by Susan Isaacs
But that didn’t explain Phyllis + Chicky = ? 4-ever, even though that ? endured less than two years. I could certainly understand a girl from my mother’s background falling for Chicky the Hunk, Chicky Bad Boy, and having a hot romance with him. I could even imagine someone like her falling so head over heels for his sweet sexuality that she’d run off with him for a few days. Even a few weeks. But longer? Marry him? Live in a rat-infested tenement? Get pregnant by him and actually have the baby?
My own sexual career had begun when I was fourteen. In all those years before I calmed down, the guys I hung with were definitely not all Harvard material—unless that category included guys who could hold up the bursar’s office at gunpoint. Certainly among those who actually were Harvard material—or Harvard students or Harvard faculty—there were some who were ill-mannered, misogynistic, or downright mean. But out of all these losers I’d fooled around with, probably 30 to 40 percent of the total, there was none with whom I would have plighted my troth, much less lived with rats.
I guess the pop-psych diagnosis for my mother would be self-hatred. By her slumming, she was punishing herself. That didn’t explain, however, why she was punishing her parents, too. And if she was so down on herself, how come she was able to break from me and Chicky and run off with—if the rumors Grandma Lil heard were right—a bodyguard? True, he might have been an utter delight, but he also could have been a dumb slab of beef packing a Smith & Wesson.
I could understand why she didn’t go back to her family, assuming they were not monsters. She was terrified that Chicky could convince a lawyer or a friendly fellow criminal that his was a bum rap and they should sec that justice was done—right, and here’s her address in Brooklyn. Or that one day, Lillian Lincoln would show up on her doorstep and hand me over, shitty diaper and all: I don’t want her and besides, she’s yours.
A glance at my watch. Almost eleven. I had to get back to the city, return the car, and show up at work to hand in my article, then hang around in case an editor had any questions. So if I was going to act, it had to be soon. Down the block, I saw a woman about my age or a couple of years older walking, or rather, being pulled by, a huge, hairy brown dog.
I put down my feet, pored over the atlas again, and had a conversation with no one on my cell phone. Dog and woman were coming closer. Okay, I thought, going up to the Hochbergs’ door wasn’t a great idea because doors can be slammed in faces. Police can be called. So what was the best way to approach my mother? Follow her? It might work, but what if she intended to spend the entire day reading Coriolanus or cleaning out her closet? What if she was agoraphobic and never went out?
And suppose she came backing out of her garage? Could I follow her? I knew detectives and investigatory reporters did that in movies: Make sure you stay four car-lengths behind. What if she was a terrific driver, taking turns at eighty miles an hour, while my car went out of control and crashed into a garden-supply center? Or what if bad driving was genetic and she led me on an eighty-mile journey out to the Hamptons at thirty miles an hour?
White woman near my age was schlepped by young brown dog past the car. She didn’t even see me. I had been surprisingly calm until then. I don’t know whether it was because I’d seemed invisible or because I knew all my thinking wasn’t getting me any place and the clock was ticking. Suddenly I became agitated. Within seconds, I went from agitation to fear. I only realized how frightened when I heard myself whimper.
I started the car and drove past my mother’s house again. Then, still too unhinged to be ashamed of myself for being such a loser, I drove on to the city.
Chapter Seventeen
I DIDN’T EVEN have to wait to get on the Long Island Expressway before being overcome with shame. Shame because I’d spent sixty-five dollars on a rental car, cut work, and accomplished nothing except learning Ira Hochberg liked golf. Shame because I, the make-an-outline, plan-ahead, neatness-counts kid, had driven to Shorehaven and gotten information, free coffee, and half a muffin from the editor-in-chief of the local newspaper, then hadn’t a clue about what to do next.
Back at In Depth, I made it a point to be seen, going to the library and making ostentatious notes, punching the soda machine with the heel of my hand, and other idiocies to establish in my colleagues’ minds the notion that I’d been around all day. Naturally, I also felt ashamed for doing this. Subterfuge was unnecessary because staff members were in and out of the office all the time. As long as your articles were up to standards and you didn’t miss deadlines, nobody gave a thought as to whether you were reading Federal Reserve stats on household debt service or going to a shoe sale at Saks. Still, I couldn’t get past the need to display what a splendid worker I was, just the way I had in elementary school, when I walked around with a backpack twice as heavy as it needed to be to impress my teachers with my willingness to cripple myself for knowledge.
The national editor, the guy who stood between me and Happy Bob, wanted a few changes in my piece, so I didn’t get out of the office that night until eight. It took me forever to walk home because I was so deep in unproductive thought about what I hadn’t done in terms of my mother and what I ought to do. I caught a reflection of myself—gray boot-cuts, blue shirt, black sweater, hysterical hair in need of cutting—in the window of a large drugstore. Clearly, I was staring at a display of Huggies diapers and Thermoscan ear thermometers, except I was clueless as to what had made me stop walking, how long I’d been standing there, and what I’d been thinking about.
It wasn’t until I was home, reheating the two slices of thin-crust pizza I’d picked up on the way, that I had my first productive thought of the day. Freddy Carrasco. The master of the Confronting a Long-Lost Parent game. Maybe I could learn something from him. Okay, our circumstances were not the same. His father was famous, my mother was not. His other parent had died, while Chicky was very much alive, albeit not a constant presence in my life. What I sensed in Freddy was that he’d tracked down—or stalked—Thom Bowles because he was looking for love. Admittedly, there was also money at the end of Freddy’s rainbow, but I didn’t think that had been his motivation.
For a few minutes, I mulled over trying to get more information about my mother from Chicky, but I knew him well enough to understand I’d gotten all I was going to get. The more I asked, the more willfully forgetful he would become.
I opened a Sam Adams and chugged down about a third of it while asking myself: What did I want from my mother? Love? Probably, though my head understood what my heart didn’t, that someone who had run away from me twenty-eight-plus years earlier wasn’t likely to want to hold me close and croon lullabies. Besides, she knew where I was. If she wanted to get into the lullaby business, all she had to do was call. But listen, my heart told my brain, she doesn’t know what to expect. Maybe she can only imagine you wanting to get even.
Freddy hadn’t confided in Thom Bowles’s handlers that he was looking for love. Bowles had every reason to think Freddy was a nut job or an extortionist. What had changed his mind—or at least his behavior? A call to his lawyer from Freddy’s lawyer, Mickey Maller? A warning from his advisers to love his son or lose the Latino vote? Or was I afflicted with the curse of journalists, uncontrollable cynicism? Wasn’t it possible that upon seeing this child born from his youthful love, Thom Bowles’s heart had melted?
Halfway through my first slice of pizza, I decided to track Freddy down. In a day so short on results and long on questions, maybe I could get some answers. But how could I elicit his help? Not by being vague. I could let him know we were in the same boat, tell him my story, and ask what he would do in my place. No. I’d already stepped over the ethical line by recommending a lawyer to Freddy; I still had to deal with people on the Bowles campaign staff throughout primary season and, in the unlikely event Thom Bowles became the Democratic nominee, beyond. I couldn’t be a confidante of his son.
Having finished off my pizza, I was debating between another beer or a sugar-free, fat-laden ice cream bar that had th
e pleasantly minty flavor of Elmer’s Glue. It occurred to me then that I could call Freddy, ostensibly to find out how things were going, and simply start asking questions about what he’d been thinking all the times he’d tried and failed to talk with his father. Maybe he’d say something that could help me.
I opted for the ice cream bar and called Freddy’s cell phone. I closed my eyes for a moment to marshal my resources to deal with the New Freddy, throwing off sparks of vim and cheer.
“Hello,” he said. Forget vim and cheer. He spoke slowly, heavily, sounding as if he could use an electroshock treatment.
“Hi, Freddy, Amy Lincoln. How are you doing with all the fried chicken and bougainvillea, or whatever they’re serving up in South Carolina?”
“I’m back in New York.”
He might as well have said good-bye. He showed not a hint of desire to talk. However, this was not an unheard-of situation for a journalist. “Was Thom on one of those in-out trips, just make a speech or whatever?”
The silence was so long I was able to finish half the ice cream bar. “Amy, anything I tell you ...”
“Totally off the record. You know that, Freddy.”
“I feel like the biggest asshole in the universe.”
“Well, you’re not. What’s going on?”
He did some of that audible breathing that depressed people do before speaking. Finally he said: “It’s like this. I met him at Teterboro. He has a private plane for the campaign. Anyway, he said something about he has to do some reading on the trip down but we’d have some time together once we got there. So I figure, that’s okay. I even brought along a book I’m reading. About ENIAC.” He paused. “It’s considered the first electronic computer.”
I said “Uh-huh” to let him know I was listening.
“Thom has his own office, room, whatever, on the plane. He went in there. His people kept going in and out. Moira especially, and one of his pollsters. And the guy who’s his administrative assistant in the Senate but who’s on a leave of absence for the campaign, Yancey Wilson. Do you know him?”
“Yeah.”
“He’s a little—I don’t know. Strange. He stares at you and kind of squints and doesn’t look away even if you look him right in the eye.”
“He does that with everyone,” I explained. “He’s trying to get people to think he has supernatural powers. The ability to read minds or see people naked. But for what it’s worth, he has a good reputation in the Senate. He’s too odd to be liked, but people on both sides of the aisle seem to trust him.” I walked to the sink to get a glass of water to dilute the taste of Elmer’s. I couldn’t figure why Freddy would have more than a nodding acquaintance with Yancey Wilson. “Did you have any dealings with Wilson?” I asked.
“Kind of.”
“Freddy, you sound less than happy. What’s going on?”
“It’s Thom. I mean, everybody except me was going to the back of the plane to talk to him. He was supposed to be doing some important reading, but he wasn’t alone for more than five minutes during the whole flight down.”
“Maybe he shouldn’t have used the word reading. Very often candidates do business on planes, catch up on phone calls. Even though Thom Bowles comes from a wealthy family and has made money on his own, he’s not bankrolling his own campaign. Fund-raising is a huge part of what these guys do.”
“Pretty soon after we landed, he said, ‘If you need anything, anything at all, speak to Yancey.’ I thought that was pretty nice, but the whole time we were down there, the only time I saw my father was during public appearances. Before audiences and any meeting ...” His voice trailed off and became a sigh.
“Any meeting in which there was someone who might be Latino?”
“Yes.”
“So where did Yancey Wilson fit into this?”
“I guess he was what they call my minder. Thom didn’t have his campaign bus down there, just a bunch of cars for the staff. So, a couple of times I asked Yancey if I could sit with Thom. You know, when there were twenty-minute, half-hour drives. And every time he’d make some excuse.”
At first, I couldn’t conceive of someone on Yancey Wilson’s level being assigned as a hand-holder. That was a job they’d give to some engaging, cold-blooded kid just out of college. Then I realized that the Bowles campaign viewed Freddy as both an asset and a potential liability. If for any reason he became disenchanted with his father, or with how he was being treated, Freddy had become enough of a public figure in his own right that when he railed against Thomas Bowles, people would listen. He might be a one-day wonder, but his mouthing off might be enough to make some voters have doubts about the candidate.
“Did you ever get to see your father alone?”
“The final ride of the day, after a talk at a junior college on the way to the airport. Thom said he was so sorry, blah blah blah, about not being able to spend any time with me. This is what pisses me off: My mother was a very smart woman. Thom’s a very smart man. Why doesn’t he give me credit for inherited intelligence? Why does lie think I’m so fucking dumb that I don’t realize that his treatment of me means one thing?”
“And what’s that, Freddy?”
“That he has no feelings for me. That I was a big problem, or at least could have been, so the best thing to do was to pretend to give me what he thought I wanted. Love.”
I heard a sniff and realized he was trying to keep from crying. “I’m so sorry,” I told him. “Look, there’s always the possibility that Thom is a guy who can’t walk and chew gum at the same time, that the mere fact of you is too much of a distraction during a presidential primary campaign. Maybe once this is all over, which I think it’s safe to predict will be sooner rather than later, he’ll be more himself.”
“The truth, Amy. Does being more himself mean that even though I’m an adult, he’ll consider me his son?”
“I don’t know. Obviously he knows you are in terms of paternity. But Freddy, if what you’re looking for is a family, a place to belong now that you don’t have your mother, I can’t say whether it will be with Jen and April and Brooke and Thom. I just don’t know.”
“Do you think he was just using me?”
“I’m a reporter, Freddy. I’m cynical by nature. So if you want a reassuring answer, I’m not your girl. On the other hand, having had a checkered childhood myself, I can only tell you I understand your need for family. You might not get it with the Bowles clan. Public people often have limited abilities to sustain private relationships. You’re a great guy and whether it’s with the girlfriend you have now or with someone else, you’re going to have a fine, deep relationship. You’re going to be part of a family. Trying to get love from a United States senator can be like trying to get blood from a stone. Even if something oozes out, it’s not real blood. Freddy, you’re a great guy. You deserve the real thing. Go for it.”
Since Preshie had spent most of Tatty’s childhood either drinking, recovering from hangovers, or getting dried out, much of Tatty’s upbringing had fallen to the household help. Even as a toddler, my guess was, Tatty could be imperious. In any case, nannies came and nannies went. The cook and the housekeeper, however, stayed put. They were the ones who taught Tatty her skills. Besides her business of creating cakes, Tatty grew up to be a homemaking genius. She could iron a pleated tuxedo shirt, unclog a shower drain, cook sauces from béarnaise to zabaglione, and, in minutes, whip up a round tablecloth with matching napkins on a sewing machine.
Since my intelligence was mostly linear and hers visual, in our friendship I was the designated reader/thinker and she was the aesthetician/shopper. At one point, shortly before John and I parted, I’d casually handed Tatty twenty dollars and mumbled something about needing a new shower curtain. If, in her near-daily shopping expeditions, she saw something she liked, she should buy it for me. She’d stared at the twenty-dollar bill with incredulity and annoyance. Impossible, she’d sniffed, but I knew she’d view it as a challenge.
The day following my conve
rsation with Freddy, she called me at work to announce she’d finally found a king-size sheet imprinted with flowers like the ones in those seventeenth-century Dutch still lifes. She said she’d be over between seven and eight to take measurements against my shower curtain liner.
“This is really pretty,” I told her. “I can’t believe a sheet like this could be on sale for $11.95!” The dark green, almost black, of the background emphasized the beautifully detailed flowers, making them appear illuminated from behind.
“It’s decent for a shower curtain, if one’s taste runs to florals. But seriously, Amy, can you believe someone would actually put this on a bed?”
“You know the answer to that.”
“Bed linen should always be white. No exceptions. You know that, but you don’t really care. That’s the pity of it. I’d rather spend a night walking the streets of a foreign city filled with purse snatchers than sleep in a hotel on peach-colored sheets. That happened once, in Venice, at the Cipriani, except there were no streets to walk. And get that stupid smile off your face, like Oh, she’s exaggerating for a change.” We pushed furniture aside. Then we laid the vinyl shower curtain liner over the sheet. Tatty knelt down and attached it with paper clips. “Pins leave hideous holes,” she said. “Would you please get down here and help me? Oh, before I forget: Don’t worry, you won’t have to deal with the curtain blowing around.”
“I’m not worrying.”
“You wouldn’t. When I sew up the hem on my machine, I’ll put in drapery weights so the curtain stays out of the tub.” We finished the paper-clip business and she started marking where the curtain holes would go to match up with the liner’s. “I want to get married again,” she said suddenly.