Shelter in Place

by David Leavitt

  “Anyway, I’d just about reached the end of my rope when Sandra Bleek came by—you remember Sandra, Grady’s cousin?—and she told me a friend of hers had the same problem with her dog, and that her groomer suggested she cover the sofa with foil—apparently dogs can’t stand the sensation of foil under their paws—so I thought, why not give it a try?”

  “And has it helped?”

  “Up to a point. The problem now is, every time they jump up on the loveseat, they tear holes in the foil, or try to pull it off with their teeth, and then Amalia has to do the whole thing over again. These days we spend more money on Reynolds Wrap than we do on food, don’t we, Amalia?”

  “Yes, Mrs. Lindquist,” Amalia said.

  “I must say, Amalia, you’ve done a beautiful job,” Min said, admiring how neatly Amalia had smoothed the foil sheets and tucked in the corners. “It’s like a miniature Christo.”

  “Let’s sit over here,” Eva said, leading Min to the dining table. “I’ve got macarons.”

  “Oh, how wonderful! I love macarons.”

  “They’re from Ladurée. Personally I prefer the ones from Maison du Chocolat, but you take what you can get. Here, have one.”

  She held out the box, which Min surveyed before opting, after some internal debate, for lemon.

  “Now, if you want to know what I think this business with the loveseat is really about,” Eva said, “it’s the election.”

  “Really?” Min said, wiping merengue crumbs from her lips. “But wait … What could the dogs know about the election?”

  “More than you might think. Dogs are incredibly sensitive to these things. For example, Alec Warriner—you know, our neighbor who threw the inauguration party—I don’t know if you’ve seen it, but he has this wheezing, smelly old dachshund that our dogs absolutely despise. Anyway, for the last month or so, Bruce and Alec have been walking the dogs together. Ours and his. It started just before we left for Venice. Bruce didn’t tell me. I found out from Frank.” She leaned across the table as if to deliver a confidence. “My theory is that it’s having to share their walks with Alec and that dachshund that’s causing the dogs so much stress.”

  “Have you mentioned this to Bruce?” Min asked, surreptitiously taking another macaron.

  “Not yet. What I can’t believe is that he’s actually spending time with that man. I see it as a betrayal.”

  “Well, but Eva, it’s just dog walking.”

  “Just dog walking? What do you mean, just dog walking? You’ve seen the result. You’ve seen the damage it’s doing.”

  “Yes, because you’ve pointed it out to me. Bruce probably hasn’t noticed.”

  “That much I’m sure of. He can be so oblivious when he chooses to.”

  “But he might not be choosing this. For all you know, he might not even want to take walks with that man. It might be that whenever he goes out to walk the dogs, that man just tags along, and Bruce is too polite to tell him not to.”

  “Then why hasn’t he said anything about it to me? Why has he kept it a secret?”

  “Well, you know Bruce. Probably he doesn’t want to upset you.”

  “More likely he doesn’t want to upset Alec. It’s always been that way with him. He can’t bear to say no to anyone—except me.”

  “Eva, you know that’s not true.”

  “Do I? I think what bothers me most about this thing is that the dogs have picked up on what Bruce knows perfectly well and chooses to ignore—how deeply I loathe Alec Warriner, how affronted I am by all he represents. They have. They recognize Alec as an enemy, and so the fact that their master is treating him like a friend causes them this incredible stress that they take out on the sofa. It’s classic PTSD.”

  Min helped herself to a third macaron. Although Eva’s words were grim, her tone was offhand, almost breezy. She often did this—said dark things in a light way, as if to challenge Min to guess her true mood and see if she responded appropriately.

  “Look, why don’t you just tell Bruce you’d rather he stop walking with him?” she said.

  “And risk his biting my head off? No, thanks.”

  “Bruce bite your head off? I hardly think—”

  “But you’ve seen it yourself. Remember how impossible he was about that hiccup with the kitchen? Since then it’s reached the point where I have to muster all my nerve just to bring up the subject.”

  “Do you think he’s nervous about buying the apartment?”

  “I don’t know if it’s the apartment itself or if he’s just grouchy for some other reason and taking it out on the apartment. Whatever the case, he’s becoming impossible to talk to.”

  “Maybe it’s the election. It’s sure to have upset him too.”

  “But if it’s the election, then why on earth is he going on these walks with Alec Warriner? No, I think what this is really about is how upset I am, and that I’m refusing to do what everyone else is doing, which is either lapsing into this state of terrible ennui or putting all their energy into looking the other way. Now, I’m not saying I wouldn’t do that if I could, but I can’t. My dread is too strong.”

  Min took a fourth macaron. These days Eva talked about her dread the way other people talked about their arthritis or their colitis.

  “The worst part is the complete loss of any basic sense of well-being. It’s like the feeling you sometimes get on a plane, when suddenly you know—you just know—that the only thing that will stop the plane from crashing is if you keep saying to yourself, ‘The plane won’t crash, the plane won’t crash.’ Over and over, without ever slipping up or letting your mind wander.”

  “Do you do that?”

  “The rest of you, you live as if you’re in a bubble, and because you’re in the bubble, you’re safe from everything outside. For me, though, the bubble isn’t there. Instead I’m on the plane. I’m always on the plane.”

  “But darling, you’re not. Plenty of people feel the same way you do.”

  “You can’t know what I feel. No one can know what anyone else feels.”

  “Well, no, of course not. And yet there is such a thing as empathy. Last night, for instance, I was watching MSNBC—”

  “You know I never watch the news anymore. I refuse to watch the news anymore.”

  “But if you don’t watch the news, is it any wonder you feel isolated? Don’t get me wrong, I’m not suggesting you watch him. I never watch him. As a matter of fact, every time he comes on, I mute the volume—it’s reached the point where the mute button on my remote control barely works anymore. No, what I do is, I only watch the smart people, the decent people, like Rachel.”

  “Rachel Weisenstein?”

  “Rachel Maddow.”

  “What, you know her personally?”

  “Of course not, I’ve just … come to think of her as Rachel. As a friend, as someone I can rely on to, well, guide me through this morass. There’s comfort in that, I find.”

  “What, in watching a bunch of so-called analysts sitting around a table with empty coffee mugs, congratulating each other on agreeing with each other? The news isn’t news anymore, it’s just pompous opinionating, the purpose of which is to keep us anxious, because these people, these newspeople, even your beloved Rachel Maddow, they know that as long as they can keep us anxious, as long as they dangle the carrot of consolation in front of us, they’ve got us hooked. They’re no different than the French papers in 1940, just more sophisticated. And more venal.”

  “Yes, but if you’re anxious already, what difference does it make? And anyway, Rachel’s not like the others. She’s better. So are her guests, like the woman she had on last night.”

  “You’re determined to tell me about it, aren’t you? All right, go ahead.”

  “OK, well, last night Rachel had on this psychiatry professor—from Cornell, I think, or maybe Penn—and she was saying, this psychiatry professor, that Tr—that there’s a provision in the Constitution that allows the cabinet or the Congress, I can’t remember which, to remove
a sitting president from office if it’s shown that he’s not mentally fit to hold the job. Which, according to her, he isn’t. Narcissistic personality disorder was her diagnosis.”

  “Oh, I can’t stand this insistence on medicalizing everything! Why can’t people just admit the truth, which is that he’s a devil, that there are such things as devils in the world? Here, have another macaron.”

  “Thanks. But is there really a difference? I mean, whether we call him a devil or say he has narcissistic personality disorder, aren’t we talking about the same thing?”

  “We most certainly are not. A personality disorder is treatable, with drugs or whatnot, whereas devils simply … are. Most of us are alloys of so many things, we can’t tolerate the idea of a devil, because it has no complexity—all it is is appetite, for power and for worship and for blood. I think that’s what’s upsetting the dogs so much. They recognize a devil when they see one.”

  “I don’t know. Maybe it’s the old devil-you-know versus the devil-you-don’t-know thing.”

  “No one can know the devil. Not even Rachel Maddow. Are you all right, Amalia?”

  “Finished,” Amalia said, rising with effort from her knees.

  No sooner had she begun to make her way to the kitchen, however, than Ralph jumped up onto the sofa.

  “Ralphie, no!” Eva said, leaping up to grab him before he lifted his leg.

  The foil was torn. Amalia looked at it in despair. “I can’t do no more right now, Mrs. Lindquist,” she said. “I’m too tired.”

  “Of course not, Amalia,” Eva said. “Never mind, you go and have a rest in the kitchen.”

  Murmuring to herself in Spanish, Amalia withdrew. Eva put Ralph down. “Now do you see what I’m living with?” she said to Min. “My only escape valve is Venice. These days all I read are books about Venice, all I look at are pictures of Venice. Oh, sorry, let me see who this is.”

  Her phone had pinged. She glanced at it, then put it back in her pocket.

  “Just Bruce saying he’s running late.” She resumed her place at the table. “Anyway, what is it you’re so eager to talk to me about?”

  “What? Oh, yes, of course. I won’t beat around the bush. I’ll cut right to the chase.”

  “Isn’t the latter an example of the former?”

  “Ha! I suppose it is. Well, as I was saying—”

  “But you weren’t. You haven’t.”

  “OK, well, yesterday afternoon, Indira and I were having a brainstorming session—I’m sure I’ve told you about Indira, she’s our new editor—”

  “Yes, quite a number of times.”

  “Oh, OK, good. So anyway, we were brainstorming, Indira and I, and I happened to mention your apartment in Venice, and her eyes just lit up. She asked if I had any pictures, and I showed her the ones on my phone, and the long and the short of it is, she wants me to do a piece on it for the magazine. Isn’t that fantastic?”

  “For Enfilade?”

  “Yes, that is the magazine I work for, last I checked.” Again Eva didn’t laugh. “But wait, here’s the best part. Not only does Indira want to run the piece, she wants to put it on the cover. Well, what do you think?”

  “To be honest, I haven’t had time to think anything yet.”

  “Well, no, of course not. It’s an important decision. You’ll want to take a few days to mull it over. Or more than a few days.”

  “Have you told Jake about this?”

  “I have, as a matter of fact, and he’s thrilled. Totally on board.”

  “But how can he be when he hasn’t even made up his mind to do the apartment?”

  “Sorry, what I meant was that he says that if he does decide to do the apartment, which we both know perfectly well he will, he’s on board with having it published in the magazine—assuming, of course, that you are.”

  “In other words, his decision is contingent on mine. And mine is contingent on his.”

  “I suppose you could look at it that way. The way I look at it, though, is that the chance to be on the cover of Enfilade may be just what it takes to get Jake off his, excuse me, rear end. He’s coming up to the country next weekend, right?”

  “On Saturday morning.”

  “Have Bruce talk to him. Bruce has a way with him. And then he won’t have any grounds for objecting to anything about the apartment, because it’s slated to be on the cover of a magazine.”

  “Min, dear, I hope you won’t take offense at my saying this, but isn’t Enfilade a bit—well—lowbrow? I mean for Jake, not me.”

  “Oh, but that’s the old Enfilade. It’s changed under Indira. You’ll see when the next issue comes out. She’s done a total overhaul, you won’t even recognize it. For example, the March issue has two different covers, different rooms from the same house, in this case this spectacular beach house Alison Pritchard decorated in Puglia.”

  “Isn’t she the one who used to work for Jake and Pablo?”

  “For a few years, yes, but then she hung out her own shingle, and now she’s huge. Not only is she doing residential projects, she’s moved on to hotels, restaurants, the new outpatient center at Sloan Kettering. And then, for the cover of the September issue, we’ve got Pablo—Clydie Mortimer’s apartment on Fifth Avenue. And if Enfilade is good enough for Pablo—”

  “Clydie Mortimer? Jake never said anything about that.”

  “He and Pablo are very discreet about these things. Clydie, too. She’s not even letting us use her name.”

  “Come on, have another macaron.”

  “What about you?”

  “I wouldn’t care for one.”

  “All right, then. Let’s see … this looks like salted caramel. Is it? Yes!” Min chewed. “Oh, there’s one more thing. I’ll be honest, this part I don’t know how you’re going to feel about. When I told Indira that you were buying the apartment, naturally she asked me why, so I told her the truth—that it was because of the election—and she was totally fascinated. As a matter of fact, she wants to make that the core of the story.”

  “Really?”

  “I told you she has fresh ideas.”

  “Yes, you did, and I’m glad she does. The only thing, Min, dear, is that I really have no idea when the apartment will be ready—there are still all the fine points of the contract to work out, you wouldn’t believe how complicated these things are in Italy—and then, when you figure in the time for the renovation and the decoration, that brings us to the fall of 2018 or the winter of 2019 at the earliest, and who knows where we’ll be then? I mean, for all we know, the press will be under government control and there won’t be any Enfilade.”

  “Do you really believe that?”

  “What I believe is irrelevant. I’m not a sibyl. I wish I could predict the future, or trust the past to serve as a guide for the future, or feel that the world was moving inexorably toward enlightenment. Once, I might have believed that, but not now. I don’t have beliefs anymore. All I have is dread.”

  “But doesn’t dread imply hope—that the things you dread won’t actually happen?”

  “Obviously, you still regard hope as a good thing. Well, I don’t. If anything, I look at hope as dangerous, because in my experience hopes are dashed far more often than they’re fulfilled.”

  “Then you do have a belief. It’s a negative belief, but it’s a belief still.”

  Again Eva’s phone pinged. “Excuse me,” she said. “Oh, thank God, it’s from Ursula. I’ve been waiting for this. Where are my reading glasses?”

  “Here, on the table.”

  “Hand them to me, will you?”

  Min obliged. Glasses on, Eva read, moving her lips but making no sound.

  After a minute she lifted her head. “What does usufruct mean?” she asked.

  “Usufruct … I used to know. I’m sure I did. Why do you ask?”

  “Because Ursula uses it in her text. It’s about the garden.”

  “The garden in Venice?”

  Eva nodded. “I didn’t want to bring
this up until it was a sure thing, but about a week ago we were WhatsApping, Ursula and I—Europeans love WhatsApp, have you noticed? Anyway, I happened to mention how lovely the garden was, and she answered that even though it meant the world to her, she really couldn’t afford to keep it up, and yet she couldn’t bear to let it go to rack and ruin, either, which naturally I interpreted as a hint that she might want to sell it.

  “The next morning I sent her an email. Essentially I told her that if she was serious, we’d consider buying the garden along with the apartment, to which she replied, literally within five minutes, that the thought of selling the garden had never so much as crossed her mind, that she could never bear to part with it, blah blah blah. So then I wrote back that I was sorry, I should never have brought it up and I hoped I hadn’t offended her, and she answered that of course I hadn’t. And that was that, until yesterday I got another message from her saying that she’d been mulling it over and decided she might be open to selling the garden after all but needed a little more time to think about it. So I told her to take as long as she needed, and now here’s what she’s written: ‘After much soul-searching and more than one sleepless night, I have reached the sorrowful conclusion that, given my dire financial situation, I have no choice but to accept your kind offer to buy my beloved garden—’ ”

  “Oh, Eva! How wonderful!”

  “Hold on, I’m not finished. ‘… your kind offer to buy my beloved garden, provided that we can agree on a mutually satisfactory price and on the condition that, for my remaining few years, I am granted usufruct to it.’ ”

  Min was typing on her own phone. “Usufruct,” she read aloud. “The legal right of using and enjoying the fruits or profits of something belonging to another.” She put the phone down. “Well, that’s no problem, is it? That just means she wants to be able to sit in it from time to time. Maybe pick a few roses for her table.”