“A nasty spell. An ugly period, literally. She was talking about the weather.”
“Ugly spell. Brutto periodo. That’s nice. It has a nice sound.” It was comforting somehow. Only a spell, then bad weather passes.
They married. After the ceremony and the festive dinner with Ivan’s lingering Fulbright friends, they walked hand in hand through the dark warm streets. “I guess I’ll have to take you to meet the family now,” said Ivan.
“Well, I should hope so. Did you think you’d keep me hidden away, like a secret vice?” She hesitated and let go of his hand. “How much will they mind that I’m not Jewish?”
“Not a lot. And however much it is, they won’t show it to you. But believe me, they’ll probably feel nothing so much as relief when they see you.”
“Why do you say that? What did you bring home before?”
“No one. That’s the point.” He laughed. “They must think I’m not interested, like you did, or that I can’t do it. Or else they have awful visions.”
“Still, I’m afraid they’ll mind. They’ll think I’m, I don’t know, an alien. Or suspect, at least.”
“No,” he said sadly. “They’ve forgotten their own history. My grandparents wanted American children and they got them, with a vengeance. My mother and father were born in America. They became like the people around them. They’re the aliens.”
His quick pace slackened and his face was closed to her; he was withdrawn to some remote, hollow recess, a place within that her burrowing might never reach.
“And you, Ivan? Will you mind? You’ve never even mentioned it.”
“Caroline,” he said, in a tone that made her feel stupid for asking, “it’s not anything missing in you, so how could I mind? I only mind what’s missing in me.”
That was distantly chilling, beyond any help she could give. She took his arm and said, “Well, you got what you wanted, anyhow. We got married.” But the words sounded strained and foolish.
“Yes. Now that that’s taken care of, we can get on with our lives.”
After that remark she didn’t feel like speaking to him for hours.
IN WARM MID-SEPTEMBER SHE met Ivan’s parents, who lived in a modest suburban tract house in White Plains. Ivan had not grown up there but in lower Manhattan; he didn’t care for the new house, he told her on the way up. Not that he wasn’t glad his parents could finally afford it, but it had no history for him. No Depression had taken place there, no street fights, no rationing lines during the war. And he did seem a stranger as he shut the screen door behind him, sent his trained eye over the living room furnished in bland colors and predictable lines, and edged slowly into the low-ceilinged space. His parents were built the way he was, large and straight. His father was totally bald and benign, with a gruff voice and an overeager manner, as if he wished personally to ensure the welfare of anyone under his roof. Ivan looked more like his mother, who was dark, with strong features, and whose thick glasses hid pensive eyes. After the embraces and exclamations, to which she gave herself with zeal, Ivan’s mother hovered nervously like a shy gray gull, then fled to the kitchen. Caroline followed to help serve the dinner. Ivan’s mother turned from the stove to clasp her hands warmly. “We’re glad to have you in our family.” Her voice held an unmistakable note of relief.
“Thank you,” said Caroline. Perhaps she was supposed to say she was glad to be in their family, but she was not ready yet to go that far.
“Ivan tells us you have no family of your own,” she went on, spooning yellow rice into a bowl.
“A couple of aunts and uncles, that’s all. I hardly know my cousins—they’re all in Chicago.”
“Well, I hope you’ll consider us your family, Caroline. I really mean that.”
“Thank you.”
“Ivan has always had good taste. He had excellent taste in everything he picked out—clothes, pictures, everything. I remember, even as a boy he would rather do without than take something shoddy.” His mother smiled. “I see his taste hasn’t failed him.”
“That’s very kind of you. Thank you.”
“Well, I don’t want to embarrass you, dear. Now why don’t you take this rice into the dining room and then come back and I’ll let you carry in the vegetables.”
She set the rice bowl on the table, which had a centerpiece of white chrysanthemums in their honor, and wondered how it would feel had she been raised in this family. Would she need to re-create herself in isolation, like Ivan?
“The only one missing from this gathering is Vic,” said Ivan’s father as he carved the roast. He carved with skill, and the roast was perfectly done, pink in the center and brown at the edges. “You’ll meet Vic when he comes in for Christmas. Or maybe he’ll come for Thanksgiving. We don’t know yet.”
“Oh, yes, I’ve heard a lot about him.” This was not exactly true. She had heard of his existence, that he was five years younger than Ivan, and that he was going to law school in California.
“He wanted to come in for this occasion,” Ivan’s mother said, “but the term just started and they make them work so hard.” She frowned with pity. “He felt terrible that he couldn’t make it. He’s going to call later on. It’s three hours earlier there, you know. I told him to wait until about nine o’clock, our time. He says he spends all his spare time studying.” She sighed. “I guess you can’t get anywhere in this world without hard work.”
“Yes, he’s quite an individual,” Ivan’s father said. He gave his wife the first slice of roast beef and reached for Caroline’s plate. “Here you go, Caroline. No danger of starvation tonight. Yes, both of our sons are real individuals. Summa cum laude at City College, both of them. And now one going to a fine law school, the other a Fulbright scholar.” He reached over and patted Ivan on the back. “We’re very proud.”
“Come on, Dad. Cut it out.”
“Why, what’s wrong with a man being proud of his family?” He smiled broadly at Caroline. “I’ve been running a hardware business all my life, but I wanted to see them do something better. Just wait, both of you, till you have a family of your own. Then you’ll know what I’m talking about.”
“Now tell us all about your impressions of Italy,” Ivan’s mother said, raising her fork delicately. “How did you happen to meet each other?”
When the phone rang at five after nine, Ivan leaped up and dashed to the kitchen to get it. “Hey, Victor, how’s it going? Hey, yeah!” he shouted, startling Caroline with his heartiness but not his parents, who beamed in rapt pleasure. “Yes, I’m back all right…Yes, I finally did it…Thanks…Oh, great…Terrific.” He laughed insinuatingly. The three of them sat listening to Ivan’s voice, alien and cheery, booming through the kitchen door. Caroline wanted to start a conversation but couldn’t think of a subject. Any subject would be an interruption.
“I’ll have to show you my slides. Say, I hear you’re really doing great out there. How do you like it?…I didn’t think you had it in you…No no, only kidding. Listen, do you want to speak to the folks?”
They took turns talking to Vic. Both his mother and his father told him that Ivan’s wife was a very lovely girl. “Come in for Thanksgiving and see for yourself,” his father said. “Your turn now, Caroline.” He waved the receiver at her. “Come on, don’t be shy. It’s all in the family now.”
“Hello?” she said tentatively.
“Well hello there!” It was a low voice remarkably like Ivan’s, but lacking his subtlety. The others surrounded her, watching. “I’m sure you feel kind of awkward,” the voice went on, “but I just want to tell you I’m glad to have you in the family, and I’m looking forward to meeting you. Rumor has it that you’re really terrific.”
“Well, thank you very much. I’ve heard good things about you too.”
“I hope my big brother’s treating you all right so far?”
“So far, yes.” She laughed. “Well, I think…I think Ivan wants to talk to you again. It’s been good talking to you.”
“So�
��” Ivan’s father said as they returned to the living room, with brandy. “Where are you kids thinking of settling down? Or haven’t you thought about it yet?”
“I hope I never settle down,” said Ivan. “That isn’t one of my goals in life.”
“You know what your father means, Ivan,” said his mother. “You’ve got to live somewhere. And you must have given some thought to finding a job? It’s only natural that we should want to know.”
“I thought I might become a forest ranger.”
He was sober and impenetrable, as at the first moment they met. Caroline felt sorry for his parents. “We thought we’d look for an apartment in Boston. I come from around there,” she explained. “I’m going back to graduate school to finish my degree, and I might have a job as a teaching assistant at the same time. Ivan…isn’t quite sure yet what he’ll do. But there are a lot of opportunities in his field up there. I’m sure it won’t be difficult.”
Ivan sat back with his arms folded, studying her.
“Thank you, Caroline,” his mother said pointedly. “That sounds reasonable. We were just interested. After all.”
“Congratulations. You’ve become a wife,” said Ivan.
Soon it was time to go.
“But don’t you kids want to stay overnight? I made up the bed in the guest room. Or if that isn’t big enough for you, this couch right here opens into a double bed.”
“Mom, I told you we were staying in the city.”
“Yes, but I thought if you stayed late you might want to…”
“We can still catch the last train back.”
“You’re sure, now? Don’t worry, we’ll let you sleep as late as you want in the morning.”
“Thanks, but it’s all arranged. Caroline never stayed in a hotel in New York. We thought it would be…kind of a treat.”
“Oh, of course. I see. Well, remember, you can stay here anytime till you get settled. A hotel can run into money.”
“Thanks anyway, Mom.” He kissed his mother good-bye.
Ivan’s father drove them to the station. They were just in time. In the train Caroline took off her shoes, leaned her head back and sighed.
“I guess they can be pretty hard to take,” he said.
“Not at all. I liked them. They were awfully nice to me. I’m just not used to it. Ivan, do you think we’ll ever get back to Rome?”
“Oh, sometime, I guess. Maybe in our wheelchairs.”
She laughed. “I can just see that. I’ll wheel you around St. Peter’s.”
“But who will wheel you?”
“I will be self-propelled.”
He stroked her hair. “You look tired. Well, we won’t be seeing them very often.”
“What a way to talk about your own parents. My parents wouldn’t have been so friendly to a total stranger. You don’t appreciate them. What have you got against them?”
“Nothing, really. Only that they make me feel about twelve years old.” He put his hand on her leg.
“Well, if that’s how you behave…”
“Don’t. I have a mother already.” He leaned into the aisle and peered through the car, which was empty except for two solitary men up front. He moved his hand up under her skirt.
“Ivan! Here?”
“Shh.”
They did what Caroline told Ivan’s parents they would do. Their apartment was in an old section of Boston known for its appeal to young couples of modest incomes and enthusiasms for the finer things. The building stood on a broad street shrouded by maples and lined with brownstones whose complex filigrees were blurring with age. To Caroline nothing was more sturdily comforting than their wide street and its forthright, settling houses, but Ivan, expert in such matters, liked to remind her that it was built on landfill. Where they walked each day was not as solid as it felt; it had once been shifting river banks.
Back in the doctoral program she switched from statistics to geometric topology. In topology you pushed shapes around so that spaces within and without transformed into new spaces: a protean vocation. You could smooth out bumps and knot up curves and play with dimensions like a god, teasing and testing how far a configuration might be deformed yet still keep its fundamental nature and properties intact. Three mornings a week she taught introductory calculus to freshmen. Ivan got a job doing research in architectural history for the Institute for Studies in the Humanities, a nonprofit organization of vague ameliorative purpose and connections to the nearby universities. Besides that, he was working on a book about the relation of Rome’s architecture to its history. When they unpacked, Caroline found he had piles of notes on his meanderings and readings, even several chapters already outlined.
“I thought you loafed the whole time.”
“I never said that.” At home, among his overflowing cartons, his books by visionaries like Lewis Mumford and Buckminster Fuller, Ivan seemed distinctly exotic. He wore dungarees and blue work shirts around the house like the young husbands in apartments above and below, but his hair was long and his expression lacked their frank, or blank, simplicity. So she did marry someone exotic after all. She smiled to herself. When her mother had worried over her lack of interest in the upstanding boys in town, she used to threaten to marry an African, or an Arab.
“When did you do all this?” She pointed to the ragged notebooks. “Before you met me, I suppose.”
“Most of it. We didn’t meet till June, remember? But I did some after too. Nights.”
“Certainly not toward the end?”
“No, I guess not.”
“I must have interfered with your project.”
“It doesn’t matter. You were an interesting project too.”
It pleased her to find he was a serious worker, like a surprise icing on a cake, but it hardly mattered. For she had accepted him, serious or idle; was not marriage the unconditional acceptance?
As Ivan had wished, they shared the pots and pans and the food in them, and he no longer had to carry his hairbrush around late at night. They shopped and cooked together, and every few weeks spent a Saturday afternoon cleaning up the apartment’s accumulated mess while Caroline’s records spun for hours on the phonograph. Afterwards, so as not to dirty their pristine kitchen, they would bring in pizza or Chinese food, then make love in slow, passive exhaustion on clean sheets and allow a new mess to begin accumulating.
They made friends with neighbors, and with people from the math department and from Ivan’s Institute, along with their husbands and wives. Male and female created he them, and male and female the serious young hordes set forth in tandem, as if every movie or party or picnic were as charged with perilous mission as Noah’s journey in the Ark. The era of togetherness blazed in its fading years with the luminosity of decadence. Caroline and Ivan were preeminent among couples striving to create a dyad of unshakable firmness, with a near-perfect meshing of parts. They did not even need to try too hard. As discordant as their courtship had been, so harmonious was their marriage. They had taken the vows.
“You two are disgusting,” one woman said. “You even talk to each other at parties.” They chalked it up to envy.
She loved the cold winters. She wanted Ivan to skate with her on the pond in the Public Garden, after work, in the bluish dusk of January, but he found excuses. Not long ago she had been ready to face two months alone in Italy; now she found she could not skate alone less than half a mile from home.
“Come on, please. It would be so nice. You can leave your book for a while.”
“I just don’t feel like it today.”
“Don’t you remember, when you were a kid, how great it felt—you get all warm, and the stars come out? We used to have a pond in town. We went after school and stayed till suppertime. We skated so long that walking felt funny after.”
“There aren’t a lot of ponds around Fourteenth Street.”
They were getting dressed for work. Ivan was scrutinizing his ties. He hated to wear a tie but owned dozens: he liked them as abstract designs.
She came over and reached her arms around his neck. “Can I ask you a personal question?”
He grunted.
“Do you know how to skate?”
He pulled her close to him. She could feel his head shaking from side to side.
“Did you ever skate?”
He nodded.
“Aha, you fell, right?”
“It’s a ridiculous means of locomotion.”
“Listen, and look at me. Meet me tonight, around six, when there’s hardly anyone left, and I will teach you how to skate.”
Shivering in the dark, she sat down on a bench to wait. The only others on the pond were two small girls of about eight, with an older girl in charge. Good; little girls would not shame him. He was habitually late, she was discovering. It was a mode of protest, like a nervous tic. When he finally arrived he put on the skates in silence and leaned on her like a cripple. She led him from the snow-covered ground to the ice feeling like a dedicated nurse in the physical therapy room of a hospital. With her arm around his waist his body sagged into its own gravity. They stood still for a moment in the crisp darkness with the trees looming, strange bulbous shapes. In the anonymous dark it could be any winter: he could be eighty, not thirty, and she seventy-five. He was a heavy, ancient shell of a man, but her burden, and she would be loyal to the end, holding him until he made the trip into darkness on his own. It was not a vision of horror, only of bleakness, and doubly vivid because so entwined were their imaginations that she suspected Ivan was seeing the same thing. A folie à deux, the most pernicious kind.
He nudged her. “Well, let’s get moving,” he said gruffly.
“Okay! First just try to walk. Pick your feet up.”
After a number of turns on her arm he was ready to try it alone. And after a few tentative turns by himself he began to glide and to skim a bit. His body lost its hunched tension as he glided to and fro like some young night bird practicing easy swoops. He crashed into Caroline in order to stop—he didn’t know yet how to stop himself. Every time she saw him veering proudly in her direction she steeled her muscles to bear the weight thudding into her. Ivan found this crashing and her patient stiffness tremendously funny, and clowning in an antic way, crashed far more often than necessary. He was delighted with himself, and planning on figure eights for next time. Hallelujah, he could skate, she thought as she watched him disappear round the bend of the center island. He would be a good skater, and he would skate alone. He was out of sight, skating somewhere off and on his own, and she felt a profound, guilty relief.
Rough Strife Page 7