by Maria Semple
“I can just hang up. You are aware that cell phone technology makes such a thing possible.”
“I’m sorry. You’re right. You didn’t make me do anything. I’m responsible for my own actions.”
“He said, as if trying to convince himself.” Violet neared her house and slowed down.
“Hey, I want to apologize for not thanking you for fixing my car. You’re right, that was ghetto. So, thank you.”
“You’re welcome.”
“I just didn’t know how. You don’t realize how much sixteen hundred bucks is to me. I mean, the most I’ve ever had at one time was eight hundred dollars. I had a real job, selling sunglasses on the Venice boardwalk. And one day a bus of Japanese tourists gets out and buys my entire inventory. When I got home, I spread all the money out on the floor and just stared at it.”
“Then you spent it on drugs.”
“No! I was clean then. I bought a sleigh bed.”
“For the first time in your life you have money, and you go out and buy a sleigh bed?” Violet howled. “That has got to be the most low-rent thing I’ve ever heard!”
“Do you even know what a sleigh bed is?” he asked. “Those rad wooden beds with the iron metalwork.”
“Of course!” Violet couldn’t stop laughing.
“What’s so funny?”
“It’s just so nineties!”
“It was the fucking nineties. What do you want?”
“Where’s the sleigh bed now?”
“I sold it for drugs two months later.”
“How much did you get for it?”
“Fuck you.” He sounded hurt.
“Two hundred bucks?”
“Can we change the subject?”
“One hundred?” Violet found a shoulder and pulled over behind a guy selling fruit from a truck.
“Is your husband always going out of town?”
“We’re supposed to go to a spring equinox yoga retreat in Ojai. But I don’t feel like going.”
“So that’s when we’re going to fuck.”
“You’re pretty sure of that, aren’t you?”
The fruit guy shuffled over, holding a three-pack of strawberries in one hand and a bag of oranges in the other. Violet waved him off.
“Just stepping up and doing the right thing like you asked,” Teddy said.
“God! You totally don’t get what I meant by that.”
David’s Bentley whizzed by. He seemed to be on the phone himself and didn’t slow down. He probably hadn’t seen Violet. She fumbled for the gearshift and jerked the car into drive. “I’ve got to go,” she said.
“Why? What happened?”
“Don’t you have a Kennedy to dump?” Violet waited for the Flying Spur to disappear up their driveway, then merged onto Mulholland.
“I get it,” Teddy said. “Bye, Violet Parry.”
“Bye, Teddy Reyes.” Violet pushed the warm phone to her cheek. Her whole face ached from smiling so much. She drove through the Aleppo pines, making figure eights with her jaw to counter the cramps forming in her cheeks. If David asked — and she knew he wouldn’t! — she’d say she had pulled over to finish up a phone conversation before she got home. That wasn’t lying.
CHAPTER FOUR
Control It or It Controls You And the Sultans Played Creole
“YOU’RE DOING GREAT,” SALLY TOLD NORA ROSS, THE THICK-WAISTED WIFE OF Jordan Ross, head of one of the big talent agencies. Nora was doing some of the most pathetic grande pliés Sally had ever witnessed. “Plié, relevé, plié, relevé. Now with arms over the head.”
“Ugh!” Nora’s pudgy arms fell to her sides and she flopped breathlessly against the wall. “I am so stressed out. The guest list for tonight’s party keeps ballooning.”
An army of Mexicans carrying heat lamps passed by the bay window.
“Next to the pool!” Nora shouted. “Junto la piscina!” She turned to Sally. “Is that how you say it?”
“I think so. How about we switch to demi pliés?”
“I hate you,” said the wealthy butterball. “Can’t I just do those kicky things?”
“Fine. Dégagé, with foot flexed. Third position.” Sally set her feet and floated her arms into grande pose. “Right foot to the front. Tendu and dégagé. Heel leads the toe.”
Nora flung her leg forward with all the grace of kicking a cat. “Please tell me these will get rid of my fat ass.”
“You know what I say, Control it or it controls you.” That was Sally’s motto, from a bumper sticker she had on her three-ring binder in high school. “And one way to control your tush is dégagé. To the back. Toe leads heel. Dégagé.”
The phone rang. Happy to bail, Nora unlatched a cabinet door and answered it.
Since the Rosses’ only child, J.J., had been diagnosed with autism, any object that could conceivably be picked up and hurled by a tantruming child — framed photos, telephone, ceramic bowls — had been secured behind custom-built glass-fronted cabinets. Last year, Sally had shown up to find the glass shattered and all the treasured memories in a million pieces in a heap on the floor. (Nora sent Sally home that day but still paid for the whole hour, which was really classy.) The following week, the glass had been removed and in its place, chicken wire. Behind which were imprisoned the images of Nora and Jordan smiling on the Great Wall, arms around Bill Clinton, huddled with Jack Nicholson at the Vanity Fair Oscar party, Nora, happy and pregnant on a yacht off Croatia. Before the diagnosis, before they stopped taking pictures.
Nora hung up and locked the phone back in the cabinet. “Can we just do abs and call it a day?” She kicked open the mat Sally had brought and sprawled out on it. “Jordan put the arm on all his big stars to show up. And word got out, so everybody, I mean everybody, wants to come.” She rolled on her side and curled up. “That’s what happens when you’re only charging five hundred bucks a plate. Live and learn, am I right?”
“Let’s try for twenty leg darts,” said Sally.
“I hate those.” Nora yelled out, “Zdenka!”
Sally braced herself for the entrance of the young Czech nanny, who clearly outranked her in the Ross household.
“Yes?” asked Zdenka in her hard accent. She nursed a bottle of exotic water. Anytime Nora outgrew a piece of clothing, it ended up on Zdenka. Today she sported a Dolce & Gabbana silk shirt, True Religion jeans, and Hogan shoes. Sally would have looked totally hot in that shirt, belted over leggings with her new Hermès belt. But did Sally ever get a crack at any of Nora’s discards? No.
“The gals are coming to put together the goody bags in the dining room,” Nora said. “Don’t let J.J. anywhere near that, please.”
“Of course,” answered the nanny, and left.
Nora raised a leg in the air, an indication that she wished to be stretched out. Sally complied. Her student groaned with pleasure, then asked, “So. What’s the latest on your beau?”
Sally had hoped Nora wouldn’t ask. It had been two weeks since Sally had seen the ring. Still, Jeremy hadn’t proposed. Sally was completely flummoxed. “We’re doing fine,” she said.
“I don’t see a ring on your finger.”
“If he proposes, he proposes. If he doesn’t, I’m fine with that, too.” This was what Sally had started to tell those who asked.
Nora yanked her leg free. “What do you mean? Two weeks ago you raved about what a good fit you two were.”
“I know. But I think I’m looking for someone more . . . emotionally available.”
“Please!” Nora crossed one leg over the other. Sally pushed the stuffed sausages into Nora’s chest. “Men don’t care about how you feel. That’s what girlfriends are for. If you’re waiting around for a guy who will share his feelings, you’d better pack Proust, because you’re going to be waiting a mighty long time.”
“I like that,” Sally said.
“You don’t have to like it or dislike it. You just have to accept it. Jordan and I have a great marriage. But does he ever have a clue what I’m feel
ing? Never! That doesn’t mean he’s a bad husband.”
“And you’re a great wife.”
“Well, thank you. I try to be. Sure, in the early days, we were screwing three times a day and making spectacles of ourselves in public and it was all very dramatic. But time passes. He has his career. I have my causes. We have a special-needs kid. We’re partners who love each other.”
Partners who love each other. Sally’s thoughts quickened. It was as if she and Jeremy had fast-forwarded past the fireworks phase straight to the partner phase. And if she wanted to talk about feelings, she had friends for that. Feelings. They suddenly seemed so trivial in the context of a whole life together. “Can you finish off with ten basic crunches?” She really wanted to help Nora with that waist.
“Fine,” moaned Nora. “But only ten.”
Sally lay on the hardwood floor and led Nora in some crunches. “One, two, three —” The overhead lights flashed. Sally squeezed her eyes shut, then squinted. J.J. stood in the doorway, flipping the switch and staring expressionless into the bulbs. On the outside, J.J. was a beautiful eight year old with long blond curls. There was no way of knowing how damaged and creepy he was on the inside. Sally closed her eyes. The hot rays burned through her eyelids and into her retina, on-off-on-off-on-off. She shielded her eyes and shot a look at J.J., but he was transfixed by the repetition.
“Could someone get him to stop that?!” Sally cried. “My God! Stop it! Where’s his nanny —”
Zdenka stared down at her. “I’m right here.”
Sally quickly turned to Nora. “I’m sorry. . . .” For all of Nora’s complaining, she did pay cash and worked out in the middle of the day when the dance studio was closed. And Nora never once put up a fight about paying for canceled sessions. Sally couldn’t afford to lose Nora, one of her bread-and-butter clients. “I apologize.” Sally’s voice trembled. “My eyes are just really sensitive.”
“Zdenka, take him to the park or something, will you?” Nora said, unfazed by Sally’s freak-out.
Sally flopped into a forward bend, fully aware she had just dodged a bullet. The Jeremy situation was beginning to affect her work. Control it or it controls you. It was time to apply her motto to Jeremy.
HOW do you look when you’re interested? Violet tried to remember, as she and David drove up Beverly Glen, Dot a bubbly passenger in her car seat.
“. . . Capitol is trying to get us to rerecord two of the tracks,” David was saying. “So contractually, I can shop the record. I’ve got Columbia frothing at the mouth.”
“Sultans of Swing” came on the radio. Violet loved this song. She was about to turn onto Mulholland, and music sounded better on Mulholland. She started to reach for the volume, but David was still talking; such an act on Violet’s part ran the risk of igniting a conflagration.
“The question is,” he said, “do we stay with Capitol and force them to release the tracks? Or would that make them lose enthusiasm for the single?”
A question. He had just asked her a question. Thank God it was still buffered in her short-term memory. Violet rewound it in her head and replied, “Is one of the tracks in question the first single?” Violet felt good about her reply; it was quick and informed, the reply of someone who cared.
“Yes. They gave me a list of producers. George Drakoulias was at the top.”
“We love George,” Violet said.
“Maybe I’ll give him a call.”
“Want dat. Want dat.” Dot had spotted Violet’s cell phone in the cup holder. Violet slipped it back to Dot, her gaze never deserting her husband.
“But all this — Hanging with Yoko, the record label, the catalogues — it’s all starting to look like a fucking hobby compared to what the gold stocks are doing. You know what I say. Gold, it’s the king of money. When it starts to run, it’s going to be scary.”
“I’m so happy for you,” Violet said.
“Be happy for us. It’s ours.” David kicked at something on the floor. “What’s this?”
“Oh,” she said, “when I subscribed to Cook’s Illustrated, without realizing it, I signed up for some cookbook-of-the-month thing. And most of the recipes involve meat, so I can’t use them.”
“Have you gotten off the list, at least?”
“I tried, but it’s such a pain. So I thought I’d just give them to LadyGo.”
David picked up a cookbook and leafed through it. “She can’t understand this.”
“I know, but there was a monster line at the post office when I went to return them. I’m sure LadyGo knows somebody who wants them.”
David stared at her, jaw hanging. “That’s your solution? For every month for the rest of my life, I’m going to pay, what” — he looked for a price on the book — “thirty-nine bucks for a cookbook that you’re giving to someone who doesn’t speak English, in hopes that she’ll find someone who wants it? Come on, Violet.”
“I’m sorry.” She should have known this would happen. She should never have left these books in her car.
“It’s not about the money,” he said. “It’s just — how are we living, here?”
“You’re right. I’ll get off the list and return the books on Monday.”
David wasn’t happy, but at least he had stopped talking. Just in time for Violet’s favorite part of the song.
And a crowd of young boys, they’re fooling around in the corner
Drunk and dressed in their best brown baggies and their platform soles
They don’t give a damn about any trumpet playing band
It ain’t what they call rock and roll. . . .
Violet held her breath to better hear her favorite line, the one that never failed to slay her:
And the Sultans played Creole.
Violet’s eyes welled up.
“Get that cell phone out of Dot’s hand!” It was David, talking again. “She could get brain cancer.”
“It’s not on.” Violet turned and held out her hand for Dot. “Mommy needs that back, sweetie.”
“That’s not the point. I don’t want her in the habit — Shit — Violet, are you crying? What’s going on?”
“I just really love this song.”
“ ‘The Sultans of Swing’?” David frowned and his head jerked back slightly, as if he was jolted by that fact. “Really?”
“Have you ever listened to the words?”
“No.”
“It’s about these working stiffs who play in a band every Friday night. And when they’re onstage, nobody appreciates them. But they don’t care. Because for those few hours, they’re . . . free.”
David looked alarmed. “Maybe you can go see Dire Straits next time they’re in town. Or, you know what, Mutt Lange is friends with Mark Knopfler. We can all go to dinner next time we’re in London.”
Teddy hadn’t called for two weeks! Two weeks tomorrow. Who jerks off to you five minutes after they meet you and asks what your pussy is like and doesn’t call you for two weeks? Violet had called him. Twice. Left messages both times, but nothing. Who winds someone up like that just to go AWOL? Where was he? Did he know how much pain she was in? How she jumped any time she heard her cell phone ring? How his absence made time crawl? Was he dying of hepatitis C somewhere? Had he not broken up with the Kennedy girl after all? Were they somewhere fucking, him repeating everything she said, him laughing at her jokes? Did being in his aura make her drunk with submission? He had told Violet she was the most pure thing he had ever experienced. Didn’t that merit a return phone call? She had gotten the mechanic’s bill. Sixteen hundred dollars to fix his shitty car, and no phone call? He was going to write poems for her! He wanted to fuck her in the ass! Call her back! She wanted to twinkle! But ever since the putting green, ever since that thrilling phone call on Benedict Canyon, ever since all she had to do was close her eyes and he was there, she couldn’t twinkle on her own.
David typed into his BlackBerry and flashed Violet a triumphant smile. “Mark Knopfler’s number. I e-mailed it to you. Y
ou can call him when we get home. Done and done.”
David had no idea. The last person Violet wanted to talk to was Mark Knopfler.
CHAPTER FIVE
The Ferrari
“TODAY WE’RE PROUD TO INTRODUCE OUR NEW COLLEAGUE, JEREMY White.” A hot guy Sally recognized from TV — Jim Something-or-Other — spoke directly into the camera. “Many of you know the name from his ‘Just the Stats’ column, which appears in over a dozen newspapers nationwide. Beginning today, the big man himself will be joining the Match-Ups team every Sunday morning. Welcome, Jeremy.”
Jeremy’s face appeared on the dozen monitors throughout the dark soundstage. Sally’s fingers were crossed in her pocket. She closed her eyes: her entire future hinged on the next three minutes.
“Hi, I’m Jeremy White. Let’s take a look at one of sports’ most exciting events, the NCAA Sweet Sixteen. First off, the matchup between heavily favored Georgetown and the little team that could, Canisius College. . . .” The voice filling the air was soothing, almost musical. Sally opened her eyes. Yes, it was Jeremy, aglow on the enormous screen overhead, his face relaxed, his eyes gazing directly and calmly into hers. Finally, he wasn’t wearing those dirty earplugs. His jacket and tie added a sexy look of authority. Sally blinked. It was as if she was beholding the man she imagined Jeremy to be when they were apart, only to have her heart sink when she saw how awkward he was in person. She turned around. In the booth, Maryam and the executives muttered excitedly, equally transfixed by this suddenly charismatic apparition.
“And who do you belong to?” Hot, wet breath tickled Sally’s ear. It was Jim, the anchorman who had introduced Jeremy. Without waiting for an answer, he ambled over to the food table.
Sally scurried to keep up. “I’m a friend of Maryam and Jeremy’s.”
“Shush!” said a voice.
“First time on a set?” Jim whispered, shaking sugar to the bottom of five packets.
“No!”
“Shhh!” Maryam stepped out of the booth and shot Sally a nasty look.
“We’re all heading to Marie Callender’s after this.” Jim poured the sugar directly into his mouth and took a hard swallow. “Maybe you’d like to join.”
