At the opposite end of the room stood metal shelving that held journals, books, stacks of letters. A laptop sat on a heavy antique desk with ornate metal drawer pulls—Lester’s desk, Gina guessed. She slipped behind the Japanese screen that obscured the remainder of the room, and jumped when she spotted Lester’s crutch, then Lester himself, lying flat on his back on the floor, his eyes closed. She rushed to him.
“Lester, are you hurt?”
Lester squinted up at her. His face was drained of color, his shirt soaked with perspiration. “Oh, Gina, thank goodness you’re here, dear. I must have dozed off, and I’m awfully thirsty. I–I– slipped and fell. Annie hasn’t come home yet?”
“No, she hasn’t. How long have you been here?”
“I don’t know; too long. I called for Annie but . . . oh, gosh, I just stepped on a damn piece of paper and fwitt! My legs flew out from under me, and I couldn’t reach my crutch. I think you’d better not move me—it’s my leg or my hip.”
Gina called 911 and grabbed a cushion to put under Lester’s head. She tilted a glass of water to his lips, and he drank.
“Annie?” he said into the glass.
“She’ll be back later, Lester. I’ve called for help.”
“Where’s Annie?” Lester asked as the ambulance wound its way along Pickering Road.
When Gina reminded him she was at the symphony, he said, “That’s right. She’ll be home after dinner.” He turned away as if to contemplate this possibility, and Gina would always remember how changed he seemed at that moment, how his confidence had seemed to wither as confusion and pain filled his face.
“What time is it then, Ginny?”
“It’s three.” She turned her watch to him, and he squinted at the numbers.
“Oh, well, I meant to tell her to fill the gas tank before she left,” he said and closed his eyes.
The ambulance flew over the Whit’s Point Bridge. As Gina watched Lester’s chest rise and fall with his heavy breathing, her own chest tightened against her racing heart. What if Lester had had a stroke or a heart attack? Perhaps if she hadn’t been so all-consumed with this house business, she would have found him sooner!
The paramedic finished examining him and sat down, looking relieved. “No major breaks at least—we’ll see what the X-rays tell us.”
Lester said, “I just need some Advil and a good stiff drink.”
Gina couldn’t remember ever having been at the Riversport hospital, a fact that seemed strange to her now. She’d been in boarding school when her mother had had a hysterectomy, in California when her father had had his bypass. She’d always imagined her local hospital would be a sorry, outdated version of the cold and sterile medical centers in San Francisco. But Riversport looked more like a Marriott Hotel, with carpeting instead of linoleum, potted plants everywhere, landscapes by local artists on the walls, even a plate of oatmeal cookies on the admittance desk. There were only four others in the waiting room, one a mother holding a young child. Nurses and doctors passing through the ER lobby actually smiled and said hello.
Gina sat next to Lester’s gurney furiously filling out forms with the information Lester gave her.
“Ginny, you’re a dear,” Lester said when she’d finished with the forms.
Gina felt undeserving of his appreciation, but there was such sweetness in his voice she impulsively took his hand. It was large and sticky in hers. “Let’s hope they can see you quickly. Can I get you anything?”
Lester asked for more water, and when he finished drinking, he took a deep breath. “Oh dear . . . you know, I’m a little rattled. I can’t remember where, exactly, you said Annie was going. The symphony was it? Goodness. I think I need a little nap. Ayuh—that’s what I need.”
While Lester slept, Gina turned on her cell phone and a text from Allison leapt onto the screen: Any thoughts re: playhouse? Gina thought of Annie and Lester’s studio overflowing with character, and all the other secret places in her life, real and imagined. I think you should let the kids design it and help build it, she texted back. They’ll be so much happier with the results!
She called the Maine Symphony office in Portland and asked them to try to track down Annie. Then she left a message for Paul, telling him about Lester’s fall.
A nurse came over to take Lester’s pulse. “I’m afraid we’re unusually busy with a couple of critical cases,” she said, turning to Gina. Her face was kind and so wide that her ears seemed to disappear. “You might want to get a cup of coffee in the cafeteria. Your father may have a wait.”
Gina let the mistake go. Thinking Lester might be hungry since he’d gone without lunch, she bought him a sandwich and some iced tea. He was still asleep when she returned, and she picked up a copy of Dream House magazine from the table next to her. Make your home your dream-come-true, the cover said. House, home—real-estate agents and journalists used the two words interchangeably even though one was concrete, or wood or brick as the case may be, and the other abstract, subjective. The magazine was repellent; the houses sprawled almost pornographically across its pages. A gaudy sunset shot from across a lighted infinity pool; a room jammed with African artifacts and hide-covered furniture; a garage full of vintage cars; and a media room stacked floor to ceiling with equipment. The rooms had been composed by a stylist, then composed again through the lens of the photographer—they were compositions of compositions that provided no sense of the houses’ spaces, of architecture. Dream houses? No room here for dreams.
Gina dropped the magazine on the table. The truth was, the professional magazines stacked in her office didn’t do much better. They published art houses—not for the approval of consumers but for that of architects—commissioned by people whose primary motivation was to own an award-winning house. Sometimes the carte blanche they gave their architects resulted in a building that was architecturally extraordinary and an efficient and comfortable dwelling. But often, awards were given to projects that were low-functioning and proud of it; while their inhabitants publicly pronounced their architects brilliant, in private, they cursed the flat roof that didn’t drain, the clanging metal stair, the skylight over the bed that cut short their sleep.
It was challenging to strike the right balance, and Gina had made her share of mistakes; with time, she’d learned to recognize which projects would inevitably compromise her aesthetic—occasionally resulting in her not taking one on—and when her vision would seriously impede utility. The Stones had given her tremendous freedom with their house, and she hoped it would showcase her artistry while also realizing their visions and needs.
As if summoned, her phone vibrated in her pocket; she pulled it out to find Jeffrey Stone’s number striped across her screensaver photo of Esther and Ben.
Jeff left a vexed-sounding message:
“Gina, having trouble reaching you—we’ve got an emergency here with the neighborhood outreach meeting—pretty stiff opposition. Expect an email from our neighbor Henchew—something about aquifers and wild parrots. Anyway, Mitzi’s very upset and would appreciate a call from you. Thanks.”
“An emergency,” Gina thought, frowning at the irony. She checked her email and sure enough, there was a message from H. H. Henchew, the owner of both a major airline and the nation’s top pet food chain who’d built a seventeen-thousand square foot mansion in the style Gina dubbed “Chateaucoco.” He’d typed his email in uppercase as if lower case wouldn’t have made his points loudly enough.
RE: NEIGHBORHOOD OUTREACH MEETING FOR STONE RESIDENCE. MULTIPLE NEIGHBORS OPPOSE THIS PROJECT BASED ON
1) THE DISTURBANCE OF EXISTING AQUIFER CAUSING FLOODING DOWNHILL OF THE HOUSE
2) DISTURBANCE OF SUBTERRANEAN HABITAT
3) POSSIBLE DISTURBANCE OF EXISITING UNKNOWN FAULTS THAT COULD CAUSE EARTHQUAKE
4) OVERSIZED WINDOWS ON UPPER LEVELS POSE DIRECT THREAT TO THE WILD PARROTS OF TELEGRAPH HILL WHO WILL FLY INTO GLASS DURING MIGRATIONS AND FALL TO THEIR DEATH.
WE LOOK FORWARD TO DISCUSSING THESE CONC
ERNS AT THE MEETING.
It would be a long fight but not an unfamiliar one. Gina’s stomach complained; anxiety tugged at her. She turned off her phone and ate half the sandwich she’d bought while people swam about, speaking with urgency. The child slumped in his mother’s arms, staring at Gina through glazed eyes: a fever—a high one she could tell. She closed her eyes and leaned her head back against the wall.
“Gina? Are you all right?”
When she opened her eyes, Lester was peering at her.
Before she could answer, the nurse was over them, standing so close to Lester that her pillowy stomach touched his hand. “I’m going to take you two into the exam room. But I can’t guarantee you’ll be seen right away,” she said.
“That catnap did me good,” Lester said when they were settled and alone.
The room was tiny and windowless, but the air conditioning felt heavenly. Gina gave Lester the sandwich half, and he nibbled at it.
“I think I was a bit heat-stricken. The painkillers are helping, too; I feel downright zippy. Just can’t for the life of me figure out how I could’ve landed on my rear end so fast! What an old man. Annie’s gonna let me have it!” He laughed, and Gina laughed too, amazed and relieved by his good humor. “How did it go today?” he asked.
“Oh, I just went to the house.” She considered telling him about measuring but was afraid he’d ask her why and what would she say?
“You did, eh? Bring back old times?”
“Oh, yes . . . you know . . . the best of times, the worst of times . . .” Gina laughed but without warning, her eyes flooded.
Lester noticed and reached over and gave her a pat. “You know, things were very different, back a generation,” he said. “All those rules. What you talked about, what you didn’t.”
The silence that filled the room was so dense it was hard for Gina to breathe. In her experience, nobody in Maine ever talked about anything, and here Lester was, plunging right into something deep. She felt disoriented, as if she’d stumbled into the middle of someone else’s conversation.
“People,” Lester said. “I even got into trouble talking about my high school kids with their folks. People didn’t air their laundry the way you all do. You just rolled with it.”
Airing laundry? Gina tingled with anticipation, remaining silent so she wouldn’t interrupt Lester’s stream of consciousness. It had to be the painkillers that had made him so forthcoming.
“Your mother—she was expert at putting on a good face in public. Not so good at it at home, I suspect.” Finally Lester turned and looked at her with such kindness she had to look away. “Listen to me; I’m a lunatic!” he exclaimed. “Have I said too much?”
Gina did her best to feign unconcern but noticed she’d slid to the edge of her chair. “No, no,” she said. “You’re right, Lester. Please keep going.”
“Your mother was a chipper gal around all us pals. But one night . . . I remember . . . you and Cassie were little tykes, and your father called looking for Eleanor. She’d stormed out and hadn’t said where to. It didn’t sound so serious; what housewife didn’t get worked up every now and then? But your dad, he was one distraught man. I could tell there was more to it. I told him, ‘Talk to her doctor,’ but Ron and I both knew she wasn’t the kind of person who took orders. In all those years, he and I never spoke about such a thing again.”
Was that all, Gina wondered, after all that build up?
“Things seemed to settle down, anyhow,” Lester said. “Ron and Eleanor, they were good . . . good together. Remember how your father used to say, ‘Can you imagine me without Eleanor? A boat without a rudder!’”
Casa senza donna, barca senza timone. Gina inwardly cringed; her father’s adage had made him sound proud of his inadequacy.
And Lester: she chafed at his loyalty, his apparent determination to tie up her parents’ marriage with a bow. She swallowed a lump in her throat. “There were two children in that boat,” she managed to say, “and the rudder was broken.”
Gina hesitated, worried about speaking so openly. But the unscripted way in which they’d been thrown together seemed to forecast that rules were going to be abandoned. “Lester, Mom was always wailing that she wanted to die,” she blurted. “My whole childhood, I was gauging the level of danger I was in of losing my mother.” Her eyes filled with emotion, but she pushed onward. “She terrified us. And she accused Dad, insulted him, and he never stood up to her. About anything.” She wanted to keep going, wanted to say, “He never stood up for us,” but didn’t dare; her cheeks burned from the shock of her own allegations.
Lester appeared unphased by her outburst. “Now you’re not talking about your mother. You’re talking about some demon in her that took over and waged war.”
Gina realized now that he knew much more about what went on in their house than he’d first let on. “Yes,” she said matter-of-factly. “A doctor I once talked to called that demon ‘agitated depression with borderline personality disorder.’”
Lester grinned at Gina’s big, hairy words, and she felt as if she were shrinking in her chair. It was pathetic, wasn’t it, to be rehashing your deceased parents’ parenting to one of their best friends lying in the emergency room? But this was the conversation she’d been waiting all her life to have with her mother.
“Your mother should’ve seen a doctor, yup, but she wouldn’t,” Lester said. “And should your father have fought with her to? Be glad, my dear, that he did not. He wouldn’t have done anything that might’ve caused him to lose his family. If Eleanor had gone to a doctor, she’d have denied everything, refused help. You know that’s true. What good would a diagnosis have been?”
“It might have helped us—Cassie and me.”
“How so?”
“My doctor’s diagnosis of Mom was an explanation—the only one ever offered me—for why she raged and seemed to have no empathy about how it affected her kids. A diagnosis made it possible for me to tell myself she wasn’t a bad mother, just sick.”
Sick, Gina thought. Such an ugly word.
Lester was silent. Finally he said, “Did sick make it more possible for you to love her?”
Gina’s chest tightened in the chilled air. “I don’t know. No. Maybe. I don’t know.” It was the truth, and she felt ashamed.
Lester’s warm smile reassured her. “‘Sick’ doesn’t explain everything.” He thumped his chest and cleared his throat but remained quiet for a few moments. Finally he said, “Your mother . . . you know, she had dreams. There was . . . well, for starters, she’d wanted a career. She’d wanted to go to art school. She worked in that publishing house in Boston so she could make enough money to go. Then she met your dad up here, and . . .” He stopped. Then he said, “But you know all that. Maybe what you don’t realize is that your mother certainly loved your father. You’ll have to believe me about that. But then things . . . things happened fast for them.”
Lester stopped abruptly. Gina opened her mouth to say something that would urge him on, but already their conversation had been so rousing that she felt suddenly shy, like when you were on a date and good things were happening too quickly.
“Ginny,” Lester said, “get out of this refrigerator and go stretch your legs.”
Gina left the room disappointed; Lester had seemed on the verge of spilling something important. As nervous as she was about all she’d said, she felt somehow powerful, too.
Her mind shifted to matters beyond: Annie, Paul, Mitzi. As she got to the end of the corridor, her phone chimed; she realized there’d been no service in the exam room. Paul had tried to reach her twice. She checked with the receptionist to see if Annie had called the hospital—she had—then ducked into a small lounge area to phone Mitzi.
“Gina, thank God!” Mitzi’s pitch rose an octave. “The neighbors are like a mob . . . They don’t speak to us on the street! Except one older woman who said to me, ‘Why do you need all this? You don’t even have children.’” Gina couldn’t stifle a gasp. Mitzi beg
an to cry. “I don’t judge them; why do they judge me? I mean, they have no idea. Me and my mom, when I was a kid . . . we lived in studio apartments—eight of them in eighteen years! Jeffrey and I are going to make this house so beautiful. Why do they hate us so much? How can we ever live there after this?”
The rawness of Mitzi’s pain touched off a sudden protectiveness in Gina, and she wished she were there in person to put her mind at rest. “Mitzi,” she said calmly, “it’s a tough neighborhood you live in. A lot of powerful people without enough to do. Try not to take it personally. This happens all the time on projects. They don’t hate you; think of them as bored dogs patrolling the fences around their castles, barking at whatever comes near. You’ve excited them. They like excitement.”
“They seemed determined to shut down the project. Should we sell the house?” Mitzi sniffed.
“No,” Gina said, “of course not! Everything we’ve planned is legal, and we’ve done all our homework with respect to engineering and soils reports. After we meet with the neighbors, we’ll thoroughly address each of their complaints in a way you and Jeff are okay with. Then we’ll meet with them again. I’m completely confident that the mob will disperse. I know this seems unbelievable, but my experience has been that once you finish the project, your neighbors happily welcome you because then you’re one of them.”
“Really?” Mitzi said weakly. “It’s so hard to imagine.”
“I know, but I see it every time.”
Mitzi was quiet. Then she took a deep breath and said, “Ohmygod. Okay, so I just have to not let them get to me. Okay. Okay. Now for the good news: I’m pregnant!”
Gina filled with a joy that seemed to silence all the nerve-wracking noise around her. “Aw, Mitzi, that’s wonderful! I’m thrilled for you!”
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