by Marge Piercy
Leila could tell how Becky had gotten into trouble. She wanted too desperately to be liked, to be noticed. Becky was always remembering some new tidbit. There had been a man hanging around, sinister, shabby, a big tough-looking man. He kept loitering near the parking lot of the complex. Surely somebody else had run into him and would remember. In fact an old woman insisted she had seen him, but the description she gave was entirely different.
Becky remembered that just a week before the murder, she had thought she had heard someone outside one evening. More and more details effloresced like plankton in the light of the TV moon. She was like a good student run amok, Leila thought, trying to pass the TV exam, saying whatever she thought would please in order to win notice.
The break in the case occurred when a seventeen-year-old from Barnstable named Gene Wiggins was traced as having sold the VCR and the TV to a pawnshop in New Bedford. His best friend Sam was a high school senior who knew Becky from community theater. Knew her very, very well. The friend’s story was that Sam had passed on the stolen property to him. Becky had ordered Sam to sink it in the Sound, but Gene needed the money. He pawned the stuff in New Bedford.
Gene was quickly persuaded to cooperate with the police and offer evidence against Sam and Becky. Sam and Becky had beaten her husband to death. Becky had slipped out of work and met Sam. The juicy details of the Cape theater romance filled the papers and the news programs for a week. A twenty-five-year-old woman and a seventeen-year-old boy. BECKY SEDUCED KID LOVER TO MURDER said the Boston Herald.
By the time Leila had finished with the tapes and her clippings, she felt convinced that Becky was being railroaded. She was about to be convicted of having an affair with everybody’s son, with breaking the patriarchal rules, with being flagrantly sexual—an affair, Leila thought sourly, no different from fifteen affairs that Nick was guilty of with three times the age gap. Becky denied the affair; she denied the murder. She claimed she had been happily married to the love of her life, and her only regret was that they had not yet had children. She presented herself as a dutiful and loving wife, whom others were slandering from jealousy, from spite. Becky did not doubt that Gene was the sliding-glass door burglar, and she was deeply shocked; she maintained he was trying for a deal by implicating his friend and herself.
The next morning, Leila tried straightforwardly to set up an appointment to see Becky at the Barnstable House of Correction. Her initial attempt met with refusal. Leila would have to find a way in. She was sorry she had taken on the story, but when Leila said she was doing something, she felt obliged to fulfill her promise. She had fought pitched battles with Nicolas about that habit.
People were always asking Nick to come to a party, a dinner, to read a script, to meet an aspiring actress, and he would never say No. He’d say Fine or I’ll give it a try, and then forget the promise as if he had never made it. He was sure people would be offended if he refused their requests, preferring simply to forget and assuming the supplicant would do likewise. He would not believe her, when she argued that he got in far more trouble by saying Yes or Very Likely when he meant No, Never, Not on your life; but he was incapable of saying No to anyone except her and his son.
And girlfriends he was tired of. They too suddenly heard No often and firmly. When he was done with a relationship, he was done, and she had twice ended up in the disgusting position of having to deal with tearful ex-lovers who wept on the phone hysterically and begged her for reasons.
She had grown up determined to stand behind her word, whether it was I do or Of course I’ll talk to your daughter for you or I’ll try to find a home for your kittens. Her mother had scarcely been able to cover for Father, a Jew with a shameful problem. Her father gambled. When he was depressed, he played the horses. When he was happy, he played poker for big stakes. He played the numbers, just in case. He was always being hired in the accounting office of some small company, and then being let go because he would disappear. Once, so did some funds. He paid them back by selling the house. He was always convinced he was about to score big, he was about to hit the jackpot. His debts escalated and he died one night when his car was run off the highway. Leila had been thirteen.
Early Leila had learned she must take over. Phyllis worked as a nurse. Leila must make it all work, whether it was Shabbat or Thanksgiving or Debbie’s birthday or supper on the table on a night when her mother came home from the hospital with her feet swollen and her back aching and everything was too much. Leila had to fill in and make things come out right. After her father died, she had assumed full adult responsibility—like David, with Nick off in L.A. or Houston. Leila aimed to be a good woman and a dependable human being. A guilty conscience was as bad as a toothache.
O Negative, Melanie had called her in teasing: O Negative. Can’t take from hardly a soul, but the universal donor.
Now she must find a way to judge if what she saw in Becky was really there, a young naive woman who had talked herself into deep trouble. A woman punished for sexual boldness by being accused of violence. Leila consulted May, who advised her, “Talk to the family. Her family. His hates her. Her father’s a fisherman in New Bedford.” Where the VCR had been pawned—did that mean anything? “They were proud of their daughter, how she got an education, how she lived in a nice apartment. You get in with them and they’ll tell Becky to see you. She was the first in her family to go to college.”
Shana called her that evening. “I can’t stand my father. My father says I have to go and live with him. It’s the middle of my junior year!”
“Maybe your grandmother could stay on with you. I’m sure your father doesn’t want to uproot you.”
“Grandma? She’s so old. She sucks on her dentures. My friends are here. I have such good friends, Leila, they really take care of me. Every night one of them comes over. They hold me when I cry about Mother. They understand. They know how special Mother was. The way you do. Daddy left her. How can I go and live with him?”
“Would your grandmother stay?”
“She embarrasses me in front of my friends. She butts in all the time, what she thinks. Aunt Leila, why can’t I live with you?”
Her first reaction was panic. Then she realized she was always that way when anyone sprang something on her. Shana had just lost her mother. The divorce had been hard on her. And Melanie’s long illness. “Certainly we have plenty of room for you,” she said carefully. “It’s a big house. But would Mrs. Peretz and your father agree?”
“I’ll make them agree,” Shana said darkly.
She must show Shana she still had a home. “You’re welcome here. With David away, you’ll be wonderful company for me. But your father is the legal guardian, so we can only propose while he disposes.”
Shana snorted. “I’m sure he’ll be happy to dispose of me. I’d adore living there, I know I would. Nick is so great. He always talks to me as if I’m a real person, not How’s school, that awful way adults talk down at you. Whenever he walks into a room, just everybody wants to talk to him.”
At ten, Nick called. “Leila, is something wrong? I thought I’d hear from you after you got my note.”
“I’ve been rather busy,” she said wearily. She did not feel like talking with him. She was still too full of broken shards of anger, sharp edges and clots of blood. She realized that this was the fourth day since he had left and her whole world had changed. “Melanie died. Her funeral was Sunday. I assume you got my message.” And didn’t bother to call me until now.
“I was sorry to hear. I know it’s been coming for a year, but the two of you were so close. How are you taking it? Are you very depressed?”
“I am. Shana may move in for the remainder of the school year.”
“Move in? Where?”
“We have plenty of space. She can use the guest room.”
“You asked her without consulting me?”
“You weren’t here. Nick, her mother was my best friend. I promised Melanie. Besides, I like having young people around.”
So did Becky Burgess, a little mischievous voice in the back of Leila’s mind spoke up.
“Actually, Shana is a treat and she’ll be company for you, with David in California.” Nick chuckled. “I’m an idiot. She’ll bring some life into the house. I think it’s a great idea.”
He had switched so abruptly, she was almost dismayed. Instantly she remembered how he flirted with Shana, how Shana flirted with him. He would never lay a finger on Shana, but she shuddered at the image of endless dinners where Nick addressed his charm to the teenager. He did like young women. “Well, nothing’s settled yet. It’s just an idea.”
“But a great one. Youth and energy, that’s what we need. The daughter you never had, Leila. Someone for you to hang with when I’m out of town.”
“You were calling to make sure I’m not arriving. As you can hear, I’m home and staying.”
“Peony, I know you’re depressed, but don’t take it out on me. If you want to visit, if you want some time in New York, come ahead. I’m always delighted to see you.”
Did she really want to quarrel with him, sending him to the arms of his young girlfriend? “Never mind, Nick, let’s not quibble. I’ll only come to New York if you need me. How are things going?”
He was silent for a moment. When he spoke next, his voice was thick and raw. “I hate New York. Every time you meet somebody, it’s prick-measuring time. My success can pee farther than yours, nyah, nyah. I ran into Don Margolis. Remember him?”
“Of course.” They’d all lived in the same old factory building cut into illegal and dank lofts. “How’s Penny?”
“They split years ago. Anyhow, he’s directing at the Public. Bastard held me up for fifteen minutes boasting, practically reading me his reviews.”
He was wrought up with fury. He could go on for an hour if she didn’t derail his anger. “But the play. How’s it going?”
“Like a busted bag of groceries rolling down the steps. That’s how it’s going—downhill in pieces.”
“But you always say before opening that nothing will work.”
“This isn’t the same thing. They’re waiting to piss on me. They’re waiting to dance on my grave. All those bastards who think they’ve made it are waiting for me to prove I don’t have it, right in their faces. I’ve been a fool. I’ve made myself vulnerable to them. I should have stayed where I belong. Maybe I’m not good enough for the harsh glare of competition.”
“What’s giving you the most trouble?”
She listened with half an ear. By now she knew that he didn’t really want her input into his directing. Her anger calmed as his voice flowed through her like good wine. It might be a false comfort, but she loved his voice.
She must find in Becky something of herself—not what she was in her own life, but a potentiality unexplored. The desire to bash in your husband’s head, she thought, every woman can identify with that at least on the odd Monday and bad Friday. Actually why on earth would Becky do that? Why couldn’t she just leave? Wouldn’t she have got a divorce? Maybe she just couldn’t let go of Terry—love/hate. Maybe Sam had committed the murder, and Becky was trying to shield her lover. Maybe the other kid, Gene, really was a burglar. Becky did not look the violent type. That seemed more of the bent of a couple of adolescent boys. Leila could imagine Becky telling any kind of tall tale, pretending to any imaginable skill or ability to garner attention and praise. She read in Becky’s face and manner a hunger for visibility, for approval that was familiar to her, another desperately good student who had studied her way out of Strawberry Mansion in Philadelphia.
“I just don’t know, Leila, I just don’t know. I feel lost here. I feel as if everyone I knew has made it except me.”
“But you have a good position in Boston, your own theater, the kind of part-time position that lets you direct anywhere in the country.”
“Sometimes it all just feels like shit.”
“Come home, then.”
“Leila!” His voice changed abruptly, resonant, chiding her. “I’ve got an opening in two weeks. I’ll beat some sense into them. Everybody loved the production in Boston. Hell, I’ll be back there soon enough.”
“It can’t be too soon for me,” she said. New York was driving him crazy. Once he was home with her, she could reach him, she could rebuild trust, reweave affection. In the meantime she would try to make fierce progress on the Becky story, so she could clear her desk when he arrived and concentrate on him. There was a lesion, but one that could still be healed.
SIX
Mary
Mrs. Landsman’s room was an uncommon mess that week, reflecting, Mary was sure, her inner condition. That was some bombshell her husband laid on her. Mary would have had him out the door, but Mrs. L. put up with a lot to stay married. How could Mary judge her harshly, considering what divorce meant to an older woman? Here she was, walking evidence, exhibit number one. Mrs. L. had some kind of job at a college, but this was an expensive house, and surely she didn’t pay for it. It cost a fortune to heat, although they tended to keep it chilly. Luckily Mary had her body fat to keep her warm, and when she was cleaning, she was bustling around. In her young days in coal country, her family had kept a warm house. Winters here were hard to get used to, after so many years outside Washington. Even after ten years in Boston, she still thought they kept their houses too cold.
It was easier for her since the son was away. Every so often he would surprise her by appearing during the day, or he would be in his room fiddling with some project instead of being at school, where he belonged. Once when David was supposed to go away with his parents, Mary had planned to stay at the Landsmans’. She went there in mid-evening. The house was dark except for the lights upstairs and down they left on—bathroom and hall lights. Mary was always cautious and circled the house before going in. On a mild Saturday in May, the windows were open. She heard unmistakable signs of love-making from upstairs. It was their son, and him still in high school, with some girl in his bed. When Mrs. Landsman was all wound up making plans about him going off to college in California, Mary kept thinking that the girlfriend was going to turn up pregnant, but David was lucky and the roof didn’t fall in on him.
Mary was glad when he left for college. He was one spoiled young man. Imagine staying home from a vacation with his family after his grandparents in Texas had been promised he would visit, then having some girl in. Mary doubted that his parents suspected what he was up to, him with his nose in a book or into his computer. He wasn’t the sort of boy you’d expect to have a girl in his bed, but then, was Jim, her husband? She had thought she knew him, didn’t she? Any man could find a willing woman, provided he kept looking. Every woman, like her daughter Cindy, thought infidelity was some other woman’s problem, until one day she might just find it was hers.
David’s room had always been hard to dust with a fancy computer he took with him to college, a laser printer, a weird laboratory set up on a library table all along one side of the room. Posters and models of spaceships. Lots of books, but nothing you’d want to read, textbooks of science and mathematics, paperbacks with robots and monsters on the lurid covers. He had pet hamsters for two years, but they died. For all of one summer the first year she cleaned this house, he had a nasty snake in a terrarium. Mary wouldn’t go near it. She wouldn’t touch anything on that side of the room. Mrs. Landsman tried to tell Mary how it was harmless and all, but Mary didn’t see her kissing it either. David kept dirty comics under his bed, but Mary never mentioned them. Her son Jim, Jr., always called Jaime, used to keep girlie magazines in his closet. At least he didn’t have girls in his room. He minded his business until he got to college, and then she couldn’t keep an eye on him. Cindy she’d kept close watch on. Girls, you had to.
It took Mary the full day to clean. Usually the Landsman house was messy rather than dirty, but this week it was a sight. Mrs. L. was generally neat with her clothes, but the bottom of her closet was a foot deep in a foul mix of dirty laundry and things fallen off of hange
rs and left lying. There were pieces of paper all over the bedroom. It looked as if she had gone to bed with a pile of newspapers and torn them up for bedding.
No new notes. Mary guessed Mr. Landsman hadn’t come back this week. Mrs. L. had been eating salmon out of cans and a frozen casserole she had put by. Mary viewed the state of her ladies’ houses as an accurate barometer of what was going on in their lives, and it appeared Mrs. Landsman was a wreck.
It was a blow to Mary too, that tomcatting of Mr. L., and him telling Mrs. L. not to go to New York. Mary had been counting on a nice weekend here. None of Mary’s clients were traveling, and no one had asked her to take care of their animals. It looked like a church basement or Logan.
The clippings pertained to that case of a little floozy from the Cape who had a boyfriend ten years younger than her and did in her poor husband. She wondered if Mrs. L. suspected her husband of planning to do away with her, for she wasn’t the type to do anything violent. Even when they had a bat dart in and roost in the linen closet, Mrs. L. insisted on handling it without hurting the little flying rat. Mrs. L. carried it outside. Mary doubted Mrs. L. would hurt anyone, let alone her husband. In Mary’s opinion, Mrs. L. was crazy about him. In many marriages, one person was the lover and the other the beloved, unless both reached a compromise—the best kind, until the hot wind of lust blew everything inside out. Anyhow, Mrs. L. adored him, and he permitted himself to be adored. Thinking of doing violence to someone who was hurting you could be soothing, in a minor way. She remembered daydreaming about poisoning Jim. Not that she ever would have, but toward the raw end of that marriage, now and then she did derive some relief from contemplating a dash of rat poison in the soup.
She wondered if Mr. Landsman would leave his wife for the actress in New York? Mary never told her ladies about her divorce, even when they were getting divorced themselves. She used to like staying at the Torgersons’. They traveled a great deal, and both sons were away at boarding school. In addition to cleaning their house, she had an agreement with them to walk and feed their poodle Winnie while they were traveling, for which they paid her eight dollars a day. They said Winnie was much better behaved when they got home after Mary had taken care of her. Mary simply lived there and gave Winnie lots of attention. Winnie was fond of Mary and slept with her at night. It was a perfect situation for everyone concerned. Mary walked Winnie twice a day and had her chase her chewtoy. Winnie was happy, the Torgersons were happy (at least about Mary and the dog) and Mary often had a comfortable roost for the night. It was a perfect setup for Mary, who enjoyed Winnie. The dog would put her head on Mary’s knee and study her with big black eyes. They watched television together.