All My Mother's Lovers

by Ilana Masad

  “Is that how you’re reading it to her these days?” Iris swats him playfully in the chest. “No wonder she always demands you when I take that book out!”

  “Look, after the twelfth time in a row, I have to do something to make it interesting,” he says. “Speaking of, she’s finally napping now. That was quite the morning.”

  “I know,” Iris says. “Thank you for taking over, love.” She’d been up with Maggie since five, when an extremely loud Harley or a car without a muffler drove by, scaring the little girl so badly awake that she started screaming like she was being murdered. It had taken Iris three readings of Possum Magic before Maggie allowed herself to be put down without beginning to cry again, but she still wouldn’t sleep so Iris had spent most of the morning coloring, playing blocks, and running around pretending to chase her daughter. She was exhausted. But Maggie was usually such a daddy’s girl—from the moment Peter first held her at the hospital and she went quiet after crying in Iris’s arms—that Iris loved getting her to herself once in a while.

  “So, are you excited?” Peter asked as the hourly news came on. Iris was back to watching the pan, waiting for the grilled cheese sandwiches she was making to turn the perfect shade of crispy.

  “About what?” she asked, genuinely confused. He wasn’t referencing tonight, was he?

  “Your favorite serial killer is getting sentenced today!”

  “He’s not my favorite,” Iris whined. “It’s not like that, I just find the whole thing so . . . lurid. So awful. How could anyone do the things he did?”

  “You’re asking the wrong person, darling. Remember, I’m an avowed pacifist. I was all set to return my draft card to the government and go to jail when they abolished the damn thing.”

  “And took away your self-righteous heroism? How dare they!”

  But Peter wasn’t entirely wrong in asking about the killer—she’d been reading any article that came out about him since he was arrested last year. She was fascinated by the man being sentenced that day, who’d been convicted over the weekend. They said he’d actually eaten parts of people. She shuddered. She didn’t know why it was so interesting, but she usually stuck to fiction for just this reason; she had a feeling she was too interested, sometimes. It was embarrassing—she worried people would think she was one of those women who fell for evil men. She’d done it once before, after all. But she didn’t find these killers attractive—she just found their capacity to do what they did so surreal that it became abstract.

  “Here we go,” Iris said, flipping the sandwiches onto two plates. “Voilà!”

  “This is deeply unhealthy,” Peter said, spreading more butter on the still hot bread, making it melt immediately.

  “Well, yes, but we need all the calories we can get if she’s as energetic after her nap as she was this morning. Cheers,” Iris added and raised her sandwich.

  “Cheers.” Peter lifted his own and they touched corners before each taking a big bite. “Mmm,” he hummed while chewing. He looked like the happiest man in the world, in that moment.

  Iris wished she had a camera around—she could caption the photo “Beloved, with Grilled Cheese, 1992.” She didn’t want to ruin that blissful expression, but she couldn’t help herself from asking. “Are you still okay with me going out tonight?”

  Peter pointed to his mouth, still full, and nodded.

  “Are you sure?” she pushed.

  He swallowed and took her hands. “Love,” he said, turning serious. “Yes, I’m sure. But—”

  “What? But what? If it’s not okay, please tell me, and I’ll stay home, just be honest, please—”

  “No, no, it’s not that,” he said. “It’s just that every time you ask me if it’s okay, it makes it feel like a much bigger deal than it needs to be, and then I feel like maybe I shouldn’t be. The point is, yes, I’m absolutely fine with you going out tonight. Maggie and I have a big evening planned! I’m going to make tomato soup and she’s never tried it before, but since she’ll get to dip bread in it, I bet she’ll like it.”

  Iris laughed. Their daughter’s love of bread had at first seemed to be tied to how much she loved tossing it at the seagulls at the beach, but more recently she was asking for it at every mealtime. She crumbled it between her fingers, mostly, though some of it did make it into her mouth. Even though her daughter was in another room, asleep finally, Iris felt that surge of love for her that never seemed to deplete, that shocked her with its intensity every time the little girl called her “Mamama,” almost always going a syllable too far. Iris grabbed Peter’s free hand and squeezed. “I love you so much,” Iris said. “I love her so much. I love this, all of this, so much.”

  Peter tried to smile but had another bite of food in his mouth and could only give a sort of grimace, which made her laugh again.

  * * *

  • • •

  ON HER WAY out that evening, Iris grabbed her amber necklace at the last minute, the one her mother gave her. Her mother would never approve, but that didn’t matter right now. The necklace was good luck, her mother had said when she gave it to her, the day of the small courthouse wedding with Peter. It had survived the war with her, somehow, and the journey to the United States. When Iris had asked why she didn’t get the necklace when she married Shlomo, her mother just said that it hadn’t felt right and refused to elaborate. Iris never talked in detail about what Shlomo did to her, but they hadn’t objected to her divorce, and though they were deeply skeptical of her marrying a Catholic—it didn’t matter how many times she told them he was lapsed—their reservations melted away when they met him. When they finally had Maggie, her father had started calling Peter “son” in a boisterous American Dad kind of way that made Iris giggle, even though she knew it was, really, quite the statement.

  “Goodbye, my loves,” Iris said, peeking in the door of the bathroom.

  “Quack quaky quack,” Peter said, nodding Maggie’s rubber ducky bath toy at Iris. “That’s duck for ‘bye-bye, have a good time, we love you!’ Don’t we love Mommy, Maggie?”

  “Love Mommy!” the little naked girl squealed and then plopped herself back in the bath, reveling in the water splashing.

  “I’ll kiss you good night when I’m back, sweetness. And you too,” she added to Peter, but didn’t get closer, not wanting to get her clothes splashed. She was wearing her high-waisted light-wash Levi’s with a sleeveless pink vest tucked into it and a loose navy sports coat to keep warm in the February chill.

  “Drive safe,” Peter called as she exited.

  “I will!” she yelled back.

  * * *

  • • •

  HOURS LATER, AS she walked into the silent house, she remembered Peter’s parting words and felt her face flame up again. She had driven safely, in more ways than one. She’d even brought her own condoms, procured at the pharmacy yesterday, and insisted on using them even though she had an IUD, because Harold had admitted to not having always been careful.

  Ah, Harold. Harold was a couples’ counselor, though Iris hadn’t met him through his profession, of course. She’d met him, of all places, at a singles’ night in an LA bar. She hadn’t even been there for herself; she was accompanying her friend Dena, a few years younger than her, who believed she had terrible taste in men. Iris was sleeping over at her place because she’d been working on getting everything ready for the rabbi’s son’s bar mitzvah at Dena’s synagogue and it was silly to drive back to Oxnard just to wake up early and come all the way back to LA. Dena had promised a girls’ night, which Iris had thought meant they were going to watch a movie and have some wine, but Dena surprised her by insisting they go out.

  “I pick the cheaters, guys who take my money, and men who call me fat. Every time. You have to help me screen them, Iris, or I swear I’ll bring home another lemon.”

  So Iris had agreed, and while Dena chatted up a few guys and reported back
to Iris, who kept nixing them, she found herself sitting at the bar next to an older man who hadn’t tried talking to anyone and seemed to be watching the whole thing at a remove.

  “Are you an anthropologist or something?” she’d asked him, sipping her white wine. Dena was drunk by this point and dancing with a man in a tweed jacket, and Iris had a feeling she should insist they go home soon.

  “Or something,” he’d said. “Psychologist. Harold.”

  They’d spent the rest of the evening flirting, and Harold, who had only had one beer, drove them back to Dena’s place. “Wait here a second,” Iris whispered when she got out of the car. She helped Dena inside and to bed and then came back out. Harold was still there, smoking a cigarette with his car off and its radio on playing the kind of sleepy, late-night jazz Iris loved.

  She got back in the car. “I’m married,” she told him. “And I have a child.”

  “Okay,” he said, affable.

  “But that isn’t something that should worry you.”

  “Okay,” he repeated.

  “I mean,” Iris said. “Because, well, it’s complicated. But. Are you okay with that?”

  “That depends. Are you okay with the fact that I’m a widower and that I have two teenage boys at home? Are you okay with the fact that I’m probably at least fifteen years older than you?”

  “Yes, yes, I’m okay with it,” Iris said. She leaned forward and kissed him.

  * * *

  • • •

  NOW, BACK HOME, her body felt both relaxed and exhausted. She cleaned her makeup off in the bathroom, undressed quietly, and went to kiss Maggie, who was sleeping with her mouth open and the trunk of her stuffed elephant clutched in one small fist. She gazed at her daughter for a moment longer, feeling boundless, huge, as if she could encompass the world with goodness and beauty and—she didn’t have the words for it, so she just tried to feel it as she touched her daughter’s cheek once more before padding back to her and Peter’s bedroom.

  * * *

  • • •

  HE DIDN’T WAKE up fully when she climbed under the covers, but he shifted his body so he could spoon her. He pulled her in close to him and breathed deeply the scent at the back of her neck. “I’m glad you’re back,” he murmured. “I love you.”

  “I love you too,” she whispered. Sated, grateful, in love with everything, she fell asleep.

  AUGUST 29, 2017

  The name clicks into place. No. It can’t be. Can it? “Harold Lake Brooks?” Maggie asks.

  “Yes,” he says, smiles. “That’s me!”

  “Oh boy.” The words slip out without forethought. Harold raises his eyebrows at her. “Um, will you excuse me for a moment?”

  “Of course,” he says. “My understanding of this custom is that I’m here to share space and time with you, without any demands. Please, do whatever it is you have to do.”

  Now she has to get up, though. She doesn’t want to yell for Peter, because he’ll ask what she’s doing, and she’s not sure she’s ready to tell him about all this. Maybe she can slip the letter to Harold when he’s leaving. She pulls Ariel’s number up on her phone and calls. He sounds confused when he answers. “Why are you—”

  “Hey, I need help getting off the couch,” she says, and hangs up. Ariel storms in a moment later, but stops short when he sees Harold.

  “Oh, sorry, I didn’t know we had company. Hi,” he says, “I’m Ariel.” He holds a hand out to Harold to shake. Maggie wonders when he became so grown-up. She has a flash of understanding—how Iris always marveled at Maggie whenever they saw each other once she left home, the way she would remark on anything adultlike that Maggie did with a kind of disbelief.

  Ariel helps her get up from her prone position and leads her into the hall. “You’re not bailing again, are you?” he hisses when they’re out of Harold’s earshot.

  “No, I just need my stuff. You said you had all my stuff.”

  “Yeah, it’s still in my car, you could have just asked me to get it,” Ariel says. “You’re not supposed to be getting up just for that.”

  “It’s nice of you to worry and all, but I need to get it myself.”

  “Why?”

  Maggie doesn’t know what to say. Her ribs ache. So she tells Ariel the truth. “That’s Harold. The letter they found in Dad’s car, it’s for this guy.”

  “Wait, what? What the hell, dude. What’s he doing here? What does he want? How does he know Mom?” Ariel’s agitation is visible as he leans from side to side on different hips, one hand beating a rhythm against his thigh inside his pocket, the other yanking impatiently at a loose thread on his t-shirt.

  “Ariel, I’ll tell you everything, if you want to know, I promise, but right now, I just want to give this guy the letter and get him out of here before Dad needs to deal with him too much, okay?” The idea of Peter needing to spend a significant amount of time facing a man who cuckolded him—an old-fashioned term that Maggie has always hated, but which somehow matches how icked out she is by this situation—is unbearable. Her anger swells again. She can’t believe how old this guy is, too.

  “Okay, okay, just, yeah, I’ll get it, okay?” He walks away, leaving Maggie to slowly head back into the living room. She manages to sit on another straight-backed chair next to Harold—easier to get in and out of than the squashy couch.

  “So, uh, how do you, I mean, how did you know Iris?” Maggie asks him. He turns his benign expression on her. She notices a white curl peeking out of his left nostril. She doesn’t want to picture him and her mother going at it. There’s something terrifying about the notion, as scary as Karl Jelen being dead—it reminds Maggie that she, too, will be this age one day. She too will have ex-lovers whose faces will have changed beyond recognition, bodies aged.

  “I’m an old, old friend,” he says. “Iris and I reconnected recently. She was a remarkable woman.”

  “Yeah,” Maggie says, fighting off images of what makes a straight cis man call a woman remarkable. “She was.”

  “Here we go. This is lovely, Harold, thank you.”

  “Oh,” Maggie says. “You know each other already?”

  “Yes,” Peter says. “Your mom, well, you could say she volunteered at the, ah—what would you call it? You live there, so . . .”

  “The old folks’ home,” Harold says, laughing. “That’s what it is! It’s a home, and we’re all old folks!”

  “I think Iris called it assisted living,” Peter says, smiling as well. Maggie looks between them, uncomfortable. She wants Harold out. This is her father’s home, his territory, and he shouldn’t have to share it with one of these awful secrets his wife kept. A part of Maggie feels embarrassed for Peter, just sitting there, not knowing, thinking this is a totally normal situation.

  “Ever the diplomat, our Iris,” Harold says.

  “Excuse me?” She’s vibrating now, the adrenaline moving through her body making her forget all about the pain. She’s on her feet, though she isn’t aware of making a decision to get up, and she’s standing over Harold, her fists clenched. “Our?” she repeats.

  “Don’t be rude, Maggie,” Peter says. He holds his mouth tight and small, his eyes narrowed at her. He knows Harold as a friend, she reminds herself. He doesn’t know what Harold is implying, what Maggie knows is implied by collectively claiming Iris.

  The tension is broken by Ariel knocking on the empty frame of the living room doorway. Maggie’s anger slides away from her body and the pain comes back. She sits back down, feeling like a chastised child. She shakes her head at Ariel, who keeps his hand, presumably carrying the envelope, behind him.

  “Harold, can I get you something to drink?” Peter asks, as if nothing has happened.

  “Sure, water, anything,” Harold says, but as Peter leaves, the old man turns his gaze between Maggie and Ariel. His blue eyes are keen and clear, and Maggie
can’t help but hate them.

  “Now, Ariel,” she hisses. He bounds over, hands her the letter rather than Harold. “This is for you. From Mom,” she says, thrusting it over into his lap. “And if my dad wasn’t in the other room, I would ask you a whole lot more questions,” she adds softly as she hears Peter clinking ice into a glass.

  When Peter comes back, Maggie stays silent, letting him and Ariel and Harold exchange empty pleasantries about the weather, traffic, the food at Harold’s assisted living. Peter ignores, or doesn’t notice, the letter now lying facedown on Harold’s lap. He tries to get Maggie involved in the conversation, asking her about the hospital food, wondering if it’s equivalent to Harold’s dining hall, and though she makes herself stretch her mouth into an approximation of a smile, makes herself answer in as few words as she can manage, the fact is that her skin is crawling. Harold’s presence is unbearable.

  Soon enough, he gets up to go. When he stretches his hand out to shake hers, and she complies, she notices how soft his skin is, baby soft, Lucia soft. He meets her eyes, intent. He looks like he wants to say something, but Peter is there beside him, about to help him out and into an Uber, so he lets go of Maggie’s hand, shakes Ariel’s, and turns to leave.

  * * *

  • • •

  “ALL RIGHT, WHAT was going on there?” Peter comes out the sliding door into the garden where Maggie is sitting with Ariel, rolling herself a joint. She doesn’t bother trying to hide it. Fuck it, she figures. She’s an adult. “Is that marijuana?” he adds as he comes closer and sees what she’s doing. “You still smoke that stuff?”

  “What, you mean I was supposed to have been scared straight by Mom? Or the pigs?” she asks, and puts it to her lips. Peter raises his eyebrows and sits down in one of the remaining two rickety metal chairs.

  “Pigs? Really? People still call cops that? Some things never change, I guess,” he says. He watches quietly as Maggie lights up in front of him, takes a long drag. She holds the joint out to Ariel, who shakes his head and leans back into his chair, as if to put the most physical distance between himself and the incriminating drug.