Help Yourself

by Rachel Michael Arends

  Being in Paris with Victor felt like being there for the first time. It was his city, where he had grown up, and he could take me places and show me things I would never have had access to without him. I loved listening to him speak French; I still love it when he talks to his parents on the telephone.

  By the time we were back in London, I was able to forget how he had looked at Michel during the show. I thought I’d forgotten it completely, until this moment.

  “I asked who the hell you are,” I say again to the strange man who answered the telephone in Victor’s tiny flat at an hour too early for legitimate guests.

  V’s voice comes on. “What’s this? Why would you yell like that, Fritzie?”

  “Who’s there with you?”

  “You can ask anything,” he says in his thick French accent, “but please do not use that tone with me.”

  I take a deep breath and let it out. “Who’s there, then?”

  “You remember I told you we have a new band manager? It is him, Paul Bertrand. He came by early with good news: we may get a recording deal.”

  “Oh,” I say.

  I know I should say that it’s fantastic, but, quite frankly, I don’t believe it. Victor, like his parents, trusts there’s a new opportunity around every corner, that all their hard work will finally pay off in the exhibition, recording contract, or book deal that will finally put them on the map. I have seen each of them at different times become hopeful over praise from a promising quarter, only to have their hopes dashed in the end. Somehow the encouragement, though ultimately fruitless, is still enough to keep them going. And since they each love their work, perhaps optimism such as theirs is valuable.

  “That’s great, V,” I say.

  “You don’t believe it will happen.”

  I think he can read my thoughts sometimes.

  “I believe in you. You know that. Whether a record company executive invests in you is beside the point. I know how talented you are.”

  “Perhaps it’s beside the point for you, who have always had everything given on silver platters. For me it means more. No?”

  “I hope that it happens this time, V. You know that I want what you want.”

  Mr. Pershing always disliked Victor’s music to the point of extreme rudeness—if you agree that plugging his ears was extremely rude. He called Poppycock whenever V was hopeful about a lucrative gig or that long sought-after record deal, which seemed more and more like a mirage as the years passed. Mr. Pershing never missed an opportunity to predict that Victor would leave me if he ever became successful.

  “Are you all right?” Victor asks. “Why is it that you are up now? Please tell me, has something happened?”

  His voice can do anything from belt out glam rock at both extremes of the musical register, to soothe me like a caress in the middle of the night. Even across the cold, gray ocean.

  I don’t mean to, but I can’t help it.

  I weep into the phone.

  I am reading a week-old copy of The London Times from cover to cover. I pretend that I am at home in London, ensconced in the front parlor, where in my former life I used to habitually consume the paper. I pretend I hear cars occasionally pass on the quiet street, and songbirds sing in the neatly trimmed hedges, and church bells ring out the half hours and the hours in the distance.

  I pretend that if I look up, I’ll see a proper room anchored by a rich red Indian carpet. I’ll be surrounded by dark wood bookshelves and floor-to-ceiling mullioned windows. If I look to the left, I’ll see a sofa covered in sumptuously rich upholstery. If I lean back, I’ll feel the lovingly worn cognac leather of the chair upon which I sit.

  I pretend that if I chose to, I could glance over to Victor’s apartment window across the way, to see if his blinds are still shut tight. I’m a morning person, always have been. Due to my beloved’s vocation, he’s up most of the night trying to make his living in pubs or any other venue that will pay him to live out his rock-and-roll dream another day.

  Sometimes, during my reading hour, Mr. Pershing would catch me wistfully looking for signs of life at Victor’s flat. Then he seemed to feel that it was his responsibility to point out the differences between my beloved and myself. His attention to detail, unfortunately, was more impressive on this subject than on most.

  Mr. Pershing commented on our styles of dress: I am a touch formal, while Victor prefers to look like a rock star, whether he’s on stage or at home. Our schedules: I already mentioned they are not entirely compatible. Our upbringings: I had the benefits of education and home comforts that couldn’t have been of higher quality if I were heir to Mr. Pershing instead of his servant’s son, while Victor was raised by struggling artists. Our accents: mine is English, obviously, while Victor’s is a romantic and expressive French. Very different, to be sure, as are our manners, which never seemed to escape Mr. Pershing’s notice.

  My benefactor/employer was always an instigator and a meddler. I knew this all too well, so I tried not to take it personally when he picked at Victor and me. My role was rather to smooth things over between the men I cared for most in the world. Luckily, Victor is actually far softer than I am. Though he talked a fine talk about how I should insist upon a good sight more respect from Mr. Pershing, V treated him with as much kindness and patience as I did.

  Mr. Pershing was correct, of course, that Victor and I are very different people. I never argued otherwise.

  But the late afternoons, after I finish my legal work and set my briefcase and tie aside, and after Victor sleeps off the night before, and showers the cigarette smoke from his hair and the driving beat from his mind in favor of an almost serene calmness…those few hours of each day are, quite simply, the best of my life.

  My phone alarm goes off. I had been trying to tune out the sound and sight of the ocean, and any consciousness of sand, or the faded blue-gray nothingness of the oppressively open sky. I had shifted the newspaper strategically to hide the perversely staring parrots trapped within the quick-dry synthetic fabric of the sofa where I really sit.

  I sigh and fold my paper.

  “Come on, old man,” I call toward the master bedroom. “It’s time for your doctor’s appointment. We have to leave here in ten minutes.”

  “You don’t have to shout,” he says, appearing in the doorway, fully dressed down to his overcoat and shoes. “I’ll just have a smoke down by the car first.”

  He looks gray today.

  “Can I help you down the stairs?” I ask, getting up.

  “Help me down the damn stairs like an invalid?” he asks, appearing stronger for a moment.

  “Go ahead then,” I tell him, like I don’t care whether he falls three flights or not. That it’s of no concern to me.

  But I watch his descent closely. When he is out of my line of sight, I hear Merry greet him cheerfully on the stairway before she appears at the top, with windblown hair and pink cheeks.

  “It’s so pretty out today!” she announces.

  “Do you ever sleep?” I ask. She accosted me with questions when I arrived home at midnight, and I heard her alarm go off at a still-dark hour after Victor had talked me through my bout of homesickness, which was as painfully acute as any flu.

  “Yes, sir, I sleep. Less than I might like to, some nights. But at least this way I’ll know that if I fail your tasks, it won’t be for any lack of trying on my part.”

  “I don’t doubt it,” I say. Merry tries harder than anyone I have ever seen.

  “Can you give me any clues to figuring out that fourth task now?” she asks.

  I shake my head a decisive no. I’m not helping with this one. The first two tasks were different. It was not only a benefit to Merry to get a makeover, but helping her repair her pitifully neglected appearance was in my best interest as well. After all, I’ve had to look at her every day since then. And it was almost a pleasure to help her get started with her catering business: to ensure that she was legally ready to launch, review her marketing materials, and sam
ple her menus.

  But the third task has rather soured me. Having had my own affairs meddled in, I feel increasingly uncomfortable meddling in Merry’s. I agreed to see this project through, but that doesn’t mean I have to like it.

  Playing matchmaker between Merry and Jack Morningstar had seemed like overstepping, but not horribly so, when it was simply words on a page. I didn’t argue too hard against the third task for two reasons. First because I despise Phil, and second because I didn’t think it would work anyway. Even if I believed that Merry and Jack might make a nice couple and perhaps help each other in many ways, I know that love is mysterious. Chemistry and mutual attraction can’t be created out of thin air. Even if they could, perhaps the end result would be a broken heart on one side and more damage done than good.

  And this fourth task? I wash my hands of it. “As I told you last night, you have to figure it out for yourself. I’m frankly not convinced these tasks are as helpful to you as your father thought.”

  “How can you say that? I’ve got my business going now. And even though I don’t love the fact that my dad tried to play matchmaker, I do think that Jack is awfully sweet. If there really is a big secret in my family, I should probably know about it, right? Maybe it’s important.”

  “Perhaps it is, perhaps it isn’t,” I say quietly, though I’m sick to death of being vague.

  “Come on, if there was a big secret in your family, wouldn’t you want to know?”

  “Perhaps I would, perhaps I wouldn’t.”

  “Oh, perhaps yourself! I know my mom, and trust me, she never did anything interesting enough to keep secret!”

  Merry is violating my personal space again. She often acts as if we’re children on a playground and she can grab my arm and pull me, or hug me, or smack me, or stand too close whenever she wants. I walk across the room to the other side of the dining table so that it’s between us. Merry follows me like an annoying puppy.

  “I mean, what on earth could there possibly be? It’s not like if I dig around enough, I’ll find out my mom has a double life. That under her cotton dress she’s wearing leopard hot pants, and when I leave the house, she’s the old mountain lady version of Hannah Montana!”

  Merry’s cell phone rings and I begin stealthily edging by her, hoping to be down the stairs and out the door by the time she’s through talking.

  “I told you I don’t have time for this nonsense, Phil.” she says.

  I stop halfway down the first flight, not in such a hurry anymore.

  “No,” she says, facing away from me. “I will not marry you, so stop asking me. I told you, we’re through.”

  I wish I could hear his side of the conversation, too, but I don’t want to lean in and have her notice me lurking. And I doubt she’d comply if I simply asked her to turn on speakerphone.

  “No,” she says. “It’s just over, Phil.” She sounds kind of sad, but also quite resolute. I feel strangely proud of her, almost to the point of being choked up, which would be ridiculous, so it’s probably allergies.

  Well, there he goes, and now I don’t need a speakerphone to hear him shouting.

  “Why?” she asks. “You really want to know why?”

  He can’t possibly hear her, the way he’s yelling. But that doesn’t stop Merry. She opens her right hand and spreads her fingers out. “I’ll give you five reasons,” she says. Lowering her thumb: “For one, you’re a bully.” She lowers her pointer: “Two, you’re a disrespectful son, and Amy Jo deserves better.” Middle: “Three, you’re self-centered and presumptuous.” She holds the phone out a bit further and I hear him shrieking louder, so maybe he can hear her a bit after all. Merry lowers her ring finger: “Four, you’re a hothead.” I think he hangs up because it’s suddenly quiet. “Five,” she says to the empty air, and no one but me, the stairwell spy, hears: “I like somebody else.”

  She has crossed the room and gone out through the oceanside doors by the time the car horn beeps in the garage below. I watch her for a moment, sure that she’s earnestly scanning the sea for a jumping dolphin to wish upon. Merry buys wholeheartedly into her father’s feigned wisdom, into his rubbishy meddling nonsense. She won’t wish for something easy, either, not if I know Merry! Let Jack Morningstar fall madly in love with me so that we can live happily ever after, she’ll likely wish with dewy eyes and a trusting smile if she sees a dolphin jump.

  I’ll vehemently deny this, so you needn’t bother mentioning it to anyone.

  But damn it, I admit it: I hope that she sees one.

  Chapter Seventeen

  IN WHICH JACK HITS ROCK BOTTOM AND BEGINS TO RESURFACE

  As told, in a whisper and wearing sunglasses, by an extremely mortified Mr. Morningstar

  Chaser licks my face. My head pounds and my mouth feels like it’s stuffed with old socks.

  The last thing in the entire world I want to do is wake up and face my dog, the day, my life…everything or anything.

  For a second, I think I remember having dreamed of Katie. A second later, I realize that a softer body graced my dreams. Then I begin to ask myself if I dreamed at all.

  Memories of last night flood my mind, many of them blurry and confused. I half hope that when I open my eyes, I will see Merry beside me in the bed. I half hope that I won’t.

  More memories of last night come back to me, and I don’t know how I’ll ever face her again.

  Maybe I should just pack up and leave the island this morning. Once my headache clears sufficiently to see straight, maybe I should move on.

  Maybe it’s time.

  Getting out of bed will require many stages, I realize. I must take extreme care, or I will shatter all over the floor like glass. I have to adjust to each change of position, no matter how small. I inch the blanket off and acclimate to the feeling of cool air on my skin. I let my sensitive scalp adjust to it until my brain stops beating against my skull.

  It takes approximately three years before I can slowly rise up to rest on my elbows.

  It’s an infinitely long process that brings me to a sitting position on the edge of the bed, with my feet on the floor.

  Things look strange.

  There are fewer piles of laundry lying around than I remember. I wonder if it’s possible that I actually started to clean up last night.

  I stand, very slowly. I shuffle, using extreme care, out to the kitchen. I find it so immaculate that I know there is absolutely no way in hell I could’ve done it.

  It dawns on me, painfully and with stars, that I not only let Merry in here, but she actually cleaned up. Mortification stabs me as unapologetically as the sun shining through the window.

  There is a note on the counter. I don’t want to read it, even if it turns out that my eyes are capable.

  Eventually I edge it closer.

  Good morning, Sunshine!

  I thought y’all were kidding, but you were right: it actually smelled in here. I made a start because I didn’t want to think of you eating my home cooking in a dirty kitchen.

  If you can have this house cleaned by Friday, I’ll make dinner here. If you want. No worries if not, I just thought I’d ask, in case it sounded OK, and y’all were looking for an excuse to shovel the rest of this place out.

  Merry

  P.S. Please don’t feel bad about last night. We’ve all gotten drunk and acted silly at one time or another. And don’t worry about being fresh—you passed out before I could really get offended.

  It’s a relief that Merry could find it in her heart to be sweet about it, but I am completely disgusted with myself.

  It was a mistake to go out in the first place, followed by so many more mistakes…they’re all adding up to make my head explode.

  Chaser whines. The clock says that it’s after ten.

  “Sorry, girl.”

  I feel guilty about Chaser’s bladder, along with everything else.

  I can’t take care of myself. I can’t take care of my dog. My life is a shambles.

  I let Chaser out
to do her business and let her in again before I crawl back into bed. I ignore her nudges, her reminders that she needs water, and food, and eventually more exercise, and another potty break.

  This is our arrangement, she seems to tell me. We take care of each other. You can’t just opt out one day because you feel sick and tired and hopeless. Get up!

  “Go away!” I yell, sounding stone-cold, like I hate her as much as I hate me.

  Instead of whining or pouting, Chaser jumps into the bed.

  She lies beside me for twenty hours.

  When I occasionally wake and notice her, she is always in the same position. She watches me like a sentinel, or a guardian angel, or simply the good girl that she is.

  Chaser, having seen me hit bottom, waits for me to come back up again, like she trusts me to do it. I guess she has no choice.

  When I finally wake with my head feeling something like normal, Chaser wags her tail happily, like she not only forgives me, but she still loves me completely and will stick with me to the end.

  I hug her coat and hold on.

  Weak-kneed, dry, and hungry, I get out of bed. I feel light-headed, too, but in a good way, like my thoughts aren’t so damn heavy for a minute. Possibly my bender and subsequent hibernation killed off exactly the right brain cells.

  After taking Chaser for a walk, I head down to the cooler and pick up yesterday’s food, follow Merry’s instructions, and eat every single bite. How are y’all feeling? was written beside a smiley face with a cold compress on its head.

  I spend the next few hours alternately getting chewed out by Jaycee for missing an important meeting yesterday and making it up to her by plowing through a stack of paperwork she has amassed for me.

  The fact that Merry cleaned my kitchen basically shames me into manning up and going the rest of the way. I spend all afternoon and evening cleaning house.

  My dad calls the next morning, and I don’t know why, but I answer. Even knowing that it’s him. Not only that, but I agree when he asks if we can Skype; he says he’s been dying to try it on his new computer. I take my iPad around and show him the house. I turn the camera to Chaser.