The Stork Club Read online

  And this morning in the bathroom! There he was, all lathered up. He looks into his shaving mirror and sees – nothing. His shaving mirror is gone, split, finito without a trace. And where does it turn up? On her make-up table. Her new, three-hundred-dollar make-up table! Which has a mirror already built into it! But for some reason she’s decided she needs his shaving mirror too!

  What she has done with his razor only the shadow knows. Ditto for the Quaaludes he was hiding in that old penicillin bottle. His robe has grown feet. No matter where he puts it, it walks back into the spare bedroom all by itself. And his kids have taken to sleepwalking in the opposite direction. Or does she herself get up in the middle of the night and carry them into the big bed for company? Oh yes, he gets the message. Too bad, then, that he isn’t sure how he’s supposed to read it.

  She is angry at him … for taking her seriously? For thoughtlessly throwing a book on the floor while operating under intolerable pressure? For trying to teach her how to treat her car and her credit cards? For being a Protestant even though he was – at most – only half Protestant? Even though the last time he went to church was four years ago at Easter?

  He has no idea what he’s supposed to be apologizing for.

  9

  What’s he’s supposed to be apologizing for is his attitude problem. It is not his anti-clerical hysteria that bothers Becky. It’s his failure to understand the spirit of the thing. He may look like a twentieth-century Cambridge Massachusetts liberal but it’s a paint job. This is a man whose ancestors burned witches.

  She knows you never really outgrow the prejudices you learn on your mother’s knee. So she can put up with a certain amount of puritan claptrap. What she will not tolerate are these subtle little hints he has been making since her father died, about unfinished business and acting out unresolved conflicts and the therapeutic effect of insights and the benefits of exploring deepseated patterns in the therapeutic context as opposed to seeking solace in the teachings of a culture-bound church.

  The gall of this man, who thought all her problems could be traced back to one basic insight that she had not had. Who thought that all a woman had to do to get her act together was lie on a couch until she admitted out loud that she had wanted to fuck her father.

  That was what made her want to kill this guy – that and the implication that we had a very wonderful shrink to thank for the Mitchell we enjoyed today.

  As she darts about the children’s end of her L-shaped kitchen, she tells herself that at least some good has come out of the argument – six days of peace during which she has had a positive surge of creative energy. She has been able to get all sorts of new art projects going for the playgroup. The ideas don’t come from a book – they come from her head. She is developing her own educational method, which is why she has decided the hell with Mitchell’s condescending, cost-cutting initiatives. She is not going to charge her friends more per hour. She is not going to use newsprint instead of art paper, or enlarge the class size, or advertise, or draw up plans for expansion. She knows the real reason why he criticizes the way she runs her playgroups. It’s the same reason why he throws her father’s books on the floor and says they have cooties: to undermine her confidence, and thus limit and control her. But she is holding her ground. In the six days since she has not been speaking to the Salem Rockjaw, she has done everything she has always been longing to do to the kitchen, and now she has it just how she likes it.

  She pauses now to look at it, this kitchen that has the angry edges of a dream come true. The new light fixtures: they are the brass and not the cheapo plastic ones Mitchell wanted. And the white tiles, which she has speckled down with the same pewter-blue as the dish racks – she had a real and not a hippy carpenter in to do them, and what do you know? No hard luck stories! No smelly hiking boots in the middle of the kitchen floor for eighteen weeks! No psychotic ex-girlfriends pointing guns at her and accusing her of selling out! No protoyuppy, disgusted daughters saving up pennies (Becky’s pennies) for med school and revenge! No more maudlin reminiscing about how good AM Radio used to be! No – just eight hours of George Michael and Madonna and they’re done! And if Mitchell thinks they can’t afford it, then fuck him. Because she has his number now. She knows how he controls things – by engineering one crisis after another so that his needs and his business’s needs come first, so that any money she might need for the house or the children or, God forbid, herself, becomes an impossible extra. Well, she’s taken a long time getting here, but she’s wise to his tricks. The only way to stump him is to follow her instincts.

  And just look at the results. Her kitchen has coherence. The aluminium fridge and cabinets match the restaurant stove. The counter and tiles give the room definition, the blue blinds drama, and the boxes of geraniums warmth. That is not all: she likes the way her girls look this morning. Fuck hand-me-downs. She wants them in matching outfits. And she likes what she is wearing too. She is glad to have rediscovered make-up. It reminds her that she was the one who took the money out of her trust fund to help Mitchell start that business. Not to mention the down payment on this house! No matter how Mitchell tries to distort them, she knows the facts.

  She recites them to herself as she returns to the kid corner to set out the paint sets. Just as she decides she has her life under control, the phone rings at the exact same time as the doorbell rings and all hell breaks loose.

  It is Ophelia again. Flicking on the intercom, Becky says, ‘Hold on a sec.’ She goes to the door to find Kiki standing there with Maria and Dottie. Looking past them she sees you sitting in the Volvo with the other children. She calls for her eldest. ‘Time to go! The car-pool’s here!’

  She lets Kiki in, and at the same time, Mitchell jumps out of the study in his towel, while over the intercom, Ophelia says, ‘Is my fucking husband there yet?’

  Kiki looks as if he is about to die.

  ‘Sure thing!’ says Becky. She ushers him into the kitchen and leaves him to it. Then she takes her eldest out to our car.

  From the driveway she and you can hear Ophelia and Kiki’s raised voices. ‘So what’s wrong with the Equal Partners this morning?’ Becky asks.

  You shrug your shoulders. ‘It’s a mystery to me.’

  ‘A severe imbalance seems to have occurred,’ says Becky. ‘Looks like today it’s not 50-50 but 49-51.’

  You both snigger. Then Becky says, ‘I shouldn’t talk, though. I’m cleaning up over here.’

  ‘Oh really?’ you say. ‘What’s your score?’

  ‘98-2 and rising.’

  You laugh hypocritically.

  ‘Well, anyway, you look more cheerful today,’ Becky says as she belts her eldest daughter into her seat in the way-back. ‘But that doesn’t mean you can let your standards slip! You hear? I’m not going to ask, but I’m assuming that you have had these seatbelts back here ergonomically tested. And that both your children are wearing regulation underpants.’ She turns to the children. ‘Everyone remember it’s T-shirt day at Hitler Youth Camp?’

  ‘Yes,’ say the children in a chorus.

  ‘Well, good. And I hope you are also making good progress with the Canadian friendship cake, and have remembered to include along with your blanket and crib sheet and set of fresh clothes clear and easily verifiable proof of Aryan descent.’

  ‘We have all that,’ you tell her.

  ‘Well, good then. Great. Go get there! And listen, give Eva Braun my love, will you?’

  You laugh again, and pull out of the driveway. As you pause in the middle of the street to turn on ‘The Ewoks Join the Fight’ again (‘or the flickering flame … of freedom … would die …’) Becky returns to the kitchen to start the little ones on their art project.

  Kiki is off the phone by now. When she offers him a cup of coffee, he thanks her in a stiff, exaggeratedly Latin voice. She almost feels sorry for the guy.

  Because Ophelia is really going too far, she thinks. There is nothing to be gained from humiliating a man in public. I
f she has learned anything during the past five years, it is that words get you nowhere. Action is the only thing men understand. That is why, when Mitchell comes into the kitchen still wearing a towel, and dares to address her directly, asking her obsequiously for a shirt, she points, without speaking, to the ironing basket.

  The fucking bitch, Mitchell screams internally. What is she trying to do to him? Why has she invited Kiki over? And how, since she is still refusing to speak to him, is he going to find out without making an asshole of himself, without having to say something like, Hey, Keeks, what can I do for you this morning?

  Which is more or less what he ends up having to say. Only to become even more mystified. So! Kiki’s here to discuss investment opportunities! Hey! Terrific! So what else is new? Here Mitchell has an hour to get downtown for an appointment with the banker his baby daughter threw up over only days ago. He doesn’t even have his shirt ironed. And now here’s Kiki, standing in his kitchen at his wife’s invitation. Why did she set it up for breakfast? And why a playgroup morning? How is he supposed to sell this guy anything while she’s supervising a bunch of three year olds in the same fucking room? Why does she have to humiliate him further by making him iron his own fucking shirt?

  He is going to ask her point blank. Tonight at the latest. In the meantime, he has got to think professional. Think bank. Pull himself together. Rise to this totally laughable occasion. So here goes: a cup of coffee. And then, if that doesn’t work, a joint. After all, he’s not the only one. This Kiki doesn’t live in a bed of roses either. Maybe what is in order is a little male bonding.

  So when the phone rings again, and it turns out to be Ophelia, wanting to speak to Becky in private this time, Mitchell is almost glad that Becky asks Kiki to ask him to keep an eye on the little ones while she goes into the next room. ‘Fine with me,’ says Mitchell, although to whom exactly he could not say.

  He decides that the best way to play it is to pretend that the whole scenario is normal. So he picks up a shirt out of the basket, spreads it out on the ironing board, and starts ironing – forcefully, as if he is branding cattle.

  ‘So. How’s it going?’ he asks Kiki.

  ‘Great,’ says Kiki.

  ‘Everything OK on the home front?’

  And Kiki says, ‘Couldn’t be better.’

  ‘Oh right. The same old story, huh?’

  Kiki just looks at him. And so Mitchell tries again. ‘Women,’ he says, ‘You can’t live with them, you can’t live without them.’

  ‘Actually, I live with two,’ says Kiki.

  Mitchell thinks: Huh? But he still keeps trying. ‘I live with four,’ he says. ‘And you know what? One of them has multiple personalities.’

  ‘I’m happy with two,’ says Kiki in the same hostile voice. ‘It can be rough at times but at least I don’t have to do my own ironing.’

  Can you believe this guy? Mitchell feels like asking the three year olds. He has to remind himself that this guy has what he needs, a lot of money. So he says, ‘Oh I don’t mind. Because you know what? I do it better than she does. I’ll tell you what I resent, though. And I’m sure you find this too. It’s her attitude.

  ‘You know what the magic word is in this household?’ Mitchell continues. ‘It’s condescending. She can get me to do anything she wants if she can get me to believe I’m condescending to her.

  ‘Take these shirts,’ he continues. ‘Her attitude towards these shirts is a perfect example. She won’t touch them, and all because of this one thing I said to her once which made her decide I was condescending to her. God, I want to nuke entire continents when I hear that word.

  ‘I mean,’ he says, ‘I’m not all that bad. I get up with the kids every other morning. I do the goddamn dishes every third night. And as you see, I iron my own shirts. And you want to know why? Because once, a couple of years ago, I asked her to go over one of the ones she had ironed because it still had some wrinkles in it. You know what I’m saying? We’re talking a white dress shirt. You can’t have a white dress shirt with wrinkles in it. It defeats the purpose, right? Anyway, she flipped, and I am talking three hundred and sixty degrees. You know? She said if I didn’t like the way she ironed shirts, then I’d have to iron them myself. And so here I am, ironing my own shirt when I have to be in the Embarcadero Centre ten minutes ago. You know? I mean, does Ophelia give you this kind of crap? I mean, in your case it’s different, because …’

  Kiki says, ‘I wear permapress.’

  ‘You wear …’

  ‘Yeah, permapress.’

  Oh boy, says Mitchell to himself.

  Kiki looks at his watch. ‘Speaking of which, you have exactly three minutes to tell me why I should get my venture group to come into that building with you.’

  ‘What building?’

  ‘You tell me what building. You now have two minutes and forty seconds. I can’t give you more than that. I’m a busy man.’

  And he’s not? And he’s fucking not? When Becky walks into the kitchen, he feels like saying to her, Hey, babes, next time you want to humiliate me, why stop at one asshole? Why not sell tickets?

  Of course he doesn’t dare say this to her, because they’re not communicating.

  Or … is he about to witness a miracle? Is she …?

  Yes, she is. She is about to talk to him.

  She says, ‘Would you mind if I asked Kiki here a question?’

  ‘No, of course not. Go right ahead.’

  ‘Thanks,’ she says.

  His wife has said thanks to him?

  ‘When you were talking to Laura this morning,’ she says, turning to Kiki, ‘did she say anything out of the ordinary?’

  ‘No, not really. No, she seemed fine. She was talking a lot about that trip they’re taking after Mike gets himself out of real estate. Which is why I thought you might be looking for new backing.’

  ‘What the hell…?’ says Mitchell.

  And Becky says, ‘I knew it. I knew he was going to do something to sabotage her career! The lengths some people will go to …’ Looking Mitchell directly in the eyes for the first time in six days, she says, ‘Will you take care of this guy when you see him today? Will you tell him to leave his wife alone and cut out this shit?’

  ‘I certainly will,’ he says. But he has something else in mind, and so does Kiki. There is no need for either of them to put it into words. They are communicating perfectly.

  10

  ‘Are you sure?’ I remember asking him. We were sitting in our old Potrero office. It was early afternoon. I had just broached the vacation idea to him. He had said would I prefer to dissolve the partnership altogether? His eyes were too alert, his voice too flower child. I ought to have asked myself why.

  And the terms he suggested – they were so favourable as to be ridiculous. Twenty thousand now, five per cent of the profits for the next ten years, full inspection rights, full protection … offering to take the ‘company car’ off my hands … I thought our troubles were over. I thought our real life, the one we had always longed for but never been able to afford, this real life of ours was about to begin.

  No more creative financing, I thought. No more selling Dali prints and coin collections to make the rent. No more long shots in the Kentucky Derby, or dented Volvos, or foggy summers cooped up in the apartment. No more dingy South of Market office buildings with winos hanging out in the doorways. No more tenants or maintenance contracts, no more potential investors with bald spots instead of conversation, no more ulcers about up and coming neighbourhoods that went down and out instead. No more unpaid bills and unanswered letters from collection agencies, no more S and M sessions with bankers, no more secretaries with dyslexia or hallucinating messenger boys, but, most important, no more Mitchell. No more Mitchell! Can you imagine how it felt, Laura, to know that I never had to do this guy’s homework ever again? That from now on it would be someone else’s problem if he overinvested or fiddled the books or made commitments that we couldn’t have honoured even if we had both
had kagamushus? Think how I felt, Laura, as I coasted down Potrero Hill.

  I have never had less trouble arranging a vacation. (That alone should have warned me.) I did not go into that travel agency with any firm idea about where to go. But when the agent showed me Molivos in the brochure, and I saw that picture of the villa we had always longed for, it seemed fated. That was where we would begin our new life. You must try and understand that I was in a trance.

  Normally something would have happened to shatter my happiness before I got home. As you know, it does not take much. But amazingly, and perhaps tragically, that afternoon nothing did, even though the odds were as always against me.

  I left the car unattended, with the engine running, in front of City Lights, while I ran across to Specs to give Rob my good news. And then, after doing the exact same thing in front of Coit Liquors, I drove the wrong way down a one-way street to get to Flower Power before it closed. I double parked in front of the Oakville Grocery – but did I have to rush out of the store half-way through and plead with a policeman? No. As I said, everything went my way.

  There were no convenient parking spaces when I got home. So I pulled up into the heart patient’s driveway to offload the champagne – and for once the old fart didn’t see me. And who should be there to hold the door for me but Mrs Last-resort Smith? I told her the good news, and that was when she offered to babysit so we could go out to celebrate.

  Together we loaded up the elevator which she then offered to hold for me while I parked the car. I don’t know if you remember, but they were filming that day at the top of The Crooked Street. I was sure I was going to have to drive half-way to North Beach. But no sooner had I turned the key in the ignition than a space opened up. You know, that space that is technically on the double yellow line but that in my opinion shouldn’t be?

  I could not believe my luck.