Mrs. Fletcher

by Tom Perrotta

  “Thanks for coming,” he said, shaking her hand with robotic indifference. “Tough day. Good to see you. Means a lot.”

  Eve wasn’t even sure he recognized her, which left her feeling vaguely offended as she left the funeral home. Come on, you know who I am! She was about to laugh at the selfishness of her reaction, but she was distracted by the cool evening air when she stepped outside, the dusky blue of the sky, and the freshly paved street in front of her, its blackness bisected by a bright yellow line, a world so inexplicably beautiful that she forgot what she was thinking about and just stood still for a moment, breathing it all in.

  * * *

  The Bikram instructor that night was Jojo, not Amanda’s favorite. She would have preferred Kendra, the soulful, slightly overweight woman who read inspirational meditations about self-acceptance during Savasana at the beginning and end of class. Kendra roamed the studio like a benign spirit, the goddess of encouragement, always ready with a supportive comment. Sometimes that was all you needed, a trinket of praise to get you through the most brutal poses, Utkatasana or Balancing Stick, the ones that made you hate your body and wonder why you even bothered.

  “Let’s go, people!” Jojo clapped his hands as if summoning a dog. “Where’s the energy? There’s no such thing as halfway in Bikram!”

  Jojo was a beautiful Asian man with the body of a gymnast and the soul of a drill sergeant. His adjustments were rare and brusque and sometimes borderline inappropriate, as if his lack of sexual interest in women gave him license to touch them wherever and however he pleased.

  Even so, Amanda knew that complaining about Jojo was pure luxury, like whining about the prices at Whole Foods. The real miracle was that anybody taught Bikram yoga in Haddington. Ten years ago, when she’d left for Sarah Lawrence, there hadn’t been a single yoga studio in her hometown. Now there were three—Bikram, Prana, and Royal Serenity, whatever that was—as well as a CrossFit gym, a decent vegan restaurant, and a tattoo parlor whose owner had a degree from RISD. Without realizing it, she’d been part of a hipster reverse migration, legions of overeducated, underpaid twenty-somethings getting squeezed out of the city, spreading beyond the pricey inner suburbs to the more affordable outposts like Haddington, transforming the places they’d once fled, making them livable again, or at least tolerable.

  Another reason for gratitude: Jojo’s classes were more sparsely attended than Kendra’s, so she had some room to spread out, no worries about her personal space getting invaded by a rude neighbor, or slipping on a puddle of fresh-squeezed man-sweat. She hated to be sexist, but it was undeniable: men were gross at Bikram. Everybody perspired, but certain guys took it to a freakish extreme, dripping like faucets throughout the entire ninety minutes of class, the foam of their mats squishing underfoot.

  Tonight there were only five males in the class, none of them familiar, thank God. A couple of weeks ago she’d found herself standing one row behind a guy she’d hooked up with on Tinder, a forty-two-year-old graphic artist named Dell, with long graying hair and a sad little belly bulging over the waistband of his Speedo. Their eyes had met in the front mirror and he’d smiled in happy surprise. She was aware of his scrutiny throughout all twenty-six postures, and it had completely ruined her concentration. And then he’d tried to chat her up in the parking lot, as if they were old pals, rather than strangers who’d fucked once, just because they both happened to be bored and lonely at the same time.

  She wasn’t sure why the encounter had unnerved her so much. Dell was a pretty nice guy—they’d actually done okay in bed together—and she was ninety-nine percent sure his presence at the studio was pure coincidence, not the beginning of a stalking nightmare. But it didn’t matter; it was just creepy to see him there, totally out of context, as if he were an actual human being, rather than a figment of her sexual imagination. She went home that night and deleted her Tinder account, so nothing like that would ever happen again.

  *

  At the Senior Center, Amanda’s tattoos were a constant source of friction with the clients, and, apparently, an open invitation to criticism, like one of those bumper stickers that read, How’s my driving? She wished she could have supplied a toll-free number, so the irate old folks could call at their leisure and leave a message, instead of accosting her in the crafts room to inform her that she’d made a terrible mistake, that she could have been a pretty girl, and what the heck was she thinking?

  At least wear some long sleeves, the sweet old ladies told her. A turtleneck and some dark tights might not be such a bad idea, either.

  Something subtler, and far more frustrating, went on in the Bikram changing room, where a number of the younger women had tattoos of their own, though of a more decorous suburban variety—a dolphin on a shoulder blade, a constellation of three or four stars around an ankle, a cheerful little bird on the nape of the neck. The first time she undressed there, she felt a sudden chill of separation, her own more drastic aesthetic marking her as an instant outsider, the badass chick with the cobra wrapped around her leg, the hand grenade on her breast, the anarchist bomb on her thigh, and the meat cleaver—the only one she truly regretted—dripping blood on her upper arm.

  She tried to compensate by being extra friendly, smiling at everyone she passed, but the others rarely smiled back. Most of them avoided eye contact altogether, the same way Amanda used to avert her gaze from the anorexic woman at her old gym, the one who seemed intent on committing suicide by elliptical. You wanted to look—how could you not?—but you didn’t want to be rude, so you just minded your business and pretended she wasn’t there.

  Five years ago, when she’d been living in Brooklyn with Blake, she would have enjoyed this outcast feeling, the knowledge that she was a little too edgy for the yoga moms and single ladies of Haddington, but she wasn’t that person anymore. She was lonely and looking for new friends, and it broke her heart a little every time she showered and changed without exchanging a single pleasant word or sympathetic look with anyone.

  She’d gotten so used to being ignored, she wasn’t sure what to think when she emerged from the shower, a much-too-skimpy towel wrapped around her torso, and noticed a slender, pretty woman staring at her with a quizzical expression. Amanda had never seen this woman at Bikram before, but she’d been aware of her throughout the class. It was hard not to be—she was one of those front-row yoga goddesses, enviably fit and limber, observing herself in the mirror with an air of scientific detachment as she tied herself in elegant knots, barely breaking a sweat.

  It was a cramped space, a single wooden bench set between two rows of lockers, with several women milling about in various states of undress, trying not to get in one another’s way. Amanda had just released the towel when she sensed a presence at her side.

  “Excuse me?” The woman’s voice was surprisingly casual, considering that Amanda was naked, and she herself was wearing nothing but yoga pants. “I think we know each other.”

  The stranger was even prettier up close, with black pixie-cut hair and blue eyes that seemed pale and bright at the same time. A tiny tattoo peeked from the waistband of her pants, something dark and swirly, a tornado or maybe a comet.

  “You went to Haddington?” she continued. “We were in AP English senior year?”

  Her voice sounded vaguely familiar, but Amanda searched in vain for a name to connect to the face. It didn’t help that she was distracted by the woman’s breasts, which were small and pert, with optimistic upturned nipples. She couldn’t help wondering what that would feel like, having boobs that defied gravity, and a stomach so flat it might actually be concave. She glanced with longing at her own discarded towel, lying uselessly on the floor.

  “I’m sorry,” Amanda said. “Your name is . . . ?”

  “Beckett.” After an awkward moment of silence, the woman smiled, realizing her error. “In high school I went by Trish? Trish Lozano?”

  Holy shit, Amanda thought. Trish Lozano. She could see it now, the ghost of the girl she’d known h
idden inside a whole new person.

  “I didn’t recognize you,” she said. “You were blond back then.”

  “Of course I was.” Trish shook her head. “I was such a cliché. The cute little cheerleader from hell.”

  Amanda wasn’t sure how to respond. She’d never thought of Trish Lozano as a cliché. She was more like the platonic ideal of an American high school girl, pretty and bubbly and super-popular, always at the center of the action. And she’d been smart, too, which seemed even more unfair.

  “Your name’s Beckett now?”

  “I changed it in college. I got into acting and Trish just seemed so blah. We were doing this all-female production of Waiting for Godot, and I don’t know, Beckett seemed like a cool name.” Trish rolled her eyes, amused by her younger, more pretentious self. “Turns out I’m a terrible actor, so the joke was on me. But I kept the name. It’s a big improvement.”

  Amanda could feel herself nodding a little too emphatically, as if she were receiving news of profound importance, and it made her queasy to think of what she must look like, plump and flushed and naked, listening so intently to a beautiful, bare-breasted woman who called herself Beckett.

  “You look great,” Trish said, touching her gently on the arm. “Are you still living here?”

  “It’s just temporary.” Amanda’s face warmed with embarrassment. “I was living with my boyfriend in Brooklyn, but . . .” It was a long story, not one she wanted to go into just then. She turned toward the open locker, rifling through her clothes until she found her bra. “What about you?”

  “Visiting my mom.” Trish made a sour face, as if this were an unpleasant obligation, like jury duty. “I live in L.A. now. I went out there for film school and never looked back. My fiancé’s a DP. You know, a cinematographer? So I think we’re pretty much stuck there.”

  Involuntarily, Amanda’s gaze strayed to Trish’s left hand, the small diamond gleaming tastefully, not the least bit boastful or obnoxious. Just a fact.

  “Wow.” Amanda hooked her bra, then gave the underwires a little tug, getting everything in alignment. “That’s exciting.”

  She grabbed her panties—they were black and high-waisted, with stretchy lace panels on the sides—and pulled them on. She felt a little better now that she was decent, glad it was a good underwear day.

  “Do you work in the movie business, too?”

  “I was a PA for a while, but now I teach at Soul Cycle. Probably do it for a few more years, till we’re ready to start a family.” Trish shrugged, not unhappily. “You?”

  “Single,” Amanda said, trying to sound matter-of-fact. “Just getting my life in order. I’m the events coordinator at the Senior Center. They actually have a pretty good lecture series.”

  Trish nodded, but there was a faraway look in her eyes, as if she wasn’t really listening.

  “This is so weird,” she said. “I still think about you sometimes.”

  “Me?” Amanda gave a puzzled laugh. She and Trish had barely exchanged two words in high school. “Why?”

  “To be honest?” Trish said. “You kinda freaked me out. You were always staring at me like I was this horrible, stuck-up, shallow person, and I couldn’t understand why you hated me so much.”

  “I didn’t hate you,” Amanda said. “I didn’t even know you.”

  “It’s okay,” Trish told her. “I had this epiphany in college. It just hit me one day, like, Fuck, I was a mean girl! That’s why she hated me! Sometimes, even now, I wake up in the middle of the night, and I’m just so ashamed of the way I treated people, how fucking selfish I was, such a little princess. So when I saw you here, I just thought I should come over and apologize. Make things right.”

  “You don’t need to apologize.”

  “I am so sorry,” Trish said, and the next thing Amanda knew they were hugging, Trish’s proud little cheerleader boobs mashing into her chest. “I am really and truly sorry for the person I used to be.”

  * * *

  Eve couldn’t remember the last time she’d gone to a restaurant by herself—not a coffee shop or a hole-in-the-wall pizzeria, but an actual sit-down restaurant with waiters and cloth napkins, a place where the other diners glanced at you with pity when you were first seated at your table for one, and then did their best not to look at you after that, as if you were disfigured in some way, and shouldn’t be made to feel self-conscious about it. And that was actually preferable to seeing someone you knew, giving them that sheepish little wave across the dining room—Yup, here I am, all by myself!—and then keeping your eyes glued to your plate for the next half hour, until either you left or they did.

  But Eve had decided to do it anyway, to lean into the awkwardness and try to conquer it. Her inspiration was an article a newly divorced acquaintance had posted on Facebook—Going Solo: Fifteen Fun Things to Do by Yourself . . . for Yourself!—that had pointed out that too many single women deprive themselves of all sorts of pleasures out of simple fear of embarrassment, of being seen as less-than because they weren’t part of a couple or a friend group. Just face up to this fear, the article suggested, and do what you want to do, and you might come to realize that there was nothing to be afraid of in the first place.

  Go ahead, the writer concluded. I dare you!

  Some of the suggested activities seemed lame—Take a Long Hot Bath; Cook Yourself a Gourmet Candlelight Dinner—and also beside the point, if the point was to overcome the stigma of being a woman alone in public. Others seemed unduly ambitious—Go Kayaking; Run a Marathon—or financially infeasible—Take a Caribbean Cruise; Visit a New Continent. But there were a few that landed right in her sweet spot—simple, inexpensive ways to treat yourself that required little more than the courage to get out of the house: Sing a Song at Karaoke Night; Go to a Bar and Order a Fancy Cocktail; Take Yourself Out to Dinner.

  The restaurant she picked was Gennaro’s, a homey red sauce Italian place on Haddington Boulevard. It was Brendan’s favorite, always his first choice on those nights when Eve had worked late or was too tired to cook. The hostess, a high school girl with glamorous false eyelashes, led her to an out-of-the-way table near the rest room hallway. Eve didn’t mind the subpar location. She was happy just to be there, surrounded by the familiar décor—the lovingly, if inexpertly, painted mural of the Neapolitan coast that took up an entire wall, the framed photographs of a Vespa and a bunch of grapes—and the comforting hum of other people’s dinnertime conversation.

  She wished she’d thought to bring a book for company; next time she’d know better. For now, she was reduced to perusing the old-school paper placemat—it hadn’t changed for as long as she could remember—featuring a map of Italy, illustrations of the Leaning Tower and the Colosseum, and a handful of helpful facts about the country.

  Population: Sixty Million

  Religion: Roman Catholic

  Language: Italian

  Brendan had always gotten a kick out of that last one. What a shocker, he’d say. Italians speak Italian. Never woulda guessed. Thinking he’d appreciate the reference, she texted him a picture.

  Dinner at Gennaro’s, she wrote.

  Cool, he replied, with gratifying promptness. Who with?

  Just me. Wish you were here.

  Me too I miss that chicken parm!

  It got easier once her wine arrived, a house chianti as unchanging as the placemat. She’d only taken a couple of sips when Gennaro emerged from the kitchen and made his way through the restaurant, going table to table like a politician. He was a sweetheart, a diminutive, blue-eyed Italian with a ruddy complexion and a thick head of silver hair, one of those slender continental types who managed to look elegant even in a dark green apron. When he spotted Eve, his face broke into a big, incredulous grin.

  “Ay, long time no see. Where’s your boy?”

  “College,” she told him. “Freshman year.”

  “Smart kid.” Gennaro tapped his skull with the tip of his index finger. “How’s he like it?”

  “
Pretty well. Maybe a little too much for his own good.”

  Gennaro waved his hand, as if batting away an insect.

  “Ah. He’s young. Let him enjoy himself.” He peered at Eve, his eyes narrowing with concern. “What about you? What’s new?”

  “Not much,” she said. “Just work. Keeping busy.”

  Gennaro shrugged with good-natured resignation.

  “What can you do? Gotta pay the tuition.” He patted her supportively on the shoulder. “Nice to see you, pretty lady. You come by anytime, we take good care of you.”

  He moved on, leaving Eve slightly deflated. She knew Gennaro meant well, but there was something about that question—What’s new?—that never failed to depress her. Maybe she was being paranoid, but it always felt like an intrusion, an indirect way of inquiring about her romantic life. And when she replied, Just work, that was code for I’m still alone, as if she were apologizing for being single, as if there was something wrong with that.

  On the other hand, at least he’d bothered to ask, which implied that he thought there was still a possibility that something might be new. That was a point in her favor. And it wasn’t even true that there was nothing new in her life. For one thing, she was taking a class in Gender Studies and actually learning something. And, oh yeah, she’d also gone and gotten herself addicted to internet porn, not that that was anything to brag about.

  She understood that it was a little extreme, or maybe just premature, to call her problem an addiction—it had only been going on for a month or so—but what other label could you use when you did something every night, whether you wanted to or not? Tonight she knew she would go home and visit the Milfateria—it felt like a fact, not a choice—probably checking out the Lesbo MILFs, her current go-to category. Last week it was Blowjob MILFs—lots and lots of blowjobs—and the week before that had been a more eclectic period—spanking, threesomes, butt play—just to get a sense of what was out there.

  Addiction was a bleak word, though, a hundred percent negative. Maybe habit was a better term. People were addicted to heroin. But their morning coffee was just a habit.