Kramer vs. Kramer

by Avery Corman

  THELMA AND CHARLIE CAME by, Thelma bearing a cooked roast beef. A slim, attractive woman in her early thirties, she was shored up by a combination of American cosmetics, tinted hair, contact lenses she squinted through, the latest fabrics, the newest fad diet—if it all slipped an economic notch or two she might have been just a plain woman, as she was when she was tired and the seams showed. She was unraveling now. Joanna’s leaving had unnerved her, confronting Thelma with the problems in her own marriage and sending her back into therapy.

  “I wish I really knew why she did it,” she said.

  “Maybe she just flipped out,” Charlie offered, tiptoeing around so as not to step on any of his own eggs.

  “I married a dentist, obviously, and not a psychiatrist,” she said sharply, Ted avoiding both their eyes with his guilty information about Charlie.

  “You know, she talked about going out to work, and I said it would have cost too much. Now I end up paying for a housekeeper anyway and I don’t have the income she would have brought in if she stayed.”

  “That’s pretty funny,” Charlie said. “You pay if you do, and you pay if you don’t,” and he laughed too hard at what was not as funny for anyone else in the room.

  “Be quiet, Charlie!” Thelma shouted, and Ted realized that his own predicament had suddenly become a field for their battles. “Can’t you see the man is in pain?” she said, covering her own pain. She knows, Ted realized. They all knew Charlie was playing around.

  “But why did she just leave? Didn’t you people communicate with each other?” Thelma said in a tone rebuking the men present.

  “Not very much, I guess.”

  “Well, I don’t mean to hurt you, Ted. So don’t take this wrong. But I think she’s kind of brave in a way.”

  “Thelma, don’t be an asshole.”

  “Shut your filthy mouth, Charlie! What I mean is, it took a kind of courage to do such an antisocial thing. And I respect her for it in a way.”

  “Thelma, I don’t think she was brave at all. It’s not brave to me to just run away!” The rage he had been trying to contain was leaking out. “And that feminist bullshit! Joanna was no more a feminist than—Charlie is.”

  “Leave me out of it, will you, Ted?”

  “What the hell difference does it make why she left? She’s gone! It matters more to you, Thelma, than it does to me.”

  “Really, Ted?”

  “The goddamn ball game is over. You’re like the announcers who sit around the booth doing a wrap-up. So what if we would have communicated? The game is over. She’s gone!”

  “And if she comes back, you’ll never know why she left.”

  “She’s not coming back!”

  He lunged for the note from Joanna which he had left on a table. Gossip, they wanted? They could see just how ugly it was. He thrust the note at Thelma. She read it quickly, uncomfortable with the scene this had become. Ted grabbed it from her and shoved it at Charlie.

  “Nice, huh? Is that a heroine? She’s just a lousy quitter. And she’s gone, that’s all, gone.”

  He took the note, crumpled it into a ball and kicked it into the foyer.

  “Ted,” Thelma said, “it might be a good idea—even if Joanna didn’t want to—for you to see somebody. You could talk to my therapist.”

  “What do I need a therapist for when I have my good friends?”

  “Look, Ted, you don’t have to get nasty,” Charlie said. “You’re upset, I realize—”

  “You’re right. And now I’d like to be alone. I thank you for the roast beef and the helpful talk.”

  “There is nothing wrong with self-awareness, Ted,” Thelma said.

  They said good night stiffly, Thelma and Ted exchanging kisses without touching. He did not want any more self-awareness than he already had or explanations for Joanna’s behavior beyond what he had. He did not want any more theorizing from his friends. Let them piece together their own marriages without examining his. He wanted only to get a housekeeper and have orderly days, a pattern, someone at home for Billy and the moment that was accomplished, Joanna would be dead.

  MRS. COLBY ARRANGED FOR a Miss Evans to come for an interview. She was a tiny old woman who showed remarkable verve by talking nonstop about her dietary needs, Breakstone’s cottage cheese, not Friendship, Dannon yogurt, not Sealtest, salt-free bread from the health-food store, not these breads they put sugar in. When she asked for a tour of the house and first requested to see where the bathroom was—she didn’t have to go, she pointed out, she was just checking—even before she asked to look in on the sleeping Billy, Ted decided they were dietarily incompatible.

  He located a Mrs. Roberts who had placed a situations wanted ad in the Times. She advertised, “Good cook. Good with children.” She arrived, an immense Puerto Rican woman, who conceivably had an agent representing her, since she had such a suitable ad, and an Anglo name like Roberts, while she spoke barely understandable English.

  “I work weeth maynee Spaneesh deefomads.”

  “I see,” he said, to be polite.

  “Maynee Spaneesh esecutees.”

  The plot thickened.

  “Well, I have one little boy.”

  “Your womeen?”

  “Vamoosed.”

  “Loco,” she said.

  She pinched him on the cheek heartily, a real pinch. He could not make out whether it was an editorial pinch or a sexual pinch, but it hurt.

  “You’ve taken care of children?”

  “I haff six baybies. Puerto Rico. The Bronx. The baybi-est, tweynty-two. He enyinee.”

  If Mrs. Roberts were employed, Ted figured Billy would be speaking Spanish by age five.

  “You cude.”

  “Excuse me?”

  “You cude peerson.”

  She was either making an improper advance or her agent had recommended the lusty approach. In any case, further inquiry revealed Mrs. Roberts was not even free immediately. She was going on “vacaytion” to Puerto Rico, where her husband currently worked for a “deefomad.” By the time she had left, Ted figured out that deefomad was diplomat, esecutee was executive, enyinee he guessed was enyinee, and Mrs. Roberts was a cude peerson, but he had not found a Mary Popeens.

  He contacted other employment agencies, followed the news­paper listings and unearthed a few “live-out” housekeepers, an attractive Jamaican lady with a lilting voice Ted would have liked to read him to sleep or other things, but who was available only for the summer, a stern lady who appeared for the interview in a starched white uniform and a starched face, a retired English nanny, who said several generations of children called her Nanny, but she wasn’t up to full-time any longer—could she work two and a half days a week?—and an Irish lady with a heavy brogue who terminated the interview on her own by severely criticizing Ted for permitting his wife to leave, the woman having clearly lost the drift. Mrs. Colby called and said she would make it her life’s mission to find the right person for Ted within hours, since she had taken a personal interest in Ted’s case, owing to his wife’s unfortunate demise, somehow having gotten Joanna’s notation mixed up with your highway fatalities and your drownings kind of thing.

  Mrs. Colby sent him four people, one in the $125 range, of which the lady informed him immediately and did he have a cook? Another, a dizzily absent-minded woman who seemed quite pleasant but who forgot she had taken on another job beginning in August. A plump woman who giggled and who seemed as if she might do, except she called back to say she got a live-in for more money. And a Swedish woman named Mrs. Larson who found the place too dirty for her liking, which made Ted uncomfortable, since he had carefully swept and mopped so that no Swedish woman would find it too dirty for her liking.

  He was thinking about placing his own ad in the newspaper, but did not want to open himself up to the crazies at large. Instead, he taped a sign on what was the community bulletin board, a wall in the supermarket across the street. “Housekeeper wanted, 9 to 6. Nice family.” He had heard this often enough.
“I only work for nice families.” He got one call from a Mrs. Etta Willewska, who said she lived in the neighborhood and had not done this work in a while but was interested. She was a short, wide Polish woman with a cherubic face, inappropriately dressed for her interview in what seemed to be her best dress, a black formal outfit. Her accent was slight; she and her husband had been citizens for thirty years, she said proudly. They had a married son. She had been a housekeeper for many years, then worked for the most part in industrial laundries. Her husband worked in a factory in Long Island City. She thought it would be good to work for a nice family again. She then asked Ted a question. It was something not one of the others had bothered to ask.

  “What kind of boy is he?”

  Ted was not certain. He had the general outlines, but he had never been obliged to define Billy’s personality.

  “He’s very nice. Sometime’s he’s shy. He likes to play. He speaks well.” He did not know what else to say.

  “Could I look in?” she asked.

  They peered through the door at Billy asleep with his people.

  “He’s very beautiful,” she whispered.

  The light from the hall fell across his face and he woke suddenly.

  “It’s okay, honey. It’s me. This is Mrs. Willewska.”

  “Mrs. Willewska,” Billy said in a tired voice.

  “Go back to sleep.”

  When they went inside she said: “He’s very smart. He said my name without a mistake. Many people cannot.”

  Ted wondered about the burden of carrying a name many people cannot say without a mistake.

  “I don’t know if he is smart. At four it’s kind of hard to tell. I think he is.”

  “You’re a very lucky man, Mr. Kramer.”

  He had not considered himself so over these past few days.

  They talked in general terms about the duties of the job, which he said paid $110—he could at least match what he would have offered through Mrs. Colby. Could she come in for a few hours to get acquainted? Could she start on Monday? She said she would be happy to work for him and take care of William. On leaving she inquired as to the kind of meals Ted liked when he came home from work. He had not realized this was part of the bargain.

  So he had a lady with a cherubic face who would cook suppers and take care of Billy. Trust your feelings, Thelma had advised on the hiring of help—and he felt he had his person. He called Mrs. Colby and told her he had found someone. Adrift in her index cards, she said she hoped his wife was feeling better.

  Now he could make his other calls. He had tidied up. He could say to his parents—My wife left, wait, don’t go crazy, we have a wonderful housekeeper, it’s neat, I made it neat. He could say to his former in-laws—Do you know where Joanna is? She left, you know. We have a housekeeper, wonderful woman. He could say—I don’t need your help, any of you. I’m keeping him. We’ll do all right. It’s the way I want it.

  He went into Billy’s room and stood over him. What kind of boy was he? Could you know at four? What kind of boy was he going to be? What kind of life would they have?

  We’ll be okay, Billy. We’ve got Mrs. Willewska. We’ve got each other.

  The boy moved in his sleep, immersed in his child’s dreams. He moved his lips, muttering words that were unintelligible. It was fascinating, but Ted could not watch, eavesdropping on his private world this way. He felt like an intruder. Little boy, don’t worry. We’re going to be fine. He kissed him and backed away. The child was involved in his dream. He was saying something about “Snoopy.”

  SEVEN

  NEARLY HYSTERICAL. SCREAMING. “What do you mean she just walked out on you and the baby? What do you mean?” his mother howled, repeating it as though the repetition were required to record it on her brain. “Just walked out? On you and the baby? Ahhh!” A howl from his childhood. “What do you mean you got caught sneaking in the RKO Fordham? What do you mean the manager has you in his office?” The theater manager knew the family. Ted’s father had a small luncheonette on Fordham Road then and the manager called the store instead of calling the police. He and Johnny Marin were going to sneak in the side door the moment Jimmy Perretti pushed it open from the inside, crouching into the shadows of the RKO Fordham like commandos in Commandos Strike At Dawn, only to get caught by the usher and about to be sent up like convicts in The Big House. “What do you mean my son is a criminal? Ahhh!” “I didn’t know you had it in you, kid,” his brother said after the manager released the hardened criminal in exchange for a hot turkey plate.

  In the time before Billy, Ted and Joanna had gone to Fort Lauderdale to see Dora and Harold Kramer’s new condominium, a garden apartment near a pool. While Harold watched television, Dora took them on a tour of the grounds. “This is my younger son, Ted, and his wife,” she would say. Sons were identified poolside by occupation, daughters and daughters-in-law by their husbands’ occupations. “Ted sells,” she said, but she never mentioned that he sold advertising space, since she was still not wholly clear what that was. He would have been easier to explain if he were a big liquor wholesaler like his brother, as in “This is my older son, Ralph, he’s a big liquor wholesaler,” or a doctor like the Simons’ boy.

  “WHAT HAVE YOU BEEN doing up there?”

  “Breaking up a marriage.”

  “I never heard of such a thing.”

  “It’s very modern.”

  “Who permits such a thing?”

  “Ted?” His father had left his game show on television, having delayed to make certain this was important enough to come to the phone.

  “How are you, Dad?”

  “You let your wife leave you?”

  “The decision was not democratically arrived at.”

  “And she left the little baby. Ahhh!”

  He howled. The shame of this must have been enormous. He had never heard his father howl his mother’s howl before.

  “I’ve got everything under control.”

  “Control?” his mother shrieked. “How can everything be under control?”

  “Mom, listen—”

  “Your wife has run away from you—”

  “I’ve hired a housekeeper, a terrific woman. She’s raised her own boy, she’s taken care of other children.”

  “What is she?” she said quickly.

  “Uh … Polish.”

  “Good. They work hard. Ahh, what’s the difference? It’s a tragedy, a disgrace.”

  “She’s very nice. She’s going to come in every day and take care of everything.”

  “A disgrace. That woman. She’s a tramp. A tramp!”

  “Mom, Joanna is probably a lot of things, some of them I don’t even know myself. But a tramp,” he said, trying to stifle his laughter. “How do you get a tramp out of this?”

  “A tramp,” she said definitively.

  “A slut,” his father added for emphasis.

  He had tried to make it neat. It was not neat enough. When he hung up he was still chuckling at how they possibly got a tramp and slut out of it.

  SHE CALLED HIM WILLIAM; he called her Mrs. Willewska. Ted called her Mrs. Willewska also; she called him Mr. Kramer, the formality appealing to Ted, as if they were an old-line family like the Kennedys, accustomed to having help. She was a gentle, reasonable woman, intuitive with a child. For Billy, his mommy gone forever was still an unfathomable idea. What was real to him were the details of his life, who brings me to school, who picks me up, who makes me lunch, when do I watch TV, who makes me supper, who does what Mommy did? These were tangible, and the possibility that these would be unpredictable was frightening to him. His mother’s absence did not mean his world had come apart. No one to give him a peanut butter sandwich did. During the search for a housekeeper, these were Billy’s concerns, which he verbalized with nervous questions about times of arrivals and departures for school, for dates, for meals—who does what, who stands where? As soon as Etta Willewska arrived, the unfathomable continued to be so—no Mommy? All else, however, was answere
d. Mrs. Willewska did that. Within a few days, Billy was saying, “Daddy, Mrs. Willewska said I could not have another cookie. I had one before.” On a morning when Ted walked along with them to take Billy to school, Ted began to step off the curb, only to be admonished: “It says don’t walk, Daddy.”

  “We only cross when it says walk, Mr. Kramer. So he’ll learn.”

  “Right.” Take me by the hand, Mrs. Willewska, and cross me.

  She had brought stability to them. They were both, at the core, still bewildered. But on the details, on the peanut butter sandwiches and the walks and don’t walks—Mrs. Willewska did that.

  To people in business he offered as information that “My wife copped out on the marriage and the kid,” and usually said, “But we’ve got it straightened out with this fabulous housekeeper,” saying this part so quickly he cut off their specific questions.

  After several days of normal performance at work and the beginning of a regular routine for everyone at home, he decided to call Joanna’s parents, since he had not heard from them. Maybe they knew where Joanna was. They did not. She had left it to Ted to tell them.

  “You don’t know anything?”

  “Know what?”

  “Joanna has left us, Harriet. She’s gone. She left Billy and me to go off and find herself.” You’re some cutie-pie. You really left this for me? There was a long pause on the other end. “I sort of hoped she’d have told you herself.”

  “She left her son? Her own baby?”

  “And her husband. She left me, too.”

  “What did you do to her?”

  “Nothing, Harriet. I didn’t ask her to leave.”

  “I think I’m going to have a heart attack.”

  “Take it easy now, Harriet. Where’s Sam?”

  “In the back.”

  “Go get him. I’ll hold on.”

  “I’m going to have a heart attack.”

  “Don’t have a heart attack. Get Sam.”

  He guessed that a person who could announce she was having a heart attack was not going to have one.

  “Hello?”

  “Sam, is Harriet all right?”