by Marge Piercy
After maybe three minutes, she heard the lock turning over and he opened the door, looking tousled and a little wary. “If you don’t want them to know you’ve been smoking, open the window. It reeks,” she said, shutting the door behind her.
“Window’s stuck.”
“Let’s see if we can get it open together.” Using the end of a hanger, she picked at the sill. The window had been painted shut. Finally they pried it open.
She sat on his desk chair, wondering if he had grown since Thanksgiving or if he just looked taller in the small room. All the upstairs rooms were small. He had a room on the second floor, as did her parents and Alison. Alison’s room was just a daybed in her office. Her mother and father shared an office downstairs, where otherwise the ground floor had been opened up into one large living-diningroom beside the narrow kitchen, running from the street to the tiny yard paved over for parking. “How has it been going for you? I heard your hockey team only lost one game so far.”
“We’re doing okay. Think we might take our division.”
“You’ve made a lot of friends at school.” This was not a question.
He shrugged. “Mom said you were dating a Black dude.”
“Yeah. Sort of Black.”
“You can’t be sort of Black.”
“He is. His adopted parents are white.”
“I thought they were Jewish.”
“So’s he.”
“Shit, Lissa, were you just trying to stir them up? See how mad you could make them?” He grimaced at her, sitting on his bed’s edge. A magazine was sticking out from under the rumpled bedspread. Probably Penthouse. He was always hiding girlie ’zines from Rosemary.
“I like him. He’s bright, he’s buff, he’s good looking and really sweet to me. He rides a Honda motorcycle. You’d like him.”
“Lissa, you just can’t do that. If there’s anything I’ve learned, it’s that we do best hanging with our own type people. It works out better. You can communicate. You just know the same things.” He was talking to her with grim seriousness, explaining the world to his ditzy sister.
“Why would I want to go out with somebody who knows exactly what I know? Sounds dull to me.” She drew herself up, feeling suddenly chilly. Was this her old coconspirator? “Getting more conservative, are we?”
“Just realistic. I’ve been with Black girls a couple of times, whores, just for the hell of it with some of the other guys. It’s no big deal.” He raked his hand through his strawberry blond hair, making it stand up in the cowlick he always tried to control. “But I wouldn’t date one of them. Obviously.”
“Blake gets better grades than I do, and he has more money, frankly.”
“Those shysters are probably rolling in it.”
“How can you assume what he is? I’m ashamed of you, Billy. I thought you’d want to meet him and see for yourself. All of a sudden you’re on their side?”
“You sound like you’re still hooked up with him.”
“And if I am?”
“You better dump him fast. Or you’ll be in real trouble.”
“You going to tell on me?”
“No way. You’re deluded on this one, but I don’t want all the yelling. It’ll fuck up the holidays if they find out.”
“Good. Keep quiet about it and I won’t tell on you.”
“Tell what?”
“Smoking. Penthouse. And a few other things.” She smiled, trying to give the impression she knew far more than she was saying. “Let’s just help each other through this so-called vacation.”
“Everybody smokes.”
“Then why aren’t you smoking downstairs?”
“Besides, why should I tell them about your Black boy? I don’t want any trouble, Lissa. I got a problem you don’t want to know about. Let’s just keep cool and stay under their radar.”
“Fine with me.” She found she had nothing more to say to Billy. Nothing at all.
IT WAS ALISON who told her what was up with Rich and Laura. “I know your mother was planning to tell you, or I wouldn’t say anything. She wanted to fill you in, so you wouldn’t put your foot in it.”
“What am I not supposed to put my foot in?” She did not like Alison in her room, but she was too curious to try to ease her out.
“Rich is having an affair with one of his campaign workers. A divorcée five years older than Rich, a publicist who’s been helping him. I’m sure Rich got in deeper than he intended, but it could really hurt him.”
“Does Laura know?”
“She doesn’t have a clue, and that condition should remain intact.” Alison touched her own cheek with her fingertips, a gesture she had borrowed from Rosemary—a flick of the wrist, the hand remaining in the air for a moment, gracefully.
“Nobody thinks she should know what’s going on?”
They both understood that nobody really encompassed only Rosemary. “It would be best for her marriage if she didn’t find out…. After all, she’s so involved with her baby that she’s been practically ignoring Rich. It’s partly her fault if he’s strayed. She isn’t giving him what he needs.”
This sounded very like what Rosemary would say. She was a husband-first sort of wife, and that was the marriage she wanted for Rich. Perhaps what Rich himself wanted. “That seems a little harsh. She’s just being a good mother.”
“And an inadequate wife.” Alison, who had never, as far as Melissa knew, had a boyfriend, pursed her lips in scorn. “She knew what she was getting into, marrying a politician. She has to put Rich first or things like this will happen.”
“That’s rather Rich’s responsibility, isn’t it? He wanted a son.”
“Of course. But he’s thrown in the way of temptation constantly. That’s how it is with powerful men.”
“But not my father.”
“Every man experiences temptation, Melissa. You’re too young to understand how it is with men. But your mother gives him what he needs from a wife, and they love each other. She’s kept that alive between them, no small undertaking. Your mother is very wise, and you could do a lot worse than to study her and learn from her.”
Learn to play geisha? Learn to flatter and charm and dangle? Learn to manipulate and sacrifice others? “Well, I want to thank you for filling me in…. I’m kind of surprised.”
“Your mother feels it’s time for you to pull your weight in the family. You made a serious mistake this year. They’ve forgiven you, but you need to prove you can behave responsibly. Your mother’s giving you a chance to show your loyalty to the family. She may want you to distract Laura so she can have a conversation with Rich. He’s been keeping himself unavailable, but he’ll be here during the holidays. She plans to corner him and set him straight before there’s a bigger problem.”
“I understand.” Rich’s affair would seem microscopic when she made her announcements. Her hands grew cold just thinking of what she had to do.
“So if required, you will occupy Laura?” Alison was watching her carefully, her eyes almost beady. “You agree to do that if I signal you?”
“Sure…. Uh, I hardly know her. What does she care about?”
“Her baby. If you get her started on him, she’ll go on for hours. Got that?”
Melissa nodded. Alison really thought she was stupid. Repeat instructions three times, because Melissa is a dim bulb. Rosemary had always underrated her, and she supposed that Alison picked up attitudes straight from her idol’s mouth.
“Now the signal,” Alison said, “will be if I say, ‘I wonder if the weather is going to improve tomorrow.’ Whenever I say that, you go into action.”
“Weather improving tomorrow. Got it.”
Alison looked a little dubious. “You won’t forget.”
“I’ll write it down.” Melissa used her most sarcastic voice, but Alison just nodded and collected herself to leave.
“Good idea. Write it down.” Alison descended the narrow back stairs.
Dick was in an expansive mood at supper. “Every
body was congratulating me on the Wall Street Journal mention. Even Senator Whitehead called this morning and asked after you.” He was talking of course to Rosemary. “My visibility is increasing, and the fuss around those scurrilous pieces in the Inquirer has died down. We’re over the hump.” His bright blue eyes glinted like faceted stones. He winked merrily, cutting into his fillet of salmon. “Time to enjoy the holidays.” Suddenly he turned to Melissa. “You had us worried there for a while, my girl. I hope you learned a lesson about choosing your associates.” He leaned over to pat her hand. How warm his hands always were. “I know you meant well, but you didn’t behave with due thought for the consequences. But I hope my little girl is back on course. Now give us a smile.”
“I still think you both made a big fuss about nothing.”
“Letting someone that dangerous near you is something to pay attention to,” he said, taking more wild rice. “Even beside the possible risk to you, you’re a member of a highly visible family, and that makes everything you do a matter of public interest, if not now then down the pike.”
“When you’re running for President.”
Dick paused and his gaze grew intense. He could not seem to decide whether to take that as flattery or to be annoyed. In the end, he chose to ignore it. “Just learn to be more careful. What you do reflects on all of us. We must constantly watch appearances as well as realities. That whole nonsense in the Inquirer proves that—if nothing else. But we’re on track now, right?” He turned to smile at his wife. “These little storms come and go in public life.”
“Is supper satisfactory?” Rosemary asked him, leaning on her elbow and toying, as always, with her food.
“Delicious. As always you’ve done well with the arrangements.”
Dick, however, ate with a good appetite. He truly did not care much what he ate. He would eat hot dogs at a county fair or three rubber chickens in a row at functions with the same relish as he dined at the most expensive restaurants. It was not an act. He seemed to enjoy any food put in front of him so long as the occasion required eating it. He was looking healthy, gleaming. He carried himself with that air of invincibility and utter confidence that always cowed her. How could she and Blake ever have thought they could influence him or even slow him down? He was rolling along, and they were in danger. That was the way it always went with him. Troubles enveloped him, then dissipated like a cloud of steam. The accusations, the scandals, the revelations vanished, and he stood there taller than ever and stronger. He was who he was, a man made for the public, a man made for power. She did not want her supper. She never wanted to eat anything again. She felt sick and very small. What on earth had they imagined they were doing? She had been an idiot to go along with Blake. She should have just told him to stop when things started getting bad. They had failed, they had been foolish, they had brought the law down on themselves. Of course.
• CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE •
Melissa escaped from the house on Monday. Rosemary, Alison and Dick had picked up their tempo, trying to get as much done as they could before the holiday, trying to cram a week’s work into two days. No one had extra energy to spend overseeing her. Billy was out most of the time. Their special closeness had eroded. She felt a void where her younger brother had always been. Merilee was off with a classmate studying. Melissa simply said she had last-minute shopping and slipped out. Blake picked her up with his bike on a corner of Rittenhouse Square.
“So where are we going?” She rested her cheek against the cold leather.
“A long way. Out to Mount Airy. Are you cold?”
“It’s not that cold today.” It was, and she was, but she didn’t care. It was such a relief to hold him. Such a relief to be out of the house, to be for a few hours who she really was, not who she was supposed to be. Still, her ears might drop off. She clutched him tight and wished they could ride off the edge of visibility, into a magical sunset beyond their families and their troubles.
“How has it been going?” he asked when he was stopped for a red light.
“Better than I expected. They haven’t had time to third-degree me.”
“So what exactly is happening with them?” The light changed.
His neighborhood was made up of mostly turn-of-the-century big rambling houses with a few newer ones interspersed, some clapboard, some brick, most of the grey stone she associated with rural eastern Pennsylvania, a sense here of space and comfort. Houses stood among bosomy trees, rolling lawns. Some of the kids she saw on the street were white, some African-American, some other. It seemed to be an integrated neighborhood, a wonder in Philadelphia. It reminded her a bit of the suburb where they had lived before Dick was elected governor, but there everything was newer—the houses, the streets, the trees—and everybody was white. A lady in an SUV was unloading three boys with hockey gear. An African-American girl with a white boy just behind her whizzed past on their bikes in spite of the snow and ice. A portly man with a grey-streaked beard was knocking icicles off his gutter with a rake. Two little kids were building a snow fort on the corner lot while an older woman bundled up till she was round as a beach ball sat on the steps clutching herself and watching them. An aide helped an old lady down the steps to the street, where a van was waiting.
Si was at his office, but Nadine was home to greet her at the door and kiss her on both cheeks. “Don’t you look blooming. Cold weather must agree with you.”
Nadine was affectionate and friendly, but Melissa felt she was being judged. Blake would deny it if she said anything, but she knew they did not consider her quite worthy of him. We’ll put up with you cheerfully because we recognize a fait accompli, and because we are too smart to risk antagonizing Blake. But we will watch and wait. This too is likely to pass.
The house reminded her a little of Emily’s. It was big and well furnished, a turn-of-the-century grey-stone house with pillars on the porch and a sizable yard with its own stone garage. NPR had been on when she came in, but Nadine shut off the radio at once. A big bushy black cat lay on the sofa in a patch of wintry sun. An Egyptian-looking dark orange kitten perched on the mantelpiece with its oversize pinkish ears pricked toward her. Blake tossed his leather jacket over a chair and nobody rushed to hang it. He swooped up the black cat, who began purring loudly as he flung himself on the couch with the cat on his chest. “Hey, Rasputin, how’s it going?” Then to her, “From a shelter, but how he grew.” Yesterday’s Philadelphia Inquirer and New York Times were scattered around the livingroom. Here and there books lay open. The fireplace had recently been used, but nobody had swept out the ashes. They did not have a Christmas tree, but a large bay tree stood in the diningroom in a Mexican earthenware pot.
The livingroom and diningroom had warm red-toned Oriental rugs on the floor and art on the walls in a variety of styles from abstract to landscape to African. Still, the house was not intended to be looked at, to serve as a backdrop. It was a place several people lived and left their activities scattered about like clothes they had dropped. It was not dirty, but it was not neat. She liked the feel of it. Her own home was always as perfect as Rosemary could manage to keep it. Nothing was left out for long. Everything had a proper placement in the scheme of things. Before she was ten, she had learned never to walk in and toss her coat or jacket over a chair. She had been trained to hang anything she removed at once. Maybe that was why she threw her clothes into vast multicolored drifts all over her dorm room and Blake tidily folded his.
She was surprised she was hungry enough to eat any of the lunch spread out on the diningroom table. Sara came down the stairs to join them, yawning. “Hi, kid. How’s the bride? My brother treating you right?”
“You came back for the holidays?”
“Dad got me a job. I gave up on my skanky boyfriend. I’m thinking of going back to school, but in the meantime…I need to make enough money for my own apartment. I am just too old to move back in.” She had grown out her hair since Melissa had seen her last. A wild combination of black and brown, most of i
t braided, it resembled a field partly burned over. Still, Sara was pretty enough to get away with the mess on her head.
Lunch was smoked fish, sliced tomatoes, sliced red onions, hardboiled eggs and rye bread. Melissa found the sturgeon and the nova fine, but the whitefish with their heads still attached made her queasy.
“So how are you holding up?” Nadine asked her. “Are you pregnant yet?”
“No!”
“Don’t be in a hurry. You want to finish school first, both of you.”
“I’m in no hurry. Although I want to have children before I’m too old.”
“What’s too old nowadays?” Nadine waved her fork. “Grandmothers have babies. Not that I could have gone through that. It’s best to do it when you’re too young to have any idea what you’re getting into. But not yet! Not yet.”
“So are you glad to be back here, in Philadelphia?” Melissa asked Sara, frantic to change the subject.
“I have friends here, but I want to be in New York. Once I get the money together.”
“She has romantic notions about being poor in New York,” Nadine said. “This is our resident romantic.”
“I was in film school when I met Nick. We were going to shoot a film in Joshua Tree. That was the idea when we went west.”
“What happened to the film? Can I see it?”
“We never finished it…. Hell, we barely started it.” Suddenly a large tear rolled down Sara’s cheek.
“That’s too bad,” Melissa said hastily. “Do you want to go back to film school?”
“It was his fault. He smoked the money. He was a loser, just like Mother said. But he could be so sweet!” Now tears were trickling from both eyes. Her black eye makeup began to run.
Nadine patted her daughter’s shoulder. “Don’t cry, sweetie. He isn’t worth the tears.”
“But I loved him! You never understood. He had a horrible childhood with an alcoholic mother. He loved films and ice cream and just being outside in a pretty place and lying in the grass. He liked so many things.”