They had a lot to be frightened of because what they saw was a reflection of themselves. But your doorman? He was just a neutral figure in your life. He had nothing to lose by seeing you. His whole job was to remember you, remember your apartment number, and sign for an occasional package.
If your doorman couldn’t even recognize you, even after you pointed yourself out to him, you were as good as homeless. You had not made a home for yourself. Even with a lease and rent bill stubs and a bed and a couch, you were homeless until your doorman said hello to you at the end of the day.
I didn’t know what I would do if my doorman had ever said, “Can I help you?” to me. But he hadn’t said that. He had said, “Hello, Liv, good to have you back in the building.” He had remembered me even though I had been gone for so long. Even if I had accomplished nothing in my life so far, if I was only a tacky real estate agent, if I had failed at my marriage, not even had a baby, not done any of the things I thought I would do, if nothing else, at least my own doorman knew me.
I wondered if Jack would ever come crawling back into the lobby and have to ask the doorman to buzz up.
I didn’t want to take the elevator with the woman who had just been humiliated by the doorman, so I stopped to get my mail. A sign on the bulletin board read, “Dale the Handywoman—no job to small.” I wondered if Dale had left real estate. I ripped one of the tabs with Dale the Handywoman’s number on it. I would need help hanging the curtains Andrew took down.
I opened my mailbox. There were a few official-looking letters that were addressed to my husband, which I promptly stuffed into the mouth of the chrome garbage can, and one large envelope hand-addressed to “Occupant.” I took it upstairs with me as excited as if it were my own invitation to the White House.
In my apartment, I tore the envelope and pulled out a letter written in a woman’s flowery handwriting.
Dear “Occupant,”
I hope you won’t think this is too “wacky” but…
My aunt was a singer and actress who lived in your apartment from 1947 until 1963. The days in your apartment were the happiest days of her life until the “bottom” dropped out and she was forced to leave.
My aunt died three months ago, at eighty years old, from cancer. It was her last wish to see the apartment again but “alas” that was not “to be.” A few days before she died I took her to your building and she went so far as to step inside the lobby and “visit” the elevators and the mailbox, but she did not want to “intrude.”
I feel very fortunate that I was able to come to New York from St. Louis (where I am a social worker) to “help” her die.
I thought you might like to know about the “life” of your apartment so I have enclosed some black-and-white photos for you to keep.
Sincerely,
Cynthia (Oberon) Otis
In the envelope was an 8 × 10 glossy publicity shot of a beautiful blonde in a mink stole clasped with a diamond brooch. Her name, Olivia Oberon, and the words “Ric Records” were printed on the bottom.
There was a picture of a party. Men in tuxedos and women in gowns filled my living room, smoking cigarettes and holding champagne saucers. Every single man wore a tux. It was the most fabulous party I had ever seen. The picture was taken from the mezzanine, looking down into my living room. There was a grand piano with a Christmas tree on it and a bamboo bar cart in the corner. Olivia stood in the center, smiling up at the camera.
There was a photo of “move-in day” with boxes everywhere and the couch lying precariously on the stairs, and Olivia, in a leopard suit and high heels, holding her hands to her temples, laughing, triumphant. I loved the idea of wearing a leopard suit and heels to move in.
The last photo was of my living room window, with giant lace curtains sweeping down on either side and the beautiful view. “View in 1947” was written on the back.
I walked down the stairs to the living room window clutching the black-and-white picture. I held the picture up to the window and moved my eyes from the park to the picture and back again. It was the exact same view. The lake was there. Not one tree had been added.
Nothing had changed.
I called St. Louis information and got the number of Cynthia Otis. She answered right away.
“Hello,” I said. “This is Liv, the occupant. I don’t think you’re wacky at all.” I told her that I would frame her aunt’s picture and hang it by the window so she would always be there in the apartment.
Cynthia Otis burst into tears. “Thank you,” she cried. “Oh, thank you. I’ve heard so much about the apartment. I’m very grateful. I know my aunt would love to be remembered to it.”
I got chills down my back and I felt like my head was going to lift off. I let
the woman cry for a few moments.
“Did you say your name was Liv?” she asked.
“Yes. Liv Kellerman.”
“But that was my aunt’s name!” she said. “Two Livs in the apartment? That’s unbelievable. Is the wall above the fireplace still mirrored?” she asked.
Suddenly I got a picture in my head of my own first “move-in day” five years before. I am not smiling, triumphant, in a leopard suit. I am eating a bagel in sweatpants and sulking while my husband is single-handedly pulling down the mirrors. They covered the whole wall from floor to ceiling and were smoked and veined as blue cheese. I had begged him to let us keep them. “It’s the mirrors or me,” he had said. I should have picked the mirrors. I should have sliced his throat with a jagged shard. Taking down those mirrors was the single worst thing my husband had ever done and I hated him for it. Olivia Oberon should never have moved out and I should never have moved in. I felt so sorry for both us Livs that my eyes welled up with tears.
“My husband made us take the mirrors down,” I cried. “I’m so sorry we took them down.”
“Aunt Liv had a tragic life,” the woman said. “She had a terrible divorce in that apartment. Terrible, terrible, violent fights. Her husband left her for the nurse who oversaw the adoption of their daughter. Then he and the nurse took the little girl and left. She ended her career for him. She nearly died of sadness when she was forced to leave the apartment. Literally.”
“But that’s exactly what happened to me!” I said.
“Your husband left you for the nurse who oversaw the adoption of your daughter?” she asked, amazed.
“He had an affair with a nurse at the hospital where he had a disk removed.”
It was the first time I had ever admitted it to anybody. It sounded almost funny. There was something inherently evil about nurses. I had always hated nurses, even when I was a little girl.
“Is he still with her?”
“No,” I said.
“At least you got to keep the apartment. Aunt Liv spent the rest of her life alone giving singing lessons in a tiny rental on Eighth Avenue.” I couldn’t think of a worse end. “You’re lucky to get to live there,” Cynthia said.
When I got off the phone I didn’t feel like staying in the apartment even though I had so much to do. I went outside to get some split pea soup at the old lady diner on the corner of Madison. Young boys were trying to throw a small beanbag on top of my building’s blue canopy.
A gorgeous Con-Ed man smiled at me. The whole street was being ripped up. I was beginning to think construction would always follow me wherever I went. Men were pouring concrete. I wanted to walk in the wet concrete, making fresh footprints. Moving back into my old apartment was like walking in my own footsteps. I lifted my foot, ready to do it, but a worker grabbed me and pulled me back. Everyone else in New York was constantly writing their initials in cement, but I never got to.
I went back home and propped Olivia Oberon’s pictures on the mantelpiece. Then I wandered around from room to room. I could do it with my eyes closed. Moving into my old apartment was like going on a blind date with my ex-husband. It was redundant. A double negative. I wondered if I had made a mistake.
When I looked at my watch I realized I was too late to go to the protest to save the Edgar Allan Poe house on West Third Street. I had enough to worry about. Edgar Allan Poe would have to fend for himself.
I realized I was holding my cordless phone even though I didn’t feel like calling anyone. “Hello?” I said out loud as if someone were calling me. “Hello?” I just kept walking around saying “Hello?” to no one. I looked at the gold curtains in a heap in the corner. But it seemed silly to call Dale the Handywoman if I wasn’t even sure if I should stay.
I looked at the couch my husband had left. Under it was the hole in the carpet that Andrew had made when he stole the piece for me. Jack had never lifted the couch to discover it gone. I lay on the couch to see if I could somehow feel the carpet missing like the princess and the pea. I thought maybe I could.
I stood and managed to move the couch, exposing the patch of missing carpet. I smiled when I saw it. It was like the new bald spot on the head of the man you love. It was the only thing about the apartment that was new.
I lay on the askew couch. I had gotten what I wanted. I had prayed to lie on this couch again one day. I had sat in Jerome’s chambers praying. I had prayed at my desk at Dale’s. I had cried in apartments all over New York thinking how inferior they were to this one. I looked at poor Olivia propped up there on the mantel. Liv, the ghost, living here again with Liv, the girl. Then I realized that Liv, the girl, was a ghost, too. I was merely a ghost haunting my own apartment.
I had to get out of there and save both of us. I could almost see the Qi flying out the window.
40.
NO FLIP TAX
At the sales meeting on Monday, Kim asked if anyone had a new listing. My stomach clutched a little bit. I raised my hand, then took it down, then raised it. I was starting to take it down again when Kim said, “Liv, do you have a listing you would like to tell us about?”
“Yes, I’m putting my apartment back on the market,” I said. “Flipping it.” I said “flipping it” as if I were flipping it the bird. Technically you had to pay for something in order to flip it, but I liked the word. Besides, I really had paid, hadn’t I?
“All right,” Kim said. “We’ll keep it in-house for as long as we can before co-broking.”
“And don’t forget,” I added, “as a Transitions agent I only have to split three percent instead of six.” It was the only part of the three-volume employees manual I had bothered to read.
“What’s the listing price?” Kim asked.
“Asking price is one point one,” I said.
I accepted an offer of one million dollars from Marti Landesman’s customers, a Mr. and Mrs. Wolfe. I didn’t show them the pictures of Olivia or tell them about myself. We didn’t discuss the “life” of the apartment, just the co-op board, the school district, and my “thinking” behind the layout of the master bath.
I didn’t take anything they said personally. I didn’t care who lived there.
I picked up my kitchen phone and called my office voice mail. There were two messages. The first was a company-wide message from Sam Smoothe herself saying she was going to be interviewed on Good Morning America about market trends and we should all wake up tomorrow at the crack of dawn to watch. She also asked if anyone knew of a good place to hold this year’s annual party.
The second message was from Juliet Flagg, the original owner of the Loft of My Life on Liberty Street, asking me to call her back. “I tried calling you at that other firm several times and finally your secretary, Lorna, called me back and told me you had moved to a new number.” I laughed thinking about Lorna saying she was my secretary. She had helped me out.
First I called Samantha Smoothe and said I would love to have the party in my apartment. What better way to remember it than filled with a couple of hundred brokers? She assured me that she would provide full catering, flowers, and clean-up service, and I would be nominated for the “good guy award” the following Christmas. It was set.
“You know there’s someone I think would make a great member of the Transitions team,” I told Samantha. “Her name is Lorna and she was sort of a mentor to me when I started in the business.”
“Bring her in,” Samantha Smoothe said. “We’d love to have her.” I thanked her and hung up. I would get Lorna a job, and Valashenko, and then, one day, maybe even Dale.
Then I called Juliet.
“I’m back in the loft,” she said. “It’s a long story but my marriage didn’t work out.”
I admired her for saying it like that, outright.
“And,” she continued, “I really missed my apartment so I called that couple, the Zeislofts, who you sold it to and made them an offer. They packed up their snow glo
bes or whatever those stupid things are called and moved to Washington, D.C., and I moved back in. But now I realize I made a mistake and I want to put it back on the market.”
I couldn’t believe my ears. The Loft of My Life was for sale again.
“I wanted to talk to you before I make any decisions,” she said. “I met a woman at my yoga class who is also a real estate agent but I don’t know how experienced she is. I think she may have just started.”
“What’s her name?” I asked.
“Storm Shapiro. She talked me into letting her come by with a client and now she says the client wants to make an offer. But then I thought maybe I should give you the exclusive because you sold it the first time.”
“Her name is Storm Shapiro?” I said. I couldn’t believe the world’s most annoying real estate client had become an agent.
“Yes, Storm. But I’m not sure I like her because she told the client that I would sell my furniture and I really don’t think I want to sell my furniture.”
It was Storm all right. How could she be a real estate agent? She wasn’t exactly good with people.
“Well, Juliet. I don’t think I can be your broker.”
“Why not?” she asked.
“Because I want to be your buyer.”
“Oh?”
“How’s six hundred thousand sound?” I said.
“Shouldn’t I have a broker?”
“You don’t need a broker, Juliet. All we need is a couple of lawyers. I can get my own mortgage, I can do the board packets myself, and besides, we’re friends.”
Juliet’s call waiting went off and she asked me to hold.
“I have Storm on the other line,” she said. “Her client matched your six hundred.”
“I’ll go to six hundred and fifty thousand,” I said. “But you know it has a really high maintenance.” It was a very high maintenance but I had faith in myself. I knew I’d be able to handle it.
“The market’s really good right now. It’s a seller’s market,” Juliet said.
High Maintenance Page 31