Starting from Happy
Page 1
More praise for Starting from Happy
“Marx doesn’t just break the fourth wall, she makes origami of it . . . . A master of the compressed one-liner.”
—The New York Times Book Review
“Moving and sweet, with a humor much deeper and more humane.”
—The Boston Globe
“A fine, zippy romance.”
—W magazine
“A funny, boy-meets-girl novel in witty, quick bits that read like your best friend’s best tweets.”
—O, The Oprah Magazine
“A sharp-edged love story . . . you might just find yourself snorting out loud.”
—NPR.org
“Sublime silliness.”
—The Cleveland Plain Dealer
“Hilarious . . . Starting from Happy is an unexpected little gem of awesomeness.”
—San Francisco Book Review
“A fast and funny read . . . with just about every stylistic gewgaw in the arsenal of fiction writers.”
—Associated Press
“Stylish and sarcastic. Marx moves the story forward with infectious zeal and allows readers to revel in a quirky take on sex (and death) in the city.”
—Publishers Weekly
“A poignant portrait of a long-term relationship, with all the disappointments and occasional triumphs that entails. A funny, sad, and original take on the mating game.”
—Kirkus Reviews
“Delightfully silly . . . comedic high art. Readers who enjoy the sly observations of Nora Ephron and the smart silliness of Woody Allen and Steve Martin should try Starting from Happy.”
—Booklist
“Smart, absurd, breezy fun, with a memorable one-liner on almost every page.”
—San Antonio Express-News
“Dry, sly, obtuse, inane, academic, slapstick, and poignant . . . Reminiscent of Kurt Vonnegut’s Breakfast of Champions, this is a case where the joy is in the journey, not the destination.”
—Fast Forward Weekly
“Cunning and howlingly funny.”
—Financial Post (Canada)
“Patty Marx is an authentic wit and her book is funny and often brilliant.”
—Woody Allen
“Patty Marx is a genius of trenchant zaniness.”
—Lorrie Moore, author of A Gate at the Stairs
“Patricia Marx has wit without preciousness, barb without snark, and a greatly droll facility with language. Starting from Happy is an original, appealing story of a freakishly funny and oddly enduring relationship.”
—Meg Wolitzer, author of The Uncoupling
ALSO BY PATRICIA MARX
Him Her Him Again The End of Him
Dot in Larryland
Meet My Staff
SCRIBNER
A Division of Simon & Schuster, Inc.
1230 Avenue of the Americas
New York, NY 10020
www.SimonandSchuster.com
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents
either are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.
Any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead,
is entirely coincidental.
Copyright © 2011 by Patricia Marx
All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book or
portions thereof in any form whatsoever. For information address
Scribner Subsidiary Rights Department, 1230 Avenue of the Americas,
New York, NY 10020.
First Scribner hardcover edition August 2011
SCRIBNER and design are registered trademarks of The Gale Group, Inc.,
used under license by Simon & Schuster, Inc., the publisher of this work.
The Simon & Schuster Speakers Bureau can bring authors to your
live event. For more information or to book an event contact the
Simon & Schuster Speakers Bureau at 1-866-248-3049
or visit our website at www.simonspeakers.com.
Designed by Maura Fadden Rosenthal / Mspace
Manufactured in the United States of America
1 3 5 7 9 10 8 6 4 2
Library of Congress Control Number: 2011010774
ISBN 978-1-4391-0128-5
ISBN 978-1-4391-0995-3 (ebook)
FOR PAUL ROOSSIN
Contents
Prolegomenon
Who’s Who
Start Here
End Here
Index
Special Bonus Edition for Readers who have had Lasik Surgery
A Message from the Publisher
A Final Word from the Publisher
More from Our Mailbag
About the Author
Uh-oh
[Warning: If, in these pages, you encounter an imaginary number or an umlaut, it’ll be okay.]
[Starting from Happy is composed not of chapters, but of chaplettes. If you are looking for a book with chapters adiós muchachos.]
[Good or bad, something will happen.]
PROLEGOMENON
Philip Roth, after reading an early draft of this book, asked my editor if he could write the foreword. I was encouraged. Not long before the publication had been scheduled to go to press Mr. Roth excused himself from the task, however, reporting that he was obliged to be present at something pastoral.
I was in a quandary. I was under contract to produce a manuscript of a certain length, and had been depending on Roth to bring me to my target word-count. Literature is supposed to be literary, but, as all of us are aware, lawyers not infrequently prevail. Thank goodness Toni Morrison, who’d also been given an advance copy of Starting from Happy, said she’d be honored to contribute a prefatory essay. Later that day, she, too, was required to withdraw her offer, implying with great tact, I thought, that Roth had poisoned the well. My editor sent proofs to Joyce Carol Oates. Oates phoned to say that she was sorry but she was suffering from a bout of writer’s block.
Cormac McCarthy was under the weather, existentially speaking. Alice Munro was stuck in Manitoba. Margaret Atwood said no—in a spare, enigmatic manner.
John Updike is dead.
Why didn’t I, Patricia A. Marx, simply write the front matter myself? According to my publisher, a foreword is customarily executed by an eminent writer.
I amn’t?
I suppose I could have written an opening of some sort—provide the backstory to my novel, say, or explain how it came to be that I wrote this book. But here’s the thing. Would that be considered an introduction or a preface? I know that one of those is the one nobody reads, so I’d want to write the other one, the one where you get the lowercase Roman numerals at the bottom of the page. Or do I mean the prologue? Or the epigraph?
I still need either 225 or 227 words—or, rather, two hundred twenty-five or two hundred twenty-seven—depending on how you feel about uh-oh (and counting this sentence). Yes, I could’ve, I mean could have, padded my manuscript—replaced each contraction with the corresponding two words, for instance—but is this the way I want posterity to view my legacy?
Even now, I am at least one hundred and forty-three words shy of the mark.
Bowwow bah bah woof ribbit ribbit meow moo coo roar.
Caw to-keh gobble gobble quack quack quack.
Neigh.
Cheep cluck buzz grrr chatter gibber cluck hiss whoop.
Chirrup oink squawk cock-a-doodle-doo.
Moo coo bark bark woof bah bah bgirk bruk bruk bruk.
Woof chatter.
Meow roar quack quack warble to-keh gobble gobble gibber growl.
Scram.
Bleat whiny grunt night cheep arg cluck buzz grrr.
Gibber cluck caw quack hiss whoop.
&nbs
p; Low chirrup squawk caw oink oink blub glug swish squeak eek.
Polly want a cracker?
Croak cuckoo mew bell trumpet moan drone cackle pitter.
Click pipe whistle scram gobble gobble.
Crow bellow yelp moo squeak squeal arf growl purr.
Trumpet chant eek baa buzz fink scram.
Howl honk.
Melba toast.
Oink neigh oink.
Hoo-hoo do you think you are jug-gug howl snort.
Hee-haw.
WHO’S WHO
(in order of appearance, except when not)
IMOGENE GILFEATHER: Lingerie designer. Likes things just so. Pet peeves: everything. Not her real hair color.
WALLY YEZ: Scientist whose field of study Patty does not understand. Knows a lot of things. Hates fake crap. Likes real crap. Wishes upside-down was one word.
PATTY: Author. Tried to be omniscient, but kept forgetting things.
RON DE JEAN: Sleep researcher. Married, if you can call it that. Patty tried to like him. Still trying.
GWEN DWORKIN: Shared a house with Wally—also a turtle and a piece of taffy. As a child, used to break into friends’ houses and refold their towels. Highest IQ in this book—next to Patty’s, of course.
HARRIET: Imogene’s assistant. From New Orleans, but talks normal because accents too time-consuming to write and read.
MEG AND RICHARD SEPKOWITZ: Accountants known for their sprightly, tax-deductible dinner parties. Not particularly known for anything else. Neither can tolerate the numeral 9.
DEREK: Wally’s best friend. Uneasy with any food that is toasted. On deathbed, finally forgave author for failing to give him a last name.
ERNA GILFEATHER: Imogene’s mother. Has no wrinkles, the result of her having committed early on to a life without smiling. Divides her time between being glad she brought a sweater and wishing she’d brought a sweater.
BEENISH ASIF: Seems to have her sights set on Wally. Outgoing phone machine says, “This is Beenish. If you pay for it, I’ll eat it.”
DONALD CHARM: Senior lingerie buyer at Saks Fifth Avenue. Wears a preponderance of argyle and lives with a mother-doll. Taciturn in twelve languages.
STUFFY: Endangered. Update: dead.
ELSIE EVANGELISTA: Wally’s barber. Her word against ours. Packages sent to Elsie always returned to sender.
BOUNCE: Until age four, thought he was age six. At age six, thought he was five. At age five, thought he was a subway car on the Lexington Avenue line.
LINLIN: Only flaw is her perfection.
UXUE: Bounce’s sweetheart. Her name is consistently misspelled in these pages, possibly on this one as well.
IGOR FLATEV: Broke LinLin’s heart. Is anagram for “I love graft.”
LEONARD: A minor character who slept his way into this book. With Gwen.
MRS. DEEDEE DOE: Litigant. Never knew what hit her.
MISSY WINKELMAN: Next-door neighbor. Don’t get me started….
PAUL S. ROOSSIN: God only knows.
: A kumquat.
START HERE
1.
It did not, as a matter of fact, start from happy for either of them. Imogene Gilfeather had just had a cruel haircut and for this reason, or maybe another, expressed little interest that night when the fellow sitting next to her on the bus down Broadway said he knew the perfect guy for her.
“Perfect,” said Imogene Gilfeather, “is not my type.”
2.
The perfect guy was Wally Yez. As Imogene Gilfeather was rejecting Wally Yez sight unseen, Wally’s beloved pet black squirrel was being electrocuted. The rodent, it seems, had ventured onto the amateur radio antenna that Wally had set up on his roof, most likely amateurishly.
Bereavement notwithstanding, Wally Yez was intrigued when, the next day, a guy at the hardware store, a friend of a friend of an acquaintance, asked if Wally would like to meet a certain Imogene Gilfeather. What intrigued Wally most? Not that Imogene Gilfeather had a one-and-a-half-bedroom with a wraparound terrace or that she knew how to make éclairs or that she was available. What intrigued Wally most about Imogene Gilfeather was that she designed a line of lingerie. It was called Featherware.
“Damn,” Wally said, wishing he had not gone in with Gwen on the dual membership to the American Museum of Natural History. Wally was a big believer in devotion. Then Wally remembered that the membership was a promotional offer, good for only three months.
3.
There will be no representations of underwear, not even long johns, in Starting from Happy.* Patty** is far too demure to enter into a realm so salacious. Nor will she pander to the oglers or the shoppers. Also, she wouldn’t know how to begin to draw a brassiere. Instead of Featherware, then: a cactus, of the utmost propriety.
4.
Wally and Gwen renewed their dual membership to the American Museum of Natural History. Every so often, it crossed Wally’s mind: Would there come a time when he and Gwen would upgrade to the family membership?
Wally took Gwen to a swank supper club on the river to celebrate the seven-month anniversary of their first meal together. While the band played a melancholy “Can’t Buy Me Love,” Wally presented Gwen with a locket. In the candlelight, Gwen read aloud the inscription on the gold-plated heart: “Twenty-five Beautiful Years Together. Norman and Arlene.”
“Whoops,” said Wally, promising to pick up the correct necklace in the morning, and then Wally and Gwen shared a tepid laugh.
Wally also gave Gwen a lifetime membership to the New York City Police Museum. “A lady from the Widows’ and Children’s Benefit Fund called, and how could I hurt her feelings?” said Wally.
Gwen gave Wally a scale for the bathroom.
5.
The next day, Wally stood on the scale because there was no room in the bathroom to stand anywhere else. Wally wasn’t feeling too hot, owing perhaps to the hollandaise sauce at the swank supper club. Hollandaise sauce or no hollandaise sauce, Gwen insisted on Wally’s attendance at the going-away clambake that afternoon for the old man who cleaned the pipettes in Gwen and Wally’s lab.
In the apple pie line at the clambake, Wally was introduced to one of the big deals in sleep disorder research, Dr. Ron de Jean (pronounced first like the Kurosawa film, and then like the mustard), and also to his date. “I know who you are,” Dr. Ron de Jean’s date said to Wally as soon as she heard his name. “You are the man I was supposed to marry.” She was Imogene Gilfeather.
“And you,” said Wally, “are the woman who …” He was going to say something about undergarments, but instead he said, “… and you are the woman who makes soufflés.” She did not look like a woman who specialized in lace or egg whites, thought Wally. Tall and thin, with jutting cheeks and fiery red hair, she looked like a kitchen match that stubbornly would not light. If Imogene produced a culinary pièce de résistance, Wally guessed it would be an orange-ginger vinaigrette or maybe a watercress sandwich with the crusts intact.
“Soufflés?” Imogene said. “I am not insouciant enough for soufflés.” Had this comment been devised to beguile? Patty does not know. Wally was, nonetheless, beguiled. He watched Imogene tilt her head forward and rearrange her hair into a high ponytail.
6.
But Wally, you may remember, was a big believer in devotion. He and Gwen said their adieus to the host and hostess. That night the four winds blew fiercely through their bedroom.
7.
Imogene Gilfeather and Ron de Jean removed themselves from the going-away clambake before coffee and taffy were served. Ron was eager to return to his lab to see if any of the subjects had woken up while he was gone. Imogene was antsy, too. She had been seized with an idea for a new bustier while chatting with the guy whose shirt was not tucked in (Wally). Imogene wanted to go home and make a sketch before she forgot where to put the snaps.
The taxi pulled up to Imogene’s. “Might be able to squeeze in a few minutes,” Ron de Jean said. Not much later, he said, “Sorry I can’t stay longer. Can you hel
p me buckle my belt?”
“Why is it that men always assume women want them to spend the night?” Imogene said, but Ron did not hear her say it.
8.
By the time Ron de Jean was in the elevator, Imogene had roughed out a sketch of the bustier with snaps, and thrown it away, deciding it looked like a jerkin for a toddler or a peanut costume. By the time Ron de Jean was in the lobby, Imogene had put on the teakettle and Billie Holiday and taken off her mascara and being-with-someone face.
Imogene scrolled through her e-mail. Ninety-seven of them—most from friends, a few from rayon and Lycra vendors, three identical messages from someone named Mirilla Borth promising her a job in the Turkmenistan diplomatic corps, and one from Saks Fifth Avenue which filled her with hope that the chain might one day carry Featherware.
9.
Imogene looked around the living room/dining alcove and beheld her art nouveau fireplace with art deco fireplace accessories; her Serapi carpet with an unusual spider design and an extensive use of teal; her collection of miniature stone fruit that included a rare half kumquat; her nineteenth-century dining room table, perfectly distressed; her books (arranged alphabetically); her snuff bottle collection (arranged snuffily); her flattering lighting system (installed by a leading man in the field of illumination); her piece of Australian aboriginal art snagged on a trip to Oceania (and artfully positioned on the wall by a framer friend); and, of course, her wraparound terrace (which added significant value to her one-and-one-half-bedroom co-op with paid-off mortgage). She contemplated her Indian jasper countertop in the kitchen, her linen closet with French fabrics in the hallway, her impressive water pressure in the bathroom, and her nice big television in the bedroom.
She marveled that, an enviable social calendar notwithstanding, she would be free this night and could do what she pleased.