Sylvie rushed forward to rescue her, and Rachel with her tiny baby hands pushed her away, and said in a clear, almost grown-up voice, “No, Mama, I want to do it myself.”
Since then she must have heard those words a thousand times. Rachel, five, poised on the seat of her new two-wheeler, demanding that Gerald let go of the handlebars. Her first day of kindergarten at Dalton, insisting that Sylvie leave her at the door, that she’d go up alone. The memories came to her like pictures in an old photo album.
And Sylvie thought, Aren’t I just the tiniest bit envious, too? Rachel seemed to know exactly what she wanted from life, and how to get it. Sylvie wondered what her own life might have been if she had not married Gerald. Not that she regretted it! No, not for a minute. She adored Gerald, and her life with him. But what dragons might she have slain if not for Gerald’s protective shield? What talents might she have discovered?
Oh yes, there were times—not often, but now and then—when she imagined herself out on her own. In an office, perhaps, behind a desk like this one, phones ringing, people asking her opinion about this or that, wanting her advice. Not just the wife of Gerald Rosenthal, but a woman with accomplishments of her own, and a paycheck with her name on it.
Then Sylvie slumped in despair. Who am I to want more? I have so much already, more than I deserve. The dearest husband in the world, [78] more luxuries than anyone could hope for. And a daughter as loving as she is headstrong.
No, she couldn’t love Rachel more if she were her own flesh and blood. She ached every time Rachel walked out the door. She wanted so much for her ... every good thing in the world. But also she longed to give back what she’d taken from her—Rachel’s sisters, her real blood ties. And she could never do that, never.
Sylvie put down the letter opener. There was only one last thing she longed for, needed, to fill up the empty space that moaned like a dark wind in her breast.
To hold her. Just once. My own child. The baby I carried inside me for nine months. Daughter of my flesh. Oh, dear Lord, just to put my arms around her, kiss her. What I would give for that.
But that was not meant to be, ever. She’d probably already risked too much, hiring that detective to find out where her daughter lived. And what had she gotten from it except more heartache? Dominic Santini was dead, she’d learned. Rose lived with her two sisters and grandmother, who was barely scraping by on Social Security and a small pension.
Sylvie had longed for a way to help Rose, to see that she was well taken care of. And then watching television one day, that old show “The Millionaire,” she had had an idea. She would open a savings account for Rose, anonymously.
Through the detective, she found a lawyer who would do what she wanted without prying into her reasons. His office, on Second Avenue and Eleventh Street, was as far removed from the mahogany-paneled 55 Water Street suite of Gerald’s attorneys as an Eskimo’s igloo. She’d forgotten his name, but she recalled that dismal hole-in-the-wall, the dusty rubber plant atop the filing cabinet, the dead flies dotting the windowsill. Through him, she arranged for a sum of twenty-five thousand dollars—all she could scrape together without risking Gerald’s suspicion—to be deposited in a trust fund in Rose’s name. Then a letter to Rose’s grandmother, naming her as trustee, and informing her that the money was from a benefactor who wished to remain anonymous.
Of course, it had been foolish and risky. Suppose Rose’s grandmother had gotten suspicious? Suppose she had gotten in touch with the lawyer? But Sylvie had covered her tracks, giving him a false name, paying in cash. Nothing truly bad could come of it, she had [79] reasoned. And this way, little Rose would have something, a nest egg for later on, for college perhaps, or, God forbid, if she should ever be sick, or hurt.
And yet even the knowledge that Rose would be taken care of could not erase the longing from Sylvie’s heart. The terrible need to see her, touch her. And so, years later, she had done something truly reckless; she had gone to Rose’s school.
“Rose,” Sylvie whispered. It felt good just to say it, aloud for once, a small stone lifted from her heart.
Sylvie glanced up, her eyes falling on the portrait that hung over the fireplace. A younger version of herself, looking serene, and yes, even regal, in a pale blue chiffon gown, her shoulders white as Easter lilies. Her gold hair was drawn up in a French twist, her head turned to one side, revealing the ruby in her ear. She remembered when Gerald had given her those earrings, just after Rachel was born—exquisite old rubies in the shape of teardrops, set in antique gold, with tiny rose diamond studs. Rubies were Rachel’s birthstone, he’d explained. And how baffled he had been by her outburst of weeping then!
Now, her gaze fixed on that earring, Sylvie thought how skillfully the artist had captured its deep wine glow, the way the light sparkled off it just so. And suddenly she was back on the sidewalk outside Rose’s school. That freezing winter day, waiting for school to let out, for Rose to appear.
The moment she’d laid eyes on her daughter, Sylvie had seen how wrong it was, the name they’d chosen for her. Rose, after the fairest of flowers. And here she was, dark as a Gypsy, all legs and eyes, with the cheekbones of a woman, not a little girl of nine. Looking trapped in that lumpy coat she’d obviously outgrown, her wild dark hair squashed into braids.
But the moment those great dark eyes tilted up at her, Sylvie forgot her daughter’s dark strangeness, and felt her heart shatter in a million pieces.
Then, against all reason, she’d wrenched the ruby from her right ear. Standing outside that frozen schoolyard, pressing that earring into Rose’s small cupped palm, she’d felt it somehow joined them, yet wished it could be more, dear God, a lifetime of a mother’s love.
Sylvie brought a hand to her ear, remembering. Diamonds now, [80] she never wore rubies anymore. And the one remaining earring she had put in a place, deep and hidden, where no one would ever find it, and where she would not have to be reminded.
She had not seen Rose, either, since that day. A few months ago, however, she had gotten up the nerve to phone Rose’s apartment. She had pretended to be with the phone company, conducting a survey. The woman who answered said she didn’t know anything, she was just a neighbor checking up on Mrs. Santini, who had had a stroke recently. Then she had given Sylvie Rose’s work number, a 212 area code. Sylvie dialed it, staying on the line only long enough to learn it was a law firm. Rose probably worked there as a secretary. She was obviously surviving. But was she happy?
I’ll never know. Never share her thoughts, or know what’s in her heart. I’ll never take her hand, or feel her head against my breast. Even Rachel, love her as I do, can’t fill that hole in me.
Sylvie, overcome, sagged into the deep leather chair at her husband’s desk, and wept.
Rachel stood at the entrance to the Ballroom of the Pierre, taking in the spectacle of Mason Gold’s twenty-first birthday party.
She watched the glitter ball rotating slowly in the middle of the ceiling, spinning and scattering light like bright confetti over the enormous room. God, Mason’s parents must have spent a fortune! Bouquets of yellow chrysanthemums and white freesias on each of the tables, vast tables heaped with food, and up on a platform, a band in gold-sequined jackets, playing “Only You” for the couples swaying together on the dance floor.
Well, thank God it’s Mason’s party, not mine, Rachel thought. All this ... this flaunting of money ... I’d die of embarrassment.
She searched for a familiar face, but saw no one she recognized. The girls all looked pretty much alike, wearing those short-sleeved pastel sheaths made fashionable by Jackie Kennedy, their hair teased into seamless helmet-shaped bouffants. The boys, too, like Ken dolls with their identical tuxedos, winter tans, and even, white smiles. She caught one of them, a broad-shouldered boy with a blond crew cut, eyeing her speculatively, and her stomach felt as if it had been dropkicked in a high punt.
[81] Oh God, does it show? I couldn’t be that obvious, could I?
Her heart
hammering, she clutched her velvet handbag hard against her hip, and felt the flat saucer shape of the diaphragm inside.
She felt now as if all the guys here were looking at her. But just because she was wearing this dress that clung to her ass and showed half her breasts didn’t mean they could tell what she was up to. Or could they?
Rachel straightened her spine, stuck her chin out. Hell, okay, so what? Let them know that tonight Rachel Rosenthal is ready and willing.
And out of all these monkey suits there had to be at least one nice horny one who wouldn’t mind breaking his champagne bottle, so to speak, over her prow in honor of her maiden voyage.
Last week, she’d been so upset about Kennedy she’d realized something profound. She could die tomorrow, and then she’d never know what sex was like. Maybe the whole thing was just fear—of taking that one, irrevocable last step. But once that was over and she had done It, she could loosen up and enjoy herself.
And that had propelled her through the ordeal of the gynecologist, pretending to Dr. Saperstein that she was getting engaged so he would fit her for a diaphragm. Then squatting in the bathroom at home, getting that disgusting jelly all over everything, practicing insertion until she felt raw.
All of it about as romantic as tightening a lug nut on her bicycle, and so unpleasant. She felt such a failure. And she hadn’t even begun!
And now, standing here, in this clingy blue velvet Oleg Cassini sheath, her long hair gleaming, wearing makeup for the first time in ages, Rachel felt more unsure of herself than ever. And the whole idea all of a sudden seemed pointless. Getting laid almost surely would confirm what she already knew herself. That she really was frigid.
A deep voice startled her.
“ ‘Of all the gin joints in all the world, you had to walk into mine.’ ”
She whirled about, instinctively clapping her hands to her mouth, laughing through her fingers as she’d done years ago.
“Mason! God, I wouldn’t have recognized you. You still do a lousy Bogie, though.” She stared up at a tall stranger with dark, [82] curly hair, looking in his tuxedo like so many of the preppies here except for one quirky touch—a gold lamé bow tie.
He shrugged. “Some things never change. Hey, you look pretty unrecognizable yourself. What’s it been ... five, six years?”
“Yeah, something like that. How’ve you been?”
“Okay.” He cut his eyes away, looking suddenly awkward, making her wish more than ever that she hadn’t come. Then his grin was dazzling her again. “Well, what do you think? Great party, huh? The old man still hasn’t lost his touch.”
But all Rachel could see now was the press of bodies. “You must know a lot of people.”
He shrugged. “I get around on campus. Lacrosse. The Yale Daily News. Anyway, New Haven’s not such a small town, and you know how frat rats multiply when they hear the word ‘party.’ ”
“I’m surprised you remembered to invite me,” she said. “We kind of went our separate ways.”
“Tell you the truth, if you won’t get offended, it was Mom’s idea. I kind of doubted you’d know anybody. Plus, I guess I still had this picture in my mind of this skinny kid with a mouthful of braces whose idea of a good time was arm wrestling.”
“Mosquito Bites, you used to call me,” she said and laughed.
At that, Mason’s gaze dropped to her exposed cleavage. A red flush crept up the sides of his neck, and he quickly looked up again.
Rachel felt embarrassed for both of them. She had not meant that as a come-on. Mason, after all, was ... well, almost a cousin.
A cute cousin, she had to admit. He had changed. From a pimply teenager with legs like bicycle spokes to this sophisticated 1963 model standing before her. Assured, but not too assured. Good-looking, if you liked the tall, dark, and Jewish type, which she did.
“And I’m not offended you didn’t want to invite me,” Rachel quickly said, laughing. “It was my mother who talked me into coming.”
“I’m glad she did. And I’m glad you listened.” Mason sounded sincere.
The awkwardness dissolved. Mason slipped his arm easily about her shoulders. “Come on, I’ll get you something to drink, and you can say hello to my folks. Then I want you to meet some of my friends.”
“I saw your father near the coat room when I came in. He told [83] me Birds Eye had a recall on some frozen spinach that got sprayed with the wrong chemical. Gold Star stock went up two points in one day. He looked like he’d just won the heavyweight championship against Cassius Clay.”
“Good old Dad,” Mason said and laughed, “King of frozen vegetables since the Flood. Wants me to come into the business the minute I graduate.”
“You could do worse.”
“Have you ever contemplated suicide by diving into a vat of creamed peas and onions? I did, every summer I worked for my old man. He put me on the assembly line. Wanted to give me a taste of what it was like to work your way up from the bottom. Can you imagine what it’s like coming home every day smelling like the Jolly Green Giant?”
Rachel laughed. Being with Mason made her feel seven again, riding tandem on Mason’s Flexi-Flyer, screeching down one of his Scarsdale hills.
Mason steered her over to a group sitting at one of the tables. Several of the boys looked her up and down, and she felt herself stiffening, flooding with panic as she remembered what she was supposed to be doing.
“Hi,” she said, nodding as she was introduced, not succeeding in remembering any of their names. Aware only of the sweat beginning to prickle under her arms despite two heavy coats of Secret roll-on. In her mind, Howard Cosell was at his microphone again.
We’re getting ready for the kickoff, folks. The team is in a huddle now. This is the Big One. We’re gonna have to see some great plays out on the old green tonight before they carry home that trophy. ...
Rachel felt a wild giggle rising in her throat. Aghast, she struggled to swallow it. Dear God, not now.
They were talking about the assassination, the grisly game the whole country was playing: Where Were You When You Heard?
“I was in the middle of an exam,” a red-haired boy said. “The prof steps out into the hall, comes back in and announces it. A real Mount Rushmore type, never comes unglued about anything. Next thing you know, he’s got his head down on the lectern and is bawling like a baby. It was unreal, I couldn’t believe it was happening.” Tears shone in his eyes as he spoke.
A dark-haired girl in a low-cut white dress bowed her head as [84] if in prayer, then said in a hushed voice, “I was in a cab. I heard it on the radio. At first I thought, no, it’s got to be some kind of put-on, like that phony invasion from Mars my mom told me about. But I could see the cabbie’s face in the rearview mirror. He turned green, like he was going to throw up. Then he started moaning, and I told him to let me out. I was afraid we’d get into an accident. ...”
“I was in the shower, and I heard one my of roommates scream. ...”
Rachel stopped listening. She should not have come. This whole party was wrong. And her own plan seemed petty, selfish, at a sad time like this. Tears filled her eyes, she mumbled some excuse, and rose.
She was almost to the door when she felt a hand on her shoulder, stopping her. Mason.
“Hey, wait a minute, where are you going?”
“I ... I don’t feel very well. I think I’d better go home.”
“Before we have even one dance? Hey, you might ruin my wish before I’ve even had a chance to blow out the candles on my cake.”
They were playing that old Presley hit, “Love Me Tender.”
Mason dropped his eyelids and curled his upper lip like Elvis, and she couldn’t help but laugh. Then suddenly there she was, moving onto the dance floor with him, submerged in rippling golden light.
He held her lightly, not clutching her as most boys did. She relaxed, enjoying the spangled light playing over his face, and felt herself moving effortlessly to the music.
Suddenly she foun
d herself visualizing the diaphragm in her purse.
She’d seen Mason’s penis once, when she was seven and he was eight. They’d been changing into their swimsuits out in the Golds’ poolside cabana, and she’d asked him if she could touch it, just to see what it felt like. And he’d hesitatingly let her. Just a jab with her finger, a quick sensation of rubbery softness, and then both of them staring down fascinated as it grew, that tiny pink finger, hardening into a thing roughly the size and shape of a two-cent roll of Bazooka bubble gum. Mason, beet red, had yanked on his trunks, and from then on he’d always changed in the house.
She found herself wondering what Mason’s penis was like now, [85] then caught herself, horrified. With Mason? God, what was she thinking?
“Hungry?” Mason asked, the dance ending. “Leave it to Pop. There’s enough food here for a starving African nation.”
Rachel’s gaze swept over the long tables, laden with huge platters of smoked salmon, oysters and shrimp nestled on beds of crushed ice, cold lobsters, mammoth silver bowls of glistening black caviar. And there, in a centerpiece of artfully arranged melon slices and grape clusters, a tall asparagus spear carved from ice—the Gold Star Frozen Vegetables logo.
Rachel’s eyes fastened on it, and the urge to giggle swept through her again. Then in her mind, she was seeing Mason, not only undressed, but with a giant asparagus stalk sprouting between his legs.
God, what was wrong with her? She ought to be on a psychiatrist’s couch.
“Did I say something funny?” Mason was smiling.
“Nothing, nothing.” Rachel took a deep breath, struggling to regain her self-control. “I could use a drink, please, some soda. Ginger ale, if you have it.”
Mason, an arm slouched over her shoulders, guided her over to a bar. It was noisy, people shouting, clapping Mason’s back, wishing him a happy birthday. Rachel couldn’t hear the bartender, but saw him shake his head.
“Pepsi, Coke, orange, Seven-up, but no ginger ale,” she heard Mason through the din. “How about champagne?”
Garden of Lies Page 10
