“Oh, really? And if you don’t love me, what does that make you?”
“That’s…not the same.”
“Oh, another difference? Well, it’s my birthday this time and I want you–”
“Call your whore, Angelo. I told you nev–”
“Then I will! I will, Lydia, with pleasure. Sheer fucking pleasure. Especially knowing that you don’t want me to and that you hate the idea of it, even though you don’t want me or love me. Especially knowing that you know she’s beautiful and that she’s younger than you–yes she is–and that she has the decency, whore or not, to say my name when I’m fucking her, unlike you, and to kiss me when I’m fucking her, unlike you, and to hit the fucking ball when I’m fucking her, unlike–”
Crraack!
Chapter 30
Taken by Force
Anatomy of a slap, by Venus Angelo, Vice President of Overseas Operations, Soloman-Schmitt, Incorporated. You hear it first. And it sounds like a castanet. Then you feel it. And it stings.
She was a weaker woman than she ought to be, Venus thought, feeling her eyes tearing up, the lump in her throat, the stinging cheek, but she was determined not to cry. She had not been slapped since she was a little girl. Like then, she knew immediately that she had earned it. A bad temper, a string of insults, speaking the truth in the vicious kind of way that nobody really likes. Taunting.
Lydia had never slapped anyone before, though there were numerous situations in which she might have and one very near miss with Rio Joe. It was her preference, rather, to throw things, which she might have done here had she been holding anything in her hand.
Years from now, when Venus Angelo’s psychotherapist asks her the question, “How old were you when you lost your innocence?” she will answer, “Three weeks shy of my thirtieth birthday,” but she will decline to elaborate beyond that. In the present, however, she has learned something valuable. That honor is not just about being true to oneself. That it often involves being true to another.
So the transition from girlhood to womanhood was, for Venus, a painful impact, marked by the sound of a castanet. It was like a death in a way, an injury and then pictures flashing before her eyes. Not ones of her own life, to be sure, because she wasn’t dying even if she wished she was, but scenes from the movies instead, images of distressed damsels and sullied dames, their lovely hands cutting through the air, some bare, some bejeweled, some gloved, all slapping. She saw a multitude of slappers, glorious in their feminine revenge, retrieving their dignity with a flick of the wrist. She saw the slapped with their handsome faces, their disheveled hair, eyes blinking with surprise, some in pain, some with anger. She had always doubted those scenes. Why would a woman slap a man?
Venus pushed her hair back, blinked the tears away. Lydia’s expression was a perfect marriage of shock and grief. She stood transfixed in front of her, as beautiful as any of them, holding the offending hand like an emptied revolver.
She would come to her senses soon, Venus knew from the movies, and slip by her, perhaps exiting through an unguarded door. How did the scene play out, she quickly tested herself. A gallery of cads and rogues paraded in her mind, every one of them drawing the same conclusion, the one she would have to draw, too, having nothing else to draw upon.
She seized the woman and kissed her.
And then, since there was no resistance to it, she kissed her again.
Chapter 31
Compelled
A job in sales with no salary, no benefits. Life can be hard with only a twenty percent commission. He would have to hustle, Joseph Rios could see, to get back the things he was accustomed to having.
Selling ad space in skin magazines was nothing to write home about and he wouldn’t, of course, but there were some fine-looking women at PM Entertainments. Better prospects than in finance, he told himself, soured on that whole industry.
“Celia,” he had crooned to the fifth-floor secretary, minutes before his interview. “Oh, wow. That’s my mother’s name,” he lied. She blushed just like a woman he used to know.
Rio Joe had them all lined up–or he would, once he had shed that pale skin and his two-hundred-dollar suit, that gaunt jailbird aura he still wore six months out of prison. He was going to dye those grays, too. Gray hair on a young man was a romantic liability, he felt. He needed to broaden his possibilities.
Probation over, he was out of the halfway house, living in a humble two room walk-up on the waterfront. That wouldn’t be for long he promised the gray man in the mirror, mister lean and mean. It was time for some tanning booths and a workout. And a trip down to the Caymans for a small advance.
_____
“Who’s that, Mommy? She’s pretty.”
The child had a good eye. “Well…I don’t know. She is though, isn’t she?”
In Stone Magazine featured one stunning Venus Angelo on the cover this week. No veils, fully clad, small blurb on the inside saying only that she worked for Soloman-Schmitt, the new vice president of something or other. Sharon wanted to know more about the young woman.
So did Helen. “You don’t know her?” she asked incredulously. Her mother knew everyone, whether or not she cared for them.
“I don’t know her, yet, Helen. Not yet.”
_____
“Because a martini is not a comfort food.”
Delilah disagreed, but she nodded understandingly. She and Helaine were having lunch and the maitre de was trying not to eavesdrop.
“Am I right, Harry?” Helaine inquired with a wink.
“Certainly,” he replied. “Doesn’t everyone know that oysters are more comforting than olives?”
“Indeed! No oysters either, Del–Harry, I expect you to back me up on that.”
“I wasn’t aware,” Delilah admitted, when Harry had returned to the bar.
“Well, it’s not a big problem. It’s just a developing problem, maybe. Or only a potential one. She hates her job, I’m sure you know.”
“She has. Even before she met you. We’ll be good, Helaine. Trust us.”
“I do, Del. I do. You know, she thinks…well she…has issues about my leaving.”
“She’s a child, Helaine. Always will be.”
“Mmmm.”
_____
“Mr. Jones, a pleasure to be talking to you after so long. Who is Venus Angelo?”
“Ms. Chambers. You working rags again? We can arrange–”
“No, no, I’m looking for Venus Angelo. How can I have her for dinner, please?”
“Ah, Venus Angelo. Very tasty. Better take a number.”
“Who is she, Sebastion? You know her?”
“Ummm…sort of.”
“Oh, you shit. What’s she like?”
“Baby, she’s a natural. Not all mine, though. Little tricky there, sometimes.”
“She’s married, you mean? I don’t have a problem with that.”
It was coming back to him. Kristenson. Chambers. Beaumont. He had said too much. “No, not married. Just…hot for someone else. I can’t help you, Sharon. She wouldn’t like me to.”
“Then where can I find her?”
“Can’t. She’s around, though. You could run into her if you knew where to look.”
“Sebastion, you owe me.”
“Do I?”
“Probably.”
_____
Flowers for Venus Angelo filled the entire elevator. Lydia let the doors close without entering. She knew where they were going. They had been pouring in all week.
Paula had asked JP Beaumont to speak to Venus about the cover photo, to impress upon the woman how unimpressed she was with it and to inform her that a ragazine was not the appropriate place to announce an executive’s promotion. Lydia had agreed to do it with no sincere ambition for the project, more with the aim of heading Paula off and giving the vice president some breathing room than anything else. But she had yet to speak to her.
Venus was out of bounds for Lydia. A smoking gun.
“You spoke
to her?”
“I…yes. She’s sorry. It won’t happen again.”
“It doesn’t have to, does it?”
“Paula, she gave her mea culpa. What more do you want? She can’t stop circulation.” She felt useless today. “I feel useless today. I’m going home.”
“You’re depressed. Stay here.”
Lydia turned and faced Paula. “How do you know?”
“I can see it. You’ve worn black for days. When does she leave?”
“Saturday.”
“Oh.” Paula took her glasses off and threw her head back. “Ms. Beaumont, I must say, you act as if she’s leaving you. Is she leaving you?”
“No, I think…not.”
“Well, what do you think she’s doing?”
“I think she’s bored with me. I think she’s flying away because she’s bored.”
“Lydia, that’s…that’s absurd. Are you having problems at home?”
“Problems? In the bedroom, that means?”
“No, in the kitchen. Yes or no?”
“Paula, of course not.”
“Then why would she be bored with you? How could anybody be bored with you, anyway? You’re so…so bizarre.”
“A stockbroker bizarre?”
“You’re hardly just a stockbroker, Ms. Beaumont. To anyone.” Paula went to the bar. She was curious what role Venus played in all this confusion. “Get you anything?” she asked, filling two glasses with ice and rattling them to temptation.
“Scotch, no water.”
“Scotch it is.”
Lydia watched her solemnly. Helaine would taste the liquor, she suddenly worried. Had she really worn black for days?
“Scotch on the rocks,” Paula said. “Bottoms up.”
“Cheers.”
“You slept together, the three of you?”
First drink all week. “Paula…that’s private.” It felt good.
“Jumped out of your birthday cake?”
That reminded her. It was Venus’ birthday today. “Quite a surprise.”
“I see. And how did you feel about it?”
“What? Now you’re my shrink?”
Paula chuckled. “If you want.”
“Out of my league, embarrassed, awkward–shall I continue, Dr. Treadwell?”
“You don’t have to. I get the picture. Top it off?”
Lydia thought about it. “Just a splash. Helaine won’t approve.”
“Aw, she won’t know. Use some mouthwash before you go.” She filled the glass. “So, tell me how that goes. Will she mind if you call on Venus while she’s away?”
“I am not going to call on anyone while she’s away. This is not a splash, Paula.”
“Work with me here–because you don’t want to, or because she’ll mind?”
Lydia contemplated the cubes of ice slowly disappearing in her glass. “Yes.”
_____
PM Entertainments was scrambling. Venus Angelo had crashed their website for three days in a row and Sebastion was thrilled with himself. “Get it back up, get it up!” She had amassed enough e-mail solicitations to keep her in dinners and lunches till her forty-fifth birthday.
There were other offers, too, but Sebastion dismissed those. People are compelled to be so bold online.
“Who?”
“Sharon Chambers…the model?”
“Model what? Yeah, I heard of her.”
“She’s been very persistent, Venus. She sent you gladiolas, a bracelet. Must have known it was your birthday.”
“Bracelet, c’mon–diamond?”
“Diamonds.”
“Di–and that doesn’t bother you, Mr. Jones?”
(Why should it?) “Why should it, Ms. Angelo?”
(Silence.)
“What should I tell her? She wants your number.”
“Tell her I’m very flattered, but I’m seeing some–I’m in love with someone.”
“Is that true, Venus?”
“Yeah…it’s true.”
“Well, I’m honored then.”
“It’s not you, Sebastion.”
“I know.”
Chapter 32
Keeping the Faith
Helaine zipped the last bag, tagged it and placed it beside the others in the penthouse parlor. It’s times like these a woman has to ask herself does she really know what she’s doing or has she gone out of her mind?
She caught a glimpse of herself in the looking glass. “What am I doing?” she wailed to the woman in it. There was no answer. She held herself and counted the suitcases one more time. Lucky seven.
She was aware of Lydia’s eleventh-hour intervention in Venus Angelo’s firing, that she had saved the girl’s career by threatening to resign. Delilah had divulged this information to her over lunch. She hadn’t batted an eye when she heard it, but Helaine had been wondering how it happened that she had lost a full-time executive director before she ever got one.
So now she knew and wasn’t sure what to make of it.
Seven bags for Saturday. She stared at the tired woman in the mirror, reached behind her head and pulled the hairpin out. A blond wave cascaded to her shoulders. She squinted as she tugged at the strands. There were sparkles of silver highlights in it, of a slightly different texture than the rest. Sort of kinky.
She adored Venus, but she did not trust her with her wife. She trusted her wife, because Lydia Beaumont was guileless.
That was good and that was bad, Helaine acknowledged, lifting the hair from her shoulders and holding it there, sizing up her mirror self this afternoon as she waited for Lydia to return, bracing herself psychologically, in the event that she came in high on martinis again. Good cleavage, she complimented the blond, and the woman smiled coyly in return.
If she was drinking, their encounter this evening would be wild. Helaine bent over and started to remove a stocking, stopped herself and rolled it up again. Let ’em rip, she decided, pinning it with the garter. That’s what they’re there for.
Oh, I must be out of my mind to do this, she thought, sitting down on suitcase number three and resting her back against the wall. Must be. She missed her wife already and she was not even gone.
The castle was particularly quiet today, the curtains partially drawn in a halfhearted attempt to divert the sun which poured generously this afternoon into the sun-room. She was rarely home in the afternoon except for the weekends and even then she was hardly ever alone, at least not for long. She would be alone for five months now, only a private secretary and some aides to socialize with, sporadic lovemaking whenever Lydia could break away from work. If she would.
Helaine was anxious for guileless Lydia. She had made no bones about not wanting her to go. She had expressed her concerns eloquently. “I love you. I need to have you every night.”
She needed her every night, too. Helaine checked her tote for the cell phone Lydia had recently purchased for the trip. She hated these obnoxious things, things that beeped or whistled or played tunes, always beeping or whistling or blaring some ridiculous ditty, in the theaters or the galleries, the restaurants, her lectures. She felt the side pocket. There it was, in the exact same place as the last time she had searched for it. It would be her lifeline now, the only way they could have each other every night.
Munich, Melbourne, Madrid…the time zones were overwhelming and, in truth, Helaine didn’t know for certain how they could arrange even this much, simply talking on the telephone. Carlos was good, but how could he manage it for her, make the sun set half a world away at the same hour Lydia’s was going down, the hour she would go to bed and need to talk to her?
She massaged her cheeks and forehead and yawned involuntarily. Light had flooded into the living room despite the curtains. Sunbeams and shadows confounded the patterns of the parquet floor and oriental rug, bedazzled the vase of yellow roses on the end table next to the old couch.
That couch and a few sticks of furniture were all that Helaine had found here when she first moved in with Lydia. And th
at drawing over there on the wall in the adjoining sun-room, the study of Manet’s Olympia, whose features, in a young student’s more modern interpretation, had been subtly altered, an alteration influenced by the standards for beauty of that time, circa 1950. Helaine loved that drawing, Manet’s nude goddess, who in this rendering bore more of a resemblance to Lydia than to the painting itself, or even, she was willing to bet, to the courtesan who had originally posed for it. She smiled a melancholy smile thinking of the gossip it had generated over the years. It was a resemblance that rarely went unnoticed by their guests, which had made the drawing quite a sensational conversation piece.
A hallway led from the living room to four separate rooms: the dining room with that dreadful wet bar, the spacious master bedroom with private bath, her home office and library and across from it, Lydia’s, which was never used for anything now but throwing weights around.
Helaine couldn’t imagine the place looking different than this and could never quite visualize it the way Lydia said it had looked before she renovated. What would it be without the beautiful wooden floors and golden oak trim, the wainscoting? How sterile and–dare she say it?–corporate it must have been. How gray.
She had changed it in hopes of “snagging a goddess” she had seen in Frank’s Place, Lydia claimed in her inimitable way. Even the queen-sized bed that had welcomed Helaine their first night had “never been used.” Helaine believed her, not just because the mattress was brand-new, but because of her candor. The woman simply oozed integrity. She could taste it in her sweat.
Which is why she no longer pressed her about Venus. Because Helaine understood it all now without asking and couldn’t bring herself to make Lydia say it. That Mr. Right would have been Venus Angelo if there had never been a Helaine Kristenson. That it would have been Venus because Lydia respected her, trusted her, relied on her, and found her sexually attractive. And because the way Venus loved her was legitimate to Lydia. It was unabashed adoration, the way she liked it to be, the way she already had it, unfortunately for Venus.
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