Plantation

by Dorothea Benton Frank

  “Can’t take the Lowcountry out of the girl,” he said.

  I waited until I was sure Mother couldn’t hear us. “Hey, Trip!” He turned back to face me. “Kiss this, bubba,” and I pointed to my backside. I let him think he was right.

  MISS LAVINIA’S JOURNAL

  Well, my girl’s gone home. And, she is my girl again. Isn’t it funny how you don’t know how much you miss someone until they are about to leave you again? What I would give to have her here with me! Hell, I’d even give her the pearls. . . .

  Twenty-one

  Dr. Blues

  WE all had a good laugh and many hugs and promises passed among us before I finally tore myself away from Tall Pines to return to Richard and Eric. Trip hung around the house to say good-bye, on the excuse that he was going fishing in the late afternoon. Even Miss Sweetie had brought me two jars of strawberry jam to take back. She hugged me with a ferociousness I wouldn’t forget. Come and see your mother more often, girl.You hear me? She needs you! I will, I had promised, I will.

  Millie gave me her famous look as I packed my car. She stood by the back fender with her arms crossed, feet apart in a stance of defiance, her eyes boring a hole right through the side of my head.

  “What’re you doing, Millie? Putting the plat eye on me?”

  “Why? You feeling guilty?”

  “Should I?”

  “Should you?”

  Now, what that was all about, I wasn’t quite sure. I just hugged her and finally she said, “Go on back and do what you gotta do.”

  All through my plane ride back to New York, my thoughts were of my family in South Carolina. I had been so off the mark about everyone. Trip was obviously unhappy with his marriage, when I thought he was okay with it. Somehow, our argument had renewed our relationship. He was too much of a coward to show the full measure of his contempt to Frances Mae, so he had set me up to do it. I had complied with probably more gusto than he had hoped for. But, it was good. At least Frances Mae would keep her villainous tongue still for a while. I just hoped she didn’t go into early labor.

  And Mother? It was the first time I had felt any warmth from her in decades. Or seen her demonstrate any need. In retrospect, she had been worried about Trip’s capacity to bounce her from Tall Pines to wherever. I suppose it had always been hard for me to see past her little barbs, but once I did, I saw them for what they were—a bad habit and nothing more.

  But, even his grab for the throne was some kind of a weird cry for her to save him from himself. Surely, he could not have seriously thought that Mother would allow him to unseat her. Old Frances Mae had obviously exhausted herself licking her fat lips at the prospect of becoming the Queen of Tall Pines, but I knew it would be a freezing cold day in hell before Mother let her within an inch of her tiara. Still, there was something going on with Trip.

  My visit had given them confidence. How perverse! Moreover, it had reminded me of who I was. Like I didn’t know? Be my daughter! Well, Daddy? Was that good enough for you? Change! Oh, fine, I thought, and resolved to change. That change would demand acceptance of a lot of complicated issues. I knew that.

  Mother was only asking for a closer tie with me. Was that too much? No, of course not. What Trip was asking was that I understand his situation and help him deal with it. Then I knew why he had been sending Eric all the gifts—we were all he had, all he had that he wanted, anyway. If all it took was to give that thing he married a verbal blast from time to time, well, I hated to admit this to myself, but I could actually relish it.

  What of Millie? Good God! Did she truly mean to turn me into a voodoo priestess? Nah. All that hocus-pocus about the caul. On the other hand, who knew? When I had teased her that her spell for Frances Mae was impotent, she had reminded me that the magic had found its place in me when I exorcised her evil spirit with my words. Whatever.

  I had to laugh at myself, remembering the way I had told Frances Mae what I thought of her the night she wet the rug, and how the next day I had told her not to just shut up, but to shut the hell up! And, Mother wanting to give her matching mother and child diapers when her new baby arrived. Oh, what a wicked thought!

  At Tall Pines I had emerged as the Deliverer? How bizarre! Me? God! It felt good! It had made me feel really alive! Then it occurred to me that in my marriage I was a bit of a mouse.

  If Richard and I had an argument, I never raised my voice to him. It wasn’t civilized to raise my voice, he said. But back at home (did I say home?) I had rediscovered this other part of my personality that I’d kept on ice way too long. Well, I thought, now I’m going back to where my life isn’t so crazy. I don’t need to expend all that energy every day, I thought. Suddenly, the prospect of that seemed dull and dreary. But, I missed Eric. Maybe I’d take him down to the ACE to go fishing with his uncle. It would probably do them both some good.

  I was still considering my next visit on the cab ride into Manhattan. May was so beautiful in South Carolina. Maybe I’d get tickets to the Spoleto Festival. If I could convince Richard to come, he would enjoy that. I couldn’t really blame Richard for his lack of enthusiasm for my family. They had all but ignored him for years. But maybe now, with Mother’s trusting him with her power of attorney, he’d feel more inclined to give them another try. I hoped so.

  It was nearly nine when I finally reached our building. Phil, the other doorman, rushed out to help me with my bags.

  “Welcome back, Mrs. Levine!” He took my carry-on luggage and I followed him down the marble entrance hall to the lobby.

  “Thanks, Phil. Is Dr. Levine at home?”

  “No, he went out around eight. Eric is at the Hillmans’ apartment.”

  “Phil?” I pressed the elevator button.

  “Yes, ma’am?” The elevator opened and he put my bags in on the floor.

  “You’ve got a tracking beam in that cap, don’t you?”

  “I guess I do!” He laughed and the door closed.

  I took my things into the dark apartment, turning on lights as I went from room to room. Maybe I’d take Eric out for supper somewhere in the neighborhood. I was just about positive that Richard hadn’t been to the grocery store. I opened the refrigerator door and confirmed it. Chinese food cartons. Well, maybe they had fun together, watching an old movie or something. I went back to the study to thumb through the mail and picked up the telephone to call the Hillmans. There was voice mail, so I dialed in the number and code. Two messages. First message: Hi, Mom! I’m up at John’s! Call me when you come home! I hit three to erase it. Second message: I thought I told you Tenth and University at eight! Where are you? The voice of Lois.

  I left my luggage in the hall and decided to call Eric when I came home. Why exactly was Richard having dinner or drinks or both with Lois when I was coming home? I couldn’t wait to hear the reason, and my intuition told me I was not going to like what I heard.

  Phil hailed a cab for me and the next thing I knew I was on Tenth Street and University Place, standing outside of Alberto’s, an Italian restaurant Richard and I used to frequent years ago. We stopped going there because every time we did, we had an argument. We decided Alberto’s had great pasta but bad karma.

  The outside of the restaurant was windowed, covered up to table level by green curtains on a brass rod. Huge trees by the windows partially concealed the view into the dining room. I didn’t see Richard from outside, so I took a deep breath and went in.

  My whole world was about to tilt as the door revolved and I knew it as sure as any premonition I had ever had. I began to shake. The maître d’ greeted me—“Buona sera!”—and handed my coat to an unemployed actress to check.

  “Do you have a reservation, signora?”

  “No, no! I’m just surprising friends! I won’t be but a moment, but I’d love a glass of champagne!”

  “And the name of your party is . . . ?” He was checking the reservation book and I walked right past him toward the back of the restaurant where I remembered there were booths. I was a nervous
bundle of determination and miraculously I smiled at the waiters and other patrons as though I owned the place. What I wanted to do was faint.

  Two booths away from where I knew I’d find them, I stopped for a minute to breathe. What would I say? The first voice I heard was Richard’s.

  “You’re a naughty girl, Lois, and I shall have to spank your bottom later!”

  “Promise? With the hairbrush?” she said, but it sounded like Oy! Dew ya praamiss? Wit tha haaaairbrush?

  Shit, now what? I turned to see the captain fast on my heels with my glass of champagne. I stepped in front of Richard’s booth. He was on the outside and Lois was next to him on the banquette. Her hand was under his napkin. His hand was under her backside, or at least in that relative vicinity.

  “Caroline!”

  Busted. The look on his face and on her face was a combination of horror and giddiness as he tried for a split second to feign innocence.

  “Hi, honey. What’s up?”

  In one movement, I reached down and jerked the napkin from his lap. There it was. Exhibit A. Lois’s nasty hand wrapped around Richard’s rapidly shrinking one-eyed friend. Ick. The captain caught up with me and I took the glass from his tray, toasting Richard, who had quickly covered himself with the edge of the tablecloth. I almost wanted to laugh at them. But in a moment of strange fixation, I became calm instead. Seeing them doing this . . . whatever you called it, to each other in public was so absurd to me! How old were they? Gross! It was like watching a train wreck. Part of me wanted to look away and the other part couldn’t stop staring.

  “Will you be joining your friends for dinner?” the captain said, obviously not realizing a thing was out of line, or that a thing was out.

  “No, I think not,” I said, “but you can put my drink on Dr. Levine’s bill.”

  The captain mumbled something like Very good and went back to the kitchen.

  “So! Here we are at the Mutual Masturbation Society!” I said. “Will someone make a motion to approve the minutes?”

  “Caroline, sit down. I can explain,” Richard said, sweat beading his brow.

  Lois said nothing, but leaned toward the wall so Richard could remove his hand from her bottom, which he carefully did as though it had never been there at all. I wasn’t sitting down; I was still watching the train wreck. After what seemed to be a time that hung in space, moving neither forward nor backward, I took another sip of champagne, put the flute down in front of his goblet of red wine, and spoke.

  “This is not good, Richard,” I said. My voice was even and low.

  “Come now, let’s be civilized,” he said.

  “Civilized? You perv! You call your public display civilized?”

  “Please don’t make a scene, Caroline, you’re getting hysterical.”

  “Really?” I said, a little louder.

  A busboy was passing with a tray of glasses and a water pitcher. I reached over his head and took the pitcher. It was nearly full. The busboy just kept going and I turned to face Richard.

  “Caroline, don’t, please . . .”

  “Seems to me, bubba, that you’re the one who needs to cool off.”

  Lois backed up as far as she could and I emptied the ice water all over Richard’s head. I slammed the pitcher down on their table, then picked up my champagne and threw it in Lois’s face. While she shrieked and tried to catch the river of mascara running down her collagen-implanted cheeks, I said, “You whore, you nasty, nasty whore! I’ve been wanting to do that for a very long time.”

  I turned away from them and walked reasonably nonchalantly to the front of the restaurant and out the door. I was all the way to Fiftieth and Madison before I realized I’d left my coat. I said nothing to Eric about his father that night, but I knew my marriage was over. The telephone rang every fifteen minutes until I finally turned it off at midnight.

  Richard never came home. I assumed he was with her. Jesus, and I thought Frances Mae was a badass.

  MISS LAVINIA’S JOURNAL

  The house is so quiet tonight; I just hate it.Trip asked me for more money! Fifty thousand! He owes me an explanation or else my wallet is closed to him. I’ll take him on the carpet tomorrow. I’m too tired now.

  I made tomato sandwiches for Millie and myself and we ate them in the kitchen. One thing we both agreed on was that seeing Caroline was good for both of us. I do wish she would call. She left her sweatshirt here and I found myself burying my nose in it to find a trace of her. I guess everyone would think that’s pathetic. Everyone except Nevil, that is. I slept in his shirts and pajamas and everything of his for years. No one knew. Well, I hope she got home to New York alright. I would’ve heard if the plane had crashed, I suppose. She’ll call eventually, won’t she? Of course she will! So wonderful to see my girl again. . . .

  Twenty-two

  Family Laundry

  I don’t know how, but the next morning I managed to get out of bed and fix Eric’s breakfast. I had barely slept at all. Images of Richard and Lois together tortured me all night. I knew what I had to do, I just didn’t have the wherewithal to get on it first thing Monday morning. I was going to leave him.

  It was cold and drizzling outside and a raw day all over town. The skies were gray like my mood. Eric kept asking, “What’s wrong, Mom?” I hadn’t figured out what to tell him yet, so I was vague, saying something like, “You don’t worry, sweetheart, everything’s fine. Mommy just has a lot on her mind today.” And, when he asked where his father was, I lied and said he had left very early for a patient in crisis. Physician, heal thyself.

  We hurried up Park Avenue to his school on Seventy-fourth Street, and I watched from the corner with my hands tucked under my arms as Eric ran to the building, neck scarf flying and backpack bouncing. He liked going in by himself. In fact it had come to the point that he hated me to walk with him. I always found an excuse, though—cash machine, deli, something. He was growing and becoming more independent in spite of me. Okay, I admit it. I overprotect Eric like a mother bear and it’s obvious. But, hello, we live in Manhattan! I did not want to get a phone call that my only child was missing.

  Meandering back down Park Avenue lost in my thoughts, my eyebrows tightly knitted and my jaw clenched, I relived what had happened, how I had been convincing myself of his fidelity, how stupid I was. More than that, I went way back to the unforgettable discussion we had on our wedding night and his trip to London when Eric was born. How many other betrayals had there been? Was he sleeping with her the night I smelled the Opium? Probably! I just knew it the same way you know anything you feel in your bones before it happens.

  I wondered what it was that he still saw in Lois, or what she did for him. She was hard-looking. Her taste in clothes was vile, her body was overexercised, her hairdo was about twenty years too young for her, and her makeup bordered on something from The Rocky Horror Picture Show. She looked like a Halloween rat with spiked hair and my husband was willing to betray me to have her. I hated her guts. Surely there had to be enough old geezers in this town who liked the feel of her two-inch-long nails and the taste of her lip gloss! Enough old farts who loved her accent and the way she chewed gum? Jesus!

  The more I thought about her the more angry I became. Did she think she could just waltz in here and take my husband? I don’t think so! Then I remembered him saying that he was going to spank her. And there they were, getting it on in a restaurant like a couple of porn dogs at a skin flick with popcorn boxes.

  Well, that certainly explained why he always called me provincial. He wanted something that wasn’t on my menu. I mean, I never would’ve done what Lois was doing in a restaurant, but maybe I would have been willing to try other things, if that was what he wanted. Like talk dirty in bed or something. He had never asked.

  Hell, everybody knew that British men were a little to the left. I knew that I should at least talk to Richard. I decided to call him when I got home. It wouldn’t have been right to just call a lawyer and change the locks. Not after fifteen years
of relatively happy cohabitation. I was so hurt and so angry. What would he say for himself ?

  There was no doubt, I was utterly and completely shocked. I couldn’t even cry. And my anger was growing with each breath. How dare he do this to me? How dare he? He always said he loved me! Weren’t words and vows supposed to mean something?

  The telephone was ringing when I entered the apartment and I answered it in the kitchen, knowing it was Richard.

  “Caroline? Are you there?”

  “Yes, I’m here, Richard.”

  “Listen, Caroline, I know you’re upset and I don’t blame you for that.”

  “Well, that’s nice.” I hadn’t even taken off my coat, which was dripping tiny pools of water all over my kitchen floor. My hair was a mass of damp tangles and I didn’t care either. My eyes were all glassy from lack of sleep. I must have been some sight. “I mean, that you don’t blame me. For once, that is.”

  Long silence.

  “I suppose we have some issues we need to work through. Caroline, you know I love you.”

  “I thought you did.” I knew my voice sounded empty of almost everything, including love and forgiveness, but I was fatally wounded. There could be no denying it, but suddenly I realized that nailing him and fidelity weren’t the point, at least, not where he was concerned. He had been living two lives—one with me and one with Lois, doing God knows what. I didn’t want my imagination to go too far.

  “I do love you,” he said, “and, darling, I am so sorry if I have hurt you.”

  Here came the tears, just bubbling over and pouring out, hot and stinging. When he heard me crying, he got upset. Then he started to cry.

  “Jesus, Richard, why don’t you come home and let’s talk. Where are you?”

  “Right outside the lobby on my cell phone.”

  “Well, then, for God sake’s, let’s not air our family’s dirty laundry all over Park Avenue. Come upstairs and I’ll make coffee or something.”

  I opened the front door of our apartment and raced back to the bedroom, kicking off my sneakers and sweats as fast as I could. I ran the brush through my hair and bit my lips to bring some color to them, knowing I looked pasty. I barely had time to zip my black trousers and pull a black turtleneck over my head before I heard him in the hallway. I brushed my hair once more and went out to face him.