Shelter in Place

by David Leavitt

“It was thirty years ago,” Pablo said. “Jake had taken a gap year of sorts. He was renting a room from Ursula.”

  “Oh, of course! Now I know how I know you.”

  “Excuse me, but do you mean Ursula Brandolin-Foote?” Eva said, coming in from the dining room. “If so, that’s an amazing coincidence, because I’m buying her apartment.”

  “Ursula’s apartment? Why?”

  “Just—to have a place there. In Venice. We’re all hoping Jake will decorate it. He decorates all my homes. He hasn’t agreed to yet, even though Indira’s promised to put it on the cover of Enfilade if he does.”

  “I have?” Indira said.

  “Indira thinks the article should be about why Eva bought the apartment,” Min said quickly. “Tell Clydie why you’re buying it, Eva.”

  “Well, there are a lot of reasons—”

  “It was because of the election,” Min said.

  “Oh, don’t talk to me about the election,” Clydie said. “A friend of mine, a dear old friend in his nineties—he voted for Sanders in the primary, and afterwards he sent me a little poem. ‘Roses are reds, violets are blue, I just voted for a Socialist Jew.’ ” She laughed to show her teeth. “Lucky for him, he died late in October.”

  “It’s true that it was the election that spurred me to buy the apartment,” Eva said. “So that we’d have someplace to escape to.”

  “Yes, but why Venice, of all places?” Indira asked, leaning forward and propping her arms on her knees to suggest keen interest. “I’ve been so curious about that.”

  “Well, because it’s Venice. It’s so beautiful.”

  “Also Eva’s writing a biography of Isabella Stewart Gardner,” Min said.

  “No, I’m not,” Eva said.

  “Do you think Venice is beautiful?” Clydie said. “Speaking for myself, I’ve always found it rather dreary. So did Denise. She had her worst depressions there. Tried to do herself in twice. For me, Venice is a city for suicides.” She adjusted her glasses and peered at Jake. “But of course, that’s how I know you. It was your friend who jumped into the canal.”

  “What’s this, Jake?” Eva said.

  “A long time ago, a friend of Jake’s jumped off a bridge in Venice,” Pablo said.

  “What was his name again?” Clydie said. “Victor?”

  “Vincent.”

  “Oh, Jake, I’m so sorry,” Rachel said, reaching an arm in his direction. “Oh, but you’ve never said anything about it. Why haven’t you ever said anything about it?”

  “I’ve never been one to go into the gory details,” Jake said. “I’m told people appreciate that about me.”

  “Vincent Bulmer, yes,” Clydie said. “Charming lad. He had the AIDS, didn’t he? Was that why he jumped?”

  “We believe that’s why,” Pablo said. “We don’t know for sure.”

  “Well, if it was, I consider it brave of him.”

  “How is suicide brave?” Indira asked. “Suicide is selfish.”

  “Of course it’s selfish,” Clydie said. “It’s claiming authority over your own life.”

  “And in the process causing great pain to the people who love you.”

  “As if dying of the AIDS doesn’t?” Clydie shook her head decisively. “Take the word of a decrepit old woman, he was brave to do it. I often wish I was that brave. If I were, I’d hang myself tonight.”

  “But Clydie, what about Jimmy?” Min asked.

  “Any sorrow Jimmy will feel at my passing, his inheritance will more than compensate for.”

  “I wish Sandra and Grady would hurry up,” Eva said. “We should really eat. It’s macaroni and cheese with lobster, Clydie. I remember you like that.”

  “All this has me wondering about Ursula,” Clydie said. “Haven’t seen her in years. How is she doing?”

  “Oh, she’s marvelous,” Min said. “When Eva and I were in Venice, she had us over for tea. That’s how the whole thing started.”

  “Was it Ursula who introduced you to Jake?” Clydie asked Eva.

  “No, I’ve known Jake forever,” Eva said.

  “Eva doesn’t know I have a history with Ursula,” Jake said. “Or rather she didn’t until now.”

  “Actually, in this case I was the one who did the matchmaking,” Aaron said.

  “Really? Why didn’t you tell me?” Eva said.

  “She asked me not to. She’s funny that way. I’m not sure why, because the truth is, I don’t really know her very well. Back in the nineties, she did a few translations for me, and then later—I mean after I left New Directions but before I broke free from the shackles of publishing altogether—I sometimes hired her to do reader reports. She can read six languages, including Serbo-Croatian.”

  “It seems everyone knows Ursula better than I do,” Eva said, sitting on the arm of the sofa.

  “Isn’t that great?” Min said. “It’s as if she’s been part of the family all along.”

  Right then Bruce bounded in, his hair flinging droplets of water and his face red from scrubbing. Hearing him, the dogs trotted in from the kitchen.

  “Clydie, how nice to see you,” he said, shaking her hand. “Can I offer you a drink?”

  “Thanks, I’ve already had two. Ah, and these must be your barracudas.”

  “My what?”

  “Come here, killers,” Clydie said, holding out her hand, which the dogs approached meekly, their tails low, as if in deference to an authority they recognized by instinct. Only when the doorbell rang did they start barking.

  “I’ll get that,” Jake said.

  He left to answer. A few seconds passed, and Sandra tiptoed in, in a red satin dress and with her hair, which she usually wore loose, in a chignon. “Sorry we’re late,” she said. “It’s started snowing again, you know.”

  “And here’s Grady, back from the tropics!” Bruce said, patting Grady on the back.

  “Yes, and in a grumpy mood after a very long flight, followed by a very long wait for the luggage, followed by a very long drive through very cold weather,” Grady said. “Oh, but I haven’t introduced Cody. This is Cody. We met on the cruise. He was giving tango lessons.”

  A rather unprepossessing young man, his scarf wound over his mouth in the manner of an Edward Gorey protagonist, nodded in greeting.

  “Well, now that we’re all assembled, shall we go in?” Eva said, motioning toward the pass-through to the dining room. “Bruce, why don’t you help Clydie up?”

  “Thanks, but I can get up on my own,” Clydie said. “I do it at least twice a day.”

  The group processed into the dining room, where Calvin waited. “Hello, Clydie,” he said, holding out his hand. “Calvin Jessup. So nice to see you again.”

  “Do I know you?” Clydie said. “If I do, I can’t remember you, which is odd. Usually I remember black men.”

  “Shall we sit?” Eva said. “Clydie, why don’t you sit here, next to Bruce? And Rachel on the other side, then Grady, then Sandra—”

  “Wait!” Clydie said. “Don’t sit! Don’t anyone sit!”

  “Why not?”

  “There are thirteen places. Don’t you know that when there are thirteen at table, the first person to sit down will die?”

  “Are you sure?” Sandra said. “I thought it was the last person to sit down who died.”

  “Actually, it’s the first person to get up who dies,” Rachel said. “It was in a novel I published, and there the characters came up with an easy solution. When the meal was over, everyone got up at the same time.”

  “What if one of us has to go to the bathroom?” Min said.

  “Hush, Min,” Eva said.

  “Hold on,” Aaron said, waving his phone, “I’ve been looking this up, and from what I’m seeing, when there are thirteen at table, it’s the youngest who dies. It doesn’t have anything to do with who gets up first or who sits down first. The tradition seems to derive from the Last Supper, where Christ was the thirteenth and the youngest.”

  “Well, who’s the youngest he
re?” Rachel said.

  “I suppose it must be Cody,” Grady said. “Cody’s … Sorry, how old are you, Cody?”

  “Twenty-three,” Cody said.

  “Drat, beaten by a hair,” Calvin said.

  “Oh, but I don’t even care,” Cody said. “I’m not even a Christian. I was raised Zen Buddhist.”

  “No, I forbid it,” Clydie said. “The last thing I need is another death on my conscience. There’s only one solution, and that’s to round up a fourteenth guest.”

  “Well, what if we put one of the dogs in a chair?” Aaron said.

  “Then the dog will be the one to die,” Eva said. “The dogs are only seven.”

  “That’s in human years,” Bruce said. “In dog years they’re forty-nine.”

  “No, they’re forty-three,” Aaron said. “Seven dog years for each human year is an old wives’ tale. If you want to calculate a dog’s age properly, you count the first year as one human year and each of the rest as seven.”

  “But that’s neglecting the fact that small dogs live so much longer than big dogs,” Sandra said.

  “Bedlingtons are especially long-lived,” Eva said. “Millie was nearly eighteen when she died.”

  “Who’s Millie?” Aaron asked.

  “The grandmother of these three,” Bruce said.

  “Hold on, if the dog’s supposed to be the fourteenth guest, we won’t be thirteen anymore, so why are we even talking about this?” Rachel asked.

  “Folks, please, there’s a simpler way to handle the situation,” Calvin said. “I’ll eat in the kitchen and you’ll be twelve.”

  “But Calvin, you’re as much a guest as any of us,” Eva said.

  “No, I’m not, I’m the cook,” Calvin said. “And I shall eat in the kitchen, as befits my lowly status.”

  “In that case I’ll join you,” Clydie said. “I want you to tell me how we know each other. I find black men so very fascinating.”

  “Eva, may I have a word with you?” Grady said. “I’m sorry I didn’t mention this before—blame the jet lag—but Cody’s vegan. That means he doesn’t eat meat, dairy, or eggs.”

  “I know what vegan means.”

  “I hope it’s not a problem. What’s for dinner, by the way?”

  “Macaroni with cheese and lobster.”

  “Do you think Calvin could take the cheese and lobster out of one of the portions?”

  “Calvin, could you take the cheese and lobster out of one of the portions?”

  “No.”

  “It’s all right,” Cody said. “I’m not all that hungry.”

  “I think there’s a salad,” Eva said. “And bread, of course.”

  “That’s fine.”

  “No, it isn’t,” Grady said. “You need a proper meal.”

  “Don’t worry, I’ll rustle something up for you,” Calvin said, putting his arm around Cody’s shoulders and leading him into the kitchen.

  “Jesus,” Grady said.

  “Well, I suppose we can sit now, given that instead of thirteen we’re now”—Eva counted on her fingers—“ten.” She scanned the number of empty seats. “Wait, we’re only nine. Who’s missing?”

  “Whoever isn’t here, raise your hand,” Aaron said.

  “Don’t be helpful,” Rachel said. “Hold on, let me see … It’s Jake. Jake’s the one who’s missing.”

  “I wonder where he’s got to,” Min said.

  “Jake!” Eva called into the echoing house.

  There was no answer.

  “Maybe he’s in his room,” Min said. “I’ll go and check.”

  On the stairs, though, she doubled over and nearly fainted. All evening, ever since Eva brought up the magazine cover in front of Indira, she’d been having stomach cramps.

  After a few seconds she felt steady enough to finish her climb to the third floor, where she knocked on the door of Jake’s room.

  “Jake?” she called. “Jake?”

  Still no answer.

  “He’s not there,” she said when she got back downstairs.

  “And the dogs are gone,” Eva said. “He must have gone out with the dogs.”

  “But why?”

  “How am I supposed to know?”

  “It’s Clydie’s fault,” Pablo said. “She should never have mentioned Vincent.”

  “Who’s Vincent?” Grady asked.

  “A friend of Jake’s who died.”

  “Oh no. Recently?”

  “No, it was ages ago.”

  “I’ll see if I can find him,” Bruce said, pulling his parka from the coatrack in the front hall.

  When he went into the kitchen, the door hinge squeaked. Min made to follow him but was stopped by a hand on her shoulder.

  She turned. It was Indira.

  “Min, might I have a word?” Indira said.

  23

  Simon: r u there

  Simon: jake

  Simon: why don’t u answer me did i do something wrong

  Simon: say something wrong

  Simon: i’ve been thinking about what u said about venice

  Simon: i’ll come if u want me to

  Simon: your worried i’ll be disappointed but i’m worried u will be

  Simon: or maybe neither of us will be

  Sim: i hope ur ok

  Simon: i’m watching my phone

  Simon: i love u my prince

  Simon: goodnight

  24

  From the kitchen, Bruce stepped through the French doors into the cold and welcoming night. Since he’d got back from Grady’s—it seemed years ago—the temperature had dropped ten degrees; the snow was falling harder and had started to stick. Through the double-paned windows he could still hear voices, but they were soft and unintelligible, like the voices on a television in a distant room. “Jake!” he called, waving his flashlight in an arc that took in slices of the patio, the broken fountain, the pool, the firepit, the yard with its edging of woods. And when he got no reply: “Ralph! Caspar! Izzy!”

  Distant barking, then—the barking of his own dogs, higher in timbre than that of his neighbors’ dogs, the ones whose nocturnal revels regularly drove the Bedlingtons to such frenzies of curtain tearing. “Guys, over here, pronto!” he called, clapping his hands, and was relieved when Caspar came shambling toward him out of the dark, his eyes lambent in the flashlight’s beam.

  “Jake? Are you there, Jake?”

  “Over here.”

  Bruce followed the voice to the copse of trees where earlier in the day they had bumped into Min, Rachel, and Sandra.

  “Are you OK?”

  “I’m OK.” Jake was wiping steam from his glasses with his shirttail.

  “I’m glad. When we couldn’t find you, we were worried.”

  “Sorry about that. I tried to make as discreet an exit as I could.”

  “But you took the dogs.”

  “Yes, that was supposed to be part of the discretion. I figured if you noticed I was gone, and then that the dogs were gone, you’d just assume I’d taken them for a walk and forget about it. Just go on with your dinner.”

  “When you’d vanished into thin air? How could we?”

  “I didn’t think my absence would be that noticeable. Stupid of me, I see now. A sort of inverted narcissism … It’s funny, for most of my life the only thing I’ve been sure of is how to behave, how I’m supposed to behave. But now it seems I can’t even do that anymore.”

  “You must understand, no one’s angry at you,” Bruce said. “Just concerned. I mean, walking out like that—it’s not like you. It may be like me, but it’s not like you.”

  “You’re right,” Jake said, “but then again, how often do I find myself caught in the headlights of someone else’s memory? And things were crazy enough already, weren’t they, what with Pablo and Indira showing up unannounced, so that when Clydie suddenly chiming in about Venice and Vincent and Ursula—and in front of Eva, no less—Eva, to whom I really should have explained all this myself, weeks ago—I just … lost
it.”

  “Is that why you left? Because of Eva?”

  “Partly. Mostly, though, I so very much didn’t want to hear Clydie talk about Venice, and Ursula, and Vincent … You know what’s the strangest part of all this? In New York, Clydie and I have known each other, what, two decades? And yet, until tonight, neither of us ever put it together that we’d met in Venice. Or maybe that’s not so strange, when you consider how long ago it was, and that Ursula introduced me to hundreds of people over there, mostly women, and mostly so much older than me that they just sort of … blurred together. If I’d been in the trade longer, I might have known to listen for Clydie’s name, but I hadn’t. I’d only just finished Parsons. I was twenty-two.”

  “I’m sorry if I missed something,” Bruce said, “but what exactly did Clydie say to you? What was it you should have explained to Eva?”

  “That I know Ursula. That I’ve known her since I was … God, twenty-two. The first time Eva mentioned her name, that night when you had me over for dinner to tell me about the apartment, I should have fessed up. But you see, I’ve spent so much of my life trying to steer clear of Ursula, and Venice, and anyone who might have known me in Venice, much less anyone who might have known Vincent, that I guess it’s become second nature.”

  “Hold on, who is this Vincent?”

  “Who was this Vincent. He was my lover. Well, that was the word we used in those days. And now he’s been dead … what, thirty years?”

  “And all this came up tonight?”

  “Clydie brought it up, but she doesn’t know the real story. She’s got a confused version of it.”

  “What’s the real story?”

  “You sure you want to hear it? There are some gory details.”

  “Go on.”

  “OK, but remember, you asked. Well, after I finished up at Parsons, Aunt Rose—I’m sure I’ve told you about her, she brought me into the business—she arranged for me to spend three months in Venice. It was a graduation present of sorts. The idea was that I’d take a decorative painting course at the Accademia di Belle Arti—a friend of Pablo’s was teaching it—and go to see some Palladian villas, and just generally soak in the atmosphere. At that point Pablo had been working for Rose, what, five years? Already she looked at him as her heir apparent, and, well, I was in love with him. Totally, passionately, unrequitedly in love with him, which he knew, and said he found touching, which I think he really did, because he treated me like an adored younger brother, in a way that was kind but also sort of sadistic, since that wasn’t how I wanted to be treated. How I wanted to be treated wasn’t in the cards.