Vanessa, distracted, still looking at Hilary, said loudly, “Her name is Miss Teacher.”
Hilary smiled unkindly and put her hand over her mouth.
Susan shook her head involuntarily. “Not Miss Teacher,” she said gently. “What is her name? Miss Wolf?”
Vanessa realized her mistake but refused to retreat. “Not Miss Wolf,” she said, shaking her head slowly, “Miss Teacher.”
“And do you like her?” Matthew asked. “Is Miss Teacher a good teacher?”
Vanessa nodded grandly.
“Tell Matthew”—Hilary’s eyes flicked up at her at the word—“what you asked your teacher. About her name,” she prompted. Vanessa stared at her mother, and Susan said again, “About her name. Miss Wolf.”
Suddenly Vanessa smiled radiantly, remembering. “I said, ‘Miss Wolf, Miss Wolf, if you’re a wolf, then where’s your bushy tail?’”
Matthew laughed. “And what did she say back?” Matthew asked.
“She said, ‘I keep it tucked inside my underpants,’” Vanessa said, triumphant. She folded her lips into a proud smile, and looked around the table, beaming.
Matthew and Susan laughed irrepressibly, but Hilary looked away, her eyebrows lifted, aggrieved, elaborately unconcerned. She frowned suddenly and scratched her neck. She turned to Matthew, who was still laughing.
“Mom is taking me to the movies tonight,” she said.
Matthew’s face drained of mirth. He looked at her, his expression entirely, deliberately, neutral, as though he were waiting politely for her to finish the sentence. Hilary hesitated. Then when she saw he was not going to answer, she shook her head briefly, as though brushing something away.
“She’s going to take me to a movie about skaters,” Hilary said. Her voice was now loud, boastful. “And then out to dinner after.”
“Skaters,” said Susan encouragingly. “That’s nice.”
Hilary did not answer.
“Could I go?” Vanessa asked, bold, hopeful.
For a moment, no one answered.
“You said Hilary was my friend,” Vanessa reminded her mother.
Still no one spoke, and Vanessa looked from face to face around the table, trying to learn these new rules.
The Nightmare
When Lewis and I left the restaurant it was raining lightly, a mild, benevolent patter that fluttered gently on our heads. The evening air was soft. A tingling mist rose up from the damp pavement, and the cars drove past slowly on West Eighty-second Street. My raincoat, which was shiny gray, light and floaty, rustled against Lewis’s, which was oatmeal-colored, thick. Lewis is only slightly taller than me, and when we walk side by side it feels as though we’re twins.
Out on the sidewalk I turned right, toward Broadway, where we would find a cab. Unexpectedly, Lewis put his hands on my shoulders and swiveled me firmly around so that I was walking in the other direction.
“What?” I asked.
“Surprise,” said Lewis. “We’re going to my place.”
We were walking in front of a big grimy Italianate building, vaguely theological. Its entrance was halfway down the block. I waited until we had reached this, until we were under a hissing lamp, before I answered Lewis, as though I needed illumination before I could speak.
I had never been inside Lewis’s house. Right now he’s living with his daughter, Samantha, who is eight. I live with my son, Nicholas, who is sixteen. Nicholas is away at boarding school, so in the evenings, to be alone together, Lewis and I have always gone to my apartment, instead of to Lewis’s brownstone. My apartment is new to me; I moved there after my divorce, two years ago. Its rooms are neutral; they carry no reproach. My husband and I never sat in that kitchen, reading the Sunday paper together, we never had Thanksgiving dinner in that dining room, we never made love in that bedroom. My apartment has held only me, and Nicholas, when he’s there, and Lewis, when Nicholas isn’t.
But Lewis still lives in the house he and Patricia shared. Since Patricia moved out, a year ago, Lewis has changed nothing.
“Didn’t you even put up new curtains?” I asked.
“Why?” Lewis answered, puzzled. “The curtains are fine. Anyway, it’s Samantha’s house, too. She doesn’t want anything changed.”
I said nothing. I don’t talk to Lewis about Patricia, because I loathe the idea of her. Everything about her seems absurd and contemptible, starting with her name. Those mincing, prissy syllables, full of lisps and ruffles: Paah-trish-ah! And she’s a decorator; she spends her days looking for heavy gold braid and great damasks. The reason Samantha is living with Lewis right now is that Pah-trish-ah is doing someone’s house in Jamaica.
Lewis doesn’t talk much about her either, but one time I asked what happened between them. We were lying in bed, and when I brought it up, his face went closed. Lewis’s face is lined and pleasant; he has small blue eyes, very kind, and very high arched eyebrows, as though he’s always listening.
“Well,” he said, not looking at me, “it was her idea.”
“But why?” I asked.
He shrugged his shoulders. “It’s not entirely clear to me.”
“She must have said something,” I said.
“She said it’s not working out,” Lewis said.
“And was it?” I asked.
“I thought it was,” Lewis said. “It wasn’t perfect, but I thought that was normal, that was the way marriage was. How do you know if your marriage is unacceptable or not? You don’t know what anyone else’s marriage is really like, when they’re alone. I thought we were pretty normal. Then one time we were spending the weekend with some friends in East Hampton. I woke up on Saturday morning and she was lying next to me, staring up at the ceiling. Without looking at me she said she wanted a divorce.”
“And that was it?”
“We spent the rest of the weekend as though nothing had happened. She didn’t mention it again, and I thought maybe she’d changed her mind. She seemed happy enough. Then when we got back on Sunday night, she packed up with Samantha and they moved in with her sister.”
“That was all she said?”
“She said she wasn’t happy.”
“Were you?” I asked.
“I thought I was,” Lewis said. “Seven years.” He looked at me. “She said I was a cold person.”
“Cold?” I repeated. I stroked his bare shoulder and he turned and put his arms around me. If there’s one thing Lewis isn’t, it’s cold, but of course temperature depends on chemistry. I could imagine him being cold to Pah-trish-ah. In fact, I liked him for being cold with her. He was saving himself for me.
I haven’t met Patricia, but I have the feeling she’s a nightmare: brainless, vain, and selfish. I picture her beautiful and spoiled. I’m also certain that she has terrible taste, and that the house is charmless and pretentious.
I haven’t met Samantha either, though I know I will. I am trying to prepare myself. I want to like her, but it’s hard to like the idea of her. She’s living proof that Lewis and Patricia were married, that they loved each other, that they made a family. And then, Samantha represents Patricia. She’s a biological message from her mother, written in genetic code, to me.
“Samantha looks exactly like Patricia as a child, exactly,” Lewis told me once. “It’s eerie. They could be twins.”
“Really?” I answered, my heart sinking. Would I have to learn to love Patricia’s face?
Lewis’s brownstone, filled with Patricia’s dreadful taste, inhabited by her living, breathing image, holds a dark fascination for me. I’ve walked past it more than once, out of unhealthy curiosity, hurrying and furtive, hoping that Lewis wouldn’t suddenly emerge. There’s not much to see, though, from the outside: it’s a dark, unpainted brown building, its lower windows always shuttered from inside, its front door always locked against the street.
I said to Lewis, “We’re going to your house?” I felt an odd thrill.
Stopping beneath the lamp Lewis put his arm around me. “I thought it was
time,” he said. “I’ve seen your place. I want you to see my place.”
“And Samantha?” I asked.
“Well, no,” Lewis said. “She’ll be asleep. The baby-sitter, wants to go to a rock concert tonight, so I told her she could leave as soon as I come home. She’s going on to spend the night with a friend. I know that means she doesn’t want me to know how late she’s coming in. Which means that I can have a friend over to spend the night with me.”
I could see he had thought this all out very carefully. “And what about the morning?” I asked.
“I thought,” said Lewis gently, “that you might be gone before Sam wakes up.”
“What time is that?” I asked, uneasy. Would I have to sneak out in the dark, like a burglar, like an illicit teenager?
“Seven-thirty.” Lewis looked at me anxiously. “Is that all right with you?”
“It’s all right,” I said, and smiled at him: he was taking this so seriously, being so careful of everyone. Then I pushed at his arm. “Are you nervous?”
He snorted. “Of what? That you won’t like my wallpaper?”
I laughed. “I might not,” I warned; it was true.
Lewis didn’t bother to answer. He kissed the side of my head in a determined way, and squeezed my shoulder, and we kept walking. We were the only people on the block, and our footsteps tocked slowly, irregularly, against the stone faces of the houses. I took a little half step so that we were walking in the same rhythm, and when we reached the stairs to Lewis’s house, we climbed them together, sounding like one person.
The front hall was dark when Lewis opened the door. At once he turned preoccupied and quiet, his mouth tense, and I realized that he didn’t want the baby-sitter to know I was there. I had become, suddenly, a liability instead of a welcome guest. Without speaking he took me by the hand and led me into a small library, where he turned on a standing lamp.
“Be right back,” he said, very quietly, and he left, closing the door behind him.
The room, with only one light in it, was shadowy. Gloomy bookshelves went up to the ceiling, and there were heavy, dark curtains pulled across the window. All the oak woodwork had been stripped and stained a somber brown and then varnished. There were deadly fishing prints on the wall. The room felt stuffy and oppressive. I was pleased to see the ghastly woodwork: I had been right. I stood in the middle of the room, waiting for Lewis to return.
“No, no,” I heard him say, loud and jovial. “Don’t be silly. It’s no trouble to me. And you’ll be back tomorrow when she gets home from school?” A girl’s voice answered, high and placatory. “Right. Fine,” Lewis said. “Have a good time, Joyce. Fine. Good night.”
I wondered if Lewis was always so effusive when the babysitter left for the evening. I wondered if Joyce wondered if someone was standing behind the closed door of the library, holding her breath.
The front door finally clicked, and I heard Lewis locking it. As I stood there, holding my breath, my heart had begun to pound, as though Lewis and I were planning a robbery. I waited for a few moments, in case Joyce had forgotten something, and to let the echoes of her presence die away. Then I stepped out into the hall.
Lewis came toward me at once, apologetic. He put his arms around me and wrapped his body around mine.
“I’m sorry to have to do that,” he said. “To hide you.”
“Why did you?” I asked. “Why couldn’t I have just been here for a drink?”
Lewis shook his head. “I don’t want Joyce snickering about you to her friends. And I don’t want her to say anything about this to Samantha. And I don’t want to have to ask her not to say anything to Samantha.”
He had thought about all this.
“It’s all right,” I said, “really.”
And it was, it had to be. There are no rules, once you’re divorced. The patterns are disrupted. You’ve had your moment, in the white dress, the veil, when everything was orderly, and understood: there was the bride’s side, the groom’s. After a divorce, everything is askew, uncharted. Now there are times when you stand behind a closed door, holding your breath so the baby-sitter will not hear you.
“So,” Lewis said, beginning to relax, “what do you think?”
“Of the house? Or your baby-sitter? I’ve seen both equally,” I said.
“Of my library,” he said plaintively, and took me back to peer inside the little room. “Isn’t this woodwork great?” he asked proudly. “Patricia wanted to paint it all white, but I put my foot down. Oh, no, I said. This woodwork is spectacular, I told her. We’re just going to stain it and varnish it.”
“Good for you,” I said, nodding judiciously. This was a blow.
Lewis drew me out into the hall and put his arms around me again. He leaned back and looked into my face, and I could see anxiety beginning again. I was touched by this, that he had planned this so carefully, that he so wanted it to go well. He was so eager for me to like what he was offering: part of his life. It was a risky business, and I realized I was nervous too. I wondered if Lewis had felt this way when he first came to my apartment: uncertain at swimming in such alien and uncharted waters, unsure of the currents, the tides. But even though these waters were unknown, they were warm, and I trusted my pilot.
“Are you all right?” he asked, looking at me earnestly. “Really?”
I nodded. “I’m fine,” I said, “really.”
Then Lewis kissed me, on the mouth, and things changed. When Lewis kisses me on the mouth, I understand what the word “swoon” means, and why women do it. I know how it feels when your strength ebbs out of you, when it drains entirely away, and your body surrenders to this strange flood tide. I’ve never actually fallen to the floor, but I can imagine it easily: rapture drains you of your strength, and you are filled with something else.
“Let’s go up,” Lewis whispered, and he took my hand, with kindness and passion. He led me up the stairs, and I followed as though I were under a spell. The staircase was dark, with a somber leafy wallpaper and a murky patterned carpet. The upstairs hall was dimly lit, with only one light burning, at the farther end. It was like an illustration from a Victorian children’s book, dusky and mysterious, rich with the promise of things not yet revealed.
Lewis opened the nearest door, his bedroom. I stepped inside, and at once Lewis took hold of me again. He pulled me over next to the bed, and put his arms around me, and put his mouth on my mouth. I had a brief impression of the room—dark and cluttered—but it no longer mattered. Patricia herself could have been standing there, watching and making comments, for all I cared. What mattered now was Lewis, and how it felt to have his hands on me. I stepped out of my high heels and stood in my stockinged feet, on tiptoe, so I could reach up and wrap myself around the part of Lewis that I wanted, his wide shoulders and his lovely broad chest. Lewis put his arms around me very tightly, and I felt as though I couldn’t wait for this any longer, not one more moment, no matter how soon it was going to happen. It was as though each minute from now on would be unbearable, ecstatic.
We stood there, sinking into the embrace. Lewis put his hand down inside the back of my dress, and I began to shiver. Then he buried his face in my neck and began whispering my name. I couldn’t stop shivering, and I wondered how long we were going to stand there. I wanted to be in bed with him, with nothing between us, nothing but our smooth, electric skins.
Lewis pulled his face away from me. I waited blissfully, my eyes closed, for him to touch me, to kiss my mouth again, but he didn’t, and I realized he was leaning away from me. I opened my eyes: he was turned toward the door, listening, his face full of concentration. I heard it too.
“Daddy? Daddy?” The voice was frail and trembling, full of middle-of-the-night quaver. “Daddy,” she said again, whimpering. She was near tears, maybe half-asleep. She was coming nearer, down the hall toward us. Lewis turned from me, without speaking, and left, pulling the door shut behind him.
I stood in his bedroom, waiting. I folded my arms on my che
st and tried to calm myself. I was glad the door was shut. My face was flaming, and my hair was wild. My body was full of heat, and my heart was pounding. If Samantha had come in, I’d have ducked into the closet, gone under the bed. I radiated guilt: how could I not? I was standing in another woman’s bedroom, my blood roused by her husband, their child standing outside in the hall.
I took a deep breath and tried to compose myself, to recover some dignity. I looked around the room. A huge mahogany four-poster dominated the space. Over the headboard were draped folds of flowered chintz, a sort of full skirt that rose to a circlet on the ceiling. At the windows were long curtains of the same chintz. On each side of the bed was a mahogany bureau, and over each of the bureaus hung a carved mahogany mirror. On each bureau was a pair of small lamps made from wooden candlesticks, carved in a spiral. Everything matched. It was all conventional and a bit pretentious, just as I had expected, but now, trying to quiet my galloping pulse, I no longer felt so superior, so contemptuous of this. Now things had altered, and this order seemed sensible, somehow, reassuring.
In my stockinged feet I walked across the needlepoint rug to one of the bureaus. It was bare except for a white linen runner and a porcelain jug holding a ragged bouquet of dried flowers. There was nothing else. On the other bureau there were things set out on the linen: a man’s set of silver-backed hairbrushes, photographs in silver frames, a stack of books, a man’s small leather jewelry case. It was a casual set of signals, semaphoring life.
I looked back at the bare bureau. There was a photograph stuck into the mirror frame, its edge curled over. I slid it out from the frame and spread it down flat. There they were, The Family. The three of them, Lewis, Patricia, and Samantha, stood smiling beneath a leafy tree. There were daffodils around their feet. Samantha, in a ruffled white pinafore over a pale blue dress, held a basket of jewel-bright Easter eggs. Lewis’s arm was around Patricia, who wore a virginal pink suit. They all looked tidy and hopeful, as though they had just come from church.
I leaned over to examine Patricia’s face. It was a surprise: for one thing, she wasn’t beautiful. She had a pleasant face, squarish, with narrow smiling eyes. Her hair was light brown, frizzy, and boring. Her mouth was too low in her face somehow, like a baboon’s. But the main thing was how nice she looked. Her mouth was humorous and her expression sunny: she looked, really, like someone it would be a pleasure to know, to have as a friend. She looked warm and solid and full of life, not at all like a nightmare.
Asking for Love Page 21