Perfect on Paper

by Janet Goss

  “I guess.”

  “So… what are you going to do tonight?”

  “No idea.”

  “Oh, come on, Dana. It’s been—what? Twenty-one years? You can manage to hold out for another twenty-four hours, can’t you?”

  “Looks like I have no choice.”

  While I appreciated Elinor Ann’s attempt to put things in perspective—especially since I knew she was far from enthused about my reunion with Ray—my dark mood refused to dissipate. I’d been so looking forward to finally spending time with him, to telling him about Hank and Billy, to having him unravel all my romantic entanglements. But mainly I just wanted to tell him how much he’d meant to me when I was young and scared and far from certain I could survive in this town. If Ray hadn’t loved me, I might not have believed in myself long enough to stick around. Who knows what would have become of me?

  Oh, why had I waited twenty-one years to see him? And why couldn’t the Chinatown gangs have declared a truce for just one night?

  I hung up my coat and assessed the situation. If I had the evening to myself, it wouldn’t be a bad idea to finish the painting sitting on my easel—the last of the bartered Hannahs owed to Vivian. The freesias in the cowboy boot were already beginning to wilt.

  But I didn’t want to paint. I wanted to be sitting in a dive bar with Ray.

  I really should eat something. Lunch had been hours ago, and I felt the effect of my two scotches.

  But I didn’t want to eat—unless Ray was my dinner partner.

  Hank was probably free. He hadn’t mentioned any plans when I’d left the brownstone that morning.

  But I didn’t want to see Hank. Not until I saw Ray.

  Well, at least I could leave Ray a message.

  But when I dialed his number, the phone just rang and rang.

  I crawled into bed with Puny and Remembrance of Things Past, which had proven to be a surefire cure for insomnia. In fact, I’d started it well over a year ago and only just made it to page seventeen.

  The Proust must have worked, because when the telephone jarred me awake, sunlight was streaming through the bedroom window.

  “Hello?”

  “Is this Dana Mayo?”

  The voice sounded familiar, but I couldn’t quite place it. “Who is this?”

  “Uh—it’s Renée Devine.”

  “Uh…”

  “Uh… listen. There’s no good way to tell you this. My father’s dead.”

  “What?”

  “My father—Ray. He’s dead.”

  This couldn’t be happening. I had to be having a dream—or more accurately, a nightmare. But there was Puny, and there was Proust, and here I was, sitting on the side of my bed with my feet on the floor and a telephone in my hand.

  “Are you still there?” A note of impatience had crept into Renée’s tone.

  I couldn’t think of anything to say. The only words that came to mind were Oh no. Oh no. Oh no.

  But hold on a minute. This wasn’t the first time Renée had told me her father was dead. “How do I know you’re—”

  “He had a heart attack. Yesterday morning. He managed to call 911, but…” She caught her breath. “I just saw in his datebook that he was supposed to meet you in the city last night.”

  “He was, but—”

  But what? I knew she’d never believe me if I told her we’d only recently reestablished contact; that I hadn’t seen Ray in more than two decades.

  “Anyway,” Renée continued, “I just thought—you know, that you should… know.”

  Oh no. Oh no. Oh no. “But—”

  “Listen—I knew that was you at my open house last year. I recognized you as soon as you walked in. The only reason I’m calling is because I think Dad would have wanted you to know what happened, okay?”

  I could hardly blame her for trying to end the conversation as quickly as possible. And, of course, seeing my name in his datebook couldn’t have made her happy. “Your father was a wonderful man,” I finally managed. “And I’m very, very sorry for your loss. For… everything.”

  She hung up.

  I tried to stand, but my legs started to buckle, and I sat back down on the mattress, too shocked to cry or scream or—thank god—laugh, and too numb to do anything but let the words Oh no, oh no, oh no echo inside my head.

  I had to reach Elinor Ann.

  “Aunt Dana!” Eddie said when I called the house. “You’re a day too early. My birthday isn’t until tomorrow.”

  Oh god. His birthday. I’d forgotten all about it. “I know. I was planning on calling you then. But I need to talk to your mother right now.” Right now. Immediately. Get. Her. To. The. Phone.

  “She and Dad went out.”

  “Any idea where?” Please, please, please let it be someplace near a cell phone tower.

  “Well, if you promise not to tell Mom…”

  “I promise.” I promise, I promise, I promise. Only please, please, please stop torturing me and tell me where she is.

  “I’m pretty sure they went to Phillipsburg. Guess why?”

  Oh god. Now I had to guess. “Eddie, I have absolutely no idea what they’re doing in New Jersey. Just tell me, okay?”

  “Okay. Don’t say anything to Mom, but… Well, you know how long I’ve wanted a bulldog, right?”

  Yes, you little sadist. Ray Devine is dead. The hell with bulldogs. The hell with everything. “Of course I do. Practically forever.”

  “Since I was like, four, right? So, I saw her and Dad whispering to each other a couple of days ago, and I checked the history on her browser that night—Aunt Dana, you cannot tell her that or I will get into so much trouble—and she’d been on the home page of a bulldog breeder in Phillipsburg!”

  “That’s fantastic!” I was going to keel over and expire, right in the middle of this conversation. “Listen, Eddie—I promise not to say anything, but only if you send tons of pictures when you get him, okay?”

  “And you’ll come out and see him, right?”

  “Of course I will. But I’ve really got to get hold of your mother now—don’t worry, I swear I won’t say a word—so I’ll call back on your birthday tomorrow, okay?”

  “Okay. Talk to you then.”

  The instant I heard Elinor Ann’s voice, the tears came. Streams of tears, with so many more behind them, I could have wound up crying forever.

  “Dana, what in the world happened?”

  Between sobs, I somehow got out the words “Ray” and “is” and “dead.”

  “Oh no. That’s—oh no. Oh, Dana. But—why would a gang member want to kill Ray?”

  I was so perplexed I stopped crying. “What are you talking about?”

  “The shooting on the subway last night. What are you talking about?”

  I’d forgotten all about that, as well as everything else in the universe. “That’s not how it happened. He had a heart attack—yesterday morning.”

  “Oh, Dana. That’s terrible.” She paused. “How’d you find out?”

  “Renée Devine just called and told me.”

  “She did? Oh my god. What did she say to you?”

  “Nothing worth repeating, other than her father was dead.”

  I could overhear Elinor Ann giving Cal a quick summary of our conversation. The phone connection began to crackle ominously.

  “Dana, listen—I am so, so sorry. And I hate to tell you this, but I forgot to charge my cell last night, and Cal left his home with the boys. If we get cut off, do you think you’ll be okay until we get back to Kutztown?”

  I didn’t have time to respond before the line went dead.

  All right, I told myself. At least she knows. She’ll call you back as soon as she can. You just have to hang on until she does. I’d finally stopped sobbing, but tears continued to roll down my face.

  I needed to do something. Commemorate Ray in some way, even if it set me off all over again.

  Of course.

  I went over to the CD rack and searched the titles un
til I found the disc with the song I was looking for—the one he’d played for me on our first official date, two days after he’d declared his love for me and made everything shockingly, deliriously perfect.

  “There’s a bar on the corner of Twenty-Fifth and Third,” he’d said. “I’ll meet you there at four.”

  “Which corner?”

  He’d laughed. “I guarantee you’ll figure that out.”

  I’d laughed, too, when I walked up Third Avenue the following afternoon and spotted the bar with the words “Sepret Tables” written on its awning. I’d entered the dark, nearly deserted room and come up behind Ray, who was bent over the jukebox.

  “Sepret?”

  He’d turned around and kissed me for a long time—maybe an hour, maybe five minutes. “I know you love a good typo.”

  Pulling some coins out of his pocket, he’d fed all the quarters into the Rock-Ola’s coin slot. “So, which song should we play for our first dance?”

  I’d scanned the titles. “Wow. It looks like every single one of these is by Frank Sinatra.”

  “It’s a Mafia joint,” he’d whispered in my ear. “But don’t worry. The bartender and I go way back.” He’d punched a couple of buttons on the jukebox. “Not every song’s by Sinatra,” he’d said, wrapping his arms around me as dreamy doo-wop harmony began to fill the room.

  I guess I’m losing my mind

  I looked around and found

  You were gone

  “The silky-smooth sounds of the Satinettes,” he’d murmured while we swayed back and forth. I had never, ever been so completely, swooningly in love, or so supremely happy.

  I guess I’m losing my mind

  I think of you from dusk

  Until dawn

  I guess you really do have to be that young to be that in love, I thought as I listened to the song a few more times before setting it on continuous play and turning down the volume. Then I did something I had never before even contemplated. I knelt down by the bed and pulled out the box of journals I’d been amassing for years, at least since my high school days.

  I made it a point never to reread them. The thought of having to face incontrovertible proof of my naïveté was simply too cringe inducing. In fact, I mainly kept the volumes around as suicide insurance: If I ever felt the desire to end it all, I always figured by the time I burned all those journals, I’d have come to my senses and saved my own life.

  But this was a singular moment for reminiscing. I scanned through the spiral notebooks until I found the first mention of Ray, just after I’d started my job at Prints on Prince:

  I am wild about him. But he’s married. And I think at least 40 (!). And has beautiful blues eyes & I love his body & he’s really cool & smart & knows about art & has a manner with women. I know he likes me & sometimes we exchange looks but I can’t see him fooling around on Rhea. I would just die to be with him, though. Does he want to be with me? I guess maybe, but he’d never do it. Why would he? I am not that great. He’s probably just being nice to me because I am the new girl at work.

  Yeesh. No wonder I avoided revisiting my past in print. And thank god I’d become a painter; clearly, writing was not my strong suit. I flipped forward to the days just before the affair officially began, when we were still in our kissing-in-bars-for-hours phase:

  He said the killer part about it all is that he knows how great we would be together. I just stressed how Up To Him that decision was and that I am ready & waiting & don’t care about anyone or anything but him. And we kissed & kissed & kissed. Oh god, I love Ray Devine so much! I know he sees me as the escape hatch to his life, but I don’t care. As long as he sees me, I never will.

  I was actually beginning to find my twenty-one-year-old self rather endearing. Insanely immature, and about to make an epic mistake, but sweeter, and much more innocent, than I ever remembered being at the time.

  I continued to relive our history until days before the end came:

  I just don’t understand why we have to be so Out Of Time. Was I destined to fall in love with Ray Devine, or do I have some hidden psychological quirk that makes me only fall in love with someone in his situation? And by that I don’t just mean “married.” He is so much older and has known so many different women, but he still seems/claims to love me more. Or does he just have a corresponding hidden psychological quirk that complements mine? I refuse to believe that’s all this is.

  I’ll always refuse to believe it, even though we both should have known better than to get involved, I thought to myself. Especially Ray.

  At least one of us must really be in love. I’m pretty sure we are both really in love. He tells me there is nothing like this in the world, that not being together is the hardest thing he’s ever heard of. I told him I wished I could fall in love with someone else and let him off the hook, but he says he wants to stay on the hook.

  I put the book away before I got to the breakup and the anguished, mournful passages I still remembered writing. I was already living that part of it all over again, right here in the present.

  I must have cried myself back to sleep, because the next thing I knew, a couple of hours had passed and someone was frantically pushing the button on my intercom.

  It was probably Vivian, wondering where her final Hannah was. Forget it, I thought, pulling a pillow over my head and closing my eyes.

  Until someone began pounding on my front door a few minutes later.

  “Dana! Let me in! Dana! ”

  My eyes shot open.

  I leapt out of bed and rushed to undo the lock.

  Elinor Ann staggered inside and threw her arms around my neck, gasping and trembling.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

  THE SALVATION ARMY

  I stood there, propping Elinor Ann up, while she caught her breath. “Are you all right?” I asked.

  “I will be. It’s just—the drive took a little more out of me than I’d expected.” She unclasped her hands from my neck and took a few shaky steps into the living room. “I know we have a lot to talk about, but can you hang on for just a second?”

  Before I could respond, she leapt skyward and began to perform a vigorous set of jumping jacks. “Sorry,” she panted. “I—just—have to—calm—myself—down.”

  Finally she dropped her arms and took in her surroundings. “Wow. I never thought I’d be back in your apartment again.”

  “Me, neither. But are you sure this was a good idea? You seem pretty—”

  “Panicky. I know. I was positive I’d be okay making the trip, but I’d forgotten how overwhelming New York City is. There are so many people on the streets. And it’s so far from Kutztown.”

  “Is that the reason you came to visit me only the one time?”

  “Hmm. I guess it is. I guess I’ve been prone to panic disorder for longer than I realized.”

  “At least you’re fighting it. You made it here, didn’t you? And god, I’m so glad you did.”

  “Honestly, it wasn’t my idea. It was Cal’s. As soon as I explained to him what you were going through, he blew right past the Phillipsburg exit on Route 78 and told me we were on our way to Ninth Street.”

  Cal’s idea. Bless him.

  She wandered into the kitchen, then poked her head in the bathroom door. “This place looks a lot smaller than I remember.”

  “I have twenty years’ worth of additional junk.”

  “I guess that’s it.”

  She examined the half-finished Hannah on the easel, went into the back room to stroke Puny, who was sprawled across my unmade bed, then stopped at the bureau. She picked up the photograph of us taken at her wedding. “Sometimes I wish we could go back to being us then, don’t you?”

  I’d been wishing it all day long. “Ray would still be alive.”

  “And I wouldn’t be crazy.”

  “Yeah, but you’re not—you’re in the big bad city and you’re still breathing.”

  “Yeah. I am.” She smiled in relief.

  “I can’t thank
Cal enough for bringing you.”

  “He didn’t think twice about it—well, at least not until he saw the backup at the Holland Tunnel. But he insisted on coming. He said it was the right thing to do.”

  “Where is Cal, anyway?”

  “Circling the block.”

  “That figures. It’s really hard to find parking in this neighborhood on a Saturday afternoon.”

  “Oh, he’s not looking for a space. He told me he’d just drive around until we’re done visiting. He’s worried someone will steal the hubcaps off the truck if he comes inside.”

  I had to laugh, even though it felt alien to do so.

  “Oh, Dana.” Elinor Ann came over and hugged me again, and this time I couldn’t hold it in any longer. The tears came back full force. I stood there, shoulders heaving, while Cal circled and circled the block.

  “I’ve never seen you like this,” she finally said.

  “I’ve never seen me like this, either.” I’d probably shed more tears in the past few hours than I had in the past twenty years.

  “Dana, I—I don’t get it. It’s been more than two decades since you and Ray…”

  “I know. But I always knew he was out there. I always thought we’d see each other one more time.” I sighed. “So much for closure.”

  She sat on the bed and beckoned for me to join her, which I did.

  “I’m sure it hurts, knowing how close you came to meeting up with him again. But all that—the two of you—happened a long time ago. You’ve already survived without Ray for half your life.”

  “I know.”

  But now he was gone forever, and I hadn’t even seen him, or talked things over with him, or said goodbye, and there wasn’t a thing I could do to change it.

  “And Dana? I’m not trying to upset you, or say anything bad about Ray, but do you remember the reasons you gave for breaking up with him?”

  Of course I remembered. “The age difference, Rhea, Renée…”

  But right now I would give anything to undo those twenty-one years of self-imposed separation. I should have been selfish. I should have let Ray move in with me, even though I’d been certain that by Year Two, I’d have been standing right here in my bedroom screaming, “Get out of here! You ruined my life!”