In the Land of Dreamy Dreams

by Ellen Gilchrist

  Now she stays in bed most of the day, reading and drinking coffee, listening to music, cutting pictures out of old magazines, dreaming, arguing with herself.

  This morning it is raining, the third straight day of the steady dramatic rains that come in the spring to New Orleans.

  “It’s on the T.V. a flood is coming,” the maid says, bringing in Alisha’s breakfast tray. Alisha and the maid adore each other. No matter how many husbands Alisha has she always keeps the same old maid.

  “They always say a flood is coming,” Alisha says. “It gives them something to talk about on television all day.”

  “I hope you’re right,” the maid says. “Anyway, your mother’s been calling and calling. And the carpenter’s here. He wants to start on the kitchen cabinets.”

  “Oh,” Alisha says, “which carpenter?”

  “The new one,” the maid says, looking down at her shoes. “The young one.” Blue-collar workers, she says to herself. Now it’s going to be blue-collar workers.

  “All right,” Alisha says. “Tell him I’ll talk to him as soon as I get dressed. Fix him some coffee.”

  Alisha gets out of bed, runs a comb through her hair, pulls on a pair of brown velvet pants, and ties a loose white shirt around her waist. I’ve got to get a haircut, she says, tying back her thick black curls with a pink ribbon. I’ve really got to do something about this hair.

  The carpenter’s name is Michael. He used to be a Presbyterian. Now he is a Zen Buddhist carpenter. When he uses wood he remembers the tree. Every day he says to himself. I am part of the universe. I have a right to be here.

  This is something he learned when he was younger, when he was tripping with his wild friends. Michael is through with tripping now. He wants to go straight and have a car that runs. He wants his parents to call him up and write him letters and lend him money. His parents are busy pediatricians. They kicked him out for tripping. They don’t have time for silly shit about the universe.

  Alisha found Michael in a classified ad. “Household repairs done by an honest, dedicated craftsman. Call after four.”

  Alisha called the number and he came right over. As soon as she opened the door she knew something funny was going on. What kind of a carpenter shows up in a handmade white peasant shirt carrying a recorder.

  “Can I put this somewhere while you show me what needs fixing,” he said, looking at her out of dark blue eyes.

  “What is it?” she said, taking it from him, laying it on a sofa.

  “It’s a musical instrument,” he said. “I play with a group on Thursday nights. I was on my way there.”

  She led him around the house showing him things that were broken, watching his hands as he touched her possessions, watching his shoulders and his long legs and his soft hair and his dark blue eyes.

  “This is a nice house,” he said, when he had finished his inspection. “It has nice vibrations. I feel good here.”

  “It’s very quiet,” she said.

  “I know,” he said. “It’s like a cave.”

  “You’re right,” she said. “It is like a cave. I never would have thought of that.”

  “Do you live here alone?” he said, holding his recorder in his arms. The last rays of the afternoon sun were filtering in through the leaded glass doors in the hallway casting rainbows all over the side of his face. Alisha was watching the blue part of the rainbow slide along the hollows of his cheeks.

  “Most of the time,” she said. “I have a husband, but he’s almost never here anymore.”

  “It feels like only one person lives here,” he said. “Everything seems to belong to you.”

  “It’s very astute of you to see that,” she began in a serious voice, then broke into a giggle. “To tell the truth, that’s why my husband left. He said only Kierkegaard would believe I loved him. He said the longer he stayed in this house the smaller he became. He said he had gotten to be about the size of an old golf ball in the corner.”

  “Why did he let you do that to him?” Michael said.

  “He did it to himself,” she said. “I don’t take responsibility for other people’s lives. I don’t believe in being a scapegoat. That’s a thing Jews are historically pretty good at, you know, so I’m always watching out for it in myself. Women are pretty good at it too, for that matter.”

  “You’re a pretty smart lady.”

  “No, I’m not,” she said. “I’m just trying to make it through the days like everybody else.”

  “I should be leaving,” he said. “I’m having a hard time leaving this house.”

  “Come back, then,” she said. “As soon as you have time. I’m looking forward to getting things fixed up around the place.”

  Now he was back, leaning on a counter in her spotless kitchen, cradling a cup of coffee, listening intently to something the maid was telling him.

  “Have you been sick?” Michael asked, looking up from his coffee.

  “Not really,” she said. “I just stay in bed a lot.”

  “Do you want me to start on these cabinets?” he said. “I could come back another day.”

  “Oh, no,” she said. “Today is fine. It was nice of you to come out in this weather.”

  “It says on the television two pumping stations are out,” the maid said. “It says it’s going to flood and your mother’s been calling and calling.”

  “Maybe you should go home then,” Alisha said. “Just in case.”

  “I think I will,” the maid said. “They might let the schools out early and I’m taking care of my grandchild this week.”

  “Go on then,” Alisha said. “I can manage here.”

  “What about the cabinets?” the maid said. “I was going to put in shelf paper when he finished.”

  “It doesn’t matter,” Alisha said. “I’ll do it. Look out there. The sky is black as it can be. You better call a cab.”

  Michael finished his coffee, rinsed out the cup in the sink, set it neatly upside down to dry and began to work on the hardware of the cabinet doors, aligning them so they stayed closed when they were shut.

  “They go out of tune, “he said, “like a piano. I wonder who installed these to begin with. He must have been an impatient man. See how he drove these screws in. I should take the hardware off and start all over.”

  “Will that take a long time?” she said.

  “Well,” he laughed, “you’d probably have to refinish the cabinets if I did that.”

  “Then do it,” she said. “Go on. Fix them right while you’re here.”

  “I’ll see,” he said. “Perhaps I will change the worst ones, like the ones over the stove.”

  He went back to work. Outside torrents of rain beat against the windows and the sky was black as evening. Alisha moved around the kitchen straightening things inside the cabinets. She had not looked inside these cabinets in ages. She had forgotten all the interesting and beautiful things she owned. There were shelves of fine Limoges china and silver serving pieces wrapped carelessly in cellophane bags from the dry cleaners. There were copper pans and casserole dishes. There were stainless-steel mixing bowls and porcelain soufflé dishes and shelves and shelves of every sort of wineglass from the time when she gave dinner parties. There was one cabinet full of cookbooks and recipe folders and flower vases and candles and candleholders.

  She took down a cookbook called The Joy of Cooking. Her first mother-in-law had given it to her. On the flyleaf was an inscription, “Much love for good cooking and a few fancy dishes.” Underneath the inscription the maid had written TAKE FROM THE LEFT, SERVE FROM THE RIGHT, in large letters.

  Alisha laughed out loud.

  “What’s so funny,” the carpenter said.

  “I found a book I used to use when I gave dinner parties,” she said. “I wasn’t very good at dinner parties. I was too ambitious. I used to make things with curry. And the maid and I used to get drunk while we were waiting for the guests to arrive. We never could remember which side to serve the vegetables from. No m
atter how many dinner parties we had we never could remember.”

  “Why did you get drunk?” Michael said. “Were you unhappy?”

  “No,” she said. “I don’t think so. To tell the truth I think I was hungry. I used to take diet pills so I wouldn’t eat any of the good things I was always cooking. I would be so hungry by nighttime I would get drunk if I only had a glass of wine.”

  “Why did you do all that?” he said, wondering if she always said anything that came into her head.

  “I did it so I would look like Audrey Hepburn,” she said. “At that time most of the women in the United States wanted to look like Audrey Hepburn.”

  “Really?” he said.

  “Well, all of my friends did at least. I spent most of my waking hours trying not to eat anything. It was a lot of trouble, being hungry all the time.”

  “It sounds terrible,” Michael said. “Do you still do it?”

  “No,” she said. “I quit giving a damn about Audrey Hepburn. Then I quit taking diet pills, and then I quit drinking, and then I quit giving dinner parties. Then I quit doing anything I didn’t like to do.”

  “What do you like to do?” he asked.

  “I don’t know,” she said. “I haven’t found out yet.”

  “Your phone is ringing,” he said. “Aren’t you going to answer it?”

  “No,” she said. “I don’t like to talk on the telephone.”

  “The maid said your mother had been trying to call you.”

  “I know. That’s probably her on the phone now.”

  “You aren’t going to answer it?”

  “No. Because I already know what she’s going to say. She’s going to tell me a flood is coming. Don’t pay any attention to the phone. It’ll stop in a minute.”

  He put down his tools and turned around to face her. “There’s a whole lot going on in this room right now,” he said. “Are you aware of that?” He looked very serious, wiping his hands across his sleeves.

  “How old are you?” Alisha said.

  “What difference does that make?” he said and crossed the room and put his arms around her. She felt very nice in his arms, soft and brave and sad, like an old actress.

  “Oh, my,” she said. “I was afraid this was going to happen.” Then they laid down their weapons and walked awkwardly down the hall to the bedroom, walking slowly as though they were going to do something embarrassing and awkward and absurd.

  At the door to the bedroom he picked her up and carried her to the bed, hoping that was the romantic thing to do. Then he saw it. “What in the name of God is this?” he said, meaning the fur bedspread.

  “Something my mother gave me,” she said. “Isn’t it the tackiest thing you’ve ever seen in your life.”

  “Your body is very beautiful,” she said when he had taken off his clothes and was standing before her, shy and human. “You look like a grown man. That’s a relief.”

  “Do you always say whatever comes into your head?” he said.

  “Oh, yes,” she said. “I think everyone knows what everyone else is thinking all the time anyway. Do you mind? Do you think I talk too much?”

  “Oh, no,” he said. “I like it. It keeps surprising me.”

  “Do you like my body,” she said, for now she had taken off her clothes and had struck a pose, sitting cross-legged on the bed.

  “Of course I do,” he said. “I’ve been wanting to touch your tits ever since the first moment I saw you. The whole time we were walking around your house I was wanting to touch your tits.”

  “Oh, my,” she said. “Not my tits again. For years I believed men liked me for my mind. Imagine that! I read hundreds of books so they would like me better. All the time they were only wanting to touch my tits. Think of that!”

  “Now you’re talking too much,” he said.

  Then Alisha closed her eyes and pretended she was an Indian princess lying in a tent deep in a forest, dressed in a long white deerskin robe, waiting for Jeff Chandler to come and claim her for his bride. Outside the wind and rain beat down upon the forest.

  Then Michael closed his eyes and pretended he was a millionaire going to bed with a beautiful, sad old actress.

  The phone woke them with its ringing. Alisha was startled for a moment. Then she settled back down, remembering where she was. Michael’s legs were smooth and warm beside her. She was safe.

  “You really ought to answer that,” he said. “This is quite a storm we’re having.”

  She picked his shirt up off the floor, put it on for a bathrobe, and went into the other room to talk.

  “That was my mother,” she reported. “She’s crying. She’s almost got her companion crying. I think they’re both crying. He’s this real sensitive young man we found in the drama department at Tulane. They watch T.V. together. He’s learning to be an actor watching T.V.”

  “Why is she crying?” Michael said, sitting up in bed, pulling the plum-colored sheets around his waist.

  “She’s crying because the basement of her house is flooding. It always does that in heavy rains. She lives on Jefferson Avenue, around the corner. Anyway, she can’t find one of her cats and she thinks he’s getting wet.”

  “Her cats?”

  “She has six or seven cats. At least six cats. Anyway, she thinks the water is going to keep on rising and drown her cats.”

  “You’d better go and see about her then. We’d better go and help her.”

  “Help her? How can we help her? It’s a flash flood on Jefferson Avenue. It’ll go away as soon as the pumping stations start working. I told her to sell that goddamn house the last time this happened.”

  “It’s flooding your mother’s house and you don’t want to go and help her?”

  “It’s only flooding the basement.”

  “How old is she?”

  “My mother. She’s seventy-eight. She has a companion. Besides, she does anything she wants to do. Last year she went to China. She’s perfectly all right.”

  “Then why is she crying?”

  “Because she thinks her silly goddamn cats are getting wet.”

  “Then we’ll have to go and help her.”

  “How can we. It’s flooded all the way down Jefferson Avenue.”

  “Does that canoe in the garage work?”

  “I think so. No one’s ever used it. Stanley ordered it last year when he got interested in the Sierra Club. But no one’s ever used it.”

  “Then we’ll go in that. Every time I see a flood on television and people going to get other people in boats I want to be one of them. This is my chance. We can take the canoe in my truck to where the water starts. Go on. Call your mother back and tell her we’re coming to save her. Tell her we’ll be right there. And, Alisha.”

  “Yes.”

  “Tell her to stop crying. After all, she is your mother.”

  “This is a great canoe,” he said, maneuvering it down from the floored platform of the garage. “Your husband never uses it?”

  “He never uses anything,” she said. “He just likes to have things. To tell the truth he’s almost never here.”

  “Then why are you married?” he asked.

  “That’s a good question,” Alisha said. “But I don’t know the answer to it.”

  “Well, look, let’s go on over there. I can’t wait to put this in the water. I’m afraid the water will go down before we get there.”

  “It’s really nice of you to do this,” Alisha said, standing close to him, smelling the warm smell of his clothes, taking everything that she could get while she could get it.

  “Everybody loves to be a hero,” Michael said, putting his arms around her again, running his hands up and down her strange soft body.

  “Say I’m not your mother,” she said.

  “You’re not my mother,” he said. “Besides, it doesn’t matter. We’re probably only dreaming.”

  They drove down Freret Street with the city spread out before them, clean and shining after the rain. The sun w
as lighting up the red tile roofs of the houses, and Tulane students were on the porches with glasses in their hands, starting their flood parties.

  The inside of Michael’s truck was very cozy. He used it for a business office. File folders stuffed with bills and invoices were piled in one corner, and an accounting book was on the dashboard.

  “Will I make love to you again?” Alisha said, for she was too old to play hard to get.

  “Whenever you want to,” he said. “As soon as we finish saving your mother.”

  They could see the flood now. They took the canoe out of the back of the truck and carried it to where the water began at the foot of Skippy Nevelson’s front yard. Alisha sat in the bow and Michael waded out pushing her until it was deep enough for him to climb in.

  “I don’t believe I’m doing this,” she said. “You’re the craziest man I ever met in my life.”

  “Which way is the house,” he said.

  “It’s the second house off Willow,” Alisha said. “I guess we’ll just go down Jefferson and take a right at Willow.”

  They floated along with Michael paddling. The water was three feet deep, thick and brown and slow-moving. An envelope floated by, then an orange barrette, then a purple Frisbee.

  Alisha was feeling wonderful. If Skippy Nevelson was leaning out of her front window with her eyes the size of plates, if the WDSU Minicam crew was filming her for the evening news, if the levee broke and carried them all out to sea, what was that to Alisha, who had been delivered of an angel.

  “What will happen next?” she asked, pushing her luck.

  “Whatever we want to happen,” he said, lifting the paddle and throwing the muddy water up into the air.

  “Oh, my,” she said to no one in particular. “This was the year I was going to stop dying my hair.”

  Now they were only a block away from their destination. Alisha kept her face to the front wishing she had a hat so Michael couldn’t see her wrinkles. I have to remember this a long time, she told herself. I have to watch everything and hear everything and smell everything and remember everything. This may have to last me a long, long time.

  Then Alisha did a stupid thing. She wrote a little script for herself. This is the very last time I will ever love anyone she told herself. I will love this boy until he leaves me. And then I will never love another human being.